Notre Dame president defends handling of Te'o case

SOUTH BEND, Ind. Top administrators at Notre Dame decided within hours of hearing about the Manti Te'o dead girlfriend hoax that it did not involve a crime and within two days had concluded there was no NCAA violation, according to a letter sent by the university president to board of trustee members on Friday.

The Rev. John Jenkins told trustees that despite "the unrelenting scrutiny of hundreds of journalists and countless others — and repeated attempts by some to create a different impression- no facts relating to the hoax have been at odds with what Manti told us" on Dec. 27-28.

The letter was obtained Friday by The Associated Press from a university official who provided it on condition of anonymity because the private school's internal workings are confidential.

The eight-page document, including a four-page letter from Jenkins and a four-page outline of how Notre Dame handled the hoax, is both a defense and an explanation of the school's actions.

"We did our best to get to the truth in extraordinary circumstances, be good stewards of the interests of the university and its good name and — as we do in all things — to make the well-being of our students one of our very highest priorities," Jenkins concluded in his letter.

Some of the timeline Notre Dame outlined is well known, including that its star linebacker disclosed the scam to his coaches the day after Christmas and it remained unknown to the public until Deadspin.com broke the story on Jan. 16, long after the Fighting Irish lost the BCS championship to Alabama on Jan. 7.

Jenkins wrote that Notre Dame officials talked in the hours after hearing from Te'o on Dec. 26 and agreed there was no indication of a crime or student conduct code violation. Athletic director Jack Swarbrick spoke with Te'o the next day, and on Dec. 28 the school concluded there were no indications of an NCAA rules violation, which could have put Notre Dame's 12-0 regular season in jeopardy.

The school then made moves to find out who was behind the hoax, thereby protecting Te'o and itself.

"For the first couple of days after receiving the news from Manti, there was considerable confusion and we simply did not know what there was to disclose," Jenkins wrote.

13 Photos

Manti Te'o

On Jan. 2, after several days of internal discussion and a week after Te'o's disclosure, Notre Dame retained Stroz Friedberg, a New York computer forensics firm to investigate the case and whether any other football players had been targeted. The firm did not return phone or email messages left Friday.

Notre Dame officials believed Te'o's girlfriend — whether alive or dead — was at least a real person until the next day, when Stroz Friedberg said it could not find any evidence that Kekua or most of her relatives ever existed. And by Jan. 4, two days after hiring Stroz Friedberg, Notre Dame officials concluded Te'o was the victim of the hoax, there was no threat to the school and the private investigation was suspended.

"We concluded that this matter was personal to Manti," Jenkins wrote, deciding it was up to Te'o to disclose, especially after he signed with Creative Artists Agency on the day after the BCS game.

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WH, Senators to Begin Push on Immigration Reform

The White House and a bipartisan group of senators next week plan to begin their efforts to push for comprehensive immigration reform.

President Barack Obama will make an announcement on immigration during a Tuesday trip to Las Vegas, Nevada, the White House said on Friday. The Senate group is expected make their plans public around the same time, the Associated Press reported.

See Also: Where Do Labor Unions Stand on Immigration?

For Obama, immigration reform is a campaign promise that has remained unfulfilled from his first White House run in 2008. During his 2012 re-election campaign, the president vowed to renew his effort to overhaul the nation's immigration system. It has long been expected that Obama would roll out his plans shortly after his inauguration.

The president's trip to Las Vegas is designed "to redouble the administration's efforts to work with Congress to fix the broken immigration system this year," the White House said.

Ever since November's election, in which Latino voters turned out in record numbers, Republicans and Democrats have expressed a desire to work on immigration reform. Obama has long supported a bill that would make many of the nation's 11 million undocumented immigrants without criminal records eligible to apply for an earned pathway to citizenship, which includes paying fines and learning English.

But the debate over a pathway to citizenship is expected to be contentious. Other flashpoints in an immigration reform push could include a guest-worker program, workplace enforcement efforts, border security, and immigration backlogs.

In a statement, the White House said that "any legislation must include a path to earned citizenship."

Ahead of his immigration push next week, Obama met today with a group of lawmakers from the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC), including chairman Rubén Hinojosa (D-Texas) , Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), Democratic Caucus Chair Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-Calif.), and CHC Immigration Task Force Chair Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.), the latter's office said. CHC members are expected to play a pivotal role in the debate.

"The president is the quarterback and he will direct the team, call the play, and be pivotal if we succeed. I am very optimistic based on conversations with Republicans in the House and Senate that we will do more than just talk about the immigration issue this year," Gutierrez said in a statement following the CHC meeting with Obama. "The president putting his full weight and attention behind getting a bill signed into law is tremendously helpful. We need the president and the American people all putting pressure on the Congress to act because nothing happens in the Capitol without people pushing from the outside."

A bipartisan group of eight senators, which includes Menendez, has also begun talks on drafting an immigration bill and will play an integral part in the process of passing a bill through Congress. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who has been participating in talks with others senators, has also unveiled his own outline for an immigration proposal.

The group of senators have reportedly eyed Friday as the date when they'll unveil their separate proposal, according to the Washington Post.

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Egypt deploys troops in Suez after 9 killed on anniversary of uprising

CAIRO/ISMAILIA, Egypt (Reuters) - Egypt's armed forces deployed troops in the city of Suez early on Saturday after nine people were shot dead during nationwide protests against President Mohamed Mursi, underlining the country's deep divisions as it marked the second anniversary of the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak.

Eight of the dead, including a policeman, were shot dead in Suez, and another was shot and killed in the city of Ismailia, medics said. Another 456 people were injured across Egypt, officials said, in unrest on Friday fuelled by anger at Mursi and his Islamist allies over what the protesters see as their betrayal of the revolution.

Mursi said the state would not hesitate in "pursuing the criminals and delivering them to justice". In a statement, he also called on Egyptians to respect the principles of the revolution by expressing their views peacefully.

The troops were deployed in Suez after the head of the state security police in the city asked for reinforcements. The army distributed pamphlets to residents assuring them the deployment was temporary and meant to secure the city.

"We have asked the armed forces to send reinforcements on the ground until we pass this difficult period," Adel Refaat, head of state security in Suez, told state television.

Friday's anniversary laid bare the divide between the Islamists and their secular rivals.

The schism is hindering the efforts of Mursi, elected in June, to revive an economy in crisis and reverse a plunge in Egypt's currency by enticing back investors and tourists.

Inspired by the popular uprising in Tunisia, Egypt's revolution spurred further revolts across the Arab world. But the sense of common purpose that united Egyptians two years ago has given way to internal strife that already triggered bloody street battles last month.

Thousands of opponents of Mursi massed on Friday in Cairo's Tahrir Square - the cradle of the revolt against Mubarak - to rekindle the demands of a revolution they say has been hijacked by the Muslim Brotherhood, the group from which Mursi emerged.

In Suez, the military deployed armored vehicles to guard state buildings, witnesses and security sources said, as symbols of government were targeted across the country.

Street battles erupted in cities including Cairo, Alexandria, Suez and Port Said. Arsonists attacked at least two state-owned buildings. An office used by the Muslim Brotherhood's political party was also torched.

"Our revolution is continuing. We reject the domination of any party over this state. We say no to the Brotherhood state," Hamdeen Sabahy, a popular leftist leader, told Reuters.

The Brotherhood decided against mobilizing for the anniversary, wary of the scope for more conflict after December's violence, stoked by Mursi's decision to fast-track an Islamist-tinged constitution rejected by his opponents.

The Brotherhood denies accusations that it is seeking to dominate Egypt, labeling them a smear campaign by its rivals.

'LEAVE! LEAVE! LEAVE!'

There were conflicting accounts of the lethal shooting in Suez. Some witnesses said security forces had opened fire in response to gunfire from masked men.

News of the deaths capped a day of violence that started in the early hours of Friday. Before dawn in Cairo, police battled protesters who threw petrol bombs and firecrackers as they approached a wall blocking access to government buildings near Tahrir Square.

Clouds of teargas filled the air. At one point, riot police used one of the incendiaries thrown at them to set ablaze at least two tents erected by youths, a Reuters witness said.

Skirmishes between stone-throwing youths and the police continued in streets around the square into the day. Ambulances ferried away a steady stream of casualties.

Protesters echoed the chants of 2011's historic 18-day uprising. "The people want to bring down the regime," they chanted. "Leave! Leave! Leave!" chanted others as they marched towards the square.

"We are not here to celebrate but to force those in power to submit to the will of the people. Egypt now must never be like Egypt during Mubarak's rule," said Mohamed Fahmy, an activist.

There were similar scenes in Suez and Alexandria, where protesters and riot police clashed near local government offices. Black smoke billowed from tires set ablaze by youths.

In Cairo, police fired teargas to disperse a few dozen protesters trying to remove barbed-wire barriers protecting the presidential palace, witnesses said. A few masked men got as far as the gates before they were beaten back.

Teargas was also fired at protesters who tried to remove metal barriers outside the state television building.

Outside Cairo, protesters broke into the offices of provincial governors in Ismailia and Kafr el-Sheikh in the Nile Delta. A local government building was torched in the Nile Delta city of al-Mahalla al-Kubra.

With an eye on parliamentary elections likely to begin in April, the Brotherhood marked the anniversary with a charity drive across the nation. It plans to deliver medical aid to one million people and distribute affordable basic foodstuffs.

Writing in Al-Ahram, Egypt's flagship state-run daily, Brotherhood leader Mohamed Badie said the country was in need of "practical, serious competition" to reform the corrupt state left by the Mubarak era.

"The differences of opinion and vision that Egypt is passing through is a characteristic at the core of transitions from dictatorship to democracy, and clearly expresses the variety of Egyptian culture," he wrote.

Mursi's opponents say he and his group are seeking to dominate the post-Mubarak order. They accuse him of showing some of the autocratic impulses of the deposed leader by, for example, driving through the new constitution last month.

"I am taking part in today's marches to reject the warped constitution, the 'Brotherhoodisation' of the state, the attack on the rule of law, and the disregard of the president and his government for the demands for social justice," Amr Hamzawy, a prominent liberal politician, wrote on his Twitter feed.

The Brotherhood says its rivals are failing to respect the rules of the new democracy that put the Islamists in the driving seat via free elections.

(Additional reporting by Tom Perry, Ahmed el-Shemi, Ashraf Fahim, Shaimaa Fayed and Yasmine Saleh in Cairo and Abdel Rahman Youssef in Alexandria; Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Robert Woodward and Peter Cooney)

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After Europe, IMF faces big challenge in Arab world

WASHINGTON: The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is gearing up for a huge new challenge to rebuild the economies of the turbulent Arab world, a mission that poses starkly different challenges to its eurozone rescues.

The Arab Spring revolutions of 2010-2011 have opened doors to the IMF's money and expertise as new governments face the need to balance their books and revive sagging growth.

Egypt and Tunisia are in negotiations over IMF loan programs that would entail structural reforms, and the Fund is also providing technical assistance to Libya.

The IMF is also nursing countries weakened by the Arab turmoil. In August, Jordan received a $2 billion loan and Morocco has a precautionary facility of $6 billion, meant to give it more protection from external shocks.

Torn by political upheaval, the countries of the region face multiple deep challenges, including high unemployment, large population growth, capital flight and deep government deficits, experts say.

The Fund recognizes the issues are more than financial.

Earlier this month, Managing Director Christine Lagarde wrote in the Financial Times that Arab countries need "urgent policy measures" to avoid killing the hopes raised by the revolutions.

Lagarde's number two, David Lipton, has swept through the region delivering the IMF's message in numerous speeches.

The Arab world has "formidable growth potential" that the IMF cannot ignore, Lipton said. But, he likes to point out, aside from oil and gas, the region's exports together are barely the size of Belgium's.

The fund nevertheless has to convince a region plagued by doubts over its approach in the past -- attaching harsh austerity conditions to its loan programs as it sought to help governments balance budgets and boost growth.

Especially in sub-Saharan Africa, the IMF has been accused of foisting such programs on governments with little consideration for local conditions and how the local people are impacted.

Before the Arab Spring, "many of the Arab and African countries were about to turn their backs on the IMF," said Ibrahim Saif of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Indeed, many people blamed IMF programs for the social and economic hardship that led to the revolts, he said.

Today, the IMF says it has got the message. It emphasizes that it is now developing reform programs that are "homegrown" -- developed with the backing of all stakeholders in a society, including civil society groups.

"As we engage more closely in the region, we find that we have to explain the role of the IMF and how we work with governments today," Lipton said in November.

"We know from experience that programs are much more likely to succeed if they are designed and owned by the national authorities and enjoy broad support within the country."

But as Egypt shows, that is not an easy thing.

Egypt's political groups have battled over what kind of reforms are needed following the revolt of early 2011.

After elections last year established a new government, they entered discussions with the IMF over a $4.8 billion loan program.

But as a preliminary deal neared in December, talks were suspended over fresh domestic political problems.

In Tunisia, an IMF program also faces the challenge of elections later this year, which could spark a new wave of instability.

"These countries are presently facing the unenviable conflict," said Zubair Iqbal, a former IMF official now at the Middle East Institute.

"There is a dire need for painful economic reforms to get these economies growing and creating jobs for a sharply rising youth bulge."

Yet, he said, "the political climate in the post-revolution period is not ready for the needed reforms. Therefore any attempts by the IMF for reform will face severe resistance."

In Egypt, for instance, a number of religious and civil groups sent a letter late last year to the IMF opposing the loan talks with Cairo, condemning the lack of transparency around the negotiations.

This underscored the deeper challenge the IMF faces in the Arab region, according to Iqbal.

"The IMF will be in the eye of the storm and will be blamed for any national failures to implement their own programs and the consequent crises," he said.

- AFP/fa

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How I misjudged Vine, and came to see it as a new artform

I'll admit it, I misjudged Vine. Here's why.

One of the first things I read about Vine, Twitter's new stand-alone video app for iPhone and
iPod Touch, was Jack Dorsey's gushing tweet about the service.

"Vine is the most exciting thing I've seen in a while," Dorsey, Twitter's co-founder (and also founder of Square), tweeted yesterday morning. "Not just because of the team, because it brings an entirely new art form to the world."

I have a huge amount of respect for Dorsey -- after all, this is a man who helped change the way the world communicates, and then repeated that success by helping change the way the world pays for things. But I tend to tune out when an executive is so effusive in touting one of his or her company's own products. And that's what happened here: I automatically discounted Dorsey's praise and ignored the possibility that Vine could, in fact, offer the world a new art form.

It's also true that I didn't spend enough time with the app at first, and as a result I misunderstood what it was. I saw it as a simple six-second video that looped. Clearly, the digerati had anointed it the Thing of The Day, but I chalked that up to its being launched by Twitter. I thought it was derivative, and even a little annoying -- that looping thing could drive you crazy. I tweeted that if Vine had been entirely a stand-alone product, and not launched by Twitter, that few would care. Once the buzz died down, people would quickly tire of yet another video app, and within a week or two, Vine would fade away.

Fast forward a few hours, though, to an instant message conversation I had with my CNET colleague Jennifer Van Grove. She confided that she had been thinking more about Vine, and that she'd come to "understand why this is interesting [and] why it could matter."

In a bit of stream of consciousness, Van Grove rattled off a few reasons why she thought Vine might actually have some value: It makes the mundane seem interesting without requiring much work by the user; With no play button, the app presented no barrier to entry; It felt like something Tumblr should have built; and it offered a lot of appeal to teens, along the lines of Snapchat. "As much as I wanted to stay this is stupid," Van Grove said, "when I used it, I had fun. I was surprised, and I will use it."

When I got home, I pulled out the app to show it to my wife, who hadn't seen it. As I did, I stumbled across some of the videos that had been selected as Editor's Picks. The first to catch my eye was one in which a banana at first appeared whole, and then frame by frame, disappeared a piece at a time, as if by magic. On a loop, it was particularly clever because as soon as the banana was gone, it would reappear, again and again.

Sadly, one current limitation of Vine is that there's no way to get an embeddable code for an individual post, unless you can find a tweet in which it was included. As a result, there's no easy way for me to show the banana video. Here, though is a Vine I shot myself, showcasing the ability to shoot several individual moments and splice them all together:

It's now clear to me that I radically misunderstood how Vine works. Sure, you can use it to shoot an uninterrupted video of up to six seconds, but how mundane is that? In fact, the tool's real value is that it lets you very easily craft a video comprising six seconds of individual moments cobbled together into a final product. That opens up a whole world of short story-telling possibilities. For example, a major book publisher posted a Vine today showcasing their upcoming releases. They could have just panned from one book to the next in an uninterrupted shot, but this was much more dramatic.

Sure enough, in the early going, almost all of the most interesting Vines make full use of the tool's stop-motion/extended GIF capability, including the very first one ever posted, by Twitter CEO Dick Costolo, of someone cooking a special dish. A personal favorite of mine -- alas, another that I can't embed here, showed a line appearing on a piece of paper, and then morphing onto someone's hand, curving around, hitting their palm and turning into the word "fin," as in what you might see at the end of an art film.

By now, I was thinking again about Dorsey's tweet from the morning. Maybe he wasn't so far off. Vine has limitations, and it's too early to tell if it will have legs, but I'm coming to the conclusion that this is in fact an all-new art form. Put in the hands of clever, artistic types, there's very likely to be a never-ending supply of fun, interesting videos coming along -- accompanied, of course, by an infinite number of pointless ones.

It's not that Vine doesn't have some real problems. I'm still not convinced about the looping thing, and I wonder if over time, they'll provide a way to turn that off when viewing a Vine. At the same time, there doesn't appear to be a way to share others' videos -- you can't tweet someone else's Vine, in other words. And it's going to be hard for the service to grow all that fast without enabling that kind of sharing. But I imagine these are features that will emerge over time.

Either way, though, I expect a whole community of people to emerge who will coalesce around interesting, innovative Vines. Recall that that's exactly how Instagram took off -- by giving people attracted to artistic photography an easy to use tool and, even more importantly, an easy way to share their own and see others' creations. Boom! Ninety million active users.

Will Vine hit 90 million users? We're a long, long, long way from there. But with Twitter behind it and an enthusiastic community, I'm not willing to bet against it. At least not anymore.

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Battery expert: "I would not fly in a Dreamliner"

(CBS News) WASHINGTON - Investigators say they still don't know what caused batteries to burn in two Boeing 787 Dreamliners, and until they figure that out and how to fix the problem, none of the planes will be allowed to fly.

More than any other plane, the Dreamliner relies on lithium ion batteries to help power its advanced electrical system. They're lighter and more powerful than older battery types, but they contain a highly flammable liquid electrolyte.

U.S. officials defend handling of 787 mishaps

Boeing 787 probe turns to battery companies

Boeing plans to carry on with Dreamliner production

Federal investigators are examining the disassembled battery from the 787 that caught fire in Boston January 7, spewing molten electrolyte.

George Blomgren worked for Eveready, a batteries and flashlights company, for 40 years. He says lithium ion batteries are bundled together for the 787, and that increases the risk.

"These fires burn at very high temperatures, so they are just very dangerous fires," he said.

George Blomgren, a battery expert for Eveready

/

CBS News

The Boston fire, and the burned-out battery on a Dreamliner in Japan, is not the first time lithium ion batteries have caused problems.

In 2011, a Chevy Volt lithium ion battery was damaged in a crash test. Three weeks later, it burst into flames. Chevrolet installed a number of fixes to prevent fires.

Safety features also were added to lithium ion batteries in some cell phones and laptops after 56 million were recalled for risk of overheating and exploding.

Boeing says lithium ion batteries "best met the performance and design objectives of the 787" and "Based on everything we know at this point, we have not changed our evaluation."

Blomgren considers the safety of lithium ion batteries on planes questionable.

"From what I know about incidents, I would not fly in a Dreamliner tomorrow. I just wouldn't feel that it was appropriate or safe," Blomgren said.

Many experts believe in the promise of lithium ion batteries, including for airlines, but they just aren't sure its safety has been perfected.

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Feds Bust Man in Alleged Bombs-for-Drugs Sting

Jan 24, 2013 7:07pm

Ryan Budnick/KMGH

A Colorado man who claimed to be a former demolition expert in the U.S. Marines was arrested Thursday after he allegedly tried to trade guns and homemade bombs with a 20-meter “kill zone” for cocaine.

Richard Lawrence Sandberg, 35, was taken into custody Thursday at his Morrison, Colo. home, ATF spokesman Bradley Beyersdorf told ABC News. Sandberg is facing one count of unlawful possession of a firearm or explosive device.

According to court documents, police became aware of Sandberg on January 18, when a confidential informant told a Denver police detective that Sandberg wanted to trade “numerous firearms and grenades” for drugs. The Denver police detective then contacted the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

On Tuesday, the documents say, an undercover ATF agent met with Sandberg at his home.

Sandberg allegedly told the undercover agent that he was in possession of 18 M67 military grenades that he offered to sell for $200 to $300 a piece, according to the criminal complaint.

The complaint did not say where Sandberg may have gotten the grenades, but said “Sandberg claimed to have been active in war zones in Iraq, Somalia, Africa, and Pakistan.”

“Sandberg also stated that he was in possession of several thousand rounds of ammunition and also in possession of uranium-tipped armor-piercing ammunition,” the complaint said.

In addition to the grenades, Sandberg allegedly claimed to have about a dozen homemade bombs, called “frags,” designed to create a “kill zone” within 20 meters and a “hurt zone” within 60 meters if they went off. The complaint says Sandberg also claimed to have access to C4 plastic explosives and napalm.

In one conversation, Sandberg “made disparaging remarks about the current administration and them wanting to take away his guns,” according to the complaint.

Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives

If any law enforcement officers tried to take his guns, the complaint says Sandberg told the agent that “it would be a bad day for them and lots of them would die. Sandberg stated that he was ready and willing to die.”

At one point, the undercover ATF agent offered to pay for pipe bombs and a small explosive called a “cricket.” Sandberg refused, the complaint says, instead insisting that “they could set up a trade for cocaine.”

During the Thursday operation, the street in front of Sandberg’s home was blocked for several hours while ATF agents and three local bomb squads made sure the house was safe. Multiple improvised explosive devices were taken from the house and rendered safe at a remote location,according to U.S. Attorney’s spokesman Jeffrey Dorchner.

One house next door to Sandberg’s had to be temporarily evacuated, Beyersdorf said.

Sandberg appeared in federal court Thursday afternoon and was advised of the charges against him. He has not entered a plea. Sandberg is being held without bond until a detention hearing scheduled for Jan. 29, Dorchner said.

SHOWS: World News

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North Korea to target U.S. with nuclear, rocket tests

SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea said on Thursday it would carry out further rocket launches and a nuclear test that would target the United States, dramatically stepping up its threats against a country it called its "sworn enemy".

The announcement by the country's top military body came a day after the U.N. Security Council agreed to a U.S.-backed resolution to censure and sanction North Korea for a rocket launch in December that breached U.N. rules.

North Korea is not believed to have the technology to deliver a nuclear warhead capable of hitting the continental United States, although its December launch showed it had the capacity to deliver a rocket that could travel 10,000 km (6,200 miles), potentially putting San Francisco in range, according to an intelligence assessment by South Korea.

"We are not disguising the fact that the various satellites and long-range rockets that we will fire and the high-level nuclear test we will carry out are targeted at the United States," North Korea's National Defence Commission said, according to state news agency KCNA.

North Korea is believed by South Korea and other observers to be "technically ready" for a third nuclear test, and the decision to go ahead rests with leader Kim Jong-un, who pressed ahead with the December rocket launch in defiance of the U.N. sanctions.

China, the one major diplomatic ally of the isolated and impoverished North, agreed to the U.S.-backed resolution and it also supported resolutions in 2006 and 2009 after Pyongyang's two earlier nuclear tests.

Thursday's statement by North Korea represents a huge challenge to Beijing as it undergoes a leadership transition, with Xi Jinping due to take office in March.

China's Foreign Ministry called for calm and restraint and a return to six-party talks, but effectively singled out North Korea, urging the "relevant party" not to take any steps that would raise tensions.

"We hope the relevant party can remain calm and act and speak in a cautious and prudent way and not take any steps which may further worsen the situation," ministry spokesman Hong Lei told reporters at a regular press briefing.

North Korea has rejected proposals to restart the talks aimed at reining in its nuclear capacity. The United States, China, Russia, Japan and the two Koreas are the six parties involved.

"After all these years and numerous rounds of six-party talks we can see that China's influence over North Korea is actually very limited. All China can do is try to persuade them not to carry out their threats," said Cai Jian, an expert on Korea at Fudan University in Shanghai.

Analysts said the North could test as early as February as South Korea prepares to install a new, untested president or that it could choose to stage a nuclear explosion to coincide with former ruler Kim Jong-il's Feb 16 birthday.

"North Korea will have felt betrayed by China for agreeing to the latest U.N. resolution and they might be targeting (China) as well (with this statement)," said Lee Seung-yeol, senior research fellow at Ewha Institute of Unification Studies in Seoul.

U.S. URGES NO TEST

Washington urged North Korea not to proceed with a third test just as the North's statement was published on Thursday.

"Whether North Korea tests or not is up to North Korea," Glyn Davies, the top U.S. envoy for North Korean diplomacy, said in the South Korean capital of Seoul.

"We hope they don't do it. We call on them not to do it," Davies said after a meeting with South Korean officials. "This is not a moment to increase tensions on the Korean peninsula."

The North was banned from developing missile and nuclear technology under sanctions dating from its 2006 and 2009 nuclear tests.

A South Korean military official said the concern now is that Pyongyang could undertake a third nuclear test using highly enriched uranium for the first time, opening a second path to a bomb.

North Korea's 2006 nuclear test using plutonium produced a puny yield equivalent to one kiloton of TNT - compared with 13-18 kilotons for the Hiroshima bomb - and U.S. intelligence estimates put the 2009 test's yield at roughly two kilotons

North Korea is estimated to have enough fissile material for about a dozen plutonium warheads, although estimates vary, and intelligence reports suggest that it has been enriching uranium to supplement that stock and give it a second path to the bomb.

According to estimates from the Institute for Science and International Security from late 2012, North Korea could have enough weapons grade uranium for 21-32 nuclear weapons by 2016 if it used one centrifuge at its Yongbyon nuclear plant to enrich uranium to weapons grade.

North Korea has not yet mastered the technology needed to make a nuclear warhead small enough for an intercontinental missile, most observers say, and needs to develop the capacity to shield any warhead from re-entry into the earth's atmosphere.

North Korea gave no time-frame for the coming test and often employs harsh rhetoric in response to U.N. and U.S. actions that it sees as hostile.

The bellicose statement on Thursday appeared to dent any remaining hopes that Kim Jong-un, believed to be 30 years old, would pursue a different path from his father, Kim Jong-il, who oversaw the country's military and nuclear programs.

The older Kim died in December 2011.

"The UNSC (Security Council) resolution masterminded by the U.S. has brought its hostile policy towards the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (North Korea) to its most dangerous stage," the commission was quoted as saying.

(Additional reporting by Christine Kim in SEOUL, Ben Blanchard and Sui-Lee Wee in Beijing; Writing by David Chance; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan and Ron Popeski)

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Australians warned to leave Benghazi immediately

SYDNEY: Australia on Friday joined three European nations in urging its citizens to leave the Libyan city of Benghazi due to a "specific, imminent threat to Westerners" linked to French action in Mali.

The advice followed similar warnings from governments in Britain, Germany and the Netherlands, which sparked an angry response from Libya's government. Tripoli said there was "no new intelligence" to justify such concerns.

But Australia's department of foreign affairs said: "We are aware of a specific, imminent threat to Westerners in Benghazi. All Australians in Benghazi should leave immediately.

"There is a risk of retaliatory attacks against Western targets in Libya following the French intervention in the conflict in Mali in January 2013," it said in an updated travel advice.

"A number of militant groups are known to operate in Libya and some may seek to target Western interests."

Only two Australians are registered as being in Benghazi and just 22 in Libya, said the department.

The alert came after US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton testified to Congress this week about the September attack on the US diplomatic mission in Benghazi that killed four Americans, including the ambassador to Libya.

It also comes as French troops battle Al-Qaeda-linked militants in Mali, amid rising concern about Islamist extremism across north Africa after last week's bloody attack on the In Amenas gas plant in Algeria.

- AFP/fa

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Microsoft: We're going to broaden Surface lineup

Microsoft Surface RT. The Surface Pro version goes on sale February 9. The CTO today reiterated that the lineup will grow.

(Credit:
Brooke Crothers)

During Microsoft's second-quarter earnings conference call today, the company's chief financial officer reiterated that the lineup of Surface devices will expand.

After Microsoft reported reported earning today, Chief Financial Officer Peter Klein spoke about future Surface products -- though he was mum about specifics.

"We had limited distribution this quarter in our stores and we're excited about expanding that [distribution]," he said, responding to an analyst's question.

"We're going to expand geographically, we're going to expand the product lineup, we're going to expand retail distribution and capacity," he said, in comments about Surface. Microsoft has made similar comments in the past.

Klein repeated a number of times that Surface contributed to revenue. "Certainly this quarter it was a contributing factor to revenue growth in the Windows business," Klein said.

And he inserted some serious commentary inside an innocuous-sounding statement. "It highlights some interesting innovation that can happen...demonstrates the power of
Windows 8 when tightly integrated with hardware and software."

In short, in order for a product to be done right, one company must make both the hardware and software -- as Apple has done successfully.

Klein did not mention -- and wasn't asked about -- shipment numbers for Surface RT. Speculation has been all over the map, though most analysts believe the number is somewhere in the neighborhood of a million.

The CFO also repeated previous comments by other Microsoft executives regarding the demand for Windows 8 touch devices. "There's great demand for touch devices," he said, adding that supply cannot keep up with demand.

Updated at 6:25 p.m. PST: throughout.

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