Six Afghan civilians, international soldier killed

KABUL (AFP) - Six Afghan civilians and an international soldier were killed in extremist-linked unrest in Afghanistan as President Hamid Karzai called Friday for all sides to respect "Peace Day" this weekend.
Four of the civilians died when rockets fired by insurgents at a base for international troops landed in a field where women and children were working, the NATO-led military force said.
"The attack killed four, including a child," it said in a statement.
Other civilians were wounded in the attack on the base in a remote district in Paktika province on the border with Pakistan, it said without identifying the civilians.
Another Afghan civilian was killed late Thursday when NATO soldiers fired at a truck that came too close to a military convoy in the southern city of Kandahar, the alliance's International Security Assistance Force said separately.
It also announced it was investigating claims that soldiers had mistakenly killed an Afghan district governor and two of his men in the southern province of Uruzgan on Wednesday.

The Australian defence ministry said its soldiers may have been involved in the apparent incident of friendly fire.
In other violence, two policemen and a civilian were killed in a Taliban ambush in the eastern province of Khost late Thursday, provincial security authorities said.
And a soldier with the US-led coalition was killed in a bomb blast Friday, the force said, without giving the nationality of the soldier.
The coalition said separately it had killed two Taliban and arrested six in the Sarobi district near Kabul where 10 French soldiers were killed in a rebel ambush last month.
And six Taliban were killed in an Afghan operation in the central province of Ghazni, provincial spokesman Ismail Jahangir said.
The steady pace of attacks are part of an insurgency that was launched by the Taliban after their ouster from government in late 2001 and has gained strength in recent years, to the despair of Afghans whose country has been at war for 30 years.
Afghan television and news agency broadcast an appeal from Karzai for all sides in the conflict to respect the United Nations' "Peace Day" on September 21.
The president urged Afghan and international forces "not to fire a single shot unless and until attacked" and urged the Taliban to join a government reconciliation process under way.

Indian police hunt militants after Delhi gunbattle

NEW DELHI (AFP) - Armed police launched an intense manhunt across the Indian capital Saturday for two suspected Islamic militants who escaped a dramatic gunbattle in which two militants and a police officer died.
The two militants killed during Friday's shootout in a Muslim area of New Delhi included the leader of a shadowy group responsible for a series of deadly bomb attacks including ones in the city a week ago, officials said.
The hour-long gunbattle erupted around an apartment in Jamia Nagar, in the south of the capital, when police acting on a tip-off discovered a group of around five armed men holed up in a building in a maze of narrow streets.
Police Inspector Mohan Chand Sharma later died in hospital after succumbing to three gunshot wounds, police commissioner Y.S. Dadhwal said.
He said one of the dead militants was Indian Mujahideen leader "Atif alias Bashir" who was "linked with the blasts all over the country."
Over the past five months, serial bombings claimed by the Indian Mujahideen have hit the cities of Jaipur, Bangalore, Ahmedabad and New Delhi -- leaving at least 130 dead and many more wounded.

Dadhwal told reporters that one militant had been placed in custody after the shootout while two others managed to flee.
Scores of armed police officers on Saturday fanned out across New Delhi and adjoining cities for the two missing militants.
"It is one of the most intense manhunts we have launched in recent days and we are hopeful of a result," a senior anti-terrorism officer told AFP.
Meanwhile police and the prime minister paid tribute to the slain inspector.
"He was one of India's most-decorated police officers... It's a sad day for us," Dadhwal said of 41-year-old inspector, credited with gunning down 35 militants and arresting 80 others.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh too praised Sharma.
"Sharma was an exceptionally brave officer. He had shown exceptional courage throughout his career and he was an inspiration for our security forces in his life and will continue to inspire them after this demise too," Singh said in a letter to Maya Sharma, the officer's widow.
Indian Mujahideen was blamed for a series of blasts in busy shopping areas of New Delhi last Saturday that left 22 dead and around 100 wounded.
The recent wave of nationwide attacks has forced the government to confront the emergence of an indigenous Muslim militancy.
The dramatic shoot-out in India's capital came a day after the government unveiled new security measures designed to tackle what premier Singh said were "vast gaps" in intelligence gathering on militants.
The cabinet approved proposals to hire 7,000 additional policemen in New Delhi, install surveillance cameras in busy areas and create a research wing in its intelligence agency.
Singh said India had to face up to the growing involvement of home-grown militants in attacks.
In the past, India has focused its limited counter-terrorist and intelligence resources on neighbouring Pakistan, which it accuses of orchestrating militant attacks.
Hindu-majority India has around 140 million Muslims. While tensions have always existed, India's Muslims have in the past largely resisted organised militancy.
Indian Muslim leaders, however, have complained their community was being victimised by security forces.

Intel rolls out computer chip with six brains

SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) - Intel on Monday rolled out its first chip with six brains, unveiling a "multi-core" microprocessor that boosts computing muscle while cutting back on electricity use.
The world's leading computer chip maker's new Xeon 7400 series microprocessor is tailored for businesses that want to boost server performance while conserving on space and energy.
Intel executives say the Xeon 7400 is part of an "incremental migration" toward chips with limitless numbers of "cores" that seamlessly and efficiently share demanding computer processing tasks.
Intel and rival Advanced Micro Devices have two-core and four-core chips on the market.
The six-core chip delivers 50 percent more performance than its quad-core predecessor while using 10 percent less electric power, according to Intel enterprise group vice president Tom Kilroy.
Electricity and cooling expenses can account for nearly half the cost of running company computer servers.

"It isn't just performance and energy efficiency but the use models," Kilroy said of the boon promised by increasingly powerful chips. "One of the major ones is virtualization."
Multi-core chips are boons to computing trends including high-definition video viewing online; businesses offering services applications on the Internet; and single servers running many "virtual" machines.
"There is a realization that we will be able to bring things to market that weren't feasible four years ago," MySpace vice president of technical operations Richard Buckingham said while discussing the new chip's potential.
MySpace is among a growing number of Internet companies using "virtualization" to essentially multiply the usefulness of computing hardware with software that creates simulated computers complete with operating systems.
"When developers ask you for something you can pull it out of the air, literally," VeriSign engineering director John Bosco said of virtualization made possible by multi-core chips.
Multi-core chips basically allow computers to divvy up tasks to work on simultaneously instead of having a single powerful processor handle a job in a linear style from start to finish.
"It helps keep things exciting. Our development community has embraced the multi-core era," Bosco said.
Dell, Hewlett Packard, IBM, Unisys and Fujitsu are among the computer makers building the new Xeon 7400 chips into servers designed for business networks, according to Intel.

China finds more brands of tainted baby milk: state media

BEIJING (AFP) - Chinese officials have found 22 companies produced baby milk tainted with a toxic chemical, state media said Tuesday, in a dramatic escalation of a scandal that has left two infants dead.
Milk powder contaminated with a chemical used to make plastics has sickened more than 1,200 infants in a health scare that erupted last week and prompted a nationwide investigation into the extent of the problem.
The contamination was originally thought contained to the Sanlu brand, with the company apologising on Monday for the scandal.
But state-run CCTV said Tuesday night that more products have been discovered with the chemical melamine, and that all, including the powder made by Sanlu, have been pulled from shelves.
"In order to ensure the safety of the milk products, the relevant government departments have pulled them from shelves, sealed them, recalled them and destroyed them," CCTV said in its report.
The State Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine said tests on products from all 109 baby milk companies in China showed varying traces of melamine in 69 batches from 22 companies, Xinhua news agency said.

In an indication, meanwhile, that markets outside mainland China could be affected, a Hong Kong supermarket chain on Tuesday recalled a yogurt ice bar found to contain melamine.
The Wellcome chain said the product was the Yili Natural Choice Yogurt Ice-bar. Yili is a dairy manufacturer in China's Inner Mongolia region.
The scandal is the latest to rock China's food industry, which has been tarnished by a series of health scares over dangerous products, including those to export markets, in recent years.
China's top product-quality watchdog would dispatch inspectors to all milk-product manufacturers to contain the spreading health threat, CCTV said.
The moves were meant to "uncover the causes, pursue those responsible and severely deal with them in accordance with the law," it said.
The government has said milk collectors, who gather milk from dairy farmers, deliberately added melamine to make it appear the milk had more protein.
Sanlu, however, had blamed dairy farmers.
Police have arrested four suspects, at least two of which have admitted adding melamine to milk, according to state press, in reports that warned more sick babies were expected to be reported.
The 22 companies mentioned by CCTV included Torador Dairy Industry, a China-Australia joint venture in the northern city of Tianjian. Calls to Torador on Tuesday evening went unanswered.
They also included Guangdong Yashili Group, the report said, which exports its products to Bangladesh, Myanmar and Yemen.
However, it said tests of Yashili export products showed no melamine traces. The report made no further mention of possible contamination of exports.
Melamine, which is used for making plastics and glues, is being blamed for causing kidney stones in the affected babies, a condition normally rare in infants, but which gives rise to a range of health risks.
The two infant deaths occurred in May and July, the health ministry said.
The government has criticised Sanlu for not going public sooner once babies began to fall ill in March in northwestern Gansu province.
Tests in early August began to show melamine in Sanlu's product, but the scandal only broke in Chinese media last week.
Sanlu has fired its chairwoman and its general manager, state media said.
Four local officials, linked with agriculture and quality control, were also sacked on Tuesday, Xinhua said.
Andrew Ferrier, the head of New Zealand dairy giant Fonterra, which owns 43 percent of Sanlu, said Fonterra knew of the contamination in early August and pushed for an immediate recall but that Sanlu was slowed by Chinese rules.
New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark said her government learned of the contamination problem September 5, then "blew the whistle" three days later by informing Beijing after local Chinese officials refused to act.

Taliban attack kills three police in Pakistan: official

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AFP) - A suicide bomber and Taliban militants attacked a security checkpost in restive northwest Pakistan late Tuesday killing three soldiers, a senior official said.
The bomber blew himself up as paramilitary soldiers approached his vehicle, before the militants attacked the checkpost in Swat valley in the North West Frontier Province, army spokesman Major Murad Khan said.
"The security forces intercepted a vehicle which was driving towards the post and the suicide bomber blew himself up in the car," Khan told AFP.
"Soon a group of militants tried to enter the post by firing on soldiers, but security forces managed to repulse their attack and three soldiers were martyred and six wounded," he said of the attack in the Tattano Bandy area.
Swat valley, a former popular tourist destination, has seen numerous clashes and bombings since radical pro-Taliban cleric Maulana Fazlullah launched a violent campaign to enforce harsh Islamic Sharia law in the region last year.
The province is not far from Pakistan's rugged tribal areas on the Afghan border, where the army is battling Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants, many of whom fled there after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in late 2001.

Washington says Pakistan's mountainous tribal regions have become a safe haven for Islamic fighters waging an insurgency against international troops based across the border.
Tuesday's attack came as US chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, Admiral Michael Mullen, arrived in Pakistan on an unannounced visit to discuss operations underway on the Afghanistan frontier with Pakistan's leaders, the Pentagon said.
The visit also comes against a backdrop of tension between the two allies. Islamabad has vowed to defend itself against violations of its air space and incursions by US forces in Afghanistan, after a series of missile strikes blamed on US-led coalition forces left 38 people dead in Pakistan.
The Pentagon on Monday denied that US-led coalition helicopters based in Afghanistan were fired on in Pakistan this week and forced to turn back.
But the increasingly frequent missile attacks, for which the United States has not claimed responsibility, are straining Pakistan's relationship with Washington, particularly because of concerns of civilian deaths.
Such deaths have stirred local anger and embarrassed the Pakistani government, already struggling to tackle the militancy that has seen 1,200 of its own people die in bombings and suicide attacks in the past year alone.
New President Asif Ali Zardari has pledged to combat the Islamic militancy.

US campaign sharpens as McCain takes poll lead

KANSAS CITY, Missouri, (AFP) - The US presidential election moved into high gear Monday as two new opinion polls showed Republican John McCain taking the lead over Democratic rival Barack Obama.
McCain, a decorated war hero who based much of his early campaign on the strength of his experience, wrestled last week for Obama's mantle of change with the help of his surprise vice presidential pick Sarah Palin.
A USA Today/Gallup survey showed McCain ahead of Obama 50 percent to 46 percent among registered voters , a turnaround from a previous poll taken by the newspaper just before last week's Republican National Convention.
That poll had McCain trailing Obama by seven percentage points.
A new Gallup daily tracking poll found McCain had moved into a 48 to 45 percent lead ahead of the November 4 election -- his best performance since May.
Experts attributed the McCain rebound to his party's convention and the surprise naming of Alaska governor Palin.

"He's in a far better position than his people imagined he would be in at this point," political scientist Larry Sabato of the University of Virginia was quoted by USA Today as saying.
McCain and Palin vowed to use their history of fighting corruption to shake up Washington at a series of campaign stops after the Republican National Convention.
"In politics, there are some candidates who use change to promote their careers, and then there are those like John McCain, who use their careers to promote change," Palin told cheering crowds in Wisconsin.
"We're going to win this election and let me offer a little advance warning to the old big spending, do-nothing me-first country second Washington crowd: change is coming. Change is coming," McCain said the next day in Colorado.
Obama ridiculed McCain's promise of change and hammered the Arizona senator on the limping US economy, saying the Republican represented no change from Bush.
"John McCain, who is a good man and has a compelling biography, has embraced and adopted the George Bush economic platform," Obama said on ABC television.
The Illinois senator argued that voters would realize that the election was a choice between a new direction and discredited Republican policies.
"If they like what they've had over the last eight years, then they'll go with McCain. And if they don't like it, hopefully they'll go with me," he said.
Obama's running mate Senator Joseph Biden called McCain's commitment to change "malarkey."
"Tell me one single thing they're going to do on the economy, foreign policy, taxes, that is going to be change," Biden said on NBC.
The Democrats have had a hard time targeting Palin, who is popular among conservatives and has garnered public sympathy in the wake of the media's response to news that her 17-year-old daughter was pregnant and planned to keep the baby.
Senator Hillary Clinton, who narrowly lost the Democratic primary and was incredibly popular among white women, has refused to criticize Palin even though the McCain campaign has actively targeted her disgruntled supporters.
Clinton, who has kept a low profile since she dramatically ceded to Obama at the Democratic National Convention in August, is expected to attack McCain at three events in Florida Monday.
McCain has been sharp in his criticism of Obama, warning Sunday that his rival did not have good "judgment" or a record of challenging his own party's dogma.
"He never took on his party on a single major issue, I have taken them on a lot," McCain said on CBS.
"I think I can make a strong case that whatever the issue, he doesn't have the judgment."
Neither headliners held rallies Sunday although McCain and Palin introduced themselves to voters at a Mexican restaurant in New Mexico and a barbecue joint in Missouri and Biden spoke at a Montana high school.
The Republican candidates had a rally planned in Missouri and a fundraising dinner in Obama's hometown of Chicago on Monday. Obama had two rallies planned in Michigan on Monday and another in Virginia on Tuesday. Biden was due to be in Wisconsin and Iowa on Monday.

Ike slams Cuba, Haiti death toll passes 600

HAVANA, (AFP) - Hurricane Ike raged over Cuba early Monday, pummeling the island with gale force winds and torrential rain after killing dozens in beleaguered Haiti and worsening its growing humanitarian disaster.
The second hurricane to strike in less than a week prompted more than 800,000 people to evacuate coastal areas of eastern Cuba. More than 9,000 foreign tourists were moved out of the resort of Varadero.
The hurricane made landfall at Punta Lucrecia late Sunday, the head of Cuba's meteorological service, Jose Rubiera, told state television.
Packing 120-mile (195-kilometer) per hour winds, Ike is the second powerful storm in just eight days to strike Cuba, following Hurricane Gustav.
"In all of Cuba's history, we have never had two hurricanes this close together," lamented Rubeira.
Just before dawn, the eye of storm was practically over Cabo Lucrecia on the northern coast of eastern Cuba, about 135 miles (220 kilometers) east of Camaguey and moving west, according to the US National Hurricane Center which said it was a Category Three storm on a scale going up to five.

Ike plowed across the Turks and Caicos as a powerful Category Four storm late Saturday, causing injuries and extensive damage on the British territory and tourist haven, before weakening.
The hurricane raked the Bahamas island of Great Inagua, toppling trees, blowing off roofs, causing an island-wide power failure and forcing many of its 1,000 to seek emergency refuges.
The main concern is now in Haiti , where four storms in three weeks have killed at least 600 people and left hundreds of thousands in desperate need of food, clean water and shelter.
Officials continued aid operations in the flood-stricken town of Gonaives, devastated by flooding from Tropical Storm Hanna. Another 47 people perished in the village of Cabaret, near Port-au-Prince, in flooding caused by Ike, officials said.
"Many homes were destroyed in Cabaret, and we have seen some bodies of children in the water," a journalist for UN radio who spent the night on the roof of his house told AFP.
Hundreds of bodies were found in Gonaives, a town of 350,000 in northwestern Haiti, after a five-meter (16-foot) wall of water and mud engulfed much of the town.
UN peacekeepers on Saturday evacuated several thousand residents from Gonaives, a local official said, but thousands more are still awaiting relief.
Some 650,000 Haitians have been affected by the flooding, including 300,000 children, and the task of delivering crucial aid has been complicated by dismal transport conditions, according to the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF). Officials said 200,000 people were without food and clean water, many for four days.
"What has happened here is unimaginable," member of parliament Pierre-Gerome Valcine told AFP from Cabaret, 35 kilometers (22 miles) north of the capital.
Massive flooding over the past week in the poorest country in the Americas has triggered a humanitarian crisis that was worsening by the day.
Pope Benedict XVI said special prayers for the stricken country.
"I want to remember the dear population of Haiti, greatly distressed in recent days by passing hurricanes," Benedict told pilgrims on the Italian island of Sardinia.
More stormy weather hampered relief efforts Sunday. Heavy rains brought down a key bridge which severed the only viable land route to Gonaives.
The bridge gave way at the town of Mirebalais in central Haiti, forcing three trucks loaded with emergency supplies and bound for Saint-Marc, where thousands of desperate refugees from Gonaives were crowding into shelters, to turn back, according to a World Food Programme official.
Many bridges in other areas of Haiti have also collapsed, homes have been washed away and crops ravaged.
Ike was expected to eventually careen past Florida into the Gulf of Mexico and sweep toward Louisiana and the storm-battered city of New Orleans as early as Tuesday.

Britney Spears sweeps top honors at MTV video awards

LOS ANGELES (AFP) - Britney Spears enjoyed a triumphant return to the scene of one of her most humiliating public appearances here, scooping three top honors at the MTV Video Music Awards.
The pop icon suffered a critical mauling at the same awards show last year, when she stumbled and mimed her way through a performance that came amid turmoil in her private and professional life.
But a beaming Spears -- who appears to have got her career back on track in recent months after a seemingly endless series of lurid headlines -- cut a different figure as she accepted her honors here Sunday.
Spears won prizes for best female video, best pop video and video of the year for her single "Piece of Me" which took aim at the paparazzi who follow her every day.
It was the first time Spears had won a statuette at the MTV video awards despite 16 previous nominations.
"Thank God first and foremost for just blessing me like this, thank my beautiful family, my two beautiful boys for just inspiring me every day and my fans, this is for you. Thank you so much," Spears said after collecting her first award of the night.

Spears recently ended a custody dispute with ex-husband Kevin Federline regarding the couple's two young sons.
The Los Angeles-based singer lost custody of the children last year as her life unraveled in the full glare of a frenzied media.
She hit rock bottom in January when she was twice rushed to hospital for treatment in a psychiatric unit following fears for her mental health.
Spears shot to superstardom in late 1998 with her smash-hit debut album "Baby One More Time," which she followed with another chart-topping success the following year, "Oops! ... I Did It Again".

Winners of the 2008 MTV Video Music Awards

A complete list of winners of the 2008 MTV Video Music Awards:
_ Video of the year: Britney Spears, "Piece of Me."
_ Female video: Britney Spears, "Piece of Me."
_ Male video: Chris Brown, "With You."
_ Rock video: Linkin Park, "Shadow of the Day."
_ Hip-hop video: Lil Wayne, "Lollipop."
Pop video: Britney Spears, "Piece of Me."
_ Dancing in a video: The Pussycat Dolls, "When I Grow Up."
_ New artist: Tokio Hotel

Particle collider no threat, safety panel says

giant particle accelerator near Geneva, Switzerland, that is set to begin operations next week poses no threat to mankind, according to the latest report from the group in charge of safety at the facility.
The Large Hadron Collider, which is run by the European Organization for Nuclear Research, lies in a 27-kilometre-long underground circuit beneath the French-Swiss border and is set to begin low-energy operations on Sept. 10.
It has attracted worldwide attention, in part because it has been a costly project, with a total budget of $9 billion. But it has also raised fears among the general populace about the potential dangers of such a large experiment.
Those fears are unfounded, wrote the safety assessment group for the LHC in a study published Friday. The safety group said its latest review should dispel fears of universe-gobbling black holes or anti-matter destroying the Earth.
If particle collisions like the ones created at the LHC had the power to destroy the Earth, such interactions would have wiped out the planet long ago, the group wrote Friday in the Journal of Physics G: Nuclear and Particle Physics.
"Nature has already conducted the equivalent of about a hundred thousand LHC experimental programs on Earth – and the planet still exists," they wrote.
It's the second such study by the safety assessment group. The first study, published in 2003, came to similar conclusions.
The collider will use a ring of super-cooled magnets to push two proton beams to speeds and energies never before reached under controlled conditions, crashing the protons into one another to create and detect a host of new particles.
It is expected to be the most powerful tool yet for physicists hoping to uncover the secrets behind the laws of the universe, both on the tiny scale of quantum mechanics and the huge domain of galaxies and black holes.
Physicists from universities across Canada will be involved in the LHC's operations through the ATLAS experiment, one of two main experiments studying the results of proton-on-proton collisions.

Thailand Prime Minister: 'I Will Not Resign'

After his security detail sweeps the building, Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej is ushered through a back entrance and enters the interview room alone.

Outside, protesters call on Samak to resign, and they refuse to leave the grounds of the Government House, the equivalent of the White House, which they have occupied for more than a week.
Samak, who says he has only been in office for seven months and has the right to stay for four years, refuses to resign.
"I will not resign. No reason, groundless," Samak tells ABC News. "A group of people stage a rally on the street and finger-point that the prime minister must resign. You are kidding. You will destroy the monarch."
Demonstrators accuse Samak of corruption and of being a puppet of exiled former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, accusations Samak dismisses. The protestors call themselves the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), although what they are seeking is less democracy, in fighting for more appointed positions rather than elected ones.

"I must stay to keep the country in a good shape and to protect the law and order, and to keep the system of the country," says Samak, who was educated in the United States.
"Now they say that they won," Samak says. "We ask, won [what]? These group of people, they [rouse] the people, and they are just like a cult, like in America," the 73-year-old says, making a comparison to the David Koresh congregation raided by federal agents in Waco, Texas, in 1993. "Everybody believes without reason."

Thailand plans to hold a national referendum to address the political turmoil, though details of what this will entail are not yet known.
Earlier this week, pro- and anti-government protests led to violence, and three people were killed, according to Samak. Video of the violence, which included people kicking and beating others with sticks, was broadcast around the world.
The military and riot police were immediately brought in to handle the situation. The police have made a point of being unarmed.
"This time the military knows [how] they should perform," says Samak, referring to examples in the past when the use of force has backfired.

Magazine: Russia's Putin Sexy, but Not That Sexy

He reportedly saved a TV crew from the jaws of a tiger and flexed his muscles before cameras in Siberia.

Vladimir Putin's macho image has made him plenty of fans among Russian women — but according to one magazine, that doesn't quite make him the nation's sexiest politician.
Sex & the City magazine's ranking of the nation's 20 sexiest politicians gives the top slot to Boris Nemtsov, a former opposition leader widely seen as a spent political force. Prime Minister Putin came in second.
"This is good news ... but I don't take it too seriously," said Nemtsov, who is pictured sitting on a bed, barefoot and dressed in a gray silk shirt and chinos.
It's rare that Putin loses out in any popularity contest at home — where he is widely admired for having restored national pride and stability after the difficult post-Soviet years under Boris Yeltsin.

Russia remains a country with limited press freedoms and carefully controlled images of its leadership — so it's unlikely an opposition figure could have pushed Putin into second place on weightier matters like leadership qualities.
Still, Sergei Markov, a pro-Kremlin lawmaker, said he was taken aback.

"Putin is way better than Nemtsov," he said. "He's one of the sexiest politicians in the world." His looks may be average, he conceded, but his "decisive, harsh and unbending" character makes him extremely attractive.
Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov gave an embarrassed laugh when asked about the result — and said it was hard for him to comment.
A black belt in judo and an accomplished skier, ex-KGB spy Putin has been snapped in an array of macho shots, from flying a fighter jet to strutting his stuff on a nuclear submarine.
Last summer, photographs of a bare-chested Putin fishing, horse riding and off-roading in Siberia with Prince Albert of Monaco prompted admiring women to flood local newspaper Web sites with excited letters.

Pakistan restores 3 judges ousted by Musharraf

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Pakistan's Supreme Court on Friday reinstated three judges ousted by Pervez Musharraf, cementing political divisions in the country a day before it elects a new president.
Musharraf's purge of the court last year deepened his unpopularity and helped his political foes to a victory in February elections. Musharraf resigned under pressure last month.
However, the second-largest party then quit the ruling coalition over the failure to restore all the judges -- including the ousted chief justice, Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry.
Tassadiq Hussain Jillani, Shakirullah Jan and Syed Jamshed Ali were sworn back into the court at a ceremony Friday.
Law Minister Farooq Naek said Chaudhry was also welcome to take a fresh oath, but said he could not return as chief justice because removing the judge who replaced him could trigger a "constitutional impasse."
"There cannot be two chief justices," Naek told reporters at the court.
The move deepens the rift between the ruling Pakistan People's Party of Asif Ali Zardari, the front-runner to become president in a vote by lawmakers on Saturday, and that of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif.
Zardari has countered calls to restore the judges by arguing that it would require constitutional amendments to untangle a legal mess bequeathed by Musharraf.
But Zardari also appears wary of Chaudhry, who stood up to Musharraf and questioned a pact signed by the former military ruler that quashed long-standing corruption charges against Zardari and his slain wife, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.
Zardari has accused Chaudhry of "playing politics" and called for sweeping judicial reforms expected to crimp the ability of the court to check the activities of the government.
He has dismissed as naive the country's lawyers movement, whose yearlong protests undermined Musharraf and turned Chaudhry into a figurehead for a burgeoning pro-democracy movement.
Sharif has argued that because the judges were illegally removed, the government could restore them all through a simple order. Pervaiz Rashid, a Sharif aide, said the return of the three judges on Friday amounted to validating Musharraf's crackdown.
"Whether they restore three or 300 judges, the way they are doing it, it doesn't change our stand," he said. "We do not believe in any judiciary without the reinstatement of Justice Chaudhry."
The fate of the judges is also important to Musharraf, who has played down suggestions he will be forced into exile by threats from Sharif to have him tried for treason.
Musharraf imposed emergency rule last November in order to purge the court and halt legal challenges to his plan to stay on for another five years as president.
The retooled court issued orders granting him immunity from prosecution for a crackdown that Musharraf himself admitted was unconstitutional.
The government already changed a law lifting the maximum number of judges in the Supreme Court from 16 to 29 -- meaning none of the judges who issued those protections will have to make way for any who return.
Zardari, generally considered pro-Western, isn't expected to change Pakistan's commitment to be an ally in the U.S. war on terrorism, despite a bold cross-border U.S.-led raid that left at least 15 people dead in the country's largely lawless tribal belt along the Afghan frontier.
The raid Wednesday sparked widespread condemnation of what was seen as an attack on the country's sovereignty.
In news likely to stoke more anger, intelligence officials said a missile strike was suspected in a blast Thursday that killed at least four people in North Waziristan, part of the tribal belt where Osama bin Laden and his deputy are thought to be hiding. Similar strikes in the past have been blamed on the U.S.
On Friday, an explosion possibly caused by a missile strike killed five suspected foreign militants near the Afghan border, two Pakistani intelligence officials said, citing local informers.
The officials asked for anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.
Army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas confirmed the explosion and said the military had sent a team to investigate what had happened.
Zardari criticized Wednesday's raid, the first known foreign ground assault inside Pakistan against a suspected Taliban haven. But he also expressed sympathy for the U.S. and other countries that have been hit by terrorist attacks, saying Pakistan also is suffering from extremist violence.

Ike set to spare Haiti

MIAMI - Hurricane Ike was forecast to spare Haiti as it moved across the Atlantic while the Caribbean nation struggled to cope with the effects Tropical Storm Hanna which killed 136 and left hundreds of thousands stranded with no food or clean water.
The forecast path of the storm had Ike bypassing northern Haiti and heading into the Bahamas, U.S. National Hurricane Center forecaster Karina Castillo told AFP.
"At least for now" Haiti looks likely to be spared yet another hit, she said. "Currently Hispaniola (the island shared by Haiti on the west and the Dominican Republic on the east) is out of the three-day forecast cone, but Cuba is not," she added noting that soaked northeastern Cuba could feel Ike's wrath.

"After Cuba, Ike is forecast to move into the central Bahamas and to make landfall in South Florida" on Wednesday" as a major (Category 3-to-5) hurricane Castillo warned.
Ike was downgraded slightly Friday but remained dangerous, the NHC said.
With sustained winds of 205 kilometers per hour, the hurricane over the western Atlantic was now a category three on the five-level Saffir-Simpson scale instead of a category four, but the center said Ike was "still forecast to be a major hurricane in a couple of days."
In Haiti, the country's third largest city Gonaives remained largely under water with Senator Yuri Latortue, who represents the city, calling the situation "catastrophic."
"I know perfectly well that the hurricane season has hit our entire country, but the situation in Gonaives is truly special, because now some 200,000 people there haven't eaten in three days," he said.
The impoverished country has been battered by a succession of three storms in as many weeks.
As of 0900 GMT, the eye of Hurricane Ike was about 1,065 kilometers northeast of Grand Turk Island and was moving west at about 24 kilometers per hour, the NHC said.
Forecasters said it was too soon to tell definitively if it would track north toward the U.S. eastern coastline, or westward toward Cuba and the Gulf of Mexico.
Ike was part of a trio of storms in the Atlantic, with Tropical Storm Hanna heading towards the United States this weekend and Tropical Storm Josephine churning in the eastern Atlantic off of Cape Verde.

How Can Britney Do It Again and Do It Right?

Forget "Entourage" and the NFL. If you're going to watch TV this Sunday night, watch Britney Spears.

Her appearance at this year's MTV's Video Music Awards is arguably the most-anticipated television event since, well, her appearance at last year's MTV Video Music Awards, in which she flailed her limbs, mumbled her "Gimme More" lyrics and confirmed that she was a fallen pop superstar.
Spears has a lot to prove. While her life has been on the upswing in recent months -- she put an end to her child custody drama, started work on a new album and is up for three awards at Sunday's ceremony -- reports that she started drinking at age 13, lost her virginity at 14, and segued into drugs at 15, according to leaks from her mom's upcoming memoir, have cast her in a less-than-favorable light once again.
How is she going to open the VMAs? We don't know, and judging from 2007's ill-planned performance, it stands to reason that she may not either. So to give the girl some advice, ABCNews.com reached out to a panel of experts.

'Bangkok' is dangerous - for Cage's career

In the torpid, barely-awake voiceover that opens "Bangkok Dangerous," Nicolas Cage's world-weary assassin sleepily intones his credo, which includes this rationalization: "The work is steady, the money's good ... but it's not for everyone."
That sums up Cage's current career, alright. And "Bangkok Dangerous" — a remake of a 1999 Thai thriller, directed, as this new one is, by Hong Kong filmmakers the Pang brothers — adds to the sad realization that this once-vibrant and witty actor is completely controlled now by his inner teenager. Now, that's not the teenager whose starring debut in 1983's "Valley Girl" still amuses. No, the teenager Cage seems to want to be is a metal-head videogame addict with dyed-black hair and a love for fast cars, easy thrills and cardboard heroes. If only this kid could crawl back into his parents' basement, we'd all be better off.
Cage's killer — "Joe," we're told his name is — roams the world from job to job, never interacting with others and getting paid loads to do his job fast, efficiently and anonymously. But arriving in Thailand, Joe incongruously takes a street grifter, Kong (Shahkrit Yamnarm), and turns him into his protege. Then he falls in love with a deaf salesgirl (Charlie Young), and, sure enough, his days as the guy who can wipe out strangers while cruising by on a motorbike or in a boat begin to end.
To its credit, "Bangkok Dangerous" does have an over-familiar but still eye-catching color scheme (gun-metal blue, with a candy-apple red final shoot-out), a luxurious score by Brian Tyler and, between bursts of violence, a contemplative mood. The problem is, there's really nothing to contemplate. Except perhaps that Joe and the deaf salesgirl are like a modern-day version of "City Lights" if the flower girl was an empty vessel of desire and Chaplin had chopped off guys' hands.
Actually, there are two other things to consider: Cage's embarrassing Alice Cooper hair and the trajectory of his fame. Of the former, all that can be said is it looks like it was ripped off a mannequin with the waxen scalp still attached. As for the latter, complaints have already been made many times, so here's a smattering of Cage's credits before his Oscar win for 1995's "Leaving Las Vegas": "The Cotton Club," "Birdy," "Raising Arizona," "Moonstruck," "Red Rock West," "It Could Happen to You." And here's a sampler of what came after: "The Rock," "Con Air," "Snake Eyes," "Gone in 60 Seconds," "Ghost Rider," "Next." And now, of course, this thing.

Jones released from prison

Disgraced former Olympic track and field star Marion Jones was released from a federal prison in Texas Friday after serving a six-month sentence.
Jones was sentenced to the six-month term for lying to federal prosecutors about her steroid use and her knowledge of a check-fraud scam involving her ex-boyfriend, former sprinter Tim Montgomery.
The sentence completed a fall from grace for Jones, who was once regarded as one of the greatest female athletes in the world.

In the past, Jones denied the use of any steroids, including to federal prosecutors when questioned in 2003.
However, she finally admitted last October, in an emotional and tearful public statement to her family, friends, and fans, to using the steroid "the clear," produced by the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative -- also known as BALCO -- that was given to her by her trainer Trevor Graham.
Jones admitted to taking the steroids leading up the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia. Jones was named Athlete of the Year by several organizations in 2000 for her accomplishments at the Sydney Games, where she became the only female track and field athlete to win five medals -- three of them gold -- at a single Olympics.
She has been stripped of all of those medals as a result of her admitted steroid use.

Week in review: Google's Chrome shines

Google made its long-rumored foray into Web browsers with the introduction of its open-source Chrome, but in the process, it ruffled some privacy feathers.

Word of the browser first accidentally leaked on the Web in the form of a detailed 38-page comic book that appeared on Google Blogoscoped, an unofficial Google blog.
The browser was written with WebKit, the open-source engine at the core of Apple's Safari and Google's Android. The browser is also getting a new JavaScript virtual machine, V8. It's said to be a better solution for complex and rich Web applications, yielding better performance and "smoother drag and drops" in interactive applications.
The project should dispel any lingering thoughts that the browser wars are over. To be sure, it's less cutthroat now than in the 1990s, but one of technology's most powerful companies just entered the battlefield.
Even before Google's browser became available for download, its repercussions were traversing the industry. There are plenty of implications from a company as large as Google that builds a browser tuned to advance the company's agenda of Web-based applications.
Chrome, Google said during its launch event, is much faster at showing Web pages than the most widely used browser, Microsoft's Internet Explorer. Google's hope is that performance will open up the bottleneck that chokes the speed and abilities of today's Web-based applications.
In short, Chrome is more of a long-term competitive threat to Microsoft Office and Windows than it is to Internet Explorer. That may sound a little grand, but the evidence is on display in Google's own lobby, where the search company's computer kiosks present a browser only--no start menu, no desktop shortcuts, no operating system.
So how does Chrome actually stack up? Google was eager to toot its horn about Chrome's performance running JavaScript, a programming language used to power many sophisticated Web applications such as Google Docs, Yahoo's Zimbra e-mail site, and Zoho's online application suite. On each one of these tests, Chrome clearly trounced the competition.
However, Mozilla fought back with some performance results to show a forthcoming version of Firefox outpacing Chrome in a different test called SunSpider.
Firefox 3.1, which Mozilla hopes to release by the end of the year, comes with JavaScript acceleration technology called TraceMonkey. In Mozilla's test that pitted TraceMonkey-enhanced Firefox against the Chrome beta, Google's browser was 28 percent slower on Windows XP and 16 percent slower on Windows Vista.
Privacy advocates objected to Chrome's End User License agreement, which appeared to give Google a perpetual right to use anything one entered into the browser. Section 11 stated that although users retain copyright to their works, "by submitting, posting, or displaying the content, you give Google a perpetual, irrevocable, worldwide, royalty-free, and nonexclusive license to reproduce, adapt, modify, translate, publish, publicly perform, publicly display, and distribute any content which you submit, post, or display on or through the services."
However, Google backtracked, saying it plans to alter those contract terms. Google said the change, once made, will apply retroactively to anyone who has downloaded the browser.
Privacy concerns were also raised over the issues of what information Google plans to store on its servers. Provided that users leave on the auto-suggest feature in Chrome and have Google as their default search provider, Google has the right to store any information typed into Chrome's Ominibox, which serves as both search bar and address bar. Google told CNET News that it plans to store about 2 percent of all such data, along with the IP address of the computer that entered the information.
Going mobileGoogle co-founder Sergey Brin expects the Chrome technology to make its way to Android, the company's mobile-phone operating system and software suite. Chrome and Android were developed largely separately, Brin said in an interview at the Chrome launch event.
"We have not wanted to bind one's hands to the other's," Brin said. But you can expect that to change, now that both projects are public and nearing their first final releases.
"Probably a subsequent version of Android is going to pick up a lot of the Chrome stack," Brin said, pointing to JavaScript improvements as one area.
When and if that happens, Google will have to contend with Apple, which has seen a large increase in the iPhone's global Web share, according to new figures. The figures, collected by Web analytics company Net Applications, show that in June 2008, before the launch of the iPhone 3G, the iPhone had 0.16 percent share of the operating-system market, as measured by OS detection during Web browsing; and in July, it had 0.19 percent.
However, as of September 1, the iPhone had 0.3 percent of global market share, an increase of 58 percent in one month. According to Net Applications, this was due to the July launch of the iPhone 3G. The figures also showed Microsoft's dominance steadily, if slowly, decreasing.
Meanwhile, AT&T said it had fixed a problem that caused many iPhone users in the northeastern United States to complain that they couldn't access the mobile Web. The problem, which caused some users to not be able to surf the Web on their phones, did not affect phone calls, text messages, or mobile e-mail from devices such as Research In Motion's BlackBerry.
And it looks as though Microsoft is joining Apple and Google in the mobile "application store" market. The software giant expects to launch "Skymarket" this fall for its Windows Mobile platform, if a recent job posting spotted by Long Zheng at Istartedsomething.com is accurate. According to the ad, posted on Computerjob.com, the Skymarket senior product manager will head a team that will "drive the launch of a v1 marketplace service for Windows Mobile."
Tech goes to the Republican conventionWhile John McCain saw a flood of online donations last week, thanks to his newly announced vice presidential choice, Sarah Palin, his campaign was steering Web donors to a site that helps victims of Hurricane Gustav.
The Republican Party canceled nearly all scheduled events for the Republican National Convention on Monday, save official business, out of respect for those impacted by the hurricane. However, a few special guests remained on the docket of speakers at the St. Paul Xcel Energy Center, including Cindy McCain and First Lady Laura Bush.
"I would ask that each one of us commit to join together to aid those in need as quickly as possible," Cindy McCain said. "As John has been saying for the last several days, this is a time when we take off our Republican hats and put on our American hats."
Republican National Convention leaders also asked convention attendees to pledge donations to hurricane relief funds via text to the code 2HELP, using the keyword GIVE.
Hurricane Gustav's unexpected interference with the four-day event highlighted the deft communications needed to direct nearly 5,000 delegates and alternate delegates through the formal presidential nomination process. The RNC turned to cloud computing for the most efficient means of registering the delegates, and when the clouds of Hurricane Gustav threatened to throw the event off course, the RNC stepped up their communications with the delegates.
Early in the week, before the storm subsided, Republican leaders were reviewing the convention schedule on a day-to-day basis to determine whether to proceed with planned events. The party maintained a text message alert system for the delegates "to keep them fully informed not only of delegate activities but also to get them information about the storm," McCain campaign manager Rick Davis said.
McCain got the enthusiastic endorsements of two of Silicon Valley's best-known female executives, who said he was a far more attractive candidate than his Democratic rival on economic and tax grounds.
The pro-McCain pair were Meg Whitman, who stepped down as eBay's chief executive officer in March, and Carly Fiorina, the chairman and CEO of Hewlett-Packard from 1999 to 2005. Both are active in the McCain campaign; both have been talked about as receiving high-level appointments, if McCain is elected.
Also of noteComcast is appealing a ruling by the Federal Communications Commission that found the broadband provider had illegally blocked some customers' Web traffic...Silicon Valley start-up NebuAd has suspended plans to deploy a controversial program that displays ads based on the monitoring of Web activity while Congress reviews privacy concerns...Intel is expected to announce the "Dunnington" processor later this month, the first six-core processor and last of its Penryn chips...Apple sent out invitations for a music-related event next week, and the smart money is on new iPods.

Google launches own Web browser

Google Inc. is releasing its own Web browser in a long-anticipated move aimed at countering the dominance of Microsoft Corp.’s Internet Explorer and ensuring easy access to its market-leading search engine.

The Mountain View, California-based company took the unusual step of announcing its latest product on the Labor Day holiday after it prematurely sent out a comic book drawn up to herald the new browser’s arrival.
The free browser, called 'Chrome', is supposed to be available for downloading Tuesday in more than 100 countries for computers running on Microsoft’s Windows operating system. Google said it’s still working on versions compatible with Apple Inc.’s Mac computer and the Linux operating system.

Google’s browser is expected to hit the market a week after Microsoft’s unveiling of a test version of its latest browser update, Internet Explorer 8. The tweaks include more tools for Web surfers to cloak their online preferences, creating a shield that could make it more difficult for Google and other marketing networks to figure out which ads are most likely to appeal to which individuals. Although Google is using a cartoonish approach to promote Chrome, the new browser underscores the gravity of Google’s rivalry with Microsoft, whose Internet Explorer is used by about 75 percent of Web surfers.
Google’s lead in the lucrative Internet search market is nearly as commanding, with its engine processing nearly two-thirds of the Web’s queries.
For the past few years, Google has been trying to take advantage of its search engine’s popularity to loosen Microsoft’s grip on how most people interact with personal computers.
The assault so far has been focused on a bundle of computer programs, including word processing and spreadsheet applications, that Google offers as an alternative to one of Microsoft’s biggest money makers, its Office suite of products.
Google has tried to make its alternatives more appealing and accessible by hosting them for free over Internet connections instead of requiring users to pay a licensing fee to install them on individual computers, as Microsoft typically does.
Meanwhile, Microsoft has tried to thwart Google by investing billions in the development of its own search engine and making an unsuccessful attempt to buy Yahoo Inc. for $47.5 billion.

The tensions between Microsoft and Google now seem likely to escalate with Google’s foray into Web browsing. Until now, Google had been trying to undermine Internet Explorer by supporting Firefox, a Web browser developed by the open-source Mozilla Foundation. Bolstered by an advertising partnership with Google’s search engine, Firefox ranks as the second most popular browser, with a market share of more than 10 percent.
Google recently extended its advertising alliance with Firefox through 2011. Bearing the stamp of Google’s renowned brand, Chrome could be an even more formidable rival to Explorer.
Still, Google’s name is no guarantee of success. For instance, Google’s instant messaging service has not come close to catching up to the market-leading products made by Yahoo, Microsoft and Time Warner Inc.’s AOL.
In a blog post Monday, Google touted Chrome as a more sophisticated Web browser better suited for displaying the dynamic and interactive content blossoming on the Web as people migrate from television, radio and newspapers.
"The Web gets better with more options and innovation,“ Sundar Pichai, Google’s vice president of product management, and Linus Upson, Google’s engineering director, wrote in the posting. "Google Chrome is another option, and we hope it contributes to making the Web even better.“

Microsoft brushed aside the threat posed by Google in a statement Monday from Dean Hachamovitch, Internet Explorer’s general manager. "The browser landscape is highly competitive, but people will choose Internet Explorer 8 for the way it puts the services they want right at their fingertips ... and, more than any other browsing technology, puts them in control of their personal data online,“ Hachamovitch said.
Even as it has backed Firefox, Google has openly fretted about the possible ramifications of Microsoft’s huge lead in Web browsing.
Google is worried that Microsoft could abuse its power by manipulating Internet Explorer’s default settings in a way that might diminish traffic to Google’s search engine, which serves as the hub of the largest online ad network.
In 2006, Google contacted the Justice Department to raise alarms about changes to Internet Explorer that Google believed made it more difficult to install search toolbars made by Microsoft’s rivals. Although regulators decided not to intervene, Microsoft subsequently modified the way Explorer handled the selection of search toolbars.

Ike explodes to Category 4 hurricane, Hanna strengthens near Bahamas

PORT-AU-PRINCE - Hurricane Ike strengthened rapidly into an extremely dangerous Category 4 hurricane in the open Atlantic Wednesday and Tropical Storm Hanna intensified to a lesser degree as it swirled over the Bahamas toward the southeast U.S. Coast.
Ike posed no immediate threat to land but strengthened explosively, growing in the space of a few hours from a tropical storm to an intense Category 4 hurricane on the five-step Saffir-Simpson intensity scale.
Ike had top sustained winds of 135 mph as it swept across the open Atlantic 610 miles northeast of the Leeward Islands, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said. It was moving west-northwest near 17 mph.

It was forecast to strengthen further as it moved toward the southern Bahamas early next week but it was too early to tell whether it would threaten land, the forecasters said.
It was also too soon to say whether Ike would threaten U.S. oil and natural gas producers in the Gulf of Mexico.
The hurricane center's Web site, with updates and graphics, is at http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/index.shtml.
Hanna's torrential rains had already submerged parts of Haiti, stranding residents on rooftops and prompting President Rene Preval to warn of an "extraordinary catastrophe" to rival a storm that killed more than 3,000 people in the flood-prone Caribbean country four years ago.
Hanna was forecast to move over the central and northern Bahamas Thursday, strengthening back into a hurricane with winds of at least 74 mph before hitting the U.S. coast near the North Carolina-Virginia border Saturday.
The government of the Bahamas had ended a hurricane warning for the northwestern part of the islands, meaning a tropical storm warning was now in effect for all of the Bahamas and for the Turks and Caicos Islands, the hurricane center said.
Hanna has been a "tenacious tropical cyclone" that is forecast to regain hurricane force in a day or two but possibly sooner, it said. "A hurricane watch may be required for a portion of the southeastern United States coast early Thursday," the center said.
Tropical Storm Josephine also marched across the Atlantic on a westward course behind Ike but it had begun to weaken.
The burst of storm activity follows Hurricane Gustav, which slammed into Louisiana near New Orleans Monday after a course that also took it through Haiti, where it killed more than 75 people.
The U.S. government has forecast 14 to 18 tropical storms will form during the six-month season that began June 1, more than the historical average of 10. Josephine was already the 10th of the year, forming before the statistical peak of the season on Sept. 10.
The record-busting 2005 season, which included deadly Hurricane Katrina, had 28 storms.
In Haiti, officials were still counting the scores of people killed by Gustav when Hanna struck the impoverished nation Monday night.
Authorities said Hanna caused flooding and mudslides that killed at least 61 people across Haiti, including 22 in the low-lying port of Gonaives. The death toll was expected to rise as floodwaters receded and rescuers reached remote areas.
"We are in a really catastrophic situation," said Preval, who planned to hold emergency talks with representatives of international donor countries to appeal for aid.
"It is believed that compared to Jeanne, Hanna could cause even more damage," he said, referring to a storm that sent floodwaters and mud cascading into Gonaives and other parts of Haiti's north and northwest in September 2004, killing more than 3,000 people.
Gonaives residents were still stranded on their rooftops two days after the floodwaters rose and the government did not know the fate of those who had been in hospitals and prisons.
"There are a lot of people on rooftops and there are prisoners that we cannot guard," Preval said.
Hanna had hovered off Haiti's coast since Monday, drowning crops in a desperately poor nation already struggling with food shortages. It also triggered widespread flooding in the neighboring Dominican Republic.
The Miami-based hurricane center said it was too early to say where Ike might go, after it churns through the Caribbean, but the storm has drawn the attention of energy companies running the 4,000 offshore platforms in the Gulf of Mexico that provide the United States with a quarter of its crude oil and 15 percent of its natural gas.
By late Wednesday, Josephine was swirling over the far eastern Atlantic about 375 miles west of the Cape Verde Islands. It was moving west but had begun to weaken, with top sustained winds dropping to 60 mph.

Scientists Say Bisphenol A May Be Harmful To Babies

Washington (dbTechno) - According to a group of scientists from the National Toxicology Program, the chemical bisphenol A (BPA), used in plastic baby bottles and linings, may actually be very harmful to babies.
The scientists included in this group come from many agencies, including the National Institutes of Health.
The scientists from the National Toxicology Program have stated that more tests need to be done on bisphenol A to try and figure out whether or not it is actually safe.
They have their doubts over its safety, as they believe that it may have a negative impact on the brain and hormonal systems of infants and young children.
The debate over the safety of BPA has been going on for quite some time now.
This new report comes shortly after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) had come out and stated that bisphenol A was perfectly safe, and that the current exposure levels pose no threat at all to kids or adults.
The scientists in this new report though state that they are concerend over the impact that BPA may have on babies.
The FDA has planned a meeting for September 16th to deal with the issue of safety once again with VPA.
Many retailers in the U.S. though including Toys ‘R Us, Wal-Mart, etc. have already banned the use of BPA in plastic baby bottles and other products they sell. The government of Canada has banned the use of BPA as well in these products.

Heart experts clash on Vytorin and cancer risk

MUNICH (Reuters) - Experts clashed over the safety of Merck & Co and Schering-Plough's cholesterol drug Vytorin on Tuesday as full results from a controversial study were presented at Europe's biggest medical congress.
Researchers involved in the so-called SEAS study -- highlights of which were first released in July -- said there was no credible evidence linking Vytorin to cancer and that the higher number of cases seen in the trial was simply a fluke.
But an editorial in the influential New England Medical Journal, which published the full data from the Vytorin study online, said the safety of the drug was now in doubt, and several leading doctors also expressed concerns.

The full report on the trial, involving 1,873 patients, showed a total of 105 cancer cases among Vytorin patients compared with 70 taking a placebo. That was an upward revision from the totals of 93 and 65 reported in July.
Lead investigator Terje Pedersen of Ulleval University Hospital in Oslo, however, said cross-checks with cancer rates in two much larger, ongoing trials simply did not support the idea that Vytorin was linked to cancer.
Other leading cardiologists were not so sure.
"I am quite concerned," Heinz Drexel, professor of medicine at the University of Innsbruck in Austria told Reuters.
"At the moment, I would not take ezetimibe myself," Drexel said, although he urged patients not to stop treatment without consulting their doctor.
Ezetimibe is one of the two ingredients in Vytorin, alongside the established statin drug simvastatin.
Pedersen presented data on the drug at the annual European Society of Cardiology congress in Munich. His trial had aimed to see whether Vytorin could help prevent heart valve problems but concluded it was no better than a placebo, or dummy, pill.
U.S. lawmakers have already announced a probe into the possible Vytorin cancer link, and shares in both the drug's makers have fallen since July. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration expects to give its verdict in about nine months.
Merck and Schering-Plough shares were both flat in early trade in a sharply higher New York market.
UNCERTAINTY
The key for the firms -- both of which say the finding is simply a statistical anomaly -- will be doctors' reaction to the furore.
The New England Journal of Medicine added to the skepticism.
"Physicians and patients are unfortunately left for now with uncertainty about the efficacy and safety of the drug," it said in an editorial.
It noted that ezetimibe interfered with the gastrointestinal absorption not only of cholesterol but also other molecules that could conceivably affect the growth of cancer cells.
Pedersen said there was absolutely no evidence for such a cancer-causing mechanism -- echoing the conclusions of Richard Peto, a cancer epidemiologist at Oxford University.

Coca-Cola to buy China juice firm

The Coca-Cola Company has offered to buy major juicemaker China Huiyuan Juice Group Ltd in a deal worth as much as $US2.5 billion ($A2.99 billion) in cash, the companies said on Wednesday.
Under the deal, Coca-Cola wholly-owned subsidiary Atlantic Industries would purchase the Chinese company's shares for HK$12.20 ($1.88) each along with all outstanding convertible bonds and options, Huiyuan said in a statement to the Hong Kong stock exchange.
The deal values Huiyuan at about HK$17.9 billion ($A2.75 billion) and its shares at triple their last closing price, HK$4.14 (64 cents).
"This acquisition will deliver value to our shareholders and provide a unique opportunity to strengthen our business in China," said Muhtar Kent, CEO of Coca-Cola, which has operated in China since 1979.
Huiyuan shares, down more than 50 per cent this year, were trading at HK$10.98 ($1.69) early Wednesday.

Update on Gustav damage

Reporting from the Gulf (WTVD) -- It is now Tuesday morning, and our crew is headed southwest from Vicksburg, Mississippi to Baton Rouge, Louisiana. On a normal day, the drive would take about 2 and a half hours.
September 2, 2008...4amSo far this morning, it's slow going. It's been pouring rain all night, we are on a 2 lane road, and it's pitch black outside. There are no street lights. We've already come across some standing water and debris in the road, forcing us to slow down even more - and at times, slam on the breaks.
Photo-journalist Dave Anderson and I are following "Big Blue." That's what we call our large satellite truck. The goal is to scope out the damage caused by Gustav in Baton Rouge. Early predictions had the storm plowing through New Orleans, the same area devastated by Hurricane Katrina three years earlier. But as Gustav made landfall Monday - it took a westward turn, catching the people who weren't forced to evacuate off-guard. There are reports of deaths in Baton Rouge -- at least two of the victims were people who were only staying in Baton Rouge to escape their home near New Orleans.
Monday, as our crew was riding out the worst of the storm along the Mississippi River in Vicksburg, we spoke with a lot of people who were doing the same. Many of them loaded up RVs and got out of dodge... Katrina and its fury, still fresh in their minds. One man I spoke with lost his home in Katrina, and lived in a truck/camper parked in his French quarter driveway for 6 months. He purchased an RV last month -- the main purpose being to more easily escape major storms. He told me it's one of the best purchases he's ever made.

Jindal says 'this is still a very, very serious storm'

Update at 10:27 a.m. ET: Entergy says 825,000 customers were without power at 6 a.m. ET. The company, which serves Louisiana and Mississippi, says this is the second largest outage in its history."This morning, we're reporting 1.4 million -- 1.4 million -- households in Louisiana without power," Jindal says. He says there are "significant transmission issues."
Update at 10:23 a.m. ET: Jindal says 12 hospitals may need to be evacuated over the next 72 hours depending on whether or not they can get them power."Over the next 72 hours, we could be looking at having to evacuate 814 hospital patients," he says. "Now remember, we evacuated over a thousand patients before the storms, and that was using flights every 30 minutes. So this is a very, very important and big challenge."
Update at 10:17 a.m. ET: Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal says the biggest dangers to residents of his state are heavy rains, tornadoes and residual storm surge.

"One of the things I want to emphasize is that this is still a very, very serious storm that has caused major damage in our state," he says.
Jindal describes the medical evacuation that preceded Hurricane Gustav as "the largest medical evacuation in our nation's history."
Original posting at 9:06 a.m. ET: Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff are scheduled to brief reporters on Hurricane Gustav at 10 a.m. ET in Baton Rouge.
President Bush will also receive an update this morning on the response to the storm, the White House says.
(Top photo of New Orleans taken yesterday by the Coast Guard, via AP; Bottom photo taken yesterday in Houma, La., by Mark Wallheiser, Reuters.)

Gustav Coverage: Barges, boats loose in New Orleans' Industrial Canal

According to a recent update on Gustav from the Army Corps of Engineers, there are at least four barges and one 500-foot boat loose in New Orlean's Industrial Canal just north of the Florida Avenue Bridge. A Corps official says the vessels could damage the canal's walls, but the water is still too high for him to safely secure them.Water is sloshing over the flood wall on the city side of the canal but the structure is still holding, the New Orleans Times-Picayune reports.

It's surprising to learn there were unsecured vessels in the Industrial Canal with a serious storm approaching, given the harsh lessons of Katrina. During the 2005 disaster, an empty barge owned by Ingram Barge Co. and under charter by Lafarge North America made its way from the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet canal to the Industrial Canal. There the barge (left), which was larger than most houses, either floated through or possibly caused a breach in a flood wall and ended up in the Lower 9th Ward neighborhood, smashing homes (below), cars and other property over several city blocks

A class-action lawsuit claimed negligence on Ingram's part, arguing the company had no written hurricane plan and made an executive-level decision against securing the barge, while nearby residents reported hearing the vessel scraping against the intact floodwall and then watched it crash through. Earlier this year, however, a federal judge exonerated the company of any liability.

Update: Crist makes pre-taped address at the GOP Convention

Gov. Charlie Crist just made an appearance at the Republican National Convention, if only remotely through a pre-taped address.Crist was third in a lineup of four Republican governors from Gulf States who bowed out of the convention as Hurricane Gustav stormed across the Gulf of Mexico."Floridians are all too familiar with the destruction that these storms can bring," Crist said. "We stand ready to help."Crist appeared in a blue polo shirt in front of a marina, where a steady wind was whipping palm trees and gently tossing boats.Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, and Alabama Gov. Bob Riley also made video appearances. Perry stood sternly on a tarmac in front of a massive, C-130 National Guard cargo plane. Behind him, crew members unloaded hospital patients evacuated from the storm.First Lady Laura Bush, who appeared as a stand in for President George Bush, introduced the clips. She said her husband skipped a planned convention address to go to Austin and monitor storm response.The clips and Laura Bush's appearance drove home the theme of the day, that Republicans put disaster recovery above partisan politics. However, she noted that all of the Gulf Coast governors appearing in the video clips were, "strong leaders" and noted that, "of course, they're all Republicans.""First, we're all Americans," she said. "Our shared ideal will always transcend political parties and partisanship," she said.

Updated 5:41 p.m.
ST. PAUL -- Former Republican Party of Florida vice chairman Allison DeFoor is a seventh-generation Floridian who once wore a sheriff's badge in the Florida Keys and served as former Gov. Jeb Bush's "Everglades Czar."His long list of accomplishments include being a running mate with former Gov. Bob Martinez on a 1990 ticket that lost to Democrat Lawton Chiles.Most Capitol observers know DeFoor, however, as the diminutive political player who appears daily in walking shorts and a Hawaiian shirt. DeFoor has taken a lot of grief for his casual attire over the years, especially at Cabinet meetings. But now that his fellow Florida delegates to the Republican National Convention have adopted a loud, Florida-themed Hawaiian shirt as the official convention uniform, DeFoor is in heaven."This is absolutely fantastic," he said Monday as the 114 delegates and 111 alternates gathered for a group photo on an empty stage in the Lowry Theatre in downtown St. Paul, a few blocks from the Xcel Energy Center. "If I were elected president, the first thing I would do is outlaw suits."
updated 4:56
ST. PAUL -- The announcement from the McCain campaign this afternoon that the 17-year-old daughter of Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin is pregnant will not damage the ticket's chances of taking Florida on Nov. 4, Republican Party of Florida Chairman Jim Greer said this afternoon.Greer said the 44-year-old, first-term-governor, whose pro-life stance has energized religious conservatives, has approached the family problem as any mother should, with love and support."My thought is she's been a very conservative elected official in the way she's governed," Greer said. "She's a mother first before she's an elected official and it's not the daughter that is the candidate."
Updated 4:34 p.m.
ST. PAUL -- A Minneapolis patrol car with smashed windows blocked one intersection and SWAT teams in gleaming black body armor surrounded the Excel Energy Center less than a half hour before the opening floor session of the Republican National Convention this afternoon.Anti-war protestors chanted slogans and raised "Funk the War" signs as delegates threaded their way through a protest parade and streets cordoned off by armed security.Kay Nelson, a 59-year-old Minneapolis native, stood in the blazing sun on Wabasha Avenue and 8th Street, sweat streaming from her brow, and complained that police were blocking her from joining a protest parade a block away."This is Orwellian, it's '1984' around here," Nelson said. "It's the death of democracy in my city and nobody is paying attention."Two blocks behind her, on Wabasha and Sixth Street, a police cruiser stood empty with its windshield and rear window smashed. A long line of protesters, many of them with their faces painted and others dressed in black T-shirts, flashed peace signs for news photographers and smiled as they streamed past the damaged cruiser.Meanwhile, convention organizers were nervously watching damage reports from Hurricane Gustav, still waiting to hear whether Arizona Gov. John McCain will accept his nomination in person at the convention on Thursday."It would be a good opportunity to introduce the public to the vice presidential nominee," said former Republican Party of Florida Chairman Al Cardenas, who is largely credited with being the architect of the party's rise to power in Florida over the past decade. "The selection really galvanized the conservative base."Cardenas was referring to McCain's surprise selection Friday of the relatively unknown Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate. Cardenas made the statement shortly before the campaign announced that Palin's 17-year-old daughter is five months pregnant and planning to marry the father."Bristol and the young man she will marry are going to realize very quickly the difficulties of raising a child, which is why they will have the love and support of our entire family. We ask the media to respect our daughter and Levi's privacy as has always been the tradition of children of candidates," Palin and her her husband, Todd, said in a prepared statement.
Earlier update
Minneapolis -- Republican Party of Florida Chairman Jim Greer today began the delicate task of "celebrating" party unity and toning down partisan politics while Hurricane Gustav barreled down on the Gulf Coast and organizers of the Republican National Convention scaled back the agenda.
More than 200 Florida delegates and alternates are doing their part by cancelling a Thursday night victory pool party at the Airport Marriott. Greer said Florida Republicans hope to raise at least $10,000 -- the cost of the event -- for the American Red Cross, another charity yet to be named and a fund that supports Florida victims of Tropical Storm Fay.
"We're here to give our thoughts and our prayers to our fellow Americans in the Southern states," Greer said. "This is not our finest hour, this is our most appropriate hour. Florida gets it once again. We lead the states in showing that we are concerned." Greer told reporters at a morning briefing that it will not be impossible take the politics out of the party's biggest political event.
"You can continue to distinguish between the two political parties," he said. "There is still the business of the day. It's a balance, a delicate balance."The balancing act will not include a scheduled keynote address by President George W. Bush and Gov. Charlie Crist, told reporters at a hurricane briefing in Tallahassee this morning that he will not attend."Public service is what we're focused on, what I'm focused on and that's where it'll continue to be," he said.This morning it was s still up in the air whether Arizona Sen. John McCain, the GOP presidential nominee, will even attend.Republicans are still fired up by McCain's surprise pick of a relative unknown, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, as his vice presidential pick, an announcement he made Friday. Gustav has given the party a chance to demonstrate it can remain above the fray of partisan politics and still get the business done of crowning a nominee, said Sen. Mike Haridopolos, R-Indialantic."We've spent the first few days focusing on the storm," Haridopolos said. "All we can do right now is catch up with friends from around the country. There's plenty of time for politics later. "Meanwhile, Florida Republicans plan a group photo later this morning at a theater in downtown St. Paul and a luncheon party featuring lawn bowling this afternoon before the first floor session at the Excel Energy Center."I think we're going to focus more on America and less on politics," said Lt. Gov. Jeff Kottkamp before the prayer breakfast. "This is certainly going to be a contrast to conventions of the past."

Florida Capital Political Editor Bill Cotterell contributed to this report.

UPDATE 1-'Thunder' still No. 1 at North American box office

LOS ANGELES, Aug 31 (Reuters) - Action film parody "Tropic Thunder" clung to the top spot at the North American box office for a third straight week as the summer moviegoing season sputtered to a lackluster close, Hollywood studios reported on Sunday.
Paramount Pictures' farcical combat movie within a comedy, starring Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr. and Jack Black, sold an estimated $11.5 million in U.S. and Canadian tickets Friday through Sunday to bring its three-week tally to $83.8 million.
While the final weekend heading into the U.S. Labor Day holiday is typically one of the slowest of the summer, the box office was especially lethargic despite five new films competing for attention in domestic theaters. None of those even managed to even crack the $10 million mark.
"It was an underwhelming end to a phenomenal summer," said Paul Dergarabedian, head of box office tracking service Media By Numbers.
Business also was likely dampened by the approach of Hurricane Gustav along the U.S. Gulf Coast, where many families were too busy boarding up their homes and fleeing to higher ground to go to the movies.
"Tropic Thunder," about a group of self-absorbed actors who get caught up in a real-life battle with narco-terrorists while filming a war movie in Southeast Asia, was the only movie to post ticket sales in the double-digit millions.
Its biggest competition came from a real action flick, the sci-fi thriller "Babylon A.D." from 20th Century Fox starring Vin Diesel, which grossed an estimated $9.7 million in its first weekend to land at No. 2.

Hurricane Gustav may change course of Republican convention

ST. PAUL, Minn. - John McCain introduced new running mate Sarah Palin to voters in battleground Pennsylvania on Saturday as they wound their way toward St. Paul and a Republican National Convention where the mood was suddenly threatened by Hurricane Gustav.
Gulf state governors could decide to remain at home if the storm threatens to bring serious damage. It could also affect Monday's opening-night address by President Bush. Gustav's projected path suggests it will make landfall late Monday or early Tuesday on Louisiana's central coast.
READ MORE: HELEN KENNEDY BLOGS FROM NEW ORLEANS AS GUSTAV NEARS
Said McCain: "You know it just wouldn't be appropriate to have a festive occasion while a near tragedy or a terrible challenge is presented in the form of a natural disaster, so we're monitoring it from day to day and I'm saying a few prayers, too."
He commented in an interview taped for "Fox News Sunday."
A top McCain aide, Mark Salter, said the campaign is drawing up contingency plans for what to do about the convention depending on when and where the storm hits. But he cautioned that it didn't mean the gathering would be canceled outright.
"It might change what we do at the convention" but wouldn't necessarily mean calling it off, Salter said.
LIVE: FOLLOW TROPICAL STORM GUSTAV'S PATH
Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama, in his first direct comment on McCain's unexpected running-mate choice, said he had called her on Friday to wish her luck "but not too much."
McCain and Palin made a morning stop at Tom's Diner in Pittsburgh's trendy Southside neighborhood. The running mates, with spouses in tow, greeted patrons and posed for pictures. Palin's daughters Willow and Piper were also on hand, with Willow carrying Palin's 4-month old son, Trig.
The first-term Alaska governor told reporters she was having fun in her new role. "It's great to see another part of the country," she said. She also said she'd managed to get a little sleep during the night.
"We're used to not getting too much sleep," she said, nodding her head toward the sleeping infant.
Palin also issued her first fundraising appeal, saying in an e-mail, "Some of life's greatest opportunities come unexpectedly, and this is certainly the case for me."
A day after his surprise selection of Palin, McCain planned to work part of the day on his convention acceptance speech.
The Democratic team of Obama and Joe Biden also began their day with a diner stop — in the Youngstown, Ohio, suburb of Boardman — as they pressed on with their post-Democratic convention bus tour of Rust Belt battleground states.