World

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

William De Jesus is shown in an undated photo. De Jesus was killed following a shooting and hostage taking at a Florida RV park. THE CANADIAN PRESS/ho-Broward Sheriff's Office

DEERFIELD BEACH, Fla. - It was a nightmare rampage of violence that police call totally random and bizarre.

A Canadian senior, a nine-year-old American boy and the man who killed them are dead and two others are seriously injured after a shooting and standoff at a Florida RV park popular with Canucks.

The incident, which ended with a SWAT team storming a mobile home Friday morning, has officials at the Broward Sheriff's Office working to piece together just what motivated a man to kill a Canadian he didn't know and then launch a bloody attack on his own family before killing himself.

"It's a very bizarre incident and it appears to be totally random," police spokesman Jim Leljedal told The Canadian Press.

Police say the attacker, William De Jesus, drove to the Highland Woods RV Park in Deerfield Beach, Fla., Thursday night from his home in Port Orange, Fla., some 350 kilometres away. His wife and their two children, aged nine and seven, were with him.

Once at the park, police say De Jesus drove up to the lot where a Quebec couple had parked their RV and got out of his car.

At that point, 76-year-old Ovila Plante, from La Tuque, Que., came to the door of his mobile home and spoke with De Jesus, but police said the two couldn't communicate well because Plante didn't speak much English.

"De Jesus started yelling, Plante pushed him away. De Jesus pulled out a gun and shot Mr. Plante once in the chest," Leljedal said.

"When Plante went down and hit the ground, De Jesus approached him, walked up and put another bullet in his head, killing him."

With the Canadian lying dead outside the RV, De Jesus then bundled his own family into the mobile home, which was still occupied by Plante's girlfriend.

Quebecer Pierrette Beauchemin, who is in her 70s, managed to flee the RV soon after and ran to authorities who had arrived at the park, police said.

A SWAT team surrounded the mobile home and although De Jesus spoke with police for a short time early on, that communication didn't last long.

After a standoff which lasted nearly seven hours, authorities entered the vehicle early Friday and found De Jesus and his nine-year-old son Jeshiah dead.

His wife, Deanna, and seven-year-old son, Samson, were badly injured.

"They'd all been stabbed," said Leljedal. "Apparently (William) De Jesus stabbed his children first, then stabbed his wife and then himself."

Police have spoken to De Jesus' injured wife and son, who are in "serious condition" but are expected to survive.

Authorities believe there was no relationship between De Jesus and the Canadians.

"There's no indication that they knew each other at all, it just appears to be totally random," said Leljedal.

"We're going to try to put together the facts as we know them. But it doesn't appear there's anyone to charge.

Autopsies on the victims were to be conducted later Friday.

The park where the incident took place is located about 30 kilometres north of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and is popular with Canadians, say staff at the facility's office.

"It's a very peaceful park," said Leljedal. "That's what makes this so bizarre."

-- By Diana Mehta in Toronto

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle says Germany is expelling four Syrian diplomats following the arrest earlier this week of two men accused of spying on Syrian opposition groups in Germany. (AP Photo/Gero Breloer)

Two suicide car bombers struck Syrian security compounds in Aleppo on Friday, killing 28 people, Syrian officials said, bringing significant violence for the first time to a major city that has largely stood by President Bashar Assad in the 11-month-old uprising against his rule.

State media touted the blasts as proof that the regime faces a campaign by terrorists, not a popular uprising against Assad's rule.

The opposition, in turn, accused the regime of trying to smear its movement as government forces try to crush rebels in one of their main strongholds, Homs.

The military, meanwhile, stepped up its siege of Homs that has reportedly killed hundreds over the past week. Soldiers who have been bombarding the central city made their first ground move, storming into one of the most restive neighbourhoods.

At the same time, troops and security forces opened fire on anti-regime protesters who streamed out of mosques after Friday prayers nationwide. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 27 civilians were killed.

The morning blasts in the northern city of Aleppo, Syria's most populous, ripped apart the facades of the local headquarters of the Military Intelligence Directorate and a barracks of the Security Preservation forces in another part of the city.

At the Directorate, windows were shattered and a large crater was torn into the pavement outside the entrance. A weeping correspondent on state-run TV showed graphic footage of at least five corpses, collected in sacks and under blankets by the side of the road.

At both sites, suicide bombers in explosives-packed vehicles tried to smash into the entrances, security officials said. At the barracks, the Security Preservation forces commander Brig. Firas Abbas told an Associated Press reporter on a government-guided visit to the scene that the vehicle made it through one roadblock before detonating near the gates.

State television cited the Health Ministry as saying 28 people were killed in the two blasts and 235 wounded, including civilians and military personnel. It didn't give a breakdown of the individual casualty toll for each blast.

State TV blamed "terrorists." Anti-Assad activists accused the regime of setting off Friday's blasts to discredit the opposition and avert protests that had been planned in the city on Friday.

Capt. Ammar al-Wawi of the Free Syrian Army, a rebel group that wants to bring down the regime by force, denied involvement. He said fighters from his group had a short gunbattle with troops several hundred yards (meters) from the Directorate about an hour before the explosion but they did not carry out the bombings.

"This explosion is the work of the regime to divert world attention from the crimes it is committing against the people of Homs," he said.

The blasts were the fourth such dramatic suicide attack since late December. All occurred on Friday mornings against various security headquarters and prompted the same exchange of accusations.

The earlier attacks, in the capital Damascus, killed dozens of security forces and civilians, according to Syrian officials. Nobody has claimed responsibility for any of the attacks.

Friday's bombings were the first significant violence in Aleppo, a city of some 2 million people that is home to a prosperous business community and merchant classes whose continued backing for Assad has been crucial in bolstering his regime.

The city has seen only occasional protests. Assad's opponents have had little success in galvanizing support there, in part because business leaders have long traded political freedoms for economic privileges.

Also, the city has a large population of Kurds, who have mostly stayed on the sidelines of the uprising since Assad's regime began giving them long-denied citizenship as a gesture to win support.

Still, hours after the explosions, hundreds of protesters marched in several Aleppo neighbourhoods after Friday prayers, part of nationwide demonstrations labeled "Friday of 'Russia is killing our children," denouncing Russia's veto last weekend of a U.N. attempt to condemn Syria's crackdown.

Regime forces opened fire on the Aleppo protesters, killing at least seven, according to the Observatory. Another activist group, the Local Coordination Committee put the Aleppo toll at 12 and said 22 others had been killed nationwide. The figures could not be independently confirmed, in part due to restrictions the Syrian government has put on journalists.

Assad's crackdown has killed well over 5,400 people since the uprising began in March, according to U.N. estimates.

___

Keath reported from Beirut.

Authorities say a barricaded man killed himself and two others following a standoff at a South Florida recreational vehicle park.

Broward County Sheriff's officials say two others were critically injured late Thursday in Deerfield Beach. Investigators are trying to determine why the shooter killed another man and a 9-year-old boy and critically injured a 7-year-old boy and a woman.

The standoff lasted more than seven hours. Deputies called to Highland Woods R.V. Park to investigate a shooting found an unresponsive man on the ground. Inside a nearby R.V., a man told them he would his hostage if they approached.

SWAT team negotiators tried unsuccessfully to contact the man. They finally entered the R.V. early Thursday and found the suspect and victims.

No further information was immediately available.

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

This Sept. 2010 photo posted recently on the Titiusville, Fla.- based arms manufacturer Knight's Armament's Internet blog, shows members of Charlie Company, 1st Reconnaissance Battalion, out of Camp Pendleton, Calif. in Sangin, Helmand province, Afghanistan. (AP Photo/knightarmco.com)

The Marine Corps on Thursday once again did damage control after a photograph surfaced of a sniper team in Afghanistan posing in front of a flag with a logo resembling that of the notorious Nazi SS, a special unit that murdered millions of Jews, gypsies and others.

The Corps said in a statement that using the symbol was not acceptable, but the Marines in the photograph taken in September 2010 will not be disciplined because investigators determined it was a naive mistake.

The Marines believed the SS symbol was meant to represent sniper scouts and never intended to be associated with a racist organization, said Maj. Gabrielle Chapin, a spokeswoman at Camp Pendleton, where the Marines were based.

"I don't believe that the Marines involved would have ever used any type of symbol associated the Nazi Germany military criminal organization that committed mass atrocities in WWII," Chapin said. "It's not within who we are as Marines."

The Corps has used the incident as a training tool to talk to troops about what symbols are acceptable after it became aware of the photograph last November, Chapin said.

The image has since surfaced on an Internet blog, sparking widespread outrage and calls for a full investigation and punishment, including bringing those in the photograph and anyone who condoned it to court martial.

"This is a complete and total outrage," said Mikey Weinstein of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, headquartered in Albuquerque, N.M.

His organization sent a letter to the head of the Marine Corps, Gen. James Amos, and Defence Secretary Leon Panetta on Thursday, demanding punishment for those involved.

It was the second time this year the Marine Corps has had to do damage control for actions of its troops. It's also investigating a separate group of Marines recorded on video urinating on the dead bodies of Taliban fighters..

"First we have Marines peeing on dead bodies and now this," Weinstein said.

The Marines in the photograph are no longer with the unit. Chapin said she did not know if they are still in the Corps.

In the photo taken in the Afghanistan town of Sangin, the Marine Corps unit is posing with guns in front of an American flag and a large, dark blue flag with what appear to be the letters "SS" in the shape of white jagged lightning bolts.

Camp Pendleton spokesman, Master Gunnery Sgt. Mark Oliva, said he did not know where the flag came from but it was likely the property of one of the Marines in the photograph.

The photograph appeared on the blog for a military weapons company called Knight's Armament in Titusville, Fla. The company did not respond to emails or phone messages left by The Associated Press.

The SS, or Schutzstaffel, was the police and military force of the Nazi Party, which was distinct from the general army. Members pledged an oath of loyalty to Adolph Hitler.

SS units were held responsible for many war crimes and played an integral role in the extermination of millions of Jews along with gypsies and other people who were deemed undesirable. The SS was declared to be a criminal organization at the Nuremberg war crime trials.

Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, headquartered in Los Angeles, said he does not buy the explanation that posing with the flag was an innocent mistake and insisted the American public has a right to know what happened.

"If you look at any book on the Nazi period, this is the dreaded symbol of the SS, and to have a Marine Corps unit adopt it and put it beside the American flag when 200,000 Americans died to free the world of that dreaded symbol is just beyond the pale," he said.

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Visitors look at a carcass of whale in Karachi, Pakistan on Wednesday, Feb 8, 2012. The 40-foot whale was found dead at a coastal area of Karachi in the Arabian Sea. (AP Photo/Shakil Adil)

 Qasim Khan waged the unlikeliest of battles with Pakistani authorities Thursday over the right to charge hundreds of curious visitors 20 rupees (22 cents) each to see a roughly 40-foot (12-meter) whale shark he bought from a fisherman.

Khan is in the business of buying fish, albeit usually much smaller ones, and jumped at the chance on Tuesday to pay about $2,200 for the 20-ton behemoth, which was discovered dead in the Arabian Sea off the southern Pakistani city of Karachi.

Business was brisk Wednesday, as several thousand people paid to see the brown and white-spotted shark, which Khan set up under a cloth tent next to the harbour. People crowded around to put their hands on the massive shark, and families snapped their picture with it ignoring the pungent smell as it began to rot.

But police cracked down Thursday, saying fishery authorities had decided people should be allowed to see the shark for free. Khan resisted and hid his prize attraction under the giant piece of green cloth he had previously used as a tent.

The move sparked a comic game of cat and mouse between Khan and the police. They would order him to remove the cover, which he would do briefly before replacing it. Then the cycle would start over again.

"We are told to protect and facilitate the people to see this rare fish, but this man is not allowing this," said police inspector Mohammad Aslam at the scene.

Khan countered by saying he paid 200,000 rupees for it. "To recover my cost I am charging just 20 rupees per ticket, but the forsaken fishery authorities have deprived me of this fortune," he said.

The altercation angered some of the hundreds of people who crowded around the fish.

"We came here to see the fish after the media hype, but to our dismay they are not allowing us to see it," said a young businessman, Sohail Shah.

One local newspaper had trumpeted the discovery with a headline that read "All is 'whale:' 'Moby Dick' comes to town ahead of Karachi Literature Festival."

Whale sharks, which are believed to grow up to 65 feet (20 metres) in length, are the largest fish in the sea and primarily feed on plankton, squid and small fish. They are found in tropical and warm temperate seas, and are harmless to humans.

Some people who turned up in Karachi were upset to see people climbing all over the shark.

"This is sheer disrespect for animals," said 20-year-old nursing student Usman Zada.

But nothing could dampen the enthusiasm of 9-year-old Fizza Umar, who came with her father.

"It was so huge!" Umar said. "I wish I could take it home."

Ashraf Daniel, a pastor of an Anglican church, was also delighted by the visit because he felt it reinforced his religious faith.

"Our Bible says that Saint Jonah survived three days in the abdomen of a whale, so I brought my children to see themselves the strength of God," said Daniel.

Rick Santorum was flying high on Wednesday, buoyed by his trio of triumphs in the Midwest over front-runner Mitt Romney and insisting he's the sought-after social conservative who can halt the former Massachusetts governor's march to the Republican presidential nomination.

In a race that has proven time and again that momentum is fleeting, it remained to be seen whether Santorum could start raising enough money to elbow Newt Gingrich out of the way and overtake Romney, the wealthy former venture capitalist who's already spent millions in his second run for president.

Santorum's campaign, meantime, said it raised $250,000 online on Tuesday night after he won handily the Missouri primary and the Colorado and Minnesota caucuses.

But the candidate argued Wednesday that success isn't dependent on cash.

"If money made the difference, we would not have won four primaries so far," the former Pennsylvania senator told CNN.

Santorum's victories, indeed, don't just pose a conundrum for Romney and his deep pockets. They've also put his fellow social conservative, Gingrich, in a pickle.

The former speaker of the House of Representatives has vowed to bring down Romney, and the most effective way to do it might involve dropping out of the race in order to allow a resurgent Santorum to consolidate the far-right voters of the Republican base. But will his legendary ego allow it?

Don't count on it, says a one-time Republican legislative aide.

"Newt's ego has always been in control, if ever Newt has a choice between self-aggrandizement and self-sacrifice, he'll always choose self-aggrandizement," says Jack Pitney, who now teaches politics at Claremont McKenna College in California.

As David Horsey of the Los Angeles Times put it earlier this week: "The transformative leader of monumental importance that he sees in the mirror every morning will not allow him to concede to what he believes is a lesser man."

Gingrich has vowed to stay in the race until the Republican National Convention in August. There's no doubt he'll hang in until so-called Super Tuesday on March 6th, when 10 states hold primaries and caucuses.

Delegate-rich Georgia, where Gingrich is expected to do well since he once served the state as a congressman, is among the contests. He might also fare well in Tennessee that day.

But if Santorum manages to best him on Super Tuesday, some wonder how Gingrich can stay in the race, ego and all.

"Ego is keeping him in the race right now, but if it's increasingly dented, to save his reputation and his place in the conservative hierarchy, he might feel compelled to get out," Cal Jillson, a political scientist at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, said Wednesday.

"Megalomania can only take you so far. If you're taking weekly drubbings, the way Rick Perry was, then you're going to want to stop the humiliation and bow out."

Fergus Cullen agrees.

"He did resign his speakership so it is possible for him to acknowledge defeat and step down, but it's premature right now, he's had bad days before, and he's had good days, and so have all the candidates," said Cullen, the one-time head of the New Hampshire Republican party.

Indeed, says Cullen, the most striking element of the topsy turvy 2012 race is how quickly momentum evaporates.

That's largely due to Republican primary voters who continue to harbour serious misgivings about Romney, whom they suspect is a secret moderate. Yet they can't decide which candidate they'd prefer as a front-runner.

"The dissipating momentum has been an unusual and unexpected phenomenon and raises questions about what it means to be a conservative in different states in different parts of the country," Cullen said.

"Are they changing their minds? Or are conservatives vastly different from state to state? Is the Tea Party the same in Florida as it is in the Midwest? Why did Newt carry married women in South Carolina but not Florida? That stratification has been really bizarre and unexpected."

And in such a climate, Cullen points out, it's no wonder candidates are hesitant to drop out. Their moment in the sun could loom just a few days beyond their latest humiliating defeat.

Pitney, however, believes Santorum's Midwest triumphs will prompt Republicans across the country to sit up and take notice. While Gingrich seems peevish and ego-driven, Santorum is increasingly projecting an air of competence and likeability.

"Most human beings are more likeable than Newt Gingrich; that's the most inexclusive club in the world," he said with a laugh.

"But we're beginning to see a side of Rick Santorum that allowed him to win a House seat that was historically Democratic, and then end up elected to the U.S. Senate a few years later. He's likeable and personable, although he can come across as strident, and he also has a very pragmatic streak. And his views are very much in the mainstream of the Republican party."

Facebook's top executives, including CEO Mark Zuckerberg, are eligible for twice-a-year bonuses of up to 45 per cent of their base salaries and other earnings, according to a Wednesday regulatory filing.

Facebook Inc. said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission that it will pay Zuckerberg, 27, a base salary of $500,000 per year. Zuckerberg's 45 per cent target bonus will be based on his performance.

Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg will receive a base salary of $300,000. Her target bonus is also 45 per cent.

David Ebersman will continue to serve as chief financial officer and he will get a base salary of $300,000.

Mike Schroepfer, Facebook's vice-president of engineering, will receive a base salary of $275,000. Both he and Ebersman have a target bonus of 45 per cent.

That said, the bulk of the windfall Zuckerberg and others will earn will be in the form of Facebook stock they own. The company said last week it plans to raise $5 billion in its IPO. If all goes as planned, Facebook could be worth as much as $100 billion.

Another executive, Vice-President and General Counsel Theodore Ullyot, will receive a base salary of $275,000, according to the filing. He will also get a retention bonus of $400,000 per year for five years, as well as restricted stock and stock options.

Pakistani intelligence officials say a U.S. drone fired two missiles at a house in northwest Pakistan, killing three suspected militants.

The officials say the attack occurred before dawn Thursday in the main bazaar in Miran Shah, the biggest town in the North Waziristan tribal area. Three suspected militants were also wounded. The exact identities of the dead and wounded were not known.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.

The strike was the second in as many days in North Waziristan.

The U.S. does not speak publicly about individual strikes because of the covert nature of the CIA-run drone program.

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Map locates Lake Vostok, Antarctica. Diagram explains drilling

 Opening a scientific frontier miles under the Antarctic ice, Russian experts drilled down and finally reached the surface of a gigantic freshwater lake, an achievement the mission chief likened to placing a man on the moon.

Lake Vostok could hold living organisms that have been locked in icy darkness for some 20 million years, as well as clues to the search for life elsewhere in the solar system.

Touching the surface of the lake, the largest of nearly 400 subglacial lakes in Antarctica, came after more than two decades of drilling, and was a major achievement avidly anticipated by scientists around the world.

"In the simplest sense, it can transform the way we think about life," NASA's chief scientist Waleed Abdalati told The Associated Press in an email Wednesday.

The Russian team made contact with the lake water Sunday at a depth of 12,366 feet (3,769 metres), about 800 miles (1,300 kilometres) east of the South Pole in the central part of the continent.

Scientists hope the lake might allow a glimpse into microbial life forms that existed before the Ice Age and are not visible to the naked eye. Scientists believe that microbial life may exist in the dark depths of the lake despite its high pressure and constant cold conditions similar to those believed to be found under the ice crust on Mars, Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moon Enceladus.

Valery Lukin, the head of Russia's Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute, said reaching the lake was akin to the Americans winning the space race in 1969.

"I think it's fair to compare this project to flying to the moon," said Lukin, who oversaw the mission and announced its success.

American and British teams are drilling to reach their own subglacial Antarctic lakes, but Columbia University glaciologist Robin Bell said those are smaller and younger than Vostok, which is the big scientific prize.

"It's like exploring another planet, except this one is ours," she said.

At 160 miles (250 kilometres) long and 30 miles (50 kilometres) wide, Lake Vostok is similar in size to Lake Ontario. It is kept from freezing into a solid block by the more than two-mile-thick crust of ice across it that acts like a blanket, keeping in heat generated by geothermal energy underneath.

Lukin said he expects the lake to contain chemotroph bacteria that feed on chemical reactions in pitch darkness, probably similar to those existing deep on the ocean floor but dating back millions of years. "They followed different laws of evolution that are yet unknown to us," he said.

Studying Lake Vostok will also yield insights about the origins of Antarctica, which is believed by many to have been part of a broader continent in the distant past.

And the project has allowed the testing of technologies that could be used in exploring other icy worlds. "Conditions in subglacial lakes in Antarctica are the closest we can get to those where scientists expect to find extraterrestrial life," Lukin said.

Drilling through the ice crust in the world's coldest environment brought major technological challenges.

Temperatures on the Vostok Station on the surface above the lake have registered the coldest ever recorded on Earth, reaching minus 128 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 89 degrees Celsius). Conditions were made even tougher by its high elevation, more than 11,000 feet (3,300 metres) above sea level.

The effort has drawn fears that the more than 60 tons of lubricants and antifreeze used in the drilling may contaminate the lake's pristine waters. Bell said the Russian team was doing its best "to do it right" and avoid contamination, but others were nervous.

"Lake Vostok is the crown jewel of lakes there," said University of Colorado geological sciences professor James White. "These are the last frontiers on the planet we are exploring. We really ought to be very careful."

The British are trying to reach another subglacial lake, Lake Ellsworth.

"The Russian team share our mission to understand subglacial lake environments and we look forward to developing collaborations with their scientists and also those from the U.S. and other nations, as we all embark on a quest to comprehend these pristine, extreme environments," Siegert said in an email.

Americans scientists are drilling at Lake Whillans, west of the South Pole.

Some voiced hope that studies of Lake Vostok and other subglacial lakes will advance knowledge of Earth's own climate and help predict its changes.

____

AP Science Writer Seth Borenstein reported from Washington.

A former prima ballerina's repeated statements that anorexia is rampant at Milan's famed La Scala theatre have startled the dance corps, which issued a statement Wednesday denying the eating disorder was an issue.

The dancers wrote that they were "flabbergasted and embittered" over Mariafrancesca Garritano's statements in media interviews and a book that anorexia is widespread, affecting as many as one in five dancers.

"There is no emergency of anorexia, and whoever is part of our reality knows it well," the dancers' statement said.

The 33-year-old dancer was fired last month after continuing to make statements that the theatre considered false and damaging to its reputation, La Scala spokesman Carlo Maria Cella said Wednesday.

Anorexia is typically characterized by an extreme fear of becoming overweight. People with anorexia severely restrict how much they eat and can become dangerously thin.

Garritano first raised the issue of the eating disorder in a book that came out in January 2010. That was followed by media interviews before the season opened last December in which she said she dropped to 43 kilograms (95 pounds) as a teenager after teachers called her "mozzarella" and "Chinese dumpling" in front of other students.

Garritano, who joined the theatre at age 16 and had recently been promoted to soloist, was initially suspended after interviews, missing a performance with the Bolshoi Ballet in Moscow in December.

Theater management fired her 10 days ago after she kept repeating the statements, Cella said.

The dancers said they were surprised by the theatre's "drastic" position, but said they did not have all the information about the theatre's procedures to draw conclusions.

"At the same time, we do not feel that we can support a campaign against the theatre and the world of dance in general, which we do not agree with and of which we feel victims," the dancers said.

"To read certain newspapers, and even some internal union statements, it seems that there is one courageous heroine who is fighting solitarily against a hell where many girls suffer in silence with the complicity of everyone else. This is not the case."

The theatre's ballet school put out a separate statement saying that all incoming students receive medical exams to ensure that they are fit for a professional dance course.

The school said it does not employ an in-house dietitian because there have been no critical cases, but it does have three specialists that it refers students to in the case of weight gains or losses "due to an unbalanced diet, or in the case of weight gain due to adolescence, but always from the point of view of the correct intake of carbohydrates, proteins and sugars for the athlete."

The ballet school has 200 students, while the dance corps is comprised of about 90 dancers, including nine female soloists and six male soloists.

WASHINGTON - Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum scored two major symbolic victories on Tuesday, walloping Mitt Romney in Missouri and Minnesota in nominating triumphs that signal trouble ahead not just for the front-runner but also for Newt Gingrich.

Santorum, a staunch social conservative with a penchant for sweater vests, more than doubled Romney in the Missouri primary, with unofficial results suggesting he took 55 per cent of the vote compared to Romney's 25 per cent.

He also handily won the Minnesota caucuses. Unofficial results had Santorum taking 46 per cent of the vote. Libertarian congressman Ron Paul was in second place at 26 per cent, Romney took 16 per cent and Gingrich brought up the rear with just 11 per cent of the vote.

"Conservatism is alive and well in Missouri and Minnesota," Santorum said in a gleeful victory speech in St. Charles, MI, as he marvelled at his Romney shellacking.

"We doubled him up here and in Minnesota!"

He took sharpest aim at U.S. President Barack Obama, however, pushing red-hot conservative buttons by telling the crowd: "He thinks he knows better. He thinks he's smarter than you. He thinks he should be able to rule over all of you."

Santorum added he wasn't satisfied "to stand here to be the conservative alternative to Mitt Romney. I stand here to be the conservative alternative to Barack Obama."

The former Pennsylvania senator was also doing well against Romney in the Colorado caucuses. Early results suggested Santorum was pulling ahead of Romney in the state where the former Massachusetts governor was once favoured to win easily.

Romney was gracious in defeat, congratulating Santorum for his wins in Minnesota and Missouri before turning his attention to Obama.

"Under his own definition, Obama has failed. We will succeed," he said.

The Missouri contest has been dubbed a "beauty contest" primary - it won't send any delegates to the Republican convention until the state's March 17th caucuses are held. Gingrich didn't qualify to get on the ballot in Missouri, and Romney didn't spend much money there.

But Missouri was considered a barometer of the sentiments of primary voters, unaffected by a barrage of negative advertising in the state. Santorum's win gives his campaign a much-needed shot of adrenalin.

Indeed, while all three contests held Tuesday are technically meaningless, they are nonetheless viewed as a way to gain serious momentum heading into the crucial next few weeks of the campaign.

The results show Romney still has a major problem on his hands connecting with the party's base, who clearly harbour serious misgivings about the front-runner. But he wasn't the only one rebuked by Santorum's triumphs in the socially conservative Midwest - the results suggest the one-time senator may be nudging Gingrich out of the way as the favoured candidate of far-right conservatives.

The next primaries are not until Feb. 28, and Santorum will argue that his strong showing in the Midwest proves he's the best conservative alternative to Romney.

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

A man begs at a pedestrian crossing at Athens' main Syntagma square, on Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2012. (AP PhotoDimitri Messinis)

Greece's private creditors signalled progress on a debt-relief deal but crucial talks between Greek coalition leaders about forcing more austerity upon a hostile public were again postponed.

Anger flared on the streets of Athens as more than 20,000 protesters marched through the Greek capital and unions called a general strike Tuesday against the new cuts in jobs and spending.

The strike halted trains and ferries, closed down schools and banks and put state hospitals on short staffing.

Several hundred protesters clashed with riot police outside Parliament and set fire to a German flag, upset over Germany's role in demanding more austerity from Athens.

"They are committing a crime against the country. They are driving wage-earners into poverty and wiping out pensioners and the unemployed," said Vangelis Moutafis, a senior member of Greece's largest union, the GSEE. "They are selling off state assets for nothing. This cannot continue."

Greek Premier Lucas Papademos delayed a meeting with his coalition parties until Wednesday, staying in talks until late in the night Tuesday with top bank negotiators as well as with debt inspectors from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.

Greece is under massive time pressure to secure a new $170 billion bailout from its partners in the euro and the IMF without which it will default in March on its massive debts.

Representatives of the Institute of International Finance, which has been leading the talks for private bondholders on forgiving Greece part of its debts, had a "constructive meeting" with Papademos, IIF spokesman Frank Vogl said.

Papademos and Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos will soon brief the rest of the 17-nation eurozone on the proposed deal, Vogl said, a sign the bond-swap deal could be close.

The meeting of eurozone finance ministers could happen as soon as Thursday in Brussels, according to officials, although that will depend on finding agreement in Athens on the terms of the second bailout.

Greece has been kept solvent since May 2010 by payments from a $145 billion international rescue loan package. When it became clear the money would not be enough, a second bailout was decided last October.

As well as passing new austerity measures, the second bailout depends on Greece's separate talks with banks and other private bondholders to forgive $132 billion in Greek debt. The private investors are expected to swap their current bonds for new bonds worth 50 per cent less than the original face value, with longer repayment terms and a lower interest rate.

Without the new debt deals, Greece would face a disastrous default in late March.

The intense talks in Athens were supposed to be finished last weekend, but have dragged on over EU-IMF demands for a new round of austerity measures that include civil service job cuts and slashing Greece's minimum wage.

The Greek government has already accepted that it must cut 15,000 state jobs in 2012 to get the new bailout, as well cut 2012 spending by a further $4.3 billion, reduce wage costs in the private sector and recapitalize banks without nationalizing them.

But disagreement remains between Greek lawmakers on the extent of those cuts.

A government official said Papademos' draft agreement on the austerity deal would be sent to Greek party leaders for scrutiny early Wednesday. "It took much longer than expected," the official told the AP, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the talks.

The government's coalition partners, the majority Socialists, main rival conservatives and the small right-wing LAOS party — are also at odds over whether to go ahead with plans for an early election in April.

The Socialists, who handed over power to Papademos in November, want him to stay through parliament's four-year term that ends in late 2013, while conservatives are demanding an April vote.

LAOS leader George Karatazferis also criticized eurozone heavyweights France and Germany on Tuesday, saying they were carrying out an "aggressive humiliation of Greece" with all their demands for new austerity measures.

A disorderly bankruptcy by Greece would likely lead to its exit from the eurozone, a situation that European officials have insisted is impossible because it would hurt other weak countries like Portugal, Ireland and Italy.

But on Tuesday, the Neelie Kroes, one of the EU's 27 commissioners, said Greece's exit wouldn't be a disaster.

"It's always said: if you let one nation go, or ask one to leave, the entire structure will collapse. But that is just not true," Kroes told Dutch newspaper De Volkskrant.

She added that "Greece is not living up to its promises: too few savings, too few reforms ... It's becoming a Greek mantra: 'We cannot. We won't'!"

But EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso quickly stepped in to counter her remarks.

"We are in a very decisive moment regarding the future of Greece and the future of the euro. We want Greece in the euro," he said. "The costs of a default by Greece, the costs of a potential exit of Greece from the euro would be a lot higher than the costs of continuing to support Greece."

While Greece remains cut off from international bond markets, where it would have to pay interest of about 35 per cent to sell 10-year issues, it maintains a market presence through regular short-term debt sales.

On Tuesday, Greek borrowing costs dropped slightly as the country raised $1.06 billion in an auction of 26-week treasury bills. The interest rate was 4.86 per cent, compared to 4.90 per cent in a similar auction last month. The auction was 2.72 times oversubscribed.

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Steinhauser reported from Brussels, Demetris Nellas and Nicholas Paphitis in Athens contributed to this report.

A mother in central China has given birth to a 15.52 pound (7.04 kilogram) baby, possibly the largest newborn on record since the country's founding in 1949.

The state-run Tianjin Post said Tuesday that the 29-year-old mother in Henan province gave birth to the boy Saturday by cesarean section. It said delivery took just 20 minutes and both mother and the baby, named Chun Chun, are doing fine.

The paper said Chun Chun's parents are average size and there was nothing unusual about his mother's pregnancy or diet.

The paper said it wasn't immediately clear whether Chun Chun made China's record books.

Guinness World Records says the heaviest newborn ever recorded was born to an Ohio woman in 1879 and weighed 23.7 pounds (10.77 kilograms).

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Afghan refugee children who fled their country with parents and their family members, play in a slums of Islamabad, Pakistan where thousands of families are living below the poverty line, on Monday, Feb 6, 2012. (AP Photo/B.K. Bangash)

PESHAWAR, Pakistan - U.S. drone-fired missiles hit a house in Pakistan's northwest tribal region near the Afghan border Wednesday, killing eight people, Pakistani intelligence officials said.

The attack occurred in Spalga village in the North Waziristan tribal area, said the officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media. The identities of those killed were unknown, but the area is dominated by Hafiz Gul Bahadur, a prominent militant commander focused on fighting foreign troops in Afghanistan.

The U.S. does not publicly discuss details of the covert CIA-run drone program in Pakistan.

The program has caused tensions with Pakistan. Although the government is widely believed to have provided support for the strikes in the past, that co-operation has become strained as its relationship with Washington has deteriorated.

Pakistan kicked the U.S. out of a base used by American drones last year in retaliation for American airstrikes that accidentally killed 24 Pakistani troops at two Afghan border posts on Nov. 26.

The move is not expected to significantly impact drone operations, but the pace of strikes has slowed since the border incident as the U.S. has tried to repair the relationship with Pakistan.

Pakistan also retaliated for the errant airstrikes by closing its Afghan border crossings to supplies meant for NATO troops in Afghanistan.

Pakistani Defence Minister Ahmad Mukhtar said Tuesday that the country should reopen the crossings after negotiating a better deal with the coalition.

He did not provide specific details. But other Pakistani officials have suggested that the government levy additional fees on the coalition for using the route because the heavy trucks damage roads.

The closure has forced the United States to spend six times as much money to send supplies to Afghanistan through alternative routes.

Pakistan's parliament is expected to vote on a revised framework for relations with the U.S. in mid-February that could pave the way for the government to reopen the supply line.

Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar said last week that she didn't think it would be much of a problem to reopen the route after the parliament vote.

The defence minister echoed this view, saying, "I think the people who are deciding, who are giving recommendations, will make the right decision."

For most of the 10-year war in Afghanistan, 90 per cent of supplies shipped to coalition forces came through Pakistan, via the port of Karachi. But over the past three years, NATO has increased its road and rail shipments through an alternate route that runs through Russia and Central Asia. The northern route was longer and more expensive, but provided a hedge against the riskier Pakistan route.

Before the accidental American airstrikes on Nov. 26, about 30 per cent of non-lethal supplies for U.S. and coalition troops in Afghanistan travelled through Pakistan.

The U.S. has since increased the amount of supplies running through the northern route, but this has cost it a lot more money. Pentagon figures provided to the AP show that the alternative transport is costing about $104 million per month, $87 million more per month than when the cargo moved through Pakistan.

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Associated Press writer Asif Shahzad contributed to this report from Islamabad.

The Ugandan parliamentarian who first introduced an anti-gay bill that carried the death penalty for some homosexual acts reintroduced the bill on Tuesday, raising concerns among rights activists who have been fighting the legislation.

Parliamentarian David Bahati first introduced the bill in 2009 but it has never come before the full legislative body for a vote. Though widely supported in Uganda, the bill's progress apparently has been slowed by an international outcry against the bill, including condemnation from President Barack Obama.

Bahati has said that homosexuality poses a serious threat to family values and that his bill has helped raise public awareness about what he calls "the dangers to our children."

Bahati told The Associated Press last year that he is willing to drop the death penalty provision if that is the recommendation of a parliament committee, though a current reading of the bill hasn't been made public.

European countries such as Sweden have threatened to cut aid to Uganda if the bill is passed.

Homosexuality, already illegal under Uganda's penal code, is highly stigmatized in Uganda. Opinion polls frequently show the bill's wide support among Ugandans. Lawmakers other than Bahati have sometimes spoken passionately about the need for such a law, and none have condemned it.

The bill has been championed by Pentecostal clerics, who warn that young Ugandans are at risk of being indoctrinated into gay lifestyles by gays visiting from the U.S. and Europe. Even pastors who oppose the draft law do so not because it is draconian or unnecessary, but rather because they believe the police would not be able to enforce it.

"I've rejected it because it does not address Uganda's homosexuality problem," said Solomon Male, a Pentecostal cleric who has been dragged to court for accusing another pastor of sodomy. "The system can't permit any good law to be enforced."

Male said that an existing law against homosexuality, inherited from the colonial days, had not been enforced.

"It is a big problem-homosexuals are in our schools, in our churches, everywhere, and we don't even know where to start," he said. "Sensitisation is the best."

Bahati's original bill carried harsh provisions. The original bill would mandate a death sentence for active homosexuals living with HIV or in cases of same-sex rape. "Serial offenders" also could face capital punishment, but the legislation did not define the term. Anyone convicted of a homosexual act would face life imprisonment.

Anyone who "aids, abets, counsels or procures another to engage of acts of homosexuality" would face seven years in prison. Landlords who rent rooms or homes to gays also could get seven years.

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Edgar Flores, right, encourages other parents to join a protest outside Miramonte Elementary school in Los Angeles Monday, Feb. 6, 2012. About three dozen parents and supporters staged a protest at the Los Angeles-area school rocked by allegations of lewd conduct crimes by two teachers against children. They demanded greater communication with education officials and the placement of cameras in classrooms and hallways at Miramonte Elementary School. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

The entire staff at an elementary school where two teachers were arrested on suspicion of lewd conduct will be removed while the school district investigates, the Los Angeles school superintendent said Monday night.

Superintendent John Deasy told parents and media that 88 teachers and 40 support staff at Miramonte Elementary School are being replaced because a full investigation of allegations is disruptive and staffers will require support to get through the scandal.

An entire staff has been trained to come into Miramonte's classrooms to take over teaching for the time being, and there will be a psychiatric social worker in every classroom to help students and staff cope with any issues.

"The last thing I'm worried about is a budget issue," Deasy said. "The No. 1 thing I'm worried about is the students."

All employees will be paid during the investigation, district spokesman Tom Waldman said. Officials didn't know how long the investigation will take.

School officials cancelled classes at the school on Tuesday and Wednesday as a cooling-off period, Waldman said. All current staff members will report to another location, where they will be interviewed, he said.

Deasy emphasized that all staff members being brought into the classroom went through a "very rigorous screening process."

Deasy told reporters after the meeting that he was trying "to govern emotion, because that's important."

United Teachers Los Angeles said in a statement that union leaders and staff have met with instructors at Miramonte.

"We support a thorough, vigorous and fair investigation of all allegations," the statement said. "It's everyone's responsibility to ensure that any and all allegations are thoughtfully and carefully investigated."

Maria Jimenez, 51, said the parents of children enrolled at Miramonte are divided over the move. "Some are in favour. Others are against it because they did this without advising us or consulting us," she said.

The move follows the arrest of two Miramonte teachers: Mark Berndt was charged last week with committing lewd acts on 23 children; Martin Springer was arrested Friday on suspicion of fondling two girls in his classroom.

More than a quarter of the students at Miramonte were absent from school Monday while parents demanded more protection at the school, with attendance reaching just 72 per cent, according to figures from the Los Angeles Unified School District.

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Associated Press writer Raquel Maria Dillon contributed to this report.

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Anders Behring Breivik, a right-wing extremist who confessed to a bombing and mass shooting that killed 77 people on July 22, 2011, arrives for a detention hearing at a court in Oslo, Norway, Monday, Feb. 6, 2012. About 100 survivors and relatives of the victims of the July 22 massacre attended the hearing in Oslo's district court - expected to decide to keep Breivik in jail until his trial begins in April. (AP Photo/Lise Aserud, Scanpix Norway) NORWAY OUT

OSLO - The right-wing extremist who has admitted killing 77 people in the worst peacetime massacre that Norway has ever seen told a court Monday that he deserves a medal of honour for the bloodshed and demanded to be set free.

Anders Behring Breivik smirked as he was led in to the Oslo district court, handcuffed and dressed in a dark suit, for his last scheduled detention hearing before the trial starts in April. He stretched out his arms in what his lawyer Geir Lippestad said was "some kind of right-wing extremist greeting."

Reading from prepared remarks, the 32-year-old Norwegian told the court that the July 22 massacre  carried out with a bomb, a rifle and a handgun was a strike against "traitors" he said are embracing immigration to promote "an Islamic colonization of Norway."

Like in previous hearings, Breivik admitted to setting off the bomb outside the government headquarters in Oslo and opening fire at a Labor Party youth camp on Utoya island, outside the capital, but denied criminal responsibility and rejected the authority of the court.

About 100 survivors and relatives of victims watched in disbelief, as Breivik asked to be released, and told the judge he should receive a military honour for Norway's most deadly peacetime attacks.

Judge Wenche Gjelsten ordered him to remain in custody until the trial begins on April 16. Breivik faces terror charges, which carry up to 21 years in prison. However, if he's deemed gravely mentally ill he will be sent to psychiatric care.

"It wasn't good that he got to say what he wanted to say," said Amel Baltic, a 16-year-old survivor of the Utoya massacre. "It made me irritated."

Many survivors have expressed concern that Breivik will use court hearings to draw attention to his extremist views.

A psychiatric evaluation found Breivik criminally insane, but a second evaluation was ordered amid criticism against that diagnosis. Breivik has refused to co-operate with psychiatrists in the second review.

Unlike the only previous public hearing, Breivik this time agreed to let himself be photographed before the proceedings began. Lippestad, the defence lawyer, suggested Breivik's remarks on Monday foreshadowed what's to come in the trial.

"It's a preparation for the trial. Much of this case is about his personality," Lippestad said.

Breivik claims he's a commander of a militant organization aiming to overthrow European governments and replace them with "patriotic" regimes that would deport Muslim immigrants.

Police have not found any trace of this supposed network of "Knights Templar" and say Breivik carried out the attacks on his own.

Photo: The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

An anti-Syrian regime protester holds a poster in Arabic that reads, "veto or not, Bashar's days are over," in front of the Russian embassy, in Amman, Jordan, Sunday, Feb. 5, 2012.

The United States has proposed an international coalition to support Syria's opposition after Russia and China blocked a U.N. attempt to end nearly 11 months of bloodshed, raising fears that violence will escalate. Rebel soldiers said force was now the only way to oust President Bashar Assad, while the regime vowed to press its military crackdown.

The threat of both sides turning to greater force after Russia and China vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution raises the potential for Syria's turmoil to move into even a more dangerous new phase that could degenerate into outright civil war.

The uprising inspired by other Arab Spring revolts began in March with peaceful protests against Assad's regime, sparking a fierce crackdown by government forces. Soldiers who defected to join the uprising later began to protect protesters from attacks. In recent months, the rebel soldiers, known as the Free Syrian Army, have grown bolder, attacking regime troops and trying to establish control in pro-opposition areas. That has brought a heavier government response.

More than 5,400 people have been killed since March, according to the U.N., and now regime opponents fear that Assad will be emboldened by the feeling he is protected by his top ally Moscow and unleash even greater violence to crush protesters. If the opposition turns overtly to armed resistance, the result could be a dramatic increase in bloodshed.

At least 30 civilians were killed Sunday, including five children and a woman who was hit by a bullet while standing on her balcony as troops fired on protesters in a Damascus suburb, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an activist group.

Government forces firing mortars and heavy machine-guns also battered the mountain town of Zabadani, north of Damascus, a significant opposition stronghold that fell under rebel control late last month. Bombardment the past two days has wounded dozens and forced scores of families to flee, an activist in the town said.

"The situation is terrifying. Makeshift hospitals are full," said the activist, who only gave his first name, Fares, for fear of government reprisal. He said the town has been under siege for the past five days and there is a shortage of food and heating fuel during the cold winter.

The commander of the Free Syrian Army told The Associated Press that, after the vetoes at the U.N., "there is no other road" except military action to topple Assad.

"We consider that Syria is occupied by a criminal gang and we must liberate the country from this gang," Col. Riad al-Asaad said, speaking by telephone from Turkey. "This regime does not understand the language of politics. It only understands the language of force."

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned Sunday that chances for "a brutal civil war" would increase as Syrians under attack from their government move to defend themselves, unless international steps provide another way.

Speaking to reporters in the Bulgarian capital of Sofia, she called the double veto at the U.N. Security Council on Saturday "a travesty."

"Faced with a neutered Security Council, we have to redouble our efforts outside of the United Nations," she said, calling for "friends of democratic Syria" to unite "support the Syrian people's right to have a better future."

The call points to the formation of a formal group of like-minded nations to co-ordinate assistance to the Syrian opposition, similar but not identical to the Contact Group on Libya, which oversaw international help for opponents of the late deposed Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi. In the case of Libya, the group also co-ordinated NATO military operations to protect Libyan civilians, something that is not envisioned in Syria.

U.S. officials said an alliance would work to further squeeze the Assad regime by stepping up sanctions against it, bringing disparate Syrian opposition groups inside and outside the country together, providing humanitarian relief for embattled Syrian communities and working to prevent an escalation of violence by monitoring arms sales.

The main Syrian opposition umbrella group, the Syrian National Council, backed the idea.

Radwan Ziadeh, a prominent figure in the SNC, wrote on his Facebook page that friendly countries should form an "international coalition ... whose aim will be to lead international moves to support the revolution through political and economic aid."

A deeply sensitive question is whether such a coalition would back the Free Syrian Army. There appears to be deep hesitation among Western countries, fearing further militarization of the conflict.

Omar Idlibi, an activist with the Syrian National Council, said action by a "friends coalition" to increase sanctions and other steps would boost peaceful opposition through protests.

But, he said, it should also include support to the FSA, which he said would prevent civilians from taking up arms, worsening the conflict.

The FSA, he said, "is a national Syrian army and as the regime has the right to get help from its Russian and Iranian allies, it is the right of the opposition to ask for help from its friends in enabling the Syrian people to achieve change."

The FSA, based in neighbouring Turkey, is believed to number several thousand soldiers and it almost daily announces claims of groups of soldiers joining its ranks that cannot be confirmed. It is heavily outgunned by the powerful regime military, which still has the power to conduct focused operations that can drive the rebels out of any areas they gain control of.

But the military cannot cover everywhere at once, and FSA troops appear to be proving effective at hit-and-run attacks and have put up staunch resistance in assaults on opposition-dominated urban areas.

On Sunday, rebel soldiers attacked a military convoy in the northwestern province of Idlib, killing 14 government troops, the Observatory said, reporting that 14 other regime soldiers were killed in fighting elsewhere.

Early Saturday, regime forces bombarded the restive central city of Homs, apparently in response to FSA attacks. Activists said the bombardment was the deadliest incident of the uprising, killing more than 200 people in a single day. The regime denied any bombardment, and there was no way to independently confirm the toll.

Gunfire continued to ring out Sunday in several neighbourhoods of Homs, and at least 23 people were killed in the city and nearby towns, including three children, the Observatory said. Grisly video posted by activists online showed a young boy said to have been wounded in the shooting, his jaw torn away. The video and the Observatory's casualty reports could not be independently confirmed.

The Russian and Chinese vetoes effectively killed an Arab League plan that called for Assad to hand over power to his vice-president and allow the creation of a unity government. The resolution would have expressed support for the Arab League plan, which Assad rejected.

The Syrian government touted the U.N. result as a victory.

The state-run newspaper, Tishreen, vowed that Damascus will press its crackdown aiming to restore "stability and security and confront all forms of terrorism." The regime has portrayed the uprising as the work of terrorists and armed gangs as part of a foreign conspiracy.

Hundreds of regime supporters rallied in a Damascus square, waving Russian and Chinese flags in gratitude for blocking the resolution.

"Thanks Russia, thanks China for undermining the Western conspiracy against our country," said Nibal Hmeid, a 24-year-old teacher at the rally. She said Assad should now settle the situation "decisively and militarily against those armed criminals."

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AP correspondent Matthew Lee reported from Sofia, Bulgaria. AP correspondent Bassem Mroue in Beirut contributed to this report.