Evening Edition

The Senate passed the bill by 246 votes to one and, having already cleared the lower house in July, the bill will now be reviewed by the Constitutional Council, which has a month to confirm its legality.

The text makes no mention of Islam, but President Nicolas Sarkozy’s government promoted the law as a means to protect women from being forced to wear Muslim full-face veils such as the burqa or the niqab.

Under the potential 60-billion-dollar (47-billion-euro), 10-year deal, the Saudis would be authorised to buy 84 new F-15 fighters and upgrade 70 more, as well as buy 178 attack helicopters and various missiles.

That should give the oil giant a clear advantage over Iran and any other of its neighbours save Israel, experts said.

Officials said ten people were wounded in fresh police firing in Indian Kashmir’s summer capital Srinagar and four other towns in the region.

Three of them were left in a critical condition, police said.

The EU’s top justice official, Viviane Reding, angrily rebuked the French government for sending hundreds of Roma migrants back to Romania and Bulgaria since August in a security sweep ordered by President Nicolas Sarkozy.

“I personally have been appalled by a situation which gave the impression that people are being removed from a member state of the European Union just because they belong to a certain ethnic minority,” Reding said.

The announcement, which follows the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s decision to oppose NAB’s acquisition of AXA’s Australian and New Zealand businesses, opens the way for rival suitor AMP to reenter the picture.

NAB, Australia’s fourth largest bank, said it remained committed to participating in the wealth management industry, which it said was “an important part of the bank’s future”.

Despite strong current economic growth, the ZEW sentiment indicator, based on a survey of analysts and institutional investors, plunged 18.3 points to minus 4.3 points, its fifth monthly drop in a row.

It was also the lowest level since sentiment registered minus 5.8 points in February 2009, and far below a historical average of 27.2 points, ZEW said in a statement.

Kan was re-elected by his centre-left Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) as party president, meaning he stays on as premier, after defeating powerful faction boss Ichiro Ozawa, dubbed the “Shadow Shogun”.

“Now the time has come to start taking full-fledged action,” said the 63-year-old, who became Japan’s leader in June when he replaced an outgoing premier, without gaining a popular mandate in a general election.

BP and its partners such as Transocean Ltd and Halliburton Co said the majority of alleged victims who have brought about 400 lawsuits must first take their claims to a $20 billion fund established by BP.

The document was part of the defense team’s proposal for managing the case, which could become one of the largest and most costly in U.S. history.

Obama is considering picking Warren, an outspoken consumer advocate backed by liberals but reviled by bankers, to run the new consumer financial protection agency as interim chief, a move that would avoid a messy confirmation battle.

The choice of Warren, which could be announced as early as this week, would set up a new fight with Republicans in the heat of the November congressional election campaign.

Sitting in the shade of a strip mall on West Sahara Avenue, miles from the casino towers that symbolize Las Vegas, Elgas is not happy with Reid. But she isn’t sure she can bring herself to vote for his challenger, former state assemblywoman Sharron Angle, either.

“I think Harry Reid should be taken out. I’m not sure Sharron Angle could do any better,” said Elgas, 47, a registered Republican.

Japan’s Yomiuri newspaper cited a source close to the issue as saying the Workers’ Party conference, which brings together the secretive state’s ruling elite for the first time in 30 years, could have been held up by severe flooding.

It said the meeting could start as early as Wednesday. Radio Free Asia, quoting sources in North Korea, said it could start as early as Tuesday.

Kan, 63, who has pledged to curb spending and borrowing, is struggling with a strong yen, a fragile recovery and public debt that is twice the size of Japan’s $5 trillion economy.

Markets had been braced for a shift toward aggressive spending if Kan lost the party leadership contest to Ichiro Ozawa, a scandal-tainted powerbroker who had said he would consider issuing more debt if the economy worsened.

Gates and chief weapons buyer Ashton Carter are due to announce the next steps in a major drive to cut overhead costs by $100 billion over the next five years while ensuring real growth in defense spending of at least one percent.

Gates has won the grudging admiration of many watchdog groups, impressed with the Obama administration’s victory in finally halting the Lockheed Martin Corp F-22 fighter and its continuing drive to hold contractors accountable for budget overruns and schedule delays.

Highlighted by GOP-tea party showdowns in New Hampshire and Delaware, six states chose candidates for governor and five featured contests for nominations to the Senate.

In New York, 40-year veteran Democratic Rep. Charles Rangel faced the voters for the first time since the House ethics committee accused him of 13 violations, most of them relating to his personal finances.

The Senate voted 246 to 1 in favor of the bill in a final step toward making the ban a law – though it now must pass muster with France’s constitutional watchdog. The bill was overwhelmingly passed in July in the lower house, the National Assembly.

Many Muslims believe the legislation is one more blow to France’s No. 2 religion, and risks raising the level of Islamophobia in a country where mosques, like synagogues, are sporadic targets of hate. However, the law’s many proponents say it will preserve the nation’s values, including its secular foundations and a notion of fraternity that is contrary to those who hide their faces.

Americans’ consumption of corn syrup has fallen to a 20-year low on consumer concerns that it is more harmful or more likely to cause obesity than ordinary sugar, perceptions for which there is little scientific evidence.

However, some scientists have linked consumption of full-calorie soda – the vast majority of which is sweetened with high fructose corn syrup – to obesity.

Utilities have been under pressure for years to better inspect and replace aging gas pipes — many of them laid years before sprawling communities were erected around them — that now are at risk of leaking or erupting.

But the effort has fallen short. Critics say the regulatory system is ripe for problems because the government largely leaves it up to the companies to do inspections, and utilities are reluctant to spend the money necessary to properly fix and replace decrepit pipelines.

Still, hundreds of anti-India protesters took to the streets of the region’s main city of Srinagar and more than a dozen other places in the region. Government forces responded by firing live ammunition and tear gas to disperse them, police said. At least 14 people were wounded, according to police and a resident.

The Himalayan region has been wracked by anti-India protests throughout the summer, but the chaos Monday – exacerbated by reports of a Quran desecration in the United States – was the deadliest since large-scale demonstrations began in June.

The decision continues the White House’s strategy of fighting terrorism both in court and on the battlefield.

Al-Awlaki, a U.S. and Yemeni citizen born in New Mexico, has inspired a wave of attempted attacks against the U.S. and has become al-Qaida’s leading English-speaking voice for recruiting and motivating terrorists. Counterterrorism officials said al-Awlaki, since mid-2009, has become a key operational figure who selects targets and gives orders.

The Dow Jones industrial average and the S&P 500 Index both closed with slight losses, breaking a four-session winning streak. Stocks had been up slightly earlier in the day.

The weakness came after German investor confidence fell sharply and industrial production stagnated in the countries that use the euro.

Kan, who took office just three months ago, vowed to use the victory over Ichiro Ozawa, a party veteran and savvy powerbroker, to push ahead with efforts to cap spending, create jobs and build unity within the often fractious ruling Democratic Party of Japan.

The former finance minister won the vote for party chief by a 721-491 margin, garnering strong support among the rank-and-file membership. The victory means he remains prime minister because of the party’s superior numbers in the lower house of parliament.

In an Associated Press-CNBC poll of investors, 61 percent said the market’s recent volatility has made them less confident about buying and selling individual stocks. And the majority of those surveyed – 55 percent – said the market is fair only to some investors.

The survey confirms that average investors have been growing more concerned about the stock market as a safe place to invest for retirement. And news about the market has been unsettling for ordinary investors of late: More than 60 percent of those surveyed said they had paid attention to news reports about swings in the stock market.

The aspiring Roman Catholic deacon had hoped for a quick recovery from spinal surgery to keep his ordination on track. But five days later, he was hunched over in agony beside his hospital bed, trying to walk but unable to stand. That’s when he prayed to 19th century cardinal John Henry Newman.

“Please, Cardinal Newman, help me to walk so I can go back to classes and be ordained,” pleaded the retired county magistrate from south of Boston.

Senate GOP leaders declared on Monday that Republicans are, to a person, opposed to legislation that would extend only middle-class tax relief – which Obama has repeatedly promised to deliver – if Democrats follow through on plans to let tax rates rise for the wealthiest Americans. The GOP senators forcefully made their case one day after House Republican leader John Boehner suggested he might vote for Obama’s plan if that ends up the only option.

Both Republicans and Democrats are using the looming expiration of Bush-era tax cuts as a defining battle in elections to determine control of Congress.

“Of Thee I Sing: A Letter to My Daughters” is a tribute to 13 groundbreaking Americans, from the first president, George Washington, to baseball great Jackie Robinson to artist Georgia O’Keeffe. It will be released Nov. 16 by Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, which will officially announce the new work Tuesday. Knopf declined to identify the other 10 subjects.

Obama is not the first president to write for young people. Jimmy Carter’s “The Little Baby Snoogle-Fleejer” was published in 1995, more than a decade after he left office. More in line with Obama’s effort, Theodore Roosevelt collaborated with Henry Cabot Lodge on “Hero Tales from American History,” released in 1895, before Roosevelt was president.

Making an ardent case for the compatibility of Islam and American values, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf reiterated that he is searching for a solution to the furor the project has created. But he left unanswered exactly what he had in mind.

If anything, Rauf only deepened the questions around the project’s future, telling an audience at the Council on Foreign Relations think tank that he was “exploring all options” – but declining to specify them – while also arguing that a high-profile site is necessary to get across his message of moderate Islam.

Dr. Donald Berwick’s appointment earlier this summer without Senate confirmation was contentious because some Republicans accused him of being willing to deny care to save on costs. Since then, the administration has kept Berwick out of the limelight, turning the otherwise well-known medical innovation guru into something of a mystery man in Washington.

Berwick broke his silence Monday, telling an audience of health insurance industry representatives that pushing back against unsustainable costs cannot and should not involve “withholding from us, or our neighbors, any care that helps” or “harming a hair on any patient’s head.”

New York University professor Lawrence Schiffman’s students and colleagues started getting panicked and confessional e-mails, in his name, that pointed them to blog posts accusing him of plagiarism. Prosecutors say the e-mails and website posts were a hoax created by a lawyer on an idiosyncratic mission: to champion his father and discredit Schiffman in a debate over the origin of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

The attorney, Raphael Golb, went on trial Tuesday on criminal charges of online impersonation and harassment for the sheer sake of coloring opinion. The case is a rarity: While impersonation claims have generated civil lawsuits, prosecutions are few unless phony identities are used to steal money, experts have said.

After the water receded, Niece and thousands of other flood victims around the Midwest stayed in their damaged homes, despite health risks, because they had pinned their hopes on a federal program that helps buy flood-damaged properties. Two and even three years later, many are still waiting for relief.

“I really don’t want to leave, but I don’t want to get sicker,” the 66-year-old homemaker said, sitting at her kitchen counter about 60 miles southwest of Indianapolis. “But I haven’t heard anything. I don’t know what they’ll do or if they’ll do anything.”

The Philadelphia-based National Constitution Center gives the medal annually to individuals or organizations whose actions strive to bring liberty to people worldwide.

Blair was honored for his work with the Tony Blair Faith Foundation, which promotes religious tolerance; for his initiative to improve governance in Africa; and for advancing peace in Northern Ireland and the Middle East, among other efforts.

Former Maj. Margaret Witt is seeking reinstatement to the Air Force Reserve in a closely watched case that “don’t ask, don’t tell” critics hope will lead to a second major legal victory this month. The trial began just days after a federal judge in California declared the policy unconstitutional.

Witt was suspended in 2004 and honorably discharged after the Air Force received a complaint from a civilian about her sexuality.