Evening Edition

The 48 countries that make up the NATO-led force in Afghanistan signed a deal with President Hamid Karzai to begin handing his government control of fighting in early 2011 and move to a support role by 2014.

Nevertheless, Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said NATO would stand by Kabul after its combat mission ends, and US President Barack Obama said US forces would stay on and were ¨breaking the Taliban’s momentum.”

As NATO leaders vowed to pass on responsibility for ensuring security to Afghan forces by the end of 2014, a man, woman and child were killed when a bomber on a bicycle blew himself up in Mihtarlam, in eastern Laghman province.

A second attack in the city just a few minutes later killed one man, the interior ministry said. Twenty-five were wounded in the first attack and eight in the second, it added.

Gunshots and explosions rang out as around 400 armed soldiers launched the assault on the army barracks where the 20 or so renegades were holed up.

The dissident soldiers announced Wednesday that all government institutions were suspended and that a military council had taken charge.

In a series of interviews published in his native German, the 83-year-old Benedict is asked whether “the Catholic Church is not fundamentally against the use of condoms.”

“It of course does not see it as a real and moral solution,” the pope replies.

As concerns grow in the continent about European economies feeling the knock-on effects of Ireland’s plight, Prime Minister Brian Cowen’s cabinet was set to gather for an emergency meeting to put the finishing touches on its austerity plan.

“A cabinet meeting is likely on Sunday, in the afternoon,” Cowen’s spokesman said.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is accused of failing to act on allegations that that his telecoms minister sold second-generation (2G) mobile phone licences for a fraction of their value in 2008.

The scandal has engulfed Singh, whose ruling Congress party’s popularity partly rests on his “Mr Clean” image, and it is being seen by Indian commentators as his government’s most serious crisis in its six years in power.

A specialist mine rescue team was on standby at the Pike River colliery but would not go underground until tests confirmed there had been no buildup of gases in the wake of Friday’s blast, police commander Gary Knowles said.

There has been no contact with the men since the explosion at the remote mine and Knowles said rescuers were hoping to swing into action by Sunday, once air samples from the mine showed there was no gas.

The action came as India inflicted more pain on arch-rivals Pakistan in the field hockey, storming into the semi-finals with a 3-2 win for their fourth success over their bitter-rivals this year.

Victories by their paddlers and shuttlers helped push China’s gold medal haul to 138 while success at road cycling and golf helped South Korea extend their tally to 52 with Japan on 29.

“There are a lot of people who say that now that the US has decided to engage with the military regime, they have turned their back on us,” Suu Kyi told CNN after being freed from years of house arrest.

“I don’t think of it like that. I think engagement is a good thing,” she said in comments broadcast by the US television network on Friday.

Some NATO officials fear a rise in violence could make it hard to meet the target date set by Afghan President Hamid Karzai for the security handover, which would leave a vastly reduced number of foreign troops in a training and support role.

But President Barack Obama lifted hopes the target date would be met by saying for the first time that his aim was to halt major U.S. combat operations by the end of 2014 and significantly reduce the number of U.S. troops there.

His remarks, made at the end of a NATO summit in Lisbon, surprised, as earlier in the day top aides had told reporters that Washington was not yet ready to commit to such a target.

“My goal is to make sure that by 2014 we have transitioned, Afghans are in the lead, and it is a goal to make sure we are not still engaged in combat operations of the sort we are involved in now,” Obama told a news conference.

One bomber detonated his explosives at a police checkpoint in Mehtar Lam, the provincial capital of Laghman province, with the second striking several hundred meters away, Laghman Governor Mohammad Iqbal Azizi told Reuters.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attacks, which came after a spike in violence over the past week and on the second day of a NATO summit in Lisbon. Leaders at the summit endorsed plans to start handing responsibility for security to Afghans next year and transfer control of the entire country by the end of 2014.

International Monetary Fund and European Commission officials are in Dublin to discuss financial aid to help Ireland cope with its struggling banks, whose huge liabilities have sent Irish borrowing costs soaring.

The main concern for EU policymakers is that Ireland’s problems will spread to other euro zone members with large budget deficits such as Spain and Portugal, threatening a systemic crisis.

The rebel officers proclaimed their plans from the barracks on Wednesday as the country was voting in a referendum on a new constitution. They called on other soldiers to join their cause, but the call went unanswered.

Witnesses said there were sustained bursts of gunfire and sporadic shots for more than 20 minutes following the assault on Saturday by about 100 men. Soon after the shooting stopped, a convoy of more than a dozen vehicles left the barracks, located on the outskirts of the capital Antananarivo.

As their national delegations cheered, the men were elevated to their new rank as top advisers to the pope at a solemn ceremony in St Peter’s Basilica known as a consistory.

Each of the 24 men swore their loyalty to him, to future popes and to the church, even if it meant giving their lives.

It said it had earlier this month inadvertently sent rival bidders Boeing Co and Europe’s EADS a limited amount of identical information about each other’s offer.

The contract award was to have been made by December 20, after two bungled efforts to replace Boeing KC-135 tankers, which are on average 50 years old. The Air Force has called the refueling plane its highest acquisition priority for nearly a decade.

Earlier on Friday, the company was prepared to oppose a plaintiffs’ motion before U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier, who is overseeing the oil-spill litigation in New Orleans, seeking a ruling that the liability cap is inapplicable in this case.

Noting that BP itself had told the court it would waive the cap, the plaintiffs’ lawyers asked Barbier to rule on the matter to preclude BP from “re-urging this defense” in the future.

Allies had different interpretations of that target’s meaning.

Capping a two-day summit of 28 NATO leaders in this Atlantic port city, Obama said that after a series of public disputes with Afghan President Hamid Karzai – and despite the likelihood of more to come – the U.S. and its NATO partners have aligned their aims for stabilizing the country with Karzai’s eagerness to assume full control.

The pope made the comments in a book-length interview with a German journalist, “Light of the World: The Pope, the Church and the Signs of the Times,” which is being released Tuesday. The Vatican newspaper ran excerpts on Saturday.

Church teaching has long opposed condoms because they are a form of artificial contraception, although it has never released an explicit policy about condoms and HIV. The Vatican has been harshly criticized for its opposition.

Speaking in Latin, Benedict read out each of the names of the new “princes of the church” at the start of the Mass, eliciting roaring applause from the pews and smiles from the cardinals themselves.

Wearing their new scarlet cassocks – to signify their willingness to shed blood for the church – the cardinals processed first into the basilica, waving to well-wishers as organ music thundered in a festive yet solemn atmosphere.

The disappointment of Copenhagen – the failure of the annual U.N. conference to produce a climate agreement last year in the Danish capital – has raised doubts about whether the long-running, 194-nation talks can ever agree on a legally binding treaty for reining in global warming.

“It’s clear after Copenhagen that the U.N. process is `on probation,'” acknowledged Alden Meyer of the Washington-based Union of Concerned Scientists, a veteran observer and supporter of the process.

The Senate’s GOP leader accused his Democratic counterparts of wasting Congress’ lame-duck session on issues from gays in the military to environment regulations. Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., didn’t mention Obama’s push to ratify the new START weapons treaty with Russia, but said extending expiring Bush-era tax cuts needed to be the top priority.

Obama, speaking from a NATO summit in Portugal, used his weekly radio and Internet address to focus on international affairs at a time of increased political gridlock at home as the GOP prepares to take control of the House in the new Congress next year.

Two men emerged after the explosion Friday, but there has been no word from the 29 others.

“We’ve got a heating of some sort underground and that means there’s some combustion generating the gases that go with that, carbon monoxide, a slight increase in methane and some other gases,” Pike River Mine Ltd. chief executive Peter Whittall told reporters Sunday.

Chicago-based Boeing Co., and the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company (EADS), parent of Airbus, are in an intense competition for a $35 billion contract to build 179 new Air Force tankers based either on the Boeing 767 jetliner or the Airbus A330.

Boeing received detailed proprietary information about the EADS bid; corresponding information was given to EADS North America concerning the Boeing bid.

In his ruling, U.S. District Judge Ralph Beistline said Friday that Miller’s challenge to the counting of write-in ballots raises “serious” legal issues.

But he said it was a matter for a state, not federal, court to decide. He approved the injuction that Miller sought with the stipulation that he takes his case to the state court by Monday. Miller told The Associated Press late Friday that he intended to do so.

Under legislation passed by the Senate on Friday, black farmers who claim discrimination at the hands of the Agriculture Department would receive almost $1.2 billion. American Indians who say they were swindled out of royalties by the Interior Department would split $3.4 billion. Both cases have languished for more than a decade, and plaintiffs say beneficiaries are dying off.

“The Senate finally did the right thing,” said John Boyd, head of the National Black Farmers Association. “They stepped up and told the world civil rights still matter in America.”

A glittering week being wined, dined and oriented by the most powerful people in Washington gave way Friday to the exercise in humility that is the freshman office lottery. The most senior lawmakers get the best real estate on Capitol Hill. The freshmen get what’s left: the worst office space in Congress.

At the outset, most professed not to care what their new work spaces looked like, or how far they were from the floor of the House.

Saying Election Day victories gave them a mandate to curb spending, Republicans formally agreed last week to a two-year prohibition of earmarks, legislative provisions that funnel money to lawmakers’ favorite projects. President Barack Obama has said he, too, wants to restrict earmarks, though he defended some as helping communities.

“I am proud that House and Senate Republicans have united to end the earmark favor factory,” said Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., a leader in the drive to stop the practice.

U.S. Senior Judge Jack T. Camp pleaded guilty to the felony charge of aiding and abetting a felon’s possession of cocaine when he bought drugs for the stripper, who was secretly cooperating with authorities. He also pleaded guilty to two misdemeanors: possession of illegal drugs and illegally giving the stripper his government-issued laptop.

Camp, 67, could face up to four years in federal prison when he is sentenced March 4, but he is likely to get substantially less time. Federal sentencing guidelines recommend he serve four to 10 months in prison. Camp’s legal team may ask for an even shorter sentence.

It’s clear from the photos why orbiting astronauts rate Earth-gazing as their favorite pastime.

“The Earth never disappoints,” the commander of the International Space Station, Douglas Wheelock, said in a broadcast interview Thursday.

Who gets praise? Simon Cowell, for one. And the movies “Juno,” “Knocked Up” and “40-Year-Old Virgin.”

Barack Obama? Unsurprisingly, not so much. She accuses him of reflecting “a stark lack of faith in the American people,” among many other things – without tipping her hand on whether she will challenge him in 2012.

From the mob that forms, a girl pushes to the front and thrusts out her hand to reveal a bejeweled Elvis Presley wristwatch. The preacher smiles graciously as a white-haired woman bends his ear about her pilgrimages to Graceland and confesses to keeping a cloth painting of “the King” on her bedroom wall. Others tell of watching Elvis on television or driving with friends to the next town over on Saturday afternoons to catch his latest movie.

The pastor beams. He knows most of the people who have turned out for evening service at Branch Chapel Freewill Baptist didn’t come to hear Rick Stanley, evangelist.

Despite more than a decade of research showing the money has little impact on student achievement, state lawmakers and other officials have been reluctant to tackle this popular way for teachers to earn more money.

That could soon change, as local school districts around the country grapple with shrinking budgets.

But the buyer was really a government informant who often wore hidden video and audio recording equipment, producing hours of what prosecutors say is incriminating evidence.

Jurors, who have watched some of the videos and listened to audio excerpts during the federal trial, are to return to court Monday and Tuesday, then take a break until Nov. 29 because of the Thanksgiving holiday.

Pfc. Andrew Holmes, of Boise, Idaho, faced a preliminary hearing last week to determine whether there’s enough evidence to send his case to a court martial. His lawyer, Dan Conway, objected because the Army barred him from showing photographs which he says help prove that his client did not kill one of the civilians. Conway said that 10 or so pictures of the victim do not appear to show any bullet wounds that could have come from the heavy machine gun Holmes was carrying.

Conway asked the Army Court of Criminal Appeals to step in and halt the proceedings or order the Army to let him present the photos. The court ordered a stay Friday and told the Army to respond to Conway’s arguments within 20 days. Conway gave a copy of the order to The Associated Press on Saturday.

Prosecutors say they acted on their anger at the government by planting a bomb that blew up inside a small-town bank in 2008, killing two police officers and maiming a third.

The father and son are on trial in Oregon in a case that has painted a picture of a rural underworld of hatred and resentment in which the defendants blamed their troubles on a government bent on taking their guns and freedom.

A proposal to extend the No. 7 line across the Hudson River has straphangers atwitter, with some wondering how the new connection might change the character of the city’s beloved trains.

“The idea of it going to New Jersey – oh my God,” said Lorraine Diehl, a dyed-in-the-wool New Yorker and author of a book about the subway. “Eek! You’ll come back with germs.”

U.S. District Judge Stephen Friot rejected a motion by death row inmates Jeffrey David Matthews and John David Duty, who argued that the use of a drug called pentobarbital amounted to “cruel and unusual punishment.”

Friot said the inmates’ attorneys failed to prove that the new drug posed a “substantial risk of serious harm.” The judge said the two anesthesiologists who testified during Friday’s daylong hearing agreed that a sufficient dose would render an individual unconscious and ultimately lead to death.

Only one ranger was working in the 500,000-acre expanse on the day of the crash, and it was for routine patrol, not race monitoring, an internal review found.

He visited a portion of the course before the 200-mile race and “did not conduct monitoring specific to the event,” the review states.