South coast blaze 'unpredictable'

Swirling winds are creating unpredictable conditions for firefighters battling a blaze close to homes at Burrill Lake on the New South Wales south coast.

Authorities haify;">Authorities have confirmed a holiday cottage near Dolphin Point was destroyed by the blaze last night.

Helicopters are waterbombing the fire and crews from surrounding areas have been called in to help protect properties.

Tim Carroll, from the Rural Fire Service (RFS), says strong winds are pushing the fire towards the township of Lake Tabourie, south of Ulladulla.

He says several rural properties are in the path of the fire and if residents choose to leave the area, they should go early.

Mr Carroll says if residents can see smoke and flames, it is probably already too late to leave.

RFS spokesman Matthew Schroder says the wind blowing on the fire ground is averaging about 40 kilometres an hour, with gusts of up to 60 kilometres an hour.

"The fire is still continuing to burn in amongst the properties there so our crews are in there working in behind the homes to ensure those properties are safe," he said.

"There is some wind that is impacting the fire at the moment, so the firefighters are experiencing quite sporadic fire activity as we speak, so they're trying to combat that throughout the day."

The Princes Highway is shut in both directions at Burrill Lake because of the fire.

RFS Assistant Fire Commissioner Rob Rogers says the holiday cottage destroyed last night "couldn't be defended" and the burnt out shell was discovered this morning.

Fingal Bay fire eases

Authorities say a bushfire burning at Fingal Bay, north of Newcastle, no longer poses a threat to properties.

Crews have worked this afternoon to contain a blaze burning through bushland in the Tomaree National Park in the Port Stephens area.

Lower Hunter Superintendent Jason Mckellar says the fire was heading towards properties, but it is now under control.

"What crews have worked on this afternoon is doing a backburn of an... area behind the houses at the back of Fingal Bay," he said.

"[The fire] has burnt out into the national park and met up with the wildfire and taken the intensity out of it.

"Now it will be a process of mopping up and patrolling that area."

Swat diary: 'Bright future ahead'

Munir (not his real name), an administrator in the Swat region of Pakistan, has returned to his home in Swat three months after his family fled the conflict there. He describes the challenges of daily life with optimism about the future.

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We returned to Swat on 2 August. We were very excited. We were desperate to go to our village, but we were told by other villagers over the phone that people were not allowed to enter the village without a special pass.

Therefore we had to stay near Mingora for two days to obtain such passes before we could return to our home village. More than two feet grass had grown while we were away. Everything seemed to be in its place, nothing was stolen.

See a map of the region

After a few days staying at home I went out for a walk around the village. I found many houses badly damaged in the fighting. Our relatives' houses were among the damaged ones. Electricity wires and phone cables were lying scattered on the ground, although we do have power and our phone is working.

Many houses and shops were plundered. I saw three shops completely emptied. One shopkeeper told me that 200 sacks of rice had been stolen from his shop.

Three or four houses belonging to militants were completely razed to the ground. The army is still coming to our village to destroy houses known to belong to militants.

'Militants defeated'

I saw the hairdresser in my village openly and bravely shaving people. I heard songs in the streets and in the shops for the first time after a long while.

About 80% of the people from our village have returned. Life is getting back to normal, but there are problems.

Many people are without jobs d people are without jobs due to the curfews and people can't move easily inside Swat. Swat is like a jail for us now - there are many checkpoints and curfews are imposed all the time. People are sick of them.

Electric power is another big problem. It is so weak, that we can't switch on the motor to pump water up and we can't turn on the refrigerator to cool things. Power cuts can happen any time.

People are a little bit worried again as several suicide attacks occurred in the last few days. But as a whole, people are happy and satisfied with the operation in the area.

We are very happy with the army: people pat soldiers on the back and give them food and gifts - something that had never happened in the past. The army has regained its popularity. People feel indebted to the army also because it has reduced the price of bread from five to two rupees.

Everyone is pleased to be back home, though most people, including me, are anxious that leaders of the militants still haven't been arrested or killed.

You hear about bodies of militants turning up these days. Many people are of the view that the security forces are behind this.

But regardless of who's responsible, people get really happy when they hear that militants have been killed, because their dear ones were brutally killed by those militants.

I have so many stories of the cruelties happening in our lands. I hope I will write them down one day.

I am myself very happy of the way things have turned up. I am optimistic about the future because I see that the militants have been defeated.

They can't hold such a powerful position here again. Swat has a bright future because its people have learnt the importance of peace and education. They have become united.

I am now thinking about my wedding, which will take place soon after the Eid, before October.

Cosgrove honoured amid E Timor celebrations

Retired General Peter Cosgrove has been presented with one of East Timor's highest honours at a ceremony celebrating the country's 10 years of independence.

Galign: justify;">General Cosgrove has been presented with the collar of the Order of East Timor by the country's President, Jose Ramos-Horta.

General Cosgrove was the head of the Australian-led multinational peacekeeping mission which arrived in East Timor after the vote for independence in 1999.

He says he is receiving the award on behalf of all those involved in the mission in East Timor.

Earlier today, Dr Ramos-Horta thanked Australia for its support and friendship.

Australia's Governor General, Quentin Bryce, has also presented Dr Ramos-Horta with three corrugated iron kangaroo sculptures which are now at the front of the President's palace.

Earlier, Dr Ramos-Horta restated that there would be no international tribunal to bring people responsible for human rights abuses in East Timor to justice.

He said he respected those calling for an international tribunal, but he said one would not be set up.

He called on the United Nations to disband its serious crimes unit, which is gathering evidence on those responsible for the violence in East Timor.

Indonesia's foreign minister, Hassan Wirajuda, attended the ceremony in Dili this morning.

Dr Ramos-Horta said he was confident Indonesia would bring people to justice in its own time.

Adopted teen finds answers, mystery in China

By Barbara Demick
Christian Norris of Easton, Md., remembers little of his pre-U.S. life. A reunion at a Beijing hotel helps fill in some of the gaps. Reporting from Beijing - The father fell to his knees, weeping. The mother quietly buried her face in her hands. The 17-year-old boy stood upright and motionless -- whether out of shock or stoicism, no one knew.

Christian Norris, who had just returned to China for the first time since he was adopted by an American eight years ago, didn't know what to think.

The interpreter stood quietly on the sidelines waiting for what seemed an eternity, the only sounds were the sobs and the clicking of cameras that filled the room.

"Honey, are you OK?" Christian's adoptive mother, Julia Norris, finally asked. He nodded affirmatively, but said nothing.

The reunion between Christian, a high school student in Easton, Md., and his birth parents took place Saturday in a Beijing hotel room crowded with well-wishers and media on hand to witness the virtually unprecedented event.

Since the early 1990s, an estimated 75,000 Chinese-born children have been adopted abroad, and although they increasingly visit China on heritage tours, Christian is one of only a few who have managed to chase down their personal history.

"I'm not sure yet," Christian answered with a teenage boy's characteristic reticence when asked what he hoped would come of the reunion. "I want to move on."

Christian's case is unusual in several respects: He's male, whereas most adoptees are girls abandoned because of the Chinese preference for boys and the government's "one child" policy. And unlike most adoptees, who are given up as babies, he lived with his family until he was nearly 7, leaving him with fragmentary memories that became vital clues in the search.

His birth parents were medical researchers, better educated than most who give up their children, and it was possible to track them down on the Internet.

It also helped that his U.S. mother, who works for an adoption agency, is both a firm believer in open adoptions and a tenacious investigator who once worked for the television show "America's Most Wanted."

Julia Norris was able to enlist an army of volunteers through a Chinese nonprofit called Baby Come Home, which helps Chinese parents search for lost children.

"This is the first case we've handled where an adopted child came back to find birth parents, but I expect it is going to happen more often," said Yang Guan, one of the agency's founders. "I hope that China can move to a more transparent system where orphanages are more able to make information available."

Like many families, Christian's had its secrets and silences.

He was born Jin Jiacheng in 1991 in Yinchuan, a city in the Ningxia region several hundred miles west of Beijing, to a couple who both worked in a hospital and already had a son. Because his parents could have been penalized for having a second child, he was sent as a newborn to his father's home village to be raised by his grandmother and a 23-year-old uncle, who pretended the infant was his own son. When he turned 6 and was ready to start school, they sent him back to the city.

He had lived only briefly with his birth parents when he somehow got lost, his family says. His father, Jin Gaoke, said that they were on an excursion by bus and that he got off for a few minutes to buy food at a market, returning to discover that the bus had driven off.

"I hope you can forgive our mistakes," the father mumbled repeatedly during the reunion.

The family was wrenched apart by the boy's absence. His mother went into a deep depression. His father and uncle stopped speaking to each other, the younger one blaming the father for losing the child.

"He was like my son. I felt so bad when he was lost, I would drink liquor to take away the sadness," said his uncle, Jin Xiaowang, now 40 and still farming wheat, potatoes and corn at the village home.

Jiacheng somehow ended up 350 miles to the east in Henan province, where he was found wandering under a bridge and brought to an orphanage in the city of Luoyang.

In 2000, Julia Norris was 2000, Julia Norris was touring the orphanage on a business trip when she met the boy and fell in love. She returned the following year to adopt him, becoming a single mother. Three years after that, she adopted a Chinese girl as well. Christian Norris of Easton, Md., remembers little of his pre-U.S. life. A reunion at a Beijing hotel helps fill in some of the gaps. Growing up, Christian was frustrated by the fragmentary nature of his memories. He could remember only a house in the country, mountains in the distance, grazing yaks, a few names. How he had gotten lost had been erased from his memory, perhaps by the trauma of it all; he remembers only a man buying him food and giving him money.

"I thought they abandoned me. It didn't feel good," Christian said.

Julia Norris decided to pursue Christian's origins because she worried he would be tormented for life by nagging questions.

"He needed the peace of mind of knowing what happened," she said.

She worries that many Chinese adoptees, now young children, will eventually be asking questions that will be almost impossible to answer. Adoptees usually have no information except the date and place they were found.

Norris' daughter, now 6, keeps asking, "Mommy, can I find out who my birth parents are too?" Norris said. "I can't make her any promises. She was found on the day she was born."

For Christian, the memories aren't exactly flooding back, but bits and pieces are starting to make sense. He can't remember a word of Chinese or his birth parents, but he recognized his grandmother and the uncle who raised him. At the reunion, his Chinese family gave him a bag with his favorite candy as a young child and an abacus -- on which he had been learning to count before he disappeared.

"This I remember," he said, fingering the beads -- one of the few times he smiled.

His Chinese family seems just as eager to understand the life that Christian has led in the United States. They pored over a photo album the American family brought: Christian posing with a surfboard. With a Halloween jack-o'-lantern. With his sister in front of the Christmas tree.

They marveled over the strapping American teenager Christian has become. A handsome, athletic boy, at 5 foot 8 he towers over all of his Chinese relatives.

"He's so big," his uncle exclaimed. "And he has hairy legs. Just like an American."

Christian and his mother, along with an aunt and uncle, will travel this week to Ningxia to visit his birthplace. Then he will return to start classes at Easton High School.

His birth parents say they are thrilled to see him, but do not expect him to move back.

"Jiacheng's roots are in China, but his future is in the United States," his father said. "It is clear that he has been well cared for and has a bright future in America."

His birth mother, Shao Julian, added quietly, "We hope to stay in touch with him, but we wouldn't try to force him to come back to China -- we wouldn't want to hurt him twice."

10,000 homes are threatened

Homeowners Jack and Debra Carr feel relief after hearing word from a U.S. Forest Service employee that their home in Big Tujunga Canyon is safe on Saturday night. (Christina House / For The Times / August 29or The Times / August 29, 2009)

Across the burning foothills, 1,000 are ordered to flee. Others watch, and dread the phone call to evacuate.
The unstoppable Angeles National Forest fire threatened 10,000 homes Saturday night as it more than tripled in size and chewed through a rapidly widening swath of the Crescenta Valley, where flames closed in on backyards and at least 1,000 homes were ordered evacuated.

Sending an ominous plume of smoke above the Los Angeles Basin, the fire was fueled by unrelenting hot weather and dense brush that has not burned in 60 years.

It took off Saturday afternoon in all directions, forcing residents out of homes from Big Tujunga Canyon to Pasadena, and reached toward Mt. Wilson.

Heavy smoke clung to the mountains and created a hot and massive convection column that limited the evening aerial fire fight.

Officials predicted that the blaze would continue its march toward homes and across hills through the night with flames that could reach as high as 80 feet.

Late Saturday, U.S. Forest Service officials said they were moving "several hundred firefighters" into the Acton area, where they expected the fire to reach this morning.

At midnight, crews were on alert for a wind shift.

The fire was headed toward Yerba Buena and Santa Clara ridges. El Dorado County Fire Capt. Larry Marinas said it was currently "probably bumping" against them, but all he could say for sure was that flames could reach those ridges "in 12 hours."

Forest Service officials said three civilians were burned and airlifted from rural Big Tujunga Canyon, where at least three to five homes were destroyed. One fire official, after surveying the canyon, estimated that the damage toll may be much worse.

No other homes had been lost by early evening as throngs of residents -- belongings loaded in cars -- descended from the hills.

"I wish I had good news for you," Les Curtis, a fire operations chief, said during a night briefing for firefighters. He shook his head and pointed to the map of the expanding fire zone. "How many of you have knots in your stomach?" he asked. More than a dozen raised their hands.

"Nothing can stop it," said Jost Vielmetter, 62, a Caltech scientist who watched the flames from the northern edge of Altadena.

By late Saturday afternoon, the fire had consumed more than 21,000 acres, propelled by temperatures that eclipsed 100 degrees, single-digit humidity and steep, rugged topography that made for a formidable foe despite low winds.

Firefighters can only expect a slight reprieve on the heat today as red-flag warnings extend until tonight. But more significant cooling and even a moist maroling and even a moist marine layer are expected Monday morning.

Fire officials estimate that about 10,000 homes are in danger if the fire continues burning unchecked.

At sundown, as scattered power outages hit the area, flames encircled the ridges near Briggs Terrace on the northeastern edge of La Crescenta. By 7:30 p.m., the northern end of Pickens Canyon, close to the neighborhood, exploded in flames.

"Oh, my God. This is what I've been dreading all day," said David Ferrera, 35, who grew up in the area.

It was the first time that he and his neighbors were seized with worry. At that point, clouds of glowing embers began floating up from the fire. Suddenly, so-called hotshots -- firefighters with shovels and axes -- rushed by on their way to battle.

Later, a wall of fire crept like lava along the mountainside toward Pickens Canyon homes. A tree would light up in a column of fire every few moments. On the streets, the air was still and quiet except for the crackle and roar of flames.

Firefighters climbed through backyards at the ends of the cul-de-sacs fronting the forest, laying their hoses and waiting to make a stand.
Across the burning foothills, 1,000 are ordered to 2C 1,000 are ordered to flee. Others watch, and dread the phone call to evacuate.
Capt. Kevin Klar of the Los Angeles County Fire Department was in place on Bristow Drive. "As far as the area goes, I think we're going to be all right," he said.

More than 1,800 firefighters from throughout California and the West used an arsenal of weapons to fight the flames.

Ten helicopters dropping buckets of water and eight air tankers were enlisted in the daytime fight.

Officials also are deploying at least one DC-10, one of the largest and most expensive pieces of firefighting equipment in the world.

Elsewhere, firefighters were on the verge of containing the Morris fire north of Azusa and a separate blaze on the Palos Verdes Peninsula. Firefighters also made progress on a fire near Hemet in the San Bernardino National Forest, which has burned nearly 2,300 acres and was 30% contained.

As flames bore down on canyon cul-de-sacs in the Crescenta Valley into the evening, residents watched raptly as firefighters -- in the air and on the ground -- valiantly kept the fire away from homes.

On the northern edge of Altadena, a DC-10 unloading fire retardant at the base of a column of smoke received a standing ovation from residents in the 3900 block of Chapman Court, which had been under mandatory evacuation orders for an hour.

Among them was physician John Cooper, 52.

"I think the firefighters are doing an incredible job. I'm in awe. I'd like to line them all up and shake their hands one at a time -- and we also have our fingers crossed," Cooper said, acknowledging the precarious nature of his address. "Live on the edge, and you take your chances."

Evacuated residents could only wait, watch and worry as flames licked the ridges near their homes. Some La Cañada Flintridge residents were evacuated Friday night, but on Saturday that mandatory evacuation order widened to parts of Altadena, La Crescenta, north Glendale and Big Tujunga Canyon. More evacuations were expected throughout the night.

All faced the same nerve-racking drill: the automated phone calls ordering them to leave, the choices about what to pack up, the negotiations with skittish pets refusing to be stuffed into portable kennels.

In Glendale, in the evacuation area north of Santa Carlotta Road, residents were packing up their cars and watering their lawns after being notified to leave.

Joanna Linkchorst, 42, dashed around her house videotaping her belongings, but appeared possessed of a preternatural calm. "For some reason I'm not concerned," she said. "There are far too many houses that would have to burn before it gets down here."

Although authorities stressed that people should not defy evacuation orders -- it puts them as well as fire and police personnel at risk -- some did anyway.

In Pickens Canyon, firefighter hotshots had taken up positions in front of about a dozen homes beneath the oak canopy. Every few minutes, patrol cars cruised by, urging holdouts to leave.

At 8:30 p.m., a law enforcement officer asked Bob Jamison and Gary Ireland, who were sprawled on lawn chairs watching the fire, to collect their belongings and leave the area.

"Everything's under control here," Jamison responded. "We got all the women, pets and important papers down the mountain."

Jay Porter, 47, and his two teenage sons stood on an Altadena ridgeline overlooking tinder-dry Millard Canyon as flames advanced to within 1,000 feet of his two-story Spanish-style home.

"I want to know what's going on here for as long as I possibly can," said Porter, who wasn't budging early Saturday evening. "Right now, I have more information than a lot of my neighbors."

He said, however, that he would relent overnight. He made reservations at a nearby Westin hotel that he said was offering "refugee specials" for evacuees -- in his case, that includes two dogs and a cockatiel.
Across the burning foothills, 1,000 are ordered to flee. Others watch, and dread the phone call to evacuate.
He watched as earthmovers in the distance rumbled over the ridge, toppling flammable chaparral and small trees in their paths. "Makes me happy," he said.

Ray Henmann, a 76-year-old graphic designer from Glendale whose home on Brookhill Street is in the evacuation area, said he had no plans to leave his home of 48 years.

The fire, he said, would have to come within a few streets of his home before he fled. "I'm not going to panic, I've lived too long to panic," Henmann said.

Across the region, there was no escaping the specter of what has been dubbed the Station fire. An ominous cloud of smoke wafted across the area and rose as high as 20,000 feet in the air, visible from the ocean and the San Fernando Valley, even the Antelope Valley. Otherwise fire-savvy Los Angeles residents were so startled by the sight that they inundated 911 emergency lines with calls about smoke. Authorities begged people to stop calling.

Donna Robinson, 60, of La Cañada Flintridge had been preparing to be evacuated since Wednesday, packing up documents, clothes and baby dish mementos of her adult children. She also packed up two dogs and three cats.

"I'm not even afraid now. I think it's good we're just out of the house. Now I feel it's not under my control," Robinson said Saturday morning as she sat with her husband, Paul, 57, outside the gym at La Cañada High, the evacuation center.

Others couldn't escape the worry. It showed on Sonia Castellon's face as she made her way into the evacuation center. "I was trying to keep calm, keep it together. But the moment you leave your home it's hard," the 46-year-old dentist said as she began to tear up.

U.S. fears clock ticking on Afghanistan

Lance Cpl. Mark Chieffallo of Pittsburg arrives at an observation post on a peak above a village in Helmand province with over Marines. (Julie Jacobson / Associated Press / August 22, 2009)

As public support wanes, the Obama administration feels it needs to deliver speedy progress in Afghanistan so that it can gain time and backing for its long-term military strategy.
Reporting from Kabul, Afghanistan, and Washington - The Obama administration is racing to demonstrate visible headway in the faltering war in Afghanistan, convinced it has only until next summer to slow a hemorrhage in U.S. support and win more time for the military and diplomatic strategy it hopes can rescue the 8-year-old effort.

But the challenge in Afghanistan is becoming more difficult in the face of gains by the Taliban, rising U.S. casualties, a weak Afghan government widely viewed as corrupt, and a sense among U.S. commanders that they must start the military effort largely from scratch nearly eight years after it began.

A turnaround is crucial because military strategists believe they will not be able to get the additional troops they feel they need in coming months if they fail to show that their new approach is working, U.S. officials and advisors say.

"Over the next 12 to 15 months, among the things you absolutely, positively have to do is persuade a skeptical American public that this can work, that you have a plan and a strategy that is feasible," said Stephen Biddle, a military expert who advises the U.S.-led command in Afghanistan.

A similarly urgent view was voiced by military and diplomatic officials who described the administration's goals and self-imposed deadline during recent interviews in Afghanistan and Washington. Most spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to comment publicly.

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, in an interview last month, first pointed publicly to the need for progress by next year. Since then, the goal has spanned the administration's international diplomatic efforts, its aid program for the Afghan government and its combat strategy.

Unlike during the Bush administration years, when Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld clashed with other Cabinet members, particularly in the State Department, Gates' assessment appears to be shared by every other major Obama administration player. At the White House, State Department and elsewhere, officials agreed on the need for rapid progress in key areas.

Besides reversing Taliban advances and strengthening the central government, U.S. officials will strive to hold the NATO alliance intact while reshuffling deployments to consolidate gains, especially in the eastern part of the country, near the Pakistani border.

Administration goals in
Administration goals in Afghanistan also include stemming government corruption, improving security forces, especially the police, and reducing violence through efforts such as wooing insurgents.

In part, the administration thinking reflects the growing impatience of liberal Democrats with the war. Sen. Russell Feingold of Wisconsin has called for a "flexible timetable" for troop withdrawals, while House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey of Wisconsin has warned of funding cuts next spring unless there is significant progress.

A senior administration official said Obey's comment was "a very important signal" to the White House.

Among military commanders, there has been no effort to sugarcoat conditions in Afghanistan.

"We need a fundamental new approach," said one officer, a senior advisor to Army Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the newly appointed top commander in Afghanistan.

McChrystal's initial assessment of Afghanistan to Pentagon officials is due soon, in a report expected to be made public in early September.

That report will probably avoid a troop recommendation, but by outlining McChrystal's view of what has gone wrong and his vision for fixing it, officers hope he can make Washington more receptive to a later request for more troops.

"We have to demonstrate we have a clear way ahead, matched with appropriate resources, that is making an impact on the ground," said the officer.

The proportion of Americans who believe it was a mistake to send troops to Afghanistan rose from about 25% in 2007 to 42% this year, according to Gallup surveys. A slight majority of Americans no longer believe the war is worth fighting, according to a Washington Post-ABC survey this month.

August has been the deadliest month for U.S. troops in Afghanistan. A U.S. fighter was killed Friday when his vehicle hit an explosive device in eastern Afghanistan, bringing the number of U.S. military deaths to 45 and exceeding the previous record, set in July. At least 732 U.S. service members have been killed in the Afghanistan war, compared with more than 4,300 killed in the Iraq conflict.

The faltering public support highlights another concern: the U.S. midterm elections next year. Democratic lawmakers fear they may become targets of Republican political attacks over the administration's handling of the war.
As public support wanes, the Obama administration feels it needs to deliver speedy progress in Afghanistan so that it can gain time and backing for its long-term military strategy.

In the face of those doubts and time pressures, top Obama administration officials such as James Jones, the national security advisor, have expressed skepticism about the prospects of sending more troops to Afghanistan.

President Obama has committed 21,000 additional troops this year, bringing the U.S. force to 68,000 by the end of the year. But military analysts said that the new strategy being developed in Kabul, the Afghan capital, will require still more troops.

Officers in Afghanistan consider much of the effort of the last eight years wasted, with too few troops deployed, many in the wrong regions and given the wrong orders.

For instance, in Iraq, the military spent between three and nine months on programs to roust militants from cities. In Afghanistan such clearing operations have lasted as little as three weeks.

"Clearing operations aren't about kicking down doors, or even going house to house once," said Kimberly Kagan, a strategist who has advised the military in both Iraq and Afghanistan. "They are about establishing presence and then building a trust relationship with the local population so that over time they feel they can provide information."

Shoring up NATO

Diplomatically, U.S. officials have begun a push to persuade NATO countries to send more forces to Afghanistan. And they are also trying to stave off departures by key allies.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, with its 38,000 troops, is considered important both to combat efforts and to the international credibility of the war.

But Canada, which now oversees the southern regional command, is scheduled to pull out its combat troops in 2011, and the Dutch are scheduled to leave next year. A German opposition party, the Free Democrats, this month called for the removal of Germany's 4,500 troops. And in Britain, public support for the war is flagging.

Any departures mean more work for U.S. forces, but are also likely to raise questions at home about why Americans are shouldering so much of the burden of the conflict.

"We cannot afford to re-Americanize the war," said a senior administration official.

Fighting corruption

As the military is overhauling its priorities, so too is the State Department. Richard C. Holbrooke, the U.S. representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, has signaled a major push to reduce corruption in the government as soon as the presidential election results are known.

Senior officials are weighing a number of approaches, including, possibly, an international commission to probe corruption cases. The goal is not only to improve Afghans' low regard for their government, but also to reassure Americans that the $2.6 billion a month they are providing is well spent.

U.S. officials acknowledge that the task is not easy. Afghan President Hamid Karzai, expected to win the election, has built political support for his administration through alliances with a number of regional leaders and warlords who face allegations of corruption.

One is his running mate, former Defense Minister Mohammed "Marshal" Fahim, accused of involvement in drug trafficking. U.S. officials have already warned Karzai that they were not happy with the prospect of Fahim as vice president.

Improving the police

Key to both the diplomatic and military strategies is a rapid expansion of the Afghan security forces.

U.S. officials are particularly focused on stepping up police training programs, a key to long-term stability in the country.

Holbrooke describes police training as one of the toughest jobs the allies face, and predicts that success in Afghanistan will depend heavily on whether a skilled force can provide security. But NATO officials continue to report that Afghan police, woefully undertrained in many regions, can't be trusted with many of the most important assignments.

Choosing fights

Most military officers believe lasting progress will be years in the making. But they also realize that they only have a few months to add to the perception that they are making headway.

As a result, the military is likely to focus on select goals instead of trying to save the entire country at once. McChrystal has said he plans to focus efforts on securing population centers. That means, at least initially, Taliban outposts that do not threaten significant Afghan cities or villages will not be targeted.

"We have to do triage," Biddle said. "We do not have the resources to stabilize the whole country at once."

Suicide Blast Kills 12 in Pakistan's Swat Valley

A Pakistani police officer stands at the site of a suicide bombing in Mingora, the main town of Pakistan's troubled of Pakistan's troubled Swat Valley, Sunday, 30 Aug. 2009

By VOA News
Pakistan officials say at least 12 police recruits have been killed in suicide bomb attack.

Authorities say the attack in the northwestern Swat Valley happened Sunday while the cadets were training near a police station.

Associated Press says television footage shows officers picking up mutilated bodies.

The attack on the police comes a day after Pakistan's military announced it destroyed a training camp for suicide bombers in the Swat Valley.

The army said in a statement that reports from intelligence sources and local residents led them to the location in northwest Pakistan.

Six militants were reported killed in the operation and several others were said to be wounded.

Pakistan's government has been fighting a Taliban insurgency in the northwest.

Fighting Stops as Kokang Surrender Arms to Chinese

ighting near the Sino-Burmese border came to an abrupt halt today after about 700 Kokang troops handed over their weapons to Chinese officials following days of clashes that sent thousands fleeing across the border.

Aung Kyaw Zaw, a Burmese military analyst who is close to the Kokang, told The Irrawaddy on Saturday that at least 700 soldiers from the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army (MNDAA), an ethnic-Kokang militia, crossed the border into China today and surrendered their arms to local officials.He added that troops from the United Wa State Army (UWSA), a much larger force allied to the Kokang, have been repositioned to Wa-controlled territory.

The Irrawaddy was unable to verify this information with other independent sources.

The sudden end to 0A
The sudden end to the fighting came a day after Kokang and UWSA troops ambushed a convoy of Burmese army vehicles in Kokang territory. According to unconfirmed reports, more than a dozen Burmese soldiers were killed in the attack.

On Thursday, a 20-year ceasefire between the Burmese army and the armed ethnic groups broke down after government forces moved to occupy Kokang territory. Since then, the Burmese army has sent reinforcements into the area from Light Infantry Divisions 33 and 99.

The crisis began on Monday, when tens of thousands of refugees, including Chinese businessmen, started flooding across the border into China from Laogai, a town in Kokang territory. Cross-border trade in Laogai has since come to a standstill and trading at other border checkpoints has decreased, say sources in the area.

The rapidly deteriorating situation caused consternation in Beijing, which has long had close relations with both sides in the conflict. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Jiang Yu said China hoped the Burmese junta would deal with the situation properly and ensure stability along the border and protect Chinese citizens in Burma.

“China is following the situation closely and has expressed concern to Myanmar [Burma],” said Jiang.

Some observers said that junta head Snr-Gen Than Shwe’s decision to send troops into Kokang territory despite China’s concerns showed his determination to demonstrate that he will not be constrained by Beijing.

“The Burmese junta doesn’t care what anybody thinks, so I don’t think the generals are thinking about China’s response,” said Chan Tun, a former Burmese ambassador to China.

But while Naypyidaw showed little concern about the consequences of renewed fighting in the area, Beijing couldn’t ignore the worsening situation, as Chinese living near the border expressed outrage at the Burmese military’s actions.

“I feel upset with the Burmese government. The Kokang people have Chinese blood. And in China, many people are so angry that they are urging the Chinese government to send troops to help the Kokang,” said a Chinese journalist who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Although Beijing appears to have defused the potentially explosive situation for the time being, it remains to be seen if fighting will resume between the Burmese and the Wa, who command a much larger military force uch larger military force than the Kokang.

The current conflict stems from the refusal of ethnic ceasefire groups, including Kokang, Wa, Kachin and Shan militias, to transform themselves into border security forces under Burmese military command.

The 20,000-strong UWSA presents the greatest obstacle to Burmese ambitions to pacify the country’s borders after six decades of civil conflict. Although they were among the first ethnic groups to sign a ceasefire agreement with the current regime in 1989, they have also been the most resistant to any effort to weaken their hold over their territory.

In Rangoon, news of the clashes in the country’s north has revived memories of the insurgencies that wracked the region for decades.

“People here are talking about it at teashops. They are saying that this is the return of civil war,” said an editor of a private weekly journal in Rangoon.

Meanwhile, Burma’s main opposition party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), called for a peaceful resolution of the ongoing conflict in northern Burma.

“We want the junta to resolve the issue in a peaceful way with ethnic groups,” NLD spokesman Han Thar Myint told The Irrawaddy on Saturday. “The cause of the conflict is the Burmese regime’s failure to resolve problems in the country politically.”

3 homes destroyed, many more threatened by Ca fire

LOS ANGELES – Authorities say a wildfire north of Los Angeles has destroyed at least three homes and is threatening thousands more.

Captain Mike Dietrich — the incident commander for the U.S. Forest Service — said at a news conference Saturday night that the fire was "the perfect storm of fuels, weather and topography coming together" and called the situation "very treacherous."

He says firefighters have discovered three burned homes in remote sections of the Angeles National Forest and are looking for more that may have been destroyed.

The fire near the mountain communities of La Canada Flintridge and Altadena had tripled in size Saturday to more than 31 square miles, sent huge billows of smoke over Los Angeles and left three people injured.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check baKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A growing wildfire sending massive billows of smoke into the sky north of Los Angeles nearly tripled in size Saturday, injuring three residents, burning a small number of homes, knocking out power to many more and prompting thousands of evacuations in a number of mountain communities.

Mandatory evacuations were extended Saturday into neighborhoods in the canyons on the northwestern edge of Altadena, Glendale, Pasadena, La Crescenta and Big Tujunga Canyon, Forest Service spokesman Bruce Quintelier said.

The flames crept lower down the slopes of the San Gabriel Mountains despite winds blowing predominantly in the other direction, in the other direction, in the other direction, threatening more than 2,000 homes in the La Canada Flintridge area.

A few homes and about 25 recreational cabins have burned but exact numbers were not immediately available, said Forest Service spokesman Gabriel Alvarez.

An evacuation center was set up at La Canada High School and Jackson Elementary School in Altadena.

The fire was the largest and most dangerous of several burning around southern and central California and in Yosemite National Park.

Flames knocked out power to at least 164 residences in La Canada Flintridge Saturday afternoon, according to Southern California Edison. Repair crews were ordered to stay out of the area because of fire danger.

More than 31 square miles of dry forest was scorched by the fire, which continued to move out in all directions, the most active flanks to the north, deeper into the forest, and east, Quintelier said. The blaze was only 5 percent contained.

At least three residents of Big Tujunga Canyon were burned and airlifted to local hospitals, Quintelier said. The details of their injuries were unknown.

Air crews waged a fierce late afternoon battle against the southeast corner of the fire, burning dangerously close to canyon homes. Spotter planes with tankers on their tails dove well below ridge lines to lay bright orange retardant then pulled up dramatically over neighborhoods, and giant sky crane helicopters swooped in to unleash showers on the biggest flareups.

The amount of smoke was hampering air operations in some areas, officials said.

"It's difficult for water-dropping aircraft to get in there, but they're still trying," Forest Service spokeswoman Jessica Luna said.

The fire was burning in steep wooded hills adjacent to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in northern Pasadena. Nearby, Dawn James, 39, a physical therapist, and friend Leah Evans, 39, watched flames roil on the mountainsides from an equestrian park where they had brought two horses from their stables. James lives in the area and her husband stayed up at the house while she watched the horses.

"We always knew it could come. We knew it was a possibility," James said.

Evans said she watched the flames spread as she spent the night in her pickup truck near her horses.

"Through the night, you kind of watch it diminish, and then flare up," said Evans. "It's just amazing to watch, kind of unbelievable."

In La Vina, a gated community of luxury homes in the Altadena area, a small group of residents stood at the end of a cul-de-sac on the lip of a canyon and watched aircraft battle flames trying to cross the ridge on the far side.

At one point, the flying circus of relatively small propellor-driven tankers gave way to the sight of a giant DC-10 jumbo jet unleashing0 a rain of red retardant.

"We see a drop, we give a big cheer," said Gary Blackwood, who works on telescope technology at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "We've watched it now for two days hop one ridge at a time and now it's like we're the next ridge."

A major goal was to keep the fire from spreading up Mount Wilson, where many of the region's broadcast and communications antennas and the historic Mount Wilson Observatory are located, officials said.

A thick layer of smoke hovered over the Los Angeles Basin and San Fernando Valley, and officials issued a smoke advisory for communities near the fire. Residents were urged to avoid exertion and seek air-conditioned shelter.

A second fire in the Angeles National Forest was burning several miles to the east in a canyon above the city of Azusa. The 3.4-square-mile blaze, which started Tuesday afternoon, was 85 percent contained Saturday. No homes were threatened, and full containment was expected by Monday.

A wildfire on the Palos Verdes Peninsula on the south Los Angeles County coast was 100 percent contained Saturday afternoon, according to county fire officials. As many as 1,500 people were forced to flee at the height of the fire Thursday night. Six homes received minor exterior damage, but the only structures destroyed were an outbuilding and gazebo. No injuries were reported.

Southeast of Los Angeles in Riverside County, a 3 1/2-square-mile fire in a rural area of the San Bernardino National Forest was 10 percent contained.

Crews aided by aircraft were working to build a line around the fire, which was burning in steep, rocky terrain in Beeb Canyon, according to Forest Service spokeswoman Norma Bailey. No structures were threatened. Temperatures were expected to top 100 degrees in the region, but winds remained light.

To the north, in the state's coastal midsection, a 9.4-square-mile fire threatening Pinnacles National Monument kept 100 homes under evacuation orders near the Monterey County town of Soledad. The blaze, 60 percent contained, was started by agricultural fireworks used to scare animals away from crops. The fire destroyed one home.

In the southern part of Monterey County, firefighters had 100 percent containment of a 5 1/4-square-mile fire that had threatened 20 ranch homes.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared a state of emergency Friday in Los Angeles and Monterey counties.

"It's fire season, clearly," he said. "There's tremendous amount of heat all over the state."

A state of emergency was declared Saturday for Mariposa County, where a nearly 5.5-square-mile fire burned in Yosemite National Park. The blaze was 30 percent contained, park officials said. No structures were threatened.

Park officials closed a campground and a portion of Highway 120, anticipating that the fire would spread north toward Tioga Road, the highest elevation route through the Sierra. The number of firefighters was expected to double over the weekend to 1,000.

The Mariposa County Sheriff's Office ordered guests and staff at the Yosemite View Lodge, in the town of El Portal just outside the park's western gate, to evacuate Friday due to the fire.

The evacuation was broadened later Friday to include the eastern part of El Portal, with about 100 residents leaving their homes, said Brad Aborn, chairman of Mariposa's Board of Supervisors. He said the remainder of the town, an estimated 75 people, were evacuated Saturday morning.

People without lodging were offered beds in a shelter in Mariposa staffed by the Red Cross.

"I went over and visited. ... Only one spent the night," Aborn said. "They're probably staying with friends."

Police review cases for connections to kidnap case

ANTIOCH, Calif. – Police on Saturday searched the home of a California couple charged with kidnapping a little girl 18 years ago looking for evidence linking them to other open cases in the area, including the unsolved murders of prostitutes.

The investigations are "preliminary," said Jimmy Lee, a spokesman for the Contra Costa County Sheriff's Department, east of San Francisco Bay. He declined to discuss what cases were being reviewed.

Police in Pittsburg are investigating whether Phillip Garrido, whose home is in nearby Antioch, is linked to several unsolved murders of prostitutes in the early 1990s. Antioch police are also looking into unsolved cases but declined further details.

About a dozen agents scoured the modest house and the acre of land it sat on Saturday afternoon as the temperature soared into triple digits.

Residents on the once-quiet street complained about the media circus that has engulfed their working class neighborhood since the arrest of Phillip and Nancy Garrido on Wednesday. Television trucks were parked on both sides of the street and about a dozen journalists paced in front of the home, which was cordoned with yellow, crime-scene tape.

Phillip and Nancy Garrido are in jail, suspected of abducting Dugard 18 years ago and subjecting her to nearly a lifetime of torment in a squalid backyard compound. They pleaded not guilty Friday to a total of 29 counts, including forcible abduction, rape and false imprisonment.

Authorities say Jaycee Lee Dugard, the little girl abducted in 1991 who is now 29, has had two daughters with Garrido.

Neighbors in Antioch had complained to law enfohad complained to law enforcement that a psychotic sex addict was in their midst, alarmed that Phillip Garrido was housing young girls in backyard tents. A deputy showed up to investigate, but never went beyond the front porch.

Probation officers showed up at the home, too, but had no inkling that his backyard was actually a labyrinth of tents, sheds and buildings that were Dugard's prison. They didn't even know he had children on the premises.

Garrido wore a GPS-linked ankle bracelet that tracked his every movement, the result of earlier sex-crime convictions in Nevada.

Outrage came as the Contra Costa County Sheriff's Department acknowledged it missed an opportunity to arrest Garrido in 2006 after the neighbor's complaint about children living in the yard.

"I cannot change the course of events but we are beating ourselves up over this and continue to do so," Sheriff Warren E. Rupf said Friday.

"We should have been more inquisitive, more curious and turned over a rock or two."

Garrido gave a rambling, sometimes incoherent phone interview to KCRA-TV from the county jail Thursday, saying he didn't admit the alleged kidnapping to investigators and that he had turned his life around since the birth of his first daughter 15 years ago.

Garrido came under suspicion in the unsolved murders of several prostitutes in the 1990s, raising the prospect he was a serial killer as well. Several of the women's bodies — the exact number is not known — were dumped near an industrial park where Garrido worked during the 1990s.

Dugard, now 29, was reunited with her mother, sister and another relative Thursday. She is said to be in good health, but feeling guilty about developing a bond with Garrido, said her stepfather Carl Probyn. Her two children, 11 and 15, remain with her.

"Jaycee has strong feelings with this guy. She really feels it's almost like a marriage," said Probyn, who was there when little Jaycee was snatched from a bus stop in 1991 and has been in contact with her mother since they found out the girl was alive.

"Hi, mom, I have babies," was Dugard's first words to her mother when they were reunited Thursday, Probyn said, adding it appears she never told them she was kidnapped by their father.

She is now free thanks in large part to two quick-thinking police employees at the University of California, Berkeley. Garrido was on campus with his two daughters earlier this week saying he wanted to hold some sort of religious event.

Garrido seemed incoherent and mentally unstable, and the girls wore drab-colored dresses, were unusually subdued and had an unnaturally pale complexion, said Lisa Campbell, a special-events unit manager with UC Berkeley's police department.

Garrido's parole officer was alerted. On Wednesday, Garrido arrived at the probation officer's building with his wife, the two girls and a woman who initially identified herself as Allissa — who was in fact Dugard. Investigators said Garrido confessed to the kidnapping.

Authorities say they do not yet know whether Dugard ever tried to escape or alert anyone of her whereabouts. During her period of captivity Garrido did a stint behind bars.

After his release, Garrido met with his parole agent several times each month and was subject to routine surprise home visits and random drug and alcohol tests, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation spokesman Gordon Hinkle said. The last unannounced visit by a team of local police agencies was conducted in July 2008.

"There was never any indication to my knowledge that there was any sign of children living there," Hinkle said.

The heavily wooded Antioch compound was arranged so that people could not view what was happening, and one of the buildings was soundproofed.

Garrido was required to register as a sex offender because he was convicted in 1977 of kidnapping a 25-year-old woman from parking lot in South Lake Tahoe, the same town Jaycee Dugard lived in when she was kidnapped.

Kennedy laid to rest at Arlington, beside brothers

WASHINGTON – Sen. Edward M. Kennedy was laid to rest Saturday night alongside slain brothers John and Robert on hallowed ground at Arlington National Cemetery, celebrated for "the dream he kept alive" across the decades since their deaths.

Crowds lined the streets of two cities on a day that marked the end of an American political era — outside Kennedy's funeral in rainy Boston where he was eulogized by President Barack Obama, and later in the day in humid, late-summer Washington.

With flags over the Capitol flying at half-staff, his hearse stopped outside the Senate where he served for 47 years. His widow, Vicki, embraced former staff members in the crowd.

Later, at a graveside enveloped in deepening darkness, Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick offered sympathies to Kennedy relatives and "an extended family that must probably include most of America."

A squad of seven riflemen fired three volleys in a traditional military funeral ritual, and a bugler sounded taps. Lightning flickered across the sky.

Hours earlier, Obama delivered the eulogy in Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church in Boston, packed with row upon row of mourners — including former presidents George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter.

"He was given a gift of time that his brothers were not. And he used that time to touch as many lives and right as many wrongs as the years would allow," Obama said in remarks that also gently made mention of Kennedy's "personal failings and setbacks."

As a member of the Senate, Kennedy was a "veritable force of nature," the president said. But more than that, he was the "baby of the family who became itf the family who became itf the family who became its patriarch, the restless dreamer who became its rock."

Those left behind to mourn "grieve his passing with the memories he gave, the good he did, the dream he kept alive" Obama said.

One of Kennedy's sons, Patrick, wept quietly as another, Teddy Jr., spoke from the pulpit. Teddy Jr. recalled the day years ago, shortly after losing a leg to cancer, that he slipped walking up an icy driveway as he headed out to go sledding. "I started to cry and I said, `I'll never be able to climb up that hill.'"

"And he lifted me up in his strong, gentle arms and said something I will never forget. He said, `I know you can do it. There is nothing that you can't do.'"

Kennedy's freshly excavated gravesite was on a gently sloping Virginia hillside, flanked by a pair of maple trees. His brother Robert, killed in 1968 while running for president, lies 100 feet away. It is another 100 feet to the eternal flame that has burned since 1963 for John F. Kennedy, president when he was assassinated.

The youngest brother died Tuesday at 77, more than a year after he was diagnosed with a brain tumor. An oak cross, painted white, marked the head of his grave, and a flat marble footstone bore the simple inscription, "Edward Moore Kennedy 1932-2009."

McCarrick, archbishop emeritus of Washington, read from a letter from Kennedy to Pope Benedict XVI, hand-delivered earlier this year by Obama.

"I know that I have been an imperfect human being but with the help of my faith I have tried to right my path," the dying senator wrote. He wrote the pontiff "with deep humility to ask that you pray for me as my own health declines."

The Vatican responded with a letter that said "his Holiness prays that in the days ahead you may be sustained in faith and hope."

Morning rain beat down steadily as Kennedy's coffin was borne by a military honor guard into the Catholic church, and again when it was brought back out for the flight to Washington and the military cemetery just across the Potomac River from Washington.

In life, the senator had visited the burial ground often to mourn his brothers, killed in their 40s, more than a generation ago, by assassins' bullets.

Hundreds lined nearby sidewalks, ignoring the rain, as the funeral procession passed.

"I said to myself this morning, 'No matter what the weather, I'm going, I don't care if I have to swim," said Lillian Bennett, 59, who added she was a longtime Kennedy supporter and determined to get as close as she could to the invitation-only funeral.

"The Mass of Christian burial weaves together memory and hope," said the Rev. Mark R. Hession, the Kennedy's parish priest in Cape Cod.

There was plenty of both in a two-hour service filled with references to Kennedy's political accomplishments and personal recollections of his private life. Cellist Yo-Yo Ma and tenor Placido Domingo provided musical grace notes.

Kennedy's widow, Vicki, his sole surviving sibling, Jean, and Robert Kennedy's widow, Ethel, carefully arranged the cloth funeral pall atop the coffin.

Like others, Teddy Jr., touched on his father's legacy.

"He answered Uncle Joe's call to patriotism, Uncle Jack's call to public service and Bobby's determination to seek a newer world. Unlike them, he lived to be a grandfather," he said.

Joseph Kennedy Jr. died in World War II, John F. Kennedy was the nation's 35th president when he was assassinated in 1963 and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy was killed five years later as he campaigned for the presidency.

Saturday's events marked the end of four days of public and private mourning meant to emphasize Kennedy's 47 years in the Senate from Massachusetts, his standing as the foremost liberal Democrat of the late 20th century yet a legislator who courted compromise with Republicans, a family man and last heir to a dynasty that began in the years after World War II.

Thousands of mourners filed past his flag-draped coffin earlier in the week when Kennedy lay in repose at the John F. Kennedy Library in Boston. Republicans and Democrats alike recalled his political career in a bipartisan evening of laughter-filled speechmaking on Friday.

Even the church had special meaning for the family. Kennedy prayed there daily several years ago during his daughter Kara's successful battle with lung cancer.

New Mexico governor urges U.S., Cuba to improve ties

HAVANA, Cuba (CNN) -- The United States and Cuba should show some flexibility and take steps to improve relations, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson said Friday during a weeklong trade mission to the island nation. "There is a good atmosphere [between the two countries]," he said at a news conference in Havana on Friday. "It is the best atmosphere I've seen in many years." Richardson called for "concrete steps from both sides," but noted a "lack of flexibility in their positions" and reciprocity from the Cuban government.

He also called on the United States to "pay more attention to the Cuba issue, though acknowledged more urgent U.S. priorities like health-care reform have drawn attention away from normalizing relations.

In his first trip to Cuba in 13 years, when he negotiated the release of three political prisoners in 1996, Richardson said he is not in Cuba as a special U.S. envoy.

"My main objective is trade and to improve commercial ties with Cuba," he said, though he acknowledged plans to report recommendations to the Obama administration early next week. Watch Richardson discuss goals for Cuba trip »

Despite the near half-century trade embargo, the U.S. Treasury Department allows U.S. states to sell agricultural, medical and IT products in Cuba on a cash basis.

The governor also called on the Obama administration to ease restrictions of biotechnology products, allow Cubans to travel to the United States for academic and cultural exchanges, and implement the changes to Cuban-American travel and remittances announced in April.

He mentioned a proposal to allow diplomats in either country to move more freely and offered to broker a dialogue between the Cuban government and Cuban-Americans.

"If there's going to be a solution for the normalization of relationship between Cuba and the United States, Cuban-Americans must play a role," he said, noting that any such dialogue would not substitute government-to-government talks.

Richardson -- known for his diplomatic resume, including high-level talks with North Korea, Sudan and Iraq -- met with Cuba's National Assembly president, Ricardo Alarcon, and received a personal letter from former President Fidel Castro.

The governor also called on the Obama administration to ease restrictions of biotechnology products, allow Cubans to travel to the United States for academic and cultural exchanges, and implement the changes to Cuban-American travel and remittances announced in April.

He mentioned a proposal to allow diplomats in either country to move more freely and offered to broker a dialogue between the Cuban government and Cuban-Americans.

"If there's going to be a solution for the normalization of relationship between Cuba and the United States, Cuban-Americans must play a role," he said, noting that any such dialogue would not substitute government-to-government talks.

Richardson -- known for his diplomatic resume, including high-level talks with North Korea, Sudan and Iraq -- met with Cuba's National Assembly president, Ricardo Alarcon, and received a personal letter from former President Fidel Castro.

"It was a positive message that I got," he said of the letter.

The former presidential candidate was nominated for Commerce Secretary in the Obama administration, but withdrew amid an investigation over whether CDR Financial Products inappropriately won $1.4 million in state work for New Mexico.

A sister’s special tie with her youngest brother

By Brian C. Mooney In a life lived mostly out of the spotlight, Jean Kennedy Smith had a close bond with the brother she buried yesterday in Arlington National Cemetery.

Now 81, Kennedy Smith is the last living child of Joseph and Rose Kennedy, the final link to an extraordinary constellation of siblings who left an indelible mark on postwar America. Since Edward M. Kennedy’s death Tuesday, Kennedy Smith, along with the senator’s wife, Victoria Reggie Kennedy, has led the extended Kennedy family in mourning.

“Jean, I know you lost your soul mate,’’ Kennedy’s niece, Caroline, told her at Friday night’s memorial service at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum. “All your nieces and nephews are here to help you as best we can.’’

Kennedy Smith was the eighth of nine children; Edward Kennedy was the youngest, born four years later. She introduced him to his first wife, Joan, and, when she was 65, her brother prevailed on President Clinton to name Kennedy Smith ambassador to Ireland.

When their sister Eunice Kennedy Shriver died two weeks before the senator, Kennedy Smith stayed with her brother, whose failing health prevented him from attending the funeral.

“Jean always had a special relationship with Teddy,’’ their mother wrote in her 1974 memoir, “Times to Remember.’’

“They were a pair; they trotted around together; she sometimes admonished him and sometimes scrapped with him but mainly was his valiant friend and big sister,’’ she wrote.��’ she wrote. “She still is, though he is now nearly twice as big as she is.’’

Kennedy Smith worked on the campaigns of her brothers John, Robert, and Edward, and she accompanied President Kennedy on his famous visit to Ireland in 1963, five months before his assassination.

She is best known for her service as ambassador to Ireland, from 1993 to 1998, when she played a significant and controversial role in advancing the cause of peace in Northern Ireland. In 1994, over the objections of the British and members of her own staff, Kennedy Smith strongly urged the State Department to allow a US visit by Gerry Adams, the leader of Sinn Fein, the political arm of the Irish Republican Army. The IRA later declared a cease-fire, and the visa is viewed as a factor in that decision.

Two years later, however, Kennedy Smith was reprimanded by the secretary of state of the time, Warren Christopher, for retaliating against a pair of subordinates who had objected to granting Adams a visa.

She also raised diplomatic eyebrows by taking Communion in an Anglican church in support of the Irish president, Mary McAleese, who was being criticized for doing the same in an effort to promote religious tolerance.

“There’s no ambiguity about the Kennedys in Ireland, so doors opened for her,’’ said Maurice Mannin�� said Maurice Manning, who was leader of the Seanad, Ireland’s senate, at the time. “She was a very unorthodox ambassador, at times annoying people in government because she had her own agenda, which was essentially to bring Gerry Adams and company in from the cold. She was hugely successful and hugely influential in doing that.’’ Manning, who is now chancellor of the National University of Ireland, said, “There’s a quietness and charm but also a toughness and single-mindedness to Kennedy Smith.’’ She was also, Manning said, “very socially gregarious and gave the best parties of any ambassadors anywhere. People fought to get into her place’’ at Dublin’s Phoenix Park.

As Kennedy Smith prepared to return to the United States, McAleese bestowed on her honorary citizenship in the country that her great-grandfather, Patrick Kennedy, had left 150 years earlier.

Like her mother, Kennedy Smith was educated at schools run by the Society of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. These included convent schools in the United States and England and her mother’s alma mater, Manhattanville College in Purchase, N.Y. At Manhattanville, her roommate was Ethel Skakel, whom she introduced to her older brother, Robert. Later, she introduced a younger Manhattanville student, Joan Bennett, to brother Ted, and they were engaged not long after.

Kennedy Smith married Stephen E. Smith, who grew up in Brooklyn in a wealthy family that made a fortune in the tugboat and barge business in New York. Smith, who died of cancer in 1990, was a major behind-the-scenes figure in the Kennedy family, managing political campaigns, the family finances, and the effort to build the Kennedy Library. The couple lived in Washington and New York’s Upper East Side and raised two biological sons and two adopted daughters.

Their second oldest, William Kennedy Smith, a physician whose practice focuses on victims of landmines, was acquitted in 1991 of charges he raped a woman in Palm Beach, Fla., after a night of drinking with his uncle Ted and cousin Patrick Kennedy.

While her sister Eunice won acclaim for establishing and promoting the Special Olympics, which has changed perceptions of the mentally challenged, Kennedy Smith in 1974 established VSA Arts, which promotes learning and education through the arts for people with disabilities in more than 50 countries. In 1993, she co-wrote with George Plympton “Chronicles of Courage: Very Special Artists.’’

Besides VSA, she has promoted and raised funds for causes and philanthropies ranging from international peace to Irish immigration.

Tally in Afghanistan Shows Karzai Lead Widening

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — President Hamid Karzai widened his lead in Afghan elections as new vote tallies were released Saturday, inching closer to the 50 percent threshold of votes he needs to avoid a runoff.With ballots counted from about a third of the country’s polling stations, election authorities said Mr. Karzai had 46.2 percent and his top challenger, Abdullah Abdullah, had 31.4 percent.

The country’s Independent Election Commission has been slow in releasing partial results from the Aug. 20 presidential vote, while accusations of fraud have mounted. The United Nations-backed Electoral Complaints Commission has said the number of complaints that could “materially affect” the outcome had soared to 270.

Videos of possible fraud have been posted on the Internet, and Mr. Abdullah and other challengers have made complaints about cheating.

The accusations, along with low turnout in the south because of Taliban threats of violence, could strip the vote of legitimacy in Afghan eyes. Final results are to come in late September.

The lengthy election process has added to strains in relations between the United States and Afghanistan, which had already cooled since the Obama administration took office.

Meanwhile, Britain’s prime minister, Gordon Brown, paid a surprise visit Saturday to British troops in southern Afghanistan, promising more help to cope with the Taliban insurgents who have inflicted casualties on the embattled force and undercut support in Britain for the war.

Mr. Brown, speaking at the British base in Lashkar Gah, pledged to provide more equipment to help overcome roadside bombs, a major threat to NATO forces.

A British marine was killed by a bomb in Helmand on Saturday, the Defense Ministry said in London. And, Reuters reported, an American serviceman was killed by a roadside bomb in the east, NATO-led forces said in a statement that gave no further details.

Last week, British troops cleared 337 roadside bombs from some of the most dangerous roads in Helmand Province, a main focus in the recent fighting.

“Let me pay tribute to the courage, bravery, professionalism and patriotism of our forces,” Mr. Brown told the troops. “This has been a most difficult summer in Afghanistan, because the Taliban have tried to prevent elections taking place.”

He added, “I think our forces have shown extraordinary courage during this period.”

Mr. Brown also called for speeding up the elled for speeding up the effort to train about 50,000 additional Afghan troops, which would bring the overall level trained to around 135,000.

The prime minister arrived with Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup, chief of the British defense staff, and met with senior commanders including the top United States officer, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal.

More than 200 British soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan since the war began in 2001 — more than Britain lost in the Iraq conflict. Many in Britain believe the mission is too open-ended, and its goals too vague.

Mr. Brown’s visit came a day after Britain replaced its top army official, Gen. David Richards, a former commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan. He succeeded Gen. Sir Richard Dannatt, who was appointed in 2006 and frequently clashed with lawmakers over defense spending, particularly relating to delays in providing helicopters.

General Richards, regarded as politically savvy, was able to build close relationships with Mr. Karzai and his ministers while leading NATO troops.

British officials said that they recognized the need for better-armored vehicles and more helicopters and that they would get them here as soon as possible.

As NATO commander, General Richards was a prominent backer of a controversial peace plan in the southern Afghan town of Musa Qala under which NATO, Afghan and Taliban soldiers were not allowed in the town.

The deal collapsed when Taliban fighters overran the area, though foreign and Afghan troops later waged a fierce battle to recapture Musa Qala.

Bush shoe thrower to be freed

An Iraqi journalist jailed after hurling his shoes at George Bush, the former US president, will be released in September.

Muntadhar al-Zaidi's sentence was reduced for good behaviour, his lawyer said on Saturday.

Karim al-Shujairi, a defence attorney, said al-Zeidi will now be released on September 14, three months early.

Al-Zaidi was initially sentenced to three years after pleading not guilty to assaulting a foreign leader, then the court reduced it to one year because the journalist had no prior criminal history.

The act of the 30-year-old reporter during Bush's last visit to Iraq as president turned him into a folk hero across the Arab world amid anger over the 2003 invasion.

The incident, which took place on December 14, embarrassed Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, who was standing next to Bush at the time during a joint news conference.

Neither leader was injured, but Bush was forced to duck for cover as the journalist shouted in Arabic: "This is your farewell kiss, you dog! This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq."

Yemen rebels 'seize army hardware'

Shia fighters in Yemen's north have released pictures of military equipment that they say they seized from government forces.

The images came as the UN on Saturday called for the creation of safe corridors to let people out of Saada city, now practically cut off from the outside world by nearly three weeks of fighting between government forces and the fighters.

Antonio Guterres, the UN high commissioner for refugees, said humanitarian corridors could allow the delivery of much-needed aid to thousands of displaced people in the Saada region.

The UNHCR estimates that about 35,000 people have been displaced by the fighting between the army and the Shia fighters, also known as Houthis after their leader.

Speaking in Geneva, Andrej Mahecic, a UNHCR spokesman, said that Saada, in Yemen's north, had been "practically cut off from the rest of the world".

"The residents, as well as those displaced in Saada city, are unable to leave," Mahecic said, according to a statement on the organisation's website.

There are no reliable reports of casualty figures.

'Operation Scorched Earth'

Some reports said that the Houthis had stopped government troops from advancing in several areas, including Malaheez, and Sufyan district in neighbouring Imran province.The Houthis also claimed to have captured an undetermined number of soldiers, destroying two tanks in an attack on an army point in Maqash, near Saada city.

But a military spokesman claimed that the army killed several fighters in the same clash. The government insists that it has inflicted heavy casualties on the fighters, who are from the Zaidi sect of Shia Islam.

Telehia Islam.

Television footage showed warplanes striking targets in the mountains around Saada and salvos of rockets being fired by a line of launchers.

The Houthis have accused the government of targeting civilians in its attacks.

They have also alleged neighbouring Sunni Saudi Arabia has been sending warplanes to aid Yemeni troops, during the course of the 18-day conflict, which the government has dubbed "Operation Scorched Earth".

That claim has been ridiculed by the Yemeni government which accuses Shia Iran of backing the Houthis.

The government had offered a six-point plan to end the fighting but the rebels dismissed the offer, recalling that a Qatari-brokered peace deal reached in June 2007 had never been implemented.

Japan votes in parliamentary poll

Voting has begun across Japan in parliamentary elections which are widely predicted to sweep the opposition into power.

Opinion polls indicate that the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), led by Yukio Hatoyama, will put an end to more than 50 years of almost continuous rule by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) of Taro Aso, the prime minister.

Voting booths opened at 7am local time (22:00 GMT on Saturday) and close at 8pm (11:00 GMT on Sunday), with exit polls expected shortly afterwards.

About 103 million Japanese are eligible to vote, with turnout expected to be high.

In advertisements published in major newspapers on Sunday, the DPJ confidently predicted: "Today, a government change."

"A courageous decision by the people will open the door for a historic and major event," it said in a separate statement. "Please join in this big task to change Japan and protect the people's lives."

The LDP has ruled for all but 10 months since it was founded in 1955, but the DPJ already controls the less powerful upper house of parliament following elections in 2007.

'Hope tomorrow'

In its own advertisements, the LDP urged voters: "Don't destroy Japan".

"Hope tomorrow can only come from stability today," it said.

Al Jazeera's Steve Chao, reporting from Tokyo, said that last-minute surveys indicated that the opposition was still on its way to a landslide victory.

"There is still a great deal of dissatisfaction among the public with the ruling government and its ability to govern the country."The economy is in the worst state since the second world war, unemployment is at 5.7 per cent, which means that three and a half million people are unemployed.

"The opposition has been [conducting] on an Obama-style campaign, promising massive changes, to take on the heavy bureaucracy created by the ruling government that is largely blamed for the problems of the country."

Surveys in major newspapers, including the Mainichi and the Asahi, said that the DPJ was likely to win more than 320 seats in the 480-member lower house of parliament.

Hatoyama travelled to the city of Sakai in western Japan on Saturday - the final day of campaigning - where he repeated his call for voters to support change.

"This is an election to choose whether voters can muster the courage to do away with the old politics," he said.

Cash handouts

Under a mantra of "Putting People's Lives First", the DPJ has offered a platform heavy on social-welfare initiatives, including cash handouts for job seekers in training and families with children.

Our correspondent said that Aso had also come out strongly on Saturday, making a his last-minute appeal to urge voters "to reconsider and to question whether they could trust the opposition to run the government at a time of economic crisis.

"He has also stressed that he needs more time to implement the massive economic reforms to deal with the global financial crisis.

"Japan is the world's second largest economy and that's why it matters a lot, not only to the voters down here but to the rest of the world because what happen world because what happens in Japan is often a bellwether for the health of the world’s financial status."

Iraqi Shia leader buried in Najaf

Thousands of mourners in Iraq's holy Shia city of Najaf have paid their final respects to one of the country's most powerful leaders.

Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the leader of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, was buried in Najaf on Saturday, three days after his death of lung cancer in a Tehran hospital.

Al-Hakim's son and potential successor, Ammar, read out portions of the Iraqi political leader's will, in which he called for coexistence among Iraq's fractured sects.

He also warned that loyalists to Saddam Hussein, the executed former Iraqi leader, and Sunni extremists, were trying to target national unity in the country, The Associated Press news agency reported.

"They see that the only way to achieve their victory is by creating sedition between Iraqi Shias and Sunnis," al-Hakim wrote.

Mourning tour

Saturday's ceremony and the arrival of the casket in Najaf marked the end of a three-day mourning tour that started in Iran and went on to Baghdad and other parts of Iraq's predominately Shia areas.

In depth

Obituary: Abdul Aziz al-Hakim Video: Rift appears among Iraq Shia

Wailing crowds touched the Shia leader's coffin as it was carried through Baghdad amid tight security following an official ceremony on Friday. Al-Hakim was a power broker who helped pave the path for the re-emergence of Iraq's Shia political majority after decades of oppression under Saddam Hussein's Sunni-dominated government.

Although he was seen as the Iraqi politician with the closest ties to Iran, where he lived in exile for 20 years, he also managed to build a rapport with the build a rapport with the US.

But his death has sparked fears of political instability ahead of national polls that many fear may be marred by violence.

Bombing attacks

His burial followed two bomb attacks in northern Iraq that killed at least 15 people and wounded more than 30 others.

In one attack on Saturday, a suicide car bomber killed at least nine people and wounded 11 others at a police station in the town of Shirqat, 300km north of Baghdad, in Salahuddin province.

The other bombing killed six people and wounded 20 others in the town of Sinjar, 390km northwest of Baghdad, which is home to Yazidis, members of a pre-Islamic Kurdish sect.

A surge in violence in the past two months has raised doubts about the durability of security gains, including lorry bombings that killed almost 100 people at government ministries on August 19.