Evening Edition

The 78-year-old, one of France’s most popular political figures, did not attend the start of the trial that will examine whether he misused public money to pay people working for his party ahead of a successful election bid.

Presiding judge Dominique Pauthe adjourned Monday’s hearing after a few hours, saying it would resume on Tuesday when he would rule on a constitutional challenge in the case, which if successful could delay the trial by several months.

“This breaks our heart,” Gates told a news conference at the presidential palace in Kabul, as Karzai looked on.

“Not only is their loss a tragedy for their families, it is a setback for our relationship with the Afghan people, whose security is our chief concern.”

The worsening conflict sent world oil prices higher, while NATO head Anders Fogh Rasmussen said attacks on civilians by Kadhafi’s troops could amount to crimes against humanity.

Libya’s foreign minister told reporters in the capital Tripoli that the Western allies were trying to split the North African country by secretly building up contacts with rebel leaders.

While Moamer Kadhafi’s offensive against rebels is intensifying, any demand for military action would set off a new diplomatic battle at the Security Council.

Anticipating opposition, Britain’s foreign minister has insisted that there must “a clear legal basis” for the zone and set other conditions.

World oil prices rose again, while NATO head Anders Fogh Rasmussen said attacks on civilians by Kadhafi’s troops could amount to crimes against humanity.

The rebels began pulling back from the key oil port of Ras Lanuf as fighter jets targeted defences on the edge of town, throwing up palls of smoke amid fears that government forces were preparing an attack.

World oil prices rose again, while NATO head Anders Fogh Rasmussen said attacks on civilians by Kadhafi’s troops could amount to crimes against humanity.

The rebels began pulling back from the key oil port of Ras Lanuf as fighter jets targeted defences on the edge of town, throwing up palls of smoke amid fears that government forces were gearing for an attack.

Pietersen will head home to undergo a hernia operation that he had been hoping to postpone until after the competition.

But after looking troubled during Sunday’s six-run win over his native South Africa in Chennai, where he made just two off three balls, the 30-year-old will go under the knife immediately.

Fighting on Monday morning between the army and a militia loyal to renegade southern general George Athor in troubled Jonglei state killed 14 rebels and seven soldiers, Philip Aguer told AFP.

He said the toll from clashes in neighbouring Upper Nile state on Sunday had risen to 72, including 65 rebels, whom he accused of being in the service of the Khartoum government.

“The rating downgrade announced by Moody’s today is completely unjustified as it does not reflect an objective and balanced assessment of the conditions Greece is presently facing,” the finance ministry said in a statement.

The finance ministry also blasted the rating agencies as a whole.

The colorful procession by the Unidos da Tijuca samba school wowed a crowd of 70,000 packed into Rio’s Sambodrome stadium from late Sunday, on the first night of the city’s spectacular annual parades.

It was one of six shows put on in an all-night climax to Rio’s Carnival partying, which began late Friday and ends Wednesday.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan — Japan’s fifth leader in as many years, now battling low poll ratings and a split parliament — said he would not call snap elections as repeatedly demanded by the conservative opposition.

“Many prime ministers before me have bowed out after short periods of time,” said Kan, referring to the revolving-door leadership that is often cited as weakening Japan’s governance and global influence.

Rebels swiftly rejected an olive branch offered by an associate of Gaddafi, and fighting escalated around a key oil port. The aging autocrat warned that if he fell thousands of refugees would “invade Europe.”

With civilians surrounded by forces loyal to Gaddafi in two western towns, Misrata and Zawiyah, fears grew of a rising humanitarian crisis if the fighting continued.

“It would be premature to send a bunch of weapons to a post office box in eastern Libya,” White House spokesman Jay Carney said. “We need to not get ahead of ourselves in terms of the options we’re pursuing.”

The Obama administration faces sharp criticism, especially from Republican lawmakers and conservative commentators, for its cautious approach to the turmoil in Libya but has signaled it will not be rushed into hasty decisions that could suck the military into a new war and fuel anti-American sentiment.

While longstanding U.S. policy is to release reserves only in the event of a significant and immediate supply shortage, some analysts say the Obama administration may feel compelled to try to tamp down prices that are being fueled both by outages in Libya and concern unrest could spread in the Middle East.

Reflecting market worries over unrest, crude futures prices were trading in Asia on Monday around their highest levels in more than two years.

Around half of Libya’s oil output, or over 1 percent of global supply, has already been choked off by lethal clashes between rebels and forces loyal to Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. Oil prices hit their highest levels since September 2008 on Monday.

Exxon Mobil and Morgan Stanley have stopped trading oil with Libya, trade sources said on Monday. ConocoPhillips also said it was not exporting oil from the country.

“The stakes for our country are very high,” said Roberto Aliboni, vice-president of Italy’s Institute for International Affairs, who argued in a recent report that Italy should take a clear stand against Gaddafi and invest in the opposition.

But Rome is moving cautiously, realizing it has the most to lose among European nations as events unfold in the North African nation just 300 miles from Italy’s southernmost island.

The Libyan army was moving east down the strategic Mediterranean coastal road from the recaptured town of Bin Jawad, heading toward Ras Lanuf which is about 60 km (40 miles) away and which has a major oil complex, witnesses told Reuters.

A Reuters correspondent had seen Gaddafi’s forces about 5 km (3 miles) east of Bin Jawad Sunday evening, suggesting the Libyan leader’s troops were making slow but steady progress.

Government forces used tanks and artillery in what appeared to be their most concerted effort yet to retake the town, 200 km (125 miles) east of the capital Tripoli, but were pushed back by rebels fighting Gaddafi’s 41-year old rule.

“Today Misrata witnessed the toughest battle since the beginning of the revolution. Horrible attacks,” one resident, who did not want to give his name, told Reuters by phone.

The move increased pressure on euro zone leaders to ease repayment terms on bailout loans to Athens, just as Germany and its allies seem to have turned their backs on more radical steps to help it reduce its debt through bond purchases or buy-backs.

Moody’s Investors Service downgraded Greek debt to B1 from Ba1 — lower than Egypt — and said it may cut further, drawing an indignant protest from the Greek Finance Ministry.

“Prince of Sleaze” ran a headline in Monday’s Daily Mirror over a story about the 50-year-old Duke of York, who is fourth in line to the throne and is Britain’s roving trade ambassador.

“Andrew: I won’t quit over my pervert pal,” the Sun added.

Gates met Afghan President Hamid Karzai on an unannounced trip to Kabul and repeated Washington’s apology for the killing of the boys last week by NATO helicopters, which has increased strain on an already testy relationship with Afghan leaders.

“Not only is their loss a tragedy for their families, it is a setback for our relationship with the Afghan people,” Gates told a media conference with Karzai.

Durbin, one of President Barack Obama’s top allies in Congress, said he opposed going beyond the $10.5 billion in domestic, non-defense discretionary spending cuts that Democrats have backed.

Republicans want $61 billion in spending reductions.

Guantanamo has been a major political and national security headache for the president since he took office promising to close the prison within a year, a deadline that came and went without him ever setting a new one.

Obama made the change with clear reluctance, bowing to the reality that Congress’ vehement opposition to trying detainees on U.S. soil leaves them nowhere else to go. The president emphasized his preference for trials in federal civilian courts, and his administration blamed congressional meddling for closing off that avenue.

It still appeared unlikely that U.S. warplanes or missiles would soon deploy in Libya, which may be sliding toward civil war, but the ongoing violence increased pressure on Washington to do something or spell out its plan.

The violence “perpetrated by the government in Libya is unacceptable,” President Barack Obama declared as he authorized $15 million in new humanitarian aid to assist and evacuate people fleeing the fighting. And he warned those still loyal to Gadhafi that they will be held to account for a violent crackdown that continued Monday with warplanes launching multiple airstrikes on opposition fighters seeking to advance on Tripoli.

President Barack Obama warned that the U.S. and its NATO allies are still considering military options to stop what he called “unacceptable” violence by Gadhafi’s regime. NATO decided to boost flights of AWACs surveillance planes over Libya from 10 to 24 hours a day, the U.S. Ambassador to NATO Ivo Daalder said.

“I want to send a very clear message to those who are around Colonel Gadhafi. It is their choice to make how they operate moving forward. And they will be held accountable for whatever violence continues to take place,” Obama said during remarks in the Oval Office Monday.

That alone might have been irritating to drivers paying the highest gas prices in more than two years. It was even more so because it happened on a day when the price of crude oil, which is used to make gasoline, fell almost $1 a barrel.

“It’s up 20 cents one day, down 10 cents the next day,” says Oscar Elmore, a courier who was filling up his Ford Taurus at a RaceTrac service station in Dallas recently. “It sounds kinda fishy to me.”

Walker said he and his administration have been in communication with at least a couple of the AWOL Senate Democrats about a deal that could bring them back, but the lawmaker who asked for the meeting, Senate Minority Leader Mark Miller, “is firmly standing in the way.”

That accusation led to a flurry of angry responses from Democrats who said Walker was misrepresenting the talks. The sometimes-angry exchange suggested that any resolution to the stalemate was farther away than ever.

Commissioner Roger Goodell, NFLPA executive director DeMaurice Smith and other members of the two negotiating teams resumed talks on a new labor deal Monday after taking a break over the weekend.

Mediator George Cohen also left his office shortly after 7 p.m.

Richard Hoover of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., claims that he found fossils that look like the remnants of bacteria in at least two meteorites. His research paper, published online Friday in the Journal of Cosmology, concludes these must have come from outer space.

But his claim has been roundly disputed by other scientists.

“I won’t say I deny it. I do not deny it, no,” Sutphin, 78, said in a frail voice as he leaned on his walker.

There are dozens of accused priests like him, from California to Maryland. To victims’ advocates, that is dangerous.

Upset that doctors didn’t make that risk clear, his mother, Christine, tracked down an experiment that just might salvage Dylan’s future fertility. Between chemo sessions, the pair flew hundreds of miles from their Florida home to try it.

Many of the cancer treatments that can save patients’ lives also may cost their ability to have babies later in life. Young adults have options – bank some sperm, freeze embryos or eggs. Children diagnosed before puberty don’t.

Station skipper Scott Kelly rang his ship’s bell in true naval tradition, as the shuttle backed away on the final leg of its final journey.

“Discovery departing,” he called out.

Congress balked, concerned the deal would improve Libyan army mobility and questioning the Obama administration’s support for the agreement, which would have benefited British defense company BAE. The congressional concerns effectively stalled the deal until the turmoil in the country scuttled the sale. Earlier last week, after all military exports to the Gadhafi regime were suspended, the State Department’s Directorate of Defense Trade Controls informed Capitol Hill that the deal had been returned without action – effectively off the table, according to U.S. officials who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe the deal’s sensitive details.

State Department spokesman Mark C. Toner said the proposed license was suspended along with the rest of “what limited defense trade we had with Libya.”

“I’m known as everything related to buffalo now,” joked the 42-year-old Gall, who was elected sheriff two decades ago. “It’s all part of the job, but this is a first.”

His rural Corson County is home to most of a sprawling ranch owned by a Florida real estate tycoon whose herd was ordered into the sheriff’s care after more than a dozen bison were found dead. Many more were malnourished and others were stuck by vehicles when they escaped in search of food.

Things don’t seem so one-sided any more.

China’s military has been on a spending spree at a time that the debt-ridden U.S. government is looking to cut defense costs. On Friday, China announced a 12.7 percent hike for this year, the latest in a string of double-digit increases.

The Portela group made a dramatic entrance into the throbbing Sambadrome stadium late Sunday, its 300-strong percussion section abruptly quieting its thundering drums and crouching down in a moment of silence for its losses in the fire.

With silence descending over the crowd for a few seconds, the drummers leaped back up with a raucous beat as Portela’s thousands of members marched on to the cheers and applause of fans.

President Hamid Karzai wants U.S. military support even as he heavily criticizes the current U.S.-led military campaign for being too quick on the trigger. Nine Afghan boys died in an accidental air strike last week, reopening a raw issue.

Gates said the U.S. is interested in keeping a military presence in this former al-Qaida haven beyond the planned end of combat in three years. At a news conference with Karzai, Gates said a team of U.S. officials would arrive here next week to begin negotiations over a new compact for U.S.-Afghan security relations after 2014, when all international combat forces are supposed to be gone. U.S. forces have been in Afghanistan since 2001, and President Barack Obama has repeatedly said the war is not open-ended.

President Barack Obama sent his deputy national security adviser, Denis McDonough, on Sunday to a Washington-area mosque known for its cooperation with the FBI and its rejection of the al-Qaida brand of Islam.

“Being religious is never un-American. Being religious is quintessentially American,” McDonough said.

Three Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals justices heard half-hour arguments and rebuttals from each side more than a year after the grizzlies were returned to the list by U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy.

The federal government is bullish on the bear’s prospects, and state wildlife agencies from Montana and Wyoming have argued in briefs filed to the appellate court that officials are confident the bears won’t go extinct if states are left to manage them.

His decision to retire could set off a free-for-all to fill the seat coveted by Democrats and become a key to what will be a significantly reconstituted U.S. Senate, where eight members have now said they won’t run again.

More than a dozen family members and supporters flanked Ensign during his brief announcement. His wife Darlene Ensign stood next to him, reassuringly patting his back at moments.

U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara announced the October 2009 arrest of Raj Rajaratnam by saying it was the largest hedge fund insider trading case in history and marked the first extensive use of wiretaps in a white collar prosecution. Since then, charges have been brought against more than two dozen others – and 19 of them have pleaded guilty.

Evidence gathered during the investigation also has led to a separate probe of those who peddle inside information as the product of legitimate research. That investigation has resulted in nine arrests, with more defendants likely.

The speech falls on Tuesday, the day a bill limiting negotiating rights for 350,000 police, firefighters, teachers and other public workers begins its trip through the Ohio House. The bill cleared the state Senate last week.

The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees set the stage for Tuesday’s protests with a “State of the Worker” event Monday.