Israel to free 26 Palestinians on Monday: Source

JERUSALEM: The 26 Palestinian prisoners Israel has agreed to free as part of ongoing peace talks will be released on Monday, a source in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said.

Netanyahu had agreed to the release of 104 Palestinian prisoners in line with commitments to the US-backed peace talks, which resumed in July, and groups have been freed on August 13 and October 30.

"Their release should come on Monday night after the 48-hour delay given for appeals from victims' families to the supreme court," the official in Netanyahu's office told AFP on condition of anonymity.

In the past, Israel's supreme court has turned down all appeals against the release of Palestinian prisoners.

Netanyahu's government gave the green light on Saturday for the latest tranche of prisoners to be freed.

"All the freed prisoners committed their crimes before the (1993) Oslo accords and have served between 19 and 28 years in prison," the government said.

"Anyone who resumes hostile activities" will be arrested and serve out their full sentence, it said in a statement.

The planned release of the latest group of detainees comes as US secretary of state John Kerry prepares for a fresh tour of the region on New Year's Day to try to push talks forward.

It will be his 10th trip to Israel and the West Bank since March, with his most recent visit in early December.

Kerry has been piling on the pressure in a bid to nudge the Palestinians and Israelis to reach an interim framework ahead of a full accord ahead of a deadline set to expire in late April.

Meanwhile, Israel is set to announce plans for new settlement construction to coincide with the prisoners' release, an official said on Thursday.

Media reports say the plans are for 1,400 settler homes.

Kerry and the European Union earlier this month urged Netanyahu to delay plans to announce new settlement construction on land Palestinians want for their future state.

But Netanyahu was bullish in the face of international pressure over settlement construction.

"We will not stop, even for a moment, building our country and becoming stronger, and developing... the settlement enterprise," he told members of his right-wing Likud party last week.

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Syria 'unlikely' to meet chemical deadline: UN

UNITED NATIONS (United States): Syria is "unlikely" to meet a December 31 deadline to move its most dangerous chemical arms out of the country, the United Nations acknowledged for the first time on Saturday.

The UN and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) said "important progress" has been made on eliminating Syria's banned weapons, but called on President Bashar al-Assad's government to "intensify efforts" to meet internationally set deadlines.

The year-end deadline was the first key milestone under a UN Security Council-backed deal arranged by Russia and the United States that aims to wipe out all of Syria's chemical arms by the middle of 2014.

"Preparations continue in readiness for the transport of most of the critical chemical material from the Syrian Arab Republic for outside destruction. However, at this stage, transportation of the most critical chemical material before 31 December is unlikely," said a joint UN-OPCW statement.

Syria's worsening civil war, logistical problems and bad weather had held up the operation to move chemical agents to the port of Latakia, the two bodies said.

Under an internationally agreed plan, the chemicals will be taken to a port in Italy where they are to be transported to a US Navy ship specially fitted with equipment to destroy the weapons at sea, according to the diplomats.

Fighting between Assad's forces and opposition rebels has held up transportation of the chemicals, and some details of the destruction operation have still not been finalized, UN diplomats said.

The US-Russia deal for Syria to surrender more than 1,000 tonnes of chemical agents averted US-led military strikes after a chemical weapons attack on August 21 near Damascus that the United States says killed 1,400 people.

The UN and OPCW are monitoring and helping with the operation but the Syrian government has prime responsibility for moving the chemicals.

"Since the Syrian Arab Republic disclosed its chemical weapons program three months ago, important progress has been made," said the UN-OPCW statement.

Syria has started the destruction of equipment at facilities it declared and completed the eradication of missiles intended for chemical weapons use ahead of schedule, said the statement.

The UN and OPCW welcomed "important milestones" already met by Assad's government, but highlighted "the importance of maintaining positive momentum."

They said the Syrian government "needs to intensify its efforts to ensure that its international obligations and commitment are met" under the Chemical Weapons Convention and the Security Council resolution which ordered the destruction of its weapons.

UN leader Ban Ki-moon played down the delay in the weapons destruction insisting in a UN statement that the operation was making "effective progress" as shown by "the steady achievements in meeting all previous milestones the past three months."

"Despite this delay the joint mission continues to work closely and intensively" with the Syrian government and other countries working on the destruction, added the statement released by UN spokesman Martin Nesirky.

The OPCW executive council is to meet again on January 8 to discuss Syria. OPCW director general Ahmet Uzumcu said in a statement that "virtually all of the necessary logistical and security related assets are now available" to start transporting Syria's chemicals.mdl

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Tens of thousands protest in Ukraine's Kiev

KIEV ( Ukraine): Tens of thousands of anti-government protesters have gathered on the central square of Ukraine's capital, maintaining more than a month of rallies protesting the government's decision to shelve a key deal with the European Union.

The turnout at Sunday's protest was markedly lower compared to some of the earlier rallies, which attracted hundreds of thousands.

The demonstrations were sparked by President Viktor Yanukovych's decision last month to spike the EU deal in favor of closer ties with Russia. The move angered many Ukrainians, who hoped that closer ties with the EU would help end centuries of Russia's domination.

The protests were galvanized by a brutal police crackdown on Nov. 30, but Yanukovych's government has since limited the use of force in an apparent hope that protests will fizzle out.

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EU condemns attack on Iran exile camp in Iraq

BRUSSELS: The European Union called on the Iraqi government on Saturday to investigate last week's rocket attack on a camp holding exiled Iranian dissidents which left several people dead and many injured.

A statement from EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton's said she condemned "in the strongest terms" the December 26 attack at Camp Hurriya near Baghdad airport, housing dissidents awaiting to be transferred elsewhere.

"The circumstances in which this brutal incident took place must be clarified and those found to be responsible must be held fully accountable," the statement said.

Ashton called for security to be stepped up around the camp to protect residents and urged "the Iraqi government to find the perpetrators and hold them accountable for the attack."

The exiled Iranian opposition group, the National Council of Resistance of Iran, has said three people were killed and dozens hurt.

The United States too has condemned the attack, the third such incident this year, "in the strongest terms".

The former US military base houses some 3,000 members of Iran's opposition People's Mujahedeen, founded in the 1960s to oppose the shah of Iran and later the country's clerical rulers.

The group set up camp in Iraq during Saddam Hussein's war with Iran in the 1980s, but was disarmed after the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 toppled Hussein, and today's Shia-majority and Iran-friendly government in Baghdad is eager to see it move elsewhere.

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Will attack rebel stronghold if ceasefire rejected: S Sudan

JUBA: South Sudan troops will attack the main stronghold of rebel forces loyal to former vice-president Riek Machar if the government's offer of a ceasefire is rejected, a senior minister said on Saturday.

The government offered an olive branch to the rebels on Friday, proposing a ceasefire and saying it would release eight of 11 senior politicians, widely seen to be Machar allies, arrested over an alleged coup plot against President Salva Kiir.

But Kiir's former deputy Machar reacted coolly to the truce offer, telling the BBC that any ceasefire needed to be credible and properly enforced for him to take it seriously.

"Until mechanisms for monitoring are established, when one says there is a unilateral ceasefire, there is no way that the other person would be confident that this is a commitment," Machar said.

Information minister Michael Makuei said government troops on Saturday morning pushed rebels out of the town of Mayom in Unity State and were ready to advance the 90 km (55 miles) to Bentiu, the last state capital held by Machar's forces.

"We will flush (Machar) out of Bentiu if he doesn't accept the cessation of hostilities," Makuei told Reuters by phone from the capital Juba.

Fighting between rival groups of soldiers erupted in Juba on Dec. 15, then triggered clashes in half of South Sudan's 10 states - often along ethnic lines, between Machar's group, the Nuer, and Kiir's Dinka.

South Sudan, a nation the size of France and the world's newest state, has the third-largest reserves in Sub-Saharan Africa after Angola and Nigeria, according to BP, but remains one of the poorest countries on the continent.

At one point rebels loyal to Machar, who was sacked by Kiir in July, controlled Jonglei state capital Bor and occupied half of Malakal, the capital of the major oil producing Upper Nile state. They were pushed out of both towns this week.

Washington, other Western powers and regional governments, fearful of a civil war in a fragile region with notoriously porous borders, have tried to mediate.

Makuei said the ceasefire offer remains in place and that the government has done all it can to bring about peace talks to end the 14 day conflict in which more than 1,000 people have been killed.

"We released two (senior politicians) on Friday but he has not done anything," Makuei said.

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500 Chinese lawmakers quit over graft

HONG KONG: More than 500 municipal lawmakers in one Chinese province have stood down following an electoral fraud scandal, as Beijing ramps up its sweeping anti-corruption crackdown, state media reported on Saturday.

The 512 municipal officials in China's central Hunan province resigned, were disqualified or dismissed after being caught taking bribes from 56 representatives of the provincial People's Congress to elect them to their posts, Xinhua news agency said.

Municipal officials have the power to appoint representatives of their provincial assembly, the local rubber-stamp parliament, although the process does not constitute a fully free or open election.

Local authorities dismissed 56 representatives of the 763-strong Hunan People's Congress for being "elected by bribery", state television channel CCTV said on its Twitter account.

An initial investigation revealed that 110 million yuan ($18 million) was offered in bribes to lawmakers and staff in the province's second city of Hengyang, state media reported, citing a Hunan government statement.

"The fraud, involving such a huge number of lawmakers and a large amount of money, is serious in nature and has a vile impact," Xinhua quoted the statement as saying.

"This is a challenge to China's system of people's congresses, socialist democracy, law and Party discipline," it said.

It named Tong Mingqian, the former Party chief of Hengyang, as being "directly responsible" for the election scandal.

President Xi Jinping has led a high-profile clampdown on China's notoriously corrupt officialdom since taking power last year, promising to stamp out both high-level "tigers" and low-ranking "flies", amid widespread anger over official corruption.

On Friday a court sentenced four government workers in Hunan to between three and a half and 11 years' jail over the death of 56-year-old watermelon seller Deng Zhengjia in July.

Domestic media blamed Deng's death on the local enforcement officers, or "chengguan", in a case that triggered fury among the public over perceived abuse of power.

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Iran developing new centrifuges

TEHRAN: Iranian nuclear chief said on Friday the country is developing a new generation of centrifuges for uranium enrichment.

The Islamic republic currently has 19,000 centrifuges and is developing a new generation of centrifuges which needs all kinds of tests before operation, reported Xinhua citing Ali-Akbar Salehi, head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI).

Iran is among the countries that are able to implement the full process of nuclear fuel production cycle, he said, without providing further details on the new generation of centrifuges.

Iran and six world powers signed an interim deal in November, under which Iran agreed not to operate its new centrifuges for six months. The deal, however, did not forbid Tehran from researching on developing new centrifuges.

In August, former AEOI chief announced that Iran had about 18,000 centrifuges, 10,000 of which were operating.

According to the Geneva deal, Tehran agreed to limit its uranium enrichment to 5 per cent and neutralize its stockpile of 20 per cent enriched uranium.

Enriched uranium can be used to build a weapon if it is enriched over 90 per cent. However, at lower levels, it is used to power nuclear reactors.

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More Greenpeace activists leave Russia: Group

SAINT PETERSBURG: Five British Greenpeace activists and one Canadian flew out of Russia on Friday following an amnesty which halted their prosecution for a protest against oil drilling in the Arctic, the environmental group said.
The activists took off on a plane heading for Paris from Saint Petersburg's Pulkovo airport precisely 100 days after they were first detained in September, a Greenpeace spokesman told AFP.

On board the plane are Anthony Perrett, Phil Ball, Iain Rogers, Alex Harris and Kieron Bryan -- all British citizens -- and Alexandre Paul of Canada.

Seven of 30 activists charged in the probe have now left Russia after Dmitri Litvinov, a Swedish-American, left Saint Petersburg for Helsinki on Thursday. Four of the so-called Arctic 30 are Russian nationals.

"We're leaving Russia, it's over, we're finally truly free," Harris said in comments before leaving, quoted by Greenpeace, saying she was "grateful and humbled" by the support she received.

"I promise I will repay those people by using my freedom to stand up for the Arctic," she added.

Their initial arrest came in September when the Dutch-flagged Arctic Sunrise was seized by the Russian security forces who winched down from a helicopter in a commando-style operation.

They were initially detained in the Arctic Circle city of Murmansk and then transferred to Russia's second city of Saint Peterburg.

It was courts in Saint Petersburg that in November ordered the release of all 30 on bail after over two months in detention. Their departure from Saint Petersburg was then made possible by the Kremlin-backed amnesty.

The Arctic Sunrise ship remains under Russian control in Murmansk.

All to have exit visas
The arrest of the Arctic 30 -- who hail from 18 different countries -- risked becoming another bone of contention in increasingly tense relations between Russia and the West.

Russia's Federal Migration Service has said that by the end of Friday all the 26 foreigners will have been given exit visas, enabling them to leave Russian territory.

Greenpeace said the activists will continue to leave Russia Friday and among them is expected to be US citizen Peter Willcox, the captain of the Arctic Sunrise.

Willcox is a veteran Greenpeace activist who was captain of its ship the Rainbow Warrior when it was bombed by the French secret service in port in New Zealand in 1985.

Dutch Greenpeace activist Faiza Oulahsen, who is also preparing to leave, told AFP earlier Friday she had "no regrets" over the protest and it had made her "even more dedicated" to saving the Arctic.

"I did not spend two months in a cell for nothing. I spent two months in a cell for standing up for something that I believe in," she said.

The Russian parliament had passed amendments to the initial Kremlin amnesty apparently specifically aimed at allowing the "Arctic 30" to benefit from it, stipulating that cases on those charges be closed even before reaching trial or verdict.

The two jailed members of Pussy Riot punk band, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina, were freed on Monday after benefitting from the same amnesty.

The amnesty comes less than two months before the start of the Winter Olympics in Sochi, and critics have described it as an attempt by the Kremlin to shore up Russia's human rights image ahead of the Games.

In apparent defiance of Greenpeace, Gazprom on Friday announced it had begun oil production at the Prirazlomnaya oil rig that had been the target of the activists' actions.

Greenpeace argues that the ageing oil rig is an environmental catastrophe waiting to happen which risks ruining the pristine Arctic ecology of the southern Barents Sea where the deposit is located.

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Thai army chief fails to rule out coup

BANGKOK: Thailand's army chief on Friday urged both sides in the country's bitter political dispute to show restraint, but did not explicitly rule out the possibility of a coup.

Thailand has been wracked by two months of political tensions and occasionally violent street protests pitting the government of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra against protesters seeking to oust her. The army has staged 11 successful coups in the country's history, so its intentions are being watched carefully.

"That door is neither open nor closed," the army chief, Gen Prayuth Chan-ocha, said in response to questions from reporters as to whether a military intervention was likely. "It will be determined by the situation."

Prayuth also reiterated a request that people stop asking the army to take sides in the dispute.

"Please don't bring the army into the center of this conflict," he said.

The protesters have been eager for the army to intervene in the crisis. Late last month, they forced their way onto the grounds of army headquarters to deliver a letter asking the military to support their campaign to topple Yingluck. The protesters stopped short of calling for a coup, but urged military leaders to "take a stand" in the political crisis. Prayuth responded by insisting that the army would not take sides.

On Thursday, the protesters, who are seeking to disrupt elections scheduled for Feb 2, battled with police in clashes that left two people dead and injured more than 140. Thirty of the injured remained hospitalized Friday.

As Thursday's violence unfolded, Thailand's election commission called for a delay in the polls, a blow to Yingluck, who expects to win them handily thanks to her overwhelming support in the country's north and northeast. The government rejected the call.

Deputy Prime Minister Surapong Tovichakchaikul said Friday that he would ask the military to provide security for the elections.

Prayuth said the army had shown "red traffic lights to both sides, so things will calm down," and called for an end to street violence. "You ask, 'Who wins?' Who wins?' No one," he said.

Police have made no move to arrest the protest movement's ringleader, Suthep Thaugsuban, who is demanding the country be led by an unelected council until reforms can be implemented. He's vowed that the protesters will thwart the polls through civil disobedience. Authorities have to tread carefully, as a crackdown would likely provoke greater violence and chaos.

The current tensions date back to 2006, when Yingluck's brother, former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, was toppled in a military coup. The protesters accuse Yingluck of being a proxy for Thaksin, who lives in self-imposed exile to avoid jail time for a corruption conviction but still wields influence in the country.

Thaksin or his allies have won every election since 2001. His supporters say he is disliked by Bangkok's elite because he has shifted power away from the traditional ruling class, which is represented in the current protest movement.

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Thai poll body urges election delay after clashes

BANGKOK: Thailand's election commission urged the government Thursday to postpone February polls after dozens of people were injured in clashes between police and opposition protesters trying to disrupt preparations for the vote.
Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra has faced weeks of mass street rallies seeking to curb her family's political dominance and install an unelected "people's council" to oversee electoral reforms.

Police fired tear gas and rubber bullets after demonstrators tried to force their way into a sports stadium in the capital where representatives of about 30 political parties were gathered for the registration process for the February 2 election.

Hours later the Election Commission held a news conference to recommend the polls be delayed indefinitely.

"We cannot organize free and fair elections under the constitution in the current circumstances," commission member Prawit Rattanapien said.

There was no immediate response from the government.

The main opposition Democrat Party — which has not won an elected majority in about two decades — has vowed to boycott the election.

Thirty-two people were hospitalized following Thursday's clashes, including one protester who was in a serious condition with an apparent gunshot wound to his head, a senior official at the public health ministry, Supan Srithamma, told AFP.

"It's likely that he was shot by a live bullet," he said.

Police said three of their officers were wounded, including one struck by a bullet in his arm.

Security forces denied firing live rounds, saying only rubber bullets and tear gas were used against the demonstrators.

"Protesters are not peaceful and unarmed as they claimed," deputy Prime Minister Surapong Tovichakchaikul said in a televised address.

"They are intimidating officials and trespassing in government buildings."

Several election commissioners were airlifted from the stadium by helicopter while other officials, party representatives and journalists were trapped inside.

Thailand has seen several bouts of political turmoil since Yingluck's older brother Thaksin Shinawatra was ousted as premier in a military coup in 2006.

His supporters have accused the protesters of trying to incite the military to seize power again, in a country which has seen 18 successful or attempted coups since 1932.

The political conflict broadly pits a Bangkok-based middle class and elite against rural and working-class voters loyal to Thaksin, who lives in self-exile.

The protesters accuse the billionaire tycoon-turned-politician of corruption and say he controls his sister's government from his base in Dubai.

The unrest, which has drawn tens of thousands of protesters onto the streets, has left five people dead and more than 200 wounded.

It is the worst civil strife since 2010, when more than 90 civilians were killed in a bloody military crackdown on opposition protests against the previous government.

The demonstrators have vowed to keep up their campaign to disrupt the polls, with protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban threatening to "shut down the country" to prevent people voting.

A second round of registrations for constituency candidates is due to begin at venues around the country on Saturday.

Yingluck's Puea Thai party said it planned to field candidates in all constituencies, despite the prospect of further attempts by the opposition to disrupt the process, particularly in its southern strongholds.

"If there is a problem we have to fight," Puea Thai leader Jarupong Ruangsuwan told AFP.

Thaksin is adored among rural communities and the working class, particularly in the north and northeast. But he is reviled by the elite, the Bangkok middle class and many southerners, who see him as corrupt and a threat to the revered monarchy.

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6 Chadian peacekeepers killed in Central Africa

BANGUI: Six Chadian peacekeepers were killed by militia in the capital of Central African Republic during hours of sporadic fighting on Wednesday, a spokesman for the African Union peacekeeping mission (MISCA) said.

The Chadians were attacked by "anti-balaka" militia in the Gabongo neighbourhood of Bangui, near the airport, MISCA spokesman Eloi Yao told Reuters.

Five of them were killed immediately on Wednesday during fighting in Bangui which displaced hundreds of people. The violence eased on Thursday as French peacekeepers took up positions on main roads near the airport and in troubled neighbourhoods, though sporadic shooting was reported.

"The number of Chadian soldiers killed has risen to six because one of them died from his wounds this morning," Yao said.

A Reuters reporter saw three civilian bodies on the streets of one northern neighbourhood following Wednesday's fighting.

The anti-balaka, a largely Christian self-defence militia whose name means "anti-machete", has taken up arms against the mostly Muslim Seleka rebels who seized power in March and unleashed a wave of looting, rape and massacres.

France deployed a 1,600-strong peacekeeping mission in its former colony in early December. Sporadic violence has continued despite the presence of the French and a nearly 4,000-strong African Union peacekeeping mission, and several peacekeepers have been killed.

The anti-balaka accuse Chadian forces of supporting the Seleka rebels, something Chad strongly denies.

MISCA's commanding officer, Cameroon's Martin Tumenta Chomu, said on Tuesday the Chadian troops would be moved outside the capital to northern Central African Republic

Colonel Gilles Jaron, spokesman for the French military, said tensions remained high in Bangui, following an increase in violence during the last week.

He said France, which was protecting the airport and neighbourhoods with its own citizens, was now also focusing on returning peace to flashpoints in the city, such as the Gabongo and Bacongo neighbourhoods.

France's force, codenamed Sangaris, has between 1,000 and 1,200 men stationed in Bangui, with the rest deployed in the interior of the country, he said.

"The Sangaris force has not been the target of coordinated attacks. We are the target of sporadic shooting which we respond to each time," he said.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is drafting plans for a possible UN peacekeeping mission in Central African Republic.

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New MERS death raises Saudi toll to 57

RIYADH: Saudi health authorities announced Thursday a new MERS death, bringing to 57 the number of people killed by the coronavirus in the country with the most fatalities.

The health ministry said in a statement on its website that a 73-year-old Saudi man, who suffered from chronic illnesses, died in the capital Riyadh after he contracted MERS.

Authorities also registered four other new MERS cases in Riyadh.

Two of them are Saudis, one is a 57-year-old who is chronically ill and is in intensive care and the other is a 27-year-old medic.

The other two people infected are foreign medics, a 43-year-old woman and a 35-year-old man.

The ministry said 141 cases have been reported in the country since the virus appeared more than a year ago.

Experts are struggling to understand the disease, for which there is no vaccine.

MERS is considered a deadlier but less-transmissible cousin of the SARS virus that erupted in Asia in 2003 and infected 8,273 people, nine per cent of whom died.

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3 Turkish Cabinet ministers resign over probe

ANKARA, Turkey: Three Cabinet ministers resigned in Turkey on Wednesday, days after their sons were taken into custody in a sweeping corruption and bribery scandal that has targeted Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's allies in one of the worst political crises of his more than 10 years in power.

Economy minister Zafer Caglayan and interior minister Muammer Guler announced their resignations in statements carried by the state-run Anadolu Agency.

Environment and urban planning minister Erdogan Bayraktar announced his resignation from both the cabinet and parliament in a live interview with the private NTV television during which he also urged the prime minister to step down.

All three ministers denied any wrongdoing.

Caglayan's and Guler's sons, along with the chief executive officer of the state-run bank Halkbank, are among 24 people who have been arrested on bribery charges. Bayraktar's son was detained as part of the probe but later released from custody.

Media reports said police have seized $4.5 million in cash that was stashed in shoe boxes in the home of the bank's CEO, while more than 1 million dollars in cash was reportedly discovered in the home of Guler's son, Baris.

Erdogan has denounced the corruption probe as a plot by foreign and Turkish forces to thwart his country's growing prosperity and discredit his government ahead of local elections in March. Critics accuse Erdogan of becoming increasingly authoritarian, but his government has won three successive elections since 2002 on the strength of the relatively robust economy, a clean image and a promise to fight corruption.

The probe is one of the biggest political challenges Erdogan has faced since his Islamic-based party narrowly escaped closure in 2008 for allegedly undermining Turkey's secular Constitution. This summer, the government also weathered a wave of anti-government protests sparked by a development project that would have engulfed a beloved Istanbul park.

Wednesday's resignations came as a surprise. Erdogan was expected to remove ministers implicated in the scandal quietly, through a Cabinet reshuffle that was planned even before the corruption allegations erupted. The planned reshuffle aimed to replace three other ministers who are standing for mayoral positions in the March local elections.

Turkish commentators believe the probe is fallout from an increasingly public feud and power struggle between Erdogan's government and an influential U.S.-based Muslim cleric, Fethullah Gulen, whose followers are believed to have a strong foothold within Turkey's police and judiciary. The two men, without naming each other, have been engaged in a war of words since the corruption probe was launched on Dec. 17.

Gulen has denied being involved in the investigation. He left Turkey in 1999 after being accused by the then-secular government of plotting to establish an Islamic state. He was later cleared of that charge and allowed to return to his homeland, but he never has and is living in Pennsylvania.

As he resigned Wednesday, Caglayan again questioned the legitimacy of the investigation, which is focusing on alleged illicit money transfers to Iran and alleged bribery for construction projects.

"It is clear that the operation is a dirty conspiracy against our government, our party and our country," he said in a brief statement. "I am leaving my position at the Economy Ministry to spoil this ugly plot, which has involved my colleagues and my son, and to allow for the truth to be exposed."

In a telephone interview with NTV television, Bayraktar also denied any wrongdoing, complained of being pressured into resigning by Erdogan and insisted "a great proportion" of construction projects that are under investigation were approved by the prime minister himself.

"I want to express my belief that the esteemed prime minister should also resign," Bayraktar said.

Guler, the interior minister, told reporters on Tuesday that he is the victim of a political plot and that there is nothing his family could not account for. He also said alleged wiretap recordings of a conversation with his son - reportedly used as evidence by police for the arrests- were tampered with, and that the cash discovered in his son's house was money earned from the sale of a luxury villa.

The opposition had long called for Caglayan and Guler to resign, claiming their sons were taking bribes on behalf of their fathers, and insisted they should not remain in positions where they were able to influence the probe.

The government already has dismissed dozens of police officials either involved in the investigation or thought to be linked to Gulen. Journalists have been barred from entering police buildings, fuelling accusations from critics that the government is trying to impede the probe.

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Pope's Christmas wish: Hope for a better world

VATICAN CITY: In his speech on Christmas Day, Pope Francis said he hopes for a better world, including successful Middle East negotiations in the land of Jesus' birth, peace for Syria and several war-torn African countries, and dignity for refugees fleeing misery and conflict.

Francis spoke from the central balcony of St. Peter's Basilica to some 70,000 cheering tourists, pilgrims and Romans in the square below. He said he was joining all those hoping "for a better world."

Among places ravaged by conflict, Francis singled out Syria, which saw its third Christmas during civil war, South Sudan, the Central African Republic, Nigeria and Iraq.

The pope prayed that Jesus, the "prince of peace," would "bless the land where you chose to come into the world and grant a favorable outcome to the peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians. Heal the wounds of the beloved country of Iraq, once more struck by frequent acts of violence."

Francis then explained his concept of peace.

"True peace is not a balancing of opposing forces. It's not a lovely facade which conceals conflicts and divisions," the pope said in his first Christmas message since being elected pontiff in March. "Peace calls for daily commitment," Francis said, reading the pages of his speech which were ruffled by a chilly wind.

With a reference to attacks on Christians in Africa and parts of the Middle East, Francis prayed that God "protect all who are persecuted in your name."

Recalling the hundreds of migrants who drowned trying to reach European shores, Francis also prayed that refugees receive hope, consolation and assistance.

In the Mideast, pilgrims celebrated Christmas Day in the ancient Bethlehem church where tradition holds Jesus was born, as candles illuminated the sacred site and the joyous sound of prayer filled its overflowing halls.

This year's turnout has been the largest in years in Bethlehem, and the celebrations have been marked by careful optimism amid ongoing Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. Leaders expressed hope that the coming year would finally bring the Palestinians an independent state of their own.

The top Roman Catholic cleric in the Holy Land, Latin Patriarch Fouad Twal, led a prayer for some 1,000 worshippers as bells rang and tourists from around the world flocked to the fourth-century Church of the Nativity complex to see the grotto that is Jesus' traditional birthplace.

"The whole world now is looking at Bethlehem, the birthplace of Jesus," Twal said in his annual address. "The Holy Land is where Jesus was born in the grotto and we have to reflect this bright picture of Jesus by representing the morals of Jesus, the message of Jesus - the message of love and reconciliation."

Bethlehem lies 10 kilometers (6 miles) south of Jerusalem. Entry to the city is controlled by Israel, which occupied the West Bank in 1967.

Following a Palestinian uprising that began in 2000, the numbers of visitors to Bethlehem had plunged, including for Christmas.

But thanks to a period of relative calm, they have been steadily climbing in recent years - and while still below the record levels of the 1990s, got an extra push this year following the resumption of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.

Iskandar Salameh, an 18-year-old Palestinian, said the Christmas spirit was uniting those gathered on Wednesday.

"We all feel that Jesus is with us today," he said.

Later, Pope Francis will deliver his first Christmas message as pontiff from the central balcony of St. Peter's Basilica to pilgrims, tourists and Romans gathered in the piazza below.

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Another dark Xmas for Iraq's Christians

BAGHDAD: It's Christmas in Baghdad, and once again Iraq's Christians are celebrating behind blast walls and barbed wire.

At least 34 people died in bomb attacks in Christian areas on Wednesday, some by a car bomb near a church after a Christmas service. A church attack in 2010 killed dozens.

As prayers are offered and gifts handed out, many are wondering what a surge in violence to its worst levels in half a decade and politicking ahead of April elections means for a community whittled down by years of carnage and migration.

On Christmas Eve, the Mar Yousif Syriac Catholic church in western Baghdad looked like a walled fortress. Soldiers and police ran bomb detectors across cars, searched trunks and bags and patted down visitors before the evening ceremony.

Inside, the red confetti-strewn Christmas tree, bright blue-and-white tile mosaic, and strings of Santa Claus-themed bunting contrasted with drab streets strewn with concrete blocks and barbed wire outside.

But pews which would have overflowed with worshippers a few years ago were barely two-thirds full - a reflection of the fact that the Christian community has fallen from about 1.5 million before the U.S.-led invasion to about half that.

"The future is very critical because of immigration," said human rights activist William Warda before Tuesday night's service, estimating 10 to 20 Christians were still leaving the country each day.

"Many Christians ... are fleeing from the country because of this issue, because there is no sign of a bright future."

Tanks, pilgrims and Santa Claus

While the situation is far from secure Warda pointed to some signs of at least cautious improvements in confidence at the Mar Yousif mass.

Organisers felt secure enough, for instance, to move mass to 8:00pm (5:00 GMT) after holding it earlier in the day in previous years.

Warda said he hoped recent gestures by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's Shia-led government, such as making Christmas a national holiday for the first time this year, would encourage more Christians to stay.

Maliki, whose government has been criticised as sectarian and divisive, may have his own interests in mind as well.

Parliamentary elections are coming up next year and with car bombs, shootings and suicide attacks a more or less daily occurrence, security is certain to be on voters' minds.

There is plenty of evidence that authorities are eager to cast themselves as a national force of stability and security after over a decade of war and acrid political divisions.

Christmas Eve overlapped this year not only with the Shia holy day of Arbain, but also with a major army offensive in desert areas of the Sunni-dominated western Anbar province aimed at flushing out al-Qaida militants.

Throughout the day, images of tanks rolling through the desert alongside heavily-armed troops were interspersed on state television with pictures of Shia pilgrims dressed in black and others of people in Santa Claus outfits.

A silhouetted soldier standing by an Iraqi flag and the words, "Amnana bikum" (You make us safe) flashed in the corner of the screen.

"They target you like they target US"

Christian leaders across the Arab world, alarmed by the rise of hardline Islamists in the wake of "Arab Spring" uprisings, have tried to emphasise their long histories in the region and have urged their communities not to leave.

"Immigration is not the solution," said Monsignor Pios Cacha, a priest at Mar Yousif.

"Leaving the country means wiping out our identity, it means the end of our presence here. And our presence as Christians is a symbol of peace."

In Iraq, the Christian minority shares some ground with majority Shias in that both groups see themselves as victims of militants linked to al Qaeda who have stepped up attacks against Maliki's government and its supporters this year.

It was perhaps with these impressions in mind that Ammar Al-Hakim, one of Iraq's most powerful Shi'ite politicians, visited Mar Yousif's Christmas Eve mass.

Hakim, head of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, a Shia party that has sometimes allied with and sometimes opposed Maliki, rose after the sermon and spoke of tolerance, forgiveness and peace, saying Jesus Christ was an example.

Then he turned to al-Qaida.

"They target you like they target us. There are people in this country who believe that anyone who has a different opinion should be killed," he said as a small army of burly bodyguards in suits fanned out through the church.

"We are partners as targets. We are partners in this challenge. And we will remain partners in confronting extremism, violence and terrorism," Hakim said.

Although the microphone cut out halfway through his 15-minute speech, worshippers applauded when Hakim finished.

Outside, the dark, palm-lined streets were empty except for the soldiers, police and bodyguards standing guard.

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Russia closes first case against Greenpeace activists

MOSCOW: Russia has closed the criminal case against one of the 30 crew of a Greenpeace ship who were charged with hooliganism over a protest against Gazprom oil drilling in the Arctic, the group said Tuesday.

The move, part of a Kremlin-backed amnesty, should pave the way for the other 29 crew to have their cases closed and then allow the 26 foreign nationals charged in the saga to finally leave Russia.

"The first of the Arctic 30 has today heard the good news that the Investigative Committee has closed its criminal case against them," a Greenpeace spokesman told AFP, without naming the activist.

After their criminal cases are closed, the activists will still need exit visas to leave Russia as they have never officially entered the country on their Arctic Sunrise protest ship.

"They will be free to leave Russia once they get the right stamps in their passports from the migration service," said the Greenpeace spokesman in a statement to AFP.

"We know that getting those stamps would be the best Christmas present for the Arctic 30 and we hope it can occur quickly, but until such time as they do, we cannot say when they will leave."

Russia had held the 30 crew members since September after two activists scaled an oil rig in the Barents Sea owned by Gazprom to protest against oil prospecting.

Their initial arrest came when the Dutch-flagged Arctic Sunrise was seized by the Russian security forces who winched down from a helicopter in a commando-style operation.

They were initially detained in the Arctic Circle city of Murmansk and then transferred to Russia's second city of Saint Peterburg.

It was courts in Saint Petersburg that in November ordered the release of all 30 on bail. Since then they have all been free but unable to leave the city. The Arctic Sunrise ship remains under Russian control in Murmansk.

In apparent defiance of Greenpeace, Gazprom on Friday announced it had begun oil production at the Prirazlomnaya oil rig that had been the target of the activists' actions.

Greenpeace argues that the ageing oil rig is an environmental catastrophe waiting to happen which risks ruining the pristine Arctic ecology of the southern Barents Sea where the deposit is located.

The arrest of the so-called Arctic 30 -- who hail from 18 different countries -- risked becoming another bone of contention in increasingly tense relations between Russia and the West.

A photo journalist and video reporter were among those detained. Along with the 26 foreigners, there are four Russian citizens.

But the Russian parliament however passed amendments apparently specifically aimed at allowing the "Arctic 30" to benefit from the amnesty, stipulating that cases on those charges be closed even before reaching trial or verdict.

The two jailed members of Pussy Riot punk band, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina, were freed on Monday after benefitting from the amnesty.

Gazprom -- already owner of the world's largest natural gas reserves and a growing presence in the oil sector -- says it planned to produce six million tonnes of crude per year (120,000 barrels per day) at the site by 2021.

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China investigates vaccine maker after baby deaths

BEIJING (AP) _ China sent health experts to investigate a drug maker Tuesday to see if several recent deaths of babies were related to a vaccine they received in a government immunization program.

A team of government investigators was sent to Biokangtai, a drug maker based in the southern city of Shenzhen, state broadcaster China Central Television said, amid growing public concern about the safety of the vaccine.

The probe was launched after provincial and health authorities separately reported that since November, about a half-dozen babies died shortly after receiving hepatitis B vaccine made by Biokangtai. One case has been ruled out while the others are still being investigated.

Repeated calls to Biokangtai's Shenzhen headquarters were disconnected after a few rings. In a statement earlier this month, the company said it was confident of the safety of its products and that the deaths could be caused by underlying diseases that coincidentally began showing symptoms after the vaccinations.

"Coincidental diseases arise the most easily and are the easiest to misinterpret," the statement on Biokangtai's website said.

A senior government expert on diseases said vaccine-related deaths could be due to coincidence, but that Biokangtai was not in a position to make an objective assessment.

"We should not treat the company's statement like a conclusion," Dr. Zeng Guang, chief epidemiologist with the China Center for Disease Control and Prevention, said in a phone interview. "They may be trying to protect their self-interest. Or they may have a lot of confidence in their product."

Hepatitis B is a chronic liver infection that is spread through the blood or bodily fluids of infected people. It can cause liver inflammation and jaundice.

The vaccine was given to children free of charge as part of the government's national immunization program. Chinese health authorities suspended the use of Biokangtai's hepatitis B vaccine last Friday after the first deaths of babies were reported.

Four babies reportedly died in the southern province of Guangdong, although one was said to have died from pneumonia. The National Health and Family Planning Commission reported that two babies in Hunan province and another in Sichuan had also died in a similar way.

One more child in Sichuan died on Monday, less than 24 hours after receiving a hepatitis B vaccine made by a different company, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

Autopsies were being conducted and results were expected in a few weeks, reports said.

Public confidence in Chinese health authorities and the country's drug safety regime is shaky at best, though improvements have been made in recent years since government agencies withheld information about the spread of SARS and bird flu.

Concerns over vaccine safety have surfaced in recent years after media reports of problems with vaccines for encephalitis, hepatitis B and other diseases, though the health ministry said the vaccines had been improperly stored but were unrelated to subsequent illnesses that were reported.

Zeng, the government expert, urged the public not to panic, saying that in general Chinese vaccines were safe and that more people would die if everyone refused inoculations.

"If the public refuses to be vaccinated, or if they try to change the vaccination procedures, the consequence will be extremely bad," Zeng said. "Instead of several deaths, it will cause tens of thousands of deaths."

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Israel launches airstrike in Gaza

JERUSALEM: The Israeli military says it has carried out an airstrike in the Gaza Strip in response to the deadly shooting of an Israeli civilian who was working along the border fence.

The military gave no immediate details on the target of the airstrike on Tuesday, and there was no word on casualties.

The military said the Israeli man was shot while he was doing maintenance work on the border fence. Hospital officials later pronounced him dead.

It was the latest in a string of Palestinian attacks on Israeli targets in recent days.

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South Sudan prepares to wrest back rebel-held town

JUBA: South Sudan's army was poised for a major offensive against rebel forces, the president said Monday, as the country slid towards civil war despite international peace efforts.

Expectations of a major upsurge in fighting came as the United Nations warned that the situation in the world's youngest nation was fast unravelling, with hundreds of thousands of civilians now at risk.

Fighting has gripped South Sudan for more than a week, after President Salva Kiir accused his former deputy Riek Machar, who was fired from the government in July, of attempting a coup.

Machar denied the claim and accused Kiir of carrying out a vicious purge of his rivals. Vowing to oust Kiir, his forces have since seized the town of Bor, capital of the powder keg eastern Jonglei state and located just 200 kilometres (125 miles) north of Juba, as well as the town of Bentiu, capital of crucial oil-producing Unity state.

The army is "now ready to move to Bor," President Salva Kiir told parliament, adding that the counter-attack to wrest back the town after it was captured on Wednesday was delayed until US had airlifted citizens out.

South Sudan army spokesman Philip Aguer said the government was on the offensive.

"The forces of Machar are still in control of the town, but we readying to take back control," he told AFP.

The comments came despite days of shuttle diplomacy by African nations and calls from the United States, Britain and the United Nations for the fighting to stop.

The UN's top humanitarian coordinator in South Sudan, Toby Lanzer, visited the besieged town of Bor on Sunday, and said the situation was rapidly deteriorating.

"It would have been have been difficult one week ago to imagine that things would have unravelled to this extent," Lanzer told AFP.

"There are hundreds of thousands of South Sudanese who've fled into the bush or back to their villages to get out of harm's way," he said.

Asked which areas of the conflict-torn country he was most concerned about, Lanzer said that "it would be quicker to talk about which areas I'm not worried about."

"I hope to be wrong, otherwise, hundreds of thousands will need help very soon," he said, adding he was "very concerned that a battle looms" in Bor, where he admitted that the UN peacekeepers were unlikely to be in a position to protect the estimated 15,000 civilians seeking shelter at the UN base there.

The clashes have left hundreds dead — possibly many more — and sent tens of thousands of people fleeing for protection in UN bases or to safer parts of the country, which only won independence from Sudan in 2011.

The young nation is oil-rich but deeply impoverished and awash with guns after the long war with Khartoum, and has grappled with corruption and lawlessness since independence.

There are both ethnic and political dimensions to the fighting, as troops loyal to Kiir, an ethnic Dinka, battle forces backing Machar, a Nuer.

Nuer gunmen stormed a UN base last week killing two Indian peacekeepers and slaughtering at least 20 Dinka civilians who had fled to the compound for shelter, and there have been reports of ethnically-motivated killings and attacks in the capital Juba and elsewhere.

Lanzer said the UN is "fortifying the camp in Bor, making sure there is no repeat of Akobo".

"But, as in Akobo, if there are few peacekeepers inside and 2,000 (fighters) outside, there's little we can do," he warned.

Kiir repeated his offer to hold talks with Machar, adding that the regional bloc, the Inter-Governmental Authority on Development (IGAD), had offered to host talks.

"IGAD has offered to mediate... but I told them that Dr. Riek (Machar) has to come to the table without any precondition," Kiir said.

Foreign governments, including in Britain, Kenya, Lebanon, Uganda and the US, have been evacuating their nationals. On Saturday four US servicemen were wounded when their aircraft came under fire in a rebel-held area.

Britain is sending its third and final military aircraft on Monday to evacuate citizens, warning those who chose to stay "may have difficulty leaving in the event of a further deterioration in security".

UN peacekeepers have said they are also reinforcing their military presence in oil-rich Unity state to help protect civilians. As in Bor, a top army commander in Bentiu switched sides to join the rebellion.

"The rebellion controls Bentiu ... we are working on regaining control," army spokesman Aguer said.

Oil production accounts for more than 95 percent of South Sudan's fledgling economy, and the sector has been hit with oil companies evacuating employees after the death of at least five South Sudanese oil workers last week.

A local official in Bentiu said the area was littered with bodies. "This Christmas will not be like the previous ones because we will be mourning our dear lost ones in this senseless war," Kiir added.

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Graft probe: Turkey PM vows to go after rivals

ANKARA: Turkey's prime minister on Sunday warned his rivals he would "break their hands" if they used a widening graft scandal to undermine his rule, as thousands of angry protesters called for the government's resignation.

"Everyone will know their place," Recep Tayyip Erdogan told cheering supporters of his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) in his latest combative response to a high-profile probe into bribery and corruption allegations that has ensnared cabinet ministers.

"Whoever dares to harm, stir up or set traps in this country, we will come to break those hands," the premier said in a speech in the Black Sea province of Giresun.

His heated remarks came as riot police fired tear gas and water cannon to disperse several thousand demonstrators in Istanbul calling on the AKP government to step down.

Many were protesting against grand urban development projects, but some symbolically held up shoe boxes to show their fury over recent claims of widespread bribery by members of Erdogan's Islamic-leaning government.

In a further sign of growing public anger, Galatasaray football fans in Istanbul chanted "Everywhere is bribery, everywhere is corruption" at the start of a home game against Trabzonspor.

The words were a deliberate play on a chant that was often heard during the huge anti-government protests that took over Istanbul's Taksim Square in June: "Everywhere is Taksim, everywhere is resistance".

The high-level graft probe has shaken Turkey's political establishment, exposing a bitter feud between the AKP and influential Muslim scholar Fethullah Gulen whose followers hold key positions in the police, judiciary and secret services.

Twenty-four people have been charged so far in connection with the investigation, including the sons of Interior Minister Muammer Guler and Economy Minister Zafer Caglayan, as well as the chief executive of state-owned Halkbank.

Police also seized $4.5 million in cash hidden in shoe boxes in Halkbank CEO Suleyman Aslan's home, local media reported last Tuesday.

Those detained are suspected of numerous offences including accepting and facilitating bribes for development projects and securing construction permits for protected areas in exchange for money.

Erdogan has described the sweeping corruption probe, which comes ahead of crucial March municipal polls, as a smear operation against his government.

A day after their sons were charged with acting as intermediaries for giving and taking bribes, the interior and economy ministers broke their silence to deny the accusations.

"It is out of the question for us to be involved in any unlawful affairs," Guler wrote on Twitter on Sunday, while Caglayan railed against a "big trap" set for the AKP government.

Observers have linked last week's police raids targeting scores of people to tensions between Erdogan and followers of the Gulen movement which boiled over when the government announced plans to shut down a network of private schools run by the Islamic cleric, a major source of revenue for the group.

Gulenists were previously key backers of the AKP, helping it to win three elections in a row since it first took office in 2002.

Erdogan has responded to the mass detentions by sacking dozens of police officials, including the Istanbul police chief, for cooperating with the investigation without permission.

Local media reported on Sunday that another 25 police chiefs had been fired in the fast-moving saga.

A lawyer for Gulen, who lives in self-imposed exile in the US state of Pennsylvania, has denied that he was involved in the graft investigation, and Gulen himself has lashed out at those responsible for the police purge, saying that the assault was aimed at "finishing off" his Hizmet (Service) movement.

Erdogan on Sunday again blamed international plotters and "very dirty alliances" for attempting to create chaos, and voiced his support for the ministers caught up in the probe.

"It is not all about corruption," he said. "The nation will respond to those who attempt to set traps in order to tarnish ministers."

The premier, whose image was already bruised by June's anti-government unrest, is facing a key test as the country braces for an election cycle next year starting with the local polls in March.

"The nation will win on March 30, democracy will win," he said. "We will emerge stronger as long as we remain united."

In the midst of the worst scandal of his 11-year rule, the premier was due to leave the country late on Sunday for a two-day official visit to Pakistan.

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Al-Qaida in Yemen apologizes for hospital attack

CAIRO: In a rare public apology, the militant leader of al-Qaida's branch in Yemen has said that one of his fighters disobeyed orders and attacked a hospital attached to the defense ministry during a December assault that killed 52 people.

Qassim al-Rimi, commander of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, said in a video posted on militant websites that the attackers were warned in advance not to enter the hospital within the complex, nor a place for prayer there. But he said one fighter did.

"Now we acknowledge our mistake and guilt," al-Rimi said in a video released late Saturday by al-Qaida's media arm al-Mallahem. "We offer our apology and condolences to the victims' families. We accept full responsibility for what happened in the hospital and will pay blood money for the victims' families."

The apology seemed prompted by Yemen state television earlier broadcasting a video showing a gunman attacking doctors and other hospital staff. Several al-Qaida jihadis tried to dismiss the video as fake on militant websites, but the outcry apparently embarrassed the al-Qaida branch to the point of issuing an unusual expression of regret from the group.

"We rid ourselves of what our brother did," al-Rimi said. "We did not order him to do so and we are not pleased with what he did."

However, al-Rimi said despite the group making a mistake, "we are continuing with our jihad."

The authenticity of the English-subtitled video could not be absolutely confirmed, though it was consistent with other Associated Press reporting and came from al-Qaida's media arm.

That fighter and eight other militants were killed in the Dec. 5 suicide bombing and gunmen attack on the ministry complex in Sanaa, Yemen's capital. Seven foreigners from Germany, India, the Philippines and Vietnam were among the dead — all who were providing aid at the hospital.

Al-Rimi repeated al-Qaida's earlier claim that the Defense Ministry was attacked because it housed drone control rooms and American experts. He also said that security headquarters used by Americans in their war are "legitimate targets."

He also warned that fighters also will attack any other military posts and camps that "cooperate with the American drones by spying, planting chips, providing information or offering intelligence advice."

"We have a long list of these places," al-Rimi said.

US drone strikes in Yemen have inflicted heavy losses on al-Qaida militants and are part of a joint US-Yemeni campaign against a group which Washington has called the most dangerous branch of the global terrorist network.

But a December 12 drone attack that mistook a wedding party convoy for an al-Qaida convoy, killing 15 people, has fueled anger against the United States and the government in Sanaa among a Yemeni public already opposed to the strikes. Yemen's parliament later urged the government to end the use of Yemen's airspace by US drones.

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Al-Qaida apologizes for hospital attack in Yemen

CAIRO: In a rare public apology, the militant leader of al-Qaida's branch in Yemen has said that one of his fighters disobeyed orders and attacked a hospital attached to the defence ministry during a December assault that killed 52 people.

Qassim al-Rimi, commander of al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, in a video posted on militant websites said that that the attackers were warned in advance not to enter the hospital within the complex, nor a place for prayer there. But he said one fighter did.

"Now we acknowledge our mistake and guilt," al-Rimi said in a video released late on Saturday by al-Qaida's media arm al-Mallahem. "We offer our apology and condolences to the victims' families. We accept full responsibility for what happened in the hospital and will pay blood money for the victims' families."

The apology seemed prompted by Yemen state television earlier broadcasting a video showing a gunman attacking doctors and other hospital staff. Several al-Qaida jihadis tried to dismiss the video as fake on militant websites, but the outcry apparently embarrassed the al-Qaida branch to the point of issuing an unusual expression of regret from the group.

"We rid ourselves of what our brother did," al-Rimi said. "We did not order him to do so and we are not pleased with what he did."

However, al-Rimi said despite the group making a mistake, "we are continuing with our jihad".

The authenticity of the English-subtitled video could not be absolutely confirmed, though it was consistent with other Associated Press reporting and came from al-Qaida's media arm.

That fighter and eight other militants were killed in the December 5 suicide bombing and gunmen attack on the ministry complex in Sanaa, Yemen's capital. Seven foreigners from Germany, India, the Philippines and Vietnam were among the dead — all who were providing aid at the hospital.

Al-Rimi repeated al-Qaida's earlier claim that the defence ministry was attacked because it housed drone control rooms and American experts. He also said that security headquarters used by Americans in their war are "legitimate targets".

He also warned that fighters also will attack any other military posts and camps that "cooperate with the American drones by spying, planting chips, providing information or offering intelligence advice".

"We have a long list of these places," al-Rimi said.

US drone strikes in Yemen have inflicted heavy losses on al-Qaida militants and are part of a joint US-Yemeni campaign against a group which Washington has called the most dangerous branch of the global terrorist network.

But a December 12 drone attack that mistook a wedding party convoy for an al-Qaida convoy, killing 15 people, has fuelled anger against the United States and the government in Sanaa among a Yemeni public already opposed to the strikes. Yemen's parliament later urged the government to end the use of Yemen's airspace by US drones.

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Egypt court jails activists over protest

CAIRO: Three of Egypt's most prominent secular activists from the 2011 revolution against Hosni Mubarak were convicted on Sunday of holding a rally without authorization and attacking police officers, receiving a three-year prison term in the first use of a highly criticized new law.

Judge Amir Assem found the three activists, Ahmed Maher, Ahmed Douma and Mohammed Adel, founders of the April 6 youth movement, guilty of violating the law passed last month. Each of them also faces fines of $7,000.

The government has described the law as an attempt to bring order and stability to the streets amid continued protests against the ouster of Islamist President Mohammed Morsi. But rights groups and politicians warn the new law is an attempt by the military-backed government to curtail dissent, particularly ahead of planned elections.

The law came amid a widening legal and security crackdown on supporters of Morsi that has left hundreds dead and thousands arrested on various charges, including inciting violence.

New-York based Human Rights Watch said the new law empowers the security agencies to crush the right of Egyptians to protest against their government. They say authorities are now also targeting secular activists who have continued to be critical of successive leadership since Hosni Mubarak's 2011 ouster - like the three activists sentenced Sunday.

Heba Morayef, Egypt director for Human Rights Watch, said the case against the three, a similar referral of 24 other protesters and a leading blogger in Cairo to trial and others in the country's second city Alexandria, appears to be the beginning of a new trend of targeting high profile activists who were behind the Jan. 25, 2011, protests.

The protesters had used rampant police abuse as a rallying cry against Mubarak and his nearly 30 years in power.

"I see this as very much as the beginning of a serious crackdown on the Jan. 25 generation of protesters. They are the ones who the interior ministry sees as disruptive and the ones to blame for its own loss of status," Morayef said. "Not only is it a trend, but it is also a reflection of the new empowerment" of the police force, which had rallied strongly for the new law.

The three activists were charged with holding an illegal protest and assaulting policemen after Maher turned himself in for questioning because he was wanted for holding an earlier protest. A crowd of supporters gathered outside the courtroom where Maher was Nov. 30, leading to scuffles with the police officers who later fired tear gas.

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13 charged over Bangladesh garment factory fire

DHAKA: Charges have finally been pressed against 13 people, including the owner of a garment factory, over a devastating fire that left 112 people dead as officials wrapped up an investigation more than a year after the horrendous tragedy.

In November 2012, in one of the worst tragedies in Bangladesh's history, at least 112 workers of the factory at Ashulia on the outskirts of capital Dhaka were killed.

Dozens of workers also sustained injuries as the Nov 24 fire, claimed to be "an act of sabotage", raged through the eight-storey Tazreen Fashion Limited, where items of global brands, including US retail giant Walmart were manufactured.

A K M Mohsinuzzaman Khan, a criminal investigation department (CID) inspector, on Sunday morning submitted the charge-sheet against the accused in the chief judicial magistrate's court in Dhaka.

A CID official, who preferred not to be named, said the Tazreen Fashion Ltd owner and its officials have been accused of breaching construction rules including building staircases that were too narrow and unsafe.

Of the accused, he said, many, including owner Delwar, are on the run. The only arrest is that of security-in-charge Anisur Rahman.

After submitting the charges, the CID inspector made a plea to the court to issue arrest warrants against the absconding accused.

He also requested the court to confiscate the properties of the absconding accused.

Bangladesh has one of the largest garment industries in the world, providing cheap clothing for major Western retailers that benefit from its widespread low-cost labour.

But the industry has been widely criticized for low pay and limited rights given to workers and for the often dangerous working conditions in the factories.

In Bangladesh, factory owners are rarely charged over such tragedies.

Analysts say tragic incidents continue to occur in Bangladesh as most of the time the culprits go unpunished.

The Tazreen fire incident was dwarfed by another industrial tragedy at an apparel hub on the outskirts of the capital where five factories housed in an eight-storey building collapsed April 24 this year, leaving at least 1,130 people dead.

The tragedy revived questions about the commitments of factory owners and their global buyers to provide safe working conditions in the annually $22 billion export sector, which comprises about 5,000 factories employing more than four million workers, 80 percent of whom are women.

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Thai opposition to boycott polls

BANGKOK: Thailand's main opposition Democrat Party on Saturday announced it would boycott snap elections in the crisis-gripped kingdom, piling further pressure on the government as protesters prepared to ramp up rallies aimed at suspending democracy.

Members of the kingdom's oldest political party — who resigned as MPs en masse to join the demonstrations that have rocked Bangkok for weeks — voted against participating in the poll, according to Democrat leader Abhisit Vejjajiva.

"The Democrats think the elections will not solve the country's problems, lead to reform, or regain people's faith in political parties," he said in a press conference following the meeting, adding that the political system was a "failure".

Embattled premier Yingluck Shinawatra, who called the February 2 elections in an effort to cool tensions, has insisted the polls will go ahead regardless of the Democrat decision.

But the move throws Democrat backing firmly behind protesters who are calling for democracy to be paused for an unelected "people's council" to be installed to enact reforms before a future vote.

Demonstrators want to rid the country of Yingluck and the influence of her Dubai-based brother Thaksin — an ousted billionaire ex-premier who is despised by a coalition of southerners, the Bangkok middle classes and elite.

The Democrats previously boycotted elections in 2006, helping to create the political uncertainty which heralded a military coup that ousted Thaksin.

The latest boycott could lead to a similar situation, with polls "nullified" on technical grounds, said Pavin Chachavalpongpun, a former Thai diplomat and associate professor at the Centre for Southeast Asian Studies at Japan's Kyoto University.

"Walking away from it, it's just bad on the part of the Democrat Party. Especially if (the) international community is now watching the Thai situation so closely," he said in comments ahead of the meeting.

Thailand has seen several bouts of political turmoil since Thaksin was deposed, with rival protests sometimes resulting in bloody unrest.

"I think if the Democrats ran in the election, we might get the most votes and be able to form a government — but then again people will be mobilised to rally against our party," former premier Abhisit said.

He added that the decision would not affect the "legitimacy" of the vote and the party would not "obstruct" polling.

The boycott announcement comes a day ahead of a planned major rally by the protesters, who are led by firebrand former Democrat MP Suthep Thaugsuban.

Demonstrators want Sunday's gathering to be bigger than earlier protests, which have drawn at least 150,000 supporters at their peak in some of the largest protests for years in the politically-divided kingdom.

Suthep, who has vowed to rid Thailand of the "Thaksin regime", has dismissed the election, saying it will install another government allied to the divisive former premier.

He has appealed for army support, in a country which has seen 18 successful or attempted coups since 1932.

But the military has indicated it is unlikely to intervene directly this time.

"The Democrats want to create the same situation that we had in 2006 and pave the way for coup," said Thida Thavornseth, leader of the pro-Thaksin "Red Shirts", adding that they "no longer exist as political party".

Two decades without a majority

On Friday the Democrats sent a letter to other parties requesting a postponement of the polls because of the ongoing protests.

But the suggestion was rejected by Yingluck's Puea Thai party, which is widely expected to win the election.

"There is no problem with the election," Puea Thai spokesman Prompong Nopparit told AFP, adding that more than 60 parties would take part.

Yingluck on Saturday offered to set up a body to implement reforms, but insisted it could operate alongside an elected government.

The Democrats have not won an elected majority in some two decades.

The party last took power in 2008 by parliamentary vote after a court stripped Thaksin's allies of power, angering the Red Shirts who launched mass street protests three years ago that ended in a military crackdown that left dozens dead.

Thaksin is adored among rural communities and the working class, particularly in the north and northeast, but the billionaire tycoon-turned-politician is reviled by the elite, who see him as corrupt and a threat to the monarchy.

Pro-Thaksin parties have won every election since 2001, most recently with a landslide victory under Yingluck two years ago.

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Greek Parliament passes property tax reform

ATHENS ( Greece): Greek lawmakers have passed a law on property tax, as demanded by the country's creditors, but the ruling coalition of conservatives and socialists has lost another member when a former conservative minister voted against it and was immediately expelled from the party.

The law passed in the 300-member Parliament Saturday, with 152 lawmakers voting for and 143 against.

It consolidates previous taxes and replaces a property charge imposed in 2011, which was paid through electricity bills.

Immediately after the vote, Prime Minister Antonis Samaras said that a veteran lawmaker and former minister, Byron Polydoras, who voted against the law, has been expelled from the ruling New Democracy party.

The new law envisages that land plots over 1,000 square meters (10, 764 sq feet) will be taxed for the first time.

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Probe begins into ISI's rigging of 1990 Pakistan polls

ISLAMABAD: A probe has begun into the distribution of money among politicians by Pakistan's intelligence agencies in their bid to prevent Benazir Bhutto's party from winning the 1990 general elections, a media report said.

The Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) probe commenced on Friday. Air Marshal (retd) Asghar Khan was the first to appear before an agency committee to record his statement, the Dawn newspaper reported.

Asghar Khan had filed the petition in 1996, accusing the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) of financing several politicians during the 1990 elections to create the Islami Jamhoori Ittehad (IJI) group and prevent Bhutto's Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) from winning.

The daily said former army chief Aslam Baig, former ISI director-general Asad Durrani and former head of Mehran bank, Younus Habib, would also be called by the committee.

The four-member committee is being headed by FIA additional director general Mohammad Ghalib Bandesha.

The Supreme Court of Pakistan had issued a landmark in October, ordering legal proceedings against Durrani and Baig.

The court ruled that there was ample evidence to suggest that the 1990 election was rigged and that a political cell maintained by then president Ghulam Ishaq Khan supported the formation of the IJI to stop PPP from winning.

The ruling said Ghulam Ishaq Khan, Baig and Durrani violated the constitution.

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Pregnant girls freed in Nigeria 'baby factory' raid

LAGOS: Nigeria's police said on Friday they had raided a home where 19 pregnant women were staying with plans to sell their newborns, in the latest discovery of a so-called baby factory.

The owner of the property, suspected of being a broker in a child trafficking ring, is on the run, said Geoffrey Ogbonna, police spokesman in southeastern Abia state.

Police "rescued 19 expectant mothers in different stages of pregnancy", he told AFP.

Southeast Nigeria is grappling with a human trafficking epidemic, with a series of black market maternity homes discovered in the last year.

In most cases, young women have run to such homes to avoid the stigma attached to pregnancies conceived outside of marriage.

They take a portion of the money earned from selling the baby. There have also been reports of young women kidnapped and forcibly impregnated by human traffickers, but such cases are thought to be extremely rare.

Ogbonna said the details of the latest baby factory found in Abia's capital Umuahia were not immediately clear.

"The proprietress fled before our men got to the place. We met her son and his wife. They are in custody," he said.

Some of the pregnant women, aged between 15 and 23, told police they "ran from home to escape the stigma of having unwanted pregnancies they cannot take care of", the police spokesman said.

The buyers are most often couples who have been unable to conceive and male children typically earn a much higher price than baby girls.

"It's a crime to sell or buy babies. Couples looking for children should go through legal adoption process," he said.

Human trafficking, including the selling of children, is the third most common crime in Nigeria behind fraud and drug trafficking, according to the United Nations.

Nigeria is Africa's biggest oil producer, but poverty is widespread across the country and most of the estimated 170 million people still live on less than two dollars a day.

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British chef Nigella Lawson's staff cleared of fraud

LONDON: Two assistants to celebrity chef Nigella Lawson were cleared on Friday of defrauding her and her millionaire ex-husband after a trial that gripped Britain with tales of drug use and marital strife.

Sisters Francesca and Elisabetta Grillo were found not guilty of defrauding Lawson and art dealer Charles Saatchi of 685,000 pounds ($1.12 million), saying there had been an understanding they could spend anything on credit cards if they kept quiet about the chef's drug taking.

The trial had produced sensational accounts of life in the wealthy couple's household before their high-profile divorce earlier this year after Saatchi was photographed grabbing his wife by the neck in a restaurant.

"My clients are naturally relieved at the verdict of the jury," the Grillos' lawyer Richard Cannon said outside court. "This has been a long, hard fight, played out in the gaze of the world's media."

Such was the huge interest in the case in Britain that even Prime Minister David Cameron passed comment, saying he was a massive fan of Lawson whom he described as "very funny and warm". It was an intervention which led to a rebuke from the trial judge.

A well-known TV star and author in Britain and the United States, Lawson told London's Isleworth Crown Court she smoked cannabis occasionally towards the end of her marriage to Saatchi and had taken cocaine several times in her life but not regularly.

The Italian sisters alleged that 53-year-old Lawson used cocaine, cannabis and prescription pills daily for over a decade.

'Domestic goddess'

Lawson, nicknamed the "Domestic Goddess" after the title of one of her bestselling books, grabbed newspaper headlines as she denied the claims in court and rebuked Saatchi for dragging their marital woes into public and trying to destroy her reputation.

"I don't have a drug problem, I have a life problem," said Lawson who is set to be a mentor and judge on U.S. TV cooking show "The Taste" on Walt Disney Co's ABC network in 2014.

Neither Elisabetta nor Francesca Grillo were in the packed courtroom to hear of their acquittal. Elisabetta had suffered a panic attack in court on Thursday, stopping breathing temporarily, and collapsed three more times on Friday, once in the courthouse building.

Lawson and Saatchi, 70, ended their 10-year marriage in July, and he accepted a police caution after newspapers published pictures of him with his hands around his ex-wife's neck.

The fraud case exposed the bitter rows between them, the excesses of their wealthy lifestyle, and their treatment of staff.

Their assistants had allegedly treated themselves to lavish purchases on the credit card without the couple noticing.

The court was told by the prosecution that in the four months to June 2012, Francesca Grillo, 35, spent an average of 48,000 pounds a month and 41-year-old Elisabetta 28,000 pounds.

At various times during the four years to which the charges relate, the court heard, the sisters spent lavishly on flights to New York, hotel stays, designer handbags and clothes.

Lawson told the court Elisabetta had been a stalwart aide who had helped her through the death in 2001 of her first husband, journalist John Diamond, from cancer. She said the fraud allegations "broke our heart".

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Hezbollah vows to 'punish' Israel

BEIRUT: Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah warned on Friday that his Lebanese Shia movement will "punish" Israel for the killing of a top leader earlier this month.

"The killers will be punished sooner or later... Those who killed our brothers will not know safety anywhere in the world," he said in a televised tribute to Hassan al-Lakiss, whose killing Hezbollah blamed on Israel despite its denials.

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UK royals' phones hacked by paper

LONDON: The phones of Prince Harry, Queen Elizabeth's grandson, and Kate Middleton, the wife of his elder brother Prince William, were hacked by staff working for Rupert Murdoch's defunct News of the World tabloid; it was revealed in a London court on Thursday.

Prosecutor Andrew Edis told the Old Bailey that messages from William left on Kate's mobile phone, including one in which he called her "babykins", had been discovered at the house of the paper's former royal editor and a private eye working for the tabloid in 2006.

William and Kate met as students at St Andrew's University in Scotland in 2001 and married in a spectacular ceremony in April, 2011, watched by up to two billion people globally.

The court also heard extracts of transcripts of a message William left for his younger brother Harry in which he put on a high voice and pretended to be Harry's then girlfriend Chelsy Davy and called him "ginger", referring to his hair colour.

Former editors Andy Coulson and Rebekah Brooks are currently on trial with five others accused of a variety of offences which they all deny, including conspiracy to illegally intercept voicemails from mobiles.

While it was known that royal aides had previously been targeted by the paper, it was the first time it had been disclosed that any royal family members themselves were victims.

In August 2006 the royal editor Clive Goodman and private investigator Glenn Mulcaire were arrested and later charged with hacking the telephones of royal aides by accessing voicemail messages.

In January 2007, both Goodman and Mulcaire admitted the charges and were sentenced to four and six months imprisonment respectively.

Mulcaire has now pleaded guilty to further phone-hacking charges while three senior journalists from the tabloid have also admitted conspiracy to tap mobile messages.

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South Sudan unrest continues as army loses town

JUBA, SOTH SUDAN: South Sudan's military said on Thursday it no longer controls a key town in an oil-producing state where fighting has spread following what the president described as an attempted coup by soldiers loyal to a former deputy president.

"We lost control of Bor to the rebellion," said Philip Aguer, the South Sudanese military spokesman.

Authorities in Bor, the capital of Jonglei state, were not answering their phones, leading the central government to believe they had defected, said Aguer.

He said there were reported gunfights in Bor overnight as renegade officers tried to wrest control of the town from loyalist forces there.

Jodi Jongole Boyoris, a lawmaker from the area, confirmed that soldiers loyal to ousted Vice President Riek Machar now controlled the town.

Ethnic rivalry is threatening to tear apart the world's newest country, with the clashes apparently pitting soldiers from the majority Dinka tribe of President Salva Kiir against those from Machar's Nuer ethnic group.

While the government insists a coup was foiled Sunday, when heavy gunfire erupted in the capital, Juba, some analysts say it remains unclear what sparked the violence and doubt the government's characterization of violent events in Juba since Sunday. By the government's own account, at least 500 people, mostly soldiers, have been killed in violence in the city since Sunday, raising questions about whether there have been targeted killings on a massive scale.

The International Crisis Group reported that armed groups in Juba have "targeted civilians based on ethnicity."

"What has for some time been a political crisis within the ruling Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) has now spilled over into an army that has long been riven by internal problems, including ethnic divisions and tensions," the group said. "The blurred lines between these institutions, senior political figures and ethnic communities - as well as wide-scale arms proliferation - make the current situation particularly volatile."

It called for a respected international mediator at a time when the country's leaders are locked "in high-stakes gambles for power."

Machar, an influential politician who is a hero of the brutal war of independence against Sudan, is Kiir's rival for top leadership of the ruling Sudan People's Liberation Movement party. Tensions had been mounting since Kiir fired Machar as his deputy in July. Machar, the deputy chairman of the ruling party, later said he would contest the presidency in 2015. At the time, the United States and the European Union urged calm amid fears the dismissal could spark political upheaval in the country.

The global political risk think tank Eurasia Group said Kiir's firing of Machar in July had alienated the "long aggrieved Nuer" in a country with "a factionalized military and a history of violent ethnic rivalries."

The group noted that the government's arrest of local leaders with links to the alleged coup was politically motivated, adding that "Nuer leaders will seize on the alleged dictatorial turn within the presidency and the favoring of the president's ethnic Dinka community in the army's promotion decisions to mobilize defections and fresh mutinies."

United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon told reporters Wednesday that South Sudan was experiencing a political crisis that "urgently needs to be dealt with through political dialogue." Ban said he urged Kiir "to resume dialogue with the political opposition."

Kiir told a news conference in Juba late Wednesday that he was willing to enter talks with Machar, who is now hiding from the armed forces who are searching for him.

Although a tense calm has now returned to Juba, military clashes appeared to be spreading elsewhere in the oil-rich East African country.

Tensions are also on the rise in the states of Unity and Upper Nile, Martin Nesirky, a spokesman for the U.N. Secretary-general's office, said Wednesday. In Bor, the capital of Jonglei where pro-Machar forces are reportedly now in charge, at least 19 civilians had been killed, he said, citing figures from the South Sudan Red Cross.

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Shiites attacked in Iraq, toll rises to 22

BAGHDAD: A suicide bomber detonated an explosives belt among Shiite pilgrims in Iraq on Thursday, killing at least 17 people, while militants shot dead a family of five, officials said.

The attack on the pilgrims in the Dura area of south Baghdad took place at a tent where they are served food and drinks on their way to the shrine city of Karbala, and also wounded at least 35 people, security and medical officials said.

Hundreds of thousands of people make pilgrimages to Karbala, many of them on foot, during the 40 days after the annual commemoration marking the death of the Prophet Mohammed's grandson, known to Shiites as Imam Hussein.

The 40th day, known as Arbaeen, falls on December 23 this year. Sunni militants, including those linked to Al-Qaida, frequently target members of Iraq's Shiite majority, whom they consider to be apostates.

The throngs of pilgrims on the roads make for an easy target, and they have been hit by a series of attacks in recent days.

On Wednesday, a suicide bomber targeted Shiite pilgrims in Khales, north of Baghdad, killing five people and wounding 10.

The toll would likely have been higher were it not for the selfless actions of a policeman who embraced the bomber just before the attack, in an effort to shield others from the blast.

On Tuesday, two attacks against pilgrims in and near Baghdad killed at least eight people, and on Monday two car bombs targeting pilgrims south of the capital killed at least 24 people.

Also on Thursday, militants dressed in army uniforms attacked the house of an anti-Al-Qaida militiaman in the Abu Ghraib area, west of Baghdad, killing him, his wife and their three children.

The Sahwa militia are made up of Sunni Arab tribesmen who joined forces with the United States from late 2006, helping to bring about a significant reduction in violence.

They are frequently targeted by Sunni militants, who consider them traitors.

Violence in Iraq has surged this year to levels not seen since 2008, when the country was just emerging from a brutal sectarian conflict.

More people were killed in the first eight days of this month than in all of December last year.

And more than 6,550 people have been killed since the beginning of 2013, according to AFP figures based on security and medical sources.

Analysts say that widespread discontent among Iraq's minority Sunni Arab community is a major factor fuelling the surge in unrest.

The civil war in neighbouring Syria, which has bolstered extremist groups, has also played a role.

While the government has made some concessions aimed at placating Sunni Arabs, including freeing prisoners and raising the salaries of Sahwa fighters, underlying issues remain unaddressed.

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Syrian planes pound Aleppo for fourth straight day

BEIRUT: Syrian warplanes dumped explosive-laden barrel bombs over opposition-held parts of the northern city of Aleppo on Wednesday, the fourth day of a relentless offensive to drive rebels out of the contested city, activists said.

The assault has killed more than 165 people in the first three days, according to the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an activist group.

The intensity of the campaign suggests that President Bashar Assad's government is trying to crush opposition in Aleppo, Syria's largest city and once its commercial hub, ahead of an international peace conference scheduled for late January in Switzerland.

Aleppo has been a major front in Syria's civil war since the rebels launched an offensive there in mid-2012, and the city has since been carved into opposition- and government-held areas.

Some of the barrels dumped on Wednesday exploded near a school and a student dormitory said Aleppo-based activist Abu al-Hassan Marea. He said the military aircraft unloaded their volatile cargo over four Aleppo neighbourhoods.

Along with the Observatory, other activist groups such as the Local Coordinating Committees and the Aleppo Media Center also reported the bombing. No one had information on the number of casualties inflicted in Wednesday's bombing.

Marea told The Associated Press over Skype that one barrel struck near the Ahmad al-Qassar school, but that the bombing was so intense he couldn't go out to check for casualties.

War-weary activists in Aleppo say the four-day offensive has been the most intense they've seen in the city since the beginning of the uprising against Assad in March 2011.

The Syrian government frequently uses barrel bombs, which contain hundreds of kilograms (pounds) of explosives and cause massive damage on impact. They appear to be simply pushed from planes to fall randomly over residential areas, and activists describe them as ''barrels of blood'' because of their devastating effect.

The international aid group Doctors without Borders warned on Tuesday that Aleppo hospitals have been overwhelmed with casualties.

In a reflection of Aleppo's grim reality, Marea said some of the residents have gotten used to the bombing.

On Tuesday, some 100 meters (yards) from a bombing site, ''people were buying and selling like nothing had happened,'' he said.

Another Aleppo-based activist, Mohammed Hussein said residents used to flee from where they thought the bombs would land. ''Now they just watch. If it seems to be heading in their direction, they hide — if they have time,'' Hussein told the AP, also on Skype.

Syria's main Western-backed opposition group, the Syrian National Council, accused the international community on Tuesday of ''failing to take any serious position that would guarantee a stop to the bloodbath'' in Aleppo ahead of the peace talks.

The country's conflict, now in its third year, appears to have escalated in recent weeks as both sides manoeuvre ahead of next month's planned peace talks and ignore calls for a ceasefire.

The US and Russian-brokered peace conference between Assad's government and the Syrian opposition is scheduled to begin in January in the Swiss city of Montreux. Plans are underway to organize a one-day meeting of foreign ministers in the city ahead of the Syrian talks.

The civil war has ripped Syria apart. Tens of thousands of people have been killed, and nearly 9 million Syrians have been uprooted from their homes — some 40 per cent of the country's prewar population of 23 million. They include some 2.3 million who have fled to neighbouring countries, mostly Lebanon.

Underscoring the perilous conditions many refugees face, Lebanese state media and a municipal official said that a roof collapse in eastern Lebanon killed two Syrian refugee children early Wednesday.

The family of the children, aged nine and three, was renting a substandard home in the town of Hazarta, said official Hussein Abu Hamdan.

Many of the impoverished Syrians have crowded into shacks, tents and unfinished structures that offer meagre shelter from the bitter cold, with no running water or electricity.

Meanwhile, a Russian cargo plane landed in Beirut on Wednesday with emergency aid for Syrian refugees. Moscow said it was the fifth planeload of aid from the Russian government.

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In US, dog saves blind owner

NEW YORK: Gallant guide dog Orlando, a black Labrador retriever, bravely leapt on to the tracks at a Manhattan subway platform on Tuesday after his blind owner lost consciousness and tumbled in front of an oncoming train.

Cecil Williams, 61, and Orlando both escaped serious injury when the train passed over top of them — a miraculous end to a harrowing ordeal that began when Williams began to feel faint on his way to the dentist.

''He tried to hold me up,'' the emotional Williams told The Associated Press from his hospital bed, his voice breaking at times.

Witnesses said Orlando began barking frantically and tried to stop Williams from falling from the platform. Matthew Martin told the New York Post that Orlando jumped down and tried to rouse Williams even as a train approached.

''He was kissing him, trying to get him to move,'' Martin said.

Witnesses called for help and the train's motorman slowed his approach as Williams and Orlando lay in the trench between the rails.

''The dog saved my life,'' Williams said.

As Williams regained consciousness, he said he heard someone telling him to be still. Emergency workers put him on a stretcher and pulled him from the subway, and made sure Orlando was not badly injured.

''I'm feeling amazed,'' Williams said. ''I feel that God, the powers that be, have something in store for me. They didn't take me away this time. I'm here for a reason.''

Williams was taken to a hospital where he is expected to recover, with Orlando at his bedside. Williams, a large bandage on his head, said he is not sure why he lost consciousness, but he is on insulin and other medications.

Orlando, described by Williams as serious but laid-back, was making new friends at the hospital. He will be rewarded with some kind of special treat, Williams said, along with plenty of affection and scratches behind the ears.

''(He) gets me around and saves my life on a daily basis,'' Williams said.

Williams, of Brooklyn, has been blind since 1995, and Orlando is his second dog. The lab will be 11 on January 5, and will be retiring soon, Williams said. His health insurance will not cover the cost of a non-working dog, so he will be looking for a good home for him.

If he had the money, Williams said, ''I would definitely keep him.''

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$4.5m seized from bank chief's home in Turkey

ANKARA, Turkey: Istanbul police leading a major corruption and bribery investigation targeting allies of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan have seized shoe boxes stashed with money totaling some $4.5 million in the home of the chief executive of a state-owned bank, a Turkish news agency reported Wednesday.

The Dogan news agency said the shoe boxes were discovered on bookshelves in the home of Halk Bank's CEO, Suleyman Aslan, who is among dozens of people - including the sons of government ministers - detained for questioning as part of the corruption and bribery investigation.

Dogan, a reliable news source, cited unidentified judicial officials for its report. A national police official said he could not immediately confirm the report, while officials at the interior ministry refused comment.

In a sign that Erdogan was fighting back against the probe, five senior police officials were removed from duty on Wednesday, Turkish media reports said. They included commissioners in charge of combatting organized crime, smuggling and criminal financial activity and oversaw the corruption detentions, according to Dogan.

Erdogan has suggested the probe is a politically motivated "dirty trap" to harm his government. The investigation comes ahead of local elections in March that are largely seen as a vote of confidence in Erdogan's 11-year tenure. He is expected to be a candidate in the presidential election in August.

The state-run Anadolu Agency said more than 50 people are in police custody as part of the investigation. Other reports said as many as 84 people were detained.

Police confirmed to The Associated Press that the sons of three government ministers have been held for questioning: the sons of economy minister Zafer Caglayan, Interior Minister Muammer Guler and environment and urban planning minister Erdogan Bayraktar.

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