Senator Paul stirs business ire over blocking of tax treaties

By Patrick Temple-West

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Senator Rand Paul is coming under pressure from some multi-national businesses to drop his opposition to tax treaties between the United States and other nations.

Citing privacy concerns about Americans' tax data, Paul, a Republican and libertarian, has single-handedly blocked Senate action on treaties with Hungary, Switzerland and Luxembourg that have been signed by authorities on both sides, but have been awaiting Senate review since 2011.

At least six other tax treaties or treaty updates -- with Chile, Spain, Poland, Japan, Norway and Britain -- may soon be added to the Senate's queue for confirmation votes.

Major U.S. businesses such as IBM Corp and Fluor Corp are lobbying for Senate action on tax treaties, according to Senate lobbying disclosure documents.

"How many treaties will be held hostage?" asked Cathy Schultz, a lobbyist for the National Foreign Trade Council, a Washington, D.C.-based group that represents companies such as Caterpillar Inc and Pfizer Inc.

Paul has said he is concerned that recent treaties would give foreign governments too much access to U.S. citizens' tax information, a stance that has some support among like-minded conservative libertarians.

"Rand Paul is not a typical senator who may bend over to business lobbyists," said Chris Edwards, director of tax policy at The Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank.

"I am very concerned about this increasingly aggressive international exchange of information," Edwards said.

NO APPROVALS SINCE 2010

No new tax treaties or treaty updates have been approved since 2010, when Paul was elected as the junior senator from Kentucky on a wave of support for Tea Party-aligned Republicans.

Paul recently declined to answer questions from a reporter in a Capitol hallway about the "hold" he has placed on the treaties. Under Senate rules, one senator can prevent a motion from reaching a vote on the Senate floor.

Paul's staff did not reply to repeated requests for comment.

"There's never really been an objection of this sort and a hold that's gone on this long," said Nancy McLernon, president of the Organization for International Investment, which lobbies in Washington on behalf of foreign companies.

In an effort to sway the senator, McLernon said her group would be lobbying both parties to draw attention to the tax treaties. "Let's stop with the self-inflicted wounds," she said.

The United States has tax treaties with more than 60 countries, ranging from China to Kyrgyzstan.

The agreements previously have routinely won Senate approval with little controversy and accomplished their main purpose of preventing double-taxation of income and profits.

In recent years, tax treaties have begun to play an increasing role in efforts by the United States and major European Union countries to crack down on tax avoidance.

The U.S. Treasury in 2012 began signing new tax pacts with countries as part of implementation of the U.S. Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, a 2010 anti-tax-evasion law.

The law, known as FATCA, which takes effect in January 2014, will require foreign financial institutions to disclose to the United States information about Americans' accounts worth more than $50,000.

SWISS A DRIVING FORCE

Switzerland, a long-time bastion of banking secrecy, is under international pressure to change its ways, and FATCA has been a driving force in that. The United States and Switzerland in February signed a FATCA implementation agreement that would make more information available to U.S. authorities about the financial interests of Americans in Switzerland.

But the taxpayer information exchange cannot go into force without Senate approval of the U.S.-Swiss tax treaty.

The Senate's delayed action on tax treaties could convince other countries to stop negotiating with the United States on tax matters, said John Harrington, a former Treasury tax official who is now a partner at law firm SNR Denton.

Paul, seen as a possible 2016 presidential contender, has taken a position that sets up a clash of traditional Republican interest groups: big business and libertarian ideologues.

In this sense, Paul is in the forefront of the party's search for a new identity since Republicans lost the presidential race last year, as well as numerous seats in the House of Representatives.

Looking toward a possible 2016 White House bid, Paul told reporters earlier this month that he will visit early-voting states this year and make a final decision next year.

New Republicans such as Paul are shifting the party away from its business-first agenda, said Dan Holler, communications director for Heritage Action, a conservative group.

"The party is not being reflexively pro-business," he said.

(Reporting by Patrick Temple-West; Editing by Kevin Drawbaugh and Leslie Adler)

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Mini-stroke could limit Algeria president ambition

ALGIERS, Algeria (AP) — The mini-stroke suffered by Algeria's president has cast fresh doubt on his perceived ambition to run for a fourth term next year as leader of one of Africa's largest and richest countries.

The possibility that President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, 76, could step down could affect the stability of this key U.S. ally in the fight against terror but might also open up its long-stagnant politics.

Bouteflika on Saturday had a brief blockage of a cerebral blood vessel known as a transient ischemic attack, which authorities said he quickly recovered from and had no lasting complications. He was sent to a military hospital in Paris for tests, however, and remained there Sunday night.

Algeria's state news agency has been uncommonly open about the president's latest health problem but insisted he will be back to work soon.

"He has not had any lasting damage and no motor or sensory function has been impaired," Rachid Bougherbal, the director of the institute of sports medicine, told the state news agency.

Such mini-strokes — known as TIAs — have symptoms of confusion and disorientation. They are quite brief but can re-occur. In a third of the cases, a full stroke can happen within a year, according to the American Stroke Association.

The mini-stroke has come during a delicate time in Bouteflika's 14-year-reign, as rumors over his poor health have proliferated and he has rarely appeared in public.

Charges of corruption have also dogged his administration. Terrorist groups, including one that carried out a massive attack on an Algerian gas field in January, are also known to be in remote desert areas along Algeria's borders.

There has also been a great deal of social unrest in this North African nation of 37 million, especially over Algeria's high unemployment rate.

Despite announcing that he would step down at the next presidential election, it is widely believed that Bouteflika wants to run for a fourth term in April 2014.

So convinced are residents of this unspoken desire of the president that there has been no talk of other candidates, only when he will make his announcement.

"This totally ends the chances of his fourth term," said Chafik Mesbah, a political analyst and former member of the military intelligence.

"This is ultimately a good thing," he added, explaining that the army and the intelligence services were increasingly upset over the rising tide of corruption.

Bouteflika's last term has seen a proliferation of corruption charges that have embroiled many of his former ministers and associates, mostly revolving around bribes paid by foreign companies to win lucrative oil or infrastructure contracts.

The charges had even reached up to the president's brother, Said Bouteflika, who had been amassing power as the leader's main adviser until he was forced to resign.

Even before the latest scare, the president's diminished health had been slowing down the pace of government, said analyst Mohammed Saidj.

"The council of ministers, which is an important institution for transmitting laws, hasn't met since December," he said. "All these absences can only be explained by one thing: his health doesn't allow him to assume the full duties of the president."

Bouteflika was elected in 1999 to a country with a devastated economy that had been savaged by years of civil war with Islamists. He is widely credited with ending the war and putting the country back on its feet, aided by soaring energy prices.

Algeria weathered the 2011 Arab Spring protests partly because of a lack of organized opposition but also because of massive sums spent on increasing subsidies and raising salaries to keep residents happy.

But as his health has declined, Bouteflika has become a shadow of his former energetic self when he was the world's youngest foreign minister in 1963 after Algeria won independence from France and became one of the faces of the non-aligned movement.

He doesn't seem to be ready, however, to let the next generation take over.

University of Algiers political professor Rachid Tlemcani said, like most authoritarian rulers, "he wishes to die in power."

But Tlemcani says Bouteflika stepping down would be a good thing for Algeria.

"I think the political game would be open, which would be really good," he said. "It can only be positive for Algeria — the game has been very closed so far."

Life on the streets of Algiers, the capital, went on as usual the day after the president's health scare. Most people seemed more focused on the country's upcoming soccer club final.

Walking through Algiers' El Biar neighborhood, Achou Slimani shrugged.

"It's normal that he fell sick, it's not the first time," he said. "He was already sick, he recovered, he came back."

______

Associated Press writer Aomar Ouali contributed to this report.

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Italian government could be settled on Saturday: sources

By Paolo Biondi

ROME (Reuters) - Italian prime minister-designate Enrico Letta could announce a new government on Saturday and spell out its programme early next week, political sources said on Friday, while outgoing premier Mario Monti said he did not expect to be a minister.

Letta, deputy leader of the centre-left Democratic Party, has been in discussions to iron out remaining differences with Silvio Berlusconi's People of Freedom (PDL) party following an initial round of talks on Thursday.

After two months of political stalemate following an inconclusive general election in February, Letta is under pressure to move quickly and form a government capable of leading Italy out of recession.

In a series of lengthy meetings, he conferred with President Giorgio Napolitano, Monti and PDL national co-ordinator Angelino Alfano.

Monti said in an evening television interview that he advised Letta not to put frontline politicians from any party in key cabinet posts in order to reduce potential tensions. He said this meant he himself would be excluded.

"I don't believe I will be in the cabinet and I have not requested to be," he told TV channel La7.

Several political sources close to Letta said he expected to announce his cabinet on Saturday and take Sunday to prepare an initial speech to parliament on Monday, which would be followed by confidence votes in the two houses of parliament.

The horse-trading around the formation of a new government represents a cooling of post-election hostilities and few politicians or commentators doubt the government will be formed.

Yet big problems remain, including securing the lasting support of Letta's own divided party and ensuring cohesion in a cabinet of long-time adversaries.

One potential stumbling block is the PDL's demand for the abolition and repayment of a housing tax introduced last year by Monti's technocrat government.

Scrapping the tax for 2013 and repaying last year's contribution would blow an 8 billion euro ($10.40 billion) hole in this year's budget plans and create further problems for medium-term finances in the years ahead.

In an interview with Italian newspapers on Friday, Berlusconi expressed optimism that a solution could be found but, in a sign that problems remained, politicians on both sides avoided public comment on how talks were progressing.

Letta has declared his chief priorities will be measures to create jobs and help small business and to reform ineffective political institutions, including an electoral law that was a leading cause of the deadlocked vote.

He has also joined a chorus of voices calling for a change to the European Union's austerity mantra to put more emphasis on economic growth and investment, a line that Berlusconi's PDL has also pushed strongly.

VIABLE COALITION?

Letta's Democratic Party has come close to breaking apart after a mutiny last week over the election of the president of the republic which forced Pier Luigi Bersani to resign as party leader.

Many in the party refuse to accept any coalition with the scandal-plagued Berlusconi, their enemy for almost 20 years, who is appealing against a four-year sentence for tax fraud and fighting charges of paying for sex with a minor.

Younger party activists have protested loudly against any deal and there has already been speculation that some rebels may refuse to support Letta in confidence votes in parliament.

The anti-establishment 5-Star Movement, Berlusconi's former allies in the Northern League and the PD's own former allies in the leftist Left Ecology Freedom party have already declared they will not be in a government dominated by the PD and PDL.

The PDL insists that the government be made up mostly of politicians from the main parties rather than technocrats, putting it at odds with many in Letta's party.

Berlusconi pressed for Renato Brunetta, a combative former economics professor who is currently the PDL's lower house leader, to be given the economy ministry, ruling out Bank of Italy official Fabrizio Saccomanni, who had been mooted.

Other possible candidates include former prime minister Giuliano Amato, while either Monti or former prime minister Massimo D'Alema have been considered possible foreign ministers.

Berlusconi claimed a role in a group deciding institutional reforms and urged a transformation of the electoral system to include a directly elected head of state along the lines of the French model.

($1 = 0.7689 euros)

(Writing by James Mackenzie; Editing by Angus MacSwan and Tom Pfeiffer)

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Exclusive: Boston bomb suspects' parents retreat to village, cancel U.S. trip

UNDISCLOSED LOCATION IN NORTH CAUCASUS, Russia (Reuters) - The father of the Boston Marathon bombing suspects has abandoned plans to travel to the United States to bury one son and help in the defense of the other, he told Reuters on Sunday in an interview in southern Russia.

Anzor Tsarnaev said he believed he would not be allowed to see his surviving son Dzohkhar, who was captured and has been charged in connection with the April 15 bomb blasts that killed three people and wounded 264.

"I am not going back to the United States. For now I am here. I am ill," Tsarnaev said. He agreed to the face-to-face interview on condition that his location in the North Caucasus, a string of mainly Muslim provinces in southern Russia, not be disclosed.

"Unfortunately I can't help my child in any way. I am in touch with Dzhokhar's and my own lawyers. They told me they would let me know (what to do)," he said.

Tsarnaev had said in the North Caucasus province of Dagestan on Thursday that he planned to travel to the United States to see Dzkhokhar and bury his elder son, Tamerlan, who was shot dead by police in a firefight four days after the bombings.

(Reporting by Maria Golovnina; Writing by Steve Gutterman; Editing by Peter Graff)

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Two policemen shot as new Italy government sworn in

ROME (Reuters) - Two police officers were shot and wounded outside the Italian prime minister's office on Sunday as Enrico Letta's new government was being sworn in around a km (mile) away at the president's palace, RAI state television reported.

One man was arrested at the scene of the shooting, a witness said, and it was initially unclear whether the attack was linked to the launch of the new government.

One of the officers was shot in the neck and was in a serious condition, a police official said.

Letta, 46, the moderate deputy head of the Democratic Party (PD), on Saturday ended two months of political stalemate since February's inconclusive election when he brought together former political rivals in a broad coalition government.

Letta's ministers stepped forward one by one to swear allegiance to the republic before President Giorgio Napolitano, who personally picked Letta as prime minister and had a central role in the choice of his cabinet team.

(Reporting by Gavin Jones; Editing by Andrew Heavens)

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London property being snapped up as quickly as before 2007 crisis - Hometrack

LONDON (Reuters) - Property in London is being snapped more quickly than at any time since October 2007 when the market hit its peak before the financial crisis, according to figures from real estate data firm Hometrack.

Homes in London were typically on the market for 4.6 weeks in April - nearly half the period of more than eight weeks seen at the end of 2008 at the height of the financial crisis. Sellers achieved more than 95 percent of their asking price, also a level not seen since 2007.

Property prices in the capital rose 0.7 percent in April, matching March which was the biggest jump since Feb 2010. Prices in England and Wales rose 0.3 percent, also the joint-biggest rise in three years.

Hometrack's findings, based on 5,000-6,000 completed questionnaires covering all postcode districts in England and Wales, come as concerns grow that recent government initiatives could fuel a new house price bubble.

The government's Help to Buy programme, unveiled in its March budget, and its Funding for Lending scheme, launched with the Bank of England last summer and expanded last week, are both likely to boost mortgage lending and help buyers with small deposits get on the property ladder.

Richard Donnell, Hometrack's director of research, noted there had been a marked decline in reports of mortgage availability acting as a barrier to purchase, a direct result, he said, of the Funding for Lending Scheme.

"In each of the last three months the growth in supply has failed to keep pace with demand," he said.

Property prices in Britain didn't fall as sharply as most parts of Europe and the United States during the financial crisis, and are already testing historically high levels relative to income.

House prices in London have also been supported by international demand, with the market seen as a safe haven at a time of uncertainty in the euro area.

(Reporting by Christina Fincher; Editing by Susan Fenton)

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3 killed in French building collapse after blast

REIMS, France (AP) — A possible gas explosion ripped off the side of a five-story residential building in France's Champagne country on Sunday, killing at least three people and injuring 14 others, officials said.

More than 100 rescue workers, firefighters, sniffer-dog squads and bomb and gas experts were deployed to the gutted building in a subsidized housing complex in the city of Reims, east of Paris, officials said. Heaps of debris spilled out of the building onto a grassy esplanade below.

"The explosion of a residential building in Reims is a terrible drama," the office of French President Francois Hollande said in a statement, conveying his condolences to the victims' relatives.

Michel Bernard, the top government official in Reims, said crews searching for survivors turned up the body of a woman under the rubble Sunday afternoon, raising the death toll to three. He said it was unlikely that the toll would rise any higher.

Through most of the day, authorities had said at least two people had died. One person was hospitalized with serious, but not life-threatening injuries, and another 13 people had minor injuries, officials said. Authorities used backhoes to help clear away the rubble.

"We don't know the cause of the explosion. It was probably due to gas," Reims mayor Adeline Hazan said at the scene. An official investigation was under way to determine the cause, she said. Authorities say the three people known to have died were adults.

Witnesses described a powerful blast.

"The explosion was very strong, like a sonic boom from a fighter plane. We had been playing football on a field about 30 meters (100 feet) away, and ran to the scene," housing project resident Abdel Kader said. "The building had fallen like a house of cards ... 30 seconds after that we saw a man calling for help, he was on a slab. His legs were caught."

"Later, he died," Abdel Kader, a 27-year-old job seeker who declined to provide his family name, said.

Bernard, the government official in Reims, said the building dated to the 1960s. About 10 of the 40 or so apartments were affected on the end of the rectangular building, he said.

The precariousness of some buildings has come to light internationally in recent days following the collapse Wednesday of an eight-story building in a suburb of Dhaka, Bangladesh, where at least 362 people have been confirmed to have died. Officials said three floors of the building, which had housed garment factories, had been built illegally.

___

Associated Press writer Jamey Keaten contributed to this story from Paris.

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Four arrested as Bangladesh building toll rises to 352

By Serajul Quadir and Ruma Paul

DHAKA (Reuters) - Two factory bosses and two engineers were detained in Bangladesh on Saturday, three days after the collapse of a building where low-cost garments were made for Western brands killed at least 352 people.

More were being pulled alive from the rubble at the building, where police said as many as 900 people were still missing in Bangladesh's worst ever industrial accident.

The owner of the eight-storey building that fell like a pack of cards around more than 3,000 mainly young women workers was still on the run.

Police said several of his relatives were detained to compel him to hand himself in, and an alert had gone out to airport and border authorities to prevent him from fleeing the country.

Officials said Rana Plaza, on the outskirts of the capital, Dhaka, had been built on spongy ground without the correct permits, and the workers were sent in on Wednesday despite warnings the previous day that it was structurally unsafe.

Anger at the negligence has sparked days of protests and clashes, with police on Saturday using tear gas, water cannons and rubber bullets to quell demonstrators who burned cars.

Two engineers involved in building the complex were picked up at their homes early on Saturday, Dhaka district police chief Habibur Rahman said. He said they were arrested for dismissing a warning not to open the building after a jolt was felt and cracks were noticed on some pillars the previous day.

The owner and managing director of the largest of the five factories in the complex, New Wave Style, surrendered to the country's garment industry association during the night and they were handed over to police. They will be kept in remand for an initial 12 days.

The factory, which listed many European and North American retailers as its customers, occupied upper floors of the building that officials said had been added illegally.

"PEOPLE ARE ASKING FOR HIS HEAD"

"Everyone involved - including the designer, engineer, and builders - will be arrested for putting up this defective building," said junior internal affairs minister Shamsul Huq.

Anger over the working conditions of Bangladesh's 3.6 million garment workers - most of whom are women earning as little as $38 a month - has grown since the disaster.

Hundreds were on the streets again on Saturday, smashing and burning cars and sparking more battles with police, who responded with tear gas, rubber bullets and a water cannon. Eyewitnesses said dozens of people were injured in the clashes.

An alliance of leftist parties which is part of the ruling coalition said it would call a national strike on May 2 if all those responsible for the disaster were not arrested by Sunday.

Rahman identified the owner of the building as Mohammed Sohel Rana, a leader of the ruling Awami League's youth front.

"People are asking for his head, which is quite natural," said H.T. Imam, an adviser to the prime minister.

Wednesday's collapse was the third major industrial incident in five months in Bangladesh, the second-largest exporter of garments in the world. In November, a fire at the Tazreen Fashion factory nearby the latest disaster killed 112 people.

Such incidents have raised serious questions about worker safety and low wages, and could taint the reputation of the poor South Asian country, which relies on garments for 80 percent of its exports.

The Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) on Saturday asked garment factory owners to produce building designs by July in a bid to improve safety.

Remarkably, rescuers armed with rod cutters and drills were still pulling people alive from the precarious mound of rubble - 29 in all since dawn on Saturday.

Marina Begum, 22, spoke from a hospital bed of her ordeal inside the broken building for three days.

"It felt like I was in hell," she told reporters. "It was so hot, I could hardly breathe, there was no food and water. When I regained my senses I found myself in this hospital bed."

Frantic efforts were under way to save 15 people trapped under the concrete who were being supplied with dried food, bottled water and oxygen.

Heavy machinery will not be used to remove the remaining bodies and debris until all the survivors are rescued, junior minister for local government Jahangir Kabir Nanak said.

About 2,500 people have been rescued from the remains of the building in the commercial suburb of Savar, about 30 km (20 miles) from Dhaka.

WRONG PERMIT, ILLEGAL FLOORS

Emdadul Islam, chief engineer of the state-run Capital Development Authority (CDA), said the owner of the building had not received the proper building consent, obtaining a permit for a five-storey building from the local municipality which did not have the authority to grant it.

"Only CDA can give such approval," he said. "We are trying to get the original design from the municipality, but since the concerned official is in hiding we cannot get it readily."

Furthermore, another three storeys had been added illegally, he said. "Savar is not an industrial zone, and for that reason no factory can be housed in Rana Plaza," Islam told Reuters.

Islam said the building had been erected on the site of a pond filled in with sand and earth, weakening the foundations.

Duty free access offered by Western countries and low wages helped turn Bangladesh's garment exports into a $19 billion a year industry. Sixty percent of the clothes go to Europe. The United States takes 23 percent and Canada takes 5 percent.

North American and European chains, including British retailer Primark and Canada's Loblaw, a unit of George Weston Ltd, said they were supplied by factories in the Rana Plaza building.

Loblaw, which had a small number of "Joe Fresh" apparel items made at one of the factories, said on Saturday that it was working with other retailers to provide aid and support.

It said it was sending representatives to Bangladesh and was also joining what it described as an urgent meeting with other retailers and the Retail Council of Canada.

(Writing by John Chalmers and Frank Jack Daniel; Editing by Paul Tait and Jeremy Laurence)

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Obama to nominate Anthony Foxx as transportation secretary

By Mark Felsenthal

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama plans to nominate on Monday Charlotte, North Carolina, Mayor Anthony Foxx to be his next transportation secretary, a White House official said on Sunday.

If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Foxx would replace Ray LaHood, who has served as transportation secretary since January 2009.

Foxx is African-American and would add to the Obama Cabinet's racial diversity, something the president's supporters have been urging him to do.

As Charlotte mayor, Foxx is credited with improving the city's transportation systems.

"Foxx's career as a public official, in a rapidly changing urban environment, has been marked by an ability to integrate local, state and federal resources to meet important transportation challenges," the White House official said.

North Carolina has been an important swing state in presidential elections. It voted for Republican Mitt Romney in the 2012 presidential election, but backed Obama in 2008. Charlotte hosted the Democratic National Convention in 2012.

(Additional reporting by Steve Holland, Sarah N. Lynch; Editing by Stacey Joyce and Mohammad Zargham)

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Egypt police in new protests demanding more rights

CAIRO (AP) — Dozens of Egyptian police officers disobeyed orders and stormed a superior's office in the capital, shut down a security directorate in the north and went on strike in the south in a new round of protests Sunday that threaten to unhinge the country's already weakened security force.

It was the year's third wave of strikes by police, who demand incentives to work, like better wages, greater firepower and more benefits.

The police force has not recovered from the days of the 2011 uprising that deposed longtime President Hosni Mubarak. His police were a symbol of the regime's unchecked powers and abuses, and they were forced from the streets in the early stages of the revolt by angry protesters.

After losing much of their power, now police are demanding more rights. Last month thousands of police stopped working for several days. In some cases, citizens found police stations closed.

In an effort to show support, President Mohammed Morsi addressed riot police and attended traditional Islamic Friday prayers with them shortly after their strike ended. He praised the police for protecting security but warned them against divisions.

The Interior Ministry, which oversees police in Egypt, relies on low-ranking police to protect government buildings. Hundreds of policemen have been wounded this year and several have been killed in anti-government protests.

Many officers say they are fed up with promises of reform. Thousands of low-ranking officers have refused orders to guard courts during heated trials and protests.

On Sunday, dozens of low-ranking officers stormed the office of the deputy interior minister in charge of health care for police. His office is inside the main police hospital in Cairo's Nileside neighborhood of Agouza. They said promises of better health care have gone unfulfilled.

In the south, police at two stations in the province of Assuit went on strike, charging that the government did not fulfill any of their demands.

In the Nile Delta province of Kafr el-Sheikh, police locked the gate to the security division with chains, according to security officials and state media reports.

Some of the police force is also calling for the dismissal of Interior Minister Mohammed Ibrahim, appointed by Morsi in a limited Cabinet shuffle in January. Five different interior ministers have headed the force in the past two years, and none has been able to exercise full control over the unsettled ranks.

Some policemen are also protesting alleged attempts by the powerful Muslim Brotherhood to try to control the force, a charge the Islamist group denies. For decades, Egypt's police aggressively targeted the Brotherhood, and Morsi himself was imprisoned under Mubarak.

Rights activists accuse the police force of continuing its brutal tactics under Morsi. Around 100 protesters have been killed in confrontations with police this year. There are concerns that a recent decision to purchase 100,000 new 9mm pistols for police could lead to an even greater use of excessive force against unarmed protesters and civilians.

Officer Mohammed Mustafa was among those who stormed the deputy minister's office in Cairo on Sunday. He told The Associated Press that the group ended its sit-in after superiors vowed to look into their demands, which include purchasing bullet-proof vests and enacting stronger laws to protect them.

Policemen say they are being arrested and put on trial for using lethal force to protect themselves against well-armed criminal gangs that are smuggling weapons, drugs and antiquities. He said they do not have enough protection to go after suspects.

They also demand the same benefits available to their superior officers.

Mustafa said neither he nor his family can be treated at the police hospital where the sit-in took place. He said he has to take his four children to rundown public hospitals, and he is allowed treatment at the police hospital only if he is injured on the job.

Many police complain that their wages are too low.

Though his salary has increased by almost three-fold following the uprising, Mustafa said he still earns only $185 a month. After 15 years on the job, low-ranking officers receive just $2,000 in compensation when they retire.

"Morsi, before he was president, promised that he would solve the problems of the police force," he said. "We want action, not words."

Also Sunday, several thousand students from state universities marched through Cairo, taking their demands to Cabinet headquarters. They called for the dismissal of the Minister of Higher Education Mustafa Mosaad, accusing him of allowing violence on campuses against student protests. They also want improvements in the education system.

Muslim Brotherhood students did not join the protest.

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Gunmen surround Libyan foreign ministry to push demands

LONDON, April 26 (Reuters) - Arsenal will keep with tradition and form a guard of honour for new Premier League champions Manchester United when the sides meet at The Emirates on Sunday. "That is part of the tradition of English football and I want that, of course, to be respected," Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger told a news conference on Friday. "I'm French, I work in England and the English tradition should be respected. When you work somewhere abroad you have to respect the culture of the country," he added. ...

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Gunmen surround Libya Foreign Ministry

TRIPOLI, Libya (AP) — A Libyan military official says about 200 armed men are surrounding the Foreign Ministry building in Tripoli, demanding the ministry to reform and hire former fighters who helped overthrow former dictator Moammar Gadhafi.

Esam al-Naas said 38 trucks, some mounted with machineguns, had surrounded the ministry on Sunday. The men allege that many supporters of the old regime are still occupying senior positions in the ministry and its missions abroad.

He said negotiations with the protesters are underway and that no one has entered the ministry building.

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Syria's neighbors cautious about U.S.-led intervention

By Nick Tattersall

ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Syria's neighbors, wary of stirring a conflict that could spill back over their borders, would be reluctant partners in a U.S.-led intervention but are ultimately likely to support limited military action if widespread use of chemical weapons is proven.

The White House disclosed U.S. intelligence on Thursday that Syria had likely used chemical weapons, a move President Barack Obama had said could trigger unspecified consequences, widely interpreted to include possible U.S. military action.

Syrian neighbors Jordan and Turkey, their support key in any such intervention, have long been vocal critics of Bashar al-Assad. Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, an erstwhile ally of the Syrian President, was among the first to call openly for his overthrow while allowing armed opponents to use Turkish soil.

But their rhetoric has been tempered by the changing circumstances of a war that has dragged on beyond their expectations and grown increasingly sectarian, as well as by the suspicion they will be left bearing the consequences of any action orchestrated by Western powers thousands of miles away.

For Turkey's leaders, facing elections next year, talk of chemical weapons is an uncomfortable reminder of the wave of anti-U.S. sentiment which followed the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, justified by intelligence on nuclear, chemical and biological weapons that turned out to be erroneous.

Turkey, which shares a 900-km border with Syria, has reacted cautiously to the U.S. disclosure while Jordan, fearful of the growing influence of radical Islamists in the Syrian rebel ranks, has voiced its preference for a political solution.

"The international community, and especially the peoples of the Middle East, have lost confidence in any report which argues that there are weapons of mass destruction or chemical weapons," said one source close to the Turkish government.

"Right now, no-one wants to believe them. And if Assad uses chemical weapons some day ... I still think Turkey's primary reaction would be asking for more support to the opposition rather than an intervention."

Turkey's rhetoric on Syria, at least in public, has toned down markedly over the past six months, even as shelling and gunfire spilled over the border and the influx of refugees to camps on its territory swelled to a quarter of a million.

Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu's push for a foreign-protected "safe zone" inside Syria gained little traction among allies and appears to have quietly slipped from the agenda. Even Erdogan, whose speeches were regularly laced with bellicose anti-Assad rhetoric, mentions the conflict less frequently.

But many analysts believe both the pro-U.S. monarchy in Jordan and Erdogan's government in Ankara would toe the line should Washington seek their cooperation in military action.

Turkey's relations with Washington have at times been prickly - notably in 2003 when it failed to allow the deployment of U.S. forces to Turkey to open a northern front in the Iraq war - but strategic cooperation has generally remained strong.

Turkish support and bases proved vital, for example, to U.S. forces in Afghanistan, while Turkey hosts a U.S.-operated NATO radar system to protect against any regional threat from Iran.

"Given the texture of the current government's relations with the U.S. and given the history of its discourse on Syria, I think it would be not impossible but rather difficult for Mr Erdogan not to oblige U.S. demands," said Faruk Logoglu, former Turkish ambassador to Washington and vice chairman of the main opposition Republican People's Party.

RELUCTANT PARTNERS

Although Obama has warned Syria that using chemical weapons against its own people would cross a "red line", he has also made clear he is in no rush to intervene on the basis of evidence he said was still preliminary.

Syria denies using chemical weapons in the two-year-old conflict in which more than 70,000 people have been killed.

Mindful of the lessons of the start of the Iraq war, aides have insisted Obama will need all the facts before deciding what steps to take. But acknowledgment of the intelligence assessment appears to have moved the United States closer - at least rhetorically - to some sort of action, military or otherwise.

Turkey and Jordan would be key to any such move, but they may prove reluctant.

From the outset, Turkey has felt slighted.

Before the crisis, Erdogan cultivated a friendship with Assad, personal ties which he tried to use after the start of the uprising in March 2011 to persuade the Syrian leader to embrace reform and open dialogue. He was rebuffed.

When his strategy changed, he began calling for Assad's removal and allowing the Syrian opposition to organize on Turkish soil. Ankara felt it gained praise from Washington and its allies but little in the way of concrete support.

"Turkey feels lonely in many senses," the Turkish source said, saying that a military intervention now would leave Turkey and Syria's other neighbors reeling from the consequences.

"There is always the risk of creating more destruction and creating a failed state in Syria ... This thing is happening next door. The flames are reaching us, starting to burn us, where they can't reach the United States, Qatar, or the UK."

Jordan's King Abdullah said last year Assad should step down, but the kingdom is increasingly concerned by the growing strength in Syrian rebel ranks of Islamist fighters who view the monarchy with just as much hostility as they do Assad.

Further fuelling those fears is the presence of fighters from the Nusra Front, which has declared its allegiance to al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahri, among rebels who have taken territory across Syria's southern province of Deraa, only 120 km (75 miles) from the Jordanian capital Amman.

Officials fear Syria has become a magnet for Islamist fighters who could one day turn their guns on Jordan - as Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi did during the sectarian conflict in neighboring Iraq. Zarqawi was widely believed to have been behind simultaneous attacks on Jordanian tourist hotels which killed dozens of people in November 2005.

SENSE OF URGENCY

Such fears could push the U.S. and its allies to act.

"The fact that the opposition is divided cuts both ways. It makes the logistics and even the politics of an intervention more difficult," said Sinan Ulgen of the Istanbul-based Center for Economic and Foreign Policy Studies (EDAM).

"But at the same time it reinforces the urgency of an intervention: the more the international community does not intervene in Syria, the more likely it is that the radical elements will gain the upper hand in a post-Assad Syria."

Turkish officials and diplomats have expressed concern about the role Saudi Arabia may be playing in providing weapons which are going to the hands of radical Islamist elements among the Syrian rebel ranks.

U.S. intelligence agencies believes Assad's forces may have used the nerve agent sarin on a small scale against rebel fighters. The fear is that an increasingly desperate Assad may use such weapons more widely the longer the conflict drags on.

An attack like that on the Iraqi Kurdish city of Halabja - where an estimated 5,000 people died in a poison gas attack ordered by former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein 25 years ago, the most notorious use of chemical weapons in the Middle East in recent history - could sway public opinion in the region.

"A major chemical attack would outrage the Arab and Muslim street ... It would be difficult just to watch, then everyone would intervene," said retired Jordanian air force general Mamoun Abu Nowar.

The role Turkey or Jordan would play in any military action will depend on Washington's strategy, but logistical support for limited missile strikes or possible assistance in enforcing the sort of no-fly zone long advocated by Turkey appear more likely than sending in ground troops.

Turkey is home to NATO's second-largest army and to the Incirlik Air base, which provided logistical support for U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is already hosting hundreds of U.S. soldiers operating part of a NATO Patriot missile system to defend against possible Syrian attack.

Washington meanwhile announced last week it was sending an army headquarters unit - which could theoretically command combat troops - to Jordan, bolstering efforts started last year to plan for contingencies there as Syria's conflict deepens.

"A surgical strike to get the stocks of chemical weapons ... or establishing air superiority through a number of strikes against Syrian air defenses, this is the type of scenario being contemplated in Turkey," said EDAM's Ulgen.

"Anything beyond that is much more difficult to see."

(Additional reporting by Suleiman al-Khalidi and Khaled Oweis in Amman; Writing by Nick Tattersall)

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Pattern seen in alleged chemical arms use in Syria

BEIRUT (AP) — The instances in which chemical weapons are alleged to have been used in Syria were purportedly small in scale: nothing along the lines of Saddam Hussein's 1988 attack in Kurdish Iraq that killed thousands.

That raises the question of who would stand to gain as President Bashar Assad's regime and the opposition trade blame for the alleged attacks, and proof remains elusive.

Analysts say the answer could lie in the past — the regime has a pattern of gradually introducing a weapon to the conflict to test the international community's response.

The U.S. said last week that intelligence indicates the Syrian military has likely used sarin, a deadly nerve agent, on at least two occasions in the civil war, echoing similar assessments from Israel, France and Britain. Syria's rebels accuse the regime of firing chemical weapons on at least four occasions, while the government denies the charges and says opposition fighters have used chemical agents in a bid to frame it.

But using chemical weapons to try to force foreign intervention would be a huge gamble for the opposition, and one that could easily backfire. It would undoubtedly taint the rebellion in the eyes of the international community and seriously strain its credibility.

Mustafa Alani, an analyst at the Gulf Research Center in Geneva, said it would also be difficult for the rebels to successfully employ chemical agents.

"It's very difficult to weaponize chemical weapons," he said. "It needs a special warhead, for the artillery a special fuse."

In the chaos of Syria's civil war, pinning down definitive proof on the alleged use of weapons of mass destruction is a tricky task with high stakes. President Barack Obama has said any use of chemical arms — or the transfer of stockpiles to terrorists — would cross a "red line" and carry "enormous consequences."

Already, the White House's announcement that the Syrian regime appears to have used chemical arms has ratcheted up the pressure on Obama to move forcefully. He has sought to temper expectations of a quick U.S. response, saying too little is known about the alleged attacks to take action now.

Analysts suggest that a limited introduction of the weapons, with little ostensible military gain, could be an attempt by the Syrian government to test the West's resolve while retaining the veil of plausible deniability. This approach would also allow foreign powers eager to avoid a costly intervention in Syria to remain on the sidelines, while at the same time opening the door for the regime to use the weapons down the road.

"If it's testing the water, and we're going to turn a blind eye, it could be used widely, repeatedly," Alani said. "If you are silent once, you will be silent twice."

The slow introduction of a weapon to gauge the West's response fits a pattern of behavior the Assad regime has demonstrated since the uprising began in March 2011, according to Joseph Holliday, a Syria analyst at the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War.

When largely peaceful protesters initially took to the streets, the regime responded with small arms fire and a wave of arrests. As the government ramped up its violent crackdown, the opposition began to take up arms in late 2011, prompting yet another escalation in force by the regime.

In early 2012, government troops began using heavy weapons, first in a relatively restrained manner on military targets.

"Once they could confirm that there wasn't going to be a major reaction from the West, they were able to expand the use of artillery," Holliday said.

By the summer of 2012, government troops were pounding rebellious neighborhoods with tank fire, field cannons and mortars, but the rebellion was stronger than ever, prompting Assad to turn to his air force, and the regime's MiG fighter jets and helicopter gunships began to strike military targets in rural areas.

After the government was satisfied that the international community wasn't going to impose a no-fly zone like NATO did in Libya, Assad unleashed the full might of his air power, and warplanes have been indiscriminately bombing rebel-held areas since.

"It all fits the pattern of being able to do this incrementally," Holliday said.

"It's been important for the regime to introduce these capabilities as gradually as possible so that they don't trip the international community's red lines," he added. "I think this is basically a modus operandi that the Assad regime has established and tested with the United States, and confirmed that it works, and he's using it again with chemical weapons."

Syria has never confirmed it even has chemical weapons. But it is believed to possess substantial stockpiles of mustard gas and a range of nerve agents, including sarin, a highly toxic substance that can suffocate its victims by paralyzing muscles around their lungs.

Concern rose last summer when then-Foreign Ministry spokesman Jihad Makdissi told a news conference that Damascus would only use chemical or biological weapons in case of foreign attack, not against its own people. The ministry then tried to blur the issue, saying it had never acknowledged having such arms.

Weapons of mass destruction are generally viewed as a deterrent against foreign attack, and their use a sign of desperation. But Assad appears far from desperate at the moment, and in fact is operating from a position of relative strength.

While much of northern Syria has fallen to the rebels, the government's hold on Damascus is firm and its forces have been on the offensive in the capital's suburbs and in the countryside near the border with Lebanon. In the northwest, regime troops recently opened up a key supply road to soldiers fighting in the embattled city of Aleppo.

Two of the alleged attacks the Syrian opposition blames on the regime took place in and around Aleppo: one in Khan al-Assal west of the city on March 19, and another in the contested Shiekh Maqsoud neighborhood on April 13. The other alleged instances were in the central city of Homs on Dec. 23 and in the village of Otaybah outside Damascus on March 19.

It is not clear exactly how many people died in those attacks because of the scarcity of credible information. The Syrian government seals off areas it controls to journalists and outside observers, making details of the attacks sketchy. But reports from anti-Assad activists and the government provide a basic outline.

Opposition activists have posted videos and pictures online of alleged victims of the attacks foaming at the mouth or with blister burns — symptoms consistent with chemical weapons attacks, but also other munitions. The Syrian state news agency, after one attack it blamed on rebels, published photos of casualties, including children. None showed signs of physical injuries.

Both sides in the civil war, which has already killed more than 70,000 people, have tried to use the issue to sway international opinion.

Rebels have been clamoring for more robust international action against the Assad regime. At a recent gathering in Turkey of the rebellion's international supporters, the opposition political leadership demanded drone strikes on regime targets and the imposition of a no-fly zone, and it reiterated calls for transfers of heavier weapons to its fighters.

The regime has seized on the opposition's demands for outside support to bolster its argument that rebels may have used chemical weapons to frame the government and precipitate foreign intervention.

In December, after rebels captured a chlorine factory in Aleppo, the government warned the opposition could be planning a chemical attack to frame the regime. To back up its assertions, the state news agency pointed to internet videos that purported to show regime opponents experimenting with poisons on mice and rabbits.

In the video, a masked man mixes gases in a glass box containing two rabbits. About a minute later, the animals start to spasm and then collapse. A narrator then says, "This is what will happen to you, Assad supporters." The origin of the video was not known.

Alani dismissed the possibility of the rebels, including Islamic extremist groups among the most powerful opposition fighting factions, carrying out a chlorine attack.

He noted that al-Qaida militants used chlorine on at least two occasions in Iraq in the cities of Ramadi and Fallujah, but abandoned the practice because "the impact of the chlorine was far less than conventional explosives."

___

Follow Ryan Lucas on Twitter at www.twitter.com/relucasz

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U.S. identifies four American victims in Afghan crash

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Pentagon identified four U.S. victims in Saturday's crash of a surveillance aircraft in southern Afghanistan and said the incident appeared unrelated to Taliban violence.

The police chief in Zabul province, Rogh Lewanai, told Reuters on Saturday that bad weather caused the plane to crash, in the district of Shahjoi. At the time, NATO did not identify the nationality of the victims but said they were part of NATO's International Security Assistance Force.

The Pentagon said on Sunday the crash of the MC-12 was under investigation.

Zabul, wedged between Kandahar and Ghazni, has seen much violence in recent weeks, including a suicide bomb attack in early April that killed a young U.S. diplomat, several U.S. soldiers and an unnamed U.S. civilian. Dozens of Afghan civilians also have been killed there this month.

The Pentagon said all four victims were airmen: Captain Brandon Cyr, 28, of Woodbridge, Virginia; Captain Reid Nishizuka, 30, of Kailua, Hawaii; Staff Sergeant Daniel Fannin, 30, of Morehead, Kentucky; and Staff Sergeant Richard Dickson, 24, of Rancho Cordova, California.

(Reporting by Phil Stewart, additional reporting by Mirwais Harooni and Amie Ferris-Rotman in Kabul; Editing by Bill Trott)

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Jurors set to get roadmap of Jackson civil trial

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The most complete account of Michael Jackson's final months is about to unfold in a cramped Los Angeles courtroom nearly four years after the pop superstar's death.

Lawyers for Jackson's mother will attempt to convince a jury that the company promoting the pop superstar's 2009 comeback concerts is responsible for his untimely death. The attorneys will try to prove that AEG Live hired and controlled the doctor convicted of involuntary manslaughter over Jackson's demise.

AEG Live denies any wrongdoing and contests that they hired the physician who for months was giving Jackson doses of a powerful anesthetic in the singer's bedroom to help him sleep.

Opening statements on Monday will provide a roadmap for a case that will delve into Jackson's addiction struggles and issues previously unexplored in court. Many of those in the singer's orbit — family, famous friends, doctors and his teenage children — may testify during the months-long trial.

Some of the stars listed on the witness list include Quincy Jones, Diana Ross, Lou Ferrigno and Spike Lee. Both of Jackson's ex-wives, Lisa Marie Presley and Debbie Rowe, are also listed as potential witnesses.

Katherine Jackson sued in September 2010, claiming AEG failed to properly investigate her son's doctor, Conrad Murray. All but one of her claims has been dismissed, but millions and possibly billions of dollars are at stake. The trial pits the family of a global superstar against AEG Live, a private company that as part of the Anschutz Entertainment Group has helped spark the revitalization of downtown Los Angeles with its venue, the Staples Center.

Unlike the 2011 trial that ended with Murray's conviction, the civil trial will explore the troubled finances of both men — a situation that Katherine Jackson's attorneys say created a conflict of interest for Murray that AEG should have been aware of.

The Houston-based cardiologist was deeply in debt when he agreed to serve as Jackson's personal doctor for a series of 50 concerts in London dubbed "This Is It." The doctor had liens and owed back child support when he began working with Jackson, expecting a $150,000 a month salary. Jackson died of acute propofol intoxication before the contract was fully signed.

The trial is expected to include detailed testimony about other doctors' treatment of Jackson, a subject that was largely off-limits in the criminal case. Unlike Murray's trial, which was broadcast live, the civil case will play out without cameras in a courtroom with only 45 public seats.

AEG denies they hired Murray, and have contended he should be considered an independent contractor, a designation many hospitals deem surgeons and other physicians.

Katherine Jackson's attorneys, Brian Panish and Kevin Boyle, have repeatedly cited emails sent by top AEG executives referencing Murray's pay and his obligations to get Jackson to perform.

Marvin S. Putnam, an attorney for AEG who was not available to comment, has said the company could not have foreseen the circumstances that led to Murray's administration of propofol to Jackson as a sleep aide.

AEG has said in court filings that Jackson's family is seeking $40 billion in damages, but Panish denies that's the figure he's seeking.

"We've never asked for $40 billion," he said. "The jury is going to decide what the loss is."

The high figure, Panish said, is the company's attempt to "prejudice everybody against the Jacksons." He says the case isn't about money.

"It's about getting the truth," he said. "We'd like to get out all the evidence. The evidence is going to speak for itself that AEG had a lot of involvement and they completely deny responsibility."

Jackson's three children, Prince, Paris and Blanket are also listed as plaintiffs on the case.

Asked whether he and the Jacksons are concerned about the image of the "Thriller" singer that will emerge in court, Panish said the trial will show a different side of the superstar. "Mrs. Jackson and her grandchildren suffered a tremendous loss and AEG has never recognized that and continues to deny responsibility," he said. "The other side of the story hasn't been told."

A jury of six men and six women has been selected to decide the case.

Monday's remarks by Panish and Putnam will provide the jurors' their first true insight into the evidence they will likely hear, and once again pull back the veil of Michael Jackson's private life.

___

Anthony McCartney can be reached at http://twitter.com/mccartneyAP

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2 killed in French building collapse after blast

REIMS, France (AP) — A possible gas explosion ripped off the side of a five-story residential building in France's Champagne country on Sunday, killing at least two people and injuring 14 others, officials said. Search teams extracted a victim's body as they pored over the rubble in a hunt for possible survivors.

More than 100 rescue workers, firefighters, sniffer-dog squads and bomb and gas experts rushed to the gutted building in a subsidized housing complex in the city of Reims, east of Paris, officials said. Heaps of debris spilled out of the building onto a grassy esplanade below.

"The explosion of a residential building in Reims is a terrible drama," the office of French President Francois Hollande said in a statement, conveying his condolences to the victims' relatives.

The Interior Ministry also issued a statement saying two people died and 14 people were injured.

"We don't know the cause of the explosion. It was probably due to gas," Reims mayor Adeline Hazan said at the scene. "We know two people are dead — we don't know their identities yet," she said, adding that the survivors were taken to hospital.

"These are not definite numbers, because we are looking for another two to five people," Hazan said. An official investigation was under way to determine the cause, she said. Authorities insisted that the two people known to have died were adults.

Witnesses described a powerful blast.

"The explosion was very strong, like a sonic boom from a fighter plane. We had been playing football on a field about 30 meters (100 feet) away, and ran to the scene," housing project resident Abdel Kader said. "The building had fallen like a house of cards ... 30 seconds after that we saw a man calling for help, he was on a slab. His legs were caught."

"Later, he died," Abdel Kader, a 27-year-old job seeker who declined to provide his family name, said.

Michel Bernard, the top government official in Reims, said the building dated to the 1960s. About 10 of the 40 or so apartments were affected on the end of the rectangular building, he said.

Late in the day, authorities deployed backhoes to help clear away the rubble.

The precariousness of some buildings has come to light internationally in recent days following the collapse Wednesday of an eight-story building in a suburb of Dhaka, Bangladesh, where at least 362 people have been confirmed to have died. Officials said three floors of the building, which had housed garment factories, had been built illegally.

___

Associated Press writer Jamey Keaten contributed to this story from Paris.

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Catching Fire's Jeffrey Wright Arrested For Drunk Driving In New York City (Reports)

Jeffrey Wright was arrested for drunk driving in New York City on Saturday, according to multiple reports.

The "Catching Fire" actor, 47, was reportedly pulled over on a lower East Side street in the early morning hours after police spotted him driving erratically, law enforcement sources reportedly told the New York Daily News.

PHOTOS: Celebrity Mug Shots

According to TMZ, officers pulled the actor over in a Toyota Tacoma and conducted a field sobriety test after allegedly detecting the odor of alcohol coming from his vehicle.

Wright was arrested and booked for DWI, TMZ reported.

PHOTOS: 'The Hunger Games: Catching FIre' - Portraits From The Capitol

The actor will soon be seen on the big screen as Beetee in "The Hunger Games: Catching Fire" - set to hit theaters on November 22.

-- Erin O'Sullivan

Copyright 2013 by NBC Universal, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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Italian policemen shot near new gov't swearing-in

ROME (AP) — In the very moments Italy's new coalition government was being sworn in, ending months of political paralysis in a country hoping to revive a bleak economy, a middle-aged unemployed bricklayer opened fire Sunday in the square outside the premier's office, seriously wounding two policemen, authorities said.

The alleged gunman from Calabria, a southern region plagued by joblessness and organized crime, told investigators he wanted to shoot politicians. But finding none in the square, he instead shot at Carabinieri paramilitary police.

A bullet pierced one of the policemen in the neck, passing through his spinal column, doctors said, adding it wasn't yet known if the 50-year-old officer would have any paralysis. The other one was shot in the leg and suffered a fracture.

The newly sworn in interior minister, Angelino Alfano, said a preliminary investigation indicated the shooting, which also slightly injured a pregnant bystander, amounted to a "tragic criminal gesture of a 49-year-old unemployed" man.

But the shooting was also a violent expression of social tensions in Italy, where unemployment is soaring, an increasing number of businesses are shutting their doors permanently and new political corruption scandals make headlines nearly every day.

Politicians described the attack as a disturbing call to fix Italy's economy.

"From what we understand, it's mainly personal problems, work, personal debts" that fueled the gunman's attack, said Guglielmo Epifani, a top official in Premier Enrico Letta's center-left Democratic Party.

Epifani said in a state TV interview that while the financial crisis has caused some to commit suicide, "this is the first time someone shoots to kill" someone else "in a place filled with innocent people."

"The symbolism is there," he said. The political world "must highlight its responsibility during the crisis before the country," he said.

In brief comments to reporters after paying a hospital visit to the more seriously wounded policeman, Letta said, "it is a moment in which each must do one's own duty."

The 46-year-old Letta will speak to Parliament on Monday, laying out his strategy to reduce joblessness while still sticking to the austerity measures needed to keep the eurozone's No. 3 economy from descending into a sovereign debt crisis. He will then face confidence votes needed to confirm his government.

Prosecutors identified the gunman as Luigi Preiti. Jobless, with a broken marriage and reportedly burdened by gambling debts he couldn't pay, Preiti had recently returned from Italy's affluent north, where he could no longer find work. He moved into his parents' home in Rosarno, a bleak Calabrian farm town where unemployment was already endemic before the last years of stagnation and recession sent youth unemployment soaring to nearly 40 percent nationwide.

His intended target was politicians, but with none in the square, he shot at the Carabinieri paramilitary police, Rome Prosecutor Pierfilippo Laviani told reporters, citing what he said Preiti told him when he questioned him.

Preiti, who was taken to the hospital for bruises, confessed to the shooting and didn't appear mentally unbalanced, Laviani said.

"He is a man full of problems, who lost his job, who lost everything," the prosecutor said. "He was desperate."

Mired in recession and suffering from soaring unemployment, Italy had been in political deadlock since an inconclusive February election. Social and political tensions have been running high among voters divided among a center-left bloc, conservative parties and an anti-establishment protest movement, which capitalized on public disgust with politicians to become Parliament's No. 3 force in its first national election bid.

The leader of the protest 5 Star Movement, comedian-turned-politician Beppe Grillo, has been criticized for inflammatory statements in the past, including saying during a campaign rally that the Parliament building could be a bombing target. He incessantly derides mainstream politicians as the root of Italy's ills.

"Words thrown like stones can become bullets," Rome's right-wing mayor, Gianni Alemanno, said after the shooting.

Grillo swiftly moved to distance what he describes as a grass-roots political movement from any calls to violence.

"The movement isn't at all violent," Grillo said.

Sunday was supposed to be a hopeful day with a new government, which, only a day earlier, was forged out of two bitter political enemies. Letta's forces, with strong roots in a former Communist party as well as centrist Christian Democrats, and media mogul Silvio Berlusconi's center-right bloc had agreed after days of negotiations to a kind of truce coalition intent on economic, political and electoral reform.

Then the sound of shots pierced the happy chatter in Piazza Colonna, near a busy shopping street shortly just as Letta and his new ministers were taking their oaths at the sumptuous hall of the Quirinal presidential palace, about a kilometer (half mile) away.

Sky TG24 TV and RAI state TV each showed a split screen, on one side, the chaos of panicked people fleeing the square; on the other side, smiling ministers taking the oath of office to work for the good of the nation.

"When I heard the first shot, I turned around and saw a man standing there, some 15 meters (50 feet) away from me. He held his arm out and I saw him fire another five, six shots," AP Television cameraman Fanuel Morelli, who was amazed at what appeared to be the man's deliberate calm, said. "He was firing at the second Carabiniere, who was about 4 meters (13 feet) in front of him."

The gunman was immediately wrestled to the ground by police outside Chigi Palace, which houses the premier's office. The new ministers arrived at the premier's office about 90 minutes later, for their first Cabinet meeting, some of them coming by foot as a way to reassure the public the area was safe.

The shooting panicked tourists and locals in the square on a rare sunny day at the end of a four-day holiday weekend.

A video surveillance camera on the Parliament building caught the attacker on film just before and during the shooting, Italian news reports said. In the film, the shooter is seen walking at a steady pace along a narrow street that leads from near Parliament's lower house to the edge of Colonna Square, where police officers appear to have stopped him to ask where he was going. Shortly after that, the man begins firing, the surveillance camera showed, according to the reports.

Alfano said Preiti wanted to kill himself after the shooting, but ran out of bullets. He said six shots were fired in all. Laviani said the assailant had obtained his weapons on the black market. Sky reported that Preiti had taken a train to Rome from Calabria on Saturday, and that police found his car parked at a southern train station.

The interior minister said security was immediately stepped up near key venues in the Italian capital, but added authorities were not worried about possible related attacks.

"Our initial investigation indicates the incident is due to an isolated gesture, although further investigations are being carried out," he said.

The ministers were kept briefly inside for security reasons until it was clear there was no immediate danger.

Preiti's uncle, interviewed by Sky, said the alleged gunman had moved back to his parents' home in Calabria because he could no longer find work as a bricklayer. "He was a great worker. He could build a house from top to bottom," the uncle, Domenco Preiti, said.

The shooting revived ugly memories of the 1970s and 1980s in Italy, when domestic terrorism plagued the country during a time of high political tension between right-wing and left-wing blocs.

President Barack Obama wished the new Italian government well. The White House press office said Obama was looking forward to working closely with Letta's government "to promote trade, jobs, and growth on both sides of the Atlantic and tackle today's complex security challenges."

There was no direct reference to the shooting in the White House statement.

Trying to renew Italy's largely discredited political class, Letta brought many political newcomers into his Cabinet, including an eye surgeon who is a Congo native, and now is Italy's first black minister, in charge of integration issues involving the growing immigrant population.

But the new premier also sought to reassure European central bankers and EU officials anxious that his government will stay the austerity course set by Mario Monti, who replaced Berlusconi in 2011 to save Italy from sliding deeper into the sovereign debt crisis. Letta picked the Italian central bank's director general, who formerly worked at the International Monetary Fund, to hold the crucial economy ministry.

While the coalition's bitter rival blocs might be enjoying a truce, relations could deteriorate. Berlusconi has insisted that the government's first act should be undoing a highly unpopular property tax Monti established to help the state's coffers.

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Egypt president, judges compromising on reform law

CAIRO (AP) — The Egyptian president's office is indicating a compromise has been reached with the judiciary to defuse an uproar over a proposed law that would have forced out thousands of the country's most senior judges.

President Mohammed Morsi met Sunday with five top judges after more than a week of bitter arguing between Islamists and some in the judiciary over the disputed bill, which would lower the retirement age.

The president's allies say the courts are filled with loyalists of the deposed regime of Hosni Mubarak. The opposition accuses Morsi's backers of calling for reform of the judiciary as a cover to install their own supporters.

After the meeting, a statement from the president's office said Morsi is launching a conference to include judges in any laws about the justice system.

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Bangladesh collapsed building owner arrested near border: police

DHAKA (Reuters) - The owner of a Bangladesh factory building that collapsed killing more than 370 people was arrested on Sunday attempting to flee to India, police said.

Mohammed Sohel Rana, a leader of the ruling Awami League's youth front, was arrested by the elite Rapid Action Battalion in the Bangladesh border town of Benapole, Dhaka District Police Chief Habibur Rahman told Reuters.

(Reporting by Ruma Paul; Editing by Jeremy Laurence)

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Dutch man arrested in Spain in connection with cyber attack

AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A 35-year-old Dutch man has been arrested in Barcelona by Spanish police over last month's massive cyber attack which disrupted global internet services, the Dutch public prosecutor's office said on Saturday.

The man, who was identified by the Dutch public prosecutor only by the initials "S.K.", was arrested in connection with attacks on Spamhaus, the public prosecutor's office said, adding that the house where he was staying was also searched, and that the police seized computers and mobile phones.

Spamhaus, a London and Geneva-based non-profit group which helps weed out unsolicited "spam" messages for email providers, said last month it had been subjected to "distributed denial of service" or DDoS attacks on an unprecedented scale for more than a week.

"(S.K.) is suspected of unprecedented heavy attacks on the non-profit organization Spamhaus, where anti-spam databases are managed. These so-called DDoS attacks last month were also performed on Spamhaus partners in the United States, the Netherlands and Great Britain," the prosecutor's office said.

The man is expected to be expected to be handed over to the Dutch authorities, according to the statement.

Spamhaus publishes blacklists used by Internet service providers (ISPs) to weed out spam in email traffic.

The group is directly or indirectly responsible for filtering as much as 80 percent of daily spam messages, according to Cloudflare, a company that said it was helping Spamhaus mitigate the attack.

(Reporting by Sara Webb; Editing by Stephen Powell)

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Collapsed building owner arrested on India border

SAVAR, Bangladesh (AP) — The owner of an illegally-constructed building that collapsed last week in a deadly heap in a Dhaka suburb was arrested at a border crossing with India on Sunday in a dramatic operation by members of an elite commando force, a government minister said.

A fleeing Mohammed Sohel Rana was arrested near the land-crossing in Benapole in western Bangladesh, just as he was about to cross into India's West Bengal state, said Jahangir Kabir Nanak, junior minister for local government. He said Rana is being brought back by helicopter to the capital Dhaka where he faces charges of negligence.

The arrest by the Rapid Action Battalion was announced on a loudspeaker at the site of the collapsed building in a Dhaka suburb, where people greeted it with cheers and claps. At least 362 people are confirmed to have died in the collapse of the 8-story building on Wednesday. Three of its floors were built illegally.

The death toll is expected to rise but it is already the deadliest tragedy to hit Bangladesh's garment industry, which is worth $20 billion annually and a mainstay of the economy. The collapse and previous disasters in garment factories have focused attention on the poor working conditions of workers who toil for as little as $38 a month to produce clothing for top international brands.

Rana, a small-time politician from the ruling party, had been on the run since Wednesday. He last appeared in public in front of Rana Plaza on Tuesday after huge cracks appeared in the structure. However, he assured tenants, including five garment factories, that the building was safe.

A bank and some shops on the first floor shut their premises on Wednesday after police ordered an evacuation, but managers of the garment factories on the upper floor told workers to continue their shifts.

Hours later Rana Plaza was reduced to rubble, and most victims were crushed by massive blocks of concrete and mortar falling on them. A garment manufacturers' group said the factories in the building employed 3,122 workers, but it was not clear how many were inside it when it collapsed. About 2,500 survivors have been accounted for.

On Sunday, rescuers located nine people alive inside the rubble on Sunday, as authorities announced they will now use heavy equipment to drill a central hole from the top to look for survivors and dead bodies.

Army Maj. Gen. Chowdhury Hasan Suhrawardy, the coordinator of the rescue operations, said they will try to save the nine people first by manually shifting concrete blocks with the help of light equipment such as pick axes and shovels.

"But if we fail we will start our next phase within hours," which would involve manual efforts as well as heavy equipment, including hydraulic cranes and cutters to bore a hole from the top of the collapsed building, he told reporters.

The purpose is to "continue the operation to recover both survivors and dead bodies. In this stage, we have no other choice but to use some heavy equipment. We will start it within a few hours. Manual operation and use of small equipment is not enough," he said.

The work will be carried out carefully so as not to mutilate bodies, he said. All the equipment is in place, "from a small blade to everything. We have engaged many private sector companies which supplied us equipment, even some heavy ones."

In rare good news, a female worker was pulled out alive on Sunday. Hasan Akbari, a rescuer, said when he tried to extricate a man next to the woman, "he said his body was being torn apart. So I had to let go. But God willing, we will be able to rescue him with more help very soon."

On Saturday, police took six people into custody, including three owners of two factories who were placed under arrest. Also under detention Rana's wife and two government engineers who were involved in giving approval for the building design.

Working round-the-clock, rescuers have used bare hands and shovels, passing chunks of brick and concrete down a human chain away from the collapsed structure. On the ground, mixed in the debris were several pairs of pink cotton pants, a mud-covered navy blue sock and a pile of green uncut fabric.

The badly decomposed bodies pulled out of the rubble were kept at a makeshift morgue at the nearby Adharchandra High School before being handed over to families. Many people milled around at the school, waving photos of their missing loved ones.

Rana was a local leader of ruling Awami League's youth front. His arrest, and that of the factory owners, was ordered by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who is also the Awami League leader.

The disaster is the worst ever for the country's booming and powerful garment industry, surpassing a fire five months ago that killed 112 people and brought widespread pledges to improve worker-safety standards. But since then very little has changed in Bangladesh, where low wages have made it a magnet for numerous global brands.

Bangladesh's garment industry was the third largest in the world in 2011, after China and Italy, having grown rapidly in the past decade. The country's minimum wage is the equivalent of about $38 a month.

Among the garment makers in the building were Phantom Apparels, Phantom Tac, Ether Tex, New Wave Style and New Wave Bottoms. Altogether, they produced several million shirts, pants and other garments a year.

The New Wave companies, according to their website, make clothing for several major North American and European retailers.

Britain's Primark acknowledged it was using a factory in Rana Plaza, but many other retailers distanced themselves from the disaster, saying they were not involved with the factories at the time of the collapse or had not recently ordered garments from them.

Wal-Mart said none of its clothing had been authorized to be made in the facility, but it is investigating whether there was any unauthorized production.

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AP writers Farid Hossain and Gillian Wong in Dhaka contributed to this report.

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Mother of bomb suspects found deeper spirituality

BOSTON (AP) — In photos of her as a younger woman, Zubeidat Tsarnaeva wears a low-cut blouse and has her hair teased like a 1980s rock star. After she arrived in the U.S. from Russia in 2002, she went to beauty school and did facials at a suburban day spa.

But in recent years, people noticed a change. She began wearing a hijab and cited conspiracy theories about 9/11 being a plot against Muslims.

Now known as the angry and grieving mother of the Boston Marathon bombing suspects, Tsarnaeva is drawing increased attention after federal officials say Russian authorities intercepted her phone calls, including one in which she vaguely discussed jihad with her elder son. In another, she was recorded talking to someone in southern Russia who is under FBI investigation in an unrelated case, U.S. officials said.

Tsarnaeva insists there is no mystery. She's no terrorist, just someone who found a deeper spirituality. She insists her sons — Tamerlan, who was killed in a gunfight with police, and Dzhokhar, who was wounded and captured — are innocent.

"It's all lies and hypocrisy," she told The Associated Press in Dagestan. "I'm sick and tired of all this nonsense that they make up about me and my children. People know me as a regular person, and I've never been mixed up in any criminal intentions, especially any linked to terrorism."

Amid the scrutiny, Tsarnaeva and her ex-husband, Anzor Tsarnaev, say they have put off the idea of any trip to the U.S. to reclaim their elder son's body or try to visit Dzhokhar in jail. Tsarnaev told the AP on Sunday he was too ill to travel to the U.S. Tsarnaeva faces a 2012 shoplifting charge in a Boston suburb, though it was unclear whether that was a deterrent.

At a news conference in Dagestan with Anzor last week, Tsarnaeva appeared overwhelmed with grief one moment, defiant the next. "They already are talking about that we are terrorists, I am terrorist," she said. "They already want me, him and all of us to look (like) terrorists."

Tsarnaeva arrived in the U.S. in 2002, settling in a working-class section of Cambridge, Mass. With four children, Anzor and Zubeidat qualified for food stamps and were on and off public assistance benefits for years. The large family squeezed itself into a third-floor apartment.

Zubeidat took classes at the Catherine Hinds Institute of Esthetics, before becoming a state-licensed aesthetician. Anzor, who had studied law, fixed cars.

By some accounts, the family was tolerant.

Bethany Smith, a New Yorker who befriended Zubeidat's two daughters, said in an interview with Newsday that when she stayed with the family for a month in 2008 while she looked at colleges, she was welcomed even though she was Christian and had tattoos.

"I had nothing but love over there. They accepted me for who I was," Smith told the newspaper. "Their mother, Zubeidat, she considered me to be a part of the family. She called me her third daughter."

Zubeidat said she and Tamerlan began to turn more deeply into their Muslim faith about five years ago after being influenced by a family friend, named "Misha." The man, whose full name she didn't reveal, impressed her with a religious devotion that was far greater than her own, even though he was an ethnic Armenian who converted to Islam.

"I wasn't praying until he prayed in our house, so I just got really ashamed that I am not praying, being a Muslim, being born Muslim. I am not praying. Misha, who converted, was praying," she said.

By then, she had left her job at the day spa and was giving facials in her apartment. One client, Alyssa Kilzer, noticed the change when Tsarnaeva put on a head scarf before leaving the apartment.

"She had never worn a hijab while working at the spa previously, or inside the house, and I was really surprised," Kilzer wrote in a post on her blog. "She started to refuse to see boys that had gone through puberty, as she had consulted a religious figure and he had told her it was sacrilegious. She was often fasting."

Kilzer wrote that Tsarnaeva was a loving and supportive mother, and she felt sympathy for her plight after the April 15 bombings. But she stopped visiting the family's home for spa treatments in late 2011 or early 2012 when, during one session, she "started quoting a conspiracy theory, telling me that she thought 9/11 was purposefully created by the American government to make America hate Muslims."

"It's real," Tsarnaeva said, according to Kilzer. "My son knows all about it. You can read on the Internet."

In the spring of 2010, Zubeidat's eldest son got married in a ceremony at a Boston mosque that no one in the family had previously attended. Tamerlan and his wife, Katherine Russell, a Rhode Island native and convert from Christianity, now have a child who is about 3 years old.

Zubeidat married into a Chechen family but was an outsider. She is an Avar, from one of the dozens of ethnic groups in Dagestan. Her native village is now a hotbed of an ultraconservative strain of Islam known as Salafism or Wahabbism.

It is unclear whether religious differences fueled tension in their family. Anzor and Zubeidat divorced in 2011.

About the same time, there was a brief FBI investigation into Tamerlan Tsarnaev, prompted by a tip from Russia's security service.

The vague warning from the Russians was that Tamerlan, an amateur boxer in the U.S., was a follower of radical Islam who had changed drastically since 2010. That led the FBI to interview Tamerlan at the family's home in Cambridge. Officials ultimately placed his name, and his mother's name, on various watch lists, but the inquiry was closed in late spring of 2011.

After the bombings, Russian authorities told U.S. investigators they had secretly recorded a phone conversation in which Zubeidat had vaguely discussed jihad with Tamerlan. The Russians also recorded Zubeidat talking to someone in southern Russia who is under FBI investigation in an unrelated case, according to U.S. officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the investigation with reporters.

The conversations are significant because, had they been revealed earlier, they might have been enough evidence for the FBI to initiate a more thorough investigation of the Tsarnaev family.

Anzor's brother, Ruslan Tsarni, told the AP from his home in Maryland that he believed his former sister-in-law had a "big-time influence" on her older son's growing embrace of his Muslim faith and decision to quit boxing and school.

While Tamerlan was living in Russia for six months in 2012, Zubeidat, who had remained in the U.S., was arrested at a shopping mall in the suburb of Natick, Mass., and accused of trying to shoplift $1,624 worth of women's clothing from a department store.

She failed to appear in court to answer the charges that fall, and instead left the country.

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Seddon reported from Makhachkala, Russia. Associated Press writers Eileen Sullivan and Matt Apuzzo contributed to this report from Washington.

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