Evening Edition

The UN force’s determination to stay threatens to provoke a showdown with strongman Laurent Gbagbo’s hardline supporters, but leaders of the world body said it would remain and investigate reports of death squad killings.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay expressed concern about “the growing evidence of massive violations of human rights” in the restive West African country since Thursday.

The demand for their “immediate” departure reflects the growing anger of Gbagbo’s nationalist supporters, and came as his most notorious lieutenant urged young Ivorians to make ready to fight for their sovereignty.

The United Nations, United States, European Union and Ivory Coast’s west African neighbours all demanded that Gbagbo cede power to Ouattara after both men claimed to have won last month’s presidential election.

Gbagbo ordered the 10,000-strong UN mission to leave on Saturday, accusing it of arming rebels loyal to his rival Alassane Ouattara, but UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon dismissed the ultimatum and called on him to step down.

Both Gbagbo and Ouattara claim to have won last month’s presidential vote but, while the latter has been recognised as the victor by the international community, the incumbent is clinging doggedly on to power.

The American set a new championship best time of 1:46.68 in the 200m backstroke, followed by an all-out effort in the 100m individual medley in a time of 50.86, meaning that Lochte achieved a gold medal in every individual event he contested.

He was also part of the victorious 4×100 medley relay team that signed off the championships with a final gold, bringing the US medal tally to 25 overall, with 12 golds.

It was almost certainly not enough to save his team from defeat, with India finishing the day on 454 for eight in their second innings, still 30 runs short of making South Africa bat again.

But it was an heroic effort which salvaged the reputation of an Indian side which took a battering in the first innings.

The Australian, who was spending his second full day on bail, vowed the whistle-blowing site would carry on releasing controversial leaked US diplomatic cables as he insisted his life was under threat.

Bank of America, the largest US bank, halted all transactions for WikiLeaks, joining other institutions that have refused to process payments for the website since it started to publish the documents last month.

One of the nine challengers seeking to unseat Lukashenko — once slammed as Europe’s last dictator by Washington — was badly wounded in clashes as protestors filled Minsk’s main square on a freezing winter night.

According to an exit poll for Belarus public ONT television, Lukashenko won 72.2 percent of the vote which, if confirmed, would give him a crushing outright first round victory.

Lukashenko, who has ruled the former Soviet republic of 10 million for the past 16 years, is running against nine opposition candidates in a battle seen as fairer than in previous years but still marred by foul play allegations.

He is widely expected to sail to victory, with the main uncertainty whether the opposition manages to bring significant numbers of supporters out onto the streets for protests Sunday night.

While an informal recycling sector has sprung up to deal with the scraps of leftover jeans and T-shirts churned out by the country’s 4,500 garment factories, it produces only low-value products for domestic consumption.

But one Bangladeshi entrepreneur has found a new, more lucrative way of dealing with the estimated 100,000 tonnes of scrap fabric the garment sector produces each year: making rag-rugs for export.

The gunbattle between insurgents and security forces in Kunduz erupted after four militants armed with guns and suicide vests attacked the centre early Sunday, killing eight security personnel, officials said.

Two of the attackers were killed by security forces as the other pair occupied the facility throughout the day, officials said.

The building in Kunduz was being held by two rebels who survived an attack on the centre that had been carried out by four militants armed with suicide vests and automatic rifles, an official said.

The attackers killed four Afghan soldiers and four police officers in a gunfight before two of them were killed, deputy provincial governor Hamidullah Danishi told AFP. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack.

Obama intends to sign it into law next week, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said. But Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who had pushed for the change, warned gay men and women serving in the military that the current “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy will remain in effect for some time while the new rules are put in place.

“By ending ‘don’t ask, don’t tell,’ no longer will our nation be denied the service of thousands of patriotic Americans forced to leave the military, despite years of exemplary performance, because they happen to be gay. And no longer will many thousands more be asked to live a lie in order to serve the country they love,” Obama said in a statement.

Republican Senators concerned about the large disparity in tactical, short-range nuclear weapons between Russia and the United States rallied behind a treaty-killing amendment that would have inserted a reference to the issue in the preamble of the accord. The amendment was defeated 60-32.

Democratic Senator Bob Casey said members of both parties were concerned about Russian tactical nuclear weapons but there was a simple reason the New START nuclear treaty did not address them — because it is an agreement dealing with strategic, or long-range, atomic arms.

Allawi’s decision cleared another potential hurdle in long and contentious negotiations between Iraq’s Shi’ite, Sunni and Kurdish political blocs to form a new government after the inconclusive election.

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki is to present his new cabinet to parliament on Monday. Maliki will win a second term if lawmakers approve his cabinet and government program as expected.

Former colonial power France said its troops stationed in Ivory Coast had the right to respond if directly attacked, and urged Gbagbo to step aside or face international sanctions. The United States ordered the evacuation of non-essential embassy staff, citing a rising risk of violence.

The world’s top cocoa grower is locked in a dispute over a November 28 presidential vote that both Gbagbo and rival Alassane Ouattara claim to have won. Ouattara’s claim is backed by numerous foreign governments and the U.N. Security Council.

Wen’s comments, made in a speech to parliament, appear part of China’s strategy to lend support to old friend Pakistan, often criticized by the United States and many in the West as an unreliable, but necessary, ally in the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan.

“Strengthening and promoting strategic, brotherly relations is our joint strategic choice and they are in the interests of two countries and their people,” Wen said, as he wrapped up a three-day visit to Pakistan.

The rules would ban high-speed Internet providers like Comcast Corp and Verizon Communications from blocking lawful traffic, but are expected to acknowledge their need to manage network congestion and possibly charge consumers based on Internet usage.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski’s plan will likely attract the grudging support of his two fellow Democrats, analysts say, overcoming opposition from the agency’s two Republicans.

Two militants wearing suicide vests attacked a bus carrying Afghan army officers in Kabul, killing five and wounding nine, the Ministry of Defense said in a statement.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the assault, the first major attack in the Afghan capital since May, when six foreign troops were killed by a large suicide car bomb.

Cowen, the most unpopular premier in recent Irish history, is widely expected to lose the election over his handling of a financial crisis that has forced Ireland to seek an 85 billion euro ($113.1 billion) EU/IMF bailout.

Opinion polls show support for Cowen and his Fianna Fail party at record lows, while Fine Gael is the most popular party. It is expected to lead a coalition government along with the center-left Labour party after the election.

The Senate voted Saturday to end the 17-year ban on openly gay troops, overturning the Clinton-era policy known as “don’t ask, don’t tell.”

“It’s one step in a very long process of becoming an equal rights citizen,” said Warren Arbury of Savannah, Ga., who served in the Army for seven years, including three combat tours, before being kicked out two years ago under the policy. He said he planned to re-enlist once the policy is abolished.

President Barack Obama is expected to sign into law this week the legislation that passed the Senate on Saturday, an act some believe will carry social implications as profound as President Harry S. Truman’s 1948 executive order on racial equality in the military.

The new law probably won’t go into practice for months. Obama and his top advisers must first certify that repealing the 1993 ban on gays serving openly will not damage U.S. troops’ ability to fight. That ban, known as “don’t ask, don’t tell,” has allowed gays to serve, but only if they kept quiet about their sexual orientation.

Dozens of protesters were injured in clashes with riot police, left bruised and bloody after being beaten with clubs. An Associated Press reporter at the scene also was struck on the head, back and arm.

Protesters broke windows and glass doors, but were pushed back by riot police waiting inside the building, which also houses the Central Election Commission. Hundreds more riot police then arrived in trucks.

Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., criticized the treaty’s verification system and expressed concern that the pact would limit U.S. missile defense options even though Obama insisted Saturday that the treaty imposes no restrictions on missile defense.

“Rushing it right before Christmas strikes me as trying to jam us,” McConnell said on CNN’s “State of the Union” a few hours before debate on the treaty resumed Sunday, the fifth day of consideration of the pact. “I think that was not the best way to get the support of people like me.”

After the attack on the publisher of such blogs as Gawker, Gizmodo and Jezebel exposed account information on as many as 1.4 million people, several unrelated companies had to freeze their accounts and force users to reset passwords.

Gawker Media itself didn’t have all that much sensitive information about its users. But the usernames and passwords obtained there could open doors to more valuable accounts elsewhere, including e-mail and banking.

Now, all it needs are customers.

Last month, the nation’s first offshore wind farm nailed down its first buyer when the Massachusetts Department of Public Utility approved a deal that sees Cape Wind selling half its power to National Grid, the state’s largest electric utility.

The attacks, both claimed by the Taliban, began at daybreak in the northern city of Kunduz, when four militants stormed an army recruitment center. At least two of the insurgents detonated suicide vests, and the remaining fighters battled security forces in a daylong firefight that left four Afghan army soldiers and four police dead, Kunduz deputy police chief Abdul Rahman Aqtash said.

The city, a major agricultural and marketing center that controls one of the main highways into neighboring Tajikistan, virtually shut down, with shops, the bazaar and administrative offices closing as the gunbattle raged, said Moeen Marastial, a parliament member from Kunduz.

“They had been intoxicated, loud and obnoxious,” according to an internal company report of the incident, which noted that Afghanistan’s deputy director for elections and a foreign diplomat were also in the lounge. “Complaints were made regarding the situation.” DynCorp fired the three guards.

Such episodes represent the headaches that U.S. contractors can cause in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere. They are indispensable to the State Department’s mission overseas, handling security, transportation, construction, food service and more. But when hired hands behave badly – or break the law – they cast a cloud over the American presence.

The Charlotte, N.C.-based bank’s move adds to similar actions by Mastercard Inc. and PayPal Inc. Though previous moves have prompted reprisals by hackers, Bank of America’s site is as well-protected as they come, security experts say.

Its site was problem-free through midafternoon Saturday.

But it won’t be easy.

The Senate vote Saturday to toss the proposal that would have granted young illegal immigrants a route to legal status dealt a harsh blow to student activists who will face an even steeper uphill battle in the next Congress.

These days, Vonn is the one speeding to victories and hoping to inspire the next generation to hit the slopes.

Gold and bronze medals at the Vancouver Games, plus a third consecutive World Cup overall title, helped Vonn become the 2010 Female Athlete of the Year, chosen by members of The Associated Press. She is the first skier – male or female – to win one of the annual AP awards, which began in 1931.

Freedom of information advocates say the proposals are unnecessary and would run counter to the right-to-know provisions in the state constitution.

The Supreme Court put the recommendations out for public comment on Dec. 7. The comment period will last for 90 days.

Lights on a cold, dark night can be a welcome, even heartwarming sight. And in gloomy economic times, or other trying circumstances, they can mean even more.

One study found that outdoor holiday displays can tell a lot about a neighborhood. Whether found in wealthy or working-class areas, they represent a community’s spirit or “social capital,” even indicating how well neighbors care for one another, says David Sloan Wilson, a professor in Binghamton University’s departments of biology and anthropology.

Steven Dale Green, a former 101st Airborne soldier, told The Associated Press in his first media interview since the 2006 killings, that his crimes were fueled in part by experiences in Iraq’s particularly violent “Triangle of Death” where two of his sergeants were gunned down. He also cited a lack of leadership and help from the Army.

“I was crazy,” Green said in the exclusive telephone interview from federal prison in Tucson, Ariz. “I was just all the way out there. I didn’t think I was going to live.”

The battle will come to a head on Tuesday when the General Assembly votes to renew its routine condemnation of the unjustified killing of various categories of vulnerable people.

It specifies killings for racial, national, ethnic, religious or linguistic reasons and includes refugees, indigenous people and other groups. But the resolution, because of a change promoted by Arab and African nations and approved at committee level, this time around drops “sexual orientation” and replaces it with “discriminatory reasons on any basis.”

Thousands of Cuban-Americans are heading to Havana this holiday season carrying everything from electronics and medicine to clothing and toiletries to help relatives back home supplement monthly salaries averaging about $20.

Not only are Cuban-Americans visiting the island in far greater numbers since President Barack Obama lifted travel restrictions last year, they are bringing more stuff. One carrier says the average bag weight per passenger is up 55 percent – and many Miami-Havana flights are shadowed by a separate cargo plane just to haul the load.

In a letter to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Obama said that as long as he is president, the U.S., “will continue to develop and deploy effective missile defenses to protect the United States, our deployed forces, and our allies and partners.”

Obama’s message was aimed at some GOP critics of the New START treaty who have argued that the pact with Russia would limit U.S. efforts to deploy missile-defense programs.