US, Europe hope the new year brings better times

NEW YORK (AP) — From teeming Times Square to an Asian capital hosting its first public New Year's Eve countdown in decades, the world looked to the start of 2013 with hope for renewal after a year of economic turmoil, searing violence and natural disasters.

Fireworks, concerts and celebrations unfolded around the globe to ring in the new year and, for some, to wring out the old.

"With all the sadness in the country, we're looking for some good changes in 2013," Laura Concannon, of Hingham, Mass., said as she, her husband, Kevin, and his parents took in the scene in bustling Times Square on Monday.

A blocks-long line of bundled-up revelers with New Year's hats and sunglasses boasting "2013" formed hours before the first ball drop in decades without Dick Clark, who died in April and was to be honored with a tribute concert and his name printed on pieces of confetti.

Security in Times Square was tight, with a mass of uniformed police and plainclothes officers assigned to blend into the crowd. With police Commissioner Raymond Kelly proclaiming that Times Square would be the "safest place in the world on New Year's Eve," officers used barriers to prevent overcrowding and checkpoints to inspect vehicles, enforce a ban on alcohol and check handbags.

Elsewhere hours earlier, lavish fireworks displays lit up skylines in Sydney, Hong Kong and Shanghai. The United Arab Emirates city of Dubai then took up the baton with a spectacular display featuring multicolored fireworks dancing up and down the world's tallest building, the Burj Khalifa. In Russia, Moscow's iconic Red Square was filled with spectators as fireworks exploded near the Kremlin.

Organizers said about 90,000 people gathered in a large field Yangon, Myanmar, for their first chance to do what much of the world does every Dec. 31 — watch a countdown. The reformist government that took office last year in the country, long under military rule, threw its first public New Year's celebration in decades.

"We feel like we are in a different world," said Yu Thawda, a university student who went with three of her friends.

The atmosphere of celebration was muted in some places with concern.

Europe planned scaled-back festivities and street parties, the mood restrained — if hopeful — for a 2013 that is projected to be a sixth straight year of recession amid Greece's worst economic crisis since World War II. Hotels, clubs and other sites in New Delhi, the Indian capital, canceled festivities after the death of a rape victim on Saturday touched off days of mourning and reflection about women's safety. In the Philippines, where many are recovering from devastation from a recent typhoon, a health official danced to South Korean rapper Psy's "Gangnam Style" video in an effort to stop revelers from setting off huge illegal firecrackers, which maim and injure hundreds of Filipinos each year.

And even in Times Square, some revelers checked their cellphones to keep up with news of lawmakers' efforts to skirt the fiscal cliff combination of expiring tax cuts and across-the-board spending cuts that threatened to reverberate globally. And the elementary school massacre in Newtown, Conn., and Superstorm Sandy mingled into the memories of 2012.

"This has been a very eventful year, on many levels," Denise Norris said as she and her husband, the Rev. Urie Norris, surveyed the crowd seeking to jam Times Square for a countdown show with Ryan Seacrest as host and musical acts including Taylor Swift, Carly Rae Jepsen, Neon Trees, Flo Rida and Pitbull.

The Norrises usually spend New Year's Eve at the suburban Pittsburgh church where he's an associate pastor. But they'd booked a night at a Times Square hotel "just to experience this energy," she said. To her, that energy is a pulse of "putting behind the past and pressing ahead to the high calling."

About a block away, Army Sgt. Clint Evanoff waited in a black suit, red vest and red tie to get into Times Square with a couple of his friends from his unit at Fort Drum, N.Y. Evanoff, 20, is scheduled to leave for Afghanistan, his first deployment, in about two weeks.

Looking ahead to the new year, "I'm just hoping to make it back," he said.

Elsewhere, too, hopes for 2013 were a mix of personal and political. In Boston, communications writer and editor Colin O'Brien, 25, said he was optimistic that the nation had realized it was time to make tough decisions about its finances and policy and that there might be "more common ground than people are willing to admit or accept." In Harrisburg, Pa., warehouse worker Adam Gassner, 43, had more internal goals: "hoping to continue to get myself back on my feet."

Back in Times Square, Elvis Rivera, of Manhattan, was taking photos to capture the moment. He wasn't planning to ring in the new year there but went by to take pictures.

How did he feel about the end of 2012?

"Relieved," Rivera said, adding that there had been a death and job losses in his family this year.

His hopes for 2013?

"A better life" and more money, he said.

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Associated Press writers Colleen Long in New York; Mark Scolforo in Harrisburg, Pa.; Jay Lindsay in Boston; Aye Aye Win in Yangon, Myanmar; Rod McGuirk in Sydney; Silvia Hui in London; Ashok Sharma in New Delhi; and Jim Gomez in Manila, Philippines, contributed to this report.

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Armstrong better, Green Day to resume tour in 2013

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Green Day is going back on the road.

The Grammy-winning punk band announced new tour dates Monday.

The band canceled the rest of its 2012 club schedule and postponed the start of a 2013 arena tour after singer-guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong's substance abuse problems emerged publicly in September when he had a profane meltdown on the stage of the iHeartRadio Music Festival in Las Vegas. The band's rep announced later that Armstrong was headed to treatment for substance abuse.

"I just want to thank you all for the love and support you've shown for the past few months," Armstrong told fans in a statement Monday. "Believe me, it hasn't gone unnoticed and I'm eternally grateful to have such an amazing set of friends and family. I'm getting better every day. So now, without further ado, the show must go on."

The tour is scheduled to begin March 28 at the Allstate Arena in the Chicago area. Tickets for postponed shows will be honored on the new dates, and refunds will be available for canceled shows.

"We want to thank everyone for hanging in with us for the last few months," the band said. "We are very excited to hit the road and see all of you again, though we regret having to cancel more shows."

The band released their most recent album, "Tre," on Dec. 11, more than a month ahead of schedule.

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Online:

http://www.greenday.com/

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Clinton's blood clot an uncommon complication

The kind of blood clot in the skull that doctors say Hillary Rodham Clinton has is relatively uncommon but can occur after an injury like the fall and concussion the secretary of state was diagnosed with earlier this month.

Doctors said Monday that an MRI scan revealed a clot in a vein in the space between the brain and the skull behind Clinton's right ear.

The clot did not lead to a stroke or neurological damage and is being treated with blood thinners, and she will be released once the proper dose is worked out, her doctors said in a statement.

Clinton has been at New York-Presbyterian Hospital since Sunday, when the clot was diagnosed during what the doctors called a routine follow-up exam. At the time, her spokesman would not say where the clot was located, leading to speculation it was another leg clot like the one she suffered behind her right knee in 1998.

Clinton had been diagnosed with a concussion Dec. 13 after a fall in her home that was blamed on a stomach virus that left her weak and dehydrated.

The type of clot she developed, a sinus venous thrombosis, "certainly isn't the most common thing to happen after a concussion" and is one of the few types of blood clots in the skull or head that are treated with blood thinners, said neurologist Dr. Larry Goldstein. He is director of Duke University's stroke center and has no role in Clinton's care or personal knowledge of it.

The area where Clinton's clot developed is "a drainage channel, the equivalent of a big vein inside the skull — it's how the blood gets back to the heart," Goldstein explained.

It should have no long-term consequences if her doctors are saying she has suffered no neurological damage from it, he said.

Dr. Joseph Broderick, chairman of neurology at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine, also called Clinton's problem "relatively uncommon" after a concussion.

He and Goldstein said the problem often is overdiagnosed. They said scans often show these large "draining pipes" on either side of the head are different sizes, which can mean blood has pooled or can be merely an anatomical difference.

"I'm sure she's got the best doctors in the world looking at her," and if they are saying she has no neurological damage, "I would think it would be a pretty optimistic long-term outcome," Broderick said.

A review article in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2005 describes the condition, which more often occurs in newborns or young people but can occur after a head injury. With modern treatment, more than 80 percent have a good neurologic outcome, the report says.

In the statement, Clinton's doctors said she "is making excellent progress and we are confident she will make a full recovery. She is in good spirits, engaging with her doctors, her family, and her staff."

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Online:

Medical journal: http://dura.stanford.edu/Articles/Stam_NEJM05.pdf

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Congress to miss midnight cliff deadline

America is going over the “fiscal cliff” – for a few minutes, or hours, at the very least. Don't panic. There's no need to move the family into the Doomsday bunker in the backyard. Yet.

While President Barack Obama and Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell have said they are close to a broad agreement that would prevent across-the-board income-tax hikes, lawmakers are unlikely to approve actual legislation before a midnight deadline.

That’s not expected to pose any major logistical problem in the next few days, provided that Democrats and Republicans actually have a deal. Unlike a college student who writes an end-of-semester paper overnight before a morning deadline, then drops the assignment off hours after it was due, Congress can write its own rules to minimize the damage – and Americans whose taxes are staying the same won’t see a change in their bottom line.

“It’s basically a matter of saying it’s effective January 1,” one senior Republican aide shrugged.

The deal – if a final deal is reached – will originate in the Democratic-led Senate (but on a House bill, since legislation affecting revenues technically has to start in the lower chamber). Republican House Speaker John Boehner has said that the House will only act after the Senate does. Obama and McConnell have both said that they expected work to continue on avoiding the first installment in $1.2 trillion in cuts to domestic and defense programs, the other part of the "fiscal cliff." McConnell called earlier in the day for lawmakers to vote on the tax component now, but Democrats demurred.

As of 5 p.m. on Monday, it was not clear whether the Senate would vote before midnight.

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US family pleas for couple missing in Afghanistan

KABUL (AP) — The family of an ailing, pregnant American woman missing in Afghanistan with her Canadian husband has broken months of silence over the mysterious case, making public appeals for the couple's safe return.

James Coleman, the father of 27-year-old Caitlan Coleman, told The Associated Press over the weekend that she was due to deliver in January and needed urgent medical attention for a liver ailment that required regular checkups. He said he and his wife, Lyn, last heard from their son-in-law Josh on Oct. 8 from an Internet cafe in what Josh described as an "unsafe" part of Afghanistan. The Colemans asked that Josh be identified by his first name only to protect his privacy.

The couple had embarked on a journey last July that took them to Russia, the central Asian countries of Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, and then finally to Afghanistan.

Neither the Taliban nor any other militant group has claimed it is holding the couple, leading some to believe they were kidnapped. But no ransom demand has been made.

An Afghan official said their trail has gone dead.

"Our goal is to get them back safely and healthy," the father told AP on Friday night by phone. "I don't know what kind of care they're getting or not getting," he added. "We're just an average family and we don't have connections with anybody and we don't have a lot of money."

He made a similar appeal in a video posted on YouTube on Dec. 13.

"We appeal to whoever is caring for her to show compassion and allow Caity, Josh and our unborn grandbaby to come home," he said.

Before the video came out, the family had kept quiet about the case since the couple disappeared in early October. They appear to have broken their silence in hopes it might lead to a breakthrough.

But many questions remain over the disappearances.

It is not known whether the couple is still alive or how or why they entered Afghanistan. And there is no information about what they were doing in the country before they went missing.

James Coleman, of York County, Pennsylvania, said he was not entirely sure what his daughter and her husband were doing in Afghanistan. But he surmised they may have been seeking to help Afghans by joining an aid group after touring the region. In the AP interview, he described his daughter as "naive" and "adventuresome" with a humanitarian bent.

He said Josh did not disclose their exact location in his last email contact on Oct. 8, only saying they were not in a safe place. James Coleman also said the last withdrawals from the couple's account were made Oct. 8 and 9 in Kabul with no activity on the account and no further communication from them after that date.

"He just said they were heading into the mountains — wherever that was, I don't know," the father said, adding, "They're both kind of naive, always have been in my view. Why they actually went to Afghanistan, I'm not sure... I assume it was more of the same, getting to know the local people, if they could find an NGO (non-governmental organization) or someone they could work with in a little way."

There was some indication that the couple knew they were in dangerous territory, though they perhaps did not grasp just how dangerous. James Coleman said in general, they preferred small villages and communities because they felt safer there than in big cities, and that is where they wanted to focus their travels.

"I assume they were going to strike out on foot like they were doing," he added.

Both the U.S. State Department and Canadian Foreign Affairs Ministry say they are looking into the disappearance.

"Canada is pursuing all appropriate channels and officials are in close contact with local authorities," Canadian Foreign Affairs Ministry spokeswoman Chrystiane Roy said Friday, calling the incident a "possible kidnap."

It was not known whether the silence over the case by U.S. and Canadian officials and, until now, by the Coleman family was because of ongoing negotiations to seek their release. But information black-outs have kept some similar past cases quiet in an attempt to not further endanger those missing.

According to Hazrat Janan, the head of the provincial council in Afghanistan's Wardak province, the two were abducted in Wardak in an area about 25 miles (40 kilometers) west of the capital Kabul. They were passing through Wardak while traveling from Ghazni province south of Kabul to the capital.

Wardak province, despite its proximity to Kabul, is a rugged, mountainous haven for the Taliban and travel along its roads is dangerous. Foreigners who do not travel with military escorts take a substantial risk.

He said they were believed to have been taken from one district in Wardak to a second and then into Ghazni.

"After that, the trail went dead," Janan said.

He said it was suspected that the kidnappers were Taliban because criminal gangs would have likely asked for a ransom.

When the AP contacted Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid about the missing couple two months ago, he said the group had carried out an investigation and found no Taliban members were involved.

"We do not know about these two foreigners," he said in a telephone interview.

Janan's information could not be independently verified, and U.S. and Canadian officials still do not say for certain the couple was abducted.

NATO officials said they had no current information on the case, which was turned over to the U.S. State Department after it was determined the couple were not affiliated with foreign military forces.

Coleman said his daughter and her husband met on the Internet and married in 2011. They had previously travelled through Central America so they had some experience abroad.

During their recent Asian travels, they bought local goods to help vendors, slept in their tent and hostels and interacted with villagers. Despite her travel fever, love of history and a desire to do good, her father said Caitlan "wanted basically to be a housewife and have a bunch of kids."

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Tucker reported from Washington. Associated Press reporter Amir Shah in Kabul contributed to this report.

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Purported photo of new BlackBerry phone with QWERTY keyboard leaks

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Kenya hospital imprisons new mothers with no money

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The director of the Pumwani Maternity Hospital, located in a hardscrabble neighborhood of downtown Nairobi, freely acknowledges what he's accused of: detaining mothers who can't pay their bills. Lazarus Omondi says it's the only way he can keep his medical center running.

Two mothers who live in a mud-wall and tin-roof slum a short walk from the maternity hospital, which is affiliated with the Nairobi City Council, told The Associated Press that Pumwani wouldn't let them leave after delivering their babies. The bills the mothers couldn't afford were $60 and $160. Guards would beat mothers with sticks who tried to leave without paying, one of the women said.

Now, a New York-based group has filed a lawsuit on the women's behalf in hopes of forcing Pumwani to stop the practice, a practice Omondi is candid about.

"We hold you and squeeze you until we get what we can get. We must be self-sufficient," Omondi said in an interview in his hospital office. "The hospital must get money to pay electricity, to pay water. We must pay our doctors and our workers."

"They stay there until they pay. They must pay," he said of the 350 mothers who give birth each week on average. "If you don't pay the hospital will collapse."

The Center for Reproductive Rights, which filed the suit this month in the High Court of Kenya, says detaining women for not paying is illegal. Pumwani is associated with the Nairobi City Council, one reason it might be able to get away with such practices, and the patients are among Nairobi's poorest with hardly anyone to stand up for them.

Maimouna Awuor was an impoverished mother of four when she was to give birth to her fifth in October 2010. Like many who live in Nairobi's slums, Awuor performs odd jobs in the hopes of earning enough money to feed her kids that day. Awuor, who is named in the lawsuit, says she had saved $12 and hoped to go to a lower-cost clinic but was turned away and sent to Pumwani. After giving birth, she couldn't pay the $60 bill, and was held with what she believes was about 60 other women and their infants.

"We were sleeping three to a bed, sometimes four," she said. "They abuse you, they call you names," she said of the hospital staff.

She said saw some women tried to flee but they were beaten by the guards and turned back. While her husband worked at a faraway refugee camp, Awuor's 9-year-old daughter took care of her siblings. A friend helped feed them, she said, while the children stayed in the family's 50-square-foot shack, where rent is $18 a month. She says she was released after 20 days after Nairobi's mayor paid her bill. Politicians in Kenya in general are expected to give out money and get a budget to do so.

A second mother named in the lawsuit, Margaret Anyoso, says she was locked up in Pumwani for six days in 2010 because she could not pay her $160 bill. Her pregnancy was complicated by a punctured bladder and heavy bleeding.

"I did not see my child until the sixth day after the surgery. The hospital staff were keeping her away from me and it was only when I caused a scene that they brought her to me," said Anyoso, a vegetable seller and a single mother with five children who makes $5 on a good day.

Anyoso said she didn't have clothes for her child so she wrapped her in a blood-stained blouse. She was released after relatives paid the bill.

One woman says she was detained for nine months and was released only after going on a hunger strike. The Center for Reproductive Rights says other hospitals also detain non-paying patients.

Judy Okal, the acting Africa director for the Center for Reproductive Rights, said her group filed the lawsuit so all Kenyan women, regardless of socio-economic status, are able to receive health care without fear of imprisonment. The hospital, the attorney general, the City Council of Nairobi and two government ministries are named in the suit.

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Associated Press reporter Tom Odula contributed to this report.

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GOP Senate leader urges Biden to break ‘fiscal cliff’ impasse

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is shown in this C-Span video footage as he addresses the Senate …Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell urged Vice President Joe Biden on Sunday to jump into “fiscal cliff” talks in hopes of breaking an impasse that threatens Americans with sharply higher income taxes come January 1.

In a brief speech on the Senate floor, McConnell complained that Democrats had not yet placed a counter-offer to a new Republican proposal, delivered at 7 pm on Saturday, “despite the obvious time crunch.”

“I’m concerned about the lack of urgency here,” the Kentucky lawmaker said. “I think we all know we’re running out of time.”

Besides conferring with his Democratic counterpart, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, McConnell said he had reached out to Biden "to see if he could help jump-start the negotiations on his side.”

McConnell added, “The vice president and I have worked together on solutions before, and I believe we can again."

Absent a breakthrough by tomorrow, income tax rates will rise across the board while government spending on domestic and defense programs will be slashed – a combination that some experts warn could plunge the economy into a new recession.

President Barack Obama has pressed for extending Bush-era tax rates on income up to $250,000 but letting them expire above that threshold. Republicans have resisted raising taxes on income at all levels. The two sides have also been at odds on issues like the estate tax and whether to extend unemployment benefits that stand to expire for some two million Americans.

Republican aides said that McConnell and Biden had spoken several times. A Biden aide said the vice president went to the White House after spending Christmas with his family in Delaware.

“We’re willing to work with whoever, whoever can help,” McConnell said. “There’s no single issue that remains an impossible sticking point. The sticking point appears to be a willingness, an interest, or frankly the courage to close the deal.”

“I’m willing to get this done, but I need a dance partner,” he said.

Reid said he had spoken several times on Sunday with Obama but acknowledged that his side had been “unable” to present a counter-offer to the latest Republican proposal.

“He and the vice president, I wish them well. In the meantime I will continue to try to come up something but at this stage I don’t have a counter-offer to make,” Reid said. “We are apart on some pretty big issues.”

Reid said he remained "hopeful but realistic" about the prospects for a breakthrough.

But he also seemed to confirm that one key sticking point was a Republican demand for reducing Social Security payments but adopting a less generous cost-of-living calculation known as “chained CPI” (the CPI being “consumer price index,” a measure of inflation).

“We’re not going to have any Social Security cuts,” Reid declared, saying it would not be “appropriate” in a short-term deal. Democratic leaders have cautiously signaled support for that approach – but only as part of a larger-scale deal that would see the U.S. debt limit raised for a significant stretch of time. Republicans want to use the debt ceiling fight to wrangle deeper government spending cuts.

“We're willing to make difficult concessions as part of a balanced, comprehensive agreement,” Reid said, “but we'll not agree to cut Social Security benefits as part of a small or short-term agreement, especially if that agreement gives more handouts to the rich.”

Republican aides bristled at Reid's characterization, noting that Democrats had not yet returned with a counter-offer. "If they don't like the CPI thing, they can strike it out," one told Yahoo News.

Republican senators, meanwhile, emerged from a closed door party meeting saying that chained CPI was off the table for now. The proposal was "not a winning hand" in the current standoff, John McCain told reporters drily.

Republican House Speaker John Boehner has said that it's up to the Senate to craft a compromise that can clear both chambers of Congress. Boehner suffered an embarrassing setback 10 days ago when conservative opposition forced him to withdraw legislation that would have let taxes rise on income of above $1 million. But a senior Republican aide noted that the exercise allowed the speaker to gauge how many of his rank-and-file would accept any increase in tax rates.

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Indian rape victim dies in hospital

SINGAPORE (AP) — A young Indian woman who was gang-raped and severely beaten on a bus died Saturday at a Singapore hospital, after her horrific ordeal galvanized Indians to demand greater protection for women from sexual violence that impacts thousands of them every day.

She "passed away peacefully" with her family and officials of the Indian embassy by her side," said Dr. Kevin Loh, the chief executive of Mount Elizabeth hospital where she had been treated since Thursday. "The Mount Elizabeth Hospital team of doctors, nurses and staff join her family in mourning her loss," he said in a statement.

He said the woman had remained in an extremely critical condition since Thursday when she was flown to Singapore from India. "Despite all efforts by a team of eight specialists in Mount Elizabeth Hospital to keep her stable, her condition continued to deteriorate over these two days. She had suffered from severe organ failure following serious injuries to her body and brain. She was courageous in fighting for her life for so long against the odds but the trauma to her body was too severe for her to overcome."

The woman and a male friend, who have not been identified, were traveling in a public bus in the Indian capital, New Delhi, after watching a film on the evening of Dec. 16 when they were attacked by six men who raped her. They also beat the couple and inserted an iron rod into her body resulting in severe organ damage. Both of them were then stripped and thrown off the bus, according to police.

Indian police have arrested six people in connection with the attack, which left the victim with severe internal injuries, a lung infection and brain damage. She also suffered from a heart attack while in hospital in India.

Indian High Commissioner, or ambassador, T.C.A. Raghanvan told reporters that the scale of the injuries she suffered was "very grave" and in the end it "proved too much.

He said arrangements are being made to take her body back to India.

The frightening nature of the crime shocked Indians, who have come out in their thousands for almost daily demonstrations, demanding stronger protection for women and death penalty for rape, which is now punishable by a maximum life imprisonment. Women face daily harassment across India, ranging from catcalls on the streets, groping and touching in public transport to rape.

But the tragedy has forced India to confront the reality that sexually assaulted women are often blamed for the crime, which forces them to keep quiet and not report it to authorities for fear of exposing their families to ridicule. Also, police often refuse to accept complaints from those who are courageous enough to report the rapes and the rare prosecutions that reach courts drag on for years.

After 10 days at a New Delhi hospital, the victim was brought to the Mount Elizabeth hospital, which specializes in multi-organ transplant. But by late Friday, the young woman's condition had "taken a turn for the worse" and her vital signs had deteriorated. It was clear then that she would not survive long.

Indian attitudes toward rape are so entrenched that even politicians and opinion makers have often suggested that women should not go out at night or wear clothes that might be seen provocative.

Other politicians have come under fire for comments insulting the protesters and diminishing the crime.

On Friday, Abhijit Mukherjee, a national lawmaker and the son of India's president, apologized for calling the protesters "highly dented and painted" women, who go from discos to demonstrations.

"I tender my unconditional apology to all the people whose sentiments got hurt," he told NDTV news.

Separately, authorities in Punjab took action Thursday when an 18-year-old woman killed herself by drinking poison a month after she told police she was gang-raped.

State authorities suspended one police officer and fired two others on accusations they delayed investigating and taking action in the case. The three accused in the rape were only arrested Thursday night, a month after the crime was reported.

"This is a very sensitive crime, I have taken it very seriously," said Paramjit Singh Gill, a top police officer in the city of Patiala.

The Press Trust of India reported that the woman was raped Nov. 13 and reported the attack to police Nov. 27. But police harassed the girl, asked her embarrassing questions and took no action against the accused, PTI reported, citing police sources.

Authorities in the eastern state of Chhattisgarh also suspended a police officer on accusations he refused to register a rape complaint from a woman who said she had been attacked by a driver.

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Associated Press writer Faris Mokhtar and Ravi Nessman in New Delhi contributed to this report.

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Facebook Instagram use dived after photo fiasco: AppData

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Facebook Inc’s Instagram lost almost a quarter of its daily users a week after it rolled out and then withdrew policy changes that incensed users who feared the photo-sharing service would use their pictures without compensation.

Instagram, which Facebook bought for $ 715 million this year, saw the number of daily active users who accessed the service via Facebook bottom out at 12.4 million as of Friday, versus a peak of 16.4 million last week, according to data compiled by online tracker AppData.

The popular app, which allows people to add filters and effects to photos and share them over the Internet or smartphones, experienced the drop over the brief, often-volatile holiday period.

Other popular apps also saw slippage in usage, and some were more pronounced. Yelp, for instance, saw daily active users — again via Facebook — slide to a weekly low of half a million on Thursday, from a high of 820,000 one week ago.

Instagram disputed the AppData survey, which was compiled from users that have linked the photo service to their own Facebook accounts, historically between 20 and 30 percent of Instagram members.

“This data is inaccurate. We continue to see strong and steady growth in both registered and active users of Instagram,” a spokeswoman said in an emailed statement on Friday.

Looking out over a broader timeframe, Instagram’s monthly active users edged up to 43.6 million as of Friday, an increase of 1.7 million over the past seven days, according to AppData.

“We’ll have to monitor the data over the coming weeks to gain perspective on trends in Instagram’s performance,” AppData marketing manager Ashley Taylor Anderson said in an email.

ATTENTION-SEEKING

The sharp slide in activity highlighted by AppData was bound to draw attention on the heels of the controversial revision to Instagram’s terms of service that, among other things, allowed an advertiser to pay Instagram “to display your username, likeness, photos (along with any associated metadata)” without compensation.

The subsequent public outrage prompted an apology from Instagram founder Kevin Systrom. Last week, a California Instagram user sued the company for breach of contract and other claims, in what may have been the first civil lawsuit to stem from the controversial change.

Instagram subsequently reverted to some of its original language.

The move renewed debate about how much control over personal data users must give up to live and participate in a world steeped in social media.

Analysts say Facebook, the world’s largest social network, was laying the groundwork to begin generating advertising revenue, by giving marketers the right to display profile pictures and other personal information, such as who users follow in advertisements.

Its shares closed down 13 cents or 0.5 percent at $ 25.91 on the Nasdaq, in line with the broader market.

(Reporting By Edwin Chan; Editing by Leslie Adler and Andrew Hay)

Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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FBI removes many redactions in Marilyn Monroe file

LOS ANGELES (AP) — FBI files on Marilyn Monroe that could not be located earlier this year have been found and re-issued, revealing the names of some of the movie star's communist-leaning friends who drew concern from government officials and her own entourage.

But the records, which previously had been heavily redacted, do not contain any new information about Monroe's death 50 years ago. Letters and news clippings included in the files show the bureau was aware of theories the actress had been killed, but they do not show that any effort was undertaken to investigate the claims. Los Angeles authorities concluded Monroe's death was a probable suicide.

Recently obtained by The Associated Press through the Freedom of Information Act, the updated FBI files do show the extent the agency was monitoring Monroe for ties to communism in the years before her death in August 1962.

The records reveal that some in Monroe's inner circle were concerned about her association with Frederick Vanderbilt Field, who was disinherited from his wealthy family over his leftist views.

A trip to Mexico earlier that year to shop for furniture brought Monroe in contact with Field, who was living in the country with his wife in self-imposed exile. Informants reported to the FBI that a "mutual infatuation" had developed between Field and Monroe, which caused concern among some in her inner circle, including her therapist, the files state.

"This situation caused considerable dismay among Miss Monroe's entourage and also among the (American Communist Group in Mexico)," the file states. It includes references to an interior decorator who worked with Monroe's analyst reporting her connection to Field to the doctor.

Field's autobiography devotes an entire chapter to Monroe's Mexico trip, "An Indian Summer Interlude." He mentions that he and his wife accompanied Monroe on shopping trips and meals and he only mentions politics once in a passage on their dinnertime conversations.

"She talked mostly about herself and some of the people who had been or still were important to her," Field wrote in "From Right to Left." ''She told us about her strong feelings for civil rights, for black equality, as well as her admiration for what was being done in China, her anger at red-baiting and McCarthyism and her hatred of (FBI director) J. Edgar Hoover."

Under Hoover's watch, the FBI kept tabs on the political and social lives of many celebrities, including Frank Sinatra, Charlie Chaplin and Monroe's ex-husband Arthur Miller. The bureau has also been involved in numerous investigations about crimes against celebrities, including threats against Elizabeth Taylor, an extortion case involving Clark Gable and more recently, trying to solve who killed rapper Notorious B.I.G.

The AP had sought the removal of redactions from Monroe's FBI files earlier this year as part of a series of stories on the 50th anniversary of Monroe's death. The FBI had reported that it had transferred the files to a National Archives facility in Maryland, but archivists said the documents had not been received. A few months after requesting details on the transfer, the FBI released an updated version of the files that eliminate dozens of redactions.

For years, the files have intrigued investigators, biographers and those who don't believe Monroe's death at her Los Angeles area home was a suicide.

A 1982 investigation by the Los Angeles District Attorney's Office found no evidence of foul play after reviewing all available investigative records, but noted that the FBI files were "heavily censored."

That characterization intrigued the man who performed Monroe's autopsy, Dr. Thomas Noguchi. While the DA investigation concluded he conducted a thorough autopsy, Noguchi has conceded that no one will likely ever know all the details of Monroe's death. The FBI files and confidential interviews conducted with the actress' friends that have never been made public might help, he wrote in his 1983 memoir "Coroner."

"On the basis of my own involvement in the case, beginning with the autopsy, I would call Monroe's suicide 'very probable,'" Noguchi wrote. "But I also believe that until the complete FBI files are made public and the notes and interviews of the suicide panel released, controversy will continue to swirl around her death."

Monroe's file begins in 1955 and mostly focuses on her travels and associations, searching for signs of leftist views and possible ties to communism. One entry, which previously had been almost completely redacted, concerned intelligence that Monroe and other entertainers sought visas to visit Russia that year.

The file continues up until the months before her death, and also includes several news stories and references to Norman Mailer's biography of the actress, which focused on questions about whether Monroe was killed by the government.

For all the focus on Monroe's closeness to suspected communists, the bureau never found any proof she was a member of the party.

"Subject's views are very positively and concisely leftist; however, if she is being actively used by the Communist Party, it is not general knowledge among those working with the movement in Los Angeles," a July 1962 entry in Monroe's file states.

___

Anthony McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP

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Kenya hospital imprisons new mothers with no money

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The director of the Pumwani Maternity Hospital, located in a hardscrabble neighborhood of downtown Nairobi, freely acknowledges what he's accused of: detaining mothers who can't pay their bills. Lazarus Omondi says it's the only way he can keep his medical center running.

Two mothers who live in a mud-wall and tin-roof slum a short walk from the maternity hospital, which is affiliated with the Nairobi City Council, told The Associated Press that Pumwani wouldn't let them leave after delivering their babies. The bills the mothers couldn't afford were $60 and $160. Guards would beat mothers with sticks who tried to leave without paying, one of the women said.

Now, a New York-based group has filed a lawsuit on the women's behalf in hopes of forcing Pumwani to stop the practice, a practice Omondi is candid about.

"We hold you and squeeze you until we get what we can get. We must be self-sufficient," Omondi said in an interview in his hospital office. "The hospital must get money to pay electricity, to pay water. We must pay our doctors and our workers."

"They stay there until they pay. They must pay," he said of the 350 mothers who give birth each week on average. "If you don't pay the hospital will collapse."

The Center for Reproductive Rights, which filed the suit this month in the High Court of Kenya, says detaining women for not paying is illegal. Pumwani is associated with the Nairobi City Council, one reason it might be able to get away with such practices, and the patients are among Nairobi's poorest with hardly anyone to stand up for them.

Maimouna Awuor was an impoverished mother of four when she was to give birth to her fifth in October 2010. Like many who live in Nairobi's slums, Awuor performs odd jobs in the hopes of earning enough money to feed her kids that day. Awuor, who is named in the lawsuit, says she had saved $12 and hoped to go to a lower-cost clinic but was turned away and sent to Pumwani. After giving birth, she couldn't pay the $60 bill, and was held with what she believes was about 60 other women and their infants.

"We were sleeping three to a bed, sometimes four," she said. "They abuse you, they call you names," she said of the hospital staff.

She said saw some women tried to flee but they were beaten by the guards and turned back. While her husband worked at a faraway refugee camp, Awuor's 9-year-old daughter took care of her siblings. A friend helped feed them, she said, while the children stayed in the family's 50-square-foot shack, where rent is $18 a month. She says she was released after 20 days after Nairobi's mayor paid her bill. Politicians in Kenya in general are expected to give out money and get a budget to do so.

A second mother named in the lawsuit, Margaret Anyoso, says she was locked up in Pumwani for six days in 2010 because she could not pay her $160 bill. Her pregnancy was complicated by a punctured bladder and heavy bleeding.

"I did not see my child until the sixth day after the surgery. The hospital staff were keeping her away from me and it was only when I caused a scene that they brought her to me," said Anyoso, a vegetable seller and a single mother with five children who makes $5 on a good day.

Anyoso said she didn't have clothes for her child so she wrapped her in a blood-stained blouse. She was released after relatives paid the bill.

One woman says she was detained for nine months and was released only after going on a hunger strike. The Center for Reproductive Rights says other hospitals also detain non-paying patients.

Judy Okal, the acting Africa director for the Center for Reproductive Rights, said her group filed the lawsuit so all Kenyan women, regardless of socio-economic status, are able to receive health care without fear of imprisonment. The hospital, the attorney general, the City Council of Nairobi and two government ministries are named in the suit.

___

Associated Press reporter Tom Odula contributed to this report.

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Senate leaders aim to craft fiscal bill by Sunday

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senate leaders are working to craft legislation by Sunday that averts the year-end "fiscal cliff" of tax hikes and spending cuts, but many details needed to be worked out after a crucial meeting with President Barack Obama on Friday.

U.S. Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid and his Republican counterpart Mitch McConnell, termed the meeting "constructive" and "positive" and said they would keep working on trying to find a solution over the weekend.

After adjourning on Friday, Reid he would probably not call the Senate back into session until about 1 p.m. EST/ 1800 GMT on Sunday to give leaders time to hash out a deal.

"We are engaged in discussions, the majority leader and myself and the White House, in the hopes that we can come forward as early as Sunday and have a recommendation that I can make to my conference and the majority leader can make to his conference," McConnell said on the Senate floor.

"So we'll be working hard to try to see if we can get there in the next 24 hours. So I'm hopeful and optimistic," he added.

An aide to House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner said it was agreed at the White House meeting that the Senate should act first.

"The speaker told the president that if the Senate amends the House-passed legislation and sends back a plan, the House will consider it - either by accepting or amending," the aide said.

However, Reid said it would be difficult to craft a solution that can win passage in both the House and Senate, adding that it involves "big numbers."

"Whatever we come up with is going to be imperfect," Reid said. "Some people aren't going to like it. Some people will like it less. But that's where we are and I feel confident that we have an obligation to do the best we can."

(Reporting By David Lawder, Rachelle Younglai; editing by Christopher Wilson)

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China tightening controls on Internet

BEIJING (AP) — China's new communist leaders are increasing already tight controls on Internet use and electronic publishing following a spate of embarrassing online reports about official abuses.

The measures suggest China's new leader, Xi Jinping, and others who took power in November share their predecessors' anxiety about the Internet's potential to spread opposition to one-party rule and their insistence on controlling information despite promises of more economic reforms.

"They are still very paranoid about the potentially destabilizing effect of the Internet," said Willy Lam, a politics specialist at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. "They are on the point of losing a monopoly on information, but they still are very eager to control the dissemination of views."

This week, China's legislature took up a measure to require Internet users to register their real names, a move that would curtail the Web's status as a freewheeling forum to complain, often anonymously, about corruption and official abuses. The legislature scheduled a news conference Friday to discuss the measure, suggesting it was expected to be approved.

That comes amid reports Beijing might be disrupting use of software that allows Web surfers to see sites abroad that are blocked by its extensive Internet filters. At the same time, regulators have proposed rules that would bar foreign companies from distributing books, news, music and other material online in China.

Beijing promotes Internet use for business and education but bans material deemed subversive or obscene and blocks access to foreign websites run by human rights and Tibet activists and some news outlets. Controls were tightened after social media played a role in protests that brought down governments in Egypt and Tunisia.

In a reminder of the Web's role as a political forum, a group of 70 prominent Chinese scholars and lawyers circulated an online petition this week appealing for free speech, independent courts and for the ruling party to encourage private enterprise.

Xi and others on the party's ruling seven-member Standing Committee have tried to promote an image of themselves as men of the people who care about China's poor majority. They have promised to press ahead with market-oriented reforms and to support entrepreneurs but have given no sign of support for political reform.

Communist leaders who see the Internet as a source of economic growth and better-paid jobs were slow to enforce the same level of control they impose on movies, books and other media, apparently for fear of hurting fledgling entertainment, shopping and other online businesses.

Until recently, Web surfers could post comments online or on microblog services without leaving their names.

That gave ordinary Chinese a unique opportunity to express themselves to a public audience in a society where newspapers, television and other media are state-controlled. The most popular microblog services say they have more than 300 million users and some users have millions of followers reading their comments.

The Internet also has given the public an unusual opportunity to publicize accusations of official misconduct.

A local party official in China's southwest was fired in November after scenes from a videotape of him having sex with a young woman spread quickly on the Internet. Screenshots were uploaded by a former journalist in Beijing, Zhu Ruifeng, to his Hong Kong website, an online clearing house for corruption allegations.

Some industry analysts suggest allowing Web surfers in a controlled setting to vent helps communist leaders stay abreast of public sentiment in their fast-changing society. Still, microblog services and online bulletin boards are required to employ censors to enforce content restrictions. Researchers say they delete millions of postings a day.

The government says the latest Internet regulation before the National People's Congress is aimed at protecting Web surfers' personal information and cracking down on abuses such as junk e-mail. It would require users to report their real names to Internet service and telecom providers.

The main ruling party newspaper, People's Daily, has called in recent weeks for tighter Internet controls, saying rumors spread online have harmed the public. In one case, it said stories about a chemical plant explosion resulted in the deaths of four people in a car accident as they fled the area.

Proposed rules released this month by the General Administration of Press and Publications would bar Chinese-foreign joint ventures from publishing books, music, movies and other material online in China. Publishers would be required to locate their servers in China and have a Chinese citizen as their local legal representative.

That is in line with rules that already bar most foreign access to China's media market, but the decision to group the restrictions together and publicize them might indicate official attitudes are hardening.

That comes after the party was rattled by foreign news reports about official wealth and misconduct.

In June, Bloomberg News reported that Xi's extended family has amassed assets totaling $376 million, though it said none was traced to Xi. The government has blocked access to Bloomberg's website since then.

In October, The New York Times reported that Premier Wen Jiabao's relatives had amassed $2.7 billion since he rose to national office in 2002. Access to the Times' Chinese-language site has been blocked since then.

Previous efforts to tighten controls have struggled with technical challenges in a country with more than 500 million Internet users.

Microblog operators such as Sina Corp. and Tencent Ltd. were ordered in late 2011 to confirm users' names but have yet to finish the daunting task.

Web surfers can circumvent government filters by using virtual private networks — software that encrypts Web traffic and is used by companies to transfer financial data and other sensitive information. But VPN users say disruptions that began in 2011 are increasing, suggesting Chinese regulators are trying to block encrypted traffic.

Curbs on access to foreign sites have prompted complaints by companies and Chinese scientists and other researchers.

In July, the American Chamber of Commerce in China said 74 percent of companies that responded to a survey said unstable Internet access "impedes their ability to do business."

Chinese leaders "realize there are detrimental impacts on business, especially foreign business, but they have counted the cost and think it is still worthwhile," said Lam. "There is no compromise about the political imperative of controlling the Internet."

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750,000 Android apps invade OS X thanks to BlueStacks App Player

Earlier this year, BlueStacks App Player made headlines by allowing Android apps run on Microsoft’s (MSFT) Windows 8 platform. The company announced on Thursday its App Player is now available in beta form for free on Mac, giving OS X users access to 750,000 Android apps normally reserved for smartphones and tablets.

[More from BGR: Google names 12 best Android apps of 2012]

BlueStacks uses patent-pending virtualization software called “Layercake” to allow Android apps to run on other platforms. It works virtually the same as running Windows within OS X using software such as Parallels or VMWare. The Windows 8 version of BlueStacks has been out since March and has been installed on more than 5 million PCs, which is a good sign that people want to run mobile apps on their computers.

[More from BGR: Samsung looks to address its biggest weakness in 2013]

BGR tested BlueStacks on a mid-2011 MacBook Air running OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion and found performance to be hit or miss. Android apps can be searched and it will list which app stores to download them from, but sometimes apps won’t install properly because of missing code, especially from the Google Play store. Downloading apps from the Amazon (AMZN) Appstore seems to be a better bet, though. If it’s any consolation, Jetpack Joyride and Fruit Ninja are perfectly playable.

BlueStacks works as mostly advertised, but honestly, why bother running Android apps on your Mac? A mouse or trackpad isn’t a better substitute for a touchscreen. But if you must do so, it’s reassuring to know BlueStacks is available.

This article was originally published by BGR

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It's husband No. 3 for actress Kate Winslet

NEW YORK (AP) — Kate Winslet has tied the knot again.

The Oscar-winning actress wed Ned Rocknroll in New York earlier this month. The private ceremony was attended by Winslet's two children as well as a few friends and family members, her representative said Thursday.

It is the third marriage for the 37-year-old Winslet. She was previously married to film directors Jim Threapleton and Sam Mendes.

The 34-year-old Rocknroll, who was born Abel Smith, is a nephew of billionaire Virgin Group founder Richard Branson.

The couple had been engaged since last summer.

Winslet won a Best Actress Oscar for her performance in the 2008 film "The Reader."

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Kenya hospital imprisons new mothers with no money

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The director of the Pumwani Maternity Hospital, located in a hardscrabble neighborhood of downtown Nairobi, freely acknowledges what he's accused of: detaining mothers who can't pay their bills. Lazarus Omondi says it's the only way he can keep his medical center running.

Two mothers who live in a mud-wall and tin-roof slum a short walk from the maternity hospital, which is affiliated with the Nairobi City Council, told The Associated Press that Pumwani wouldn't let them leave after delivering their babies. The bills the mothers couldn't afford were $60 and $160. Guards would beat mothers with sticks who tried to leave without paying, one of the women said.

Now, a New York-based group has filed a lawsuit on the women's behalf in hopes of forcing Pumwani to stop the practice, a practice Omondi is candid about.

"We hold you and squeeze you until we get what we can get. We must be self-sufficient," Omondi said in an interview in his hospital office. "The hospital must get money to pay electricity, to pay water. We must pay our doctors and our workers."

"They stay there until they pay. They must pay," he said of the 350 mothers who give birth each week on average. "If you don't pay the hospital will collapse."

The Center for Reproductive Rights, which filed the suit this month in the High Court of Kenya, says detaining women for not paying is illegal. Pumwani is associated with the Nairobi City Council, one reason it might be able to get away with such practices, and the patients are among Nairobi's poorest with hardly anyone to stand up for them.

Maimouna Awuor was an impoverished mother of four when she was to give birth to her fifth in October 2010. Like many who live in Nairobi's slums, Awuor performs odd jobs in the hopes of earning enough money to feed her kids that day. Awuor, who is named in the lawsuit, says she had saved $12 and hoped to go to a lower-cost clinic but was turned away and sent to Pumwani. After giving birth, she couldn't pay the $60 bill, and was held with what she believes was about 60 other women and their infants.

"We were sleeping three to a bed, sometimes four," she said. "They abuse you, they call you names," she said of the hospital staff.

She said saw some women tried to flee but they were beaten by the guards and turned back. While her husband worked at a faraway refugee camp, Awuor's 9-year-old daughter took care of her siblings. A friend helped feed them, she said, while the children stayed in the family's 50-square-foot shack, where rent is $18 a month. She says she was released after 20 days after Nairobi's mayor paid her bill. Politicians in Kenya in general are expected to give out money and get a budget to do so.

A second mother named in the lawsuit, Margaret Anyoso, says she was locked up in Pumwani for six days in 2010 because she could not pay her $160 bill. Her pregnancy was complicated by a punctured bladder and heavy bleeding.

"I did not see my child until the sixth day after the surgery. The hospital staff were keeping her away from me and it was only when I caused a scene that they brought her to me," said Anyoso, a vegetable seller and a single mother with five children who makes $5 on a good day.

Anyoso said she didn't have clothes for her child so she wrapped her in a blood-stained blouse. She was released after relatives paid the bill.

One woman says she was detained for nine months and was released only after going on a hunger strike. The Center for Reproductive Rights says other hospitals also detain non-paying patients.

Judy Okal, the acting Africa director for the Center for Reproductive Rights, said her group filed the lawsuit so all Kenyan women, regardless of socio-economic status, are able to receive health care without fear of imprisonment. The hospital, the attorney general, the City Council of Nairobi and two government ministries are named in the suit.

___

Associated Press reporter Tom Odula contributed to this report.

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House back Sunday night, will have 29.5 hours to strike deal on fiscal cliff

President Barack Obama salutes as he returns via Marine One from a Christmas visit with his family in Hawaii, to …Will parachutes be provided? Republican House leaders informed their rank-and-file on a conference call Thursday that they have to be back at work at 6:30 p.m. Sunday – giving them, oh, 29.5 hours to forestall the “fiscal cliff.”

Absent a last-minute compromise, Americans will see across-the-board income-tax hikes and painful federal spending cuts come into force January 1. Some economists fear that, taken together, the measures could plunge the economy into a new recession.

Technically, however, the Congress could vote the cliff into oblivion at any time – either before OR after the income-tax increases and spending cuts are slated to take effect. Republican House Majority Leader Eric Cantor noted on Twitter that lawmakers “may be in session through Wednesday, January 2.”

House Speaker John Boehner told his troops on the conference call that the Senate would have to act first, either by passing, or by amending, legislation the House has already passed to avert the cliff.

“If the Senate will not approve these bills and send them to the president to be signed into law in their current form, they must be amended and returned to the House,” he said, according to a source on the call.

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Afghan bomber attacks near major US base

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — A vehicle driven by a suicide bomber exploded at the gate of a major U.S. military base in eastern Afghanistan on Wednesday, killing the attacker and three Afghans, Afghan police said. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack.

Police Gen. Abdul Qayum Baqizai said a local guard who questioned the vehicle driver at the gate of Camp Chapman was killed along with two civilians and the assailant. The camp is located adjacent to the airport of the capital of Khost province, which borders Pakistan. Chapman and nearby Camp Salerno had been frequently targeted by militants in the past, but violent incidents have decreased considerably in recent months.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in an email that the bomber targeted Afghan police manning the gate and Afghans working for the Americans entering the base. He claimed high casualties were inflicted.

NATO operates with more than 100,000 troops in the country, including some 66,000 American forces. It is handing most combat operations over to the Afghans in preparation for a pullout from Afghanistan in 2014. Militant groups, including the Taliban, rarely face NATO troops head-on and rely mainly on roadside bombs and suicide attacks.

NATO forces and foreign civilians have also been increasingly attacked by rogue Afghan military and police, eroding trust between the allies.

On Tuesday, the Interior Ministry said a policewoman who killed an American contractor in Kabul a day earlier was a native Iranian who came to Afghanistan and displayed "unstable behavior" but had no known links to militants.

The policewoman, identified as Sgt. Nargas, shot 49-year-old Joseph Griffin, of Mansfield, Georgia, on Monday, in the first such shooting by a woman in the spate of insider attacks. Nargas walked into a heavily-guarded compound in the heart of Kabul, confronted Griffin and shot him once with her pistol.

The U.S-based security firm DynCorp International said on its website that Griffin was a U.S. military veteran who earlier worked with law enforcement agencies in the United States. In Kabul, he was under contract to the NATO military command to advise the Afghan police force.

The ministry spokesman, Sediq Sediqi, told a news conference that Nargas, who uses one name like many in the country, was born in Tehran, where she married an Afghan. She moved to the country 10 years ago, after her husband obtained fake documents enabling her to live and work there.

A mother of four in her early 30s, she joined the police five years ago, held various positions and had a clean record, he said. Sediqi produced an Iranian passport that he said was found at her home.

No militant group has claimed responsibility for the killing.

The chief investigator of the case, Police Gen. Mohammad Zahir, said that during interrogation, the policewoman said she had plans to kill either the Kabul governor, city police chief or Zahir himself, but when she realized that penetrating the last security cordons to reach them would be too difficult, she saw "a foreigner" and turned her weapon on him.

There have been 60 insider attacks this year against foreign military and civilian personnel, compared to 21 in 2011. This surge presents another looming security issue as NATO prepares to pull out almost all of its forces by 2014, putting the war against the Taliban and other militant groups largely in the hands of the Afghans.

More than 50 Afghan members of the government's security forces also have died this year in attacks by their own colleagues. The Taliban claims such incidents reflect a growing popular opposition to the foreign military presence and the Kabul government.

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Mint, otro Linux para quienes quieren explorar el mundo fuera de Windows

Una de las grandes virtudes de Linux (un sistema operativo libre para PC y otros dispositivos) es la cantidad innumerable de versiones disponibles. Estas distribuciones, además, son en su enorme mayoría de uso gratis, y representan una buena alternativa para los que no desean invertir en una licencia de Windows o quieren explorar -sin gastar- alternativas para la computadora hogareña.

Hemos recomendado en varias ocasiones opciones sencillas de usar e instalar que tienen herramientas iguales o muy similares a las que pueden encontrarse en Windows, destacando la ductilidad de las distribuciones disponibles y cómo hacer para probarlas sin complicarse demasiado , usando un CD regrabable o un pendrive, para no afectar el Windows instalado en la computadora.

En los últimos años fue Ubuntu el que más hizo para facilitarle el trabajo a los neófitos que venían de Windows, automatizando y simplificando procesos de instalación, creando un sitio amigable, sumando instrucciones de instalación y uso en lenguaje no técnico e incluso haciendo acuerdo para preinstalarlo en equipos de marca , pero la elección de la interfaz de usuario Unity (algo rígida) le hizo perder adeptos.

Una de las alternativas que venía creciendo en popularidad era Linux Mint (gratis), y los últimos números de DistroWatch , un sitio que lista las diferentes distribuciones y su popularidad, lo dan como el rey de 2012. Mint usa a Ubuntu como base, por lo que aprovecha algunas de sus herramientas (como la que permite instalarlo dentro de Windows para poder usarlo sin afectar la instalación original) y viene con una gran cantidad de componentes multimedia preinstalados, para facilitar la reproducción de audio y video, entre otras cosas (las distribuciones más “puras” suelen evitar esto para promover el uso de estándares libres de audio y video).

Hace poco más de un mes Linux Mint liberó su versión más reciente, Nadia 14, que incluye dos entornos de escritorio que resultarán muy agradables para quienes no se sienten cómodos con Unity, porque mantienen el esquema tradicional de Windows y Gnome 2.x: una barra de herramientas en la parte inferior de la pantalla, ventanas con los botones de control a la derecha, etcétera.

Linux Mint 14 tiene dos versiones: MATE (basado en Gnome 2.x, y cuyo nombre está inspirado en la yerba mate) y Cinnamon (canela, en inglés) de aspecto similar pero con algunos detalles visuales más atractivos: menús de notificaciones más sofisticados, escritorios virtuales persistentes, miniaturas en el administrador de ventanas y más.

cómo instalarlo

Cualquiera de ellas se puede meter en un pendrive o disco externo y correr desde allí o, si se quiere, instalarlas en la PC, junto con Windows (es compatible con Windows 8) o en una partición nueva. Alcanza con descargar el archivo ISO de instalación (hay uno para MATE y otro para Cinnamon). Ese archivo (900 MB, aproximadamente) se puede grabar en un DVD con una aplicación para quemar imágenes de disco: en Windows está el freeware CDBurnerXP , por ejemplo. Con el disco en la lectora, al encender al PC debería cargar primero Mint antes que Windows (si no, habrá que cambiar una configuración en el BIOS). Podremos usarlo como si estuviera instalado en la PC y luego, si queremos, instalarlo en el disco rígido de nuestra computadora, cuidando de hacerlo en una partición vacía o dentro de Windows.

Otra opción es instalarlo en una memoria USB (de 2 GB o más de capacidad). Para eso hay que usar la aplicación Image Writer (gratis, hay que cliquear donde dice win32diskimager-binary.zip para descargar el archivo). Luego habrá que cambiar la extensión del archivo de .ISO a .IMG para que Image Writer reconozca el archivo y pueda copiarlo en el pendrive (atención que borrará todo lo que está allí).

Si al prender la PC con el pendrive conectado no lo reconoce, habrá que cambiar el orden de carga de sistemas operativos, una opción que suele aparecer apenas se prende la PC (y que no estará disponible si la computadora es muy vieja) para ordenarle que cargue primero el contenido de la memoria USB.

Para quienes estén pensando en probar una distribución de Linux y buscan reducir el “choque cultural” con una interfaz de usuario que sea parecida -pero no idéntica- a la del Windows tradicional, y que además sea sencillo de usar, tienen en Linux Mint 14 Nadia una opción muy atractiva.

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Patrick Dempsey brews up coffee shop purchase

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Patrick Dempsey says he wants to rescue a coffee house chain and more than 500 jobs.

The "Grey's Anatomy" star said Wednesday he's leading a group attempting to buy Tully's Coffee. The Seattle-based company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in October.

Dempsey said he's excited about the chance to help hundreds of workers and give back to Seattle.

The actor has a strong TV tie to the city: He plays Dr. Derek Shepherd on "Grey's Anatomy," the ABC drama set at fictional Seattle Grace Hospital.

Tully's has 47 company-run stores in Washington and California, as well as five franchised stores and 58 licensed locations in the U.S.

Any sale would have to be approved by a judge. A bankruptcy court hearing is set for Jan. 11 in Seattle.

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Predicting who's at risk for violence isn't easy

CHICAGO (AP) — It happened after Columbine, Virginia Tech, Aurora, Colo., and now Sandy Hook: People figure there surely were signs of impending violence. But experts say predicting who will be the next mass shooter is virtually impossible — partly because as commonplace as these calamities seem, they are relatively rare crimes.

Still, a combination of risk factors in troubled kids or adults including drug use and easy access to guns can increase the likelihood of violence, experts say.

But warning signs "only become crystal clear in the aftermath, said James Alan Fox, a Northeastern University criminology professor who has studied and written about mass killings.

"They're yellow flags. They only become red flags once the blood is spilled," he said.

Whether 20-year-old Adam Lanza, who used his mother's guns to kill her and then 20 children and six adults at their Connecticut school, made any hints about his plans isn't publicly known.

Fox said that sometimes, in the days, weeks or months preceding their crimes, mass murderers voice threats, or hints, either verbally or in writing, things like "'don't come to school tomorrow,'" or "'they're going to be sorry for mistreating me.'" Some prepare by target practicing, and plan their clothing "as well as their arsenal." (Police said Lanza went to shooting ranges with his mother in the past but not in the last six months.)

Although words might indicate a grudge, they don't necessarily mean violence will follow. And, of course, most who threaten never act, Fox said.

Even so, experts say threats of violence from troubled teens and young adults should be taken seriously and parents should attempt to get them a mental health evaluation and treatment if needed.

"In general, the police are unlikely to be able to do anything unless and until a crime has been committed," said Dr. Paul Appelbaum, a Columbia University professor of psychiatry, medicine and law. "Calling the police to confront a troubled teen has often led to tragedy."

The American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry says violent behavior should not be dismissed as "just a phase they're going through."

In a guidelines for families, the academy lists several risk factors for violence, including:

—Previous violent or aggressive behavior

—Being a victim of physical or sexual abuse

—Guns in the home

—Use of drugs or alcohol

—Brain damage from a head injury

Those with several of these risk factors should be evaluated by a mental health expert if they also show certain behaviors, including intense anger, frequent temper outbursts, extreme irritability or impulsiveness, the academy says. They may be more likely than others to become violent, although that doesn't mean they're at risk for the kind of violence that happened in Newtown, Conn.

Lanza, the Connecticut shooter, was socially withdrawn and awkward, and has been said to have had Asperger's disorder, a mild form of autism that has no clear connection with violence.

Autism experts and advocacy groups have complained that Asperger's is being unfairly blamed for the shootings, and say people with the disorder are much more likely to be victims of bullying and violence by others.

According to a research review published this year in Annals of General Psychiatry, most people with Asperger's who commit violent crimes have serious, often undiagnosed mental problems. That includes bipolar disorder, depression and personality disorders. It's not publicly known if Lanza had any of these, which in severe cases can include delusions and other psychotic symptoms.

Young adulthood is when psychotic illnesses typically emerge, and Appelbaum said there are several signs that a troubled teen or young adult might be heading in that direction: isolating themselves from friends and peers, spending long periods alone in their rooms, plummeting grades if they're still in school and expressing disturbing thoughts or fears that others are trying to hurt them.

Appelbaum said the most agonizing calls he gets are from parents whose children are descending into severe mental illness but who deny they are sick and refuse to go for treatment.

And in the case of adults, forcing them into treatment is difficult and dependent on laws that vary by state.

All states have laws that allow some form of court-ordered treatment, typically in a hospital for people considered a danger to themselves or others. Connecticut is among a handful with no option for court-ordered treatment in a less restrictive community setting, said Kristina Ragosta, an attorney with the Treatment Advocacy Center, a national group that advocates better access to mental health treatment.

Lanza's medical records haven't been publicly disclosed and authorities haven't said if it is known what type of treatment his family may have sought for him. Lanza killed himself at the school.

Jennifer Hoff of Mission Viejo, Calif. has a 19-year-old bipolar son who has had hallucinations, delusions and violent behavior for years. When he was younger and threatened to harm himself, she'd call 911 and leave the door unlocked for paramedics, who'd take him to a hospital for inpatient mental care.

Now that he's an adult, she said he has refused medication, left home, and authorities have indicated he can't be forced into treatment unless he harms himself — or commits a violent crime and is imprisoned. Hoff thinks prison is where he's headed — he's in jail, charged in an unarmed bank robbery.

___

Online:

American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry: http://www.aacap.org

___

AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/LindseyTanner

Read More..

George H.W. Bush in intensive care

HOUSTON (AP) — A spokesman says former President George H.W. Bush is in the intensive care unit at a Houston hospital.

Bush's spokesman, Jim McGrath, said late Wednesday that the former president was admitted to the ICU on Sunday at Methodist Hospital, "following a series of setbacks including a persistent fever."

McGrath says Bush is alert and conversing with medical staff, and that doctors are cautiously optimistic about his treatment.

No other details about his medical condition were provided, but McGrath says Bush is surrounded by family.

Earlier Wednesday, McGrath said a fever that kept Bush in the hospital over Christmas had gotten worse and that doctors had put him on a liquids-only diet.

A bronchitis-like cough initially brought Bush to the hospital in late November. McGrath says the cough has improved.

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Kazakhstan military plane crashes, killing 27

MOSCOW (AP) — Kazakhstan's acting border service chief was among 27 people killed in a military plane crash Tuesday near a southern city, another blow to the agency after he was appointed in June to deal with the aftermath of a mass killing involving a conscript.

The Russian-made An-72 crashed at 1255 GMT (7:55 a.m. EST) about 20 kilometers (12 miles) away from the city of Shymkent near the border with Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan's Committee for National Security said in a statement.

The fatalities included a crew of seven and 20 border guards, including the acting head of the ex-Soviet nation's border protection service, Col. Turganbek Stambekov, the statement said.

Without specifying further details, authorities said an investigation was opened into the crash. No cause was given, but southern Kazakhstan over recent weeks has been buffeted by winds, heavy snows and low temperatures, causing widespread flight delays.

Stambekov was appointed acting head of the border service in June, after a mass killing of 14 frontier troops in a remote Kazakh outpost near China the month before. Vladislav Chelakh, a 20-year-old conscript, was sentenced earlier this month to life in prison after being found solely responsible for the killings.

The border service has come under close scrutiny in Kazakhstan since the killings, which many argued showed the lack of readiness and professionalism among serving troops. Legislation approved Thursday by the upper house of parliament and supported by Stambekov was designed to improve the process for selecting conscripts for the service.

The Kazakh-Uzbek border stretches 2,200 kilometers (1,350 miles) of Central Asian steppes and deserts.

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Tajikistan blocks scores of websites as election looms

DUSHANBE (Reuters) – Tajikistan blocked access to more than 100 websites on Tuesday, in what a government source said was a dress rehearsal for a crackdown on online dissent before next year’s election when President Imomali Rakhmon will again run for office.

Rakhmon, a 60-year-old former head of a Soviet cotton farm, has ruled the impoverished Central Asian nation of 7.5 million for 20 years. He has overseen constitutional amendments that allow him to seek a new seven-year term in November 2013.

The Internet remains the main platform where Tajiks can air grievances and criticize government policies at a time when the circulation of local newspapers is tiny and television is tightly controlled by the state.

Tajikistan’s state communications service blocked 131 local and foreign Internet sites “for technical and maintenance works”.

“Most probably, these works will be over in a week,” Tatyana Kholmurodova, deputy head of the service, told Reuters. She declined to give the reason for the work, which cover even some sites with servers located abroad.

The blocked resources included Russia‘s popular social networking sites www.my.mail.ru and VKontakte (www.vk.com), as well as Tajik news site TJKnews.com and several local blogs.

“The government has ordered the communications service to test their ability to block dozens of sites at once, should such a need arise,” a senior government official told Reuters on condition of anonymity.

“It is all about November 2013,” he said, in a clear reference to the presidential election.

Other blocked websites included a Ukrainian soccer site, a Tajik rap music site, several local video-sharing sites and a pornography site.

VOLATILE NATION

Predominantly Muslim Tajikistan, which lies on a major transit route for Afghan drugs to Europe and Russia, remains volatile after a 1992-97 civil war in which Rakhmon’s Moscow-backed secular government clashed with Islamist guerrillas.

Rakhmon justifies his authoritarian methods by saying he wants to oppose radical Islam. But some of his critics argue repression and poverty push many young Tajiks to embrace it.

Tighter Internet controls echo measures taken by other former Soviet republics of Central Asia, where authoritarian rulers are wary of the role social media played in revolutions in the Arab world and mass protests in Russia.

The government this year set up a volunteer-run body to monitor Internet use and reprimand those who openly criticize Rakhmon and other officials.

In November, Tajikistan blocked access to Facebook, saying it was spreading “mud and slander” about its veteran leader.

The authorities unblocked Facebook after concern was expressed by the United States and European Union, the main providers of humanitarian aid for Tajikistan, where almost a half of the population lives in abject poverty.

Asomiddin Asoyev, head of Tajikistan’s association of Internet providers, said authorities were trying to create an illusion that there were no problems in Tajik society by silencing online criticism.

“This is self-deception,” he told Reuters. “The best way of resolving a problem is its open discussion with civil society.”

Moscow-based Central Asia expert Arkady Dubnov told Reuters that Rakhmon’s authoritarian measures could lead to a backlash against the president in the election. “Trying to position itself as the main guarantor of stability through repression against Islamist activists, the Dushanbe government is actually achieving the reverse – people’s trust in it is falling,” he said.

(Writing by Dmitry Solovyov; Editing by Pravin Char)

Internet News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Jessica Simpson's Christmas gift: She's pregnant

NEW YORK (AP) — Jessica Simpson's daughter has the news all spelled out: "Big Sis."

Simpson on Tuesday tweeted a photo of her baby daughter Maxwell playing in the sand, the words "Big Sis" spelled out.

The 32-year-old old singer and personality has been rumored to be expecting again. The tweet appears to confirm the rumors.

"Merry Christmas from my family to yours" is the picture's caption. Simpson used a tweet on Halloween in 2011 to announce she was pregnant with Maxwell. She is engaged to Eric Johnson and gave birth to Maxwell in May.

One possible complication regarding her pregnancy: She is a spokeswoman for Weight Watchers.

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Predicting who's at risk for violence isn't easy

CHICAGO (AP) — It happened after Columbine, Virginia Tech, Aurora, Colo., and now Sandy Hook: People figure there surely were signs of impending violence. But experts say predicting who will be the next mass shooter is virtually impossible — partly because as commonplace as these calamities seem, they are relatively rare crimes.

Still, a combination of risk factors in troubled kids or adults including drug use and easy access to guns can increase the likelihood of violence, experts say.

But warning signs "only become crystal clear in the aftermath, said James Alan Fox, a Northeastern University criminology professor who has studied and written about mass killings.

"They're yellow flags. They only become red flags once the blood is spilled," he said.

Whether 20-year-old Adam Lanza, who used his mother's guns to kill her and then 20 children and six adults at their Connecticut school, made any hints about his plans isn't publicly known.

Fox said that sometimes, in the days, weeks or months preceding their crimes, mass murderers voice threats, or hints, either verbally or in writing, things like "'don't come to school tomorrow,'" or "'they're going to be sorry for mistreating me.'" Some prepare by target practicing, and plan their clothing "as well as their arsenal." (Police said Lanza went to shooting ranges with his mother in the past but not in the last six months.)

Although words might indicate a grudge, they don't necessarily mean violence will follow. And, of course, most who threaten never act, Fox said.

Even so, experts say threats of violence from troubled teens and young adults should be taken seriously and parents should attempt to get them a mental health evaluation and treatment if needed.

"In general, the police are unlikely to be able to do anything unless and until a crime has been committed," said Dr. Paul Appelbaum, a Columbia University professor of psychiatry, medicine and law. "Calling the police to confront a troubled teen has often led to tragedy."

The American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry says violent behavior should not be dismissed as "just a phase they're going through."

In a guidelines for families, the academy lists several risk factors for violence, including:

—Previous violent or aggressive behavior

—Being a victim of physical or sexual abuse

—Guns in the home

—Use of drugs or alcohol

—Brain damage from a head injury

Those with several of these risk factors should be evaluated by a mental health expert if they also show certain behaviors, including intense anger, frequent temper outbursts, extreme irritability or impulsiveness, the academy says. They may be more likely than others to become violent, although that doesn't mean they're at risk for the kind of violence that happened in Newtown, Conn.

Lanza, the Connecticut shooter, was socially withdrawn and awkward, and has been said to have had Asperger's disorder, a mild form of autism that has no clear connection with violence.

Autism experts and advocacy groups have complained that Asperger's is being unfairly blamed for the shootings, and say people with the disorder are much more likely to be victims of bullying and violence by others.

According to a research review published this year in Annals of General Psychiatry, most people with Asperger's who commit violent crimes have serious, often undiagnosed mental problems. That includes bipolar disorder, depression and personality disorders. It's not publicly known if Lanza had any of these, which in severe cases can include delusions and other psychotic symptoms.

Young adulthood is when psychotic illnesses typically emerge, and Appelbaum said there are several signs that a troubled teen or young adult might be heading in that direction: isolating themselves from friends and peers, spending long periods alone in their rooms, plummeting grades if they're still in school and expressing disturbing thoughts or fears that others are trying to hurt them.

Appelbaum said the most agonizing calls he gets are from parents whose children are descending into severe mental illness but who deny they are sick and refuse to go for treatment.

And in the case of adults, forcing them into treatment is difficult and dependent on laws that vary by state.

All states have laws that allow some form of court-ordered treatment, typically in a hospital for people considered a danger to themselves or others. Connecticut is among a handful with no option for court-ordered treatment in a less restrictive community setting, said Kristina Ragosta, an attorney with the Treatment Advocacy Center, a national group that advocates better access to mental health treatment.

Lanza's medical records haven't been publicly disclosed and authorities haven't said if it is known what type of treatment his family may have sought for him. Lanza killed himself at the school.

Jennifer Hoff of Mission Viejo, Calif. has a 19-year-old bipolar son who has had hallucinations, delusions and violent behavior for years. When he was younger and threatened to harm himself, she'd call 911 and leave the door unlocked for paramedics, who'd take him to a hospital for inpatient mental care.

Now that he's an adult, she said he has refused medication, left home, and authorities have indicated he can't be forced into treatment unless he harms himself — or commits a violent crime and is imprisoned. Hoff thinks prison is where he's headed — he's in jail, charged in an unarmed bank robbery.

___

Online:

American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry: http://www.aacap.org

___

AP Medical Writer Lindsey Tanner can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/LindseyTanner

Read More..