Evening Edition

Tokyo stocks, punished Monday in a frantic sell-off that sent indexes around the world sliding, plummeted another 14 percent before paring some losses and ending 10.55 percent down. European and US stocks also fell sharply.

In towns and cities, fearful citizens stripped shelves of food and water, prompting the government to warn that panic buying could hurt its ability to provide aid to areas devastated by Friday’s massive quake and tsunami.

The announcement came as engineers scrambled to keep the temperature of three reactors under control after they were hit by the tsunami that swept Japan following Friday’s massive earthquake.

Rescue teams searching through the shattered debris of whole villages swept away by the wall of water on Japan’s northeast coast found 2,000 bodies in the region of Miyagi.

“Let me say that the possibility that the development of this accident into one like Chernobyl is very unlikely,” Yukiya Amano told a news conference at the headquarters of the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna.

The current crisis at the Fukushima nuclear plant was caused not by human error or a design fault, as in the case of Chernobyl in Ukraine in 1986, but by a “huge natural catastrophe beyond imagination,” Amano said.

Television stations around the world have broadcast the footage of the seismic waves as they razed homes and carried away cars as if they were toys, stranding dazed survivors on the brutalized landscape.

But coverage has also shown another side — Japanese showing calm as they search for loved ones or wait for basic necessities. There is not a hint of looting or violence, even as residents line up at half-empty stores.

As violence escalated, close ally the United States warned that there was “no military solution” to political upheaval in Bahrain and that any violence against peacefully expressed political demands “should be stopped.”

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Bahrainis must “take steps now” toward a political resolution of the crisis.

After the Gulf Arab armed forces entered the country at the king’s invitation, the United States warned that there was “no military solution” to political upheaval there.

Thousands of protesters marched to the Saudi embassy chanting slogans against the king and vowing to defend the country from the “occupation” forces, as unrest in the tiny country became a regional diplomatic crisis.

Rebel sources said forces loyal to Libyan strongman Moamer Kadhafi had outflanked them and cut the road north, amid scenes of chaos in the city.

An AFP reporter saw long lines at filling stations as civilians and some rebels tried to leave eastwards to Tobruk, while others erected barricades in the streets.

The UN Security Council wrangled over Arab calls for a Libya no-fly zone, with Russia insisting “fundamental questions” remain.

European and Arab envoys emphasized the need for urgent UN action as Kadhafi’s forces advance. But because of the split between world powers, the Security Council would need several days to agree measures, diplomats said.

An airstrike killed one fighter and wounded another, witnesses and medics said after explosions and anti-aircraft fire rocked the western edge of Ajdabiya.

Rebel fighters were still reportedly holding out in Brega, 80 kilometres (50 miles) to the west, but Ajdabiya residents said otherwise the last checkpoint was just six kilometres from their town.

The attack comes as the west African cocoa giant is wracked by conflict in the wake of a disputed presidential election on November 28, which the UN says has left some 400 dead in a bloody tug-of-war for the country’s top job.

Strongman Laurent Gbagbo who has ruled for 10 years is refusing to yield power despite being widely recognised as having lost the vote to rival Alassane Ouattara.

Pro-Gbagbo forces were in control of a strategic military barracks in the northern suburb of Adjame after the heaviest day of fighting since the disputed November 28 presidential poll plunged the west African country into violence.

Forces backing internationally recognised president Alassane Ouattara tried to move south towards central Abidjan from their stronghold in the northern suburbs but met fierce resistance from Gbagbo loyalists, witnesses said.

The Fed held rates at historic lows and stuck to a $600 billion stimulus plan in an effort to spur growth, as it pondered events in the Arab world that have pushed up oil prices and a developing nuclear crisis in quake-hit Japan.

The Fed kept the crisis stimulus in place despite a “firmer” economic recovery at home — where unemployment eased, consumer spending picked up and businesses grew more optimistic.

The 23-year-old was not part of the side humiliated first by Italy and then by their coach Marc Lievremont, who accused them of being cowards and betraying their country in the manner they had performed in the 22-21 defeat in Rome.

Palisson – who will win his 14th cap on Saturday after being named in the starting XV as one of five changes to the previous line-up – admitted that he had seen some pretty downhearted players when he joined up with them on Monday.

JP Duminy agonisingly missed a century by just one run as the Proteas recovered from a poor start to make 272 for 7 in Kolkata before Ireland were dismissed for 141 to lose by 131 runs.

“We wanted to qualify. We’ve got one round robin game left against Bangladesh and hopefully three good games in the knockout phase. We’ve done the first part of it now,” said South Africa captain Graeme Smith.

Applicants were urged to approach the start of the ballot for 6.6 million tickets — coinciding with 500 days to go until the Games begin — as a marathon not a sprint, with applications possible for the next six weeks.

Allocation of tickets is not on a first-come-first-served basis, meaning every request made until April 26 stands an equal chance of success.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said two workers at the Daiichi plant in Fukushima were missing after two more blasts at the facility on Tuesday blew a hole in a building housing a reactor and cooling pool for spent fuel rods.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan urged people within 30 km (18 miles) of the facility — a population of 140,000 — to remain indoors, as Japan grappled with the world’s most serious nuclear accident since the Chernobyl disaster in Ukraine in 1986.

Tokyo’s stock market plunged more than 14 percent at one point after the stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant was hit by two explosions and a grim-faced Prime Minister Naoto Kan warned the nation that radioactivity levels had become “significantly” higher.

Even before Tuesday’s dramatic events, economists had estimated that recovery and reconstruction costs would reach at least $180 billion, or 3 percent of the economic output of the world’s third-biggest economy. Others suggested the cost could amount to 5 percent of output.

As bodies washed up on the coast from Friday’s devastating earthquake and tsunami, injured survivors, children and elderly crammed into makeshift shelters, often without medicine. By Monday, 550,000 people had been evacuated after the cataclysmic events that killed at least 10,000.

Panic swept Tokyo after a rise in radioactive levels around an earthquake-hit nuclear power plant north of the city, causing some to leave the capital and others to stock up on food and supplies.

Embassies advised staff to leave affected areas, tourists cut short vacations and some multinational companies told staff to move from Tokyo out after low levels of radiation were detected in one of the world’s biggest and most densely populated cities.

In one sign of the panic, Don Quixote, a multistory, 24-hour general store in Tokyo’s Roppongi district, was sold out of radios, flashlights, candles, fuel cans and sleeping bags on Tuesday as a Reuters reported visited the shop.

Japanese shares plunged 10.55 percent, the largest fall since October 2008, as more explosions rocked a quake-stricken nuclear plant, triggering a rise in radiation and prompting investors to dump riskier assets across Asia.

The yen rose on Tuesday, sparking market speculation that the authorities might intervene to prevent the currency’s strength from further damaging an economy reeling from a triple blow of Friday’s 9.0 magnitude earthquake, a tsunami and an escalating nuclear crisis.

Rising radiation levels at an earthquake-hit nuclear plant in northeastern Japan triggered a huge selloff in Japanese shares and panic hoarding of food and other supplies in Tokyo.

At one stage, Nikkei futures were down 16 percent before paring losses to 10 percent, while the benchmark Tokyo stock index ended down almost 11 percent, its biggest one-day percentage loss since October 2008.

The yen tripped on talk of intervention and bond yields rose as investors sold debt to offset losses in the stock market. The scale and speed of the equity selloff, on record volume for a second day running, forced fund managers to sit on the sidelines.

“Even if we wanted to sell today there was very little we could do,” said a fund manager at a Japanese fund, asking not to be named because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

Modern skyscrapers built to the state’s now-rigorous building codes might ride out the big jolt that experts say is all but inevitable, but the surviving buildings will tower over a carpet of rubble from older structures that have collapsed.

Hot desert winds could fan fires that quakes inevitably cause, overwhelming fire departments, even as ancient water pipelines burst, engineers and architects say.

Technology companies were particularly hit since Japan accounts for one-fifth of the world’s semiconductor production, including about 40 percent of flash memory chips used in everything from smartphones, tablets to computers.

Multinationals that buy parts from Japan or have plants located there were grappling with power blackouts, factory closures and transportation problems after roads, railways and ports in north east Japan were destroyed by Friday’s devastating earthquake and tsunami.

Yukiya Amano, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), expressed confidence Japanese authorities were doing all they could to restore safety at the sites and said a Chernobyl-style disaster was “very unlikely.”

He spoke as Japan scrambled to avert a meltdown at a stricken nuclear complex after a hydrogen explosion at one reactor and exposure of fuel rods at another, just days after the devastation that killed thousands.

Even though some extreme projections of the longer-term costs project figures closer to $1 trillion over several years, standard tallies akin to those used after the Kobe quake hover around this level.

The world’s third-largest economy, already saddled with public debt double the size of its $5 trillion output, must rebuild its infrastructure — from roads and rail to power and ports — on a scale not seen since World War Two.

Nuclear power has been poised for a revival as Europe strives to cut climate-warming carbon emissions and gas imports, but public mistrust still runs high, with the Chernobyl accident in 1986 still strong in many Europeans’ minds.

Public confidence in the industry looked set to fall as Japan scrambled on Monday to avert a meltdown at a stricken nuclear plant, days after an earthquake and tsunami.

The U.S. central bank decided unanimously to forge ahead with its $600 billion bond-buying plan despite a considerably more upbeat assessment of the economy and the job market

It made no mention of Japan, which is grappling with the aftermath of the country’s worst earthquake on record — and struggling desperately to avert a nuclear disaster.

In a second straight day of losses tied to Japan, the S&P 500 fell to within four points of support at 1,257, its 2010 close. The benchmark index fell more than 2 percent in early trading and the Nasdaq briefly turned negative for the year.

Equities nearly halved their losses after the Fed stuck with its ultra-loose monetary policy and said the economy was gaining traction.

The small town of Ajdabiyah was all that stood between the relentless eastward advance of Libyan government troops and the second city of Benghazi and lies on a road junction from where Gaddafi’s forces could attempt to encircle the rebel stronghold.

“The town of Ajdabiyah has been cleansed of mercenaries and terrorists linked to the al Qaeda organization,” state television said, referring to the rebels fighting to end Gaddafi’s 41 years of absolute power.

In a blow to France’s efforts to use the crisis in Libya to reassert its leadership in international diplomacy, a G8 meeting resisted French pressure to come out in support of a no-fly zone and made no mention of the issue in its final communique.

The Libyan crisis dominated the first meeting of France’s Group of Eight presidency, but Germany and Russia blocked flight restrictions sought also by Britain, leaving the group with a position that contained strong words but little substance.

France, which along with Britain has led calls for an enforced ban on military flights across the North African oil-producing state, said it hoped the Arab League decision to ask the council to impose a no-fly zone would persuade reluctant members to support it.

“Now that there is this Arab League statement, we do hope that it’s a game changer for the other members of the council,” French U.N. Ambassador Gerard Araud said before the closed-door council meeting.

In an escalating war of words, Bahrain condemned the comments and withdrew its ambassador to Iran for consultations.

About 1,000 Saudi soldiers entered Bahrain on Monday as part of an effort by the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) to help the island’s Sunni Muslim elite cope with protests by members of the island’s Shi’ite majority.

“When you got caught you pinned it all on Raj, didn’t you?” Rajaratnam’s main lawyer, John Dowd, tersely asked Anil Kumar in cross-examination at the Manhattan federal court trial.

“No,” Kumar replied. Dowd said: “You did what you could to get out of jail.” “Wrong,” Kumar shot back.

“We hope this will be the last time we have to engage in any stopgap measures,” House Majority Leader Eric Cantor told reporters on Monday. “We would like to see this resolved.”

Similarly, second-ranking House Democrat Steny Hoyer has warned that the upcoming vote would be the “last time” he would support a stopgap spending bill for this year.

Bank accounts in Switzerland and Liechtenstein, alleged to have belonged to the executives and seen as key to the case over Renault’s electric car technology, did not exist, prosecutor Jean-Claude Marin told a news conference on Monday.

The response of authorities in those countries has enabled the prosecutor “to dismiss a certain number of theories, notably that which was put forward in the initial complaint by the company Renault,” Marin said.

Tokyo Electric Power Co. says the new blaze flared early Wednesday in the outer housing of the reactor’s containment vessel. Fire fighters are trying to put out the flames.

On Tuesday, a fire broke out in the reactor’s fuel storage pond – an area where used nuclear fuel is kept cool – causing radioactivity to be released into the atmosphere.

The disaster frightened financial markets in Tokyo and on Wall Street on Tuesday. Japan’s Nikkei average lost 10 percent, and the Dow Jones industrials fell so quickly after the opening bell that the stock exchange invoked a special rule to reduce volatility.

Yet the damage to the U.S. and world economies is expected to be relatively moderate and short-lived. Oil prices are falling, helping drivers around the world. And the reconstruction expected along Japan’s northeastern coast could even provide a jolt of economic growth.

Health agencies in California and western Canada warned Tuesday that there’s no reason for people an ocean away to suddenly stock up on potassium iodide. Some key suppliers say they’re back-ordered and are getting panicked calls from potential customers.

“Tell them, `Stop, don’t do it,'” said Kathryn Higley, director of radiation health physics at Oregon State University.

“Help yourself! Take what you need!” they yelled as they put box after box on the sidewalk. Their boss Kazuyoshi Chiba said the phone lines are down, so he can’t reach company headquarters, but “I think this is the right thing to do.”

With the same mixture of resilience and resignation that has lifted Japan out of previous disasters, many survivors of last Friday’s calamity are calmly pitching in to help themselves and others, taking life one day at a time. Four days on, there is little of the public anger and frustration that so often bursts forth in other countries.

In desperation, rebels sent up two antiquated warplanes that struck a government ship bombarding Ajdabiya from the Mediterranean. But as tanks rolled into the city from two directions and rockets relentlessly pounded houses and shops, the ragtag opposition fighters’ defenses appeared to break down.

Only 10 days ago, the rebellion was poised to march on Tripoli, the capital, and had appeared capable of sweeping Gadhafi out after 41 years in power, but the regime’s better armed and organized military has reversed the tide. Efforts led by France and Britain to create a no-fly zone to protect the rebels have gone nowhere, and some rebels lashed out at the West for failing to come to their aid.

A force of more than 1,000 Saudi-led troops expanded to defend the Sunni monarchy; Iran and Lebanon’s Hezbollah denounced the presence of foreign soldiers; and Washington feared for its main naval base in the Gulf. Any compromise appeared distant at best, with the latest order from Bahrain’s king and protesters’ demands for the royal family to be toppled altogether.

Doctors were overwhelmed by onslaught of patients at Manama’s Salmaniya hospital, rushing the wounded into a packed emergency room, forcing many to wait in the halls. Nurses held back tears when attending to injured young men, and doctors could barely contain their anger.

Washington urged the ruling family in Bahrain, home to the Navy’s 5th Fleet, to talk to protesters about political reform as reports came in of hundreds of Bahraini demonstrators injured by shotgun blasts and clubs. A Saudi soldier from a large contingent of Gulf troops imported to Bahrain was shot to death by a protester.

Urging restraint, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton expressed alarm over “provocative acts and sectarian violence,” and said she telephoned Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud to stress the need for the foreign forces to promote dialogue.

The measure would buy additional time for talks between Capitol Hill Republicans and the Obama administration on a bill to fund the day-to-day operations of the government through the end of September. Those negotiations haven’t gotten very far yet and House GOP leaders haven’t shown much flexibility.

The measure passed by a 271-158 vote despite opposition from some tea party-backed conservatives who said it “kicks the can down the road” instead of imposing steep and immediate spending cuts. The $6 billion cut by the measure includes many items that the Obama administration and Democrats agree can be axed. Fifty-four Republicans opposed the bill, which meant that Democratic support was required to pass it – a prospect that GOP leaders must avoid to keep control of the debate in future rounds.

Gingrich, the former U.S. House speaker who has aggressively courted the conservatives who dominate Iowa’s lead-off presidential caucuses, raised the money for the political arm of Restoring American Leadership, also known as ReAL.

That group then passed $125,000 to American Family Association Action and an additional $25,000 to the Iowa Christian Alliance – two of the groups that spent millions before last November’s elections that removed three of the state’s seven state Supreme Court justices. The court had unanimously decided a state law restricting marriage to a man and a woman violated Iowa’s constitution.

The seven-page document, obtained by The Associated Press, alleges that the sex-fueled parties started with dinner, progressed to erotic dancing involving the premier and culminated with Berlusconi’s choice of a sex partner, or partners.

Prosecutors have formally closed the investigation and are seeking indictments against the three aides, whom they accuse of identifying possible sex partners for Berlusconi and informing them of payment and other compensation “that they would have received for their sexual availability.”

This year, there doesn’t seem to be that one team that’ll be at the top of everyone’s bracket. It’s probably closer to a dozen. Heck, there are five or six teams just in the Big East that could be considered legitimate title contenders.

Certainly, going with one of the top four seeds is a pretty safe route, but each one in this year’s field of 68 has enough flaws that it’s going to be difficult to feel certain about the final pick at the middle of the bracket.

“That’s an astonishing number,” he said Monday at a Virginia middle school. “We know that four out of five schools in this country aren’t failing.”

Obama’s terminology wasn’t quite right, though. There is no “failing” label in the No Child Left Behind Act. And schools that do not meet growth targets – aimed at getting 100 percent of students proficient in math, reading and science by 2014 – for one year are not subject to any intervention.

The plan is part of the governor’s two-year budget proposal that seeks to plug an $8 billion shortfall while retaining an $800 million, two-year income tax cut that went into effect in January and adding an additional $34 million in tax incentives designed to create jobs.

The budget announcement came as Kasich has voiced his support for a much contested bill that would restrict the collective bargaining rights of state employees. Hearings on the bill, which has passed the Senate and is now before the House, have drawn thousands of protesters to the Statehouse in recent weeks.

In a four-hour Senate hearing that was his first since taking command in Kabul last summer, Army Gen. David Petraeus said the tide is turning in the war despite persistent questions about the durability of the Afghan government led by Hamid Karzai and the commitment of neighboring Pakistan to keep militants at bay.

Several Republicans said they worry that the Obama administration is sending mixed signals about when the U.S. will leave Afghanistan. Several cited a new Washington Post-ABC poll that said nearly two-thirds of Americans consider the war no longer worth fighting.

Two cash injections totaling 8 trillion yen ($98 billion) came a day after the Bank of Japan fed a record 15 trillion yen ($184 billion) into money markets and eased monetary policy to support the economy in the aftermath of Friday’s 9.0 magnitude quake that has killed thousands.

The injections have helped stabilize currency markets. But stock markets dived for a second day as investors unloaded assets amid escalating worries of a nuclear crisis.

Now, as Obama cranks up his re-election campaign, all those factors are absent.

The president has many tools, of course, for inspiring and exciting potential voters. But he faces a different landscape, one in which key supporters are disappointed by concessions he has made to Republicans, and discouraged by huge Democratic losses last fall.

Elizabeth Warren, the Harvard law professor who championed the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and is now in charge of setting it up, faces the hostile fire directly on Wednesday. Republicans running the House Financial Services Committee will press her to answer their concerns – shared by banks and other business interests – that the agency and its director will have unfettered power over financial products used by millions of people and might abuse it.

“You have no guarantee what kind of hobby horses that person may ride, how out of control they might be,” said Wayne Abernathy, an executive vice president of the American Bankers Association.

UCLA student Alexandra Wallace quickly proved that, launching into a three-minute tirade that ridiculed Asian students for talking loudly in the library, packing her neighborhood with annoying relatives, and repeatedly calling home to Japan in a funny sounding foreign language to check on loved ones after the deadly tsunami.

The junior political science major says now she doesn’t know why she did it. But figuring that out would seem to be the least of her worries.