Firefighters Attack Stubborn Blaze Near LA Homes
Firefighters attack stubborn blaze near LA homes, gain headway on smaller wildfires

Flames whirled dangerously close to homes Tuesday as gusty Santa Ana winds sent the biggest of southern California's wildfires flaring in hilly brushlands on Los Angeles' northern edge and along subdivisions to the west.

Firefighters with hoses guarded houses as helicopters unleashed loads of water on hot spots of the more than 15-square-mile blaze charring slopes above the San Fernando Valley communities of Porter Ranch and Granada Hills.



Afghan insurgency spreads, attacks rise sharply: U.N.

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The insurgency in Afghanistan has spread beyond Taliban strongholds in the south and east while the number of attacks in the country has reached a six-year high, a top U.N. envoy said on Tuesday.

Violence in Afghanistan this year is worse than at any time since U.S.-led and Afghan forces toppled the militant Islamist Taliban in 2001 and fears are growing among NATO members that they are losing both the military campaign and the support of ordinary Afghans.



US unveils $250bn banking rescue

The US government has announced a $250bn (£143bn) plan to purchase stakes in a wide variety of banks in an effort to restore confidence in the sector.

President George W Bush said the move would help to return stability to the US banking sector and ultimately help preserve free markets.

US federal authorities will also temporarily insure most new debt issued by US banks.

The moves echo similar steps taken by the UK and other European countries.
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The money will come from the $700bn bail-out package approved by US lawmakers earlier this month.

The US plan - effectively part-nationalisation - comes after the bosses of the country's largest banks were summoned to a special meeting at the US Treasury on Monday.
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Mr Paulson said the government would buy stakes in a "wide variety" of banks and thrifts - financial institutions similar to building societies in the UK.

Nine banks, which Mr Paulson described as "healthy institutions", have so far signed up to the deal.



American Consulate in Mexico attacked

Two men attacked the United States Consulate in the northern Mexican city of Monterrey early Sunday morning, but damage was minimal and no injuries were reported, the authorities said. One man fired at the office and another lofted a grenade that did not explode, officials said. The FBI will lead an investigation into the attack. Although there were no immediate suspects, speculation fell on narcotics traffickers.



Stocks: No staying power
Wall Street retreats as investors step back after the previous session's historic rally, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq hit hardest.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Technology shares led a broader retreat Tuesday as the government's plan to spend $250 billion on stock in banks failed to extend the previous session's historic rally.

Credit markets eased a bit, with a key overnight bank lending rate falling. Treasury prices slumped, raising the corresponding yields. The dollar fell against the euro and the yen. Oil, gold and gas prices eased.

The Dow Jones industrial average (INDU) lost 76 points, after having fallen as much as 302 points in the afternoon and having risen as much as 406 points in the morning. The decline was equal to 0.8%.




Russian rights lawyer 'poisoned'

French police have opened an inquiry into allegations that a prominent Russian human rights lawyer may have been poisoned in Strasbourg on Monday.

Karina Moskalenko, who represents some of the Kremlin's best known critics, fell ill after finding a substance similar to mercury inside her car.

She and members of her family were later treated for nausea and headaches.

Prosecutors said there had not been enough of the substance to endanger life, but that more tests were needed.



PNP official with 120,000 euros held in Russia

The Philippine National Police (PNP) on Tuesday confirmed one of their officials have been taken into custody by Russian Customs officials for bringing excess amounts of money.

PNP spokesperson Chief Supt. Nicanor Bartolome told ABS-CBN News that former PNP Director for Comptrollership Eliseo dela Paz was taken into custody by Russian customs officials at the Moscow Airport for questioning, because he was said to have 120,000 euros (roughly P7.5 million) with him.

Passengers are only allowed a maximum of $10,000 (around 7,365 euros) in their possession, and Dela Paz was questioned for having such a big amount of money with him.




Georgia blasts Russia on eve of peace talks

GENEVA (AFP) — Georgian and Russian delegates were to meet here face-to-face on Wednesday -- for the first time since a brief August war -- in talks that threatened to collapse even before they began.

The negotiations in Geneva are meant to provide a forum for Russians and Georgians to sit down together and work out how to assist displaced people faced with the onset of winter and launch an overall process for resolving the conflict.

On the eve of talks, however, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili cast doubt on the any chances of success while branding representatives of Georgia's rebel regions of South Ossetia and Abkazia as "ethnic cleansers."

"We don't think these people are politicians, we think they are ethnic cleansers and we think they are criminals," Saakashvili told reporters in Brussels, after talks with European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso.

"First Russia has to get out of there, they have no right to be there with tanks and troops," he said. "We would be more than happy to cooperate with any community, any representative but not in this kind of situation."



Gazprom executives visit Alaska

MOSCOW: Three weeks after Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska told an interviewer that it seemed, at times, that the Russian prime minister, Vladimir Putin, "rears his head" over her state's border, a delegation of Russian energy executives, including close associates of Putin were in the capital, Anchorage, for talks on Russian energy investment in her state.

The delegation of eight senior executives of Gazprom, the giant Russian natural gas company, met with Tom Erwin, the head of the state's natural resources department and a Palin appointee, as well as the chief executive of the Texas oil company ConocoPhillips, Jim Mulva.

Gazprom's chief executive Aleksei Miller led the meetings on Monday, which were only announced in Moscow on Tuesday. Miller is a close and long-time political ally of Putin.
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A Gazprom official, who was not authorized to speak publicly, said it was "rare, indeed" that such a large delegation of senior executives would travel together to present at a seminar.



How Russia Is Trying to Regain Influence in Latin America
Planned naval exercises with Venezuela, plus big energy deals, get Washington's notice

MOSCOW—Somewhere in the North Atlantic, a squadron of Russian warships is steering toward the Caribbean. Led by the nuclear-powered missile cruiser Peter the Great, the ships are on their way to joint naval exercises with Venezuela. U.S. officials say they'll be watching when the vessels finally arrive in a few weeks.

Russia has beefed up its presence in Latin America in recent months, inking military and business deals amid a drive to reassert its status as a major world power. "Russia is adopting the course that any superpower should have," says Boris Martynov, deputy director of Moscow's Institute of Latin America.

Latin America seems an obvious partner. Russia's relations with the West are strained following the Georgia conflict, while some left-leaning governments in the region, such as Venezuela and Bolivia, are looking for allies after clashing with the United States.

But it's up for debate what Russia truly wants in the region and whether it has the capacity to become a major player there.



Russia Takes Anticrisis Measures

Moscow, Oct 14 (Prensa Latina) A package of anticrisis measures aimed at guaranteeing the stability of the Russian financial market was put in place Tuesday, after being approved by President Dmitri Medvedev, the official gazette reported.

According to the new measures, the Central Bank can grant credits for up to six months, while the Economic Foreign Bank can refinance companies' debts with foreign creditors.

Banks will also receive subordinated credits for up to 11 years, totaling 38 billion dollars.



Modernizing the Russian military

MOSCOW: The Russian defense minister announced Tuesday that he would slash the number of generals and officers in a drive to streamline the bloated armed forces, local news agencies reported.

Russia has increased military spending as part of an effort to re-establish itself as a global power, but the new cash has not delivered radical improvements - a failure analysts put down to corruption and inefficiency.

Defense Minister Anatoli Serdyukov is a former businessman and tax official who, in the face of fierce resistance from many senior generals, has been given the task of reshaping the military so that it provides value for money.




Russia to reduce top brass in military

Russia's defence minister has announced a sweeping reform of the military that will cut hundreds of generals and disband nine of every 10 army units.

Though downsized to 1.13 million from the four million-member Soviet Army, the military has done little to reduce its number of officers. It maintains almost the same number of military units as in the Soviet era, though many exist only on paper.

By 2012 Russia will reduce its armed forces to one million, including around 150,000 officers, Defence Minister Anatoly Serdyukov said Tuesday in televised remarks.


Forced into Russia's arms
The run on Kaupthing, prompted by Britain's PM and chancellor, has had far-reaching economic and geopolitical effects

While most stock exchanges have been climbing in the last two days, after EU leaders' joint effort to save the crumbling banking system was announced on Sunday, the Icelandic stock exchange has almost completely collapsed. Since it reopened this morning it has fallen 77%.

This extraordinary fall is almost entirely due to the collapse of the three major banks last week. Glitnir, Landsbanki and Kaupthing amounted to more than half of the value of Iceland's stock exchange and they are now worth nothing. Apart from the three banks and closely related firms, most Icelandic companies are still standing.

Iceland has few good options. The IMF is looking into our loan application and earlier today Icelandic representatives were warmly welcomed in the finance ministry in Moscow. Negotiations are reported to be well under way with the Russian government, which has offered a $5.5bn loan to the Icelandic government. This situation is not something that sits well with most Icelanders.



Russia's RUSAL slams Potanin for $600 mln sale

MOSCOW, Oct 14 (Reuters) - Russia's United Company RUSAL lashed out at billionaire Vladimir Potanin on Tuesday for selling $600 million in assets to a unit of mining giant Norilsk Nickel.

Potanin and UC RUSAL both hold large stakes in Norilsk, and are embroiled in an complex corporate dispute.

The dispute took a new turn on Monday when Norilsk's electricity generator, OGK-3, said it had bought 25 percent of energy company RUSIA Petroleum and some smaller assets for more than $600 million.




China, Russia hail border agreement

CHINA and Russia yesterday unveiled boundary markers delineating the eastern section of their border, hailing the agreement as an example for the rest of the world in solving territorial disputes.

The two countries held a ceremony on Heixiazi Island to unveil new border markers, and frontier guards from the two sides took up positions in accordance with the newly laid boundaries.

The eastern half of Heixiazi Island, a rocky island at the meeting of the Ussuri and Heilongjiang rivers on the border between China and Russia, has become China's most eastern area, the first part of the country to greet the sun each day.




Russia, North Korea to hold nuclear talks Wednesday

MOSCOW (AFP) — Russia's foreign minister will meet his North Korean counterpart on Wednesday in Moscow to discuss a six-party disarmament pact on Pyongyang's nuclear programme, the ministry said.

"Special attention will be paid to the situation in northeastern Asia, in particular to the six-party talks over the nuclear problem of the Korean peninsula," Russian foreign ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko said Tuesday.

Russia, along with the United States, Japan, China, South Korea and North Korea make up the six countries involved in the negotiations.



Syria, Russia sign $71 million gas deal

Damascus: Syria and Russia have signed a $71 million gas deal to transport natural gas from Syria’s northern city of Aleppo to the Turkish border.

The agreement between Syrian Gas Company and Russia’s StroyTrans Gaz provides construction of a 62-kilometre pipeline from Aleppo to the border, Sana news agency reported on Tuesday.




RUSSIA DISCARDS ITS “PEACEKEEPING” OPERATION IN ABKHAZIA

At the CIS summit in Bishkek on October 9 and 10, Russia announced the termination of the “CIS collective peacekeeping operation in the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict zone.” Moscow describes its move as a common decision of the assembled heads of state and government, in a final attempt to portray the now-defunct operation as having been approved multi-nationally from its inception to its end (Interfax, Itar-Tass, October 9, 10).
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Moscow’s move ends a 14-year-old “peacekeeping” pretense that culminated in Russia’s full-scale military seizure of Abkhazia from Georgia, rendering any peacekeeping redundant from Moscow’s viewpoint. Russian “peacekeepers,” who acted ostensibly under a “CIS mandate” and with Georgian consent extracted under duress since 1994, are now to be replaced by far larger Russian forces, by “agreement” with the Abkhaz authorities, whom Moscow installed in the first place and has now given “diplomatic recognition.”



Hong Kong and Japan step in to help banks

HONG KONG: Regulators in two of the biggest Asian financial centers stepped up their efforts Tuesday to ensure liquidity and insulate their respective banking systems from the turmoil in global credit markets.

The Hong Kong Monetary Authority said it would provide government backing for all of the $773 billion in Hong Kong bank deposits through 2010 as government assistance for banks in Europe and the United States put pressure on Asian regulators to follow suit even though Asian banks tended to be better capitalized. The authority also said that it was prepared to provide capital to the 23 locally incorporated banks if they needed it, following the examples of the United States and Britain.

The Bank of Japan, meanwhile, said it would increase the size and frequency of its commercial paper repurchase operations and take other steps to improve money market operations in the wake of the recent global financial market turmoil, Reuters reported.



Iran seen supplying arms to Sudan

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Iran and Russia joined China and nine other states as direct weapons suppliers for Sudan after a U.N. embargo was imposed in 2004, a human rights group said in a report published on Tuesday.

China's position as Khartoum's top arms supplier is well known and has long been criticized by human rights activists and Western governments. Other suspected weapons suppliers, such as Iran, are rarely mentioned.

In a report dismissed by Sudan, the New York- and Washington-based activist group Human Rights First said it used public databases to compile data on weapons transfers to Sudan.



Jesse Jackson: Obama will rid United States of 'Zionist' control

The New York Post reported Tuesday that the Rev. Jesse Jackson said the United States will rid itself of years of "Zionist" control under an administration headed by Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama.

The daily quoted the veteran civil rights leader on Tuesday as having said that although "Zionists who have controlled American policy for decades" remain strong, they will lose a much of their clout when Obama enters the White House.



Syria issues decree to establish diplomatic relations with Lebanon

Syria said Tuesday it plans to open an embassy in Beirut and an official with the Syrian Foreign Ministry said that will likely happen before the end of the year.

The move means Syria will officially recognize the sovereignty of Lebanon.

The Syrian Arab News Agency (Sana) said President Bashar Assad issued a decree on Tuesday that establishes diplomatic ties with Lebanon.

The decree didn't specify when the embassy would open, but announced "the establishment of diplomatic relations between the Syrian Arab Republic and the Lebanese Republic, and the creation of a diplomatic mission at ambassador level in the Lebanese capital Beirut," Sana reported.



Forest fires raging in Lebanon
Four injured as fires detroy Lebanon's most beautiful forests in Shouf mountains

BEIRUT - Three Lebanese soldiers and a firefighter were injured battling forest fires raging in the Shouf mountains southeast of Beirut on Tuesday, a civil defence official said.

"There are many fires in Dibbiyeh, the area of Aley, Sirjbal and another in al-Zaaruriyeh," the official said.

Students from the nearby Arab University were evacuated and dozens of families were seen fleeing the area, witnesses said.

"This entire area, home to one of Lebanon's most beautiful forests, has been destroyed," said Rafiq Boustani, a resident of Dibbiyeh, who estimated the affected area to be 500 hectares (more than 1,200 acres).

"By tonight it will be 600 hectares," added Boustani, who owns an estate in the area.



US Navy: Pirates haven't destroyed Ukrainian ship

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) - The U.S. Navy says Somali pirates have not followed through with their threat to blow up an arms-laden Ukrainian ship they hijacked.

Lt. Stephanie Murdock, a spokeswoman for the 5th Fleet in Bahrain, confirms the vessel, with a 20-member crew and a cargo of heavy weapons, is still in one piece.



Somali splinter’s forces free ship from pirates

MOGADISHU: Forces from the Somali breakaway region of Puntland yesterday freed a Panama-flagged cargo freighter that was seized last week, officials said.

The MV Awail, with a crew of 13 Syrians and two Somalis, was seized last Thursday off the Somali northeastern coast.

“The Panama-flagged ship was forcibly released by the Puntland forces at 10am (0700 GMT) in a successful operation,” said Puntland Foreign Affairs Minister Ali Abdi Aware.

“Ten pirates were captured and two policemen were injured during the raid,” he added.



No letup in slaying of Christians in Mosul

BAGHDAD: A Christian music store owner was shot and killed in Mosul, the Iraqi police said Monday, in the latest in a series of killings that have prompted thousands of members of the religious minority to flee the northern city.

Religious leaders have called for action to stop the apparent Sunni insurgent campaign against Christians and the government has announced plans to send more troops.

Gunmen stormed into the businessman's store late Sunday in an eastern part of the city, killing him and wounding his teenage nephew, according to a police officer in the regional security operations center.



Paulson Plans to Invest in `Thousands' of U.S. Banks

Oct. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson urged banks getting $250 billion of taxpayer funds to channel the money to customers quickly to halt a credit freeze that's threatening to bankrupt companies and hammer the job market.

"Leaving businesses and consumers without access to financing is totally unacceptable,'' Paulson said in Washington. He rolled out the emergency program after a crisis of confidence in the financial system last week spurred the biggest stock sell- off since 1933. Paulson told companies getting the government funds to "deploy'' the money in loans.



Religious peace threatened in South Korea

As a gong echoes through the neighborhood of office towers in central Seoul, afternoon worshipers arriving at the temple - home to the largest Buddhist order in South Korea - walk below a canopy of 6,200 lotus-shaped lanterns. The lanterns are arranged by color to spell the English word "OUT" - a highly unusual rebuke to President Lee Myung Bak from the country's once-docile and normally apolitical Buddhists.

"Religious peace in our country is being threatened by those who dream of turning it into a medieval Christian kingdom through a church elder-president," said Park Jeong Kyu, a spokesman for the Jogye Order.



Independent Audit Shows Turkmen Gas Field 'World-Class'

Turkmenistan has long boasted that it has some of the largest natural-gas reserves in the world. But no one was sure of this because only Turkmen specialists had ever checked to determine exactly how much gas the country really has.

But that began to change earlier this year when the Turkmen government hired the British firm Gaffney, Cline, and Associates (GCA) to survey some of the country's gas fields. The news was better than anyone could have imagined.

On October 13, GCA manager Jim Gillet announced that the results of an audit from one field, the South Yolotan-Osman field in southeastern Turkmenistan, indicated that the "best estimate is five times larger than Dauletabad, which makes Yolotan-Osman approximately the fourth- or fifth-largest gas field in the world."



Ghana secures its oil discovery

Ghana is taking steps to secure its recently discovered oil in the Western region of that country. The Western Regional Minister, Anthony Evans Amoah has therefore suggested to the Ghana government to use the region as what he terms "a growth pole" in the wake of oil find there, by developing the region.

He said the benefits of the intervention measures would spill over to other regions with time. Mr. Amuah made the suggestion at an oil forum organized for Senior Military Officers, the media, traditional rulers, the police and civic society groups in Takoradi in the Western region of Ghana.



Bush to host crisis talks with EU

US President George W Bush is to hold talks on Saturday with French President Nicolas Sarkozy and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso.

The summit at Camp David will focus on the global financial crisis.

Mr Bush has already spoken to leaders from Italy, Germany and the UK this week in a bid to co-ordinate the global response to the economic turmoil.

President Sarkozy had earlier called for a meeting of heads of state from the Group of Seven richest nations.

France currently holds the presidency of the Council of the European Union.



German official attended Teheran's 'destroy Israel' rally

German Ambassador to Iran Herbert Honsowitz violated EU guidelines by allowing a military attaché to attend an anti-Israel military parade in Teheran late last month, according to a spokeswoman for the German Foreign Ministry's Iran section.

"Israel must be wiped off the map" was one of the slogans painted on Shihab-3 missiles featured at the event in Teheran, which commemorated the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq War.
The presence of a German defense attaché at the military parade was a source of enormous embarrassment for the ministry in Berlin.



Effort to halt financial crisis costs governments two trillion pounds
The unprecedented global effort to try to avert the world financial crisis has cost governments more than two trillion pounds.

The US authorities followed the UK and Europe by announcing an extraordinary plan to buy stakes in its biggest banks using taxpayers' money.

Although stock market volatility may continue over the next few weeks, City experts are hopeful that the co-ordinated bail-out will finally put a stop to the catastrophic stock market slump which threatened to bring down the financial system.



Iraq ready to cooperate with Turkey in fight against PKK

ANKARA, Oct. 14 (Xinhua) -- Iraqi ambassador to Turkey Sabah Umran has extended Iraq's support to Turkey's fight against the banned Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK) and said that they were ready to cooperate with Turkey in that fight.

Umran said Tuesday that Turkey's Special Envoy to Iraq Murat Ozcelik held a series of contacts in Iraq with the bilateral relations and the issue of PKK high on his agenda.

The ambassador said that Iraq supported Turkey's fight against the PKK, adding that they were ready to cooperate with Turkey to this end.



Rice to pursue Mideast peace till leaves office

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on Tuesday she would leave "no stone unturned" to reach an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal before leaving office but conceded time was running out.

Speaking to a US conference on business investment in Palestinian areas, Rice said she still hoped to reach the Bush administration's goal of a peace deal by the end of 2008 that was set at a conference in Annapolis nearly a year ago.

"I still believe that we must make every effort in the time that we have to lay this foundation for peace, and that still means that we must do everything that we can ... to find an agreement between these parties by the end of the year," Rice said.

"Know too that until that moment when I leave office, I will leave no stone unturned to see if we can finally resolve this conflict," Rice said.



Turkey's Thy to Seek Bids on 100 Aircraft From Boeing And Airbus

ISTANBUL, Oct 15 Asia Pulse - Turkey's national airline company is planning to purchase aircraft from two giant international commercial jetliner manufacturers, the company said on Tuesday.



World Bank president sees Turkey's inclusion in new G-7 possible

World Bank President Robert Zoellick, who last week suggested that the body of industrialized countries known as the Group of Seven (G-7) is outmoded and should be replaced with a new entity that would include growing economies in Asia and Latin America, has said Turkey would probably be eligible for a place in the new body.



Ban calls for more coordinated action to counter global financial crisis

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today called for more action over the global financial crisis following the “laudable” steps taken by major economies and international financial institutions over the weekend, voicing deep concern over the impact of the crisis on the developing world, particularly the poorest of the poor.

“More coordinated approaches, including direct intervention by governments of the major economies, are necessary to recapitalize the banking system and guarantee the savings of ordinary people,” he said in a statement.
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“It is critical that the international community reach agreement on financing targets and mechanisms to which all parties can be held accountable in the negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change ),” he declared. “Deficiencies in global governance, already much in evidence in the financial crisis, will therefore have to be overcome in order to adequately and effectively address climate change.”



Global Chamber Platform anticipates “cost” of 2% of world GDP

Christoph Leitl, Chairman of the GCP, said: “GCP members, representing business from across the globe, are obviously concerned about the impact of this crisis on the real economy. An effective global dialogue and governance is necessary. As entrepreneurs, we need to be positive and look for solutions out of this crisis.”