Suicide bomber kills guard at U.S. embassy in Turkey

ANKARA (Reuters) - A far-leftist suicide bomber killed a Turkish security guard at the U.S. embassy in Ankara on Friday, officials said, blowing open an entrance and sending debris flying through the air.

The attacker detonated explosives strapped to his body after entering an embassy gatehouse. The blast could be heard a mile away. A lower leg and other human remains lay on the street.

Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said the bomber was a member of the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), a far-left group which is virulently anti-U.S. and anti-NATO and is listed as a terrorist organisation by Washington.

The White House said the suicide attack was an "act of terror" but that the motivation was unclear. U.S. officials said the DHKP-C were the main suspects but did not exclude other possibilities.

Islamist radicals, extreme left-wing groups, ultra-nationalists and Kurdish militants have all carried out attacks in Turkey in the past. There was no claim of responsibility.

"The suicide bomber was ripped apart and one or two citizens from the special security team passed away," said Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan.

"This event shows that we need to fight together everywhere in the world against these terrorist elements," he said.

In New York, the U.N. Security Council strongly condemned the attack as a heinous act.

Turkish media reports identified the bomber as DHKP-C member Ecevit Sanli, who was involved in attacks on a police station and a military staff college in Istanbul in 1997.

KEY ALLY

Turkey is a key U.S. ally in the Middle East with common interests ranging from energy security to counter-terrorism and has been one of the leading advocates of foreign intervention to end the conflict in neighboring Syria.

Around 400 U.S. soldiers have arrived in Turkey over the past few weeks to operate Patriot anti-missile batteries meant to defend against any spillover of Syria's civil war, part of a NATO deployment due to be fully operational in the coming days.

The DHKP-C was responsible for the assassination of two U.S. military contractors in the early 1990s in protest against the first Gulf War and launched rockets at the U.S. consulate in Istanbul in 1992, according to the U.S. State Department.

Deemed a terrorist organisation by both the United States and Turkey, the DHKP-C has been blamed for suicide attacks in the past, including one in 2001 that killed two police officers and a tourist in Istanbul's central Taksim Square.

The group, formed in 1978, has carried out a series of deadly attacks on police stations in the last six months.

The attack may have come in retaliation for an operation against the DHKP-C last month in which Turkish police detained 85 people. A court subsequently remanded 38 of them in custody over links to the group.

"HUGE EXPLOSION"

U.S. Ambassador Francis Ricciardone emerged through the main gate of the embassy shortly after the explosion to address reporters, flanked by a security detail as a Turkish police helicopter hovered overhead.

"We're very sad of course that we lost one of our Turkish guards at the gate," Ricciardone said, describing the victim as a "hero" and thanking Turkish authorities for a prompt response.

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland condemned the attack on the checkpoint on the perimeter of the embassy and said several U.S. and Turkish staff were injured by debris.

"The level of security protection at our facility in Ankara ensured that there were not significantly more deaths and injuries than there could have been," she told reporters.

It was the second attack on a U.S. mission in four months. On September 11, 2012, U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three American personnel were killed in an attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya.

The attack in Benghazi, blamed on al Qaeda-affiliated militants, sparked a political furore in Washington over accusations that U.S. missions were not adequately safeguarded.

A well-known Turkish journalist, Didem Tuncay, who was on her way in to the embassy to meet Ricciardone when the attack took place, was in a critical condition in hospital.

"It was a huge explosion. I was sitting in my shop when it happened. I saw what looked like a body part on the ground," said travel agent Kamiyar Barnos, whose shop window was shattered around 100 meters away from the blast.

CALL FOR VIGILANCE

The U.S. consulate in Istanbul warned its citizens to be vigilant and to avoid large gatherings, while the British mission in Istanbul called on British businesses to tighten security after what it called a "suspected terrorist attack".

In 2008, Turkish gunmen with suspected links to al Qaeda, opened fire on the U.S. consulate in Istanbul, killing three Turkish policemen. The gunmen died in the subsequent firefight.

The most serious bombings in Turkey occurred in November 2003, when car bombs shattered two synagogues, killing 30 people and wounding 146. Part of the HSBC Bank headquarters was destroyed and the British consulate was damaged in two more explosions that killed 32 people less than a week later. Authorities said those attacks bore the hallmarks of al Qaeda.

(Additional reporting by Daren Butler and Ayla Jean Yackley in Istanbul, Mohammed Arshad and Mark Hosenball in Washington; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Stephen Powell and Sandra Maler)

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Twitter hit by "sophisticated" cyber attack

SAN FRANCISCO: Twitter said Friday it had been hit by a "sophisticated" cyber attack similar to those that recently hit major Western news outlets, and that the passwords of about 250,000 users were stolen.

"This attack was not the work of amateurs, and we do not believe it was an isolated incident," Twitter information security director Bob Lord said in a blog post.

Lord referred to an "uptick in large-scale security attacks aimed at US technology and media companies" as he told of Twitter detecting attempts this week to get unauthorized access to data in the firm's network.

The attack coincided with the revelation of several high-profile security breaches. The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal said this week that they had been hacked, and pointed to hackers from China.

Twitter did not confirm the source of the intrusion.

But Lord noted that "the attackers were extremely sophisticated, and we believe other companies and organizations have also been recently similarly attacked."

He said that Twitter shut down a live attack as it was in process.

However, Lord added, cyber attackers may have gotten usernames, email addresses, passwords and other data.

As a precaution, Twitter invalidated passwords of accounts at issue and sent people email messages telling them to create new passwords.

-AFP/ac

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ED raids in 3 cities, hawala money seized

JALANDHAR: The enforcement directorate (ED) conducted simultaneous raids in Jalandhar, Ludhiana and Delhi on Friday and recovered money received through hawala channels. It is learnt that the directorate also seized documents pertaining to hawala transactions running into a few hundred crores.

The raid in Jalandhar was conducted at Happy Forex Pvt Ltd in Adda Hoshiarpur in the early afternoon. The team was accompanied by a heavy posse of CRPF and Punjab Police. They conducted thorough search in the office when according to eye witnesses one person escaped with a bag from the roof of the foreign exchange company.

Though ED officials remained tight-lipped about the raids, sources revealed that these people were on ED radar for a long and were carrying out hawala transaction at the behest of some individuals as well as some companies based abroad. These hawala operators were being used for sending funds in the country for anti-national activities.

Sources disclosed it is also being investigated if these people were conducting transactions at the behest of drug lord Raja Kandhola or other drug peddlers. Kandhola is main accused in the recovery of 40kg synthetic drug ice.

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Healthier schools: Goodbye candy and greasy snacks

WASHINGTON (AP) — Goodbye candy bars and sugary cookies. Hello baked chips and diet sodas.

The government for the first time is proposing broad new standards to make sure all foods sold in schools are more healthful, a change that would ban the sale of almost all candy, high-calorie sports drinks and greasy foods on campus.

Under new rules the Department of Agriculture proposed Friday, school vending machines would start selling water, lower-calorie sports drinks, diet sodas and baked chips instead. Lunchrooms that now sell fatty "a la carte" items like mozzarella sticks and nachos would have to switch to healthier pizzas, low-fat hamburgers, fruit cups and yogurt.

The rules, required under a child nutrition law passed by Congress in 2010, are part of the government's effort to combat childhood obesity. While many schools already have made improvements in their lunch menus and vending machine choices, others still are selling high-fat, high-calorie foods.

Under the proposal, the Agriculture Department would set fat, calorie, sugar and sodium limits on almost all foods sold in schools. Current standards already regulate the nutritional content of school breakfasts and lunches that are subsidized by the federal government, but most lunch rooms also have "a la carte" lines that sell other foods. And food sold through vending machines and in other ways outside the lunchroom has not been federally regulated.

"Parents and teachers work hard to instill healthy eating habits in our kids, and these efforts should be supported when kids walk through the schoolhouse door," said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.

Most snacks sold in school would have to have less than 200 calories. Elementary and middle schools could sell only water, low-fat milk or 100 percent fruit or vegetable juice. High schools could sell some sports drinks, diet sodas and iced teas, but the calories would be limited. Drinks would be limited to 12-ounce portions in middle schools, and 8-ounce portions in elementary schools.

The standards will cover vending machines, the "a la carte" lunch lines, snack bars and any other foods regularly sold around school. They would not apply to in-school fundraisers or bake sales, though states have the power to regulate them. The new guidelines also would not apply to after-school concessions at school games or theater events, goodies brought from home for classroom celebrations, or anything students bring for their own personal consumption.

The new rules are the latest in a long list of changes designed to make foods served in schools more healthful and accessible. Nutritional guidelines for the subsidized lunches were revised last year and put in place last fall. The 2010 child nutrition law also provided more money for schools to serve free and reduced-cost lunches and required more meals to be served to hungry kids.

Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin, a Democrat, has been working for two decades to take junk foods out of schools. He calls the availability of unhealthful foods around campus a "loophole" that undermines the taxpayer money that helps pay for the healthier subsidized lunches.

"USDA's proposed nutrition standards are a critical step in closing that loophole and in ensuring that our schools are places that nurture not just the minds of American children but their bodies as well," Harkin said.

Last year's rules faced criticism from some conservatives, including some Republicans in Congress, who said the government shouldn't be telling kids what to eat. Mindful of that backlash, the Agriculture Department exempted in-school fundraisers from federal regulation and proposed different options for some parts of the rule, including the calorie limits for drinks in high schools, which would be limited to either 60 calories or 75 calories in a 12-ounce portion.

The department also has shown a willingness to work with schools to resolve complaints that some new requirements are hard to meet. Last year, for example, the government relaxed some limits on meats and grains in subsidized lunches after school nutritionists said they weren't working.

Schools, the food industry, interest groups and other critics or supporters of the new proposal will have 60 days to comment and suggest changes. A final rule could be in place as soon as the 2014 school year.

Margo Wootan, a nutrition lobbyist for the Center for Science in the Public Interest, says surveys done by her organization show that most parents want changes in the lunchroom.

"Parents aren't going to have to worry that kids are using their lunch money to buy candy bars and a Gatorade instead of a healthy school lunch," she said.

The food industry has been onboard with many of the changes, and several companies worked with Congress on the child nutrition law two years ago. Major beverage companies have already agreed to take the most caloric sodas out of schools. But those same companies, including Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, also sell many of the non-soda options, like sports drinks, and have lobbied to keep them in vending machines.

A spokeswoman for the American Beverage Association, which represents the soda companies, says they already have greatly reduced the number of calories kids are consuming at school by pulling out the high-calorie sodas.

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Follow Mary Clare Jalonick on Twitter at http://twitter.com/mcjalonick

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Hillary Clinton Says Goodbye...Until 2016?

Feb 1, 2013 6:48pm

Image Credit: Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP Photo

After four years, nearly a million miles traveled and 112 countries visited, Hillary Clinton stepped down as the 67th secretary of state on Friday. But even on this, her final day as America’s top diplomat, she could not escape the questions about what she’ll do four years from now.

Many of the 1,000 employees who gathered to see her off expressed hope that this was not the end of her political career.

“2016! 2016!” the crowd chanted as   Clinton waved and drove away. “We’ll Miss You!”

Right before her departure, Clinton gave the traditional farewell speech to staff on the steps of the State Department’s historic C street lobby. In a roughly 10 minute, often reflective speech she called the 70,000 State Department employees part of “a huge extended family.”

“I cannot fully express how grateful I am to those with whom I have spent many hours here in Washington, around the world and in airplanes,” she said, drawing laughter from the audience.

Clinton’s trademark sense of humor was on display, even as she grew emotional  speaking about how much the State Department had  meant to her over the last four years.

PHOTOS: Hillary Clinton Through the Years

“I am very proud to have been secretary of state. I will miss you. I will probably be dialing ops just to talk,” she joked to a cheering and laughing crowd. “I will wonder what you all are doing, because I know that because of your efforts day after day, we are making a real difference.”

But  Clinton also was somber when discussing the danger diplomats and foreign service officers face all over the world, using Thursday’s suicide bombing attack against the U.S. Embassy in Ankara, Turkey, in which a Turkish guard was killed, as an example.

“We live in very complex and even dangerous times, as we saw again just today at our embassy in Ankara, where we were attacked and lost one of our foreign service nationals, and others injured,” said Clinton “But I spoke with the ambassador and the team there. I spoke with my Turkish counterpart. And I told them how much we valued their commitment and their sacrifice.”

Clinton was flanked by trusted deputies, Bill Burns and Tom Nides, whom she gave warm hugs to at the end of the speech. With a huge “Thank You” sign behind her she walked a rope line after finishing her speech, greeting the hordes of employees who wanted to shake her hand and say goodbye before she walked out of the State Department as secretary of state for the last time.

“It’s been quite a challenging week saying goodbye to so many people and knowing that I will not have the opportunity to continue being part of this amazing team,” Clinton said. “But I am so grateful that we’ve had a chance to contribute in each of our ways to making our country and our world stronger, safer, fairer and better.”

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Explosion at Mexican oil giant Pemex offices kills 14

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - A powerful explosion rocked the Mexico City headquarters of state oil giant Pemex on Thursday, killing at least 14 people and injuring 100 others.

The blast hit the lower floors of the downtown tower block, throwing debris into the streets and sending workers running outside.

Interior Minister Miguel Angel Osorio Chong said the blast killed at least 14 people and injured 100. It was not yet clear what caused the explosion, and the death toll could still rise, he added.

Media reports said machinery inside the building had apparently exploded. But an ambulance service official at the scene, who asked not to be named, said it was caused by a gas leak.

Police quickly cordoned off the building, and television images showed the explosion caused serious damage to the ground floor and blew out windows on the lower floors of the tower.

"The place shook, we lost power and suddenly there was debris everywhere. Colleagues were helping us out of the building," witness Cristian Obele told Mexican television.

Some people at the scene said the blast came from a neighboring building.

Pemex said initially its headquarters had been evacuated because of a problem with its electricity supply. It then said there had been an explosion, but did not say what caused it.

Helicopters buzzed around the building and lines of fire trucks sped to the entrance, while emergency workers ferried injured people through wreckage strewn on the street.

"Now we are in rescue mode and looking for people and for bodies," Osorio Chong said.

Search-and-rescue dogs were sent into the skyscraper, a Mexico City landmark more than 50 floors high and sporting a distinctive "hat" on top.

DEADLY ACCIDENTS

President Enrique Pena Nieto said via Twitter he "deeply regretted" the deaths and headed to the scene of the blast.

Gloria Garcia, 53, a Pemex worker not in the building during the explosion, came to see if she could track down her son, who works in one of the floors hit.

"I'm calling his phone and he's not answering," Garcia said, weeping as she called repeatedly on her phone. "Nobody knows anything. They won't let me through. I want to see my son whatever state he's in."

Plaster fell from the ceiling of the basement, and the situation at the Pemex tower was dangerous, a spokesman for local emergency services said.

Pemex has experienced a number of deadly accidents in recent years. In September, 30 people died after an explosion at a Pemex natural gas facility in northern Mexico.

More than 300 were killed when a Pemex natural gas plant on the outskirts of Mexico City exploded in 1984. Eight years later, about 200 people were killed and 1,500 injured after a series of underground gas explosions in Guadalajara, Mexico's second biggest city.

(Additional reporting by Gabriel Stargardter and Liz Diaz; Editing by Kieran Murray and Peter Cooney)

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Sony invites press to mystery New York event

SAN FRANCISCO: Sony sent out invitations Thursday to a mystery event in New York City on February 20, sparking rumors that the world would get its first look at a new-generation PlayStation videogame console.

Both Sony and Microsoft are expected this year to show off successors to their competing consoles, which have been evolving into home entertainment hubs for films, television, music, social networking and more.

The PlayStation 3 was released in November 2006 and industry trackers believe a successor is on the near horizon.

In January, the number of PS3 units shipped by Sony hit an estimated 77 million units, according to market research firm International Data Corporation.

IDC gaming research manager Lewis Ward predicted at the time of the report that consoles will retain their strongholds in homes while expanding to include other digital entertainment.

"The console ecosystem is in a state of flux since these platforms need to support an ever-growing array of non-gaming features and services at the same time that game distribution and monetization is moving in a digital direction," Ward said.

"It doesn't appear that alternative platforms -- set-top boxes from cable companies, Web-connected smart TVs and so on -- are positioned to materially disrupt the trajectory of the 'big 3' console OEMs in 2013 or 2014."

Videogame industry sales should be bolstered by the arrival of next-generation videogame consoles from Sony and Microsoft, according to Ward.

"With the advent of eighth-generation consoles, starting with the Wii U, historical norms strongly imply that game disk revenue will stop bleeding in 2013 and rise substantively in 2014," he said in the report.

- AFP/ir

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TOI Social Impact Awards: When an IT mind took the organic route to farming

BORIAVI (ANAND): Devesh Patel, 30, graduated in computer applications in 2005. But the idea of flying off to the US didn't attract him. He followed in his father's footsteps and became a farmer, returning to the land of his forefathers — Anand's Boriavi village.

Until recently, Devesh's father Ramesh, 56, suffered from chronic breathing problems induced by the chemical fertilizers he used. Nausea and headaches were part of life. "Only when his health worsened did my father realize that increasing yield wasn't everything. There's no point making money if one can't enjoy it. We switched to organic farming," Devesh says. They shifted to Anand Agricultural University's newly developed liquid biofertilizer (LBF). That changed their lives.

"Dharti maa chhe (Earth is our mother)," Devesh says. "A farmer should give her what she deserves. My father doesn't fall sick now. Hundreds of farmers in Gujarat are living healthier lives, largely because of AAU." Devesh uses 70 litres of LBF a year on his 4ha. "The health of the soil has improved. Chemical fertilizers cost up to Rs 28,000 per ha for crops such as sweet potato and ginger. LBF has cut my cost to below Rs 4,000/ha," he says. Proprietor of an organic brand, he supplies potato chips, turmeric and ginger powder to retail stores, earning Rs 30-40 lakh annually.

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Hedgehog Alert! Prickly pets can carry salmonella

NEW YORK (AP) — Add those cute little hedgehogs to the list of pets that can make you sick.

In the last year, 20 people were infected by a rare but dangerous form of salmonella bacteria, and one person died in January. The illnesses were linked to contact with hedgehogs kept as pets, according to a report released Thursday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Health officials on Thursday say such cases seem to be increasing.

The CDC recommends thoroughly washing your hands after handling hedgehogs and cleaning pet cages and other equipment outside.

Other pets that carry the salmonella bug are frogs, toads, turtles, snakes, lizards, chicks and ducklings.

Seven of the hedgehog illnesses were in Washington state, including the death — an elderly man from Spokane County who died in January. The other cases were in Alabama, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio and Oregon.

In years past, only one or two illnesses from this salmonella strain have been reported annually, but the numbers rose to 14 in 2011, 18 last year, and two so far this year.

Children younger than five and the elderly are considered at highest risk for severe illness, CDC officials said.

Hedgehogs are small, insect-eating mammals with a coat of stiff quills. In nature, they sometimes live under hedges and defend themselves by rolling up into a spiky ball.

The critters linked to recent illnesses were purchased from various breeders, many of them licensed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, CDC officials said. Hedgehogs are native to Western Europe, New Zealand and some other parts of the world, but are bred in the United States.

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Online:

CDC report: http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr

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What If Undocumented Immigrants Had Voted?

If every undocumented immigrant had cast a vote for President Obama in 2012, he would have won Arizona, Georgia, North Carolina and Texas, and he would have beaten Mitt Romney by nearly 11 percentage points nationally, instead of three.

Only citizens can vote, however, and 11.2 million unauthorized residents didn't get the chance.

But with immigration overhaul on the table, legalizing new Democratic voters looms as a threat for conservatives who don't want to hand their political foes a potential windfall of 11.2 million new voters with the creation of a pathway to citizenship -- and to voting rights -- with a comprehensive bill.

"The fear that many people have is that the Democrats aren't interested in border security, that they want this influx," Rush Limbaugh griped during his Tuesday interview with overhaul champion Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida. "For example, if 70 percent of the Hispanic vote went Republican, do you think the Democrats would be for any part of this legislation?"

New immigration policies could mean in influx of new voters, but Republicans needn't worry about it in the short term.

See Also: Gang of Eight Accelerates Immigration Reform Pace

"Under almost any scenario, it's pretty far in the distance," Jeff Passell, senior demographer at the Pew Hispanic Center, said of the prospect that unauthorized immigrants' gaining voting rights would pump up numbers significantly enough to meaningfully change the U.S. electorate.

Whitney Curtis/Getty Images

And yet, the "influx" wouldn't be negligible: "Realistically, we're talking about potentially adding probably 5 million potential voters or so in 10 years," he said.

Hispanic voters broke 71 percent for Obama in November, and Republican strategists recognize that the party has failed to court Hispanic voters effectively. But depending on how slowly the citizenship line moves, the Republican Party will have a decade or so to shake its anti-Hispanic stigma.

See also: A Glossary for Immigration Reform

"It's a long time coming. You're talking about 15 to 20 years before we're talking about a whole slew of new voters coming into the electorate," said Jennifer Korn, executive director of the Hispanic Leadership Network, who served as Hispanic outreach director for George W. Bush's presidential campaign.

"If Republicans can map out and change their positions with things that Hispanics do support -- on less government, lower taxes, less regulations on small businesses -- then they can really compete for the Hispanic vote over the next 20, 30 years."

There are 11.2 unauthorized immigrants living in the United States, according to the Pew Hispanic Center's estimate. While most are of voting age (Pew estimates just 1 million younger than 18), the deluge of new Democratic voters might not be as substantial as Limbaugh implied.

In other words, it's not as if Democrats will gain 11.2 million votes in the next few years. Here are some things to keep in mind:

• Not All Hispanics Vote for Democrats. Most do, but not all, and voter preferences vary from state to state. In Florida, 60 percent of Hispanic voters backed Obama, according to 2012 exit polls; in Arizona, 74 percent voted for the president. Even if all 11.2 million had voted in 2012, Obama would only have picked up North Carolina if they simply hewed to Hispanic voter trends. Romney still would have carried Arizona, Georgia and Texas, although he would have won Georgia by less than 1 percentage point. (Note: There were no exit polls in Texas or Georgia, and here the national rate provides rough estimates of how results would have changed.)

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