WASHINGTON – Outnumbered Republicans are pledging to delay passage of historic health care legislation as long as possible after jubilant Democrats locked in Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson as the 60th and decisive vote.
Nelson's backing puts President Barack Obama's signature issue firmly on a path for Christmas Eve passage. Democrats will need to show 60 votes on two additional occasions, with the next — and most critical — test vote set for about 1 a.m. Monday.
"This bill is a legislative train wreck of historic proportions," the Republican leader, Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, said at a Saturday news conference. He pointed to cuts to Medicare that the Congressional Budget Office said totaled more than $470 billion over a decade, with reductions in planned payments to home health care agencies and hospices. He also said the bill includes "massive tax increases" at a time of double-digit unemployment.
With senators set to resume debate Sunday afternoon, Republicans note the CBO concluded that under the bill, "federal outlays for health care would increase during the 2010-2019 period, as would the federal budgetary commitment to health care."
To get Nelson's vote, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., agreed to a series of concessions on abortion and other issues demanded by Nelson, a Democrat, and then informed Obama of the agreement as the president flew home from climate talks in Copenhagen.
Obama welcomed the breakthrough, saying in a statement at the White House, "After a nearly centurylong struggle, we are on the cusp of making health care reform a reality in the United States of America."
The CBO said the Senate bill would extend coverage to more than 30 million Americans who lack it. It also imposes new regulations to curb abuses of the insurance industry, and the president noted one last-minute addition would impose penalties on companies that "arbitrarily jack up prices" in advance of the legislation taking effect.
CBO analysts also said the legislation would cut federal deficits by $132 billion over 10 years and possibly much more in the subsequent decade.
At its core, the legislation would create a new insurance exchange where consumers could shop for affordable coverage that complied with new federal guidelines. Most Americans would be required to purchase insurance, with federal subsidies available to help defray the cost for lower and middle income individuals and families.
In a concession to Nelson and other moderates, the bill lacks a government-run insurance option of the type that House Democrats inserted into theirs. In a final defeat for liberals, a proposed Medicare expansion was also jettisoned in the past several days as Reid and the White House maneuvered for 60 votes.

Summer Ski Camp

Snow skiing is a group of sports using skis as primary equipment. Skis are used in conjunction with boots that connect to the ski with use of a binding. Skiing can be grouped into two general categories. Nordic skiing is the oldest and includes sport that evolved from skiing as done in Scandinavia. Nordic style bindings attach at the toes of the skier's boots but not at the heels. Alpine skiing includes sports that evolved from skiing as done in the Alps.

Alpine bindings attach at both the toe and the heel of the skier's boots. As with many disciplines, such as Telemark skiing, there is some crossover. However, binding style and history tend to dictate whether a style is considered Nordic or Alpine. Therefore, in view of its lack of a locking heel, and its roots in Telemark, Norway, Telemark is generally considered a Nordic discipline. To use common known sports as examples, since examples make the concept, cross country skiing is Nordic whereas downhill skiing is Alpine.

KABUL (AFP) –
A senior NATO commander in Afghanistan conceded on Wednesday for the first time that civilians may have been killed during a joint military operation with Afghan forces in the east of the country this week.

"There is confusion. The initial reports are confusing like always in this situation. In the confusion there was obviously a fire-fight and we are investigating," Lieutenant General David Rodriguez told journalists.

"There could possibly have been some civilians killed," added Rodriguez, the number two commander of NATO troops serving in Afghanistan.

President Hamid Karzai's office said six civilians, including a woman, died when troops from the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) conducted an operation in the eastern province of Laghman.

Several other people were detained, officials have said.

ISAF said previously it had no reports to substantiate claims of civilian casualties during the joint Afghan-international operation in Laghman. The government says it is investigating the incident in conjunction with ISAF.

Hundreds of students took to the streets in the eastern town of Jalalabad on Wednesday shouting "death to America" to protest against the alleged deaths of civilians during a NATO-led raid, witnesses said.

Most of the roughly 400 demonstrators were university students and blocked a key highway to the capital Kabul.

The protesters also demanded the release of those arrested and a classmate detained last month in his home province of Paktia, also in the east.

Civilian casualties are highly sensitive in Afghanistan where officials say it creates animosity against the Western-backed government, and 113,000 NATO and US forces fighting against an escalating Taliban insurgency.

Karzai has long called on foreign troops to avoid civilian casualties during operations against insurgents.

US Defence Secretary Robert Gates, currently visiting Afghanistan, said Tuesday that preventing civilian deaths would be a "top priority" as Washington and NATO allies prepare to boost the overall number of troops to 150,000.

BERNE (Reuters) –
Most of the thousands of rich people whose UBS (UBSN.VX) bank accounts are to be handed over to U.S. authorities are suspected of serious fraud rather than simple tax evasion, Swiss authorities revealed on Tuesday.

The account details of about 4,450 people are due to be handed over to settle a bitter row over bank secrecy under a deal struck with the United States in August.

The saga has dented Switzerland's reputation as a center of banking discretion and threatened at one point to bring UBS to its knees.

The Swiss Justice Department said around 4,200 of the accounts are to be handed over on the grounds of "advanced and serious fraud." The category covers accounts with assets of at least 1 million Swiss francs ($986,200) and 100,000 francs in average revenues over at least three years, the Swiss Justice Department said.

About a further 250 accounts are suspected of a lesser offence -- of knowingly providing U.S. tax authorities with false information or setting up vehicles to dodge tax.

The submission of information on clients suspected of dodging U.S. taxes by stashing away money in secret accounts, promises to end years of investigation and uncertainty for UBS.

Submission of data to U.S. authorities applies to UBS accounts held between 2001 and 2008 by U.S. citizens resident in the United States.

Switzerland has claimed its banking secrecy remains intact, but some private bankers say it is no longer a selling point for its banks, which will need to offer other skills like wealth management and legacy planning to attract clients.

The country will also hand over the names of U.S. citizens holding offshore company accounts with UBS if they are suspected of tax fraud or similar, regardless of whether they were resident in the U.S. or elsewhere.

Earlier on Tuesday, UBS set an ambitious target for annual pretax profit of $15 billion, vowing to rebuild the loss-making bank and win back clients after the subprime crisis and U.S. tax row.

(Editing by Erica Billingham and Andrew Callus)

NEW YORK (Reuters) –
It's still not cheap, but Livin' La Vida Madoff may now cost a bit less.

Asking prices for homes once occupied by now imprisoned Ponzi schemer Bernard Madoff in Manhattan's Upper East Side and in Palm Beach, Florida, have been cut, after about two months on the market.

Madoff's 4,000-square-foot duplex Manhattan penthouse, "perched atop a distinguished white-glove prewar cooperative" according to the broker Sotheby's International Realty, is now being offered for $8.9 million, 10 percent below its initial $9.9 million asking price.

The price of the 8,750-square-foot home in Palm Beach was cut 7 percent to $7.9 million from $8.49 million, according to the broker Corcoran Group.

Corcoran calls that home "a return to classic Florida island living" of the 1950s and 1960s "when Palm Beach was a less manicured tropical paradise."

In contrast, Madoff's beachfront home sold last month for $9.41 million, above its $8.75 million asking price, and also listed by Corcoran. Steven Roth, chairman of Vornado Realty Trust, was the buyer, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Corcoran did not immediately return requests for comment. Madoff himself estimated the Manhattan penthouse was worth $7 million and the Palm Beach home $11 million.

Sale proceeds will go toward reimbursing victims of Madoff's estimated $65 billion Ponzi scheme.

U.S. Marshal Joseph Guccione said the price for the Manhattan penthouse was reduced to attract more potential buyers.

Irving Picard, the trustee supervising the liquidation of Madoff's investment firm, last month said he had recovered $1.4 billion of Madoff assets. That's just 7 percent of the $21.2 billion of investor losses he had identified.

An auction is scheduled for Saturday at a Sheraton hotel in Manhattan of items once used by Madoff and his wife Ruth, including Rolex watches, Hermes and Prada handbags, and a satin New York Mets baseball jacket emblazoned with Madoff's name.

Proceeds are expected to be at least several hundred thousand dollars, according to low estimates from the U.S. Marshals Service and Gaston & Sheehan Auctioneers Inc, (http://www.txauction.com), and also go to Madoff victims.

Bernard Madoff is serving a 150-year prison sentence in North Carolina.

(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel, editing by Dave Zimmerman)

STRASBOURG, France – Europe's court of human rights says the display of crucifixes in Italian public schools violates religious and education freedoms.
A seven-judge panel sided with a complaint filed by Soile Lautsi, a parent who claimed public schools in her northern Italian town refused to remove the Roman Catholic symbols from classrooms. Lautsi says the crucifixes violated the secular principles the public schools are supposed to uphold.
Tuesday's ruling awarded euro5,000 ($7,390) in damages to Lautsi, which the Italian government is to pay her. It has not ordered Italian authorities to remove the crucifixes.

NEW YORK (Reuters) –
Crude oil rose and the dollar fell on Monday on strong worldwide factory data and a surprise jump in U.S. pending home sales, but U.S. stocks see-sawed before ending higher after a sell-off in banking shares.

The data boosted risk appetite as it pointed to steady improvement in the economy, but critical remarks by a Federal Reserve official caused investors to sell financial shares and snuff an early rally on Wall Street.

The major U.S. equity indexes had risen about 1 percent as the data and strong results from Ford Motor Co (F.N) spurred broad-based gains and soothed worries over the strength of the recovery.

But Jon Greenlee, associate director of the Federal Reserve's Division of Banking Supervision and Regulation, said U.S. banks are at risk of sizable new loan losses, particularly on commercial property.

Some banks may not have sufficient capital to fully cushion against setbacks, Greenlee said in testimony before a congressional subcommittee meeting in Atlanta.

Questions about whether the seven-month rally in U.S. equities has run out of steam also weighed on sentiment. The Fed is set to begin a two-day policy meeting on Tuesday.

"The market has turned from buying on dips to selling on rallies," said Terry Morris, senior vice president and senior equity manager for National Penn Investors Trust Co in Reading, Pennsylvania.

The Dow Jones industrial average (.DJI) was up 76.71 points, or 0.79 percent, at 9,789.44. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index (.SPX) was up 6.69 points, or 0.65 percent, at 1,042.88. The Nasdaq Composite Index (.IXIC) was up 4.09 points, or 0.20 percent, at 2,049.20.

The economic data gave the oil markets a shot in the arm, said Phil Flynn, an analyst at PFGBest Research in Chicago.

"Oil futures are still trading in the recent range here, but the market is sensing that if manufacturing continues to be strong that will translate into higher demand for oil," Flynn said.

U.S. crude rose $1.13 to settle at $78.13 a barrel. In London, Brent crude settled $1.35 higher at $76.55 a barrel.

Commodity prices mostly rose, lifting commodity-linked currencies such as the Australian and Canadian dollars.

"The pattern in which stocks and the euro are correlated is intact. As stocks rise, so does the euro," said Marc Chandler, global head of FX strategy at Brown Brothers Harriman in New York.

"But I don't think we're out of this consolidation and correction in stocks, and even in the euro. I'm not convinced that the downside correction in the euro is over," he said.

The dollar was down against a basket of major currencies, with the U.S. Dollar Index (.DXY) down 0.10 percent at 76.223.

The euro was up 0.36 percent at $1.4768, and against the yen, the dollar was up 0.27 percent at 90.32.

U.S. December gold futures settled up $13.60 at $1,054 an ounce in New York.

The benchmark 10-year U.S. Treasury note was down 11/32 in price to yield 3.43 percent.

Earlier in Asia, worries about the U.S. financial sector resurfaced after CIT Group Inc (CIT.N), the lender to small and mid-sized U.S. companies, filed for bankruptcy.

The MSCI index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan (.MIAPJ0000PUS) fell 1 percent to touch a one-month low. Japan's Nikkei average (.N225) dropped 2.3 percent, mirroring the 2.8 percent slide in the U.S. S&P 500 (.SPX) on Friday.

(Reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak, Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss, Matthew Robinson and Ellen Freilich in New York; Emelia Sithole-Matarise and Joanne Frearson in London; writing by Herbert Lash; Editing by Leslie Adler)

MARRAKECH, Morocco – Trying to mute Arab criticism that the Obama administration had retreated from its tough stance on Israeli settlements, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Monday softened her praise for Israel's offer to restrain new housing in Palestinian areas.
While Israel was moving in the right direction in its offer to restrict but not stop the settlements, Clinton said, its offer "falls far short" of U.S. expectations.
Clinton said her earlier praise of Israel's offer, during a stop in Jerusalem, had been intended as "positive reinforcement." But her comment drew widespread criticism from Persian Gulf ministers who interpreted it as a U.S drawback on settlements, which have been the main obstacle to a resumption of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
In a sign of U.S. eagerness to calm Arab concerns, Clinton is extending her trip by one day to fly to Cairo to meet with President Hosni Mubarak on Wednesday, her staff announced. She had been scheduled to return to Washington on Tuesday.
Clinton's comments in Jerusalem on Saturday appeared to reflect a realization within the Obama administration that Netanyahu's government will not accept a full-on settlement freeze and that a partial halt may be the best lesser option. Her appeal on Saturday seemed designed to make the Israeli position more palatable to the Palestinians and Arab states.
Clinton had traveled to the region only reluctantly, concerned her visit might be seen as a failure, according to several U.S. officials. She agreed to meet Israeli and Palestinian leaders after pressure from the White House, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal administration thinking.
During a photo-taking session Monday with her Moroccan counterpart, Clinton was asked by a reporter about the Arab reaction, and she responded by reading from a written statement that appeared designed to counter the skepticism about the Obama administration's views on settlements.
"Successive American administrations of both parties have opposed Israel's settlement policy," she said. "That is absolutely a fact, and the Obama administration's position on settlements is clear, unequivocal and it has not changed. As the president has said on many occasions, the United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements."
Clinton's tweaking of her earlier remarks appeared to satisfy at least some of the Morocco meeting attendees. Palestinian Foreign Minister Riad Malki said Monday that "we have heard her say something completely different from that statement in line with previous statements, so we are happy that such a position was highlighted and brought back to the right line and right now we will see how things will go."
Malki added that "we completely appreciate the sincere efforts made by President Barack Obama and his team to take this issue as a top priority and to try to deal with it from day one."
In her recalibrated comments Monday, Clinton also called on the Israelis to do more to improve "movement and access" for Palestinians and on Israeli security arrangements.
She added, however, that Israel deserved praise for moving in the right direction.
"This offer falls far short of what we would characterize as our position or what our preference would be," she added. "But if it is acted upon, it will be an unprecedented restriction on settlements and would have a significant and meaningful effect on restraining their growth."
In her statement to reporters, Clinton also stressed that the Palestinian authorities deserved credit for what she called "unprecedented" steps to improve security in the West Bank and praised the Palestinians for progress in training their security forces.
On Monday evening, Clinton met with representatives of the Gulf Cooperation Council, plus officials from Egypt, Jordan, Iraq and Morocco. Clinton also flew Monday to the south-central city of Ouarzazate for an audience with King Mohammed VI, then returned to Marrakech for talks with foreign ministers of several Persian Gulf nations.
Clinton was expected to meet separately with Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal, who has rejected U.S. appeals for improved Arab relations with Israel as a way to help restart Middle East peace talks.
After taking office in January, Obama buoyed Palestinian hopes for progress toward establishing a Palestinian state with his outreach to the Muslim world and an initially tough stance urging a full freeze to all settlement construction.
But after making little headway with the Israelis in recent months, Clinton urged Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas in a face-to-face meeting in Abu Dhabi on Saturday to renew talks, which broke down late last year, without conditions. Abbas said no, insisting that Israel first halt all settlement activity in the West Bank and east Jerusalem — lands the Palestinians claim for a future state.

Then, at a joint news conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu late Saturday in Jerusalem, Clinton praised Netanyahu's offer to curb some settlement construction, saying it was an unprecedented gesture.

That statement provoked a chiding by Palestinian government spokesman Ghassan Khatib. Jordan and Egypt also issued statements Sunday critical of the latest U.S. approach.

___

Associated Press writer Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report.

MASHPEE, Mass. – From a blustery perch over a Cape Cod beach, Chuckie Green gestures toward a stretch of horizon where he says construction of the nation's first offshore wind farm would destroy his Indian tribe's religion.
The Wampanoag — the tribe that welcomed the Pilgrims in the 17th century and known as "The People of the First Light" — practice sacred rituals requiring an unblocked view of the sunrise. That view won't exist once 130 turbines, each over 400 feet tall, are built several miles from shore in Nantucket Sound, visible to Wampanoag in Mashpee and on Martha's Vineyard.
Tribal rituals, including dancing and chanting, take place at secret sacred sites around the sound at various times, such as the summer and winter solstices and when an elder passes.
The Wampanoag fight to preserve their ceremonies has become the latest obstacle — some say delay tactic — for a pioneering wind energy project that seemed at the cusp of final approval.
"We, the Wampanoag people, who opened our arms and allowed people to come here for religious freedoms, are now being threatened with our religion being taken away for the profits of one single group of investors," Green said.
The Mashpee and Aquinnah Wampanoag claim Nantucket Sound is eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places as a Traditional Cultural Property. The tribes say the designation, which would come with new regulations for activity on the sound, is needed to preserve not only their pristine views but ancestors' remains buried on Horseshoe Shoal, where the turbines would be built.
Cape Wind supporters say the tribes' claim for a National Register listing for the sound is baseless and was sprung late, in league with the project's most vociferous opponents, the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound.
"I think this is clearly a tactic for delay, for delay's sake," said Mark Rodgers, a spokesman for Cape Wind. "I think it's fair to say, looking at the past eight years, that opponents to Cape Wind have tried every conceivable strategy to slow down or stop the project."
Green bristles at the notion that the tribes, prodded by the Alliance to Protect Nantucket Sound, are jumping in late just to gum up the works. Green and Audra Parker, the alliance's executive director, said the alliance supports the Wampanoags' claim, but didn't engineer it.
Cape Wind, proposed in 2001 and expected to cost $1 billion, aims to provide up to 75 percent of Cape Cod's power. Other offshore wind farm proposals are in earlier stages of development in several states, including Rhode Island, Delaware and Texas.
Cape Wind opponents say it would be a hazard to aviation, harm the environment — including fish and bird life — and mar historic vistas. The late Sen. Edward Kennedy, whose family compound would be in view of the project, fought the project until his death, saying it was a triumph of special interests over state interests.
A major decision on the Wampanoag claim is due within two weeks.
The U.S. Minerals Management Service, the lead agency reviewing the proposed wind farm, has recommended that the sound is not eligible for the National Register to Brona Simon, head of the Massachusetts Historical Commission.
Simon must decide by Nov. 12 if she disagrees. If so, the claim would be sent to the National Parks Service for a final ruling within 45 days.
A parks service decision that the sound should be listed a Traditional Cultural Property wouldn't kill Cape Wind, but it could add months to the approval process by forcing developers to comply with the designation's various standards.
Simon declined comment through a spokesman for the Massachusetts Secretary of State, which has jurisdiction over her office.
Earlier this year, in a letter to the minerals service, Simon criticized federal review of the project, saying it appeared to value Cape Wind's profitability and schedule over "effects to historic properties."
Barbara Hill of Clean Power Now, an advocacy group that supports Cape Wind, said the entire offshore wind industry would suffer if Simon decides more review of the tribal claim is needed.

"If there is going to be an allowance to this type of viewshed issue, as far as the eyes can see, what are we going to build?" she said.

Cape Wind appeared close to final approval in January when the minerals service concluded the project posed no major environmental problems. If the tribes win their claim, say project supporters, there would be a host of unintended consequences.

Two Massachusetts environmental and economic development officials, Ian Bowles and Greg Bialecki, produced a list of commercial activities — from commercial fishing to sand mining — they said would be hurt by the ensuing new regulations. They also argued the Supreme Court has ruled that a vast, unenclosed body of water such as the 560-square mile Nantucket Sound isn't eligible as a Traditional Cultural Property.

"It seems clear that this request for such a designation, coming at this time, is an attempt to block or further delay renewable energy development in Nantucket Sound," their letter said.

Rodgers said the tribes' concerns have always been taken seriously, and noted borings were taken at the project site to determine if an Indian burial ground is there — though Green says they don't go deep enough. In a September letter to the tribes, the minerals service listed numerous times in the last three years when it met, or tried to meet, to discuss their concerns.

Green said despite the years of review, regulators have never truly met requirements to thoroughly address their concerns — including the pending claim about the sound.

"I don't expect anything from this, except for due process," Green said. "And I have not received due process."

KHARTOUM (AFP) –
A French employee of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) was kidnapped in the war-torn western Sudanese region of Darfur on Thursday, the aid agency said.

"We can confirm the abduction of one of our employees in the vicinity of El-Geneina," capital of West Darfur state, ICRC spokeswoman Tamara al-Rifai said in Khartoum.

The man was named as Gauthier Lefevre and had been working in Darfur for the past 15 months.

Sudan's minister of state for humanitarian affairs Abdel Baqi Gilani told AFP that Lefevre was in "good health" and that he expected him to be released soon.

"He is in good health according to the first report I have received," Gilani said without elaboration.

"I think he will be released soon. The ICRC is very respected and neutral and has no enmity among Darfur groups," Gilani said.

In Geneva, the ICRC said the incident occurred around midday as Lefevre "was returning with other ICRC staff to El-Geneina after completing a field trip north of the town to help local communities upgrade their water supply systems.

"He was travelling in one of two clearly marked ICRC vehicles when he was seized a few kilometres (miles) from the town."

Rifai said that a small group of expatriates as well as local Sudanese staff were travelling with Lefevre when he was abducted but were not harmed and were able to continue the trip.

"We don't know why they targeted him (Lefevre,)" Rifai said.

The ICRC said it had no immediate information concerning the abductors or their motives, while Gilani described the kidnappers as "bandits" and said the Khartoum government "condemns" the incident.

The Red Cross also called for Lefevre's immediate and "unconditional release" -- a demand also made by the French foreign ministry in Paris -- and said it is "in contact with the authorities and other parties with the aim of resolving the situation as swiftly as possible."

Earlier Gilani told AFP that the authorities are "trying to collect information" on the abduction, which he said occurred "in a zone near (the border with) Chad."

A senior Chadian rebel official contacted by AFP denied any Chadian rebel involvement in the abduction.

Thursday's abduction was the fifth of a foreign worker since March, when Sudan's ties with foreign relief organisations soured after the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for President Omar al-Beshir on charges of war crimes in Darfur.

But it was the first time a Red Cross employee was targeted.

Gilani voiced concern of more abductions and urged foreign relief organisations "to bolster security around their offices."

A relief official echoed his concern and said: "What has been happening in Darfur is very worrisome. I hope that the government will take this seriously."

On Sunday, two female aid workers -- Irishwoman Sharon Commins and Ugandan Hilda Kawuki -- were freed after 107 days of gruelling captivity in Darfur.

The two women's captivity was the longest endured by foreign aid staff in Darfur since the conflict erupted in the region in early 2003.

Two members of Doctors Without Borders (Medecins Sans Frontieres MSF) and French aid agency Aide Medicale Internationale (AMI) were kidnapped in March and April but were later freed unharmed.

However two civilian employees of the UN-African Union joint peacekeeping force in Darfur who were kidnapped in August at Zalingei in west Darfur are still in the hands of their abductors.

The United Nations says up to 300,000 people have died and 2.7 million have fled their homes since ethnic minority rebels in Darfur rose up against the Arab-dominated government in Khartoum in February 2003.

The government says 10,000 people have been killed.

KABUL (AFP) –
An anti-corruption campaigner who came third in Afghanistan's election said Thursday he may urge a boycott of a run-off next month, as the UN strived to avoid a repeat of the first round's rampant fraud.

The scale of the corruption during the August 20 election, most of which benefited President Hamid Karzai, has led to deep disillusionment in a country beset by a bloody Taliban insurgency.

US Defense Secretary Robert Gates said the run-off on November 7 would be watched closely for fraud and foreign troops would work to protect voters from Taliban attack.

But outspoken lawmaker Ramazan Bashardost, who came a distant third in August with about 10 percent of the vote, damned the entire process as a "failure".

"Elsewhere in the world people involved in fraud are sent to jail but here in our country they are praised," he told AFP.

Bashardost said he would announce early next month whether he is asking his followers to back Karzai or former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, or to boycott the new ballot.

The two contenders had already lobbied for his support, he said, as distribution got under way of ballot papers and indelible ink to polling stations.

"But mark my words, I won't trade the vote of Afghan people or my supporters in return for a position" in government, he said. "I'll do what is best for the people of Afghanistan."

One analyst cast doubt on whether Bashardost, a member of Afghanistan's minority Hazara community, had the political clout to make a difference.

"I don't think he's in a kingmaker position," said Haroun Mir, of Afghanistan's Centre for Research and Policy Studies.

"The people who voted for him were the ones who are fed up with both Karzai and Abdullah and were the ones who were not affiliated to a political party or tribal group -- that's why they voted for him."

But a boycott call could undermine the credibility of a hastily-arranged poll that comes after weeks of political paralysis, threatening to depress August's low turnout rate of 38 percent still further.

Afghanistan's Independent Election Commission said the vote run-up would begin in earnest on Saturday with the start of a 12-day campaign period until November 5 and the first distribution of electoral materials nationwide.

UN chief Ban Ki-moon has said the poll faces huge challenges and has ordered the replacement of around 200 monitors who oversaw the first round.

UN spokesman Dan McNorton said some polling stations where major ballot-stuffing was detected and where it is not possible for Afghan security forces to be present to ensure safe voting were unlikely to reopen.

Abdullah's camp is also sceptical about the composition of the electoral commission, a nominally independent body seen by many as pro-Karzai.

"If the composition of the leadership of the commission is not changed, no doubt we will still have the crisis of fraud and illegal rule in the country," said a pro-Abdullah political party, the New Way League.

Organisers face a race against time to stage the second round with the onset of winter, as US President Barack Obama considers whether to deploy thousands more troops into the fray and NATO defence ministers discuss strategy changes.

The issue heightened political tension in Washington, with the White House slamming Dick Cheney Thursday, accusing him of years of neglect of Afghanistan, after the ex-vice president said Obama was "dithering" over the decision.

Asked about security problems surrounding the run-off, Gates said almost all countries that increased troop levels before the August polls had kept those additional forces in Afghanistan.

"Everybody has an interest in making sure that there are as few problems with this run-off election as possible in terms of providing legitimacy for the winning candidate," he said.

NATO chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen urged member nations and partners to step up efforts to build Afghan security forces, warning that failure would destabilise the region and ultimately export insecurity to Europe.

"Leaving Afghanistan behind would once again turn the country into a training ground for Al-Qaeda," he said.

NATO defence ministers were to discuss Friday the new US and NATO counter-insurgency strategy to protect civilians rather than hunt militant fighters.

WASHINGTON – The Obama administration said Thursday it is designating more than 200,000 square miles in Alaska and off its coast as "critical habitat" for polar bears, an action that could add restrictions to future offshore drilling for oil and gas.
Federal law prohibits agencies from taking actions that may adversely affect critical habitat and interfere with polar bear recovery.
Assistant Interior Secretary Tom Strickland called the habitat designation a step in the right direction to help polar bears stave off extinction, while recognizing that the greatest threat to the bear is the melting of Arctic sea ice caused by climate change.
"As we move forward with a comprehensive energy and climate strategy, we will continue to work to protect the polar bear and its fragile environment," Strickland said at a news conference.
The total area proposed for critical habitat designation would cover about 200,541 square miles — about half in the rugged Chukchi Sea off Alaska's northwest coast. About 93 percent of the area proposed for the polar bear is sea ice, with the remaining 7 percent made up of barrier islands or land-based dens of snow and ice.
Designation as critical habitat would not, in itself, bar oil or gas development, but would make consideration of the effect on polar bears and their habitat an explicit part of any government-approved activity.
Thursday's announcement starts a 60-day public comment period, with a final rule expected next year. Interior faces a June 30 deadline for critical habitat designation under terms of a settlement agreement between the government and three environmental groups.
The Bush administration last year declared polar bears "threatened," or likely to become endangered. The May 2008 order by then-Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne cited the bear's need for sea ice, the dramatic loss of such ice in recent decades and computer models that suggest sea ice is likely to recede further in the future.
Environmental groups hailed the habitat announcement, but noted that it came in the same week that the Interior Department approved a plan by a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell to drill exploratory wells on two leases in the Beaufort Sea off Alaska's north coast. The proposed drilling sites are within the area proposed for critical habitat designation.
"If polar bears are to survive in a rapidly melting Arctic, we need to protect their critical habitat, not turn it into a polluted industrial zone," said Brendan Cummings, a lawyer with the Arizona-based Center for Biological Diversity, which filed a lawsuit in the polar bear case.
Cummings called the Interior Department "schizophrenic" — on the one hand declaring its intent to protect polar bear habitat in the Arctic, yet at the same time "sacrificing that habitat to feed our unsustainable addiction to oil."
The announcement comes one day after the state of Alaska filed a new complaint in its effort to overturn the listing of the polar bear as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.
Former Gov. Sarah Palin filed suit last year, saying that Interior did not respond to the state's concerns in a timely manner before listing the polar bears as threatened. State officials say the listing could cripple offshore oil and gas development in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas, which provide prime habitat for the polar bears.
Gov. Sean Parnell, who succeeded Palin upon her resignation last summer, said the Endangered Species Act was being used as a way to shut down resource development along Alaska's northern coast. Parnell said he does not intend to let that happen.
Environmental groups monitoring the Arctic have long complained that federal regulators routinely grant permits for petroleum exploration without adequately considering consequences for whales, polar bears, walrus and other marine mammals. They say boats, drilling platforms and aircraft will add to bears' stress by causing them to flee and expend more energy.
Conservation groups also say oil companies have not demonstrated they can clean up an oil spill in broken ice. Cleanup off Alaska's coast could be slowed by extreme cold, moving ice, high wind and low visibility.
Andrew Wetzler of the Natural Resources Defense Council said designation of critical habitat is a powerful tool to protect threatened species, but said more must be done to save the polar bear from extinction.

ST. LOUIS – A Wisconsin diocese has suspended a Catholic priest who fathered a child during a five-year relationship.
The Diocese of Superior said late Friday that the Rev. Henry Willenborg had been suspended with pay.
The Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests had urged the move Friday in St. Louis. SNAP also wants church officials to help the mother and their now 22-year-old son, who has cancer.
The demands were in response to a New York Times story Friday about the Ashland, Wis., pastor.
Pat Bond, now of O'Fallon, Mo., has received about $100,000 in financial support from the Franciscans, Willenborg's religious order.
She seeks more, and says the church has made her and her son beggars. The Franciscans say they went beyond what the law required.

GENEVA (Reuters) –
The U.N. Human Rights Council on Friday endorsed a U.N. report that accused Israel of war crimes in Gaza, passing a resolution that singled it out for censure without referring to wrongdoings by Hamas.

The report by South African jurist Richard Goldstone accuses both sides of war crimes in Gaza but is most critical of the Jewish state. Up to 1,387 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed in the war last December and January.

In a special session proposed by the Palestinians, 25 states including China, Cuba, Russia and Nigeria endorsed the resolution. Six including the United States voted against, and 11 abstained. Four, including France and Britain, did not vote.

Palestinian officials promptly called for further U.N. inquiries into Israel's actions.

"The international community should make sure that the decision will become a precedent that will ensure the protection of the Palestinian people from any aggression," said Nabil Abu Rdaineh, aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

But Israel, which has wholly rejected the charges in the 575-page report, said the vote would impair the Middle East peace process and also boost militants around the world.

"This resolution provides encouragement for terrorist organizations worldwide and undermines global peace," the Israeli government said in a statement.

The resolution endorsed all Goldstone's recommendations, including the view that the war crimes issue should be referred to the U.N. Security Council if the two sides failed to conduct credible domestic investigations with six months, and possibly then the International Criminal Court.

U.S. OPPOSED

U.S. charge d'affaires Douglas Griffiths said the United States had voted against the resolution because of its one-sided approach and "sweeping conclusions of law," which could unsettle the fragile Middle East peace process.

"This resolution goes far beyond even the initial scope of the Goldstone report into a discussion of elements that should be resolved in the context of permanent status negotiations between the Palestinians and the Israelis," he said.

Taher al-Nono, spokesman of the Hamas government in Gaza, said Hamas would investigate the recommendations of the report.

"We hope that the vote may be the beginning of the prosecution of the leaders of the occupation," he said.

In addition to slamming Israel's lack of cooperation with the Goldstone inquiry, the text "strongly condemns all policies and measures taken by Israel, the occupying power, including those limiting access of Palestinians to their properties and holy sites particularly in Occupied East Jerusalem."

It also called for the U.N. General Assembly to consider the findings and for U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to report back on Israel's adherence to them, moves that could keep Israel in the international spotlight.

The Human Rights Council had agreed during its last regular session to postpone discussion of the Gaza report under pressure from Washington aimed at getting the Middle East peace process back on track.

But Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas came under sharp criticism at home for agreeing to the delay, leading to the request for a special session.

Half of the 12 special sessions the Human Rights Council has held since its launch in 2006 have related to Israel. Israel's ambassador in Geneva told the forum the vote was another attempt to deflect attention from gross abuses elsewhere.

"Many of the speakers over the past two days showed no genuine interest in the Israelis or Palestinians other than ensuring that the glare of Geneva is never shined toward them," Aharon Leshno Yaar said.

(Additional reporting by Matt Falloon in London and Nidal al-Mughrabi in Gaza; Editing by Jonathan Lynn and Kevin Liffey)

TEHRAN, Iran – A hard-line cleric sought Friday to head off an attempt to reinvigorate Iran's anti-government movement, warning against a planned opposition rally next month that would coincide with annual state-sponsored demonstrations against the United States.
Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, delivering the weekly Muslim prayer sermon in Tehran, also had an unusual warning for the security forces, telling them any soft treatment of those activists already in detention would be considered treason. "Nobody gives a flower to his murderer," he said.
Iranian authorities executed a fierce crackdown on the hundreds of thousands of protesters who poured into the streets in response to allegations that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won re-election in June through vote fraud.
Opposition groups say at least 72 protesters were killed in the unrest, while government officials insist only 36 people died. Hundreds were detained in sweeps and there were accusations that people were abused and even raped in custody.
Iran has also brought more than 100 people, including some of the most senior figures in the country's pro-reform movement, to trial on charges of plotting to overthrow Iran's clerical leadership. Three of the defendants have been sentenced to death.
Under the government's campaign, street protests fizzled and the opposition has been unable to decisively regroup.
The last significant protest was on Sept. 18, when tens of thousands of protesters — many chanting "Death to the dictator!" — rallied in defiance of a ban on the march by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and clashed with police.
That rally coincided with a government-organized anti-Israel protest held annually.
Opposition Web sites say another attempt will be made on Nov. 4, when there are calls for a rally coinciding with another yearly state-sponsored event — a day of marches to mark the anniversary of the 1979 student takeover of the U.S. Embassy.
Jannati, whose sermon was broadcast live on state radio, accused the opposition of seeking to transform the event into an outpouring of support for the U.S. Iranian authorities have sought since the unrest first broke out to portray the activists as tools of the West, particularly America and Britain.
"They want to show their pro-American and pro-Israeli nature on the day," Jannati said. "If they are allowed, they will say, 'Long live the U.S. and Israel.'"
Jannati, a zealous supporter of President Ahmadinejad, heads a clerical body that oversees elections and parliamentary decisions.
Jannati asked intelligence services and the judiciary to deal harshly with detainees and said any officials who do not would be committing treason.