|  |  |  | | | | | The Guardian World News | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Artur Mas's CiU will need alliance with hardliners after party emerged with 50 seats, down from the 62 it won two years ago The Catalan president leading the region's most determined bid for independence in decades has emerged much weaker from elections he called to press for a referendum on breaking away from Spain. The final count gave Artur Mas's Convergència i Unió (CiU) 50 seats, down from the 62 it won when elections were last held, two years ago, and far fewer than the 68 needed to win approval for a referendum in the 135-member Catalan parliament without settling differences with smaller parties. CiU now needs an alliance with the separatist Esquerra party, which surged into second place with 21 seats, from fourth spot in 2010. Although Esquerra has often criticised Mas's minority government, it has not ruled out an agreement. In third and fourth place, respectively, the Socialists and People's party will together hold 39 seats, but both are firmly opposed to independence. In his first reaction to the results, Mas insisted he would stay on as president and any government would have to include CiU, but did not explicitly mention the referendum. "This will require reflection by other parties, because it is evident that CiU cannot lead the government and the process alone," he told supporters in Barcelona. Unlike the Scottish referendum set for 2014 in agreement with London, the central government in Spain has pledged to block an independence vote for Catalonia by appealing to the constitutional court, which stopped the Basque country from holding a similar plebiscite in 2008. Apart from opposition in Madrid, one of Mas's biggest difficulties is uncertainty over whether a newly independent Catalonia could remain within the European Union and the euro. The European commission president, José Manuel Barroso, said in Spain last weekend that EU treaties required breakaway states to join the queue for membership. Catalonia has its own distinct language and culture, and many Catalans think they would be better off without Spain, because some estimates show they pay more in tax than they get back from Madrid. In September, 1.5 million people flocked to an independence rally in Catalonia, which prompted Mas to call for early elections and a referendum. In 1934, the Spanish army put down an independence revolt led by the then Catalan leader, Lluís Companys, which added to simmering tension before the 1936-39 civil war. The dictator Francisco Franco had Companys shot in 1940 and suppressed all regional aspirations for decades, but after his death Spain adopted a democratic constitution in 1978, which gave considerable autonomy to all 17 of the country's regions, including Catalonia. A recent survey by the Catalan government-funded research group CEO estimated that 57% of Catalans would vote to split from Spain. However, a Sigma Dos poll for the Guardian on Thursday showed that many Catalans would be reluctant to part with the Spanish language, passports or Lionel Messi and his Barça teammates playing football in La Liga. Spanish business leaders – many of them Catalans – have said independence would have dire consequences for Catalonia, which would lose its main market, as well as for Spain, which relies on the region for almost one-fifth of its economic output. José Manuel Lara, head of the Barcelona-based publishing group Planeta, threatened to move what is the world's sixth-largest publisher away from Catalonia if the region secedes from Spain. "There is no publishing business that has its headquarters in a foreign country, or one that speaks another language," Lara said in September. For the central government in Madrid, moves towards Catalan independence could unsettle financial markets as Spain struggles to convince its European partners that it can borrow money at affordable rates and thus avoid a bailout. "There was no point holding elections when the priority should have been fighting the crisis," the Spanish prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, said after the EU summit in Brussels on Friday. Falling to the third- from second-largest party in the Catalan parliament, the Socialists have voiced frustration that high unemployment and unpopular spending cuts have not been prominent in campaigning, although across Spain they have sparked massive street protests and, on 14 November, the country's second general strike this year.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Authorities say 11 victims found in a mass grave could have been killed two years ago, but eight others were tortured recently Authorities in Mexico's northern border state of Chihuahua say they have found 11 long-dead people in a mass grave and another eight who were apparently tortured and killed in recent days. The state prosecutor's office for missing people says 11 male bodies were found in Ejido Jesus Carranza, near the US border about 25 miles south-east of Ciudad Juárez. Officials say they were apparently buried two years ago, a time when the area was wracked with battles between drug gangs. Officials said on Sunday they also have found eight bodies tossed along a road near Rosales, about 120 miles south-west of Ojinaga, Texas. It said they had been shot in the head after being tortured. Some had been burned, beaten and had eyes carved out. The discovery comes on the same day that scores of protesters took part in a rally in Mexico City to call for justice for the victims of drug-related violence.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | New York Times reports administration attempting to set out circumstances in which targeted assassination is justified President Barack Obama's administration is in the process of drawing up a formal rulebook that will set out the circumstances in which targeted assassination by unmanned drones is justified, according to reports. The New York Times, citing two unnamed sources, said explicit guidelines were being drawn up amid disagreement between the CIA and the departments of defense, justice and state over when lethal action is acceptable. Human-rights groups and peace groups opposed to the CIA-operated targeted-killing programme, which remains officially classified, said the administration had already rejected international law in pursuing its drone operations. "To say they are rewriting the rulebook implies that there is already a rulebook" said Jameel Jaffer, the director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Center for Democracy. "But what they are already doing is rejecting a rulebook – of international law – that has been in place since [the second world war]." He said the news was "frustrating", because it relied on "self-serving sources". The New York Times piece was written by one of the journalists who first exposed the existence of a White House "kill list", in May. ACLU is currently involved in a legal battle with the US government over the legal memo underlying the controversial targeted killing programme, the basis for drone strikes that have killed American citizens and the process by which individuals are placed on the kill list. Jaffer said it was impossible to make a judgement about whether the "rulebook" being discussed, according to the Times, was legal or illegal. "It is frustrating how we are reliant on self-serving leaks" said Jaffir. "We are left with interpreting shadows cast on the wall. The terms that are being used by these officials are undefined, malleable and without definition. It is impossible to know whether they are talking about something lawful or unlawful. "We are litigating for the release of legal memos. We don't think the public should have to reply on self-serving leaking by unnamed administrative officials." The New York Times said that, facing the possibility that the president might not be re-elected, work began in the weeks running up to the 6 November election to "develop explicit rules for the targeted killing of terrorists by unmanned drones, so that a new president would inherit clear standards and procedures, according to two administration officials". It went on to say that Obama and his advisers were still debating whether remote-controlled killing should be a measure of last resort against imminent threats to the US, or whether it should be more widely used, in order to "help allied governments attack their enemies or to prevent militants from controlling territories". Jaffer said he was sceptical about the significance of the debate outlined in the piece. He said: "The suggestion is that there is a significant debate going on within the administration about the scope of the government's authority to carry out targeted killings. I would question the significance of the debate. If imminent is defined as broadly as some say it is within the administration then the gap between the sides is narrow. "It matters how you define 'imminent'. The Bush administration was able to say it didn't condone torture because of the definition of torture. You might think that if someone says, 'I believe we should only use targeted killings only when there's an imminent threat,' you might think that sounds OK. But without terms like 'imminent' being defined it is impossible to evaluate the arguments." Medea Benjamin, the co-founder of Code Pink, an anti-war group, said the news that formal rules were being written for targeted killing was "disgusting". "That they are trying to write the rules for something that is illegal is disgusting" said Benjamin. "They are saying, 'The levers might be in the wrong hands.' What about the way they are using them right now? There is nothing about taking drones out of the hands of the CIA – which is not a military organisation – or getting rid of signature strikes, where there is no evidence that people are involved in terrorist activities." In Pakistan and Yemen, the CIA and the military have carried out "signature strikes" against groups of suspected and unnamed militants, as well as strikes against named terrorists. Benjamin said she had just come back from Pakistan, where the "intensity of the backlash will take generations to overcome". The New York Times quotes an official who, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there was "concern that the levers might no longer be in our hands" after the election. In October, Obama referred to efforts to codify the controversial drone programme. In an interview with Jon Stewart on The Daily Show on 18 October, the president said: "One of the things we've got to do is put legal architecture in place and we need congressional help in order to do that, to make sure that not only am I reined in but any president is reined in, in terms of some of the decisions we're making". While Obama and administration officials have commented publicly on the legal basis for targeted killings, the program is officially secret. In court, government lawyers fighting lawsuits by ACLU continue to claim that no official has ever formally acknowledged the drones, and that there might not even be a drone programme. Two lawsuits – one by the ACLU and the other by the ACLU and the NYT – seeking information on the legal basis on targeted killing, are still pending.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Minute-by-minute report: Can Milan get their season back on track with a win over Juventus? Join Ian McCourt NOW to find out
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | CiU may seek alliance with Esquerra party after exit polls in Spain suggest they will win 11 to 14 seats too few The Catalan president leading the region's most determined bid for independence in decades to have fallen short of a majority in elections which he called to press for a referendum on breaking away from Spain, according to exit polls. According to a poll by state television broadcaster TVE, Artur Mas's Convergència i Unió (CiU) party could expect to pick up between 54 and 57 seats, compared with the 68 he needed to win approval for a referendum in the 135-member Catalan parliament without settling differences with smaller parties. CiU was on course to come out weaker than when it won 62 seats in the last elections two years ago. But Mas could take heart from predictions that the separatist Esquerra party was expected to be in second place with 20 to 23 seats. Although Esquerra, which came fourth in the last elections in 2010, has often criticised Mas's minority government, it has not ruled out an agreement. Participation meanwhile jumped to 56.2% from 48.4% of registered voters in 2010, an early estimate by electoral authorities showed. "Now many people have the real feeling we are opening a new era, that we are writing the book of our history with different pages," Mas said after casting his ballot on Sunday afternoon. Unlike the Scottish referendum set for 2014 in agreement with London, the central government in Spain has pledged to block an independence vote for Catalonia by appealing to the constitutional court, which stopped the Basque country from holding a similar plebiscite in 2008. Apart from opposition in Madrid, one of Mas's biggest difficulties is uncertainty over whether a newly independent Catalonia could remain within the European Union and the euro currency. The European commission president, José Manuel Barroso, said in Spain last weekend that EU treaties required breakaway states to join the queue for membership. Catalonia has its own distinct language and culture, and many Catalans think they would be better off without Spain, because some estimates show they pay more in tax than they get back from Madrid. In September, 1.5 million people flocked to an independence rally in Catalonia, which prompted Mas to call for early elections and a referendum. In 1934, the Spanish army put down an independence revolt led by the then Catalan leader, Lluís Companys, which added to simmering tension before the 1936-39 civil war. The dictator Francisco Franco had Companys shot in 1940 and suppressed all regional aspirations for decades, but after his death Spain adopted a democratic constitution in 1978 giving considerable autonomy to all 17 of the country's regions, including Catalonia. A recent survey by the Catalan government-funded research group CEO estimated that 57% of Catalans would vote to split from Spain. However, a Sigma Dos poll for the Guardian on Thursday showed that many Catalans would be reluctant to part with the Spanish language, passports or Lionel Messi and his Barça teammates playing football in its Primera Liga. Spanish business leaders – many of them Catalans – have said independence would have dire consequences for Catalonia, which would lose its main market, and for Spain, which relies on the region for almost one-fifth of its economic output. José Manuel Lara, head of the Barcelona-based publishing group Planeta, threatened to move what is the world's sixth-largest publisher away from Catalonia if the region secedes from Spain. "There is no publishing business that has its headquarters in a foreign country, or one that speaks another language," Lara said in September. For the central government in Madrid, moves towards Catalan independence could unsettle financial markets as Spain struggles to convince its European partners that it can borrow money at affordable rates and thus avoid a bailout. "There was no point holding elections when the priority should have been fighting the crisis," the Spanish prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, said after the EU summit in Brussels on Friday. Falling to the third place second-largest party in the Catalan parliament, the Socialists have voiced frustration that high unemployment and unpopular spending cuts have not been prominent in campaigning, although across Spain they have sparked massive street protests and, on 14 November, the country's second general strike this year.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | A worldwide research effort in collaboration with BBC Panorama and the ICIJ reveals the people behind these anonymous companies The existence of an extraordinary global network of sham company directors, most of them British, can be revealed. The UK government claims such abuses were stamped out long ago, but a worldwide joint investigation by the Guardian, the BBC's Panorama and the Washington-based International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) has uncovered a booming offshore industry that leaves the way open for both tax avoidance and the concealment of assets. More than 21,500 companies have been identified using this group of 28 so-called nominee directors. The nominees play a key role in keeping secret hundreds of thousands of commercial transactions. They do so by selling their names for use on official company documents, using addresses in obscure locations all over the world. This is not illegal under UK law, and sometimes nominee directors have a legitimate role. But our evidence suggests this particular group of directors only pretend to control the companies they put their names to. The companies themselves are often registered anonymously offshore in the British Virgin Islands (BVI), but also in Ireland, New Zealand, Belize and the UK itself. More than a score of UK agencies sell offshore companies, several of which also help supply sham directors. One British couple, Sarah and Edward Petre-Mears, who migrated from Sark in the Channel Islands to the Caribbean island of Nevis, have sold their services to more than 2,000 entities, with their names appearing on activities ranging from Russian luxury property purchases to pornography and casino sites. In 1999, the government claimed Britain's sham director industry had been "effectively outlawed" after a judge, Mr Justice Blackburne, said the court would not tolerate "the situation where someone takes on the directorship of so many companies and then totally abrogates responsibility". But our findings show this has failed to be policed. These nominee fronts conceal a wide variety of real owners, including those that are perfectly legal, from Russian oligarchs to discreet speculators in the British property market. Their only common factor is the wish for secrecy. Some of the owners we have identified include: • Vladimir Antonov, the London-based billionaire Russian purchaser of Portsmouth FC, who is currently fighting an extradition request from Lithuania, where he controlled a bank. He denies wrongdoing. • Yair Spitzer, a north London software engineer who bought and sold London flats. He said: "We were advised by UK accountants that this structure … was perfectly legal." • The Hackmeys, a wealthy Israeli family, one of whom used a BVI company to buy a £26m London office block. Their spokesman said: "The deal was introduced by a [confidential] joint venture partner who set up the deal and structure." • Nicholas Joannou, whose Armstrong Group sold shares from an address in Berkeley Square, central London. The Guardian was unable to contact him. • SP Trading, which was linked in 2009 to a Kazakh businessman and an arms to Iran scandal. The nominee directors in Vanuatu turned out to have no knowledge of the company's true activities. They told us there were "very few cases of misuse by clients". In a parallel investigation Monday's Panorama on BBC1 is due to show a company formation agent offering to assist its undercover reporter to escape tax. The agent, James Turner, of Turner Little in York, offers nominee directors in Belize and says: "They won't even know that they were a director, they just get paid." A representative of a second company, Atlas Corporate Services, is asked for maximum confidentiality. He explains that many of its nominees are not even aware of how their names are being used. Jesse Hester, who runs Atlas Corporate Services from Mauritius, is seen assuring a potential client that the UK is unlikely to catch up with him. "Tax authorities don't have the resources to chase everybody down … They reckon it's probably the same rough odds as probably winning the lottery," he says. The revelations launch a week-long series onthe Guardian site designed to strip away anonymity from offshore companies, the most shadowy aspect of the UK's financial industry. The British Virgin Islands are a particularly successful hideaway, thanks to the exceptional secrecy on offer. This Caribbean territory, which is ultimately controlled by the UK, has sold more than a million anonymously-owned offshore entities since launching itself in 1984 as a tax haven. The purchasers are often people who, for a variety of reasons, some perfectly legitimate, do not wish to advertise what they are doing with their wealth. But a worldwide research effort has been launched this year by the ICIJ. It aims to identify, country by country, thousands of the true owners. The Guardian has collaborated with the ICIJ, a non-profit organisation, to analyse many gigabytes of the British data. This week we intend to reveal the names of more owners. We do not suggest criminal wrongdoing by them. Among those we have contacted, not all go so far as to employ nominee directors. Some insist they have done nothing improper, and are merely taking advantage of legitimate tax breaks or the opportunity for privacy. Critics say, however, that the islands' system can be open to abuse because of its lack of transparency. Gerard Ryle, the director of the ICIJ, said: "We are applying specialist software to crunch through literally hundreds of thousands of offshore entities to look for patterns. We are marrying our findings with old-fashioned shoe leather and interviews from key insiders who can provide further context on this little known and loosely regulated world. We are satisfied that the information we have is authentic." Ryle believes the ICIJ's global project, when it is completed next year, will haul into the open a shadowy financial system estimated to conceal the movement around the world of trillions of dollars. Offshore secretsGuardian team: David Leigh, Harold Frayman and James Ball. The project is a collaboration between the Guardian and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) headed by Gerard Ryle in Washington DC. Guardian investigations editor David Leigh is a member of ICIJ, a global network of reporters in more than 60 countries who collaborate on in-depth investigative stories that cross national boundaries. The ICIJ was founded in 1997 as a project of the Center for Public Integrity, a Washington DC-based non-profit.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | A worldwide research effort in collaboration with the Guardian/ICIJ reveals the real people behind these anonymous companies The existence of an extraordinary global network of sham company directors, most of them British, can be revealed. The UK government claims such abuses were stamped out long ago, but a worldwide joint investigation by the Guardian, the BBC's Panorama and the Washington-based International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) has uncovered a booming offshore industry that leaves the way open for both tax avoidance and the concealment of assets. More than 21,500 companies have been identified using this group of 28 so-called nominee directors. The nominees play a key role in keeping secret hundreds of thousands of commercial transactions. They do so by selling their names for use on official company documents, using addresses in obscure locations all over the world. This is not illegal under UK law, and sometimes nominee directors have a legitimate role. But our evidence suggests this particular group of directors only pretend to control the companies they put their names to. The companies themselves are often registered anonymously offshore in the British Virgin Islands (BVI), but also in Ireland, New Zealand, Belize and the UK itself. More than a score of UK agencies sell offshore companies, several of which also help supply sham directors. One British couple, Sarah and Edward Petre-Mears, who migrated from Sark in the Channel Islands to the Caribbean island of Nevis, have sold their services to more than 2,000 entities, with their names appearing on activities ranging from Russian luxury property purchases to pornography and casino sites. In 1999, the government claimed Britain's sham director industry had been "effectively outlawed" after a judge, Mr Justice Blackburne, said the court would not tolerate "the situation where someone takes on the directorship of so many companies and then totally abrogates responsibility". But our findings show this has failed to be policed. These nominee fronts conceal a wide variety of real owners, including those that are perfectly legal, from Russian oligarchs to discreet speculators in the British property market. Their only common factor is the wish for secrecy. Some of the owners we have identified include: • Vladimir Antonov, the London-based billionaire Russian purchaser of Portsmouth FC, who is currently fighting an extradition request from Lithuania, where he controlled a bank. He denies wrongdoing. • Yair Spitzer, a north London software engineer who bought and sold London flats. He said: "We were advised by UK accountants that this structure … was perfectly legal." • The Hackmeys, a wealthy Israeli family, one of whom used a BVI company to buy a £26m London office block. Their spokesman said: "The deal was introduced by a [confidential] joint venture partner who set up the deal and structure." • Nicholas Joannou, whose Armstrong Group sold shares from an address in Berkeley Square, central London. The Guardian was unable to contact him. • SP Trading, which was linked in 2009 to a Kazakh businessman and an arms to Iran scandal. The nominee directors in Vanuatu turned out to have no knowledge of the company's true activities. They told us there were "very few cases of misuse by clients". In a parallel investigation Monday's Panorama on BBC1 is due to show a company formation agent offering to assist its undercover reporter to escape tax. The agent, James Turner, of Turner Little in York, offers nominee directors in Belize and says: "They won't even know that they were a director, they just get paid." A representative of a second company, Atlas Corporate Services, is asked for maximum confidentiality. He explains that many of its nominees are not even aware of how their names are being used. Jesse Hester, who runs Atlas Corporate Services from Mauritius, is seen assuring a potential client that the UK is unlikely to catch up with him. "Tax authorities don't have the resources to chase everybody down … They reckon it's probably the same rough odds as probably winning the lottery," he says. The revelations launch a week-long series onthe Guardian site designed to strip away anonymity from offshore companies, the most shadowy aspect of the UK's financial industry. The British Virgin Islands are a particularly successful hideaway, thanks to the exceptional secrecy on offer. This Caribbean territory, which is ultimately controlled by the UK, has sold more than a million anonymously-owned offshore entities since launching itself in 1984 as a tax haven. The purchasers are often people who, for a variety of reasons, some perfectly legitimate, do not wish to advertise what they are doing with their wealth. But a worldwide research effort has been launched this year by the ICIJ. It aims to identify, country by country, thousands of the true owners. The Guardian has collaborated with the ICIJ, a non-profit organisation, to analyse many gigabytes of the British data. This week we intend to reveal the names of more owners. We do not suggest criminal wrongdoing by them. Among those we have contacted, not all go so far as to employ nominee directors. Some insist they have done nothing improper, and are merely taking advantage of legitimate tax breaks or the opportunity for privacy. Critics say, however, that the islands' system can be open to abuse because of its lack of transparency. Gerard Ryle, the director of the ICIJ, said: "We are applying specialist software to crunch through literally hundreds of thousands of offshore entities to look for patterns. We are marrying our findings with old-fashioned shoe leather and interviews from key insiders who can provide further context on this little known and loosely regulated world. We are satisfied that the information we have is authentic." Ryle believes the ICIJ's global project, when it is completed next year, will haul into the open a shadowy financial system estimated to conceal the movement around the world of trillions of dollars. Offshore secretsGuardian team: David Leigh, Harold Frayman and James Ball. The project is a collaboration between the Guardian and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) headed by Gerard Ryle in Washington DC. Guardian investigations editor David Leigh is a member of ICIJ, a global network of reporters in more than 60 countries who collaborate on in-depth investigative stories that cross national boundaries. The ICIJ was founded in 1997 as a project of the Center for Public Integrity, a Washington DC-based non-profit.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Utilities worker thought to be responsible for puncturing pipe before explosion that flattened a Springfield strip club, injuring 18 A utility worker responding to reports of a natural gas leak in one of New England's largest cities punctured a pipe before an unknown spark ignited a massive explosion that injured 18 people, the state fire marshal said on Sunday. The natural gas blast, which happened in Springfield on Friday night, was caused by "human error", state fire marshal Stephen Coan said. Coan did not name the Columbia Gas Go worker who pierced the high-pressure pipe. The blast flattened a strip club, caused serious damage to a daycare center and scattered debris over several blocks. Some officials said it was a miracle that no one was killed. The cause of the spark that ignited the explosion is still unknown. Most of the injured were among a group of gas workers, firefighters and police officers who ducked for cover behind a utility truck just before the blast. Part of the neighborhood had been evacuated, because of reports of a gas leak and odor. The gas company planned a news conference for later Sunday afternoon. A message left for a company spokeswoman was not immediately returned. Preliminary reports showed that the blast had damaged 42 buildings, housing 115 residential units. Three buildings were immediately condemned and 24 will require additional inspections by structural engineers. Springfield, which is 90 miles west of Boston and has about 150,000 residents, is the largest city in western Massachusetts. It's known as the home of the Basketball Hall of Fame. The city has been rebuilding from damage caused by a tornado in June 2011.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Lindsey Graham and Peter King indicate step back from outright opposition to possible state department appointment Senior Republicans opposed to Susan Rice becoming the next secretary of state softened their tone on Sunday, with one suggesting that he could change his mind if the UN ambassador explained her much-discussed comments on the Benghazi attack of 11 September. Senator John McCain had been among those gearing up for a showdown in Washington over the issue, with a series of opponents to President Barack Obama suggesting they would block Rice's nomination as Hillary Clinton's successor in the state department, should it be made. Republicans have claimed that Rice misled the public in the aftermath of a deadly assault on the US consulate in Benghazi, in which four Americans, including ambassador Chris Stevens, were killed. Rice suggested in television interviews that intelligence information pointed towards a spontaneous attack, prompted by protest over a US-made anti-Muslim film. It has since been accepted that the attack on the consulate was a terrorist assault. However, in evidence given to a congressional committee, the former CIA chief David Petraeus is believed to have said that a report handed to Rice on the day after the attack neglected to mention the terrorist link. Moreover, a CBS report has claimed that it was the Office of the Director of National Intelligence that omitted the words "al-Qaida" and "terrorism" from the notes which were handed to Rice prior to her TV appearances. If true, it would appear to absolve the diplomat of any blame. Rice has consistently hit out at suggestions that she deliberately misled the public, and Obama has defended his presumed state department pick, saying that attacks on her character were "outrageous". But McCain and other senior Republicans continued to criticise Rice, vowing to oppose attempts to put her into a role that would require Senate confirmation. Their position now looks increasingly clumsy, especially at a time, after its election defeat, when the Republican Party has been characterised as being anti-women. Asked on Fox News Sunday if he could change his mind on Rice becoming secretary of state, McCain said: "Sure. She can. I'd give everyone the benefit of explaining their position and the actions that they took. I'd be glad to have the opportunity to discuss these issues with her." Another senior Senate Republican, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, said on Sunday that Rice had a "lot of questions" to answer, should she reach a Senate confirmation hearing as secretary of state. But he declined to repeat an assertion that Rice's remarks on Benghazi disqualified her from the post. Peter King, the Republican chairman of the House of Representatives homeland security committee, has also criticised Rice. Asked on Sunday on NBC's Meet the Press about the Benghazi attack, he said "on this she was wrong". He did, however, add that Rice had done an "effective job" at the United Nations.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The mutiny was loud and sustained and, for Rafael Benítez, callous in its intentions. His team only sporadically threatened to lift the mood and Benítez's first match as Chelsea's manager will be remembered only for the vitriol that was waiting for him inside Stamdford Bridge. Benítez should probably just be grateful that Manchester City were just as flat and uninspiring because goodness knows what kind of reaction there would have been if Roberto Mancini's team had put away one of the game's few chances. As it was, it was difficult to remember another time when manager has faced this kind of outpouring of hostility. "We don't want you here," was the general gist, although that is with the expletives removed. Stamford Bridge was an unhappy place, to put it mildly, and this anti-Benítez campaign might well become the soundtrack to their season. Perhaps the negative vibes got through to the players, too. Chelsea have rarely looked so devoid of imagination and Mancini could be forgiven for regarding this as a missed opportunity. His team had the better of the match but did not do enough to explore whether Chelsea might be vulnerable and get the win that would have taken them back to the top of the table. The match, put bluntly, was a stinker. Benítez will have a better idea now of how Fernando Torres has regressed on another difficult day for the Chelsea striker. Torres, however, was far from alone in this regard. It was rare to see so many flair players lacking their usual touch and subtlety and, for Benítez, the only real encouragement can come from the way a new-look back four restricted City to so few opportunities. As much as they might not like their new manager, Chelsea's supporters will have to concede his decision to play Branislav Ivanovic alongside David Luiz was one of good sense. Man of the match Vincent Kompany (Manchester City)
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Minute-by-minute report: Rafael Benítez's Chelsea face the Premier League leaders. Follow the action with John Ashdown
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | TV station says search for "fool-proof suffication" was made from within home of mother Casey Anthony on 16 June 2008 Police investigating the death of the toddler Caylee Anthony overlooked a computer search for "fool-proof suffication" (sic) that was made from within the girl's home on the day she was last seen alive, it was confirmed on Sunday. Captain Angelo Nieves of Orange County, Florida, said that a forensic computer expert missed the 16 June 2008 Google enquiry. The instigator of the search is not known. The oversight was brought to light by Orlando television station WKMG. A report by the station suggested that the search was carried out on a browser primarily used by the two-year-old's mother, Casey Anthony – who was acquitted of her daughter's murder following a high-profile trial in 2011. Despite the not-guilty verdict, Anthony emerged from the courtroom to a barrage of verbal abuse, including shouts of of "baby killer" from a 100-strong pack of onlookers. Such scenes followed the media vilification of the mother, after the discovery of her daughter's skeletal remains in December 2008. Caylee Anthony was last seen alive on 16 June 2008, but Anthony failed to report her missing for a month. In the intervening period the 25-year-old was seen partying in clubs and flat-hunting with her boyfriend. She eventually alerted the police after being confronted by her parents, but at first blamed a non-existent babysitter of kidnapping Caylee. A police investigation led to a charge of first-degree murder. The resulting trial became compelling viewing for much of America, in much the same way as the OJ Simpson case some 16 years earlier. Anthony's lawyers claimed that the young girl had accidentally drowned in a family pool and that Anthony had been panicked into making it look like murder. Prosecutors said Anthony suffocated her daughter using duct tape, because the young girl got in the way of her partying lifestyle. Throughout the trial, Anthony's defence team waited for prosecutors to bring up evidence that they would claim linked the suspect to a search for "fool-proof suffication" on a computer at her home. "We were waiting for the state to bring it up. And when they didn't, we were kind of shocked," defence attorney Jose Baez told WKMG's Local 6. Trial prosecutor Jeff Ashton told the station: "It's just a shame we didn't have it. This certainly would have put the accidental death claim in serious question."
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Protests and divisions in small, peaceful oil-rich country include calls to boycott ballot which may have repercussions in region November evenings are balmy on Kuwait City's waterfront, and there is a festive atmosphere in Irada Square as crowds gather for another protest rally. Women swathed in black mix with others in jeans while men in dishdashas and red-checked ghutra headdresses sip tea on Persian rugs spread on the spiky grass. Speakers are hammering home the call to boycott this Saturday's elections because the emir, Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad Al Sabah, has decreed a change to voting rules that will weaken the opposition. Stewards display spent teargas canisters that were fired to break up an unlicensed protest last month. Unlike elsewhere in the Middle East and North Africa, Kuwaitis are not demanding the overthrow of their regime. Irada (the Arabic name means "will") is tamer than Cairo's Tahrir Square. Violence is extremely rare. Yet there is no mistaking the depth of divisions in this small but fabulously wealthy country – and the anxiety about how they will play out. Its ultraconservative Saudi and Emirati neighbours are watching nervously. "The emir's decree was the straw that broke the camel's back," said Sultan al-Majrubi, a young activist who was injured when special forces broke up October's big demonstration. "The Sabah family need to change from the inside. They are not thinking about the future and their credit with the people is running out." Kuwait is still the most democratic state in the Gulf. Its "springtime" dates back to 2006, long before the overthrow of the autocrats who ruled Tunisia, Egypt and Libya. Last November the prime minister, the emir's nephew, was forced to quit in the face of allegations that MPs had been bribed to support the government. Protests then were the largest ever seen in the region. Parliament was dissolved in June. The opposition is a coalition of youth groups, disgruntled tribes and Islamists. Many sport orange ribbons – a nod to the revolution in distant Ukraine. Social media play a vital role. The Twitter hashtag #KarametWatan ("dignity of the nation") has been used with stunning effect to organise protests and outwit the government. "If you look at the slogans, the empowerment of the grassroots and the emergence of civil society activism then yes, we are part of the Arab spring," argues political scientist Shafeeq Ghabra. "People want dignity and political participation and equality before the law. But it's not a revolution here." Kuwaitis suffer neither hunger nor poverty. The country's oil riches have paid for a lavish welfare system since independence in 1960. Its 1.2 million citizens pay no tax but the system is rife with paternalism and wasta (connections or nepotism). Last year the emir gave every citizen 1,000 dinars (£2,210) in grants and free food coupons. "Kuwait is a wealthy society so people have a lot to lose," smiles Jaafar Behbehani, a businessman. "That's why many support the status quo." In the capital's diwaniyas – informal all-male gatherings held in private homes – the election boycott is being hotly debated. Ostensibly, the emir is modernising the system by reducing the number of votes from four to one. But his intention seems clear. "They are crafting a new parliament by having it customised for their own needs," complains a twentysomething consultant handing out boycott badges under the palm trees in Irada Square. Kuwait's hybrid political system, enshrined in its constitution, is famously dysfunctional. Near permanent deadlock between MPs and the emir has stymied development. The capital's iconic water towers dominate the waterfront but no new hospitals have been built for decades and the international airport is a 1960s relic compared with its gleaming counterparts further down the Gulf. Oil still accounts for 90% of state revenues, and little progress has been made in diversifying the economy, promoting the private sector and reducing state subsidies. Inward investment is sluggish. Underlying this malaise is a lack of trust in the system and resentment at corruption and a lack of accountability by ministers and officials. Protesters warn that fiddling with the electoral system will not help if root causes are not addressed. "The government blames the national assembly for being an obstacle to development," says engineer Ghazi al-Shammar. "But the problem really is that they want to make it into a one-man show." For Ghabra the conclusion is clear: "By not listening to the people the government is creating a bigger problem." Profound social changes lie behind the unrest. Tribes that came from Saudi Arabia in the 1970s have multiplied and tensions grown between them and Kuwait's urban community, descendants of the pearl merchants and traders of old. "We are against corrupt institutions run by some of the sheikhs and businessmen in their own interests," says Mohammed Ruwayhil of the opposition people's bloc. And like elsewhere in the region, over half of the population are under 25, many educated abroad at government expense. Deference has faded. "We were always told by our fathers that at a diwaniya there was a strict seating pattern," reflects a thoughtful Sabah minister. "The further you were away from the centre the less you were expected to speak. But with Twitter and WhatsApp and all the social media everyone can speak their mind." Repression is mild by regional standards. State security agents hanging around Irada Square are easily spotted. "People do get slapped around and sometimes put into solitary confinement but there is no torture," says one activist. Still, official patience is wearing thin. Arrests for the Kuwaiti equivalent of lese majeste have increased. Musallam al-Barrak, the firebrand opposition leader, was imprisoned for 10 days after issuing an unprecedented public warning to the emir over his election decree – and (falsely) accusing Jordan's King Abdullah, (who is also struggling with demands for political change), of sending in mercenaries to crush protests. Earlier this month there was a reminder of happier times with a dazzling firework extravaganza commemorating 50 years of the Kuwaiti constitution – winning an immediate place in the Guinness Book of Records as the most expensive pyrotechnic display ever mounted. But the mood is turning ugly. The opposition is "obsolete," and their protests vulgar complains Safaa al-Hashim, a candidate in the third electoral district. In the media, charges of treachery are flying over the boycott and there is a whiff of sectarianism in the air as Shias are accused of standing with the government and the tribes of being backward. "My views have shifted from left to right," admits a woman business executive. "I am against the way the opposition is behaving. I understand why they are against the one-man-one vote but this country is still being run by a tribal mentality. The law is only enforced selectively." Liberals and nationalists are quick to lambast the Muslim Brotherhood – known in Kuwait as the Islamic Constitutional Movement – and accuse it of conspiring to create a new caliphate under the orders of the new Egyptian government. But the claims seem wildly exaggerated and western diplomats privately dismiss them. "There is an Islamist presence, but they are very pragmatic," is the assessment of Ghanima al-Oteibi, a secular student leader. "The Kuwaiti government is attacking the Ikhwan (Brotherhood) because they need Gulf support," suggests Saad al-Ajmi, a former minister. Turnout in Saturday's election will be crucial in determining whether the new parliament enjoys sufficient legitimacy, or whether, in the words of one sceptic, it is just a "Micky Mouse assembly". Whatever the outcome it is hard to see how the country's underlying tensions can be resolved any time soon. "Kuwait is different but we are not isolated from what is happening around us elsewhere in the Arab world," sighs the businesswoman. "The Sabah have always ruled by consensus, but now it is breaking down." Sheikh to visit BritainSheikh Sabah al-Ahmad Al Sabah will get a brief respite from troubles at home when he pays a state visit to Britain this week. The 83-year-old emir is being hosted by the Queen at Windsor Castle and will be her guest at a royal banquet, visit the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst and meet David Cameron and business leaders who are keen to pursue opportunities in the lucrative Kuwaiti market. Kuwait is the UK's fourth-largest trading partner in the Gulf, with exports worth £1.1bn to the emirate in 2009. Britain is also Kuwait's the emirate's "partner of choice" for delivering much of its £70bn development plan, comprising 1,000 infrastructure projects including a £4.6bn metro system and a new Kuwait International airport terminal designed by Lord Foster. But implementation of the plan is being held up because of the ongoing political crisis. Britain is popular for the role it played in helping liberate Kuwait from Iraqi occupation in 1991. Its embassy is the oldest continuously-occupied building in the capital and a relic of the days when British "political agents" ruled the Gulf coast all the way to Aden. Two years ago Tony Blair produced a report – Kuwait Vision 2030 – in which he concluded that the country needed to change if it was to fulfil its potential and avoid an "uncertain future". Kuwait was the first client of Tony Blair Associates, set up by the former prime minister to advise on "political and economic trends and governmental reform".
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | South Carolina senator tells This Week he will break Grover Norquist's pledge in order 'to avoid becoming Greece' Senator Lindsey Graham has become the second senior Republican in days to publicly disavow a pledge that handcuffs the party to a policy of no tax rises, raising hopes of a deal over the fiscal cliff. Speaking on ABC's This Week, the South Carolina politician said that the only pledge members of either party should make would be one to make sure the country did not go the same way, economically, as Greece. Regarding a pledge against tax hikes that has been signed by most Republicans in Congress – having been promulgated by the conservative lobbyist Grover Norquist – Graham said: "I will violate this pledge, long story short, for the good of the country." In the aftermath of the GOP's defeat in the presidential election of 6 November, Norquist is increasingly seeing his influence on the party decline. On Thursday, senator Saxby Chambliss said he would break the Taxpayer Protection Pledge in an attempt to help avert the automatic triggering of $600bn of spending cuts and tax increases, the so-called "fiscal cliff". Washington has until the end of a year to negotiate a deal to avoid such a situation. Economists have suggested that a package of swingeing spending cuts and tax hikes could be catastrophic for the US economic revival, plunging the country back into recession. "I care more about this country than I do about a 20-year-old pledge," Chambliss said in an interview, earning a rebuke from Norquist. A vast majority of Republicans in the House and the Senate have signed the Taxpayer Protection Pledge, which was created in 1986 and which commits them to voting against any increase in revenue taken from personal income. Until recently it had been seen as a litmus test for the conservative credentials of party representatives, but the incoming House of Representatives will have 16 Republicans who have not signed up – an increase from six. One new Republican senator, Arizona's Jeff Flake, has avoided putting his signature to the demand. On Sunday, Graham – who had already spoken of his misgivings about the pledge – added his name to those who have gone on record about their intention to break with the policy. "I think Grover is wrong," he said. "When you are $16tn in debt the only pledge we should be making to each other is to avoid becoming Greece. I will violate this pledge, long story short, for the greater good of the country, only if Democrats do entitlement reform." Speaking on the same show, the Democrat senator Dick Durbin also indicated a willingness for negotiation. After saluting Graham, Durbin said: "What he just said about revenue and taxes needs to be said on his side of the aisle. We need to be honest on our side of the aisle." Durbin, a Democratic Party whip, noted that Congress was due to begin its new session on Monday. "We can solve this problem," he said. "Tomorrow, there's no excuse: we're back in town."
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Blaze occured at Tazreen Fashions in Dhaka, which makes clothes for foreign clients including high-street chain C&A Survivors have described how a fire tore through a multi-storey garment factory just outside Bangladesh's capital, Dhaka, killing more than 100 of their colleagues in one of the worst such incidents in recent years. Mohammad Shahbul Alam, 26, described flames filling two of the three stairwells of the nine-floor building – where clothes for international brands including high-street names appear to have been made — shortly after the fire alarm had been raised. Rooms full of female workers were cut off as piles of yarn and fabric filling corridors ignited. Reports also suggested fire exits at the site had locks on, which had to be broken in order for staff to escape. "It was 6.45pm when the fire alarm was raised. I rushed out. I heard that [grills blocking the way to] the second and third floors were locked. When I came down, I saw fire at both the stairways that the ladies used. I still have not found any trace of my sister-in-law," Alam told the Guardian. According to Zakir Hossain, another worker, management told their employees not to evacuate immediately. "The office staff asked us to stay where we were, telling us not to panic. We did not listen to them and started moving out," Hossain recalled. "A lot of people were stuck there. Some people got out climbing down the bamboo [scaffolding] tied against the building." Witnesses said many workers leapt from upper stories in a bid to escape the flames. Twelve workers died in hospital from injuries sustained in falls, officials said, bringing the overall toll to 123 dead and more than 150 injured. The blaze will focus attention once more on the conditions in which workers producing clothes for sale in the west work. Fires in textiles and garments factories across south Asia have killed hundreds in recent months. More than 280 died in oneat a site in Karachi, Pakistan, in September. Delwar Hossein, the managing director of the Dhaka factory, told the Guardian that the factory, Tazreen Fashions, had been making clothes for European high street giant C&A among other clients. "I lived on these workers' efforts," he said. "I could not do anything for my workers. I do not know what went wrong and cannot understand why the staff could not get out of the building." There was no immediate response from C&A. The factory, in the Ashulia industrial zone, is one of around 4,000 such installations in Bangladesh, many of which operate with minimal safeguards against fire or industrial accidents. The country annually earns about £12.5bn from exports of garment products, mainly to the US and Europe. Earlier this year, more than 300 factories near the capital were shut for almost a week as workers demanded higher wages and better working conditions. Siddiq Ur Rahman, acting president of Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association said the families of the dead would receive 100,000 aka (£760) as compensation. Abu Nayeem Mohammad Shahidullah, director general of the Dhaka fire brigade, told reporters the toll could still rise. Army soldiers and border guards had been deployed to help police keep order at the scene of the tragedy as thousands of anxious and angry relatives of the factory workers gathered. Kalpona Akter, from the Bangladesh Centre for Workers' Solidarity (BCWS), said: "We initially thought the fire broke out from generator but I checked the generator room today and it was not from there.". Akter said that locks on exits at the factory had been broken, indicating that the gates had been locked when the fire broke out. Most bodies are too badly burned for immediate investigation. Fire service officials have said they believe a short circuit was responsible.
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Fans of 1980s TV show Dallas flock to Southfork Ranch to lay flowers in memory of actor Larry Hagman, who has died at 81 Fans of the 1980s TV hit Dallas flocked to the fictional home of the series' villainous oil tycoon JR Ewing over the weekend, dropping off flowers at Southfork Ranch in memory of the man behind the character. Larry Hagman died in Dallas on Friday, at age 81, due to complications from his battle with cancer. Southfork, a ranch north of Dallas, was known to millions of viewers as the Ewing family home. Exterior shots of the house and pool were shown when the series aired, from 1978 to 1991, although the show wasn't filmed there. The ranch has been open for tours since the mid-1980s, and now sees more than 100,000 visitors each year. Each room of the house is themed for a character. On Saturday, JR Ewing's room had flowers and a card for tourists to sign. "Today is about Larry Hagman and his family," said Janna Timm, of Southfork Ranch & Hotel. "He was such a wonderful person, and we will really miss him." Dallas was revived on the cable TV channel TNT this summer, and all of the scenes were filmed at Southfork or other places in the Dallas area. Hagman reprised his role as the scheming oilman who would even double-cross his own son. Linda Sproule of Peterborough, Ontario, heard about Hagman's death on Friday, while in Dallas. She said she wanted to come to Southfork because she had been a fan of the show in the 1980s. "I remember on Friday nights we watched it, and JR was bigger than life in some ways," she said, after taking the Southfork tour on Saturday morning. "This ranch is beautiful. Being here is kind of emotional in a way." "We loved him [JR] because he was so ruthless," said Barbara Quinones, of Albuquerque, New Mexico. "This is a sad day, but I'm glad we're here." Some of the show's stars, including Hagman, came to Southfork to mark the series' 25th anniversary. The Fort Worth-born actor had visited several times before the show was revived. "He was definitely a gentleman, a class act," said Jim Gomes, vice president of resorts at Southfork Ranch & Hotel. "He loved the fans as much as they loved him."
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Beijing's heightened military ambitions send message to Asia and rest of world as new leadership takes reins China has carried out its first successful landing of a fighter plane on its first aircraft carrier, state media said on Sunday, a symbolically significant development as Asian neighbours fret about the world's most populous country's military ambitions. The domestically-built J-15 fighter jet took off from and landed on the Liaoning, a reconditioned Soviet-era vessel from Ukraine, which only came into service in September. China ushered in a new generation of leaders this month at the 18th Communist party congress in Beijing, with outgoing President Hu Jintao making a pointed reference to strengthening China's naval forces, protecting maritime interests and the need to "win local war". China is embroiled in disputes with the Philippines and Vietnam over South China Sea islands believed to be surrounded by waters rich in natural gas. It has a similar dispute with Japan over islands in the East China Sea. It has also warned the US, with President Barack Obama's "pivot" to Asia, not to get involved. "We should make active planning for the use of military forces in peacetime, expand and intensify military preparedness, and enhance the capability to accomplish a wide range of military tasks, the most important of which is to win local war in an information age," Hu said. China has advertised its long-term military ambitions with shows of new hardware, including its first test flight of a stealth fighter in early 2011, an elite helicopter unit and the launch of the aircraft carrier. China is boosting military spending by 11.2% this year, bringing official outlays on the army to 670.3bn yuan (£67bn) for 2012, after a 12.7% increase last year and a near-unbroken string of double-digit rises across two decades. Beijing's public budget is widely thought by foreign experts to undercount its real spending on military modernisation, which has drawn repeated calls from the US for China to share more about its intentions. China's state-run Xinhua news agency said the J-15 – which can carry multi-type anti-ship, air-to-air, and air-to-ground missiles – is comparable to the Russian Su-33 jet and the American F-18. It did not say when the landing on the carrier took place.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Egyptian president claims decree granting him greater powers is only temporary and says he is committed to democratic dialogue Egypt's president, Mohamed Morsi, has tried to defuse the backlash against a decree issued last week that granted him sweeping powers by calling for dialogue with political opponents and stressing the temporary nature of his decree. After being locked in a meeting with his advisers for much of Sunday, Morsi issued a statement in which he declared his "firm commitment to engage all political forces in the inclusive democratic dialogue to reach a common ground". The statement also stressed the temporary nature of measures "which are not meant to concentrate powers, but on the contrary devolve it [to a] democratically elected parliament". There have been reports that Morsi may issue an addendum to the decree to limit the expansive powers he has granted himself. The attempt to defuse the row comes as supporters and opponents of the Muslim Brotherhood plan further demonstrations on Tuesday, which many fear could lead to the continuation of violence that has seen more than 500 people injured in protests since Friday. The Cairo stock market plunged nearly 10% on Sunday as a result of the crisis and was halted only by automatic curbs. It was the worst fall since the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak in February 2011. The decree Morsi issued last Thursday gave him far-ranging powers, including immunity from judicial oversight regarding any laws he issues until a parliament and constitution is in place. Morsi also protected the upper body of parliament, the Shura council, and the constituent assembly tasked with drafting Egypt's constitution from court appeals. A court verdict due in December could have invalidated the assembly. Tens of thousands protested on Friday at what was has been seen as a blatant power grab to benefit the Muslim Brotherhood and its monopoly on the assembly. Offices of the Muslim Brotherhood's political arm, the Freedom and Justice party (FJP) , were set ablaze in Alexandria, Port Said and Mahalla. In Cairo, police fired tear gas and shotguns at protesters and built a wall on a main road to Tahrir to keep crowds away. The backlash extended to the corridors of the judiciary, with judges locked in continuous meetings and on partial strike. After Sunday's meeting, Morsi also requested a meeting with senior judges to discuss a way out of the impasse. A similar request by the FJP to meet with secular political forces up in arms about the decree was flatly refused until Morsi rescinded the decree. Political opposition parties and movements have called for another mass protest in Tahrir Square on Tuesday, with the Muslim Brotherhood planning a counter-protest in support of Morsi, whose location was changed from the city centre area of Abdin near Tahrir to Cairo University to avoid clashes.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | President Mohamed Morsi's moves to consolidate power triggers financial jitters, amid growing concerns over political instability Egypt's stock market has plummeted in its first trading session since the Islamist president expanded his authority last week, triggering violent protests and a political crisis. More than 500 people have been injured in demonstrations since Friday, when Egyptians awoke to news that Mohamed Morsi had issued a decree widening his powers and shielding them from judicial review. Supporters and opponents of the Muslim Brotherhood are planning further demonstrations on Tuesday, which many fear could lead to more violence. The stock market fall of nearly 10% – halted only by automatic curbs – was the worst since the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak in February 2011. "We are back to square one, politically and socially," said Mohamed Radwan, an analyst at Pharos Securities, an Egyptian brokerage firm. Leftwingers, liberals, socialists and others say Morsi's move to consolidate power exposes the autocratic impulses of a man once jailed by Mubarak, while Islamist parties have rallied behind him. "There is no room for dialogue when a dictator imposes the most oppressive, abhorrent measures and then says 'let us split the difference'," Mohamed ElBaradei, prominent opposition leader, said. "I am waiting to see, I hope soon, a very strong statement of condemnation by the US, by Europe and by everybody who really cares about human dignity." Activists opposed to the Morsi decree camped out in central Cairo for a third consecutive day. State media reported that the president met his advisers for a second day. "I am really afraid that the two camps are paving the way for violence," said Hassan Nafaa, a professor of political science at Cairo University. "Morsi has misjudged this, very much so. But forcing him again to relinquish what he has done will appear a defeat." Morsi's decree has drawn warnings from the west to uphold democracy, only days after he was commended by the US and others for his work brokering a deal to end eight days of violence between Israel and Hamas. "Investors know that Morsi's decisions will not be accepted and that there will be clashes on the street," said Osama Mourad of Arab Financial Brokerage. Investors had grown more confident in recent months that a legitimately elected government would help Egypt put its economic and political problems behind it. The stock market's main index had risen 35% since Morsi's victory. Last week investor confidence was buoyed by a preliminary agreement with the International Monetary Fund over a $4.8bn loan needed to shore up state finances. The Morsi decree, issued on Thursday, marks an effort to expand his influence after he successfully sidelined Mubarak generals in August. Analysts say it reflects Muslim Brotherhood suspicions of sections of a judiciary that is largely unreformed from the Mubarak era. The decree defends from judicial review decisions taken by Morsi until a new parliament is elected. That vote is expected early next year. It also shields the Islamist-dominated assembly writing Egypt's constitution from a series of legal challenges that have threatened the body with dissolution, and offers the same protection to the Islamist-controlled upper house of parliament. Many of Morsi's opponents share the view that Egypt's judiciary needs reform, but they see the decree as a threat to the country's nascent democracy.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Another round of climate change talks has every chance of suffering the same fate as the others: stalemate and failure • Doha has a special place in the history of diplomacy. Talks started there in 2001 under the World Trade Organisation, aimed at solving trade barriers that penalise the poor. The Doha round dragged on to 2008 without conclusion and is now in limbo. Doha is a byword for stalemate and failure. So when the United Nations chose the Qatari capital as the location for this year's round of climate change talks, starting on Monday, there was a collective groan from greens. There is every prospect these negotiations will suffer the same fate. The history of climate talks is as unpromising as the location – this year, the negotiations "celebrated" their 20th birthday, but after all that talking there is still no global treaty stipulating cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, and the best governments are now hoping for is to draw up an agreement in the next three years that would not come into force until 2020. • This year marks the end of the first commitment period of the 1997 Kyoto protocol. But it was never ratified by the US, contains no obligations for developing countries and has been abandoned by others. Kyoto will limp on, as the EU and some developing countries want it, but without an effective new treaty there will be no global resolve to tackle emissions. Compared with the urgent warnings from scientists – that we are on the edge of a "climate cliff" and only urgent drastic emissions cuts will save us from a world of extreme weather – the less-than-snail's pace of these negotiations looks not just absurd but dangerous. In frustration, some have suggested scrapping the talks. But without them, what mechanism would there be to enjoin all countries, developed and developing, to take the action needed? The UN provides the only forum where all countries have an equal say. • The fortnight-long talks, which take place each year in the weeks leading up to Christmas, provide little in the way of spectacle, but sometimes stray into bad pantomime. Negotiators spend their days and long stretches of the night locked in technical discussions over such arcana as LULUCF (land use, land use change and forestry, since you ask) and the CDM (clean development mechanism, a form of carbon trading). Adjusting the placement of a comma can take hours, and the texts are thick with square brackets, denoting all the terms that have not yet been settled. Only the presence of campaigning groups pulling stunts outside the halls – dressing as polar bears is a favourite, and every day the most recalcitrant negotiator is crowned "fossil of the day" – enlivens the proceedings. This year's accessory of choice looks to be the Homer Simpson mask, imploring governments not to put the "D'oh!" into Doha. (The jokes don't get any better as the talks drag on.) For the final three days, the ministers arrive and the real work begins. Last year, in Durban, the talks ran on past the final Friday night deadline, through Saturday and only finished as dawn broke on Sunday. All that achieved was an agreement to keep talking, setting a deadline of 2015 for drafting a potential treaty. • While the diplomats dither, time is running out. Global greenhouse gas emissions are still rising, having barely registered a blip from the financial crisis and recession. As a world, we are doing worse than ever on climate change, just when we need to be doing better – if emissions do not peak by 2020, scientists have warned, we may lose forever the chance to contain climate change to manageable levels. On current trends, the world is headed for 6C of warming, a level not seen for millions of years and that would cause chaos, according to the International Energy Agency. Fatih Birol, chief economist, says: "I don't see enough of a sense of urgency. We do not have time to waste. We need progress at these talks." Achim Steiner, executive director of the UN environment programme, warns: "While governments work to negotiate a new international climate agreement, they urgently need to put their foot firmly on the action pedal." • Every conference centre, every hotel the delegates will inhabit, every piece of modern infrastructure in the city of Doha has been built on its oil and gas wealth. This is the first time the talks have been held in an oil-rich Middle Eastern country, and the UN evidently hoped the choice of site would encourage countries that have long been among the most hostile to a climate agreement. Ironically, the Middle East is facing energy issues of its own. The IEA has just forecast that the US will be the world's biggest oil and gas producer within the decade, thanks to the bonanza of shale gas and oil. This will redraw the geopolitical power map, and the economics of energy, and should make for interesting chats among the US and Saudi delegations. • Barack Obama's re-election stands out as one bright spot. Although climate barely rated a mention during the campaign, even while superstorm Sandy raged, Obama will be looking to his legacy. This year's weather – Sandy, a drought in the US that pushed up food prices, disruption to the Indian monsoon, floods in Europe – was accompanied by some stark warnings. Satellite pictures showed melting across almost the entire Greenland ice sheet. The Arctic sea ice shrank to its lowest recorded extent. As negotiators gather in their air-conditioned conference rooms, they might want to spare a glance for the world outside. You can't put square brackets around the ice cap.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Minute-by-minute report: Rafael Benítez got a reception frostier than Mr Frost's breakfast bowl of Frosties, but Chelsea claimed a point against the champions
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Decision by Sears, Target, Walmart to open on Thursday contributes to 1.8% fall in retail sales in stores Thanksgiving shopping on Thursday took a noticeable bite out of Black Friday's start to the holiday season, as the latest survey found retail sales in stores fell slightly from last year. Saturday's report from retail technology company ShopperTrak estimated that consumers spent $11.2bn at stores across the US. That is down 1.8% from last year's total. This year's Friday results appear to have been tempered by hundreds of thousands of shoppers hitting sales on Thursday evening. Retailers including Sears, Target and Walmart got their deals rolling as early as 8pm on Thursday. Online shopping also may have cut into the take at brick-and-mortar stores: IBM said online sales rose 17.4% on Thanksgiving and 20.7% on Black Friday, compared with 2011. However, ShopperTrak said retail foot traffic increased 3.5%, to more than 307.67 million store visits, indicating that at least some shoppers were browsing but not spending freely. "Black Friday continues to be an important day in retail," said ShopperTrak's founder, Bill Martin. "This year, though, more retailers than last year began their door-buster deals on Thursday, Thanksgiving itself. So while foot traffic did increase on Friday, those Thursday deals attracted some of the spending that's usually meant for Friday." The company estimated that shopper foot traffic rose the most in the Midwest, up 12.9% compared with last year. Traffic rose the least, 7.6%, in the Northeast, parts of which are still recovering from Superstorm Sandy. ShopperTrak, which counts foot traffic and its own proprietary sales numbers from 25,000 retail outlets across the US, had forecast that Black Friday sales would grow 3.8% this year, to $11.4bn. While consumer confidence has been improving, many people are still worried about the slow economic recovery, high unemployment and whether a gridlocked Congress can avert tax increases and government spending cuts – the so-called "fiscal cliff" that is set to occur automatically in January. Some would-be shoppers said they were not impressed with the discounts, or that there wasn't enough inventory of the big door-busters. "As far as deals, they weren't there," said Tammy Stempel, 48, of Gladstone, Oregon. "But businesses have to be successful, too. I'm hoping they extend the deals through December." Many shoppers around the country were armed with iPads and smart phones, to check prices as well as buy. The online auction and shopping site eBay reported more than 2.5 times the number of mobile transactions compared to last year, and online retailers worked as hard as brick-and-mortar stores to draw customers, sending each of their subscribers an average of 5.9 promotional emails during the seven days through Black Friday, an all-time high, according to marketing software company Responsys. IBM, which tracks more than a million transactions at 500 online retailers each day, said its data showed 24% of online shoppers used a mobile device to check out a retailer's site and about 16% of online purchases were made on a mobile device. But while total online spending rose sharply, the value of the average online order dipped about 5%, to $181.22. IBM said combined sales of consumer electronics, printers and other office supplies were up only 8%, with average order prices of $326.05. Sales of appliances and other home goods rose the most, up about 28% from Black Friday last year. Clothing sales rose 17.5%, department-store sales grew just under 17% and sales of health and beauty products rose 11%. Despite the throngs in stores Thursday night and Friday, many shoppers held off until Saturday, hoping for shorter lines and less drama. For the entire holiday sales season of November and December, ShopperTrak has predicted that sales should rise 3.3% over last year. Those two months are crucial for retailers and can account for up to 40% of stores' annual revenue.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Vehicle driving into church premises at Jaji military barracks in Kaduna detonated bomb that also left dozens injured At least five people were killed and dozens injured on Sunday when a car bomb exploded at a church inside the Jaji military barracks in Nigeria's northern Kaduna state, a military source said. "I saw five bodies and scores injured," a military officer who witnessed the bombing told Reuters, asking not to be named. "A car drove into the church premises … then detonated the bomb," one of the military officers told Reuters, asking not to be named. The National Emergency Agency confirmed there had been an explosion inside the barracks and said it was "likely at a worship centre". Kaduna state in northern Nigeria has been the target of several bomb attacks this year, including on churches. Some have been claimed by Islamist sect Boko Haram, a group which has killed hundreds in an insurgency this year.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Minute-by-minute report: How will Liverpool manager Brendan Rodgers get on on his return to Swansea? Find out with Daniel Harris
  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Republican group's jailed paramilitaries refused to wash and smeared cell walls in faeces, in echo of IRA inmates in 1980s Continuity IRA prisoners have ended their "dirty protest" in Maghaberry top-security prison on the outskirts of Belfast. In a communique sent to the Guardian on Sunday, the so-called "commanding officer" of the CIRA in the jail said they would suspend their protest from Monday. CIRA inmates have been refusing to wash and in some cases smearing their cells with excrement in the same way IRA prisoners did during the H-block crisis in the Maze prison, in the years prior to the 1981 hunger strike. The dissident republican terror group began its protest six months ago in opposition to full body searches as part of the prison's security regime. The CIRA has joined the other republican factions represented in the jail who have ended the no-wash dirty protest. In their statement, the CIRA spokesman said: "Now after 18 months of this second phase of protest, we believe that we have shown the prison regime our resolve and determination to oppose conditions not befitting Republican prisoners of war. We also believe we can afford them the opportunity at this juncture to implement the agreement. "It is our hope that with this magnanimous gesture, the prison regime will now honour their word. As Republicans we will not shirk our responsibility and we believe that it is now necessary for us to take this lead in bringing the agreement to its conclusion. "To all who have supported us up to this point, we ask for your continued support. We salute all people across the world who have worked on our behalf. We thank our families and our friends and Cahair (a prisoner support group) who have given us unswerving support and assistance. " The disputes inside the prison, where up to 30 republican dissident paramilitaries are held, has spilled outside the jail. At the start of this month, the larger New IRA faction murdered Maghaberry prison officer David Black as he drove along the M1 motorway on his way to work.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Region's leader Artur Mas, who has promised independence referendum, is expected to fall short of overall majority Catalans have begun voting in elections that could lead to the north-eastern region breaking away from Spain, after the region's leader Artur Mas made the running in the campaign by vowing to hold a referendum on independence for rich but indebted Catalonia. Unlike the Scottish referendum set for 2014 in agreement with London, the central government in Spain has pledged to block an independence vote for Catalonia by appealing to the constitutional court, which stopped the Basque country from holding a similar plebiscite in 2008. Voting closes at 8pm local time (19:00 GMT), and exit polls are expected shortly afterwards. A Sigma Dos opinion poll for the Guardian on Thursday predicted that Mas's Convergència i Unió (CiU) party would fall 9-11 seats short of an overall majority in the Catalan parliament, meaning he would have to reach deals with smaller parties to hold the referendum he has promised within a four-year mandate. "Catalonia is one of the oldest nations in Europe and the world. We have overcome all our difficulties: we have fought the military and dictatorships, and we're still alive," Mas said on Friday, the last day of campaigning allowed by law. Apart from opposition in Madrid, and heading for fewer seats than he won in the last elections two years ago, one of Mas's biggest difficulties is uncertainty over whether a newly independent Catalonia could remain within the European Union and the euro currency. The European commission president, José Manuel Barroso, said in Spain last weekend that EU treaties required breakaway states to join the queue for membership. Catalonia has its own distinct language and culture, and many Catalans think they would be better off without Spain, because some estimates show they pay more in tax than they get back from Madrid. In September, 1.5 million people flocked to an independence rally in Catalonia, which prompted Mas to call for early elections and a referendum. In 1934, the Spanish army put down an independence revolt led by the then Catalan leader Lluís Companys, which added to simmering tension before the 1936-39 civil war. Francisco Franco's ensuing dictatorship suppressed all regional aspirations for decades, but after his death Spain adopted a democratic constitution in 1978 giving considerable autonomy to all 17 of the country's regions, including Catalonia. A recent survey by the Catalan-government-funded research group CEO estimated that 57% of Catalans would vote to split from Spain, although Sigma Dos showed that many Catalans would be reluctant to part with the Spanish language, passports or Lionel Messi and his Barça teammates playing football in its Primera Liga. Spanish business leaders – many of them Catalans – have said independence would have dire consequences for Catalonia, which would lose its main market, and for Spain, which relies on the region for almost one-fifth of its economic output. José Manuel Lara, head of the Barcelona-based publishing group Planeta, threatened to move what is the world's sixth-largest publisher away from Catalonia if the region should secede from Spain. "There is no publishing business that has its headquarters in a foreign country, or one which speaks another language," Lara said in September. For the central government in Madrid, moves towards Catalan independence could unsettle financial markets as Spain struggles to convince its European partners that it can borrow money at affordable rates and thus avoid a bailout in order to balance the books in a country hit by its worst economic crisis in decades. "There was no point holding elections when the priority should have been fighting the crisis," the Spanish prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, said after the EU summit in Brussels on Friday. Struggling to remain the second-largest party in the Catalan parliament, the Socialists have voiced frustration that high unemployment and unpopular spending cuts have not been prominent in campaigning, although across Spain they have sparked massive street protests and, on 14 November, the country's second general strike this year.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | At least five Shias killed and more than 90 wounded after explosion during Ashura procession in Dera Ismail Khan The Taliban have said it carried out a bombing that killed at least five people and wounded more than 90 others at a Shia religious procession in north-west Pakistan on Sunday. At least 30 people died in five attacks on the minority Muslim sect over the past five days, while about 100 have been wounded in the runup to the annual Ashura holiday, which commemorates the 7th-century death of the prophet Muhammad's grandson. The schism between Sunni Muslims and Shias dates to that time. The explosion occurred as hundreds of Shias were passing through the main intersection of Dera Ismail Khan city, a police officer, Abdul Sattar, said. Preliminary investigations suggest a bomb had been planted near a shop along the procession route, he added. Several of the injured are in a serious condition, said a local hospital official, Faridullah Mahsud, who added that three members of a paramilitary unit providing security were among the injured. Mahsud confirmed the five deaths. The Pakistani Taliban, a Sunni extremist group, frequently attack Shias, whom they consider heretics. Ashura ceremonies are a prime target as they draw large crowds that march to mourn the martyred Imam Hussein. Qais Abbas, a witness, said the procession had been passing through the Chogla intersection of the city when the bomb went off. One of his relatives remained in a critical condition, he said, but he and others were moving the wounded to better-equipped hospitals. "Here we are not getting proper care for the injured, there are not enough doctors or medicines," he said. The same city was hit by a similar bombing on Saturday, which killed seven and injured 30. On Wednesday night, a Taliban suicide bomber struck a Shia Muslim procession in Rawalpindi, a garrison city near Islamabad, killing 17. Also on Wednesday, extremists detonated two bombs outside a Shia mosque in the southern city of Karachi, killing one person and wounding 15 others. The Pakistani Taliban have claimed responsibility for all the attacks. Its spokesman, Ehasanullah Ehsan, said the group would not relent and "looks forward to more [attacks]". The authorities have deployed thousands of police officers across the country to bolster security for the holy day. Mobile phone service has been shut down in major cities to prevent further bombings, which officials say often use phones as remote detonators.
 | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Blaze broke out at the seven-storey factory on Saturday and firefighters recovered more than 100 bodies on Sunday morning At least 112 people have been killed in a fire that raced through a multi-storey garment factory just outside of Bangladesh's capital, Dhaka. The blaze broke out at the seven-storey factory operated by Tazreen Fashions late on Saturday. By Sunday morning, firefighters had recovered 100 bodies, fire department operations director major Mohammad Mahbub said. He said another 12 people who had suffered injuries after jumping from the building to escape the fire later died at hospitals. The death toll could rise as the search for victims was continuing, he said. Mahbub said army soldiers and border guards had been deployed to help police keep the situation under control as thousands of anxious relatives of the factory workers gathered at the scene. He would not say how many people were still missing. Bangladesh has some 4,000 garment factories, many without proper safety measures. The country annually earns about $20 billion from exports of garment products, mainly to the United States and Europe.
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