Rural job plan can start green revolution II: Sonia

NEW DELHI : Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Saturday said UPA's flagship rural employment guarantee programme has the potential to set off a second green revolution as it can boost agricultural production.

Speaking at a conference on the Mahatma Gandhi national rural employment guarantee act here, she said "I am of the belief that MNREGA has tremendous potential to increase agriculture production, which we have not been able to tap fully till date."

Sonia said that "There are many possibilities not only for creating community assets in villages but also providing irrigation facilities to small and marginalised farmers, developing land and promoting farming."

Although the MNREGA scheme has been found to suffer from implementation problems, the Congress chief saw the programme being overall beneficial to the farmers.

"Manifold increase in the produce of farmers can be made by connecting this scheme with the use of modern technologies in agriculture. There is no doubt that MNREGA can play a big role in fulfilling our dreams of second green revolution," she said.

At the same conference, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said use of Information Technology in at many levels has helped making governance better and increase accountability and transparency in government work. He said the act has increased financial inclusion.

Singh called on the rural development ministry to work with states to ensure panchayats are provided full technical assistance.

"This will help prepare the labour budget truly as per the local development plan and will facilitate the inclusion of all possible resources. Besides, this will also strengthen the Panchyati Raj institutions and increase people's participation in development works," Singh said.

The Congress president also said, "there is also a need to think how to make implementation better. How to bring momentum in the empowerment of Panchayati Raj institutions."

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New rules aim to get rid of junk foods in schools

WASHINGTON (AP) — Most candy, high-calorie drinks and greasy meals could soon be on a food blacklist in the nation's schools.

For the first time, the government is proposing broad new standards to make sure all foods sold in schools are more healthful.

Under the new rules the Agriculture Department proposed Friday, foods like fatty chips, snack cakes, nachos and mozzarella sticks would be taken out of lunch lines and vending machines. In their place would be foods like baked chips, trail mix, diet sodas, lower-calorie sports drinks and low-fat hamburgers.

The rules, required under a child nutrition law passed by Congress in 2010, are part of the government's effort to combat childhood obesity. While many schools already have improved their lunch menus and vending machine choices, others still are selling high-fat, high-calorie foods.

Under the proposal, the Agriculture Department would set fat, calorie, sugar and sodium limits on almost all foods sold in schools. Current standards already regulate the nutritional content of school breakfasts and lunches that are subsidized by the federal government, but most lunchrooms also have "a la carte" lines that sell other foods. Food sold through vending machines and in other ways outside the lunchroom has never before been federally regulated.

"Parents and teachers work hard to instill healthy eating habits in our kids, and these efforts should be supported when kids walk through the schoolhouse door," Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said.

Most snacks sold in school would have to have less than 200 calories. Elementary and middle schools could sell only water, low-fat milk or 100 percent fruit or vegetable juice. High schools could sell some sports drinks, diet sodas and iced teas, but the calories would be limited. Drinks would be limited to 12-ounce portions in middle schools and to 8-ounce portions in elementary schools.

The standards will cover vending machines, the "a la carte" lunch lines, snack bars and any other foods regularly sold around school. They would not apply to in-school fundraisers or bake sales, though states have the power to regulate them. The new guidelines also would not apply to after-school concessions at school games or theater events, goodies brought from home for classroom celebrations, or anything students bring for their own personal consumption.

The new rules are the latest in a long list of changes designed to make foods served in schools more healthful and accessible. Nutritional guidelines for the subsidized lunches were revised last year and put in place last fall. The 2010 child nutrition law also provided more money for schools to serve free and reduced-cost lunches and required more meals to be served to hungry kids.

Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, has been working for two decades to take junk foods out of schools. He calls the availability of unhealthful foods around campus a "loophole" that undermines the taxpayer money that helps pay for the healthier subsidized lunches.

"USDA's proposed nutrition standards are a critical step in closing that loophole and in ensuring that our schools are places that nurture not just the minds of American children but their bodies as well," Harkin said.

Last year's rules faced criticism from some conservatives, including some Republicans in Congress, who said the government shouldn't be telling kids what to eat. Mindful of that backlash, the Agriculture Department exempted in-school fundraisers from federal regulation and proposed different options for some parts of the rule, including the calorie limits for drinks in high schools, which would be limited to either 60 calories or 75 calories in a 12-ounce portion.

The department also has shown a willingness to work with schools to resolve complaints that some new requirements are hard to meet. Last year, for example, the government relaxed some limits on meats and grains in subsidized lunches after school nutritionists said they weren't working.

Schools, the food industry, interest groups and other critics or supporters of the new proposal will have 60 days to comment and suggest changes. A final rule could be in place as soon as the 2014 school year.

Margo Wootan, a nutrition lobbyist for the Center for Science in the Public Interest, said surveys by her organization show that most parents want changes in the lunchroom.

"Parents aren't going to have to worry that kids are using their lunch money to buy candy bars and a Gatorade instead of a healthy school lunch," she said.

The food industry has been onboard with many of the changes, and several companies worked with Congress on the child nutrition law two years ago. Major beverage companies have already agreed to take the most caloric sodas out of schools. But those same companies, including Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, also sell many of the non-soda options, like sports drinks, and have lobbied to keep them in vending machines.

A spokeswoman for the American Beverage Association, which represents the soda companies, says they already have greatly reduced the number of calories that kids are consuming at school by pulling out the high-calorie sodas.

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Follow Mary Clare Jalonick on Twitter at http://twitter.com/mcjalonick

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Obama Clings to Shotgun in WH Photo

(Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)

After a week of speculation over the authenticity of claims by President Obama that he regularly participated in skeet shooting at Camp David, the White House released a photograph today showing him firing a shotgun.

The photo shows Obama targeting clay pigeons at the presidential retreat last August, according to the White House. In an interview published Sunday the president said he shoots skeet “all the time” during stays at the compound. The comment was a response to a question of whether he had ever held a gun.

“Not the girls, but oftentimes guests of mine go up there. And I have a profound respect for the traditions of hunting that trace back in this country for generations. And I think those who dismiss that out of hand make a big mistake,” he said.

READ: Skeet-Shooter Obama Has ‘Respect’ for Hunters

But amid a White House-backed push for stronger gun-control in the U.S., some questioned whether the claim was an embellishment or even true. Politicians who regularly use firearms often advertise the fact to gun owners, but ABC News has not found a quote from Obama referencing his own use before the statement on Sunday.

“If he is a skeet shooter, why have we not heard of this?” asked Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn. “Why have we not seen photos? Why has he not referenced it at any point in time as we have had this gun debate that is ongoing?”

PHOTOS: From 2009 to Now: Obama Since His First Inauguration

Appearing on CNN this week, the congresswoman challenged Obama to a skeet shooting contest.

The Associated Press reported in 2010 a second-hand reference to the activity. After a visit with the Texas Christian University rifle team, a student reportedly told the AP that Obama told her he’d practiced shooting with the Secret Service.

This is the only known image of Obama holding a gun.

Asked Monday about the president’s interview, Press Secretary Jay Carney responded to reporters about how often the president participates in shooting.

“I would refer you simply to his comments,” he said. “I don’t know how often. He does go to Camp David with some regularity, but I’m not sure how often he’s done that.”"

On Wednesday, Carney addressed the issue again, telling press that when the president travels to “Camp David, he goes to spend time with his family and friends and relax, not to produce photographs.”

White House officials and some Obama supporters have compared skeet-doubters to “skeeters” or “birthers,” the label fixed to those who deny Obama was born on U.S. soil in his home state of Hawaii, and therefore is ineligible for the Oval Office.

“Attn skeet birthers. Make our day — let the photoshop conspiracies begin!” senior adviser David Plouffe wrote on Twitter this morning, referencing the popular photo-editing software.

In January, Obama signed several executive orders strengthening gun regulation and revealed proposals that, if enacted, would include bans on assault weapons and high capacity magazines. The move began in response to the December mass-shooting of 20 first graders and six adults at a Newtown, Conn., elementary school.

INFOGRAPHIC: Guns in America: By The Numbers

A recent ABC News/Washington Post poll found 53 percent of Americans viewed Obama’s gun control plan favorably, 41 percent unfavorably.

The photo’s release comes two days before Obama travels to Minneapolis for a speech continuing his push for tougher gun control, where he is expected to appear alongside local law enforcement officials.

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Suicide bomber kills guard at U.S. embassy in Turkey

ANKARA (Reuters) - A far-leftist suicide bomber killed a Turkish security guard at the U.S. embassy in Ankara on Friday, officials said, blowing open an entrance and sending debris flying through the air.

The attacker detonated explosives strapped to his body after entering an embassy gatehouse. The blast could be heard a mile away. A lower leg and other human remains lay on the street.

Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said the bomber was a member of the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), a far-left group which is virulently anti-U.S. and anti-NATO and is listed as a terrorist organization by Washington.

The White House said the suicide attack was an "act of terror" but that the motivation was unclear. U.S. officials said the DHKP-C were the main suspects but did not exclude other possibilities.

Islamist radicals, extreme left-wing groups, ultra-nationalists and Kurdish militants have all carried out attacks in Turkey in the past. There was no claim of responsibility.

"The suicide bomber was ripped apart and one or two citizens from the special security team passed away," said Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan.

"This event shows that we need to fight together everywhere in the world against these terrorist elements," he said.

Turkish media reports identified the bomber as DHKP-C member Ecevit Sanli, who was involved in attacks on a police station and a military staff college in Istanbul in 1997.

KEY ALLY

Turkey is a key U.S. ally in the Middle East with common interests ranging from energy security to counter-terrorism and has been one of the leading advocates of foreign intervention to end the conflict in neighboring Syria.

Around 400 U.S. soldiers have arrived in Turkey over the past few weeks to operate Patriot anti-missile batteries meant to defend against any spillover of Syria's civil war, part of a NATO deployment due to be fully operational in the coming days.

The DHKP-C was responsible for the assassination of two U.S. military contractors in the early 1990s in protest against the first Gulf War and launched rockets at the U.S. consulate in Istanbul in 1992, according to the U.S. State Department.

Deemed a terrorist organization by both the United States and Turkey, the DHKP-C has been blamed for suicide attacks in the past, including one in 2001 that killed two police officers and a tourist in Istanbul's central Taksim Square.

The group, formed in 1978, has carried out a series of deadly attacks on police stations in the last six months.

The attack may have come in retaliation for an operation against the DHKP-C last month in which Turkish police detained 85 people. A court subsequently remanded 38 of them in custody over links to the group.

"HUGE EXPLOSION"

U.S. Ambassador Francis Ricciardone emerged through the main gate of the embassy shortly after the explosion to address reporters, flanked by a security detail as a Turkish police helicopter hovered overhead.

"We're very sad of course that we lost one of our Turkish guards at the gate," Ricciardone said, describing the victim as a "hero" and thanking Turkish authorities for a prompt response.

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland condemned the attack on the checkpoint on the perimeter of the embassy and said several U.S. and Turkish staff were injured by debris.

"The level of security protection at our facility in Ankara ensured that there were not significantly more deaths and injuries than there could have been," she told reporters.

It was the second attack on a U.S. mission in four months. On September 11, 2012, U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three American personnel were killed in an attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya.

The attack in Benghazi, blamed on al Qaeda-affiliated militants, sparked a political furor in Washington over accusations that U.S. missions were not adequately safeguarded.

A well-known Turkish journalist, Didem Tuncay, who was on her way in to the embassy to meet Ricciardone when the attack took place, was in a critical condition in hospital.

"It was a huge explosion. I was sitting in my shop when it happened. I saw what looked like a body part on the ground," said travel agent Kamiyar Barnos, whose shop window was shattered around 100 meters away from the blast.

CALL FOR VIGILANCE

The U.S. consulate in Istanbul warned its citizens to be vigilant and to avoid large gatherings, while the British mission in Istanbul called on British businesses to tighten security after what it called a "suspected terrorist attack".

In 2008, Turkish gunmen with suspected links to al Qaeda, opened fire on the U.S. consulate in Istanbul, killing three Turkish policemen. The gunmen died in the subsequent firefight.

The most serious bombings in Turkey occurred in November 2003, when car bombs shattered two synagogues, killing 30 people and wounding 146. Part of the HSBC Bank headquarters was destroyed and the British consulate was damaged in two more explosions that killed 32 people less than a week later. Authorities said those attacks bore the hallmarks of al Qaeda.

(Additional reporting by Daren Butler and Ayla Jean Yackley in Istanbul, Mohammed Arshad and Mark Hosenball in Washington; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Stephen Powell)

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US manufacturing picks up in January

WASHINGTON: US manufacturing activity expanded for a second straight month in January as new orders and inventories picked up, the ISM monthly survey showed Monday.

The Institute for Supply Management's manufacturing sector index rose to 53.1 from 50.2 in December.

Until January the index had hovered around the 50 break-even line between growth and contraction for about six months. The overall economy shrank by 0.1 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2012, according to official data, underpinned by little change in the manufacturing sector.

January's rebound included an 8.0 per cent surge in the inventories sub-index and a 3.6 per cent gain for new orders.

But customer inventories were still contracting, as were manufacturers' order backlogs.

Thirteen of 18 manufacturing industries covered in the ISM survey reported growth in the month, compared with only seven in December.

But manufacturers polled in the survey suggested they remained worried about the tentative direction of the economy.

"Slowing interest in high-dollar purchases reflects continuing economic uncertainty," said one.

- AFP/jc

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Ordinance on sexual crimes: Women activists angry, criticize ‘key’ omissions

NEW DELHI: No sooner had the Union Cabinet cleared an ordinance to sharpen laws on sexual assault than some women activists questioned the "unseemly haste" in promulgating an ordinance when Parliament is convening only 20 days later. A bipartisan sanction to tougher laws against sex crimes, they said, would carry greater force. Some of them went so far as to say that they would urge the President to not sign the ordinance.

Additional solicitor general, Indira Jaising felt that ordinances should be brought only in an emergency situation that brooked no delay. In this instance there was no such pressing emergency. In fact, greater deliberation would only help to enact a set of stronger — and if need be, more nuanced — laws.

The non-inclusion of marital rape as a crime, even in the period leading up to separation, has come in for sharp criticism from activists.

Jaising said she was disappointed that the Cabinet had not waived government sanction for police to take up cases of rape by armed forces personnel. "While this need for sanction is understandable in the case of encounter deaths, as that might have happened in the course of duty, how can rape be committed in the course of duty?" she said.

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Obama offers faith groups new birth control rule

WASHINGTON (AP) — Facing a wave of lawsuits over what government can tell religious groups to do, the Obama administration on Friday proposed a compromise for faith-based nonprofits that object to covering birth control in their employee health plans.

Some of the lawsuits appear headed for the Supreme Court, threatening another divisive legal battle over President Barack Obama's health care overhaul law, which requires most employers to cover birth control free of charge to female workers as a preventive service. The law exempted churches and other houses of worship, but religious charities, universities, hospitals and even some for-profit businesses have objected.

The government's new offer, in a proposed regulation, has two parts.

Administration officials said it would more simply define the religious organizations that are exempt from the requirement altogether. For example, a mosque whose food pantry serves the whole community would not have to comply.

For other religious employers, the proposal attempts to create a buffer between them and contraception coverage. Female employees would still have free access through insurers or a third party, but the employer would not have to arrange for the coverage or pay for it. Insurers would be reimbursed for any costs by a credit against fees owed the government.

It wasn't immediately clear whether the plan would satisfy the objections of Roman Catholic charities and other faith-affiliated nonprofits nationwide challenging the requirement.

Kyle Duncan, general counsel for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, which is representing religious nonprofits and businesses in lawsuits, said many of his clients will still have serious concerns.

"This is a moral decision for them," Duncan said. "Why doesn't the government just exempt them?"

Neither the Catholic Health Association, a trade group for hospitals, nor the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops had an immediate reaction, saying the regulations were still being studied.

Some women's advocates were pleased.

"The important thing for us is that women employees can count on getting insurance that meets their needs, even if they're working for a religiously affiliated employer," said Cindy Pearson, executive director of the National Women's Health Network.

Policy analyst Sarah Lipton-Lubet of the American Civil Liberties Union said the rule appeared to meet the ACLU's goal of providing "seamless coverage."

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said in a statement that the compromise would provide "women across the nation with coverage of recommended preventive care at no cost, while respecting religious concerns."

The birth-control rule, first introduced a year ago, became an election issue, with some advocates for women praising the mandate as a victory but some religious leaders decrying it as an attack on faith groups.

The health care law requires most employers, including faith-affiliated hospitals and nonprofits, to provide preventive care at no charge to employees. Scientific advisers to the government recommended that artificial contraception, including sterilization, be included in a group of services for women. The goal, in part, is to help women space out pregnancies to promote health.

Under the original rule, only those religious groups that primarily employ and serve people of their own faith — such as churches — were exempt. But other religiously affiliated groups, such as church-affiliated universities, Catholic Charities and hospitals, were told they had to comply.

Catholic bishops, evangelicals and some religious leaders who have generally been supportive of Obama's policies lobbied fiercely for a broader exemption. The Catholic Church prohibits the use of artificial contraception. Evangelicals generally accept the use of birth control, but some object to specific methods such as the morning-after contraceptive pill, which they argue is tantamount to abortion, and is covered by the policy.

Obama had promised to change the birth control requirement so insurance companies — and not faith-affiliated employers — would pay for the coverage, but religious leaders said more changes were needed to make the plan work.

Since then, more than 40 lawsuits have been filed by religious nonprofits and secular for-profit businesses contending the mandate violates their religious beliefs. As expected, this latest regulation does not provide any accommodation for individual business owners who have religious objections to the rule.

Questions remain about how the services ultimately will be funded. The Health and Human Services Department has not tallied an overall cost for the plan, according to Chiquita Brooks-LaSure, an HHS deputy policy director.

However, in its new version of the rule, the department argues that the change won't impose new costs on insurers because it will save them money "from improvements in women's health and fewer child births."

The latest version of the mandate is now subject to a 60-day public comment period. The overall mandate is to take effect for religious nonprofits in August.

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Zoll reported from New York. Associated Press writer David Crary in New York contributed.

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Ala. Hostage Suspect Had Court Date Scheduled

The retired Alabama trucker who shot a school bus driver and is now holding a kindergarten student in an underground bunker was scheduled to be in court Wednesday to answer for allegedly shooting at his neighbors in a dispute over a damaged speed bump.

Jimmy Lee Dykes, 65, has been holed up in a 6 by 8 foot bunker 4 feet underground with a 5-year-old autistic boy named Ethan since Tuesday, when he boarded a school bus and asked for two 6 to 8 year old boys. School bus driver Charles Albert Poland Jr., 66, was shot several times by Dykes, and died trying to protect the children.

Police said that they do not think that Dykes had any connection to Ethan, and that SWAT teams and police are negotiating with Dykes.

"I could tell you that negotiators continue to communicate with the suspect and that there's no reason to believe the child has been harmed," Sheriff Wally Olson said late Thursday.

PHOTOS: Worst Hostage Situations

Dykes' neighbor Claudia Davis told The Associated Press that he had yelled at her and fired his gun at her, her son James Davis, Jr. and her baby grandson after he claimed their truck caused damage to a speed bump in the dirt road near his property. No one was hurt, but Davis, Jr. told the AP that he believes the shooting and kidnapping are connected to the scheduled court hearing.

Alabama Hostage Standoff: Boy, 5, Held Captive in Bunker Watch Video

Alabama 5-year-old Hostage: Negotiations Continue Watch Video

Alabama Child Hostage Situation: School Bus Driver Killed Watch Video

"I believe he thought I was going to be in court and he was going to get more charges than the menacing, which he deserved, and he had a bunch of stuff to hide and that's why he did it," he said.

This was not Dykes' only run-in with people in the neighborhood, where he had come to be known as a menacing figure. Neighbor Ronda Wilbur told the AP that Dykes beat her 120-pound dog with a lead pipe when it entered the side of the dirt rode his trailer sits on. Wilbur said her dog died a week later.

Early last year, two pit bulls belonging to neighbors Mike and Patricia Smith escaped and got into his yard. Patricia Smith said that Dykes threatened to shoot her children when they went to retrieve them.

Neighbor Ronda Wilbur said that Dykes would be seen on his property at all hours of the day.

"It could be 2 o'clock in the morning, it could be midnight. He was out there either digging or moving dirt," she said.

As the underground standoff moved into its fourth day, tensions grow in this small community near Midland City, Ala., which is now enveloped by SWAT teams and police.

"That's an innocent kid. Let him go back to his parents, he's crying for his parents and his grandparents and he does not know what's going on," Midland City Mayor Virgil Skipper told ABC News. "Let this kid go."

Neighbor Jimmy Davis said that he has seen the bunker where Dykes has been known to hunker down for up to eight days.

"He's got steps made out of cinder blocks going down to it, Davis said. "It's lined with those red bricks all in it."

Police say he may have enough supplies to last him weeks.

Former FBI profiler and ABC News consultant Brad Garrett said there's a distinct reason why authorities are keeping details about Dykes under wraps.

"One of reasons they are keeping negations closed and not releasing his picture, is to try to insulate the situation, so they don't have a situation where they don't have to deal with his anger and rage," he said.

Meanwhile, children are trying to understand why this happened to their friend

"He always comes up to my house to play," 10-year-old Trisha Beaty told ABC News. "I miss him. I miss him a lot."

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Syria protests over Israel attack, warns of "surprise"

BEIRUT/AMMAN (Reuters) - Syria protested to the United Nations on Thursday over an Israeli air strike on its territory and warned of a possible "surprise" response.

The foreign ministry summoned the head of the U.N. force in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights to deliver the protest a day after Israel hit what Syria said was a military research centre and diplomats said was a weapons convoy heading for Lebanon.

"Syria holds Israel and those who protect it in the Security Council fully responsible for the results of this aggression and affirms its right to defend itself, its land and sovereignty," Syrian television quoted it as saying.

The ministry said it considered Wednesday's Israeli attack to be a violation of a 1974 military disengagement agreement which followed their last major war, and demanded the U.N. Security Council condemn it unequivocally.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed "grave concern". "The Secretary-General calls on all concerned to prevent tensions or their escalation," his office said, adding that international law and sovereignty should be respected.

Israel has maintained total silence over the attack, as it did in 2007 when it bombed a suspected Syrian nuclear site - an attack which passed without Syrian military retaliation.

In Beirut on Thursday Syria's ambassador said Damascus could take "a surprise decision to respond to the aggression of the Israeli warplanes". He gave no details but said Syria was "defending its sovereignty and its land".

Diplomats, Syrian rebels and security sources said Israeli jets bombed a convoy near the Lebanese border on Wednesday, apparently hitting weapons destined for Hezbollah. Syria denied the reports, saying the target was a military research centre northwest of Damascus and 8 miles from the border.

Hezbollah, which has supported Assad as he battles an armed uprising in which 60,000 people have been killed, said Israel was trying to thwart Arab military power and vowed to stand by its ally.

"Hezbollah expresses its full solidarity with Syria's leadership, army and people," said the group which fought an inconclusive 34-day war with Israel in 2006.

Russia, which has blocked Western efforts to put pressure on Syria at the United Nations, said any Israeli air strike would amount to unacceptable military interference.

"If this information is confirmed, we are dealing with unprovoked attacks on targets on the territory of a sovereign country, which blatantly violates the U.N. Charter and is unacceptable, no matter the motives," Russia's foreign ministry said.

Iranian deputy foreign minister Hossein Amir Abdullahian said the attack "demonstrates the shared goals of terrorists and the Zionist regime", Fars news agency reported. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad portrays the rebels fighting him as foreign-backed, Islamist terrorists, with the same agenda as Israel.

An aide to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Saturday Iran would consider any attack on Syria as an attack on itself.

In battle-torn Damascus, residents doubted Syria would fight back. One mother of five said she had heard retaliation would come later. "They always say that. They'll retaliate, but later, not now. Always later," she said, and laughed.

"The last thing we need now is Israeli fighter jets to add to our daily routine. As if we don't have enough noise and firing keeping us awake at night."

BLASTS SHOOK DISTRICT

Details of Wednesday's strike remain sketchy and, in parts, contradictory. Syria said Israeli warplanes, flying low to avoid detection by radar, crossed into its airspace from Lebanon and struck the Jamraya military research centre.

But the diplomats and rebels said the jets hit a weapons convoy heading from Syria to Lebanon and the rebels said they - not Israel - attacked Jamraya with mortars.

One former Western envoy to Damascus said the discrepancy between the accounts might be explained by Jamraya's proximity to the border and the fact that Israeli jets hit vehicles inside the complex as well as a building.

The force of the dawn attack shook the ground, waking nearby residents from their slumber with up to a dozen blasts, two sources in the area said.

"We were sleeping. Then we started hearing rockets hitting the complex and the ground started shaking and we ran into the basement," said a woman who lives adjacent to the Jamraya site.

The resident, who declined to be named because of the sensitivity over the strike, said she could not tell whether the explosions which woke her were the result of an aerial attack.

Another source who has a relative working inside Jamraya said a building inside the complex had been cordoned off and flames were seen rising from the area after the attack.

"It appears that there were about a dozen rockets that appeared to hit one building in the complex," the source, who also asked not to be identified, told Reuters. "The facility is closed today."

Israeli newspapers quoted foreign media on Thursday for reports on the attack. Journalists in Israel are required to submit articles on security and military issues to the censor, which has the power to block any publication of material it deems could compromise state security.

Syrian state television said two people were killed in the raid on Jamraya, which lies in the 25-km (15-mile) strip between Damascus and the Lebanese border. It described it as a scientific research centre "aimed at raising the level of resistance and self-defense".

Diplomatic sources from three countries told Reuters that chemical weapons were believed to be stored at Jamraya, and that it was possible that the convoy was near the large site when it came under attack. However, there was no suggestion that the vehicles themselves had been carrying chemical weapons.

"The target was a truck loaded with weapons, heading from Syria to Lebanon," said one Western diplomat, echoing others who said the convoy's load may have included anti-aircraft missiles or long-range rockets.

The raid followed warnings from Israel that it was ready to act to prevent the revolt against Assad leading to Syria's chemical weapons and modern rockets reaching either his Hezbollah allies or his Islamist enemies.

A regional security source said Israel's target was weaponry given by Assad's military to fellow Iranian ally Hezbollah.

Such a strike or strikes would fit Israel's policy of pre-emptive covert and overt action to curb Hezbollah and does not necessarily indicate a major escalation of the war in Syria. It does, however, indicate how the erosion of the Assad family's rule after 42 years is seen by Israel as posing a threat.

Israel this week echoed concerns in the United States about Syrian chemical weapons, but its officials say a more immediate worry is that the civil war could see weapons that are capable of denting its massive superiority in airpower and tanks reaching Hezbollah; the group fought Israel in 2006 and remains a more pressing threat than its Syrian and Iranian sponsors.

(Additional reporting by Mariam Karouny and Oliver Holmes in Beirut, Gabriela Baczynska in Moscow and Marcus George in Dubai; editing by David Stamp and Philippa Fletcher)

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French air strikes hit Islamist bases in north Mali

TIMBUKTU: France said Thursday its warplanes had hit Islamist command posts near the last militant stronghold in northern Mali, as the UN mulled a peacekeeping force to take over the fast-moving French-led operation.

Ground troops gathered at the gates of Kidal, a desert outpost that is the last rebel stronghold yet to be fully recaptured, as France said its fighter jets had blasted command centres, training camps and depots run by Islamist extremists in the mountains north of the town.

Many rebels are believed to have melted away into the desert hills around Kidal since France launched air strikes on January 11 in a surprise assault to block an advance towards the capital, Bamako, by Al-Qaeda linked extremists who have occupied the north for 10 months.

The latest air strikes were carried out over the past few days in the Aguelhok region near the border with Algeria, a French military spokesman told journalists.

To back up the ground troops already in place, a column of 1,400 Chadian soldiers was heading by road towards Kidal from the Niger border, he added.

Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said France's air attacks had hit the rebels hard.

"The jihadists suffered heavy losses," Le Drian said. "There were numerous strikes which hit their equipment and men.

"The French intervention has succeeded," he added, saying rebel fighters were now on the run.

But, in a sign the insurgents remain a threat, at least two Malian soldiers were killed when their vehicle drove over a landmine in central territory recaptured last week from the rebels, a security source said.

Paris has urged dialogue between "non-armed terrorist groups" and Mali's interim government for a long-term solution to the woes of the country, which straddles the Sahara desert and the region to the south known as the Sahel.

Tuareg desert nomads in the north have long felt marginalised by Bamako, and last January rebels launched the latest in a string of insurgencies, kickstarting Mali's rapid implosion.

Their National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA), which had allied with the Islamist groups, rapidly overran the vast desert north.

They were soon thrust aside by the extremists, who imposed a brutal form of Islamic law on areas under their control, where offenders were punished by public whippings, amputations and executions.

Ex-UN chief Kofi Annan said Thursday there was evidence the crisis in Mali was driven by dangerous alliances between drug smugglers, criminal gangs and extremist groups operating across the region's porous borders.

"These developments threaten the stability of our region as we have witnessed so graphically in Mali in recent weeks," he said.

Interim president Dioncounda Traore said he was willing to talk to the secular Tuaregs from the MNLA, but would not meet any of the Islamist groups.

His comments came after a breakaway rebel faction, the Islamic Movement of Azawad (MIA), said it rejected "extremism and terrorism" and appealed to the international community to prevent the deployment of Malian and West African troops in its base, Kidal, 1,500 kilometres northeast of Bamako.

But Traore dismissed the apparent MIA olive branch, saying: "Because fear has now changed sides, they are looking for a way out."

And the Malian army said it already had a reconnaissance unit in the town to prepare the way for more troops.

France, Mali's former colonial ruler, is keen to hand over its military operation to nearly 8,000 African troops slowly being deployed.

UN officials said planning was at an advanced stage to gather those forces together under the umbrella of a formal UN peacekeeping operation.

France now has 3,500 troops on the ground and with support from the Mali army, has retaken several rebel strongholds, including the large regional town of Gao and the fabled desert trading post of Timbuktu, with no resistance.

French soldiers remained at Kidal's airport Thursday, after being blocked by a sandstorm. The defence ministry said they would secure the town when the weather cleared.

With the Islamists on the run, rights groups have voiced fears of widespread abuses and reprisals against Tuaregs and Arabs accused of supporting them, after reports of summary executions by Malian troops.

"All sides have committed very serious violations, and we believe that they should be investigated," said Human Rights Watch's Africa director, Tiseke Kasambala.

The European Union joined the United States and France in raising alarm over reprisal attacks against minorities.

- AFP/jc

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