Evening Edition

“The colonialist countries are hatching a plot to humiliate the Libyan people, reduce them to slavery and control the oil,” Kadhafi said on state television.

He again accused Al-Qaeda of being behind the insurrection that began on February 15 and called on inhabitants of Benghazi, the rebels’ main base, to “liberate” the eastern city.

“The colonialist countries are hatching a plot to humiliate the Libyan people, reduce them to slavery and control the oil,” Kadhafi said on state television.

He again accused Al-Qaeda of being behind the insurrection that began on February 15 and called on inhabitants of Benghazi, the rebels’ main base, to “liberate” the eastern city.

The government said it “is fully committed to the interests of the people and to implementing the goals of the revolution; and it will stand firm against plans for a counter-revolution,” according to state news agency MENA.

Sectarian clashes killed at least 13 in Cairo, the health ministry said.

The clashes erupted on Tuesday afternoon in the poor working class district of Moqattam, when at least 1,000 Christians gathered there to protest the burning of a church last week.

“The total number of injured received by hospitals after the violence in the areas of Moqattam, the Citadel and Sayeda Aisha is 110, while 10 people were killed,” said Sherif Zamel, head of emergency services at the health ministry, without specifying if they were Christian or Muslim.

The 2,777 deaths underscore the level of violence in the country as foreign troops prepare to start handing control of security to Afghan forces in some areas from July ahead of a full transition due by 2014.

Insurgents were responsible for 75 percent of all civilian deaths, up 28 percent on 2009, the figures said.

Police and witnesses said the bomber had slipped into the congregation of more than 200 people attending funeral prayers for the wife of a known anti-Taliban militiaman in Adezai village, near Peshawar city.

Television footage showed bearded elderly men wearing bloodstained clothes rushing from the scene in panic. Prayer caps and slippers lay alongside scattered body parts at the prayer site, which was spattered with blood.

The shuttle cruised onto the Kennedy Space Center runway at 11:57 am (1657 GMT), wrapping up a rich, 27-year career in spaceflight that has traveled further and endured longer than any of the remaining three US shuttles.

“And Houston, Discovery. For the final time, wheelstop,” Commander Steve Lindsey said when the orbiter came to a halt on the runway.

Yuvraj Singh scored a match-winning 51 not out, his third successive half century, as India pulled off a five-wicket win against the Netherlands after making heavy weather of chasing a 190 target at Delhi’s Feroz Shah Kotla.

India were reeling at 99-4 after a three-wicket burst by left-arm spinner Pieter Seelaar but scraped through with 81 balls remaining.

At least three men and a woman were the latest victims of an increasingly bloody post-electoral crisis, which the UN fears could become a full-blown civil war, when they were shot dead in Abidjan’s Treichville neighbourhood.

According to medics and AFP correspondents at the scene, the four were killed in violence which flared following a rally by hundreds of supporters of Alassane Ouattara, who was Gbagbo’s challenger in November’s run-off.

Drawing inspiration from the boardrooms of Finland and the toppling of autocratic regimes in Tunisia and Egypt, demonstrators staked their claim for equality, education and a better life.

A month before Silvio Berlusconi goes on trial over allegations he paid an underage prostitute for sex, hundreds of Italian women rallied in Rome.

Biden held his first one-on-one meeting with the Russian president at his suburban Moscow residency during a visit that will also see him hold talks Thursday with the country’s strongman Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

US and Russian officials have rubbished Russian reports suggesting that Biden would be using the visit to urge Medvedev to stand for re-election next year — a vote that could also be contested by Putin.

The firm said it aimed to double operating profit to 1 trillion yen ($12 billion) from estimated levels this year “as soon as possible” and would slash its board of directors to 11 from 27 “to improve decision making”.

Toyota’s “Global Vision” aims to implement lessons learned from the global financial crisis that plunged the automaker into the red, and from the millions of recalls that tarnished its once stellar image for quality.

Zawiya appeared to change hands twice during the day as Gaddafi tried to crush the uprising against him by bombarding the western town and a series of oil towns in the rebel-held east.

“Thanks to Allah we are sitting in the square now,” the fighter, who gave his name as Ibrahim, said by telephone after earlier reporting his forces had pulled back from the square.

The fighter named Ibrahim told Reuters the government had brought in supporters of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi for a rally there and they were now on the main road.

“We have pushed (pro-Gaddafi forces) out and we are back in the square now,” Ibrahim said by telephone. “They are one km away now. Thanks to Allah we are sitting in the square now.”

As President Barack Obama’s top advisers met to debate what to do next, Muammar Gaddafi’s forces halted a rebel advance in the east of the oil-producing North African country and made gains against others in western areas.

A range of options are on the table in the White House situation room, U.S. officials said, including a “no-fly” zone to ground Gaddafi’s warplanes. But White House spokesman Jay Carney cautioned that no decision on firm action was expected to emerge from the meeting.

The rebels said Muammar Gaddafi’s forces had hit an oil pipeline leading to Es Sider and dropped bombs on storage tanks in the Ras Lanuf oil terminal area at the front line in the east of this oil-producing desert state.

Libyan state television blamed the explosion on “al Qaeda-backed” armed elements who had blown up an oil storage tank as pro-Gaddafi forces advanced into Ras Lanuf. The Libyan leader has blamed the revolt on al Qaeda and drug addled youths.

As Obama faces growing calls at home to help Libyan rebels seeking to end Muammar Gaddafi’s 41-year rule, he and Cameron discussed a “full spectrum of possible responses” during their telephone call, the White House said in a statement.

Forces loyal to Gaddafi attacked rebels with rockets, tanks and planes in western and eastern Libya, intensifying efforts to crush the revolt and raising pressure on foreign governments to avert a humanitarian crisis in the oil-producing North African country.

European Union member states agreed to extend sanctions on Libya to include the secretive $70 billion Libyan Investment Authority, which holds stakes in Western bluechips such as Pearson and UniCredit.

The latest sanctions, designed to punish the regime of Muammar Gaddafi, are also likely to hit companies in sectors ranging from banks to construction, part of the $1.5 billion in publicly listed equities globally that LIA controls, according to Thomson Reuters data.

A Reuters/Ipsos poll showed on Wednesday the proportion of people who believe the United States is on the wrong track rose seven points to 64 percent from February, in a fresh challenge to President Barack Obama.

It was the highest number of people in an Ipsos poll who think the country on the wrong track since Obama took office in January 2009. The survey comes as many indicators show an improving U.S. economy.

The Idaho bill, which excludes issues like class size and workloads from negotiations for the state’s 12,000 unionized teachers, was given final approval by the Republican-led House and is expected to be signed by Republican Governor Butch Otter.

The bill also eliminates teacher tenure, limits the duration of teacher labor contracts to one year and removes seniority as a factor in determining the order of layoffs.

Rajaratnam, sitting impassively as prosecutor Jonathan Streeter spoke, went on trial in New York on Wednesday in a high-stakes clash with the government. The U.S. Justice Department has made insider trading probes into the secretive hedge fund industry a priority, and the Rajaratnam prosecution is its signature case.

“Greed and corruption. This is a case about that man right there, Raj Rajaratnam, using stolen business information to make tens of millions of dollars,” Streeter, an assistant U.S. attorney, told the jury, gesturing toward Rajaratnam.

With al Qaeda and its affiliates openly trying to recruit Americans and Muslims inside the United States for attacks, House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Peter King called congressional hearings on the subject “absolutely essential”.

“I am facing reality, my critics are not,” King said on MSNBC. “Al Qaeda is changing its tactics, they realize that it’s very difficult to attack from the outside, they’re recruiting from within.”

The world’s largest car maker, trying to move on from a massive global recall of vehicles a year ago, will cut its board to 11 members by June from the current 27 to speed up decision-making as part of the blueprint.

Outlining his “Global Vision,” Toyota President Akio Toyoda said the company would also eliminate one layer of management, while giving each geographic region a bigger role to bring the automaker closer to its customers after a recall of nearly 20 million cars since 2009 dented its reputation for quality.

Since Colonel Jason Morris’s Marines replaced British soldiers at Forward Operating Base Sabit Qadam last fall, 29 of his men from the Marine 3rd Battalion, 5th Regiment, have been killed.

Another 175 have been wounded, giving the unit the dubious record of suffering the most casualties in the Afghan war.

Touchdown at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida is scheduled for 11:57 a.m. EST (1657 GMT) on Wednesday, with a backup landing opportunity available at 1:34 p.m. (1834 GMT)Meteorologists expect the weather will be suitable for landing.

Discovery blasted off on February 24 to deliver supplies, a storage room and an outdoor platform to hold spare parts for the International Space Station, a $100 billion project of 16 nations that has been under construction 220 miles above Earth since 1998.

In the west, Gadhafi claimed victory in recapturing Zawiya, the city closest to the capital that had fallen into opposition hands. The claim could not immediately be verified; phone lines there have not been working during a deadly, six-day siege.

State TV showed a crowd of hundreds, purportedly in Zawiya’s main square, shouting “The people want Colonel Gadhafi!”

“We’re not at a decision point,” Obama’s spokesman, Jay Carney, said as the White House sought hard to inject perspective into a fast-changing conflict. Gadhafi’s forces pounded rebels with artillery and gunfire in at least two major cities on Wednesday, adding more pressure on nations and international bodies to figure out what to do – and whether they can agree.

The NATO alliance said it was planning for any eventuality in the Libyan crisis. But with Defense Secretary Robert Gates preparing to join a meeting of alliance defense chiefs to discuss military options on Thursday, there was little sign they would agree to set up a no-fly zone over the North African country.

After Libya agreed to give up its weapons of mass destruction in 2003, the U.S. has been spending about $2 million a year to steer weapons scientists and technicians into other fields, including medicine, green technology and the oil and gas industry, current and former U.S. officials told the AP. Efforts by the U.S. and by Britain, which also is involved in the program, have helped build a seawater desalination plant, a water quality lab and a telemedicine facility at the Tripoli Medical Center.

About 200 nuclear specialists and 500 others who worked with chemical weapons and missile technology could be driven to leave Libya by the fighting, including key figures in the nuclear weapons programs.

In a sign of how much security has broken down, the pitched battles – the deadliest in years – went on for nearly four hours Tuesday night as both sides fought with guns, knives and clubs. Army troops fired in the air to disperse the crowds to no avail.

The new Cabinet sought to reassure Egyptians on Wednesday night, ordering police to immediately take back the streets.

The shake-up comes at a critical time. Conservative politicians are again pressing to end congressional funding for NPR, money the organization said it needs to keep operating public radio and television stations in some of the nation’s smallest communities. The White House defended the funding, saying there remains a need for public broadcasting.

Vivian Schiller also faced criticism for her firing of analyst Juan Williams over comments he made about Muslims. She told The Associated Press that the recent remarks made by her fellow executive Ron Schiller were outrageous and unfortunate, and her staying on would only hurt NPR’s fight for federal money.

The votes to scuttle the competing measures were designed, ironically, to prompt progress. The idea was to show tea party-backed GOP conservatives in the House that they need to pare back their budget-cutting ambitions while at the same time demonstrating to Democratic liberals that they need to budge, too.

“It isn’t often that two failed votes in the Senate could be called a breakthrough,” Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said in a speech at the liberal Center for American Progress think tank. “Once it is plain that both party’s opening bids in this budget debate are non-starters, we can finally get serious about sitting down and narrowing the huge gap that exists between the two sides.”

After a flawless trip to the International Space Station, NASA’s oldest shuttle swooped through a few wispy clouds on its way to its final touchdown.

“To the ship that has led the way time and time again, we say, ‘Farewell Discovery,'” declared Mission Control commentator Josh Byerly.

Gov. Pat Quinn also commuted the sentences of all 15 inmates remaining on death row. They will now serve life in prison with no hope of parole.

State lawmakers voted in January to abandon capital punishment, and Quinn spent two months reflecting on the issue, speaking with prosecutors, crime victims’ families, death penalty opponents and religious leaders. He called it the “most difficult decision” he has made as governor.

In a letter dated May 18, 2009 – a copy of which was obtained Wednesday by The Associated Press – NFL Players Association executive director DeMaurice Smith asked Commissioner Roger Goodell to “provide audited financial statements concerning the operations of the 32 clubs and the league.”

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The NFL proposed this week to provide new financial data, but the union said it wasn’t enough to satisfy the players’ call for full disclosure.

It’s the 2,500 ticket-takers, janitors and other game-day employees at the Superdome in New Orleans, and the suburban dry cleaner who washes all their uniforms.

It’s the receptionists and accountants for the New York Jets, and the high school band booster club that sells burgers and beer at Carolina Panthers games.

A drug for high-risk pregnant women has cost about $10 to $20 per injection. Next week, the price shoots up to $1,500 a dose, meaning the total cost during a pregnancy could be as much as $30,000.

That’s because the drug, a form of progesterone given as a weekly shot, has been made cheaply for years, mixed in special pharmacies that custom-compound treatments that are not federally approved.

Amid the worst financial crisis facing states in decades, stringent rules governing the use of reserve funds have tied the hands of lawmakers in nearly a dozen states even as they consider raising taxes, slashing health and social services and shuttering education programs.

About three-fourths of states have used rainy day funds in the past three years to alleviate budget cuts, but some have had difficulty accessing the money or have shied away from doing so. They would have to repay it quickly or were worried it would hurt their bond ratings.

Officially, producers were still saying the show is scheduled to open next week.

“We are not confirming or commenting on the recent reports” of the brief hiatus and new opening, said Rick Miramontez, spokesman for “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.” The $65 million show, he said, is still scheduled to open March 15.

The blast near the city of Peshawar was not far from the tribally administered regions bordering Afghanistan where militants are at their strongest. The area struck is home to several tribal armies that battle the Pakistani branches of the Taliban with the government’s encouragement.

Police officer Zahid Khan said about 300 people were attending the funeral for the wife of a militiaman in the Matani area when the bomber struck. TV footage showed men picking up bloodied sandals and caps from a dusty, open space where mourners had gathered.

Biden plans two days of meetings Wednesday and Thursday, including with President Dmitry Medvedev, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and representatives of Russia’s beleaguered opposition groups. He is to cap the trip with an address at Moscow State University that is expected to lay out the White House’s vision for U.S.-Russian relations in the last half of President Barack Obama’s term.

“This trip for the vice president is an opportunity to take stock of the reset and what we’ve achieved and where we hope to go next,” said Biden’s national security adviser Tony Blinken.

The first-term Democrat’s whereabouts became the subject of speculation and news reports after staff members said they either didn’t know where he was or wouldn’t say after he left Thursday.

Adding to the public interest in his whereabouts, Vermont got walloped by its biggest-ever March snowstorm, which dumped more than two feet of snow in places and closed schools and some state government offices.

Rigali spoke to several hundred Roman Catholics packing the pews and aisles for a noon Mass at the city’s grand basilica on Ash Wednesday, which marks the beginning of the Lenten season of penance.

Outside, about a dozen protesters carried placards and signs criticizing Rigali and Monsignor William Lynn, a former church official charged last month with endangering children and covering up the crimes by knowingly shifting priests suspected of molestation from parish to parish.

Republicans at a House hearing on Wednesday complained that the 2.1 million-strong federal work force is overpaid compared with workers holding similar jobs in the private sector.

The personnel chief for federal workers cried foul. He said many federal employees earn too little.

Gov. Scott Walker met with GOP senators in a closed-door meeting a day after releasing details about concessions he’s offered to Democrats, saying he had the backing of his fellow Republicans.

“They’re firm,” Walker said after dashing out of the meeting and into an elevator at the Capitol.

Locke is well-versed in the Chinese trade policies that have frustrated American businesses trying to sell their products in the huge and growing Asian power. He’s led delegations of U.S. companies on dozens of trade missions abroad, including to China, where U.S. exports were up 34 percent last year.

“When he’s in Beijing, I know that American companies will be able to count on him to represent their interests in front of China’s top leaders,” Obama said as he announced Locke’s nomination.

A friend went to a teacher, investigators went to the girl and her mother, and authorities say they learned the disturbing images depicted just one of several attacks on the girl last year.

Now 18 people – including two of Cleveland’s star high school athletes and adults with criminal records – face assault and abuse charges that have horrified and divided their small Texas town.

The familiar problem for personal computers is being studied in automobiles as internal computer networks become as critical to vehicles as tires and engines, and as auto companies push to bring the Internet to motorists.

Two researchers demonstrated the ability last year to hack into the internal networks that operate a car’s brakes and engines. While there is no evidence that anyone has hacked into auto computer systems to compromise safety or steal vehicles, industry groups are studying the issue in hopes of getting ahead of future cyber-attacks.

In real life, that woman is Roberta Walker. She still lives in Hinkley, using her share to buy a new home in what she thought would be a safe four-mile distance from the toxic plume of chromium.

Earlier this year, she and other residents learned that the pollution, which Pacific Gas & Electric was required to clean up, was once again moving and had seeped into their groundwater.

In real life, that woman is Roberta Walker. She still lives in Hinkley, using her share to buy a new home in what she thought would be a safe four-mile distance from the toxic plume of chromium.

Earlier this year, she and other residents learned that the pollution, which Pacific Gas & Electric was required to clean up, was once again moving and had seeped into their groundwater.

Only six of the 19 original covered bridges in Madison County, Iowa – made famous by the love story “The Bridges of Madison County” – remain.

Floods, vandalism, arson and neglect are also taking a toll. About 750 of the 15,000 covered bridges that dotted the United States in the 19th century are still standing.

The early-introduction Focus, available as a sedan and five-door hatchback, is rated at 28 miles a gallon in city driving and 40 mpg on the highway as a sedan with automatic transmission and an extra-cost Special Fuel Economy (SFE) package. Ford’s Fiesta small car also has a 40-mpg highway rating.

The $495 SFE package on the Focus swaps out standard tires for low rolling resistance rubber, adds special wheel covers that are more aerodynamic than the regular ones and a spoiler at the sedan’s trunk lid and puts a newfangled grille in front that can adjust air flow. All this boosts the mileage rating above that of the regular Focus sedan with automatic transmission mileage of 28/38-mpg.