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NEW YORK – Although Ashley Tisdale recently turned 24, in some people’s eyes, she’s still that scheming, platinum-blond teen diva from the outrageously popular Disney musical trilogy “High School Musical.”
She’s trying her best to change that.
To that end, she recently traded in her light tresses for a return to her dark brown roots, and her new album, “Guilty Pleasure,” reveals a sexy side of the singer: The cover features her in a tight black skirt and semi-revealing top, and her inspirations for the album’s music include the rock group My Chemical Romance.
“I feel like when I went back to my original hair color, a little bit of an edgier side came out,” Tisdale said during a recent interview. “I just wanted to show a different side of me that people haven’t seen.”
But as much as she would love to be seen apart from her Disney persona, she’s not trying to make a dramatic break from her youthful image. On Friday, she will be seen in the kid movie “Aliens in the Attic,” and she says she still wants to keep “High School Musical” fans as her own.
“I’m not trying to run away from my fans at all,” she says. “I want them to grow with me.”
AP: What are the challenges in trying to create your own identity apart from the character Sharpay in the “High School Musical” series?
Tisdale: I wouldn’t be there if it wasn’t for those projects, but I feel that dyeing my hair back to its original hair color, this is originally what I look like … and it does separate me from that in a way, because everybody really knows me as the blond bubbly character, and this is a different side.
AP: Do you feel like there’s a delicate balance between going more adult and keeping your young fans?
Tisdale: I don’t feel pressure because I’m not trying to be something that I’m not. … I’m not perfect, I’m not trying to be perfect, and if people and fans like me for who I am, that’s just amazing. … With the first album, I was trying to cater to young fans and the kids, and also an older group, and with this album, it’s like I said, it’s a reflection of where I am in my life right now.
AP: There’s so much focus on young female stars to see if they will mess up. Does that put pressure on you?
Tisdale: I don’t drink and I don’t smoke, and it’s a personal choice. … I don’t go clubbing (laughs) mainly because you’re dancing and drinking, I think, but I definitely love to dance. I like to have fun but my fun is different from other’s people’s fun. Just because I live in L.A .and I live in Hollywood doesn’t mean I have to have a Hollywood life.
AP: Do you feel for your next project that you need to change your image completely?
Tisdale: I’m not someone who is going to do a 180. If anything I know I look young, so I’m still going to be in high school (in movies) but I think the projects would have to be a little bit more mature if it’s in a high school environment. … I’m really into comedy, and I love making people laugh, so I will definitely go in that direction for a little bit, and then maybe some drama, because I love drama as well and people haven’t seen me do drama … but I’m not going too dark yet — that’s not me.
AP: Would you do a “High School Musical 4,” “5″ or “10″?
Tisdale: I feel like we graduated (laughs). I know they left it open for Sharpay. It’s been one of the most amazing projects. I feel like it would be a little weird going back without that cast. For all of us, we’re all going in our own directions and we all are moving on. I think that they should definitely keep going with the franchise because it makes so many people happy and for the fans … but there comes a time to move on, and I feel like this is the time to go out and do other things.
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On the Net:

http://www.ashletisdale.com

Brooklyn, N.Y. –
For the first time in generations, people are challenging the view that a free-market order – the system that dominates the globe today – is the destiny of all nations. The free market's uncanny ability to enrich the elite, coupled with its inability to soften the sharp experiences of staggering poverty, has pushed inequality to the breaking point.
As a result, we live at an important historical juncture – one where alternatives to the world's neoliberal capitalism could emerge. Thus, it is a particularly apt time to examine revolutionary movements that have periodically challenged dominant state and imperial power structures over the past 500 years.
Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, which laid the foundation for liberal democratic elections and the expansion of the free-market system throughout the world, revolution and protest seemed to lose some of their potency.
Leading historians believed that a new age had appeared in which revolutionary movements would no longer challenge the status quo. Defenders of the contemporary system were suspicious of nearly all forms of popular expression and contestation for power outside the electoral arena. But remarkably, this entire discourse sidestepped the major impulses of human emancipation of the past 500 years – equality, democracy, and social rights.
Proponents of neoliberalism are indifferent to this history and dismiss the notion that “another world is possible” that could alleviate grinding misery and poverty around the world. But in opposition to the contemporary individualistic system of capitalism, evidence of a new global movement dedicated to social justice and human rights has sprung from the ashes of the past. Just in the past decade, we have witnessed the expansion of worker insurgencies, peasant and indigenous uprisings, ecological protests, and democracy movements.
Historians frequently view revolutions as extraordinary and unanticipated interruptions of state social regulation of everyday life.
This isn't the case.
In my work as editor of a new encyclopedia of revolution and protest, I've reviewed 500 years' worth of revolutionary actions. And the surprising pattern I've found is the regularity of volatile and explosive conflicts, commonly revealed as waves of protest from within civil society to confront persistent inequality and oppression. While historians cannot forecast the time and place of revolutions, the past has a sustained, if disjointed, record of popular resistance to injustice.
History shows that revolutions must have political movement and a socially compelling goal, with strategic and charismatic leadership that inspires majorities to challenge a perception of fundamental injustice and inequality. A necessary feature is the development of a political ideology rooted in a narrative that legitimates mass collective action, which is indispensable to forcing dominant groups to address social grievances – or to overturning those dominant groups altogether.
Unresponsive rulers risk possible overthrow of their governments. For example, the vision and struggle of a multiracial South Africa was a guiding principle that put an end to the entrenched white-dominated apartheid system.
A second essential element is what Italian philosopher Antonio Negri calls constituent power, the expression of the popular will for democracy – a common theme in nearly all revolutions – through what he calls the multitude.
Mr. Negri counterpoises the concepts of constituent power and constituted power to demonstrate the oppositional forces in society. Thus, following the American Revolution, the ruling elite created a second Constitution establishing a national government with fewer democratic safeguards.
In response to challenges from popular movements, modern states have concentrated power in constitutions and centralized authority structures to suppress mass demands for democracy and equality. Few democratic revolutionary movements have gained popular power as new states almost always consolidate control, often resorting to repression of the masses that initially brought them to power. Still, virtually all revolutions during the past 500 years have created enduring consequences that, in evolving form, remain forces for justice to this day.
Revolutionary movements must recognize the durability and overwhelming inertia of state power. They must acknowledge that they are highly unlikely to seize power from unjust regimes, even when their objectives have moral force and are deeply popular among the masses. And yet, history is full of exceptions to this rule, so we must conclude that while revolutionary transformation is improbable, it is always a possibility.
At a lecture to Young Socialists in Zurich just one month before the February 1917 Revolution, Vladimir Lenin said: “We of the older generation may not live to see the decisive battles of this coming revolution.” Less than a year later, Lenin and the Bolsheviks gained power over the Soviet state with the initial support of workers, peasants, and most of the military.
In the last century, the opponents of the failed bureaucratic statism in the Soviet sphere and free-market capitalism in the West have struggled to find a discourse of resistance. While democratic opponents defeated Soviet Russia in the early 1990s, opponents of free-market capitalism have yet to gain traction, in part due to the general consensus among global rulers in defense of neoliberalism. As such, revolutionary movements have had to redefine themselves outside territorial borders as powerful tools of the global collective to petition for human rights and social justice for all.
People are inherently cautious and take extraordinary action only when they have little to lose and something to gain. The current economic crisis has pushed more people into poverty and despair than at any time since the early 20th century, to the point where alternatives to the current system can be considered.
Today, throughout the world, peasants, workers, indigenous peoples, and students are galvanized into movements that are challenging state power rooted in global norms of neoliberalism. New movements have gained greater traction with the legitimacy and strength of a global collective behind them, rather than as isolated protests. The oppressed are framing new narratives of liberation to contest power on a state and international level: whether peasants in Latin America or India struggling for land reform; indigenous peoples mobilizing resistance for official recognition of their rights; or workers and students throughout the world waging unauthorized strikes and sit-ins, and taking to the streets in support of democracy and equality.
Immanuel Ness is a professor of political science at Brooklyn College, City University of New York, and editor of “The International Encyclopedia of Revolution and Protest: 1500 to the Present.”

MIAMI – They’re lurking, holding bags of cash and eyeing distressed condo markets.
Big-time cash investors are snapping up South Florida condo units in bulk. There have been at least seven purchases of 10 or more condos this year, including four since June, according to county records. Investors are re-selling the units or renting them until the market recovers.
Last month, Tom D. Sullivan and Jorge Arevalo shelled out 14.6 million for 51 oceanfront, condo-hotel units in the One Bal Harbour complex from developer WCI Communities, which is reorganizing under bankruptcy protection.
“It didn’t take 10 years of research to see it was a pretty good deal,” said Sullivan, founder of Lumber Liquidators Inc.
That’s because existing condo prices in Miami have fallen by half since the peak in December 2006, and investors think they see the bottom. There’s also plenty of selection. Miami has a two-year supply of condos for sale, at the current demand, according to the local Realtors associations.
Since 2003, nearly 23,000 units have been built or are still under construction in greater downtown Miami, said Peter Zalewski, a principal with Condo Vultures Realty. In June, developers were still holding about 9,400 units, he said. Banks own about 5,000 local homes and condos.
Desperate to get them off their books, banks and developers are auctioning off Miami condos by the dozen. That’s where investor Ed Pascoe, an antiques dealer, snapped up 56 units for 4 million in a 135-unit building in February.
This month, he started offering the units for rent at 1,000 a month, or for sale from 99,000 to 299,000, according to his broker Brian Carter. Pascoe declined to comment.
By paying monthly fees on time, these new owners can be a financial relief for homeowners associations struggling to cover the costs of maintenance and insurance in a building dotted with empty units. While lenders and developers are obligated by law to keep up with association fees, it doesn’t always happen.
The cash for some of these deals is coming from groups of private investors. One multibillion-dollar firm, Contrarian Capital Management LLC in Greenwich, Conn., is looking closely at bulk purchases in Florida, according to Gil Tenzer, the firm’s real estate portfolio manager.
He’s not the only one.
“We’re getting much closer on several deals,” said Jay Massirman, managing partner of Rivergate Residential, a Miami-based real estate investment firm. Massirman said he has researched dozens of bulk purchases for investors.
Unlike the condo investors of the boom years, who borrowed recklessly with the intention on flipping the units within months, more investors today are using cash and thinking strategically.
“They have the money and the knowledge and wherewithal to hold them until the market turns around,” said Jennifer Drake, a real estate attorney with Becker & Poliakoff.
Talk of bulk condo purchases has reached San Diego, where “there’s some scurrying about in the local market on the part of investment groups who have explored the idea,” said Gary London, president of The London Group Realty Advisors.
And, if values stay depressed in troubled condo markets like Phoenix or Las Vegas, developers and banks could make bulk deals with cash investors at a discount to unload their unsold units. So, for now, Florida is the testing ground, and investors with deep pockets are watching.

NEW YORK – Citigroup Inc., one of the biggest recipients of government bailout money, gave employees 5.33 billion in bonuses for 2008, New York’s attorney general said Thursday in a report detailing the payouts by nine big banks.
The report from Attorney General Andrew Cuomo’s office focused on 2008 bonuses paid to the initial nine banks that received loans under the government’s Troubled Asset Relief Program last fall. Cuomo has joined other government officials in criticizing the banks for paying out big bonuses while accepting taxpayer money.
Cuomo’s office found that the companies, which also included Bank of America Corp., Merrill Lynch & Co., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc., awarded nearly 4,800 million-dollar-plus bonuses, with much of the money going to Wall Street investment bankers.
Citigroup, which is now one-third owned by the government as a result of the bailout, gave 738 of its employees bonuses of at least 1 million, even after it lost 18.7 billion during the year, Cuomo’s office said. The bank’s top four recipients received a combined 43.7 million.
The New York-based bank received 45 billion in government money and guarantees to protect it against hundreds of billions of dollars on potential losses from risky investments.
“There is no clear rhyme or reason to the way banks compensate and reward their employees,” Cuomo said in the report, noting banks have not in recent years actually tied pay to performance as they claim when describing their compensation programs. Cuomo added that when banks’ performance deteriorated significantly, “they were bailed out by taxpayers and their employees were still paid well.”
Bank of America, which also received 45 billion in TARP money, paid 3.3 billion in bonuses, with 172 employees receiving at least 1 million and the top four recipients receiving a combined 64 million. Merrill Lynch, which Charlotte, N.C.-based Bank of America acquired during the credit crisis, paid out 3.6 billion, including a combined 121 million to four top employees.
Bank of America earned 2.56 billion in 2008, while Merrill lost 30.48 billion. Cuomo’s office said Merrill Lynch doled out 696 bonuses of at least 1 million for 2008.
Bank of America has been sharply criticized for its acquisition of Merrill Lynch because of mounting losses at the Wall Street bank and the size of bonuses Merrill paid its employees. Of the 45 billion in bailout funds Bank of America received, 20 billion was to support the acquisition of Merrill. Neither Bank of America nor Citigroup have repaid their TARP loans.
A Bank of America spokesman declined to comment on the report. A spokesman for Citigroup did not return repeated calls for comment.
Banks have said they needed to pay their top performing employees to prevent them from defecting to competitors. Companies that accepted TARP money have faced intense government scrutiny and must now comply with restrictions on compensation, including bonuses.
Because of those restrictions, some banks began shifting how they pay their workers. In June, Citigroup said it would rebalance how it pays employees, by reducing bonuses for some and instead giving them larger salaries. The change does not effect total pay, just the mix in compensation.
President Barack Obama last month named Kenneth Feinberg to oversee compensation given to the 100 highest-paid employees at banks and other firms that received the largest government bailouts, including Citigroup and Bank of America.
However, his oversight does not include reviewing bonus payments tied to 2008. He can only review plans starting with 2009 compensation. Companies have until Aug. 13 to submit compensation plans to Feinberg.
Asked about the attorney general’s report, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said he had not seen it.
“I think the president continues to believe that the American people don’t begrudge people making money for what they do as long as … we’re not basically incentivizing wild risk-taking that somebody else picks up the tab for,” Gibbs said.
Rep. Edolphus Towns, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said Cuomo’s report was appalling.
“This egregious behavior proves that Wall Street still doesn’t get that times have changed and the old way of paying executives is long gone,” said Towns, D-N.Y.
JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs, which are considered among the healthiest banks and that have already repaid TARP funds they received, paid out the most bonuses of more than 1 million.
Goldman gave 953 workers bonuses of at least 1 million, with its four most highly compensated employees receiving a combined total of nearly 46 million. JPMorgan gave 1,626 employees at least 1 million, and its top four recipients received a combined 74.8 million. The two banks each gave more than 200 employees bonuses in excess of 3 million.
JPMorgan spokesman Tom Kelly said the bank took TARP money “at the government’s request, even though we didn’t need it, because it was good for the overall financial system, and we paid it back as soon as we were allowed to.”
JPMorgan repaid the 25 billion in TARP money it received last month. Goldman repaid the 10 billion it received.
A Goldman Sachs spokesman did not return repeated calls for comment.
The government launched the bailout program at the peak of the credit crisis last fall, shortly after investment bank Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. failed and insurer American International Group Inc. only survived with the support of the government.
Democratic lawmakers say excessive salaries and bonuses encouraged risk-taking on Wall Street and contributed to the financial crisis.
They are pushing legislation, expected to pass the House on Friday, that would ban “incentive-based” pay that regulators determine could threaten the economy or viability of the institution. Regulators would be given 270 days after the bill is enacted to hash out the details.
Bank of New York Mellon, Morgan Stanley, State Street Corp. and Wells Fargo & Co. were the other four banks that initially received bailout money. All but Wells Fargo, which received 25 billion and paid out 977.5 million in bonuses, repaid their loans last month.
Spokespeople from Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo declined to comment on the attorney general’s report. Spokespeople for BNY Mellon and State Street were not immediately available to comment.
_____
AP Business Writer Ieva M. Augstums in Charlotte, N.C. and Associated Press Writers Darlene Superville and Anne Flaherty in Washington contributed to this report.

SULTANWAS, Pakistan – Village leaders in a former Taliban stronghold are rebuilding their own militia to protect the area from militants holding out in nearby hills after fleeing the Pakistani army’s offensive last spring.
The military operation in the Swat Valley and surrounding areas is winding down, but sporadic fighting persists — a sign that the Taliban have not given up. Locals say Taliban fighters are hiding in the hills outside Sultanwas, a village pulverized by air strikes and tanks during Pakistan’s offensive.
So villagers are leaving nothing to chance: They have reorganized their own militia and say they are talking to nearby villages to join forces.
Pakistan’s authorities say such militias, known as lashkars, can prevent the Taliban from rebounding in the strategic area north of the capital. The groups have been compared to Iraq’s Awakening Councils, which helped U.S. forces turn the tide against al-Qaida there.
“The army is protecting the main road, and we are protecting the village,” said one of the militiamen, Abdul Rauf, 43.
The concept is an old one in Pakistan, where lashkars have augmented security in the lawless tribal belt along the Afghan border. But they have not been a feature of the more peaceful districts such as Buner, which includes Sultanwas, and in the nearby Swat Valley.
Nevertheless, authorities have encouraged the local militias.
They are “a great assistance, support to the government agencies, to law enforcement”, said army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas.
Sultanwas was the first village in the area to form its own defense force against the Taliban in April, the army and residents say. But the fighters withdrew after receiving assurances from a local administrator that the militants would not enter. The administrator was alleged to have been a Taliban sympathizer.
The village soon became one of the militants’ southernmost strongholds as the Taliban swept south from Swat. The Taliban later lost control of Sultanwas in the spring offensive by the army.
With the militants gone, militiamen are now organizing patrols and setting up positions.
“We are sure if the Taliban come back, we will fight,” said Rauf.
Maj. Gen. Tariq Khan, commander of the paramilitary Frontier Corps, said the militias play an important role because they allow the army to operate elsewhere instead of being tied down guarding villages.
More importantly, they can identify local militants whom outsiders might not recognize.
“The lashkars are the right type of people who control the markets, control the bus stands, and can see who’s coming and who’s going out,” Khan said.
But critics say the militias could become a threat without proper supervision.
“It is quite possible that these armed groups, once they don’t have the militants to fight, … will become a power in their own substance and start oppressing the people of that area,” political and defense analyst Ikram Sehgal warned.
There are also doubts as to how effective the often ramshackle forces, armed with their own, often aging, weapons, could be when faced with a sustained assault by the much better trained and armed Taliban.
In Sultanwas, the militia currently numbers about 150 fighters, including a 13-year-old boy and a 65-year-old man. The group’s arsenal on display recently consisted of little more than the ubiquitous Kalashnikov rifles and a couple of light machine guns — and a pistol patented in Spain in 1928.
But the fighters themselves appear unperturbed.
“We are ready for self-defense. (The Taliban) can attack at any time, maybe at night, maybe during the day. Maybe they will send a suicide bomber,” said Eftikhar Ahmad, 26. “We are living a risky life, but we have no other way. So we accept the Taliban’s challenge.”

Los Angeles (E! Online) –
It's understandable—even commendable—that Erin Andrews would want to keep a low profile these days. Unfortunately, she may have done too good a job.
Seems the ESPN reporter had to go into extreme detail to explain to a 911 operator why she thought a couple of male stalkerazzi set up camp in the driveway of her Georgia home.
“I've been in the news recently about being in a hotel naked, and I have paparazzi outside my window, and I was told by law enforcement that if I did to call 911,” she explains on the recording, released today by DeKalb County authorities. (Listen to the complete conversation after the jump.)
“My name is Erin. My last name is Andrews. I'm all over the news right now…I'm the girl that was videotaped without her knowing, without her clothes on in the hotel. And I got two assholes sitting outside my house.”
She continues: “They're looking at me through my window. I cannot believe these jerks are knocking on my door, they're such assholes.”
Andrews confides that she had hired private security in the wake of the violating video leak, but that the hired help was not currently with her. Toward the end of the call, the sports reporter begins to break down to the sympathetic dispatcher.
“I did nothing wrong and I'm being treated like f–king Britney Spears, and it sucks. I'm sorry.”
As long as she doesn't shave her head or run into her driveway waving around an umbrella Braveheart-style, we suspect she'll make it out of the news cycle just fine.
··· THEY SAID WHAT? Get today's most commented stories now at www.eonline.com

LOS ANGELES – Investigators probing Michael Jackson’s death looked for evidence related to the powerful anesthetic propofol when they searched his doctor’s Las Vegas home and business, according to search warrants filed Thursday that alluded to the pop star being an “addict.”
Los Angeles police and federal Drug Enforcement Administration agents spent much of the day Tuesday at Dr. Conrad Murray’s properties looking for evidence supporting a manslaughter charge and various violations of the California Business and Professions Code, including “prescribing to an addict,” “excessive prescribing” and “unprofessional conduct.”
The code states a physician cannot prescribe drugs to anyone thought to have a chemical dependency or who is using the drugs for non-therapeutic purposes.
The warrants, which had been sealed when the searches were conducted, also said investigators wanted all documentation relating to the “purchase, transfer, receiving, ordering, delivery and storage of propofol.”
A law enforcement official earlier told The Associated Press that on the day Jackson died Murray gave him propofol to help him sleep and that investigators are working under the theory the anesthetic caused Jackson’s heart to stop. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.
A cause of death has yet to be announced. The Los Angeles County coroner has twice said toxicology findings on Jackson were imminent but after meeting Thursday with investigators assistant chief coroner Ed Winter announced an indefinite delay. Winter said further investigation needs to be done; he did not go into detail.
Propofol, dubbed “milk of amnesia,” is commonly used for surgeries and is not meant as a sleep agent or to be given in private homes. Because of its potency, only trained anesthesia professionals are supposed to administer it and patients are to be monitored at all times.
Murray, a 56-year-old cardiologist, has spoken to police but not commented publicly since Jackson died June 25.
Murray’s attorney, Edward Chernoff, did not immediately respond to a request for comment Thursday. He has previously said the doctor did not prescribe anything that “should have” killed Jackson.
Jackson was given anesthesia for numerous medical procedures over the years and had a long history of prescription drug use.
Search warrants issued last week in Houston allowed authorities to search Murray’s clinic and a storage unit. They were the first public acknowledgment that investigators consider Jackson’s death a possible manslaughter and that Murray is the target of the investigation.
The Las Vegas warrants were far more detailed and authorized authorities to look for medical and other records related to Jackson or any of the apparent 19 aliases he used, including the names Omar Arnold, Josephine Baker, Paul Farance, Jack London and Michael Amir Williams Muhammad.
Among the items seized in the Vegas searches were an iPhone, copies of several computer hard drives, a CD with the name Omar Arnold on it and a binder containing invoices for medical equipment and supplies. No propofol was found.
A warrant was also served at a storage locker, but no items were taken.
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Associated Press Writer Ken Ritter in Las Vegas contributed to this report.

A diary reported to have come from a top Colombian guerrilla leader killed last year says key officials in Ecuador accepted money from the rebels and had connections with Mexican drug gangs.
The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known as FARC, has been at war with the government for decades.
The money was meant to finance Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa’s 2006 election campaign, Marxist rebel Raul Reyes is said to have written in a diary allegedly obtained after his death. Ecuador denies the allegations and has asked the Organization of American States to investigate. “The president of the republic did not know anything about this and never sent any emissary to finance his electoral campaign,” Interior Minister Gustavo Jalkh said at a news conference Wednesday. Ecuadorian officials released excerpts from the diary Thursday. Wednesday’s revelation was the second instance in two weeks tying Correa to donations from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known as FARC. Last week, Colombian media broadcast a 2008 video in which guerrilla leader Victor Julio Suarez Rojas, widely known as Mono Jojoy, said the rebels donated money to Correa’s campaign. The guerrilla group also had conversations with Correa’s emissaries and has reached “some accords, according to documents that we have,” Suarez said in the videotape. Correa denied those allegations, asking the nation’s civil service commission to investigate. FARC issued a statement Tuesday denying that the rebels have “given money to any electoral campaign of any neighboring country.”
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The guerrillas accused the United States and Colombia of manipulating the Suarez video to make Correa look bad. FARC has been at war with the Colombian government for more than 45 years. In the latest allegations, Reyes, FARC’s second-in-command until his death in March 2008, identifies the Ecuadorians who had contacts with the rebels as former head of security Gustavo Larrea, former under secretary for governing Ignacio Chauvin, retired Col. Jorge Brito and dentist Luis Ayala. “Larrea, Brito and Dr. Ayala, I am sure, move among the Mexican drug cartels and, in order to have free reign, collaborate with the CIA,” Reyes wrote, according to the state-run Notimex news agency in Mexico. “For them, I am the true loot, and turning me over would be their major deal.” Ecuadorian Interior Minister Jalkh and Foreign Minister Fander Falconi declined Wednesday to confirm the diary’s authenticity, attributing to it “neither truth nor falseness.” Instead, they said they turned it over to the Organization of American States so that the hemispheric body can verify its authenticity. Ecuadorian officials also turned a copy over to the nation’s attorney general. The 20-page diary goes from July 2007 to February 23, 2008, seven days before a Colombian bombing attack killed Reyes at his camp inside the Ecuadorian border. In addition to Reyes, the attack killed 24 people, including four Mexicans and an Ecuadorian. As a result, Ecuador broke diplomatic relations with Colombia in March 2008. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, an ally of the leftist Correa, also strongly objected to the attack and sent tanks to his country’s border with Colombia in March 2008. On Tuesday, Chavez froze relations with Colombia and recalled Venezuela’s ambassador after Colombia revealed that the FARC had gotten hold of shoulder-launched anti-tank grenades that Sweden sold to Venezuela 20 years ago. Reyes’ diary portrays a rebel leader who feels trapped and betrayed. “No matter how much Nacho [Ignacio] Chauvin insists, as well as correspondence from Larrea, I don’t see any convenience in staying at the Angostura camp that I occupied as a result of Col. Brito,” Reyes wrote. “I know that Larrea is behind all this.” Writing about the Angostura camp on the border with Colombia, Reyes said, “This place is a trap. They have me tied up here under the pretext that I should receive the international delegations. All this stuff is very false.” He goes on to doubt the people who come to see him at the jungle base. “The revolutionaries who visit me, save for a few people, only want money and deals. I ask myself, how many of them are infiltrators who work as double agents? I feel the presence of double agents in Correa’s intimate group, without a doubt.” Giving money to Correa was a waste, Reyes wrote. “Trusting Correa was suicide,” the diary said. “All the contributions of money for Correa’s campaign weren’t worth a damn.”
Source:CNN

Brazilian authorities on Thursday ruled the death of former world boxing champion Arturo Gatti a suicide, according to local media reports.
Arturo Gatti was found dead on July 11 in a rented condo in Brazil, where his family was vacationing.
Gatti’s death initially had been investigated as a murder. The boxer’s widow, Amanda Carina Barbosa Rodrigues, who had been arrested as a suspect, was released from jail Thursday, the newspaper O Diario de Pernambuco reported. Gatti was found dead on July 11 in a rented condo in Brazil, where he was taking a vacation with Rodrigues and their young child. Police found strangulation marks on Gatti’s neck and a blood-stained purse strap at the scene. The public safety ministry of the northeastern Pernambuco state said investigators determined that Gatti hung himself in a stairwell, the newspaper O Globo reported. Police official Paulo Alberes said Gatti used the purse strap to end his life, O Diario de Pernambuco reported.
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The 37-year-old Canadian, who was born in Italy and made his name as a fighter based in New Jersey, was staying in the northeast seaside resort of Porto de Galihnas. Gatti made his reputation in his renowned trilogy of fights against “Irish” Micky Ward, losing the first but triumphing in the other two. He was a former International Boxing Federation junior lightweight champion and World Boxing Council junior welterweight champ. Gatti retired in 2007 after suffering a knockout defeat by Alfonso Gomez, ending with a record of 40 wins and nine losses. He grew up in Montreal, Canada, after leaving Italy at an early age, and returned to the city after his retirement. Gatti’s suicide came less than two weeks after another world champion boxer took his own life. On July 1, three-time world boxing champion Alexis Arguello, who was the mayor of the Nicaraguan capital of Managua, was found dead in his home from a gunshot wound to the chest. He was 57. A third boxer, former welterweight champion Vernon Forrest, died last week after being shot multiple times in a neighborhood southwest of downtown Atlanta, Georgia.
Source:CNN

LAGOS, NigeriaMohammed Yusuf, the leader of a fundamentalist Islamist sect who was initially reported captured Thursday by the Nigerian military, is dead, said a spokesman for the governor of the state of Borno.
The bodies and clothes of militants lie in a street in the northern city of Maiduguri.
“I have just come from the police station and seen his body,” said Usman Ciroma, chief secretary to the governor of Borno. “I believe he was killed in a shoot-out. … I saw his body with bullet wounds.” Earlier in the day, Col. Ben Ahonotu, the commander of the Nigerian government security forces’ operation in the north, said Yusuf had been captured, described him as “healthy” and said he would be turned over to police. Yusuf’s sect, known as Boko Haram, wants the government to impose Islamic law, or sharia, in the entire Muslim-dominated northern section of Nigeria. Sharia already is practiced in some northern states, but the sect wants even tougher religious laws. The sect also opposes Western education. Southern Nigeria is predominantly Christian.
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Hundreds killed in Nigeria fighting, rights group says
Nigerian police accused over riot deaths
At least 400 rebels, troops and civilians have died since the fighting began Sunday, triggered by the arrest of some members of Boko Haram. The group retaliated by attacking police, military and government institutions in Bauchi state. The violence quickly spread to three other states, prompting a major response by troops. Nigeria’s military claimed Thursday that it had raided the sect’s compound and killed one of its leaders as the battles intensified. On Wednesday, troops seized control of a Boko Haram stronghold in the city of Maiduguri in Borno and killed the deputy leader of the group, Ahonotu said.
Source:CNN

India’s family battle over gas
By Shantanu Guha Ray, Delhi
The world’s richest brothers are locking horns yet again – and this time, it is over natural gas.The latest spat between Mukesh Ambani and Anil Ambani, who control India’s Reliance group of industries, could turn out to be the most unsavoury yet and hinder efforts to solve the country’s chronic energy shortage. This week, Anil Ambani, the 50-year-old younger brother, described the government as “partisan and biased” towards his elder brother, Mukesh. At the heart of the latest battle between the siblings is the natural gas that was discovered by Reliance Industries in the Krishna Godavari basin off India’s eastern coast in 2002, three years before the brothers parte ways. The Reliance empire was divided between the two brothers in 2005 after a bitter seven-month feud. In a family pact vetted and supervised by the brothers’ mother in 2005, Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) was to supply 28 million cubic meters of gas a day at 2.34 per million units to Anil Ambani’s Reliance Natural Resources Limited (RNRL) for 17 years. Pricing feudThis price was lower than 4.20 per million units set by the government in 2006 for all buyers of gas from the basin. Anil Ambani has not accepted the higher selling price set by the government, citing the agreement with his elder brother. On 15 June, his company won a case in the Bombay High Court, asking his elder brother’s company to honour the family agreement. Mukesh Ambani has appealed against the judgement in the Supreme Court – the court will hear the dispute on 1 September. India’s oil ministry has also become embroiled in the controversy – federal oil minister Murli Deora has been criticised by Anil Ambani for allegedly siding with his elder brother. In return, Mr Deora has said gas is a national property and belongs to the people of India – “It really doesn’t belong to them [Mukesh and Anil Ambani],” he told reporters.
The dispute is impeding efforts by the government to harness India’s natural gas reserves to help tide over its energy crunch. Three companies – RIL, the state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) and Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation (GSPC) – are investing 30bn to produce gas from the Krishna Godavari basin. All the three companies have discovered gas – and some oil- in three different blocks. RIL plans to spend 12 billion on producing and transporting the gas across the country while the state-owned ONGC has announced a 3 billion investment. The Krishna Godavari basin off the Andhra Pradesh coast is described as the North Sea of India due to its immense gas prospects. The basin is likely to produce 120 million cubic metres per day (mcmd) of gas, four times the gas and 30% cheaper than the gas India would have received through the much-delayed Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline. Once the entire gas comes on stream, it will have a huge impact on the country’s fertiliser and power companies. Energy needsIndia, Asia’s third largest oil importer, could easily save at least 20 billion off its surging oil import bill that crossed a whopping 80 billion last year. Power and fertiliser plant owners, which consume 70% of the available gas in India, are optimistic that the Krishna Godavari basin gas will help them operate at full capacity.
India’s energy needs are soaring
Currently, they mostly operate at 50-60% of their capacity because of inadequate gas. The fertiliser industry, which has not seen any new investments in the last decade, could increase capacity to 22 million tonnes in two years from the current 20 million tonnes once more gas becomes available. Presently, the industry needs 41 mcmd of gas, but gets only 28 mcmd. Once the gas from Krishna Godavari basin begins to flow – possibly after 2013 – it can add at least 10,000MW to India’s power output. The figure is more than half the country’s current peak power deficit. The World Bank estimates that power shortages deter the development process in India where more than 400 million people lack electricity and supplies fall short of peak demand by 16.6%. The writer is business editor of Tehelka magazine

Source:BBC

STRATFORD, Conn. – He may not be so happy anymore. A Connecticut teen has been arrested on allegations he drew smiley faces all over Stratford High School while avoiding officials’ efforts to catch him.
Police said the 16-year-old was the elusive hooded figure who drew the graffiti. They said he turned himself in Tuesday after being told there was a warrant for his arrest, but denies the allegations.
He was charged with criminal mischief and posted 500 bail.
Stratford officials had been trying to catch the person who was drawing smiley faces on interior school walls. They eventually set up video cameras that recorded one of the incidents. The suspect’s face was not visible in the footage, but teachers identified the sweatshirt he was wearing as Irby’s.
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Information from: Connecticut Post, http://www.connpost.com

DECATUR, Ga. – Authorities are investigating two Atlanta-area police officers accused of using government computers to run a criminal background check on President Barack Obama.
DeKalb County police spokeswoman Sheila Edwards confirmed Thursday that officers Ryan White and C.M. Route have been placed on paid administrative leave while the July 20 incident is investigated. She said both officers have worked for the department for about two years.
County public safety director William Miller said in a prepared statement Wednesday the officers’ actions will “not be tolerated by the county.”
“I want everyone to know that we take these allegations very seriously,” he said. “We expect our officers to adhere to professional standards and departmental policy. Furthermore, we do not and will not condone the inappropriate use of county equipment or resources.”
Miller said the police department was notified by the U.S. Secret Service that DeKalb County computers were used to run a check on Obama. He did not say what the officers’ motive may have been.
Edwards would not comment on possible punishment for the officers but said there are multiple factors to consider, including violation of internal department policy and a possible criminal aspect related to invasion of privacy.

PALMA DE MALLORCA, Balearic Islands – A powerful bomb on the Spanish resort island of Mallorca killed two police officers in their patrol vehicle Thursday, the second attack blamed on Basque separatist group ETA in two days.
Police found a second bomb under another police jeep later Thursday in the same area and carried out a controlled explosion. Authorities temporarily blocked all outgoing flights and ships from leaving Mallorca as part of a manhunt.
Less than 36 hours earlier, a car bomb destroyed a police barracks in the northern Spanish city of Burgos, injuring about 60 people Wednesday.
If confirmed as ETA attacks, the blasts would conflict with government assertions that the group is seriously weakened after major police crackdowns in Spain and France in recent years.
The 50th anniversary of ETA’s founding is Friday and the group may be trying to demonstrate with attacks on the two consecutive days before the milestone that it was not in any danger of breaking up.
The officers killed Thursday were aged 27 and 28. They belonged to the paramilitary Civil Guard, which is chiefly in charge of policing rural areas and guarding official buildings.
Television images showed the charred and mangled remains of a vehicle that had been parked on a street in the Palmanova beach resort area, southwest of the island’s capital, Palma de Mallorca.
The blast was caused by a bomb attached to the underneath of the vehicle, Interior Ministry official Ramon Socias said. Police believe the attack was carried out by an ETA cell that came to the island specifically to carry it out and was not based there, he said.
The island’s airport and ports were closed shortly after 4 p.m. (1400 GMT, 10 a.m. EDT) and reopened just under two hours later, police said.
Mallorca, with its golden sandy beaches, mild Mediterranean climate and crystal clear waters is one of Europe’s main tourist destinations and the explosion occurred at the height of the summer holiday season.
In June, about 2.6 million passengers used Mallorca airport while more than 22 million passed through it last year.
Most of the tourists come from Britain and Germany and tour operators said they were trying to make contact with them. A spokeswoman for British travel organization ABTA said there were an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 Britons on the island Thursday.
The blast occurred shortly before 2 p.m. (1200 GMT, 8 a.m. EDT). The ministry said several people were injured but none was in serious condition.
Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero will fly to the island later Thursday.
ETA is now blamed for nine attacks this year. The group has killed more than 825 people since it launched its violent campaign in 1968 for an independent homeland in the Basque region of northern Spain. The group was founded July 31, 1959.
There were no warning calls before the attacks over the past two days and no group had claimed responsibility.
In Wednesday’s attack, there were around 120 people in the 14-story barracks and surrounding buildings, a third of them children, at the time of the early morning blast.
The van had false license plates and had probably been stolen in France, officials said.
El Mundo newspaper recently reported that Spanish authorities had received intelligence reports that three vans had been prepared as car bombs and were expected to cross into Spain from France. One of the vehicles mentioned was a Mercedes Vito, the same model that was used in Wednesday’s attack, leading to speculation there might be two van bombs still ready to be used.
Spain has vowed to crush the separatist group since ETA ended what it had said was a permanent cease-fire with a bombing that destroyed a Madrid airport parking garage and killed two people in 2006.
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Associated Press writers Ciaran Giles, Harold Heckle and Jorge Sainz in Madrid contributed to this report.

NEW YORK – The stock market is a day away from locking in its best July in 20 years.
Stocks added to an already impressive run Thursday as another round of earnings reports gave investors new reasons to be optimistic about the economy. The Dow Jones industrial average rose its highest level in nearly nine months with a gain of 84 points and the Nasdaq composite index traded above 2,000 for the first time since October.
The latest reports struck a theme that has played out for weeks: Times are tough but companies aren’t doing as badly as feared. Many have chopped costs to produce profits well beyond the market’s modest expectations.
Motorola Inc. said it used deep cost cuts to wring a profit from its latest quarter. Analysts had expected a loss. Goodyear Tire & Rubber’s shortfall was half what had been expected and Dow Chemical Co.’s CEO said he believes the U.S. economy “has found bottom.”
A surprise drop in the number of people continuing to seek unemployment benefits gave investors even more reason to put money into stocks.
With one day to go, the Dow is up 8.4 percent this month, its strongest July since 1989, when it gained 9 percent. It would be the best performance of any month since October 2002.
A much-anticipated report on the overall output of the economy is sure to drive the market Friday. Economists expect that the nation’s gross domestic product shrank at an annual rate of 1.5 percent in the April-June quarter. That would be a big improvement from the 5.9 percent average annualized drop recorded in the prior six months, the weakest numbers in 50 years.
Stocks are up 13 percent since July 13 when investors bet correctly that Goldman Sachs Group Inc. would report enormous earnings. Since then, other profit reports have brought hope that the longest recession since World War II might end this year. AT&T Inc., chip maker Intel Corp. and heavy equipment maker Caterpillar Inc. all posted results that outran expectations.
Three out of four companies in the S&P 500 index that reported second-quarter results so far have topped analysts’ expectations, according to Thomson Reuters. About 300 of the 500 companies have reported.
Analysts said the end of the month is pressuring money managers and traders to show they have kept up with July’s rally. Often, the summer months are quieter than the rest of the year on Wall Street as traders take vacations.
Some of the buying is likely tied to short-covering, where investors have to buy stock after having earlier sold borrowed shares in a bet they would fall.
“People kind of got caught a little flat-footed here. The summer is supposed to be slow,” said Jon Merriman, chief executive of Merriman Curhan Ford in San Francisco.
The Dow rose 83.74, or 0.9 percent, to 9,154.46 after being up as much as 176 points. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index rose 11.60, or 1.2 percent, to 986.75. It rose to nearly 997 during the day. It hasn’t traded above 1,000 since November.
It was the highest close for the Dow and the S&P 500 index since Nov. 4.
The Nasdaq advanced 16.54, or 0.9 percent, to 1,984.30. It rose to nearly 2,010 in morning trading, its first move above 2,000 since Oct. 3. The index is up 56 percent from its low of 1,269 in March. It was its highest finish since Oct. 1.
About four stocks rose for every one that fell on the New York Stock Exchange. Consolidated volume came to 6.1 billion shares compared with 5.4 billion Wednesday.
Stocks made little progress in the four days prior to Thursday though some break in the buying had been expected after the steep gains.
General Electric Co. led the Dow higher after a Goldman Sachs analyst raised his rating on the industrial conglomerate. The stock rose 85 cents, or 6.9 percent, to 13.11.
“There are some specific stock stories that are getting people involved and making people confident,” said Nick Kalivas, vice president of financial research at MF Global in Chicago.
Investors also welcomed a government report that the number of Americans continuing to collect unemployment benefits fell unexpectedly last week to 6.2 million. Economists polled by Thomson Reuters had expected that figure to rise to 6.3 million from 6.23 million in the prior week.
Bond prices were mixed after a successful auction of 28 billion of seven-year notes. Weak demand at auctions earlier in the week raised concerns that the government might have to offer higher returns on bonds to lure in investors, which would have the negative effect of raising borrowing costs on loans such as mortgages.
The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note fell to 3.61 percent from 3.67 percent late Wednesday.
Crude oil rose 3.59 to settle at 66.94 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange after tumbling 6 percent Wednesday on fears economic growth in China would slow and curb demand for resources.
The dollar was mixed, while gold prices rose.
The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies rose 9.42, or 1.7 percent, to 557.80.
Overseas, Britain’s FTSE 100 gained 1.9 percent, Germany’s DAX index gained 1.7 percent, and France’s CAC-40 rose 2.1 percent. Japan’s Nikkei stock average rose 0.5 percent.

ROME (Reuters) –
Michael Moore's documentary on the global financial crisis, “Capitalism: A Love Story”, will vie for the top prize at this year's Venice film festival.
The Oscar winner's is one of six U.S. movies in the main competition at the world's oldest film festival, a sign U.S. film-making is back in business after last year's problems, according to organizers.
“It seemed that the writers' strike, the financial difficulties had slammed the brakes on the most creative part of American cinema, but the selection has never been so great,” said festival director Marco Mueller as he unveiled the program of the Sept 2-12 event.
Also up for the Golden Lion are Werner Herzog's remake of “Bad Lieutenant”, former Gucci designer Tom Ford's directorial debut “A Single Man” and John Hillcoat's “The Road”, an adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's bestseller starring Viggo Mortensen and Charlize Theron.
One title among the 24 films in the official contest has yet to be unveiled.
Highlights out of competition include Steven Soderbergh's “The Informant!”, with Matt Damon as the whistle-blower in an agri-business powerhouse, and Joe Dante's 3-D horror “The Hole”.
George Clooney, star of last year's opening film by the Coen brothers, will be back on the Lido in Grant Heslov's satirical drama “The Men Who Stare at Goats”.
Italy and France will also loom large over Venice with four films each in the main lineup, including Jaco van Dormael's “Mr Nobody” and Giuseppe Tornatore's epic drama “Baaria”, the first Italian movie to open the festival in two decades.
The heavy U.S. presence promises a steady flow of Hollywood stars on the Lido red carpet, unlike last year, and there will be a career award for John Lasseter and his fellow Pixar directors for their animation blockbusters.
To mark the award, new 3D versions of Toy Story and Toy Story 2 will screen at the festival.
(Editing by Robert Woodward)

Los Angeles (E! Online) –
Looks like the Jackson 3 just become the Jackson 4.
Joe Jackson, who can't sit in front of a television camera without dropping a bombshell or two, didn't disappoint in an interview with News One yesterday, confirming the long-simmering rumor that Michael Jackson did, in fact, have a secret son.
Or at least a son who was secret up until last month, when 25-year-old Norwegian Omer Bhatti's placement next to the Jackson family in the front row of his memorial—not to mention his undeniable resemblance to the late King of Pop and the fact that he spent eight years living at Neverland Ranch—got tongues wagging.
Papa Joe's included.
“I knew he had another son, yes I did,” he said. “He looks like a Jackson, he acts like a Jackson, he can dance like a Jackson…”
But can he be steered into a career in entertainment like a Jackson (setting aside, for a moment, Bhatti's own denial of a biological connection)?
Ignoring what appear to be dollar signs in his eyes, we'll leave the final word on that matter to Joe: “I don't know. I can't say that yet. Not until I see it happen.”
··· THEY SAID WHAT? Get today's most commented stories now at www.eonline.com

TEHRAN (Reuters) –
Baton-wielding Iranian police fired tear gas on Thursday and arrested protesters mourning the young woman killed in post-election violence who has become a symbol for the opposition to Tehran's hardline leaders.
The renewed protests show the opposition refuses to be quelled or accept the June 12 hardline election victory despite a security crackdown, the arrest of hundreds of demonstrators and repeated calls from Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The clashes erupted after hundreds of supporters of opposition leader Mirhossein Mousavi gathered to mourn Neda Agha-Soltan, whose death on June 20 was captured on video and has been seen by hundreds of thousands on the Internet.
At least 300 mourners were at a ceremony for the 26-year-old music student at Tehran's Behesht-e Zahra cemetery, greeting the opposition leader with chants of “Mousavi we support you” and clinging to his car as he arrived, a witness said.
But police forced Mousavi to return to his car and leave.
Many hundreds later tried to move toward the Grand Mosala, a large prayer venue in central Tehran. But police were out in force outside the Mosala, having rejected a request by opposition leaders to hold a memorial ceremony there.
“There are thousands of people chanting slogans in favor of Mousavi. Hundreds of riot police around Mosala and nearby streets are trying to disperse them,” another witness said.
Plainclothes security agents and riot police beat protesters with batons and police fired tear gas, witnesses said.
Protesters set garbage containers alight in nearby streets. At least three protesters were arrested and police smashed the car windows of drivers who honked their horns in support of the demonstrators, one of the witnesses said.
Smaller groups of scores of protesters gathered in parts of Tehran as evening fell, shouting “death to dictators,” and “independence, freedom, Iranian republic”; an echo of a slogan from the 1979 revolution with the word “Iranian” replacing the word “Islamic” that was used 30 years ago.
Official restrictions prevent Reuters and other news organizations from reporting outside their offices.
Later, as night fell, Tehran residents shouted “Allahu Akbar” — “God is greatest” — from balconies and rooftops.
Mousavi and another reformist candidate, Mehdi Karoubi, say the authorities rigged the June 12 vote to ensure the re-election of hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
Supreme Leader Khamenei has upheld the result and demanded an end to protests over the election, which tipped Iran into its worst internal crisis since the 1979 Islamic revolution and exposed deep rifts within the establishment.
“I don't understand the meaning of dispatching police forces and security agents to surround those who want to mourn,” said Karoubi at the cemetery, where Neda's family was marking the 40th day since her death.
Neda was shot as Mousavi supporters clashed with riot police and Basij militiamen in Tehran. Authorities say the bullet that killed her was not a type used by Iranian security forces and say the incident was staged to blacken their image.
Neda's mother said her daughter was an innocent bystander.
“It was all about being young and feeling passionate about freedom,” her mother told the BBC. “She wasn't political, she didn't belong to any party or group … Every other young Iranian was there and she was one of them.”
DISABLED REFORMIST STILL HELD
Iranian media have reported the deaths of several other protesters. Rights groups say hundreds of people, including senior pro-reform politicians, journalists, activists and lawyers, have been detained since the election.
Reformist former President Mohammad Khatami has denounced the killings and arrests. “Blood has been shed,” he said on Wednesday, according to the semi-official Mehr news agency. “Detainees have faced illegal and un-Islamic behavior. Those responsible should be punished,” he added.
The authorities have said many have been released but the head of a parliamentary committee said this week that 200 protesters and 50 political figures remained in custody.
Among them is disabled reformer Saeed Hajjarian, who was transferred on Thursday to a “state-owned” house from the jail where he had been held since he was arrested on June 15, the semi-official Mehr news agency reported.
“State-owned” houses belong to security-related organizations, including Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards and the Intelligence Ministry, analysts say.
“Detainees who are kept in such places, are actually under tight security supervision … it does not mean they have been freed,” said an analyst, who asked not to be named.
The head of Tehran's Revolutionary Guards, Brigadier General Abdollah Araghi, had warned on Wednesday against any gathering to mourn protesters killed in last month's huge demonstrations.
“We are not joking. We will confront those who want to fight against the clerical establishment,” he said, according to the semi-official Fars news agency.
Ahmadinejad is under pressure even from his allies over his initial choice of vice-president and his decision to dismiss the intelligence minister, who had criticized the president for failing to obey the supreme leader promptly on the issue.
For a week Ahmadinejad had ignored Khamenei's order that he drop his choice of deputy, Esfandiar Rahim-Mashaie, a man who outraged hardliners last year by saying Iran had no quarrel with Israelis, only with their government.
(Writing by Jon Hemming; Editing by Jon Boyle)

LOS ANGELES – Michael Jackson’s children will live with their grandmother under an agreement reached with the King of Pop’s ex-wife that should ensure the youngsters return to the privacy they enjoyed when their father was alive.
The agreement announced Thursday preserves Jackson’s wishes as spelled out in his 2002 will and maintains a stable parenting figure in their lives. It also reopens the door to a relationship with Deborah Rowe, who is the mother of Jackson’s two oldest children.
Rowe will be allowed to visit her children, as part of the agreement. Those visits will be coordinated by a child psychologist.
Rowe will receive no money from the deal, as she had after previous custody arrangements with Jackson.
The agreement ends the possibility of a lengthy and public custody battle between Katherine Jackson and Rowe. It spares the children, who range in age from 7 to 12, from appearing before a judge and declaring who they would prefer to live with.
The announcement also ends weeks of rampant speculation about who would care for the children and Rowe’s intentions, which were never officially announced before Thursday.
Michael Jackson, who died June 25 at 50, was the sole parent to his three children. He was married to Rowe for three years, but both had described the relationship as borne out of friendship and that Rowe had given birth to Prince Michael, 12, and Paris-Michael, 11, as a “gift.” They divorced after Paris-Michael was born.
His third child, 7-year-old Prince Michael II, known as Blanket, was born to a surrogate and the mother’s identity has never been revealed.
In a joint statement, attorneys for both women made clear that the agreement was reached with the children’s best interests in mind.
“Mrs. Jackson and the family are pleased this matter is resolved and was handled in a caring, thoughtful and courteous manner by the parties and their representatives,” L. Londell McMillan and Diane Goodman, attorneys for Mrs. Jackson, wrote in a statement. “We were all united in our goals to do what is best for Michael’s wonderful children, and both Mrs. Jackson and Debbie Rowe were on the exact same page.”
Eric M. George, an attorney for Rowe, called the agreement a “dignified outcome.” George credited Katherine Jackson’s attorneys for their work on the deal, and expressed pride with Rowe for “her integrity and selflessness.”
The use of a child psychologist to coordinate and oversee the visits is a smart move, said Dorian Traube, a professor at the University of Southern California’s School of Social Work.
“This is a good model for introducing these kids to a woman that they don’t know very well,” Traube said.
She said child psychologists are often used in situations where children are being reintroduced to a parent who lost visitation privileges. It’s often a temporary arrangement, she said, since the aim is for the children and parents to develop their own relationship.
“The whole point of doing this is to build to a point of autonomy,” Traube said.
She said an experienced psychologist will also help the children deal with their father’s death, and ensure that Jackson’s children, family and Rowe “are comfortable because it is an unusual situation.”
The children have been living with their 79-year-old grandmother at the family’s home in the San Fernando Valley since their father’s death. Despite their untraditional upbringing, they have been described as model children.
Katherine Jackson was perhaps her son’s most constant and trusted confidante — by his side through the triumphs and successes of his music career and his downfall after being accused of child molestation.
The singer clearly favored his mother as caretaker for his children, designating her as his top choice in his will. His backup was singer and friend Diana Ross.
Although Jackson’s children have grown up without a mother, Jackson adored his.
“Every child thinks their mother is the greatest mother in the world, but we Jacksons never lost that feeling,” Jackson wrote in “Moonwalk,” his 1988 autobiography. “Because of Katherine’s gentleness, warmth and attention, I can’t imagine what it’s like to grow up without a mother’s love.”
Jackson was fiercely protective of his children, generally shielding or disguising them in public. Their introduction to the public came during Jackson’s memorial service, an event broadcast worldwide. Paris-Michael provided the service’s most touching moment when she tearfully eulogized her father as “the best father you could ever imagine.”
Rowe, 50, who breeds horses and has a home northeast of Los Angeles, has not been a fixture in the children’s lives. She met Jackson when she was a receptionist for celebrity dermatologist Dr. Arnold Klein.
Public records show there have been significant gaps in visits between Rowe and her children, but they do not indicate when she last saw them.
In 2001 Rowe wrote of Jackson’s parenting when she petitioned to relinquish her parental rights. “Michael has been a wonderful father to the children and I do not wish to share parenting responsibilities with Michael because he is doing so well without me.”
At the time, she said she hadn’t seen her children in more than a year.
Although much has been made of that decision since Jackson’s death, her parental rights were eventually restored and she petitioned for custody after the singer was charged with child molestation in 2003.
Yet she was one of Jackson’s strongest witnesses at his 2005 child molestation trial in Santa Barbara.
Rowe described him to jurors during the singer’s criminal trial as: “Generous to a fault, good father, great with kids, puts other people ahead of him. Brilliant businessman.”
At the time, she testified it had been two-and-a-half years since she saw her children.
Although Rowe never formally petitioned for custody after Jackson’s death, the agreement with Katherine Jackson will likely be discussed during a hearing scheduled for Monday in Los Angeles Superior Court. That hearing will now focus more on lingering issues with Jackson’s multimillion dollar estate, of which Katherine Jackson has vied for control.
___
Associated Press Music Writer Nekesa Mumbi Moody in New York City contributed to this report.

LOS ANGELES – Search warrants served at the Las Vegas home and office of Michael Jackson’s doctor show investigators think the pop star was an addict.
The warrants, served Tuesday and filed in court Thursday, targeted Dr. Conrad Murray. They say investigators wanted to seize any evidence relating to the sale and shipment of the powerful anesthetic propofol (PROH’-puh-fahl).
The warrants say authorities were seeking evidence supporting a manslaughter charge and medical rule infractions including “prescribing to an addict.”
A law enforcement official has said investigators are working under the theory propofol caused Jackson’s heart to stop. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation is ongoing.
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Associated Press Writer Ken Ritter in Las Vegas contributed to this report.

NEW YORK (Reuters) –
A U.S. judge on Thursday denied a bid by Fox News Network LLC seeking details from the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve about the central bank's loans to companies affected by the financial crisis.
The owner of the Fox Business cable network made an initial request for documents in November last year under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) about the companies and funds they received between August 2007 and November 2008.
Both parties had filed motions with U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein in Manhattan federal court to rule in their favor after Fox filed its request to the court in January.
“I rule that one document, which the Board determined is not a record, is indeed, a record. The Board shall identify this document and either produce it or claim an exemption,” Hellerstein said in a written order.
“In all other respects, I grant the Board's motion and deny Fox's motion, finding that the Board performed an adequate search and that Exemption 4 permits the Board not to disclose the documents that Fox seeks.”
Under Exemption 4 of the FOIA, an agency must demonstrate that the information sought is a “trade secret” or “commercial or financial” in character and “obtained from a person” and “privileged and confidential.”
The Fed has been a critical player in financial rescue packages for companies. It also opened up its discount window to a wider range of entities in an attempt to provide more liquidity to the financial sector.
Fox News is owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp
The case is Fox News Network LLC v Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System 09-272 in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York (Manhattan)
(Reporting by Grant McCool; editing by Ted Kerr)

TEHRAN, Iran – Iranian police fired tear gas and beat protesters to disperse thousands chanting “Neda lives!” Thursday at a memorial for victims of post-election violence held at the gravesite of the woman whose death made her an icon of the pro-reform movement, witnesses said.
The new wave of unrest showed the opposition’s continuing ability to harness anger over the crackdown, and more protests could erupt around the inauguration next week of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose government has been virtually paralyzed by the crisis.
Thursday’s memorial gathering marked the end of the traditional 40-day mourning period for Neda Agha Soltan, a 27-year-old music student who was shot to death June 20. Her dying moments were filmed and circulated widely on the Internet, making her name a rallying cry for the opposition.
“Neda is alive! Ahmadinejad is dead!” chanted protesters, many holding up single red roses tied with green ribbons, the signature color of the opposition.
Plainclothes forces dispersed the crowd with tear gas and batons — and with chants of “Death to those who are against the supreme leader,” according to witnesses and state television.
The witnesses spoke on condition of anonymity because they feared reprisal. The government has banned media from covering some events, including Thursday’s memorial.
Demonstrations that drew thousands more later spread to other parts of the capital, Tehran, and more clashes with security forces erupted. Police fired tear gas, shots in the air and paintballs at hundreds of protesters on Vali Asr Street and other major avenues, witnesses said. Protesters set tires and trash cans ablaze in response. There was no word on casualties.
The opposition claims Ahmadinejad’s election victory was a fraud and his government has been virtually paralyzed by the 7-week-old crisis. The president has come under attack from both the opposition and his own supporters, who were angered by his appointment of a controversial first vice president he was later forced to sack.
The government says 30 people have been killed in the crackdown, though human rights groups say the true number is likely much higher. Hundreds were arrested in the sweeps, including young protesters, politicians and longtime critics of the government.
Soltan and at least 24 others killed in the crackdown are buried at Behesht-e Zahra, the vast cemetery on Tehran’s southern outskirts, according to rights groups tracking the dead.
The site holds great symbolic weight. Many of those killed during the 1979 Islamic revolution are buried there, and the revolution’s leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini has a gigantic mausoleum complex nearby. Those killed in Iran’s 1980-1988 war with Iraq are also buried in the cemetery, and families frequently visit the graves.
During the revolution, the deaths of protesters prompted similar marches after the 40-day mourning period, which were often answered by security forces attacking mourners in a cycle that helped fuel the street uprising.
Police barred opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi from joining the crowd around Soltan’s grave Thursday, witnesses said. Mousavi and his supporters claim he is the true winner of the election.
An amateur video of Thursday’s memorial showed thousands marching through the cemetery, chanting and flashing victory signs. Some wore green T-shirts — the color of Mousavi’s movement.
When Mousavi tried to approach the grave, hundreds of police surrounded him as supporters chanted “Yaa Hossein, Mir Hossein” — comparing their leader to the Prophet Muhammad’s grandson Hussein, who is the most revered Shiite saint. Police forced Mousavi to leave, said witnesses who asked not to be identified out of security concerns.
Afterward, his supporters remained at the grave, chanting, “Death to the dictator,” as the crowd swelled to several thousand.
The police charge came when an ally of Mousavi, Mahdi Karroubi — who was also a candidate in the election — tried to give a speech. Karroubi had to flee the site, and several of his aides were beaten and harassed, according to pro-opposition Web sites.
After the clash, thousands of supporters continued to pay their respects at Soltan’s grave. Passengers riding the subway from the cemetery to central Tehran chanted slogans against Ahmadinejad, shouting, “Traitor Mahmoud, we want you to become homeless,” witnesses said.
Police arrested two prominent Iranian filmmakers when they tried to lay flowers at Soltan’s grave — Jafar Panahi, whose film, “The Circle,” criticized the treatment of women under the Islamist government and is banned in Iran, and a female documentary maker, Mahnaz Mohammadi.
State Department spokesman Ian Kelly criticized the use of force to disperse the mourners, saying it was “particularly disturbing … to break up a group of people who are trying to exercise an important ritual under Islam, the mourning after 40 days.”
Thousands more gathered at the main Mosalla mosque in central Tehran, with heavy security forces nearby and at other major intersections.
Though massive protests and deadly clashes erupted in the days and weeks after the disputed election, Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guard and its allied Basij militia have since adopted a zero-tolerance stance. Demonstrators have managed to hold several smaller protests in recent weeks, however.
Thursday’s protests showed the opposition movement still has momentum, fueled by growing anger over abuses of detainees and continuing arrests. Ahmadinejad is scheduled to take his oath of office before parliament on Aug. 5 and there is talk in some opposition circles of demonstrations in front of parliament and calls to wear black in mourning.
Ahmadinejad’s government has been paralyzed by a double blow — the election crisis and heavy criticism from within his own conservative camp over his appointment of Esfandiar Rahim Mashai as first vice president.
Mashai came under attack by conservatives for once calling Israelis friends of Iran, and Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ordered Ahmadinejad to dismiss him in a humiliating setback. That was seen as a bid by Khamenei to prevent his hard-line supporters from splintering in the face of the opposition attack on the country’s clerical leadership. The top clerics were already deeply divided over the election outcome and the crackdown.
Allegations of torture against jailed protesters have become an embarrassment to the clerical leadership, bringing criticism from top clerics and even fellow conservatives.
Hundreds were arrested in the sweeps, including young protesters, politicians and longtime critics of the government. Many have been held in secret locations, without contact with relatives. In recent weeks, the bruised bodies of several young protesters have been handed over to families. The opposition has said detainees were tortured to extract false confessions for the courts.
Soltan’s mother, Hajar Soltan, said she was waiting for her daughter’s killers to be arrested and brought to justice.
“Her death has been so painful,” she told the British Broadcasting Corp. “Words can never describe my true feelings. But knowing that the world cried for her, that has comforted me. I am proud of her. The world sees her as a symbol and that makes me happy.”