Evening Edition

BP wants to keep the valves on its containment cap closed continuously until an operation to permanently seal the well can be performed in less than two weeks time, meaning no more toxic crude would stream into the Gulf.

But those hopes were dealt a blow on Sunday when the government raised concerns about “the detection of a seep near the well and the possible observation of methane over the well.”

Tensions emerged as the government’s pointman on the worst environmental disaster in US history also told the energy giant to report swiftly on a “detected seep” and “anomalies” near the well.

BP — which said the bill from the leak had risen to 3.95 billion dollars — had earlier acknowledged some bubbles appeared near the wellhead but expressed optimism that the cap installed three days earlier could stay on.

A prototype cream tested in South Africa curbed the risk of infection by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) by 39 percent overall, but by 54 percent among those women who used it most consistently, they said.

The study coincided with the six-day 18th International AIDS Conference in Vienna, where leading campaigners responded with cheers leavened with some caution.

The Farnborough International Airshow took off with a rush of firm orders for 192 short and long-haul passenger jets worth a total of 23.3 billion dollars (18 billion euros).

The biggest single order came from Dubai airline Emirates for 30 Boeing long-range 777 aircraft worth a combined 9.1 billion dollars.

French champion Thomas Voeckler handed the hosts their fifth success of the race after soloing to victory on the 15th stage, finishing nearly three minutes ahead of the race favourites.

However, as he raced away to victory on the 21.5km descent from the Port de Bales climb, all the race drama was going on behind him.

“This is like a prison in the middle of the forest, when the entrance to the lake is blocked up,” bemoaned a fisherman, Douglas, as he repaired his nets. “Some villages have been depopulated. Farmers and fishermen have left for other parts of the province.

“Anengue has lost its reputation as the food store for Port Gentil,” the oil city on Gabon’s southern Atlantic coast, Douglas said.

It was the biggest winning margin in the world’s oldest and most prestigious tournament since Tiger Woods won here by eight strokes in 2000.

The 27-year-old South African, a 200-1 betting shot on Wednesday, started the day on 15-under par, four strokes ahead of England’s Paul Casey and with the rest of the field already left trailing in his wake.

The top rating agency said it has downgraded cut Ireland’s rating by one notch to Aa2, blaming high debt levels, weak economic growth prospects and the huge cost of bailing out the troubled banking sector.

“Moody’s Investors Service has today downgraded Ireland’s government bond ratings to Aa2 from Aa1,” the group said in an official statement, but added that it had upgraded its outlook to stable from negative.

The rating agency’s one-notch drop to Aa2 came a day ahead of a scheduled sale of up to 1.5 billion euros of Irish debt, putting Moody’s on par with rival agency Standard and Poor’s AA rating and still one grade above Fitch.

The downgrade, which a minister said provided no surprises but which briefly weakened the euro against the dollar and hit European stocks, prefaced a sale of six- and 10-year bonds worth between 1 billion and 1.5 billion euros at Ireland’s regular monthly auction.

Obama, under pressure to reduce the 9.5 percent U.S. jobless rate, sought to direct some of Americans’ frustration over the sputtering economy toward the Republicans, who are hoping for big gains in November 2 congressional elections.

In Rose Garden remarks, Obama said Republicans have opposed a $34 billion extension of benefits for the unemployed in this instance but had voted for such an extension when Republican President George W. Bush had asked for them.

The gel, containing Gilead Sciences AIDS drug tenofovir, reduced HIV infections in women by 39 percent over two and a half years — the first time such an approach has protected against sexual transmission of the virus.

The findings, presented at an international AIDS conference in Vienna, were described as “groundbreaking” by the World Health Organization and the United Nation’s AIDS group (UNAIDS).

General sentiment at the Farnborough Airshow, the industry’s largest gathering, was that the lessors’ flurry of activity proved the industry was starting a meaningful recovery from recession.

“2011-2012 is the time when the rising tide will lift all ships,” Bombardier Commercial Aircraft President Gary Scott told reporters.

The ambitious pledges will be made at the Kabul Conference, where President Hamid Karzai will plead for more say in $13 billion in international funding to use on programs he hopes will boost economic growth and help end the insurgency.

With governments anxious to withdraw from the 150,000-strong NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) sooner than later, they are keen too for assurances the country won’t slide back into the isolation that allowed al Qaeda to flourish and launch the September 11, 2001 attacks.

The aftermath of the weekend fire could disrupt shipments of oil, iron ore and soy and add to pressure for stricter environmental standards in China, already reeling from a toxic copper mine leak in the south of the country which burst into headlines last week amid accusations of a cover up.

The fire began on Friday while a crude oil tanker was being off-loaded.

The transfers announced by the Pentagon of Abdul Aziz Naji to Algeria and Abd-al-Nisr Mohammed Khantumani to the island of Cape Verde in West Africa bring the number of remaining detainees at Guantanamo to 178, down from 245 when U.S. President Barack Obama took office last year.

Naji’s case has been closely watched because he is the first detainee to be involuntarily repatriated by the Obama administration, according to Human Rights Watch. Other detainees who feared persecution at home were resettled in “safe” third countries, the group said.

TV forecasters along the Gulf Coast have been adding a new ritual to their daily weather lineup – predicting the path of oil spewing from the Deepwater Horizon rig. But predicting the oil’s movement is proving more difficult than predicting sunshine or showers.

“It’s the biggest challenge in forecasting simply because it’s all new,” said Jason Smith, a meteorologist at the Fox 10 station in Mobile, Ala. “I’ve tracked a lot of hurricanes, but this is the first oil spill I’ve had to track.”

Or you could, until now.

Millions of gallons of oil from the April 20 explosion of the Deepwater Horizon rig have fouled some of the world’s richest fishing grounds from Florida to Texas, and even though BP stopped the leak for the first time Thursday, more than a third of the Gulf of Mexico remains closed. For thousands who feed their families from the water, what once seemed like a never-ending, free buffet of high-protein, low-fat shrimp, crabs, oysters and fish is off limits.

The ban shows a rare point of agreement between Syria’s secular, authoritarian government and the democracies of Europe: Both view the niqab as a potentially destabilizing threat.

“We have given directives to all universities to ban niqab-wearing women from registering,” a government official in Damascus told The Associated Press on Monday.

Meanwhile, traditional allies of the administration are grumbling about a decision to ban most abortion coverage in insurance pools for those unable to purchase health care on their own.

The Catholic bishops “welcome this new policy,” said Cardinal Daniel DiNardo, although he added the organization remains concerned that other parts of the health care overhaul will promote abortion.

But in Rhode Island, both sides of the debate agree that the executive order issued by Gov. Don Carcieri in 2008 is far less sweeping than the Arizona law, which takes effect this month.

Comparisons of the two approaches are intended to rationalize the law in Arizona, generally more conservative than Rhode Island, by suggesting it’s already more or less in place in a heavily Democratic state, said Steven Brown, a leading critic of the governor’s order and executive director of the Rhode Island affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union.

A unique loophole in a new security procedure means a gun permit is like a special-access pass into the domed building, allowing people who are certified to carry a gun to bypass lines at the metal detectors that were set up after a shooting incident earlier this year.

“Nobody wants to be the one standing in line behind three hundred kids wearing the same colored T-shirt,” said University of Texas political scientist Jim Henson. “If you’re trying to get in and out really quick and there’s going to be choke points, well, people don’t want to have to deal with that.”

The results need to be confirmed in another study, and that level of protection is probably not enough to win approval of the microbicide gel in countries like the United States, researchers say. But they are optimistic it can be improved.

“We are giving hope to women,” who account for most new HIV infections, said Michel Sidibe in a statement. He is executive director of the World Health Organization’s UNAIDS program. A gel could “help us break the trajectory of the AIDS epidemic,” he said.

Retailers are pumping still more energy this year into trying to get shoppers to loosen their purse strings early for Christmas with sparkly ornaments, holiday music and special prices. In July.

Target Corp. is entering the game for the first time, with a one-day online sale starting Friday on 500 items from clothing to Blu-ray disc players that’s modeled after sales typically held Thanksgiving weekend. And Sears and Toys R Us are dramatically promoting “Christmas in July” online based on the success they saw in last year’s efforts.

Andy Schleck was fighting mad after dropping his chain during a tough climb Monday and then losing the overall lead when defending champion Alberto Contador unabashedly sped ahead to take the yellow jersey.

“He can be nervous for the next days … this gives me anger,” said Schleck, vowing revenge. “I’m not the one who will get chased any more, I’m the one who chases. That’s a big difference.”

One week after beaming in pride at its historic hosting of soccer’s World Cup, the nation torn apart by apartheid just a generation ago had another reason to stick out its chest: Louis Oosthuizen won the British Open in a dominating romp. On Nelson Mandela’s 92nd birthday, no less.

A white Afrikaner with a black caddie on his bag crossed over the Swilcan Bridge, tapped in the last putt and lifted the claret jug.

The National Association of Home Builders said Monday that its monthly reading of builders’ sentiment about the housing market sank to 14 – the lowest level since March 2009. Readings below 50 indicate negative sentiment about the market.

The weak job market and an increasing number of foreclosed properties have prompted builders to limit construction of new homes. A modest revival in sales over the past year ended in May after federal tax credits expired at the end of April.

The study, released Monday, suggests that HIV is epidemic in certain poverty-stricken urban neighborhoods. And, more significantly, poor heterosexuals in those neighborhoods were twice as likely to be infected as heterosexuals who lived in the same community but had more money.

Federal scientists found that race was not a factor – there were no significant differences between blacks, whites or Hispanics.

But the horizon remains clouded – major European airlines, which are still haunted by recession, mostly kept their hands in their pockets as Middle Eastern carriers and U.S. plane leasing firms made purchases to build up their fleets.

The optimism also isn’t extending to the defense side of the sector where massive cuts to Western military budgets were the talk of the industry’s premier event.

Oklahoma County District Judge Noma Gurich set a pretrial hearing for Jan. 21 and directed that the state not enforce the law, which was passed by legislators this year. A temporary restraining order against the law had been in effect since May.

Gurich handed down the ruling following a brief hearing attended by more than 50 people including about two dozen women in pink tops who are members or supporters of the Oklahoma Coalition for Reproductive Justice, a grass-roots organization that opposes the law and other anti-abortion measures adopted by state lawmakers in recent years.

Many feline and canine companions face health care challenges similar to those that confront humans. Veterinary care costs are skyrocketing as pet owners are offered a sophisticated menu of potentially lifesaving services, including kidney dialysis, sonograms and chemotherapy.

U.S. consumers spent more than $12 billion on veterinary care in 2009, according to The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

“Loyal Forces: The Animals of WWII” will run July 22-Oct. 17, featuring the four kinds of animals most often brought into the war, as they were used in all five theaters.

“There was a great love and loyalty between the soldiers and the animals they worked with,” said registrar Toni M. Kiser, who created the exhibit with archivist Lindsey Barnes.

Georgia’s old law was challenged by civil liberties groups even before it took effect. After losing court battle after court battle, state legislators were forced to make a change or a federal judge was going to throw out the entire law. Now that the restrictions have been eased, about 13,000 registered sex offenders – more than 70 percent of all Georgia sex offenders – can live and work wherever they want.

Previously, all registered sex offenders were banned from living within 1,000 feet of schools, parks and other places where children gather, essentially driving them either to desolate areas or out of state. At one point, a tent city of homeless sex offenders was discovered in the woods behind a suburban office park.

Integration came relatively peacefully to the North Carolina capital. There was no “stand in the schoolhouse door,” no need of National Guard escorts or even a federal court order.

Nearly 50 years passed – mostly uneventfully, at least until a new school board majority was elected last year on a platform supporting community schools.