Syrian troops push back in fight on Damascus edges (AP)

BEIRUT ? Syrian forces pushed dissident troops back from the edge of Damascus in heavy fighting Monday, escalating efforts to take back control of the capital's eastern doorstep ahead of key U.N. talks over a draft resolution demanding that President Bashar Assad step aside.

Gunfire and the boom of shelling rang out in several suburbs on Damascus' outskirts that have come under the domination of anti-regime fighters. Gunmen ? apparently army defectors ? were shown firing back in amateur videos posted online by activists. In one video, a government tank on the snow-dusted mountain plateau towering over the capital fired at one of the suburbs below.

As the bloodshed increased, with activists reporting more than 40 civilians killed Monday, Western and Arab countries stepped up pressure on Assad's ally Russia to overcome its opposition to the resolution.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and the British and French foreign ministers were heading to New York to push for backing of the measure during talks Tuesday at the United Nations.

"The status quo is unsustainable," Clinton said, saying the Assad regime was preventing a peaceful transition and warning that the resulting instability could "spill over throughout the region."

The draft resolution demands that Assad halt the crackdown and implement an Arab peace plan that calls for him to hand over power to his vice president and allow creation of a unity government to pave the way for elections.

If Assad fails to comply within 15 days, the council would consider "further measures," a reference to a possible move to impose economic or other sanctions.

Moscow, which in October vetoed the first council attempt to condemn Syria's crackdown, has shown little sign of budging in its opposition. It warns that the new measure could open the door to eventual military intervention, the way an Arab-backed U.N. resolution led to NATO airstrikes in Libya.

A French official said the draft U.N. resolution has a "comfortable majority" of support from 10 of the Security Council's 15 members, meaning Russia or China would have to use its veto power to stop it. The official said Russia had agreed to negotiate on the draft, but it was not yet clear if it would be willing to back it if changes were made.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity in accordance with department rules.

The Kremlin said Monday it was trying to put together negotiations in Moscow between Damascus and the opposition. It said Assad's government has agreed to participate; the opposition has in the past rejected any negotiations unless violence stops.

Western countries cited the past week's escalation in fighting to pressure Moscow.

"Russia can no longer explain blocking the U.N. and providing cover for the regime's brutal repression," a spokeswoman for British Prime Minister David Cameron said, on customary condition of anonymity in line with policy.

The United Nations estimated several weeks ago that more than 5,400 people have been killed in Syria's crackdown on the uprising against Assad's rule, which began in March. It has been unable to update the figure, and more than 200 people have been killed in the past five days alone, according to activists' reports.

Pro-Assad forces have fought for three days to take back a string of suburbs on the eastern approach to Damascus, mostly poorer, Sunni-majority communities. In past weeks, army defectors ? masked men in military attire wielding assault rifles ? set up checkpoints in the communities, defending protesters and virtually seizing control.

Late Sunday, government troops retook two of the districts closest to Damascus, Ein Tarma and Kfar Batna, said Rami Abdul-Rahman, the London-based head of the Syrian Human Rights Observatory, which tracks violence through contacts on the ground.

On Monday, the regime forces were trying to retake the next suburbs out, pounding neighborhoods with shelling and heavy machine guns in the districts of Saqba, Arbeen and Hamouriya, he said.

At least five civilians were killed in the fighting near Damascus, according to the Observatory and another activist group, the Local Coordination Committees.

Regime forces also heavily shelled buildings and battled dissidents in the central city of Homs, one of the main hot spots of the uprising, activists said.

The Observatory reported 28 killed in the city Monday. The Local Coordination Committees put the number at 27.

The reports could not be independently confirmed. Syrian authorities keep tight control on the media and have banned many foreign journalists from entering the country.

The Syrian Interior Ministry, in charge of security forces, said Monday that its three-day operation in the suburbs aimed to track down "terrorist groups" that have "committed atrocities" and vowed to continue until they were wiped out. Damascus had remained relatively quiet while most other Syrian cities have slipped into chaos since the uprising began.

Regime forces, backed by tanks and armored vehicles, heavily outgun and outnumber the defectors, organized into a force known as the Free Syrian Army. However, the military can't cover everywhere at once, and when it puts down the dissidents in one location, they arise in another. The dissidents' true numbers are unknown.

The result has been a dramatic militarization of a crisis that began with peaceful protests demanding the ouster of the Assad family and its regime. The army defectors began by protecting protesters, but over the weeks they have gone more on the offensive.

The dissidents have seemed increasingly confident in hit-and-run attacks.

On Monday, they freed five imprisoned comrades in an assault on a military base in the northeastern province of Idlib, the Observatory and Local Coordination Committees reported. Other defectors attacked a large military checkpoint outside Hama, destroying several transport trucks and claiming to kill a number of troops, the two groups said.

Six government soldiers were killed in an ambush on their vehicles in the southern region of Daraa, the state news agency SANA reported. The Observatory reported two other soldiers and 10 defectors killed in fighting elsewhere.

Attackers also blew up a gas pipeline near the border with Lebanon, SANA reported, the latest in numerous attacks on Syria's oil and gas infrastructure.

Because of the upsurge in violence, the Arab League halted a month-old observer mission, which had already come under heavy criticism for failing to stop the crackdown. The League turned to the U.N. Security Council to throw its weight behind its peace plan, which Damascus has rejected.

The move resembles the turn of events before last year's NATO air campaign in Libya, when Western countries waited for Arab League support before winning U.N. cover for intervention.

But so far, there has been little appetite for a similar campaign in Syria. There is no clear-cut geographical divide between the regime and its opponents as there was in Libya, and the opposition is even more divided and unknown than it was in the North African nation. Syria is intertwined in alliances with Iran, Hezbollah and Palestinian militant groups, and borders Israel ? making the fallout from military action more unpredictable.

___

AP correspondents Bradley Klapper in Washington and Jamey Keaten in Paris contributed to this report.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/energy/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120130/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_syria

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SF's Mexican Museum joins Smithsonian network (AP)

SAN FRANCISCO ? The Mexican Museum in San Francisco is joining the nation's largest museum network.

The San Francisco Chronicle ( http://bit.ly/ye7fAu) reports the museum of Latino art and culture on Tuesday becomes the city's first museum to join the Smithsonian Institution's Affiliations Program.

The partnership allows the Mexican Museum to borrow and lend pieces long-term within the 160-member network.

The museum's CEO Jonathan Yorba was previously a fellow at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.

Founded in 1975 in San Francisco's Mission District, the Mexican Museum and its 14,000-item collection is now located at the Fort Mason Center.

The museum is planning to build a new facility near downtown San Francisco. Yorba hopes to break ground next year and open in 2016.

___

Information from: San Francisco Chronicle, http://www.sfgate.com

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/latam/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120131/ap_on_re_us/us_mexican_museum

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Base Jumping Off the Most Insane Pool in the World [Video]

Singapore's Marina Bay Sands hotel is home to one of the most-photographed and internet beloved swimming pools on the planet. It's atop a massive tower, and looks seamless, like a levitating mirror. So why not leap off off of it? More »

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Steve Jobs Emailed Eric Schmidt and Told Him to Stop Stealing Employees. And Schmidt Obliged. [Crime]

Remember that civil lawsuit looming over the heads of some of the top Silicon Valley companies for conspiring not to poach each other's employees? The latest juicy tidbit to leak from that involves Steve Jobs sending Eric Schmidt an email demanding that Google stop stealing. More »

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France, Karzai want faster NATO Afghanistan exit (AP)

PARIS ? France and Afghanistan agree NATO should speed up by a year its timetable for handing all combat operations to Afghan forces in 2013, President Nicolas Sarkozy said Friday, raising new questions about the unity of the Western military alliance.

Sarkozy also announced a faster-track exit for France, the fourth-largest contributor of troops in Afghanistan ? marking a distinct break from previous plans to adhere to the U.S. goal of withdrawing combat forces by the end of 2014. The proposal comes a week after four unarmed French troops were killed by an Afghan soldier described as a Taliban infiltrator.

Sarkozy, alongside Afghan President Hamid Karzai who was in Paris for a previously planned visit, said France had told the U.S. of its plan, and will present it at a Feb. 2-3 meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels. He said he would call President Barack Obama about it Saturday.

"We have decided in a common accord with President Karzai to ask NATO to consider a total handing of NATO combat missions to the Afghan army over the course of 2013," Sarkozy told reporters.

A sense of mission fatigue has been growing among some European contributors to the 10-year allied intervention in Afghanistan. The new idea floated by Sarkozy would accelerate a gradual drawdown of NATO troops that Obama has planned to see through until the end of 2014.

France's announcement could step up pressure in other European governments like Britain, Italy and Germany, which also have important roles in Afghanistan ? even if the U.S. has the lion's share by far. But the leaders of those European nations don't face elections anytime soon: Sarkozy does.

Sarkozy said France will withdraw combat troops by the end of 2013, a reversal from his repeated commitment in recent months to stick with other allies on a U.S.-led schedule.

At the same time, he said France will restart its training missions of Afghan troops Saturday. After the shootings Jan. 20, he immediately suspended the training and joint French military patrols with Afghan forces.

In Washington, U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said the timetable announced by France was worked through by both the Afghans and NATO as part of efforts to transfer security authority to Afghanistan.

"We, obviously, want to continue to work together to ensure that this is implemented in a way that is consistent with the efforts of all of NATO to give increasing authority to the Afghans, and that it is smooth," she said.

Nuland said the U.S. was pleased the move was not "precipitous."

"So you know, this was a national decision of France. It was done in a managed way. We will all work with it. As the president has said, with regard to our own presence, we are working on 2014," she said.

"The alliance as a whole is working on 2014. But we are also going to work within this French decision," she added.

NATO reacted tersely to Sarkozy's statement.

"We have taken note of the statement," NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu said in Brussels.

Sarkozy said France will speed up its withdrawal timetable, pulling out 1,000 of its current 3,600 soldiers by year-end ? the previous target was 600 ? and bring all combat forces out by the end of 2013.

Karzai had said previously that the goal was to have Afghan security forces in charge of security across the entire nation by the end of 2014. Afghan forces started taking the lead for security in certain areas of the country last year and the plan has been to add more areas, as Afghan police and soldiers were deemed ready to take over from foreign forces.

According to drawdown plans already announced by the U.S. and more than a dozen other nations, the foreign military footprint in Afghanistan will shrink by an estimated 40,000 troops at the close of this year. Washington is pulling out the most ? 33,000 by the end of the year. That's one-third of 101,000 U.S. troops that were in Afghanistan in June, the peak of the U.S. military presence in the war, Pentagon figures show.

Sarkozy also said France would hand over authority in the strategic province of Kapisa east of Kabul, where nearly all French troops are deployed, to the Afghans in March.

"A new phase is starting with the Afghans in which civilian and development projects will progressively take the handoff from our military presence," Sarkozy said, adding Afghan security "is the business of Afghans."

Karzai, who praised the role of France and other NATO allies, didn't object when Sarkozy said the 2013 timetable was sought by the two countries.

But the Afghan leader appeared to suggest that it was a high-end target.

"Yes, Mr. President, it is right that Afghanistan has to provide for its own security and for the protection of its own people, and for the provision of law and order," Karzai said.

"We hope to finish the transition ? to complete this transition of authority to the Afghan forces, to the Afghan government, by the end of 2013 at the earliest ? or by the latest as has been agreed upon ? by the end of 2014," Karzai said.

The NATO-led international force in Afghanistan has been steadily handing over responsibility for security to the government's army and police ever since the alliance's last summit in Lisbon in 2010. There, NATO leaders decided to move the Afghans into the lead role in fighting the Taliban by 2014 and end the coalition's combat role.

Afghan forces have started a process of taking the lead in over half of the country's population of 30 million in terms of security, and the transition remains on track.

Britain and Germany said France's announcement didn't change their pullout plans.

Britain said it's keeping to plans to withdraw all its 9,500 troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2014.

"We set out our long-term plans for no combat role by the end of 2014," a Foreign Office spokesman said on customary condition of anonymity. "We have already set out plans for some withdrawals in 2012."

Prime Minister David Cameron will hold talks with Karzai on Saturday. The Foreign Office said their meeting "is about long-term partnership and commitment beyond 2014 and the need for progress on the political track."

In Berlin, a Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said Germany's government had recently affirmed its troops' mandate "with a wide majority."

"We are in agreement with the international goal to hand over security responsibility fully by the end of 2014 and withdraw combat troops," the spokeswoman said on customary condition of anonymity.

During Karzai's stop Thursday in Italy as part of his European tour, Premier Mario Monti said his country would give economic and civilian support after a 2014 withdrawal. The two signed a long-term cooperation agreement.

Sarkozy's government has been under political pressure to withdraw French troops before the United States' pegged pullout in 2014. Polls show most French want an early pullout ? and he may soon be up for re-election.

Francois Heisbourg, an analyst at the Paris-based Foundation for Strategic Research think tank, told The Associated Press this week that a quick exit would also pose logistical problems for French forces, who hope to bring home much of the heavy equipment they have deployed in Afghanistan.

Francois Hollande, the Socialist nominee for France's presidential elections, repeated on French TV on Thursday his hope to bring all French forces home this year. Polls show him leading the conservative Sarkozy, who has not formally announced whether he will run in the two-round election in April and May ? though most political observers believe he will.

Nick Witney, a senior policy fellow at the Paris-based European Council on Foreign Relations, said public support of the war in Europe started sliding fast after the coalition agreed to end the combat mission in 2014.

"It has become more and more difficult to justify every single casualty, since it's now clear that these are wasted lives," said Witney, a former head of the European Defense Agency.

"Most European policymakers realize that on a purely cost-benefit assessment, we would all leave Afghanistan tomorrow," Witney said, adding that "it's difficult for any single government to break with its allies without being accused of lack of solidarity."

At the news conference with Karzai, Sarkozy didn't respond to a reporter's question about whether he believed France's announcement could weaken the alliance.

___

Slobodan Lekic in Brussels, Deb Riechmann in Kabul, Jill Lawless in London, David Rising in Berlin, Colleen Barry in Rome, and Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/europe/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120127/ap_on_re_eu/eu_france_afghanistan

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US Embassy: US citizen kidnapped in Nigeria freed (AP)

LAGOS, Nigeria ? A U.S. citizen kidnapped by gunmen in Nigeria's oil-rich southern delta has been freed after a week in captivity, the U.S. Embassy said.

U.S. Embassy spokeswoman Deb MacLean told The Associated Press on Friday that the man had been released after being kidnapped in Warri in Delta state on Jan. 20. MacLean declined to offer any other details, citing privacy rules. Delta state police spokesman Charles Muka said he had not been informed about the man's release, as his company refused to cooperate with local authorities.

The freed hostage was identified as William Gregory Ock, 50, of Bowdon, Georgia, by his sister, Dee Dee Patterson.

Patterson told the AP on Friday that the family had no details of his release.

"The only thing we know is that he is safe and he is in a secure location," Patterson said by telephone.

She had no information on when Ock would return home to Georgia.

It was not immediately clear whether a ransom had been paid to secure his release, though many companies working in the region carry kidnap insurance and simply pay a negotiated price to see their employees freed. Kidnappers had made contact with authorities previously and demanded a $333,000 ransom.

The attack Jan. 20 occurred outside a bank branch in Warri, one of the main cities in nation's Niger Delta, a region of mangroves and swamps where foreign oil companies pump 2.4 million barrels of crude oil a day. The gunmen attacked Ock as he came outside, shooting his police escort to death before abducting him, Muka said.

Investigators believe the gunmen trailed him for some time before the attack, Muka said.

Foreign firms have pumped oil out of the delta for more than 50 years. Despite the billions flowing into Nigeria's government, many in the delta remain desperately poor, living in polluted waters without access to proper medical care, education or work.

In 2006, militants started a wave of attacks targeting foreign oil companies, including bombing their pipelines, kidnapping their workers and fighting with security forces. That violence waned in 2009 with a government-sponsored amnesty program promising ex-fighters monthly payments and job training. However, few in the delta have seen the promised benefits and criminal gangs still roam the region, increasingly targeting middle-class Nigerians.

In 2011, there were five reported kidnappings of U.S. citizens in Nigeria, according to a recent U.S. State Department travel warning about the country. The most recent occurred in November when two U.S. citizens and a Mexican were kidnapped from a Chevron Corp. offshore oil field and held for about two weeks, the State Department said.

A German working in the city of Kano in north Nigeria was abducted Thursday by unknown gunmen, authorities have said.

___

Associated Press writer Russ Bynum in Savannah, Georgia, contributed to this report.

___

Jon Gambrell can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/jongambrellAP.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/topstories/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20120128/ap_on_bi_ge/af_nigeria_oil_unrest

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Smartphones drive record Samsung profit (Reuters)

SEOUL (Reuters) ? Samsung Electronics Co posted a record $4.7 billion quarterly operating profit, driven by booming smartphone sales, and will spend $22 billion this year to boost its production of chips and flat screens to further pull ahead of smaller rivals.

The South Korean firm, the world's top technology firm by revenue, is locked in breakneck competition with Apple Inc in the red-hot smartphone market, and said its telecoms business earned a record 2.64 trillion won profit in October-December on increased sales of its flagship Galaxy smartphones.

October-December operating profit of 5.3 trillion won was broadly in line with its earlier estimate and topped the previous record profit of 5 trillion won in the second quarter of 2010. The profit was up 76 percent from a year ago and 25 percent higher than in the third quarter.

"This year, the smartphone market will expand to more mid-and low-end models that are affordable to the wider public," said Baik Jae-yer, fund manager at Korea Investment Management.

"Rather than focusing on market share, I would point out the strong contribution of Samsung's handset business to earnings growth and margins. The battle of the two big smartphone powers, Apple versus Samsung, will go on."

Samsung trails Nokia in the overall mobile phone market, competes with Sony Corp and LG Electronics Inc in televisions, Toshiba and Hynix in chips and LG Display in displays.

Samsung said it will increase its investment this year by 9 percent to 25 trillion won, with 15 trillion won of that going to the chips division, 6.6 trillion won on flat screens and the rest mainly to boost capacity at overseas production sites and to build research and development centers.

RIVALRY WITH APPLE

Apple, overtaken by Samsung as the world's biggest maker of smartphones in the third quarter, looks certain to have regained the top spot in the fourth quarter with record sales of 37.04 million iPhones.

Samsung did not provide its own sales volume data for the fourth quarter, but said smartphone shipments rose by around 30 percent, suggesting sales of around 36 million, in line with analysts' estimates of 35-37 million.

Samsung only entered the smartphone market in earnest in 2010, some three years after Apple first introduced the iPhone with the touchscreen template.

Samsung may not have come up with the concept, but it has adopted Apple's breakthrough idea perhaps better than any other handset maker - and now seeks to offer the Apple experience at a better price, with better functionality.

Apple is Samsung's biggest client, buying mainly chips and displays, and the two firms are locked in a bruising patent battle in some 10 countries from the United States to Europe, Japan and Australia as they jostle for top spot in the booming smartphone and tablet market.

Apple, though, is streets ahead in profitability. Apple, which generates half its revenue from the iPhone, boasts a 37.4 percent operating margin versus Samsung's 11 percent, and its $17.3 billion operating profit is almost four times what Samsung earned from selling phones, chips, flat screens and TVs combined.

"Apple had good sales, but it's very unlikely this will be a trend that will overwhelm Samsung later," said Kim Young-chan, analyst at Shinhan Investment & Securities.

"There were many end-of-year promotions and, most importantly, the impact from (Apple founder Steve Jobs') death on sales growth can't be ruled out.

"It's unlikely Samsung and Apple will fight over each other's market share, but they will eat up the market share of smaller companies like HTC and RIM."

Shares in Samsung, also the world's top maker of memory chips and TVs, have risen by close to a fifth in the past three months and hit a life high of 1.125 million won earlier this week, outperforming a 3 percent gain on the KOSPI.

The stock was up 0.3 percent in early Seoul trading at 1.116 million won, while the broader market was a touch lower.

(Additional reporting by Seoul newsroom; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman and Jonathan Hopfner)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/earnings/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20120127/bs_nm/us_samsung

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