Elevated risk factors linked to major cardiovascular disease events across a lifetime

Elevated risk factors linked to major cardiovascular disease events across a lifetime

Thursday, January 26, 2012

In one of the largest-ever analyses of lifetime risks for cardiovascular disease (CVD), researchers have found that middle-aged adults who have one or more elevated traditional risk factors for CVD, such as high blood pressure, have a substantially greater chance of having a major CVD event, such as heart attack or stroke, during their remaining lifetime than people with optimal levels of risk factors. This National Institutes of Health-supported study used health data from 257,384 people and was the first to look simultaneously at multiple risk factors for CVD across age, sex, race, and birth generation.

The paper will be published in the January 26 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

"This paper adds to the substantial body of evidence that modifiable cardiovascular disease risk factors in healthy men and women heavily influence the likelihood of developing cardiovascular disease later in life, regardless of their backgrounds," said Susan B. Shurin, M.D., acting director of the NIH's National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.

"Prevention of cardiovascular disease is a lifetime opportunity for and a responsibility of individuals, families, communities, and the health care system. This paper reinforces that cardiovascular disease can be prevented and controlled throughout the course of an adult's lifetime," she added.

As part of the Cardiovascular Lifetime Risk Pooling Project, investigators analyzed 50 years of data from 18 existing cohort, or population-based, studies in the United States. The investigators pooled the data from the 18 cohorts and measured traditional CVD risk factors ? including high blood pressure, high cholesterol levels, diabetes, and smoking status ? in men and women from both black and white populations at ages 45, 55, 65, and 75 years.

Men who were 55 years old with at least two major risk factors were six times as likely to die from CVD by age 80 as were men with none or one CVD risk factor (29.6 percent vs. 4.7 percent). Women with at least two major risk factors were three times as likely to die from CVD as were women with no or one CVD risk factor (20.5 percent vs. 6.4 percent).

When all CVD events ? fatal and non-fatal ? were considered, the results were even more striking. Forty-five-year-old men with two or more risk factors had a 49.5 percent chance of having a major CVD event through age 80, while 45-year-old women had a 30.7 percent chance. On the other hand, men with optimal risk factor levels only had a 1.4 percent chance of having a major CVD event, while women had a 4.1 percent chance of having a major CVD event through age 80.

The results from each individual study were consistent with one another and with those of the pooled group, and showed that traditional risk factors predicted a person's long-term development of CVD more than age. All of the risk factors appeared to carry the same levels of risk as they did 20, 30, or 40 years ago. While black Americans had a higher prevalence of CVD risk factors than white Americans, their lifetime risks were similar when their risk factor profiles were similar.

"In general, previous studies have only looked at CVD risk factors across one specific age or gender in white populations," said Donald M. Lloyd-Jones, M.D., principal investigator of the study and an associate professor and chair of the Department of Preventive Medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago. "We analyzed an enormous pool of available data, which allowed for a more precise estimate of lifetime CVD risks across the age, sex, race, and risk factor spectrum."

Lloyd-Jones added, "These data have important implications for prevention. We need to get more serious about promoting healthy lifestyles in children and young adults, since even mild elevations in risk factors by middle age seem to have profound effects on the remaining lifetime risks for CVD."

The NHLBI supported several of the cohort studies involved, including the Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Study, Cardiovascular Heart Study, Framingham Heart Study, Framingham Offspring Study, Honolulu Heart Program, Puerto Rico Heart Health Program, and Women's Health Initiative.

"This paper illustrates the power of pooling data from epidemiological studies," said Michael Lauer, M.D., director of the NHLBI's Division of Cardiovascular Sciences. "Because of the U.S. government's investments in these studies, it was possible for the investigators to gather and analyze data on over a quarter of a million people, which could lead to substantial public health and clinical practice implications."

"It is important for adults to know their blood pressure and cholesterol numbers and whether they are at risk for diabetes and also to understand the different approaches they can take to prevent or control their risks for CVD. As American Heart Month approaches in February, this paper underscores the importance of raising awareness of heart disease and coronary heart disease ? the most common type of heart disease and the number one killer of both men and women in the United States," said Lloyd-Jones and Shurin.

In an effort to help people reduce their risks of cardiovascular disease, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services recently launched the Million Hearts Campaign, a national initiative to prevent 1 million heart attacks and strokes over the next five years.

Also, in December 2010, in an effort to promote healthy behaviors and prevent diseases, including cardiovascular disease, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services launched Healthy People 2020. Healthy People 2020 and its specific, measurable health objectives represent the nation's disease prevention and health promotion goals for the coming decade.

###

NIH/National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute: http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov

Thanks to NIH/National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute for this article.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/117092/Elevated_risk_factors_linked_to_major_cardiovascular_disease_events_across_a_lifetime

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NASA renames Earth-observing mission in honor of satellite pioneer

ScienceDaily (Jan. 25, 2012) ? NASA has renamed its newest Earth-observing satellite in honor of the late Verner E. Suomi, a meteorologist at the University of Wisconsin who is recognized widely as "the father of satellite meteorology." The announcement was made Jan. 24 at the annual meeting of the American Meteorological Society in New Orleans.

NASA launched the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System Preparatory Project, or NPP, on Oct. 28, 2011, from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. NPP was renamed Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership, or Suomi NPP. The satellite is the first designed to collect critical data to improve short-term weather forecasts and increase understanding of long-term climate change.

"Verner Suomi's many scientific and engineering contributions were fundamental to our current ability to learn about Earth's weather and climate from space," said John Grunsfeld, associate administrator of NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington." Suomi NPP not only will extend more than four decades of NASA satellite observations of our planet, it also will usher in a new era of climate change discovery and weather forecasting."

The Suomi NPP mission is a bridge between NASA's Earth Observing System satellites to the next-generation Joint Polar Satellite System, or JPSS, a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) program. JPSS is the civilian component of the former National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS), which was reorganized by the Obama Administration in 2010.

"The new name now accurately describes the mission," said Michael Freilich, director of the Earth Science Division in NASA's Science Mission Directorate. "Suomi NPP will advance our scientific knowledge of Earth and improve the lives of Americans by enabling more accurate forecasts of weather, ocean conditions and the terrestrial biosphere. The mission is the product of a partnership between NASA, NOAA, the Department of Defense, the private sector and academic researchers."

Verner Suomi pioneered remote sensing of Earth from satellites in polar orbits a few hundred miles above the surface with Explorer 7 in 1959, and geostationary orbits thousands of miles high with ATS-1 in 1966. He was best known for his invention of the "spin-scan" camera which enabled geostationary weather satellites to continuously image Earth, yielding the satellite pictures commonly used on television weather broadcasts. He also was involved in planning interplanetary spacecraft missions to Venus, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune.

Suomi spent nearly his entire career at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where in 1965 he founded the university's Space Science and Engineering Center with funding from NASA. The center is known for Earth-observing satellite research and development. In 1964, Suomi served as chief scientist of the U.S. Weather Bureau for one year. He received the National Medal of Science in 1977. He died in 1995 at the age of 79.

"It is fitting that such an important and innovative partnership pays tribute to a pioneer like Verner Suomi," said Mary Kicza, assistant administrator for NOAA's Satellite and Information Service. "Suomi NPP is an extremely important mission for NOAA. Its advanced instruments will improve our weather forecasts and understanding of the climate and pave the way for JPSS, our next generation of weather satellites."

Suomi NPP currently is in its initial checkout phase before starting regular observations with all of its five instruments. Commissioning activities are expected to be completed by March. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., manages the Suomi NPP mission for the Earth Science Division of the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. The JPSS program provides the satellite ground system and NOAA provides operational support.

For more information about Verner Suomi's career, visit: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/Suomi/

For more information about the Suomi NPP mission, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/npp

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Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/EoaLc0OAnKs/120125093918.htm

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Time Warner leads funding for second social TV company (Reuters)

(Reuters) ? Media conglomerate Time Warner Inc is leading a $12 million round of funding into a start-up company that analyzes tweets and Facebook posts as people watch their favorite TV programs.

Social TV analytics company Bluefin Labs is also backed in its second round of funding by another new investor, SoftBank Capital, as well as existing backers Redpoint Ventures and Lerer Ventures.

Time Warner, whose networks include Turner, CNN and HBO, has previously backed GetGlue, a social entertainment company that allows U.S. TV viewers to "check-in" when they are watching their favorite shows.

Time Warner investments executive Rachel Lam said the latest investment in Bluefin showed that the company sees engaging and understanding TV viewers as important to its future as more viewers share their opinions and experiences about TV through social media.

"For Time Warner it's pretty important to understand where the social data might take us and how it impacts television programming as well as the advertising," said Lam, who will join Bluefin's board.

Boston-based Bluefin launched its flagship analytics service Bluefin Signals last July for clients to analyze and organize social media conversations about U.S. national television.

The company said clients use the social data about TV shows and commercials to help make buying and selling decisions. Bluefin's clients include TV networks, marketers and agencies including CBS Corp, Discovery Communications Turner Networks, Starcom MediaVest, MediaCom and MTV.

To date it has collected data from more than 11,000 shows and analyzes more than 5 billion pieces of social media commentary every month.

Bluefin Chief Executive Deb Roy said his company will focus on expanding its sales efforts to get the service to more clients who want to better understand the viewers as consumers of programming as well as advertising.

"You can use understanding of social media to better optimize your advertising to consumers," Roy said.

(Reporting By Yinka Adegoke; Editing by Maureen Bavdek)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/tv/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120124/tv_nm/us_timewarner_bluefin

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Indiana Right To Work: AFL-CIO Airing Ad Targeting Mitch Daniels During SOTU Response

WASHINGTON -- A labor union is using Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels' (R) high-profile speech on Tuesday night to remind viewers of the governor's change of heart on controversial right-to-work legislation.

Daniels will be giving the official GOP response to President Obama's State of the Union message on Tuesday.

In his own state, Daniels and the GOP-controlled state legislature are locked in a standoff with Democrats over right to work, which would bar unions from automatically collecting dues from workers' paychecks at private companies.

The Indiana AFL-CIO will begin airing a new television ad on the issue across the state during evening broadcasts and nationally on CNN and MSNBC on Tuesday in conjunction with the State of the Union.

The ad, called "What," will contrast his current support for right to work with the fact that in the past, he spoke out against such legislation.

"We cannot afford to have civil wars over issues that might divide us and divert us from that path. I have said over and over, I'll say it again tonight: I'm a supporter of the labor laws we have in the state of Indiana," he said in a speech to the Teamsters 135 Union Stewards Dinner on Sept. 23, 2006. "I'm not interested in changing any of it. Not the prevailing wage laws, and certainly not the right to work law. We can succeed in Indiana with the laws we have, respecting the rights of labor, and fair and free competition for everybody."

"As Governor Daniels prepares to give the national Republican response to the State of the Union, this is an opportunity to show the nation just how far he's strayed from the Hoosier values he once claimed to represent," said Indiana State AFL-CIO President Nancy Guyott. "He has gone from opposing partisan right-to-work legislation that he said was bad for Indiana to flip-flopping on the issue now that he's more interested in becoming a right-wing darling and doing the bidding of his undisclosed donors."

Daniels' office has admitted that he did once believe Indiana did not need to change its labor laws, but he has since shifted his position.

"[T]wo things in particular have changed his mind and led to his support of right to work legislation: Indiana misses many job opportunities and the significant downturn in the national economy," Daniels spokeswoman Jane Jankowski recently told The Huffington Post.

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Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/23/indiana-right-work-mitch-daniels-sotu-afl-cio_n_1224651.html

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RIM's Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis are out, new CEO Thorsten Heins may license BlackBerry 10

After months upon months of investor backlash, RIM's making some significant changes. And by "significant," we mean the co-chief executives (and founders) are out. As of tomorrow, both Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis will be stepping away from the top posts, enabling "a little-known company insider" to take over, according to The Wall Street Journal. Purportedly, this is all part of "a board and management shuffle," with COO Thorsten Heins (seen above) to step into what many expect to be an impossible role to thrive in. The Globe and Mail asserts that he'll be immediately seeking a Chief Marketing Officer to polish up the company's severely damaged brand, and he "will not rule out licensing RIM's new BlackBerry 10 operating system to other handset manufacturers." In an interview with the outlet, he stated that he'll be executing "flawlessly" and with vigor -- not unexpected, but still, bold words.

Startlingly, Heins also asserted that he's "confident" in the existing lineup of BlackBerry handsets and the software update recently made available for the PlayBook; call us crazy, but he'd be wise to just spout out reality and make clear that RIM's existing lineup is nowhere near competitive in the grand scheme of things. As for Mike and Jim? The former will become "vice-chair of the board with special duties to examine innovation," with the latter becoming a traditional director. In an interesting move, outgoing co-CEO Lazaridis stated the following: "I think it's that unwillingness to sacrifice our long-term value for short-term gain. That's why we didn't choose Android. That's why we decided to build the future on QNX." So wait, RIM had the chance to choose Android... and didn't? No time like the present to reach back and shake things up, Mr. Thorsten.

Continue reading RIM's Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis are out, new CEO Thorsten Heins may license BlackBerry 10

RIM's Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis are out, new CEO Thorsten Heins may license BlackBerry 10 originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 22 Jan 2012 21:28:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Peter Rojas (Twitter)  |  The Wall Street Journal (1), (2), The Globe and Mail, RIM  | Email this | Comments

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2012/01/22/rim-ceo-quits/

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NW storm cuts power, thousands try to stay warm (AP)

SEATTLE ? Tens of thousands of Pacific Northwest residents faced the prospect of a chilly weekend after a powerful storm brought snow and ice and left a tangle of fallen trees and damaged power lines. Several Oregon counties saw their worst flooding in more than a decade.

The National Weather Service forecast more rain and winds gusting as high as 40 mph Saturday in Western Washington, a combination that could bring down even more snow-laden and ice-damaged trees.

Nearly 230,000 customers were without power late Friday night in Western Washington, about 220,000 of them Puget Sound Energy customers.

The utility has brought in repair crews from across the West and planned to field more than 800 linemen on Saturday, in addition to tree-trimming crews, spokesman Roger Thompson said.

"The wind is a wild card that could set us back," he said, adding PSE hoped to have the majority of the outages restored by Sunday, although some customers will probably be without power into early next week.

The Weather Service predicted weekend lows in the mid-30s.

Several warming shelters have been opened in the area to aid people whose homes are without heat.

Despite warnings from emergency officials, the first cases of possible carbon monoxide poisoning surfaced Friday night. Two families in the Seattle suburb of Kent were taken to hospitals after suffering separate cases of possible poisoning. Both had been using charcoal barbecues indoors for heat.

The storm was already blamed for three deaths. A mother and her 1-year-old son died after torrential rain on Wednesday swept away a car from an Albany, Ore., grocery store parking lot. An elderly man was fatally injured Thursday by a falling tree as he was backing an all-terrain vehicle out of a backyard shed near Seattle.

On Washington's Mount Rainier, a blizzard kept rescuers from searching Friday for two campers and two climbers missing since early this week. Just east of that region, about 200 skiers and workers were able to leave the Crystal Mountain ski resort after transportation officials reopened the area's main highway, closed two days earlier by fallen trees.

Near Tacoma, three people escaped unharmed Friday when a heavy snow and ice load on the roof of an Allied Ice plant caused the building to collapse. West Pierce Fire and Rescue Battalion Chief Hallie McCurdy said they heard loud noises and got out just in time.

As floodwaters receded, residents of Oregon's Willamette Valley began taking stock of damage in soaked cities.

Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber paid a visit Friday to the hard-hit town of Turner, where 100 homes were damaged or still underwater.

Friday's mainly dry streets belied a morning of terror barely 24 hours earlier, when emergency crews conducted 55 boat rescues as water filled streets, homes and businesses.

"You just watch the water rise hour by hour, and there's nothing you can do about it," Mayor Paul Thomas said. "It's a long, slower sort of torture."

Kitzhaber said the state would work with local and federal officials to try and get disaster funding to Turner and other communities hard-hit by flooding.

The governor praised residents' strong sense of community as neighbors helped each other.

Nancy Ko saw that spirit first-hand. From the safety of higher ground, she watched a live feed from a security camera as water rose over the curb and lapped against the front door of the convenience store and cafe she owns just feet from Mill Creek.

Out of the blue, five strangers showed up and plopped sandbags in front of the door, preventing damage that she believes would have otherwise been far more severe.

"Just a godsend," said Ko, a Korean immigrant who has owned the store for six years. "Good person, amazing persons."

Elsewhere in the Willamette Valley, a 35-year-old woman who drove a Ford Mustang into 4 feet of floodwater was plucked from the roof Friday by deputies who arrived by boat to save her. It was one of a number of dramatic rescues in western Oregon, left sodden by as much as 10 inches of rain in a day and a half that has brought region's worst flooding in 15 years.

Interstate 5, the main road connecting Seattle and Portland, was briefly closed near Centralia so crews could remove fallen power lines.

Much of Washington's capital, Olympia, was without power.

Gov. Chris Gregoire's office, legislative buildings and other state agencies in Olympia lost electricity for several hours before power was restored. The governor thanked repair crews late Friday by hand-delivering peanut butter cookies.

The storm was "a constant reminder of who's in charge. Mother Nature is in charge, she gives us a wake-up call every once in a while, this is one of those," Gregoire said.

It was still snowing in the Cascades, with up to 2 feet possible in the mountains over the weekend.

At Sea-Tac Airport in Seattle, airlines were trying to accommodate passengers whose flights were canceled Thursday. The airport's largest carrier, Alaska Airlines, canceled 50 of its 120 daily departures Friday. On Thursday, Alaska and sister airline Horizon canceled 310 flights to and from Seattle, affecting 29,000 passengers.

In Seattle, Carly Nelson was negotiating an icy sidewalk on her way to Starbucks. Nelson has been frequenting her neighborhood coffee shop to avoid cabin fever.

"I'm pretty tired of it. It gets old pretty fast. All my friends are stranded in little pockets and you can't get together to go to yoga," she said. "I'm just looking forward to being able to go wherever I want to go."

___

Cooper reported from Oregon. Associated Press writers Doug Esser, Ted Warren, Rachel La Corte, Nigel Duara and Nicholas K. Geranios contributed to this report.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/weather/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120121/ap_on_re_us/us_northwest_storm

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Nicholas Hoult Is 'Beautiful' In 'Warm Bodies'

Teresa Palmer gushed to MTV News about her co-star's zombie performance.
By Josh Wigler, with reporting by Josh Horowitz

Teresa Palmer and Joel Edgerton
Photo: MTV News

If Hollywood can turn vampires and werewolves into sex icons, what's keeping zombies from entering that same sexy stratosphere? Well, there's the whole feasting-on-human-flesh thing to consider, we suppose, not to mention the endless groaning and decaying to boot.

Despite their brain-craving reputation, the walking dead are about to undergo a serious makeover in "Warm Bodies," director Jonathan Levine's adaptation of the Isaac Marion novel set in a post-apocalyptic world where a zombie named R (played by "X-Men: First Class" actor Nicholas Hoult) inexplicably falls in love with Julie Grigio, whose father is a general in the dwindling human resistance.

Teresa Palmer, who plays Julie, spoke with MTV News at the Sundance Film Festival about her work on "Warm Bodies" and why she can't wait to fall in love with a zombie on the big screen.

"I'm just excited to see how Nicholas Hoult comes across on the screen," said Palmer, who's attending Sundance to support her drama "Wish You Were Here." "He was so beautiful to work with. He does such an incredible performance. He's playing a zombie, so he can't say much, but he's very expressive with his eyes."

It's not just Hoult's "beautiful" zombie performance that Palmer fell in love with, but the "Warm Zombies" universe as a whole.

"The world that Jonathan Levine has set up is so epic and so interesting," she said. "It's always very cool when Jonathan Levine does something. I'm really excited to see it."

Are you excited to see zombie love story "Warm Bodies"? Let us know in the comments.

The 2012 Sundance Film Festival is officially under way, and the MTV Movies team is on the ground reporting on the hottest stars and the movies everyone will be talking about in the year to come. Keep it locked with MTV Movies for everything there is to know about Sundance.

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Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1677682/warm-bodies-movie-nicholas-hoult.jhtml

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In video, Giffords' firm and touching farewell

This video image provided by the office of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords shows Giffords announcing her plans to resign, Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012. (AP Photo/Office of Gabrielle Giffords)

This video image provided by the office of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords shows Giffords announcing her plans to resign, Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012. (AP Photo/Office of Gabrielle Giffords)

This video image provided by the Office of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords shows Giffords and her husband, Mark Kelly, walking. Giffords announced Sunday, Jan. 22, 2012 she intends to resign from Congress this week to concentrate on recovering from wounds suffered in an assassination attempt a little more than a year ago. (AP Photo/Office of Gabrielle Giffords)

PHOENIX (AP) ? In part, the short video has the feel of a campaign ad: the strains of soft music, the iconic snapshots of rugged Arizona desert, the candidate earnestly engaged with her constituents.

Interspersed with the slick montage of photos and sound, though, is a video close-up of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords gazing directly at the camera, offering not a campaign promise but a goodbye, a thank-you message to her supporters in a voice that is both firm and halting.

"I have more work to do on my recovery," the congresswoman says at the end of the two-minute-long "A Message from Gabby," appearing to strain with all of her will to communicate. "So to do what's best for Arizona, I will step down this week."

Arizonans had to know in their hearts that this day was coming.

A bullet to the brain, from point-blank range, is a nearly impossible obstacle to overcome, even for a congresswoman known for pluckiness and fight. Giffords seemed to accept that reality in the video announcing her resignation from Congress, which also included a promise to return one day to her mission to help Arizonans.

The clip, posted to YouTube and on her Facebook page, pastes together 13 sentences into a fluid announcement. Giffords wears a bright red jacket eerily similar to the one she was wearing a year ago when she was nearly assassinated. She looks straight into the camera, almost begging the viewer to listen.

But the video also includes images of the 41-year-old struggling at rehab and walking along a leafy street with husband Mark Kelly with an obvious limp. And Giffords acknowledges that, at least for now, she isn't up to taking on a re-election challenge.

The announcement sets off not one but two elections cycles to replace her. The first will be a special primary election that Gov. Jan Brewer must call sometime in April, with a general election in June to fill out the remainder of Giffords' term.

The second cycle will concern the regular full two-year term, with the primary scheduled for August and the general election in November.

In between, the 8th Congressional District that Giffords currently represents will change under redistricting. It will become the 2nd Congressional District.

"We've got someone that's going to move in, hold that seat for the remainder of her (term,) and then we'll have people out there ? probably at the same time ? running for that seat ... with different lines," Gov. Jan Brewer said Sunday. "So it will confuse some people."

Brewer said she spoke with Kelly before the announcement and understood the decision. "...As her husband said, they have sat, and they have discussed this, and that it would be the best thing for her and for her recovery," Brewer said. "And I indicated on the telephone with him that knowing Gabby and what she has accomplished in this last year in her recovery, who knows what's going to happen in the next two years."

The announcement came just over a year after a gunman opened fire at Jan. 8, 2011, meeting with constituents in front of a Tucson grocery store. Six people were killed, and Giffords and 12 others wounded.

At the time, the Democrat had just eked out a razor-thin victory against a tea party candidate in her conservative-leaning district. She won a third term with less than 1 percent margin.

Many in Arizona believed she would be handed an easy victory if she chose to seek another term this year. But Giffords elected not to try.

"A lot has happened over the past year. We cannot change that," she said.

For days after the shooting, it was touch and go. A huge memorial grew in front of the Tucson hospital where she was fighting for her life.

Then, almost miraculously, just two weeks after she was shot, she was whisked off in a jet to a rehabilitation hospital in her astronaut husband's hometown of Houston.

Months of rehab began, with Giffords struggling to learn how to walk and talk again. Just over four months after she was shot, she flew to Florida to watch Kelly, an astronaut, pilot the nation's next-to-last space shuttle mission.

But she remained out of view.

Slowly, in carefully choreographed bits, she began to emerge. The first photos in June. Her surprise August appearance in Congress to vote to raise the federal debt limit. The first halting TV shots, just a few words at a time, then a more complex recording released in November.

Sunday's recording was slightly more elaborate, but it was not a campaign Q&A or an appearance before a tough interviewer.

She's clearly not yet ready for another run for Congress. But she said in Sunday's video that she's not done yet.

"I'm getting better. Every day my spirit is high. I will return, and we will work together for Arizona and this great country," she said.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2012-01-22-Giffords-The%20Announcement/id-58b2ead149d14911af0b47d4c7da04b5

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Report: Undercover police had kids with activists (AP)

LONDON ? Britain's Guardian newspaper said Friday that two undercover police officers have fathered children with the activists they were spying on.

Key details were hazy but the revelations are the latest in a series of reports which has cast doubt on whether undercover police in the U.K. go too far in seeking to infiltrate environmental, animal rights and extremist groups.

British authorities are already preparing a report into the use of undercover officers after one of them caused a trial to collapse when his cover was blown.

The Guardian said that two other police operatives had children while on the job, although the timing of the officers' alleged relationships is unclear.The paper said one of them fathered a child in the 1980s and that another one did so "some years ago." The paper said it was withholding the women and children's names for reasons of privacy.

The newspaper cited one of the now-former police operatives and an unnamed second person as the source for its reporting. An email seeking comment from the ex-officer named in the article was not immediately returned late Friday.

A spokeswoman for Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary, the police body which is looking into the use of undercover officers, said she was checking to see whether the group could comment on report, which is due out in the Guardian's Saturday edition but was available online late Friday.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/world/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120120/ap_on_re_eu/eu_britain_undercover_fathers

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sportsnetworld: Meeting with #canWNT head coach John Herdman this morning. Any questions you'd like asked? GD

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Wikipedia, Google protest US antipiracy proposals (AP)

NEW YORK ? January 18 is a date that will live in ignorance, as Wikipedia started a 24-hour blackout of its English-language articles, joining other sites in a protest of pending U.S. legislation aimed at shutting down sites that share pirated movies and other content.

Reddit.com shut down its social news service for 12 hours. Other sites made their views clear without cutting off surfers. Google blacked out the logo on its home page, directing surfers to a page where they could add their names to a petition against the bills.

Local listings site Craiglist took a middle route, changing its local home pages to a black screen directing users to an anti-legislation page. After 10 seconds, a link to the main site appears on the home page, but some surfers missed that and were fooled into thinking the whole site was blacked out.

The Internet companies are concerned that the Stop Online Piracy Act in the House and the Protect Intellectual Property Act under consideration in the Senate, if passed, could be used to target legitimate sites where users share content.

The 24-hour Wikipedia blackout is an unprecedented move for the online encyclopedia. The decision was reached after polling the community of contributors, but dissenters say political advocacy undermines the site's mission as a neutral source.

However, it's not complete: the block can be bypassed by changing browser settings to disable JavaScript, or by using the version of the site designed for cellphone screens.

There's also a "mirror" or copy, of Wikipedia called The Free Dictionary, but it's not up to date.

___

Online:

Wikipedia for mobiles: http://en.m.wikipedia.org/

"Mirror" site of Wikipedia: http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/topstories/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120118/ap_on_hi_te/us_tec_internet_protest

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France mulls early Afghanistan pullout as 4 killed

U.S. soldiers with the NATO led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) stand guard at the scene of a suicide attack in Kandahar south of Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012. A suicide attacker blew himself up Thursday at an entrance to a sprawling base for U.S. and NATO operations in southern Afghanistan, killing at least six civilians, police said. (AP Photo/Allauddin Khan)

U.S. soldiers with the NATO led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) stand guard at the scene of a suicide attack in Kandahar south of Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012. A suicide attacker blew himself up Thursday at an entrance to a sprawling base for U.S. and NATO operations in southern Afghanistan, killing at least six civilians, police said. (AP Photo/Allauddin Khan)

A U.S. soldier with the NATO led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) walks past by a damaged vehicle at the scene of a suicide attack in Kandahar south of Kabul, Afghanistan, Thursday, Jan. 19, 2012. A suicide attacker blew himself up Thursday at an entrance to a sprawling base for U.S. and NATO operations in southern Afghanistan, killing at least six civilians, police said. (AP Photo/Allauddin Khan)

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) ? France suspended its training operations in Afghanistan and threatened to withdraw its entire force from the country early, after an Afghan wearing an army uniform shot and killed four French troops Friday and wounded others.

The attack ? the second time this month an Afghan soldier has killed French forces ? came during a particularly deadly 24 hours for the international military coalition. Six U.S. Marines also died in a helicopter crash late Thursday.

It was the latest in a series of attacks by members of the Afghan security forces, or those dressed in their uniforms, against coalition partners that have raised fears of increased Taliban infiltration of the Afghan police and army as foreign combat forces prepare to withdraw from the country by 2014. The impact of the French suspending training operations is unclear, but it would result in a major setback for the U.S.-led coalition if other troop-contributing nations stopped training Afghan national security forces or decided to pull out earlier than planned.

French officials said the attack happened during a training exercise at a base jointly operated by French and Afghan forces.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy announced the French deaths in Paris and the suspension of training programs. He did not specify how many French forces or which programs would be affected.

"The French army is in Afghanistan at the service of the Afghans against terrorism and against the Taliban. The French army is not in Afghanistan so that Afghan soldiers can shoot at them," Sarkozy said.

He added that if security for troops is not restored, "then the question of an early withdrawal of the French army would arise."

Defense Minister Gerard Longuet said the French soldiers were unarmed when the attacker opened fire in Gwan in the Kapisa province during a very difficult training exercise at high altitude.

"We don't know at the moment whether it's a Taliban member who infiltrated, or someone who decided (to attack) for reasons that we don't know," he said on France-2 television.

He said the Afghan was in custody of the Afghan army's 3rd brigade, held by a general "whom we trust."

A Taliban spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, praised the Afghan attacker but did not claim he was an infiltrator or provide other details.

Afghan Ministry of Defense spokesman Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi also said the shooting occurred while Afghan and French forces were on a joint operation in Tagab district. He also did not confirm whether the shooter was an Afghan soldier or a militant dressed as one.

"An individual in an Afghan army uniform opened fire over the French troops," he said. "This happened outside the base while they were on an operation."

The ministry sent a delegation to the area to investigate the shooting, he said, confirming that the attacker was arrested and was being questioned.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai expressed deep regret over the attack.

The number of wounded in the attack was unclear.

French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe said 15 troops were wounded but did not indicate their nationalities. Longuet said eight French troops were wounded, and the commanding officer was in serious condition.

Friday was among the most deadly days for French forces in the 10 years they have been serving in the international force in Afghanistan. The latest deaths bring to 82 the number of French troops killed in the Afghan campaign.

"From now on, all the operations of training and combat help by the French army are suspended," Sarkozy said.

The defense minister and the chief of staff of the French army are heading Friday to Kabul. Once they report back, Sarkozy said, the French government will decide how to proceed.

A big part of the French role in Afghanistan recently has been training Afghan troops and police ahead of an expected pullout of the around 3,600 French troops currently there in 2014.

Unpopular at home, Sarkozy is facing a potentially tough re-election campaign for elections in April and May and appeared determined Friday to act swiftly and sternly to the latest troop deaths.

The candidate who tops opinion polls ahead of France's elections, Socialist Francois Hollande, said in a statement Friday that he would aim to pull out French forces by the end of this year if he becomes president.

Friday's attack was all the more painful for the French because it came just weeks after an Afghan army soldier shot and killed two members of the French Foreign Legion serving in the NATO force on Dec. 29. French forces fired back and killed the assailant.

It remained unclear how likely or swift a French pullout could be. France has the fourth-largest force in the international coalition.

"Today there is clearly a new truth. It is not the first time that an Afghan soldier ... assassinates French soldiers," Foreign Minister Juppe said. He called it a question of "responsibility to adapt our timetable for withdrawal by taking into account these new circumstances."

Longuet was more cautious, saying French officials should maintain calm when making any decisions.

Sarkozy said he'd discuss France's role in Afghanistan with Karzai when he visits Paris next week.

Afghan security forces or insurgents dressed in their uniforms have attacked and killed international troops or civilian trainers more than a dozen times in the past two years, according to an Associated Press count.

Earlier this month, a U.S. service member was killed when a man in an Afghan army uniform opened fire at a base in the south of the country.

In one of the worst incidents, a veteran Afghan military pilot opened fire at Kabul airport on April 27, 2011, killing eight U.S. troops and an American civilian contractor.

In Riga, Latvia, NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said this was "a very sad day for our troops in Afghanistan and for the French people," but insisted that such incidents are "isolated."

The helicopter crash, which occurred in the southern Helmand province, was the deadliest in Afghanistan since August, when 30 American troops died after a Chinook helicopter was apparently shot down in Wardak province in the center of the country.

The cause of Thursday's crash is still being investigated, but a coalition statement said there was no enemy activity in the area when it happened.

A senior U.S. defense official said all six reported killed were U.S. Marines and there was no indication that the helicopter had been hit by enemy fire. The defense official spoke on condition of anonymity because the U.S. command in Afghanistan had not yet publicly released details, including the nationalities of the dead.

Taliban spokesman Qari Yousef claimed insurgents shot down the helicopter, a Chinook, in Musa Qala district of Helmand province, killing all on board. The Taliban frequently exaggerate the number of people they claim to have killed.

___

Corbet reported from Paris. Associated Press writers Angela Charlton, Jamey Keaten and Samantha Bordes in Paris, and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2012-01-20-AS-Afghanistan/id-4cc22b3198574d12ab69e3502148edd8

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More child-porn charges added for Washington man

A Washington man paid for access to child sex shows transmitted over the Internet from the Philippines, according to a federal indictment about which details were unsealed today.

Jeffrey W. Herschell, 53, faces charges of possession, production and receipt of materials depicting minors in sex acts.

According to a search warrant affidavit, he used several online services that transmitted live broadcasts of men having sex with girls as young as 5 to 8 years old from the Philippines to subscribers. He also communicated online with one of the girls, age 11, who asked that contributions be sent to her mother, according to the affidavit.

Agents of the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement found child pornography images on Mr. Herschell's computer, the affidavit said.

He was charged with possession of the images in August, and the additional charges were added Tuesday.

Mr. Herschell is represented by Assistant Federal Public Defender Jay. J. Finkelstein, who was not available for comment.

Rich Lord: rlord@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1542.

First published on January 18, 2012 at 11:52 am

Source: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/12018/1204296-100.stm?cmpid=news.xml

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MLK vs. Malcolm X (Theagitator)

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HLTV.org - News: ESC Gaming win EPS Poland

Season three of the Polish ESL Pro Series concluded Monday evening in Warsaw, with ESC Gaming winning their third title in a row, defeating Drunken Five 2-0 in the Grand Final.

The third season of ESL Pro Series was set to conclude in Warsaw's Multikino cinema, where the third place decider, as well as the Grand Final would be played. In the third place decider, DELTA overcame ZKTeam 2-0, which secured them 1,300 Polish zloty, equivalent to ?296.

After hitting delays at the venue, supposedly due to DDoS attacks, the final between ESC Gaming and Drunken Five (former Fear Factory) kicked off. The match started on what is considered as ESC's favorite playground, with the WCG champs starting on the Terrorists side. Little went in favor of Drunken Five in the first half, as the found themselves dominated from start to finish, only gathering four CT rounds before switching sides. From the CT ESC won five rounds straight to win 16-4 and claim a 1-0 lead.

On second map de_inferno D5 started on the CT side, which seemed to fit them, as they managed to build up a 10-5 lead, going into the second half. Despite having a five round lead, D5 were not able to fend off ESC, who secured eleven rounds, versus two for D5, giving the third ESL Pro Series victory in a row to ESC Gaming.

Result

ESL Pro Series Polan..

ESL Pro Series Poland final standings

1. ESC Gaming - 5,000 zloty (?1,138)
2. Drunken Five - 2,500 zloty (?569)
3. DELTA - 1,300 zloty (?269)
4. ZKTeam

Despite not featuring HLTV, the organizers have promised us to send demos at a later stage. With the victory ESC Gaming clinched their third ESL Pro Series title in a row, having won a total of ?3,477 over the course of three seasons.

Source: http://www.hltv.org/news/8035-esc-gaming-win-eps-poland

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Traditional physical autopsies ? not high-tech 'virtopsies' ? still the gold standard for determining cause of death, experts claim

ScienceDaily (Jan. 16, 2012) ? TV crime shows like Bones and CSI are quick to explain each death by showing highly detailed scans and video images of victims' insides. Traditional autopsies, if shown at all, are at best in supporting roles to the high-tech equipment, and usually gloss over the sometimes physically grueling tasks of sawing through skin and bone.

But according to two autopsy and body imaging experts at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, the notion that "virtopsy" could replace traditional autopsy -- made popular by such TV dramas -- is simply not ready for scientifically vigorous prime time. The latest virtual imaging technologies -- including full-body computed tomography (CT) scans, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), ultrasound, X-ray and angiography are helpful, they say, but cannot yet replace a direct physical inspection of the body's main organs.

"The traditional autopsy, though less and less frequently performed, is still the gold standard for determining why and how people really died," says pathologist Elizabeth Burton, M.D., deputy director of the autopsy service at Johns Hopkins.

Burton and Johns Hopkins clinical fellow Mahmud Mossa-Basha, M.D., in an editorial set to appear in the Annals of Internal Medicine online Jan. 17, offer their own assessment of why the numbers of conventional autopsies have steadily declined over the past decade and why, despite this drop, the virtopsy is unlikely to properly replace it anytime soon.

Burton, who has performed well over a thousand autopsies, says current imaging technologies can help tremendously when used in combination with autopsies. "It's not a question of either traditional autopsy or virtopsy," she says, "it's a question of what methods work best in determining cause of death."

The Johns Hopkins experts base their claims on evidence, some of which will also be published in the same edition of Annals, that some common diagnoses are routinely missed when imaging results are compared to autopsy findings, and there is no proof that virtopsy is a more reliable alternative to conventional autopsy, at least, for now.

According to Burton, a visiting associate professor at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, hospital autopsy rates in the United States -- for patients who die of natural causes in hospitals -- whose bodies do not have to be examined by the local medical examiner or coroner -- have fallen from a high of about 50 percent in the 1960s to about 10 percent today. At The Johns Hopkins Hospital, she says, the rate remains close to a once-required standard for hospital accreditation of 25 percent, set as an appropriate goal for teaching medical residents and fellows, and auditing clinical practice.

Burton says many reasons are behind the drop in conventional autopsy rates. Medical overconfidence in diagnostic imaging results partly explains the decline, but is also to blame for the high number of diagnostic errors.

"If we chose the right test at the right time in the right people, and followed clinical guidelines to the letter, then modern diagnostic tests would produce optimal results. But we don't," says Burton.

Burton says such misinterpretations of images, lab results, and physical signs and symptoms, help explain the roughly 23 percent of new diagnoses that are detected by autopsy.

She acknowledges that it also is easier for physicians to rely on existing diagnostic techniques to determine the cause of death than to go through the often uncomfortable task of asking grieving family members for permission to perform a conventional autopsy to confirm the cause of death. Making the process more difficult is that many physicians simply don't know what steps to take, including the paperwork and approvals, to get an autopsy performed.

For many families, dissuading factors include the prospect of delaying funeral arrangements, possible disfigurement to a loved one's body as well as the stress in coping with their loss, and the cost of an autopsy, which can run upwards of $3,000, unless the hospital offers to do it at no charge for teaching or its own auditing purposes.

While diagnostic overconfidence, changing cultural norms and cost may depress autopsy rates, Burton says, overreliance on technology underscores an inherent flaw in switching to virtopsy.

In a German study that accompanies the Hopkins editorial, conventional autopsy and imaging results, as would be seen in virtopsy, were compared for accuracy in 162 people who died in hospital. Some had just virtopsy, while the others had both virtopsy and conventional autopsy. In the 47 who underwent both procedures, 102 new diagnoses were found; while in comparison, 47 new diagnoses were found among the 115 who underwent virtopsy alone. Study results also showed that virtual autopsy by CT scan failed to pick up 20.8 percent of the new diagnoses, while conventional autopsy missed only 13.4 percent.

Medical problems most commonly missed or not seen by autopsy included air pockets in collapsed lungs (which could have impeded breathing) and bone fractures, and the most common diagnoses missed by imaging were heart attack, pulmonary emboli and cancer.

Burton says the study findings are not surprising because, for example, a tumor nodule in the lung could appear on any scan or X-ray image as a small, dense, white spot or so-called coin lesion that could easily be interpreted as a fungal infection, tuberculosis-related granuloma or benign tissue mass. But until the tissue is physically examined in a lab, after biopsy or during traditional autopsy, "there's no way to know the diagnosis with 100 percent certainty."

In addition to diagnostic weaknesses, Mossa-Basha says that perhaps the biggest hurdle for proponents of the virtopsy alternative is the high cost of imaging. Modern ultrasounds and MRI scanners cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, with the most advanced CT scanners needed for the most detailed imaging priced well in excess of a million dollars. Full-body CT scans, he says, run about $1,500 each, which, when added to device purchasing and maintenance fees, make vitropsy an expensive option.

Mossa-Basha says major advances in scanning devices make some forensic aspects of autopsy easier when keeping the body closed protects physical evidence from being destroyed, such as tracking bullet trajectories in gun victims.

"Steady progress in imaging technology is refining conventional autopsy, making it better and more accurate," says Mossa-Basha, a clinical fellow in neuroradiology at Johns Hopkins. "Physicians really need to be selective and proactive -- even before a critically injured patient in hospital dies -- in deciding whether an autopsy is likely to be needed and, if so, whether to approach the family in advance. Only in this way do we ensure that we are using the latest scanning devices appropriately during autopsy and when it is most effective in producing the most accurate-as-possible death certificates."

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Johns Hopkins Medicine, via Newswise.

Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above.

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Journal Reference:

1. Elizabeth C. Burton and Mahmud Mossa-Basha. To Image or to Autopsy? Annals of Internal Medicine, Jan. 17, 2012 [link]

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: This article is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/~3/uxF_CHvkAjs/120116200602.htm

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UN chief says Syrian president must stop violence

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, right, speaks during the opening session of a conference on democracy in the Arab world, in Beirut, Lebanon, Sunday Jan. 15, 2012. Ban demanded Sunday that Syria's president stop killing his own people, and said the "old order" of one-man rule and family dynasties is over in the Middle East. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, right, speaks during the opening session of a conference on democracy in the Arab world, in Beirut, Lebanon, Sunday Jan. 15, 2012. Ban demanded Sunday that Syria's president stop killing his own people, and said the "old order" of one-man rule and family dynasties is over in the Middle East. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, left, and Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati attend the opening session of a conference on democracy in the Arab world, in Beirut, Lebanon, Sunday Jan. 15, 2012. Ban demanded Sunday that Syria's president stop killing his own people, and said the "old order" of one-man rule and family dynasties is over in the Middle East. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)

This image from amateur video made available by Shaam News Network on Friday, Jan. 13, 2012, purports to show a rally in support of the Free Syrian Army in Daraa, Syria.(AP Photo/Shaam News Network via APTN) THE ASSOCIATED PRESS CANNOT INDEPENDENTLY VERIFY THE CONTENT, DATE, LOCATION OR AUTHENTICITY OF THIS MATERIAL. TV OUT

This image from amateur video made available by Shaam News Network on Friday, Jan. 13, 2012, purports to show a rally in support of the Free Syrian Army in Hama, Syria. (AP Photo/Shaam News Network via APTN) THE ASSOCIATED PRESS CANNOT INDEPENDENTLY VERIFY THE CONTENT, DATE, LOCATION OR AUTHENTICITY OF THIS MATERIAL. TV OUT

BEIRUT (AP) ? The U.N. chief demanded Sunday that Syria's president stop killing his own people and said the "old order" of one-man rule and family dynasties is over in the Middle East on a day when activists said 27 people died.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, delivering the keynote address at a conference in Beirut on democracy in the Arab world, said the revolutions of the Arab Spring show people will no longer accept tyranny.

"Today, I say again to President (Bashar) Assad of Syria: Stop the violence. Stop killing your people," Ban said.

Ban has been highly critical of the Assad government's deadly crackdown on civilian protesters since the killings began ? unlike the U.N. Security Council. That body is deeply divided. The U.S. and European nations demand strong condemnation and possible sanctions against Assad, but Russia and China are opposed.

Ban's speech Sunday was his toughest against the continued survival of authoritarian regimes in the face of the growing international clamor for democracy.

Thousands of people have been killed in the government's crackdown on a 10-month-old uprising, which has turned increasingly militarized in recent months with a growing risk of civil war.

Syria agreed last month to an Arab League plan that calls for a halt to the crackdown, the withdrawal of heavy weaponry, such as tanks, from cities, the release of all political prisoners, and allowing foreign journalists and human rights workers in. About 200 Arab League observers are working in Syria to verify whether the government is abiding by its agreement to end the military crackdown on dissent.

Observers visited the coastal city of Banias and the restive town of Maaret al-Numan in northern Syria Sunday, where they were met with thousands of anti-Assad protesters chanting for his downfall.

Amateur video posted by activists on the Internet showed the monitors watching and filming from a balcony as a large protest unfolded on the streets below. "Victory for our revolution!" the protesters shouted.

The monitors also visited the Damascus suburb of Zabadani, which activists say has come under an intense crackdown in the past few days.

"The authorities pulled out tanks and stopped firing just before the observers arrived," said one activist in Zabadani, who declined to be named for fear of reprisals. "But they saw with their own eyes the destruction and fear," he said, adding people took to the streets in huge protests while the monitors were there.

The presence of the observers has not put a stop to bloodshed and the U.S. and many in the Syrian opposition say killings have accelerated. The U.N. says about 400 people have been killed in the last three weeks alone, on top of an earlier estimate of more than 5,000 killed since March.

The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and Syria's state-run news agency SANA reported Sunday that at least five factory workers were killed when a roadside bomb detonated near the bus they were traveling in the town of Khan Sheikhoun in northern Syria.

The Observatory said 16 other people died in Syria Sunday, 11 of them in the restive central city of Homs.

The Local Coordination Committees activist network said 27 people were killed Sunday. The differing numbers could not be immediately reconciled.

Syria bans most foreign correspondents and limits movement.

"The killings still continue and still there are people arrested," said Arab League chief Nabil Elaraby in Bahrain. He said there will be a meeting of Arab foreign ministers at the end of the week in Cairo to decide on the next steps.

Syria's state news agency reported that Assad granted a general amnesty for "crimes" committed during the uprising and officials said authorities have begun granting local and foreign media outlets approvals to work in Syria. It was not clear how many prisoners would be released.

Information Minister Adnan Mahmoud said the level of "incitement and distortion of facts" has doubled since some reporters were allowed in along with the Arab League observers who started work late last month.

Ban acknowledged challenges facing Arab states in the wake of the uprisings sweeping the Arab world, in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Syria.

"It is sometimes said that authoritarian regimes, whatever else their faults, at least kept a lid on sectarian conflict. This is a cruel canard," Ban said in Beirut. "Yet it would be equally mistaken to assume that all of the new regimes now emerging will automatically uphold universal human rights," he said.

"Democracy is not easy," he added. "It takes time and effort to build. It does not come into being with one or two elections. Yet there is no going back."

He encouraged Arab countries to usher in real reforms and dialogue, and to respect the role of women and youth.

"The old way, the old order, is crumbling," Ban said. "One-man rule and the perpetuation of family dynasties, monopolies of wealth and power, the silencing of the media, the deprivation of fundamental freedoms that are the birthright of every man, woman and child on this planet ? to all of this, the people say: Enough!"

The U.N. chief also urged an end to Israeli occupation of Arab and Palestinian territories.

"Settlements, new and old, are illegal. They work against the emergence of a viable Palestinian state."

The foreign minister of Tunisia, which became the first Arab country to oust a dictator through a peaceful revolution one year ago, said there is no escape from the process of democratization and freedoms in the Arab world.

"My message (to the Syrian regime) is to hear and to listen to the will of the people," Rafik Abdessalem told APTN in an interview in Beirut Sunday.

On Saturday, the leader of Qatar was quoted as saying that Arab troops should be sent to Syria to stop a deadly crackdown on anti-government protests. Sheik Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani's comments to CBS' "60 Minutes," which will be aired Sunday, are the first statements by an Arab leader calling for the deployment of troops inside Syria.

Excerpts of the interview were sent to The Associated Press by CBS on Saturday.

Qatar, which once had close relations with Damascus, has been a harsh critic of the crackdown by Assad's regime. The wealthy and influential Gulf state withdrew its ambassador to Syria in the summer.

___

Reem Khalifa In Manama, Bahrain and Edith M. Lederer at the U.N. contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2012-01-15-ML-Syria/id-2d49c863a50848ed938a9ba7c5af2e0b

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3 more women held in Mexico child-trafficking case

MEXICO CITY (AP) ? Mexican investigators detained three more women in the city of Guadalajara in connection with an apparent child-trafficking ring that aimed to supply babies to Irish couples, authorities said Monday.

Authorities also took a tenth child, a 9-month old boy, into custody, the Jalisco state prosecutor's office said in a statement.

It said the three women were detained at a ranch in Tonala, a suburb of Guadalajara, while taking care of the baby boy. They told authorities they had been hired as nannies to take care of children in the process of being adopted, prosecutors said.

Police have raided several ranches to look for more evidence in the case, investigators said.

Authorities last week detained four women and seized nine children, all of them between two months and two years of age.

Prosecutors first opened the investigation last week following the arrest of a 21-year-old woman who was accused by her sister-in-law of trying to sell one of her children and of "renting" the other one.

The woman led authorities to three other women, all in their early 30s, who took part in the "renting" of the babies, and seized nine children, including the 21-year-old woman's two kids. The other seven were seized from the Irish couples.

The first woman arrested claimed she had signed a contract with a law firm to allow her child to be photographed in different places in Jalisco state for advertising purposes. She told investigators that her baby was taken for 15 days and that she received $500 pesos ($36 dollars) per day as payment, prosecutors said.

The other three women reportedly took the child and several others to a hotel in Guadalajara where they met with the Irish couples who believed they were going to adopt them. The couples then took the children to the nearby town of Ajijic, a lakeside resort popular with American and Canadian retirees, where they were staying while the adoptions were finished.

Officials are investigating whether the Irish couples and Mexican mothers were being tricked by the smuggling ring.

The Irish Embassy in Mexico said in a statement that it's providing consular advice to the couples involved and that the Irish council had traveled to Guadalajara to meet with the Irish citizens and local Mexican authorities.

Police are also looking for at least two lawyers with the Guadalajara law firm Lopez Lopez y Asociados who were allegedly processing the adoptions in neighboring Colima state. The lawyers purportedly advertised in local newspaper for expectant mothers who wanted to give their children up for adoption.

Investigator said the foreign couples had been giving $1,200 pesos ($188 dollars) per week to the mothers since pregnancy, and paying for their medical attention.

___

Associated Press writer Shawn Pogatchnik in Dublin contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/cae69a7523db45408eeb2b3a98c0c9c5/Article_2012-01-16-LT-Mexico-Child-Trafficking/id-418997ed3dbe4f98839c63206b8575f3

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