Fewer health care options for illegal immigrants

ALAMO, Texas (AP) — For years, Sonia Limas would drag her daughters to the emergency room whenever they fell sick. As an illegal immigrant, she had no health insurance, and the only place she knew to seek treatment was the hospital — the most expensive setting for those covering the cost.

The family's options improved somewhat a decade ago with the expansion of community health clinics, which offered free or low-cost care with help from the federal government. But President Barack Obama's health care overhaul threatens to roll back some of those services if clinics and hospitals are overwhelmed with newly insured patients and can't afford to care for as many poor families.

To be clear, Obama's law was never intended to help Limas and an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants like her. Instead, it envisions that 32 million uninsured Americans will get access to coverage by 2019. Because that should mean fewer uninsured patients showing up at hospitals, the Obama program slashed the federal reimbursement for uncompensated care.

But in states with large illegal immigrant populations, the math may not work, especially if lawmakers don't expand Medicaid, the joint state-federal health program for the poor and disabled.

When the reform has been fully implemented, illegal immigrants will make up the nation's second-largest population of uninsured, or about 25 percent. The only larger group will be people who qualify for insurance but fail to enroll, according to a 2012 study by the Washington-based Urban Institute.

And since about two-thirds of illegal immigrants live in just eight states, those areas will have a disproportionate share of the uninsured to care for.

In communities "where the number of undocumented immigrants is greatest, the strain has reached the breaking point," Rich Umbdenstock, president of the American Hospital Association, wrote last year in a letter to Obama, asking him to keep in mind the uncompensated care hospitals gave to that group. "In response, many hospitals have had to curtail services, delay implementing services, or close beds."

The federal government has offered to expand Medicaid, but states must decide whether to take the deal. And in some of those eight states — including Texas, Florida and New Jersey — hospitals are scrambling to determine whether they will still have enough money to treat the remaining uninsured.

Without a Medicaid expansion, the influx of new patients and the looming cuts in federal funding could inflict "a double whammy" in Texas, said David Lopez, CEO of the Harris Health System in Houston, which spends 10 to 15 percent of its $1.2 billion annual budget to care for illegal immigrants.

Realistically, taxpayers are already paying for some of the treatment provided to illegal immigrants because hospitals are required by law to stabilize and treat any patients that arrive in an emergency room, regardless of their ability to pay. The money to cover the costs typically comes from federal, state and local taxes.

A solid accounting of money spent treating illegal immigrants is elusive because most hospitals do not ask for immigration status. But some states have tried.

California, which is home to the nation's largest population of illegal immigrants, spent an estimated $1.2 billion last year through Medicaid to care for 822,500 illegal immigrants.

The New Jersey Hospital Association in 2010 estimated that it cost between $600 million and $650 million annually to treat 550,000 illegal immigrants.

And in Texas, a 2010 analysis by the Health and Human Services Commission found that the agency had provided $96 million in benefits to illegal immigrants, up from $81 million two years earlier. The state's public hospital districts spent an additional $717 million in uncompensated care to treat that population.

If large states such as Florida and Texas make good on their intention to forgo federal money to expand Medicaid, the decision "basically eviscerates" the effects of the health care overhaul in those areas because of "who lives there and what they're eligible for," said Lisa Clemans-Cope, a senior researcher at the Urban Institute.

Seeking to curb expenses, hospitals might change what qualifies as an emergency or cap the number of uninsured patients they treat. And although it's believed states with the most illegal immigrants will face a smaller cut, they will still lose money.

The potential impacts of reform are a hot topic at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. In addition to offering its own charity care, some MD Anderson oncologists volunteer at a county-funded clinic at Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital that largely treats the uninsured.

"In a sense we've been in the worst-case scenario in Texas for a long time," said Lewis Foxhall, MD Anderson's vice president of health policy in Houston. "The large number of uninsured and the large low-income population creates a very difficult problem for us."

Community clinics are a key part of the reform plan and were supposed to take up some of the slack for hospitals. Clinics received $11 billion in new funding over five years so they could expand to help care for a swell of newly insured who might otherwise overwhelm doctors' offices. But in the first year, $600 million was cut from the centers' usual allocation, leaving many to use the money to fill gaps rather than expand.

There is concern that clinics could themselves be inundated with newly insured patients, forcing many illegal immigrants back to emergency rooms.

Limas, 44, moved to the border town of Alamo 13 years ago with her husband and three daughters. Now single, she supports the family by teaching a citizenship class in Spanish at the local community center and selling cookies and cakes she whips up in her trailer. Soon, she hopes to seek a work permit of her own.

For now, the clinic helps with basic health care needs. If necessary, Limas will return to the emergency room, where the attendants help her fill out paperwork to ensure the government covers the bills she cannot afford.

"They always attended to me," she said, "even though it's slow."

___

Sherman can be followed on Twitter at https://twitter.com/chrisshermanAP .

Plushnick-Masti can be followed on Twitter at https://twitter.com/RamitMastiAP .

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School Shooting Victims Were Shot Multiple Times

The gunman who massacred 20 children in a Connecticut elementary school riddled them with bullets, shooting some of them as many as 11 times, the medical examiner said today.

"I've been at this for a third of a century so my sensibilities may not be the that of the average man, but it's probably the worst I've ever seen," said Chief Medical Examiner H. Wayne Carver II, who has been a medical examiner for 36 years.

A team of 14 medical technicians worked through the night to complete the grisly job of identifying the children killed by Adam Lanza, 20, in the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre so their names could be released today.

Several weapons were found in the school, including a semi-automatic rifle.

"All the wounds that I know of at this point were caused by the long weapon," Carver said, and many were shot at close range.

CLICK HERE for full coverage of the tragedy at the elementary school.

"I believe many of them were hit more than once," and he said the wounds were "all over" the children's bodies.

"I only did seven of the autopsies. The victims I had ranged from 3 to 11 wounds a piece," Carver said.

The names of the children slain Friday in the Newtown, Conn., school were released today.

To carry out the identifications, Carver said they "did not bring the families and the bodies into contact." He said the identifications were made through photographs of the children's faces. "It's easier on the families," he said.

Additional work is needed to complete the autopsies and identifications of the seven adults slain in Lanza's killing spree.

Emmanuel Dunand/AFP/Getty Images

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Fresh details of the massacre emerged including the fact that all of the young victims were first graders in two rooms.

Based on the Sandy Hook school directory, all the kids killed were in the first grade and were in two classrooms.

In one class, 15 of the 16 students listed were killed. In the other class, five of the 16 students died along with their teacher Victoria Soto. Also, nine of the deceased students have siblings in the school.

At a nearby firehouse that has become a center for the town a makeshift memorial and vigil has emerged under a sign that reads "Sandy Hook School." People have left flowers, candles, signs that read "Rest in Peace" and "God Bless Sandy Hook Elementary," as well as a cross made of blue flowers and a wreath of teddy bears

With the tally of Lanza's carnage complete, authorities and the grieving people of Newtown, Conn., are left to wonder why he turned the elementary school in this quaint New England town into a slaughter house.

Connecticut State Police Lt. Paul Vance said the investigation "did produce some very good evidence" about motive, but he would not go into further detail.

He indicated the evidence came from the shooting scene at the school as well as at the home where Lanza's mother, Nancy, was slain.

Also key will be the lone person shot by Lanza who wasn't killed. The female teacher has not been publicly identified.

"She is doing fine," Vance said at a news conference today. "She has been treated and she'll be instrumental in this investigation."

Vance said it appears that reports of an altercation involving Lanza at the school in the days before the mass slaying are not checking out.

Vance said that Lanza forced his way into the school, but did not say how.

Evidence emerged today that Lanza's rampage began in the office of school principal Dawn Hochsprung while the school intercom was on. It's not clear whether it was turned on to alert the school or whether it was on for morning announcements, but the principal's screams and the cries of children heard throughout the school gave teachers time to take precautions to protect their children.

Hochsprung was among those killed in the Friday morning killing spree.

READ: Connecticut Shooter Adam Lanza: 'Obviously Not Well'

Authorities have fanned out to New Jersey, Connecticut and Massachusetts to interview Lanza's relatives, ABC News has learned.

According to sources, Lanza shot his mother in the face, then left his house armed with at least two semi-automatic handguns, a Glock and a Sig Sauer, and a semi-automatic rifle. He was also wearing a bulletproof vest.

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Violence flares in Cairo as Egyptians vote

CAIRO (Reuters) - Islamists attacked the offices of an Egyptian opposition party newspaper on Saturday, security sources said, as people voted on a new constitution intended to pull the country out of a growing political crisis.

The newspaper of the Wafd party in Cairo was targeted with petrol bombs and birdshot, the sources said, in the latest of a series of violent incidents surrounding a divisive referendum designed to pave the way to national elections next year.

The attack came as officials began counting votes after polling stations closed at 11 p.m. (1600 ET).

Official results will not come until after a second round of voting in remaining areas of the country next Saturday, but conflicting claims were already emerging from the rival camps.

A spokesman for the opposition National Salvation Front said it had indications that 60-65 percent of voters in Cairo and other cities had rejected the new constitution, while President Mohamed Mursi's Muslim Brotherhood allies said that after 1 million votes had been counted, 72.5 percent were in favor.

Mostafa Shafik, managing editor at Wafd's newspaper, which is located next to the party headquarters, said his offices had been damaged.

"The attackers used Molotov cocktails to enter, which left minor areas burned," he said.

A Reuters photographer saw a dozen or so cars damaged inside the Wafd headquarters' grounds, their windows broken. Glass was also broken in the headquarters, but he saw no immediate signs of fire damage. Two people appeared to have been injured.

Wafd blamed followers of Hazem Abu Ismail, a Salafist preacher, for the attack, but he used his Facebook page to deny involvement.

Violence in Cairo and other cities has marred the run-up to the referendum. Several party buildings belonging to the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice party have been burned in protests.

Rival factions armed with clubs, knives and swords fought in the streets of Alexandria on Friday. Opposition supporters trapped a Muslim preacher inside his mosque after he backed a "yes" vote in favor of the constitution.

ANGRY DEMONSTRATIONS

President Mursi provoked angry demonstrations when he issued a decree last month expanding his powers and then fast-tracked the draft constitution through an assembly dominated by his Muslim Brotherhood group and its allies. At least eight people were killed in clashes last week outside the presidential palace.

His liberal, secular and Christian opponents say the constitution is too Islamist and tramples on minority rights. Mursi's supporters say the charter is needed if progress is to be made towards democracy nearly two years after the fall of military-backed strongman Hosni Mubarak.

"The sheikhs (preachers) told us to say 'yes' and I have read the constitution and I liked it," said 53-year-old Adel Imam as he queued to vote in Cairo on Saturday. "The country will move on."

Turnout was high enough for voting to be extended by four hours in Cairo and some other cities.

In order to pass, the constitution must be approved by more than 50 percent of voters who cast ballots. A little more than half of Egypt's electorate of 51 million are eligible to vote in the first round in Cairo and other cities.

Rights groups reported some abuses, such as polling stations opening late, officials telling people to vote "yes", bribery and intimidation.

But Gamal Eid, head of the Arab Network for Human Rights Information, which is monitoring the vote, said nothing reported so far was serious enough to invalidate the referendum.

TRANSITION

Christians, making up about 10 percent of Egypt's 83 million people and who have long complained of discrimination, were among those waiting at a polling station in Alexandria to oppose the basic law. They fear Islamists, long repressed by Mubarak, will restrict social and other freedoms.

"I voted 'no' to the constitution out of patriotic duty," said Michael Nour, a 45-year-old Christian teacher in Alexandria. "The constitution does not represent all Egyptians."

Howaida Abdel Azeem, a post office employee, said: "I said 'yes' because I want the destruction the country is living through to be over and the crisis to pass."

Islamists are counting on their disciplined ranks of supporters and the many Egyptians who may fall into line in the hope of ending turmoil that has hammered the economy and sent Egypt's pound to eight-year lows against the dollar.

Mursi was among the early voters after polls opened at 8 a.m. (0600 GMT). He was shown on television casting his ballot shielded by a screen and then dipping his finger in ink - a measure to prevent people voting twice.

The second round will be held in other regions on December 22 because there are not enough judges willing to monitor all polling stations after some said they would boycott the vote.

Egyptians are being asked to accept or reject a constitution that must be in place before a parliamentary election can be held next year to replace an Islamist-led parliament dissolved in June. Many hope this will lead Egypt towards stability.

If the constitution is voted down, a new assembly will have to be formed to draft a revised version, a process that could take up to nine months.

The army has deployed about 120,000 troops and 6,000 tanks and armoured vehicles to protect polling stations and other government buildings. While the military backed Mubarak and his predecessors, it has not intervened in the present crisis.

(Writing by Edmund Blair and Giles Elgood; Editing by Tom Pfeiffer)

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Counting under way in Egyptian referendum

CAIRO: Counting was under way early Sunday after a first-round referendum on a divisive new constitution pushed through by President Mohamed Morsi and his Islamist allies despite weeks of opposition protests.

Polling stations in half the country, including the biggest cities of Cairo and Alexandria, were tallying the results from Saturday's voting.

The second round of the referendum is to be held next Saturday, after which the official result is to be given.

Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood and main media outlets said that, based on very early unofficial figures, it appeared that the polling was trending towards 70 percent support for the draft charter.

But the opposition disputed that, saying its preliminary figures suggested that 66 percent of the voters had rejected the proposed constitution. It claimed the Muslim Brotherhood had sought to "rig" the vote.

If those contradictory positions are maintained, Egypt's turmoil of the past three weeks over the draft constitution will not subside.

Violent clashes claimed eight lives on December 5 amid a highly polarised political climate.

Late Saturday, riot police fired tear gas to disperse dozens of hardline Islamists who attacked the central Cairo headquarters of the opposition liberal Wafd Party with fireworks and stones, officers at the scene told AFP.

On Friday, clashes between stone-throwing and sword-wielding Islamists and opposition supporters erupted in Egypt's second city of Alexandria, injuring 23 people according to the official MENA news agency.

To ensure security, 120,000 troops were deployed to reinforce 130,000 police.

Voting was being staggered, with half the country casting their ballots on Saturday and the other half a week later.

The Muslim Brotherhood has thrown its formidable organisational machine behind a campaign in favour of the draft constitution.

The proposed charter "offers rights and stability," said one Cairo voter who backed it, Kassem Abdallah.

It will help Egypt "return to normal", agreed another, Ibrahim Mahmoud, a teacher.

But many opposition voters were especially hostile toward the Brotherhood, which the Front believes wants to usher in strict Islamic sharia laws.

Abbas Abdelaziz, a 57-year-old accountant, said he voted against the charter "because I hate the Muslim Brotherhood. It's very simple. They are liars."

Sally Rafid, a 28-year-old Christian, said: "There are many things in the constitution people don't agree on, and it's not just the articles on religion."

International watchdogs, the UN human rights chief, the United States and the European Union have expressed reservations about the draft because of loopholes that could be used to weaken human rights, including those of women, and the independence of the judiciary.

Analysts said it was likely - but not certain - that the draft constitution would be adopted.

Whatever the outcome, "lasting damage to the civility of Egyptian politics will be the main outcome of the current path Morsi has set Egypt on," one analyst, Issandr El Amrani, wrote for his think tank, the European Council on Foreign Relations.

"If the 'no' vote wins, the Morsi presidency will have been fully discredited and the pressure for his resignation will only increase," he said. "If 'yes' wins, the protest movement is unlikely to die down, (and) may radicalise."

- AFP/de

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Govt plans own channel, real autonomy for DD

NEW DELHI: The information and broadcasting (I&B) ministry has asked regulator Trai for a review of the policy which disallows government ownership of television channels. This letter to the regulator is seen as a precursor to the Centre launching a TV channel of its own.

On November 30, I&B secretary Uday Kumar Varma wrote to Trai chairman Rahul Khullar asking him "to kindly provide your recommendations as to whether the following may be allowed" in broadcasting: central and state government ministries and departments, state-owned companies, undertakings and joint ventures.

Varma cited the instances of the governments of Gujarat, Punjab, Andhra Pradesh and the Union HRD ministry seeking permission to operate and distribute their TV channels which the I&B ministry has turned down because the current policy doesn't allow government presence in broadcasting.

Sources in the ministry said Doordarshan was allowed because it was ostensibly run by an autonomous body, Prasar Bharati. They also said that it was a question of time before Prasar Bharati is likely to be asked to raise and manage its own finances and that would automatically lead to the public broadcaster asserting its autonomy.

It's in this context that the government's letter seeking Trai's views on government presence in broadcasting acquires significance. Incidentally, Doordarshan enjoys 92% coverage of the country through its terrestrial network with a viewership of about 2.5 crore people.

Not just TV channels, the government is also keen on having a presence in print and radio too. There is urgency to the move in view of elections in 2014 when the government having its own media would be undoubtedly helpful.

While the Punjab government sought permission for its own TV channel, the Gujarat government and HRD ministry sought the I&B ministry's nod to set up educational channels on their own DTH platforms.

90% of I&B funds spent on Prasar Bharati

Sources said that the I&B ministry was looking to recast Prasar Bharati as a financially autonomous public service broadcaster like the BBC with independent sources of funding like licence fees, commercial programming and ads.

At present 90% of the ministry's fund is spent on funding Prasar Bharati's operations. I&B minister Manish Tewari is said to have discussed the issue with senior memeber of the government. "Why should there be a veil of hypocrisy in running one's own channel or paper? If there are 800 TV channels, allowing 30 more will only be a drop in the ocean. If there are 3,000 radio stations, there can be space for 30 more, and the same is true for papers," the sources said.

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Fewer health care options for illegal immigrants

ALAMO, Texas (AP) — For years, Sonia Limas would drag her daughters to the emergency room whenever they fell sick. As an illegal immigrant, she had no health insurance, and the only place she knew to seek treatment was the hospital — the most expensive setting for those covering the cost.

The family's options improved somewhat a decade ago with the expansion of community health clinics, which offered free or low-cost care with help from the federal government. But President Barack Obama's health care overhaul threatens to roll back some of those services if clinics and hospitals are overwhelmed with newly insured patients and can't afford to care for as many poor families.

To be clear, Obama's law was never intended to help Limas and an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants like her. Instead, it envisions that 32 million uninsured Americans will get access to coverage by 2019. Because that should mean fewer uninsured patients showing up at hospitals, the Obama program slashed the federal reimbursement for uncompensated care.

But in states with large illegal immigrant populations, the math may not work, especially if lawmakers don't expand Medicaid, the joint state-federal health program for the poor and disabled.

When the reform has been fully implemented, illegal immigrants will make up the nation's second-largest population of uninsured, or about 25 percent. The only larger group will be people who qualify for insurance but fail to enroll, according to a 2012 study by the Washington-based Urban Institute.

And since about two-thirds of illegal immigrants live in just eight states, those areas will have a disproportionate share of the uninsured to care for.

In communities "where the number of undocumented immigrants is greatest, the strain has reached the breaking point," Rich Umbdenstock, president of the American Hospital Association, wrote last year in a letter to Obama, asking him to keep in mind the uncompensated care hospitals gave to that group. "In response, many hospitals have had to curtail services, delay implementing services, or close beds."

The federal government has offered to expand Medicaid, but states must decide whether to take the deal. And in some of those eight states — including Texas, Florida and New Jersey — hospitals are scrambling to determine whether they will still have enough money to treat the remaining uninsured.

Without a Medicaid expansion, the influx of new patients and the looming cuts in federal funding could inflict "a double whammy" in Texas, said David Lopez, CEO of the Harris Health System in Houston, which spends 10 to 15 percent of its $1.2 billion annual budget to care for illegal immigrants.

Realistically, taxpayers are already paying for some of the treatment provided to illegal immigrants because hospitals are required by law to stabilize and treat any patients that arrive in an emergency room, regardless of their ability to pay. The money to cover the costs typically comes from federal, state and local taxes.

A solid accounting of money spent treating illegal immigrants is elusive because most hospitals do not ask for immigration status. But some states have tried.

California, which is home to the nation's largest population of illegal immigrants, spent an estimated $1.2 billion last year through Medicaid to care for 822,500 illegal immigrants.

The New Jersey Hospital Association in 2010 estimated that it cost between $600 million and $650 million annually to treat 550,000 illegal immigrants.

And in Texas, a 2010 analysis by the Health and Human Services Commission found that the agency had provided $96 million in benefits to illegal immigrants, up from $81 million two years earlier. The state's public hospital districts spent an additional $717 million in uncompensated care to treat that population.

If large states such as Florida and Texas make good on their intention to forgo federal money to expand Medicaid, the decision "basically eviscerates" the effects of the health care overhaul in those areas because of "who lives there and what they're eligible for," said Lisa Clemans-Cope, a senior researcher at the Urban Institute.

Seeking to curb expenses, hospitals might change what qualifies as an emergency or cap the number of uninsured patients they treat. And although it's believed states with the most illegal immigrants will face a smaller cut, they will still lose money.

The potential impacts of reform are a hot topic at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. In addition to offering its own charity care, some MD Anderson oncologists volunteer at a county-funded clinic at Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital that largely treats the uninsured.

"In a sense we've been in the worst-case scenario in Texas for a long time," said Lewis Foxhall, MD Anderson's vice president of health policy in Houston. "The large number of uninsured and the large low-income population creates a very difficult problem for us."

Community clinics are a key part of the reform plan and were supposed to take up some of the slack for hospitals. Clinics received $11 billion in new funding over five years so they could expand to help care for a swell of newly insured who might otherwise overwhelm doctors' offices. But in the first year, $600 million was cut from the centers' usual allocation, leaving many to use the money to fill gaps rather than expand.

There is concern that clinics could themselves be inundated with newly insured patients, forcing many illegal immigrants back to emergency rooms.

Limas, 44, moved to the border town of Alamo 13 years ago with her husband and three daughters. Now single, she supports the family by teaching a citizenship class in Spanish at the local community center and selling cookies and cakes she whips up in her trailer. Soon, she hopes to seek a work permit of her own.

For now, the clinic helps with basic health care needs. If necessary, Limas will return to the emergency room, where the attendants help her fill out paperwork to ensure the government covers the bills she cannot afford.

"They always attended to me," she said, "even though it's slow."

___

Sherman can be followed on Twitter at https://twitter.com/chrisshermanAP .

Plushnick-Masti can be followed on Twitter at https://twitter.com/RamitMastiAP .

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20 Children Killed at Conn. Grade School, 7 Adults

Twenty children died today when a heavily armed man invaded a Newtown, Conn., elementary school and sprayed staff and students with bullets.

The gunman, identified as Adam Lanza, 20, was found dead in the school.

Lt. Paul Vance said 18 children died in the school and two more died later in a hospital. Six adults were also slain, bringing the total to 26.

In addition to the casualties at the school, Lanza's mother Nancy Lanza was killed in her home, federal and state sources told ABC News.

According to sources, Lanza shot his mother in the face, then left his house armed with at least two semi automatic handguns, a Glock and a Sig Sauer, and a semi automatic rifle. He was also wearing a bullet proof vest.

Lanza drove to Sandy Hook Elementary School and continued his rampage, killing 26 people, authorities said. He was found dead at the school. It appears that he died from what is believed to be a self inflicted gunshot wound. The rifle was found in his car.

In the early confusion surrounding the investigation, federal sources initially identified the suspect as Adam's older brother Ryan Lanza, 24. He is being questioned by police.

LIVE UPDATES: Newtown, Conn., School Shooting

"Evil visited this community today," Gov. Dan Malloy said at a news conference this evening.

First grade teacher Kaitlin Roig, 29, locked her 14 students in a class bathroom and listened to "tons of shooting" until police came to help.

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"It was horrific," Roig said. "I thought we were going to die."

She said that the terrified kids were saying, "I just want Christmas…I don't want to die. I just want to have Christmas."

A tearful President Obama said there's "not a parent in America who doesn't feel the overwhelming grief that I do."

The president had to pause to compose himself after saying these were "beautiful little kids between the ages of 5 and 10." As he continued with his statement, Obama wiped away tears from each eye.

He has ordered flags flown as half staff.

CLICK HERE for more photos from the scene.

The alert at the school ended when Vance announced, "The shooter is deceased inside the building. The public is not in danger."

The massacre prompted the town of Newtown to lock down all its schools and draw SWAT teams to the school, authorities said today. Authorities initially believed that there were two gunmen and were searching cars around the school, but authorities do not appear to be looking for another gunman.

It is the second worst mass shooting in U.S. history, exceeded only by the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007 when 32 were killed before the shooter turned the gun on himself. Today's carnage exceeds the 1999 Columbine High School shooting in which 13 died and 24 were injured.

The Newtown shooting comes three days after masked gunman Jacob Roberts opened fire in a busy Oregon mall, killing two before turning the gun on himself.

Today's shooting occurred at the Sandy Hook Elementary School, which includes 450 students in grades K-4. The town is located about 12 miles east of Danbury.

State Police received the first 911 call at 9:41 a.m. and immediately began sending emergency units from the western part of the state. Initial 911 calls stated that multiple students were trapped in a classroom, possibly with a gunman, according to a Connecticut State Police source.

Lt. Paul Vance said that on-duty and off-duty officers swarmed to the school and quickly checked "every door, every crack, every crevice" in the building looking for the gunman and evacuating children.

A photo from the scene shows a line of distressed children being led out of the school.

Three patients have been taken to Danbury Hospital, which is also on lockdown, according to the hospital's Facebook page.

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NATO says Syrian Scuds hit "near" Turkey

BEIRUT (Reuters) - NATO accused Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces of firing Scud missiles that landed near to the Turkish border, in explaining why it was sending anti-missile batteries and troops to the bloc's frontier.

The Syrian government, which finds itself under attack from rebels in the capital Damascus and by a diplomatic alliance of Arab and Western powers, denies firing such long-range, Soviet-built rockets and had no immediate comment on the latest charge.

Admiral James Stavridis, the American who is NATO's military commander, wrote in a blog on Friday: "Over the past few days, a handful of Scud missiles were launched inside Syria, directed by the regime against opposition targets. Several landed fairly close to the Turkish border, which is very worrisome."

It was not clear how close they came. NATO member Turkey, once friendly toward Assad but now among the main allies of the rebels, has complained of occasional bullets and artillery fire, some of which has been fatal, for many months. It sought the installation of missile defenses on its border some weeks ago.

"Syria is clearly a chaotic and dangerous situation; but we have an absolute obligation to defend the borders of the alliance from any threat emanating from that troubled state," Stavridis wrote.

Batteries of U.S.-made Patriot missiles, designed to shoot down the likes of the Scuds popularly associated with Iraq's wars under Saddam Hussein in the 1990s, are about to be deployed by the U.S., German and Dutch armies, each of which is sending up to 400 troops to operate and protect the rocket systems.

The Syrian government has accused Western powers of backing what it portrays as a Sunni Islamist "terrorist" attack on it and says Washington and Europe have publicly voiced concerns of late that Assad's forces might resort to chemical weapons solely as a pretext for preparing a possible military intervention.

In contrast to NATO's air campaign in support of Libya's successful revolt last year against Muammar Gaddafi, Western powers have fought shy of intervention in Syria. They have cited the greater size and ethnic and religious complexity of a major Arab state at the heart of the Middle East - but have also lacked U.N. approval due to Russia's support for Assad.

Moscow reacted angrily on Friday to the way U.S. officials seized on comments by a top Kremlin envoy for the Middle East as evidence that Russia was giving up on Assad. Comments by Mikhail Bogdanov on Thursday in which he conceded Assad might be ousted did not reflect a change in policy, the Foreign Ministry said.

Assad's diplomatic isolation remains acute, however, as Arab and Western powers this week recognized a new, united coalition of opposition groups as Syria's legitimate leadership. Large parts of the country are no longer under the government's control and fighting has been raging around Damascus itself.

European Union leaders who met in Brussels on Friday said all options were on the table to support the Syrian opposition, raising the possibility that non-lethal military equipment or even arms could eventually be supplied.

In their strongest statement of support for the Syrian opposition since the uprising began 20 months ago, EU leaders instructed their foreign ministers to assess all possibilities to increase the pressure on Assad.

With rebels edging into the capital, a senior NATO official said that Assad is likely to fall and the Western military alliance should make plans to protect against the threat of his chemical arsenal falling into the wrong hands.

HUNGER SPREADS

Desperation for food is growing in parts of Syria and residents of the northern city of Aleppo say fist fights and dashes across the civil war front lines have become part of the daily struggle to secure a loaf of bread.

"I went out yesterday and could not get any bread. If only the problem was just lack of food - there is also a huge shortage of fuel, which the bakeries need to run," said Ahmed, a resident of the battle-scarred Salaheddine district.

He said people get into fist fights over flour and rebels regularly have to break up fights by firing into the air.

The World Food Programme (WFP) says as many as a million people may go hungry this winter, as worsening security conditions make it harder to reach conflict zones.

Forty thousand people have now been killed in the most enduring and destructive of the Arab revolts. The government severely limits press and humanitarian access to the country.

U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos said on Friday the United Nations is committed to maintaining aid operations in Syria.

"NOTHING OFF THE TABLE"

At the EU summit, Britain's David Cameron pushed for an early review of the arms embargo against Syria to possibly open the way to supply equipment to rebels in the coming months. Germany and others were more reluctant and blocked any quick move. But there was widespread agreement that whatever action can be taken under current legislation should be pursued, and the arms embargo would still be reviewed at a later stage.

"I want a very clear message to go to President Assad that nothing is off the table," Cameron told reporters at the end of a two-day summit. "I want us to work with the opposition ... so that we can see the speediest possible transition in Syria.

"There is no single simple answer, but inaction and indifference are not options."

Among factors holding Western powers back from arming the rebels is the presence in their ranks of anti-Western Islamist radicals. Following a U.S. decision this week to blacklist one such group, Jabhat al-Nusra, a "terrorist" group, thousands of Syrians demonstrated on Friday against ostracizing the movement.

The latest, weekly Friday protests in rebel-held areas were held under the slogan: "The only terrorism in Syria is Assad's".

Inspired by Arab uprisings across the region, Syrian protesters were met with gunfire by Assad's security forces in March 2011. Armed revolt overtook the movement, which has become increasingly sectarian - waged by majority Sunni Muslims against forces loyal to Assad, who is from the minority Alawite sect, an offshoot of the Shi'ite Islam practiced in Assad's ally Iran.

A video posted on the Internet showed dozens of Sunni rebels dressed in camouflage gear congratulating and kissing each other outside a burning Shi'ite shrine.

A fighter holding a rifle said the group was destroying the "dens of the Shi'ites". Reuters could not independently verify the video, which was posted on YouTube on Wednesday and purports to be filmed in the northern town of Jisr al-Shughur.

(Writing by Oliver Holmes and Alastair Macdonald; Editing by Michael Roddy)

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Football: Beaten but not outclassed

SINGAPORE: Aide Iskandar told his boys that when they pull on the national jersey and wear the national flag on their chests, they needed to play like there was no tomorrow.

On Friday night at the Jalan Besar Stadium, his Singapore Youth Selection matched the Liverpool under-19s stride for stride and, despite going down 1-0 in the semi-final of the four-team NexLions Cup, the future Lions were not disgraced.

From the opening hustings, it was clear the hosts, who will face Manchester United in the third-place play-off on Sunday, were not cowed by their vaunted English opponents and were determined to take advantage of their familiarity on the artificial surface and humidity.

Iqbal Hussain and Shahfiq Ghani made a menace of themselves, while Safirul Sulaiman showed the experience from his time in the LionsXII with pacey runs down the left flank, though he lacked the final delivery to make things count.

With the Singapore players not holding back in their tackles, frustrations surfaced as early as the 19th minute, when Liverpool forward Samed Yesil lashed out at Shakir Hamzah after he was felled.

Both escaped unpunished and Yesil exacted revenge less than 10 minutes later with a little moment of magic, backheeling the ball into goal after his captain Adam Morgan had tested the Singapore defence.

It turned out to be the only goal, which pleased the smattering of Liverpool fans among the 4,300 crowd.

Earlier, United saw their good work in the first half undone by a rampant Sporting Lisbon that came back from a goal down to put four past their English counterparts and book their place in tomorrow's final against Liverpool.

United went into the break a goal up from James Wilson's 38th-minute strike but Sporting captain Carlos Mane equalised early in the second half. The match turned following a missed penalty by United's Jack Barmby. The Portuguese side took full advantage, with a double strike from second half substitute Edelino Ie and an injury-time goal from Cristian Ponde.

"They got a big boost when we missed the penalty and that made the difference," said United coach Paul McGuinness. "That gave them more confidence and that's something youth players have to overcome."

Sporting manager Pedro Luz felt his team prevailed because his boys never stopped running.

"(For our club), it is important that the players play every minute to win the match. This is a great result for us," he said.

For Aide, the night belonged to his boys, who showed they had the ability to mix it with the 18-time English league champions' best youngsters.

"They rose to the occasion. It's good for the fans to see that we have a good bunch of young players and this is the future of the national team," said the former Singapore captain.

"I am very proud of the boys. We managed to compete with a very good side, with players who have tasted Premiership action, and now they know they are able to compete at the highest level."

- TODAY

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Rice Withdraws From Sec. of State Consideration

Image Credit: Evan Vucci/AP Photo

UN Ambassador Susan Rice has withdrawn her name from consideration for Secretary of State, saying the criticism surrounding her comments on Benghazi had become an “irresponsible distraction.”

“I am fully confident that I could serve our country ably and effectively in that role,” Rice wrote in a letter to President Obama today. “However, if nominated, I am now convinced that the confirmation process would be lengthy, disruptive and costly – to you and to our most pressing national and international priorities.”

Read Susan Rice’s letter to President Obama

“That trade-off is simply not worth it to our country,” she added.

Rice has been criticized by Republicans for her response to questions on the Sunday talk shows shortly after the terrorist attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi killed four Americans.

“The position of Secretary of State should never be politicized,” Rice wrote. “As someone who grew up in an era of comparative bipartisanship and as a sitting U.S. national security official who has served in two U.S. Administrations, I am saddened that we have reached this point, even before you have decided whom to nominate. We cannot afford such an irresponsible distraction from the most pressing issues facing the American people.”

Sources tell ABC News that even before Rice withdrew her name from consideration to be Secretary of State earlier today, Senator John Kerry, D-Mass., had emerged as the leading contender, with the president convinced he would be the better Secretary of State.

The president is all but certain to nominate Kerry, sources say, though no official decision has been made.

The position of Secretary of Defense is not as far along in the process, but sources say former Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., seems to have an edge right now over other possible candidates such as former undersecretary of defense for policy Michelle Flournoy and deputy Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter.

The CIA director slot, sources say, will go to either acting director Michael Morrell or White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan.

President Obama, who publicly defended Rice on several occasions, has accepted her decision to remove her name from the running.

“I have every confidence that Susan has limitless capability to serve our country now and in the years to come, and know that I will continue to rely on her as an advisor and friend,” Obama said in a written statement. 

“While I deeply regret the unfair and misleading attacks on Susan Rice in recent weeks, her decision demonstrates the strength of her character, and an admirable commitment to rise above the politics of the moment to put our national interests first,” he said. “The American people can be proud to have a public servant of her caliber and character representing our country.”

Two Republican members of Congress who had adamantly opposed Rice’s potential nomination both reacted quickly.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-SC., tweeted, “I respect Ambassador Rice’s decision.” And a spokesperson for Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., wrote, “Senator McCain thanks Ambassador Rice for her service to the country and wishes her well. He will continue to seek all the facts surrounding the attack on our consulate in Benghazi that killed four brave Americans.”

–Jake Tapper and Mary Bruce

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U.S., rebels urge gloomy Moscow to help oust Assad

BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syria's rebel leadership and the United States seized on Russian pessimism over President Bashar al-Assad's future to urge Moscow to help push its ally into ceding power and end the battles closing in around his capital.

"We want to commend the Russian government for finally waking up to the reality and acknowledging that the regime's days are numbered," the U.S. State Department spokeswoman said after a senior Kremlin envoy conceded publicly on Thursday that Assad's opponents could win the 20-month-old civil war.

"The question now is, will the Russian government join those of us in the international community who are working with the opposition to try to have a smooth democratic transition?" U.S. spokeswoman Victoria Nuland added in Washington.

In Marrakech, where his new coalition won recognition from other international powers as the legitimate leadership of Syria, rebel political leader Mouaz al-Khatib said he believed Russia, ally and arms supplier to the Assad dynasty since Soviet times, was looking for ways out of its support for a lost cause.

"I believe that the Russians have woken up and are sensing that they have implicated themselves with this regime, but they don't know how to get out," al-Khatib told Reuters. He held them "particularly responsible" for helping Assad with arms but said Moscow need not "lose everything" in Syria if it changed tack.

Under President Vladimir Putin, wary since last year's Libyan war of what Russia sees as a Western drive to use the United Nations to overthrow national leaders it dislikes, Russia has blocked U.N. efforts to squeeze Assad, who has also had strong support from his long-time sponsor Iran.

But Mikhail Bogdanov, a deputy foreign minister and the Kremlin's special envoy for Middle East affairs, was quoted as saying in Moscow: "One must look the facts in the face."

"Unfortunately, the victory of the Syrian opposition cannot be ruled out." The Syrian government, he said, was "losing control of more and more territory" and Moscow was preparing to evacuate Russian citizens if necessary.

Nuland said Bogdanov's comments demonstrated that Moscow now "sees the writing on the wall" on Syria and said Russia should now rally behind U.N. efforts to prevent a wider bloodbath.

"They can withdraw any residual support for the Assad regime, whether it is material support (or) financial support," she said. "They can also help us to identify people who might be willing, inside of Syria, to work on a transitional structure."

DIPLOMACY

International envoy Lakhdar Brahimi, who has met Russian and U.S. officials twice in the past week, is seeking a solution based on an agreement reached in Geneva in June that called for the creation of a transitional government in Syria.

But Russia has repeated warnings that recognition of al-Khatib's coalition, notably by the United States, is undermining diplomacy, and rejected U.S. contentions that the Geneva agreement sent a clear message that Assad should step down.

Nuland said the Brahimi meetings could lay the framework for a political structure to follow Assad:

"We've said all along to the Russians that we are concerned that the longer that this goes on, and the longer it takes us to get to an alternative political path for Syria, the only path is going to be the military one and that is just going to bring more violence.

"We all ought to be working together."

Bogdanov, whose government has suggested that Assad himself should be allowed to see through a transition he has promised, suggested the rebels and their allies were set on a military solution and he gave little hint of detente with Washington.

"The fighting will become even more intense and (Syria) will lose tens of thousands and, perhaps, hundreds of thousands of civilians," Bogdanov was quoted as saying. "If such a price for the removal of the president seems acceptable to you, what can we do? We, of course, consider it absolutely unacceptable."

The head of NATO, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, said elsewhere: "I think the regime in Damascus is approaching collapse."

A U.S. official said: "Assad probably still believes that Syria is his and illusions can die hard. But Assad and those closest to him have got to be feeling the psychological strain of fighting a long war that is not going their way."

DAMASCUS BATTLES

But Al-Khatib, who played down Western concerns of sectarian Sunni Islamists in rebel ranks, warned that the fighting was far from over, even as it has begun to rattle the heart of Assad's power in Damascus. On Wednesday, a car bomb killed at least 16 people in a nearby town which is home to many military families.

"The noose is tightening around the regime," al-Khatib said.

"(But) the regime still has power. People think that the regime is finished, but it still has power left, but it is demoralized and however long it lasted its end is clear."

Day and night, Damascenes can hear the thunderous sound of bombardment aimed at rebel-held and contested neighborhoods.

The city's streets have now turned into a labyrinth of checkpoints and road blocks, with several major roads permanently closed off to traffic by concrete barriers.

"We escape from one place and trouble follows," said one grandmother, Um Hassan, as she described to Reuters her family's flight from one neighborhood to another as fighting seeps into the capital. "I don't know where we can keep running to."

Nonetheless, al-Khatib played down demands for their allies to provide heavier weaponry - a request long resisted by governments wary of anti-aircraft missiles and other hardware reaching Islamist rebels who might turn them against the West.

"The Syrian people ... no longer need international forces to protect them," he said, not specifying whether he meant a no-fly zone, arms supplies or other military support.

The opposition chief said he was willing to listen to proposals for Assad to escape with his life - "The best thing is that he steps down and stops drinking the blood of the Syrian people" - and outlined three scenarios for a change of power:

Al-Khatib ruled out the Russian proposal suggesting Assad hand over power to a transitional government while remaining president, saying it was "disgraceful for a slaughtered nation to accept to have a killer and criminal at its head".

The British-based Syrian Observatory said war planes bombed rebel-held eastern suburbs of Damascus on Thursday and artillery was hitting Daraya and Moadamiyeh, southwestern areas near the centre where rebels have been fighting for a foothold.

Syria has relied on war planes and helicopters to bombard rebel districts but Damascus denied accusations by U.S. and NATO officials that it had fired Scud missiles in recent days. The foreign ministry said the long-range missiles were not used against "terrorist groups," a term it uses for the rebels.

At least 40,000 people have been killed in Syria's uprising, which started in March 2011 with street protests which were met with gunfire by Assad's security forces, and which spiraled into the most enduring and destructive of the Arab revolts.

(Additional reporting by Steve Gutterman in Moscow and Andrew Quinn in Washington; Writing by Alastair Macdonald; Editing by Michael Roddy) For an interactive look at the uprising in Syria, please click on http://link.reuters.com/rut37s

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McAfee says he's broke after fleeing Belize

MIAMI: Anti-virus software pioneer John McAfee said Thursday he is flat broke after leaving behind what remains of his fortune in Belize, where he is wanted for questioning over his neighbor's murder.

McAfee and 20-year-old girlfriend Sam Vanegas spent more than three weeks on the run in Belize after Gregory Faull's November 11 murder before slipping across the border into Guatemala, where he was arrested on December 5.

In the latest sudden twist to the McAfee drama, Guatemala on Wednesday abandoned efforts to return him to Belize and expelled him immediately to his country of origin, the United States.

"I have nothing now," McAfee, a free man for now, told ABC television in Miami, claiming to have left all his worldly possessions in Belize, including, he said, some $20 million in investments and about 15 properties.

"I've got a pair of clothes and shoes. My friend dropped off some cash," McAfee said, waving a short stack of bills for the TV cameras and adding that he had no idea how he would support himself or where he would live.

McAfee, who says a movie is in the works as he sells his incredible life story, told AFP his immediate focus was getting his girlfriend Sam and another friend, Amy, into the United States.

"My plan is to stay here for now, I don't know for how long, and to bring Samantha and Amy to safety, and then go to Portland (Oregon)," he said.

He admitted to ABC that he resorted to theatrics to save himself, saying that he had played the "crazy card" to convince officials in Guatemala to send him to the United States, rather than deporting him to Belize.

McAfee admitted also faking a heart attack to buy time as he scrambled to stave off deportation to Belize and said his elaborate ruses during his time on the run helped keep the media interested, which may have saved his life.

"What's a better story (than) 'millionaire madman on the run'," he told ABC. "You (the media) saved my ass, because you paid attention to the story. As long as you are reporting, it is hard to whack somebody that the world is watching."

Authorities in Belize want to question McAfee about the death of Faull, a 52-year-old Florida expatriate who was found by his housekeeper with a 9-mm bullet in his head, lying in a pool of his own blood.

McAfee denies murdering Faull, who lived a couple of houses along on idyllic Ambergris Caye, and says he went on the run because he feared for his life if apprehended, claiming he knew too much about official corruption.

"John McAfee is still a person of interest, but not a suspect," Miguel Segura, the assistant commissioner of police in Belize, said Thursday. "The investigation must be completed and we need to interrogate him for the case to move forward."

Segura told local media that investigators did not have enough evidence to issue an arrest warrant or ask for McAfee's extradition.

Belize's Prime Minister Dean Barrow has shrugged off McAfee's claims of official intrigue in his country, saying the American is "extremely paranoid."

Prior to his murder, Faull had orchestrated a letter of complaint to the local mayor, urging the authorities to take action because McAfee's "vicious" dogs and aggressive security guards were scaring tourists and residents.

McAfee shot dead four of his dogs before fleeing, claiming they had been poisoned by Faull.

Police in Belize said weeks ago that ballistics experts were seeking a match between bullets founds in the dog carcasses and one found in the murder victim, but no results have been announced.

McAfee amassed an estimated $100 million fortune during the early days of the Internet in the 1990s, designing the pioneering anti-virus software that bears his name, before cashing out to become an intrepid adventure-seeker.

He decamped to Belize in 2009 after losing most of his fortune to bad investments and the financial crisis.

McAfee was briefly incarcerated in April after police found him living with a 17-year-old girl and discovered an arsenal of seven pump-action shotguns, one single-action shotgun, and two 9-mm pistols.

-AFP/ac

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Govt seeks Trai's opinion on cable monopolies

NEW DELHI: The government has sought broadcast regulator Trai's views to prevent monopolistic operations by cable operators and multi-system operators, expressing concern that it might have serious implications in terms of competition, pricing and healthy growth of the cable TV sector in the market.

In a statement, the information and broadcasting (I&B) ministry said, "It has been observed that cable TV distribution is virtually monopolized in some states as operation of the entire cable TV network is dominated by a single entity. At present, there are no restrictions on the issue of accumulation of interest in terms of market share in a city, district, state or country by individual MSOs and LCOs in the cable sector."

MSOs and cable operators are free to operate in any area of their choice after obtaining registration from the ministry. "It is felt that such monopolies may not be in the interest of consumers and may have serious implications in terms of competition, pricing and healthy growth of cable TV sector in that market," the ministry said.

The ministry has requested Trai to provide its recommendations on whether "in order to ensure fair competition, improved quality of service, and equity, should any restriction be imposed on MSOs/LCOs to prevent monopolies/accumulation of interest? If yes, what restrictions should be imposed and what should be the form, nature and scope of such restrictions?" The regulator will also explore the necessity of amending the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Act, 1995.

MSOs and cable operators are required to be registered with local post offices to be able to operate in the permitted areas of registration. However, as per recent amendments in the Cable Television Networks (Regulation) Amendment Rules 2012, it has become mandatory for MSOs to register with the I&B ministry to operate.

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Congress examines science behind HGH test for NFL

WASHINGTON (AP) — A congressional committee has opened a hearing to examine the science behind a human growth hormone test the NFL wants to start using on its players.

Nearly two full seasons have passed since the league and the players' union signed a labor deal that set the stage for HGH testing.

The NFL Players Association won't concede the validity of a test that's used by Olympic sports and Major League Baseball, and the sides haven't been able to agree on a scientist to help resolve that impasse.

Among the witnesses before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Wednesday is Pro Football Hall of Fame member Dick Butkus. In his prepared statement, Butkus writes: "Now, let's get on with it. The HGH testing process is proven to be reliable."

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Mall Shooter Quit Job, Was Going to Hawaii

In the days before he stole a semiautomatic weapon and stormed into an Oregon shopping mall, killing two people in a shooting spree, Jacob Roberts quit his job, sold his belongings and began to seem "numb" to those closest to him.

Roberts' ex-girlfriend, Hannah Patricia Sansburn, 20, told ABC News today that the man who donned a hockey mask and opened fire on Christmas shoppers was typically happy and liked to joke around, but abruptly changed in the week before the shooting.

Roberts unleashed a murderous volley of gunfire on the second floor of the Clackamas Town Center on Tuesday while wearing the mask and black clothing, and carrying an AR-15 semiautomatic weapon and "several" magazines full of ammunition. He ended his barrage by walking down to the first floor of the mall and committing suicide.

READ: Why Mass Shooters Wear Masks

"I don't understand," Sansburn said. "I was just with him. I just talked to him. I didn't believe it was him at all. Not one part of me believed it."

She said that in recent weeks, Roberts quit his job at a gyro shop in downtown Portland and sold all of his belongings, telling her that he was moving to Hawaii. He had even purchased a ticket.

She now wonders if he was really planning to move.

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"He was supposed to catch a flight Saturday and I texted him, and asked how his flight went, and he told me, 'oh, I got drunk and didn't make the flight,'" she said. "And then this happens... It makes me think, was he even planning on going to Hawaii? He quit his job, sold all of his things."

Roberts described himself on his Facebook page as an "adrenaline junkie," and said he is the kind of person who thinks, "I'm going to do what I want."

Roberts, who attended Clackamas Community college, posted a picture of himself on his Facebook page firing a gun at a target. His Facebook photo showed graffiti in which the words "Follow Your Dreams" were painted over with the word "Cancelled."

Sansburn said the pair had dated for nearly a year but had broke up over the summer. Throughout their relationship, she had never seen him act violently or get angry.

"Jake was never the violent type. He didn't go out of his way to try to hurt people or upset people. His main goal was to make you laugh, smile, make you feel comfortable. I never would have guessed him to do anything like this ever," she said.

"You can't reconcile the differences. I hate him for what he did, but I can't hate the person I knew because it was nothing like the person who would go into a mall and go on a rampage. I would never associate the two at all."

The last time she saw him, which was last week, he "seemed numb," and she didn't understand why, she said.

"I just talked to him, stayed the night with him, and he just seemed numb if anything. He's usually very bubbly and happy, and I asked him why, what had changed, and said 'nothing.' He just had so much he had to do before he went to Hawaii that he was trying to distance himself from Portland," Sansburn said.

Sansburn said the last message she sent Roberts was a text, asking him to stay, and saying she didn't want him to leave. He replied "I'm sorry," with a sad face emoticon.

Police are still seeking information about what Roberts was doing in the days leading up to the shooting. They said today they believe Roberts stole the gun he used in the rampage from someone he knew. They have searched his home and his car for other clues into his motive.

Read ABC News' full coverage of the Oregon Mall Shooting

Clackamas County Sheriff Craig Roberts said earlier today on "Good Morning America" that he believes Roberts went into the mall with the goal of killing as many people as he could.

"I believe, at least from the information that's been provided to me at this point in time, it really was a killing of total strangers. To my knowledge at this point in time he was really trying, I think, to kill as many people as possible."

Sansburn said she has not talked to police.

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North Korea rocket launch raises nuclear stakes

SEOUL/TOKYO (Reuters) - North Korea successfully launched a rocket on Wednesday, boosting the credentials of its new leader and stepping up the threat the isolated and impoverished state poses to opponents.

The rocket, which North Korea says put a weather satellite into orbit, has been labeled by the United States, South Korea and Japan as a test of technology that could one day deliver a nuclear warhead capable of hitting targets as far away as the continental United States.

"The satellite has entered the planned orbit," a North Korean television news reader clad in traditional Korean garb announced, after which the station played patriotic songs with the lyrics "Chosun (Korea) does what it says".

The rocket was launched just before 10 a.m. (0100 GMT), according to defense officials in South Korea and Japan, and was more successful than a rocket launched in April that flew for less than two minutes.

The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), a joint U.S.-Canadian military organization, said that the missile had "deployed an object that appeared to achieve orbit".

North Korea followed what it said was a similar successful launch in 2009 with a nuclear test that prompted the U.N. Security Council to stiffen sanctions that it originally imposed in 2006 after the North's first nuclear test.

North Korea is banned from developing nuclear and missile-related technology under U.N. resolutions, although Kim Jong-un, the youthful head of state who took power a year ago, is believed to have continued the state's "military first" programs put in place by his late father, Kim Jong-il.

North Korea hailed the launch as celebrating the prowess of all three members of the Kim family to rule since it was founded in 1948.

"At a time when great yearnings and reverence for Kim Jong-il pervade the whole country, its scientists and technicians brilliantly carried out his behests to launch a scientific and technological satellite in 2012, the year marking the 100th birth anniversary of President Kim Il Sung," its KCNA news agency said. Kim Il Sung, the current leader's grandfather, was North Korea's first leader.

The United States condemned the launch as "provocative" and a breach of U.N. rules, while Japan's U.N. envoy called for a Security Council meeting. However, diplomats say further tough sanctions are unlikely from the Security Council as China, the North's only major ally, will oppose them.

"The international community must work in a concerted fashion to send North Korea a clear message that its violations of United Nations Security Council resolutions have consequences," the White House said in a statement.

U.S. intelligence has linked North Korea with missile shipments to Iran. Newspapers in Japan and South Korea have reported that Iranian observers were in the North for the launch, something Iran has denied.

Japan's likely next prime minister, Shinzo Abe, who is leading in opinion polls ahead of an election on Sunday and who is known as a hawk on North Korea, called on the United Nations to adopt a resolution "strongly criticizing" Pyongyang.

A North Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman reiterated that the rocket was a "peaceful project".

"The attempt to see our satellite launch as a long-range missile launch for military purposes comes from hostile perception that tries to designate us a cause for security tension," KCNA cited the spokesman as saying.

"STUMBLING BLOCK"

China had expressed "deep concern" prior to the launch which was announced a day after a top politburo member, representing new Chinese leader Xi Jinping, met Kim Jong-un in Pyongyang.

On Wednesday, its tone was measured, regretting the launch but calling for restraint on any counter-measures, in line with a policy of effectively vetoing tougher sanctions.

"China believes the Security Council's response should be cautious and moderate, protect the overall peaceful and stable situation on the Korean peninsula, and avoid an escalation," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei told journalists.

Bruce Klingner, a Korea expert at the Heritage Foundation, said: "China has been the stumbling block to firmer U.N. action and we'll have to see if the new leadership is any different than its predecessors."

A senior adviser to South Korea's president said last week it was unlikely there would be action from the United Nations and Seoul would expect its allies to tighten sanctions unilaterally.

Kim Jong-un, believed to be 29 years old, took power when his father died on December 17 last year and experts believe the launch was intended to commemorate the first anniversary of his death. The April launch was timed for the centennial of the birth of Kim Il Sung.

Wednesday's success puts the North ahead of the South which has not managed to get a rocket off the ground.

"This is a considerable boost in establishing the rule of Kim Jong-un," said Cho Min, an expert at the Korea Institute of National Unification.

There have been few indications the secretive and impoverished state, where the United Nations estimates a third of people are malnourished, has made any advances in opening up economically over the past year.

North Korea remains reliant on minerals exports to China and remittances from tens of thousands of its workers overseas.

Many of its 22 million people need handouts from defectors, who have escaped to South Korea, for basic medicines.

Given the puny size of its economy - per capita income is less than $2,000 a year - one of the few ways the North can attract world attention is by emphasizing its military threat.

It wants the United States to resume aid and to recognize it diplomatically, although the April launch scuppered a planned food deal.

The North is believed to be some years away from developing a functioning nuclear warhead although it may have enough plutonium for about half a dozen nuclear bombs, according to nuclear experts.

It has also been enriching uranium, which would give it a second path to nuclear weapons as it sits on big natural uranium reserves.

"A successful launch puts North Korea closer to the capability to deploy a weaponized missile," said Denny Roy, a senior fellow at the East-West Center in Hawaii.

"But this would still require fitting a weapon to the missile and ensuring a reasonable degree of accuracy. The North Koreans probably do not yet have a nuclear weapon small enough for a missile to carry."

The North says its work is part of a civil nuclear program although it has also boasted of it being a "nuclear weapons power".

(This story has been refiled to clarify reference to NORAD in paragraph five)

(Additional reporting by Jumin Park and Yoo Choonsik in SEOUL; David Alexander, Matt Spetalnick and Paul Eckert in WASHINGTON; Linda Sieg in TOKYO, Sui-Lee Wee and michael Martina in BEIJING,; Rosmarie Francisco in MANILA; Writing by David Chance; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan and Robert Birsel)

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New Fed QE sends dollar lower; yen falls ahead of vote

NEW YORK: The Federal Reserve's expected expansion of its quantitative easing bond-buying Wednesday sent the dollar lower for the third straight day, with the euro almost touching $1.31 before easing back.

The yen meanwhile continued to sag ahead of the December 16 general election, with the opposition Liberal Democratic Party, which wants the Bank of Japan to further ease monetary policy, leading in polls.

In its final policy review of the year, the Fed announced it would replace its Operation Twist bond swapping program with $45 billion per month in straight bond buys, on an open-ended basis, as economic growth still needed the support.

Even as the Fed set new explicit targets for tightening policy -- when the unemployment rate falls to 6.5 percent and inflation prospects top 2.5 percent -- its actions and forecasts implied that would still not happen until 2015.

At 2200 GMT the euro was buying $1.3075, compared to $1.3003 late Tuesday.

The yen sagged as the Japanese election draws near, with the LDP's Shinzo Abe expected to return as prime minister.

Abe, prime minister in 2006-2007, has made strong calls to kickstart Japan's deflation-plagued economy, vowing to impose a three percent inflation target on the Bank of Japan and forcing it to buy bonds -- effectively deficit financing.

He has since rowed back after criticism he was endangering the independence of the central bank. But his comments helped pull down the high yen, delighting exporters hit hard by the surging currency.

The dollar gained to 83.24 yen from 82.51, while the euro moved to 108.85 yen from 107.28 yen.

"It's hard to imagine a change of government will lead to measures that have a real impact on the economy," said Kenji Shiomura, strategist at Daiwa Securities.

"Behind the deflation is a structural problem -- a shrinking population with low birthrates. This problem won't go away."

The dollar slipped to 0.9261 Swiss francs, while the pound gained to $1.6147.

-AFP/ac

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Stringing East andnd West with music

KOLKATA: Ravi Shankar was an established name in Indian music - on stage, screen and public broadcasting - when he began collaborating with peers in Western classical music. It began in 1952 when Yehudi Menuhin came to raise money for famine relief. Nehru invited the socially conscious violinist to a reception where Ravi Shankar, then popularising through Jhankar Music Circle - set up by the Shrirams in New Delhi - and composing for AIR, played for him.

Although Ravi Shankar had travelled extensively with Uday Shankar dance troupe, he had not played independently nor been to the US. Taken aback by the technical brilliance and improvisational aspect of Indian music, Menuhin started telling the Europeans about it. He invited Panditji for demonstration concerts and recorded them for posterity. That started a series which changed the face of classical music, in the East and West, giving birth to a genre we know as World Music.

"Violinist Menuhin and flutist Jean-Pierre Rampal, two of his early and lifelong collaborators, wrought a monumental change in the basis and range of global art music," Philip Glass later wrote. The American composer "had the great fortune" to work as Panditji's assistant in Paris of 1960s, when he was scoring for Conrad Rook's Chappaqua. "I found he had a practical knowledge of Western instruments. And though I was in charge of transcribing his music into Western notation for the French Chamber Orchestra, the actual orchestration was completed by Ravi himself," he wrote in the foreword to the maestro's autobiography, My Music My Life.

Ravi Shankar's encounters with Western Music proved to be a two-way street. While he gained from the discipline of notating, he joyfully shared the breadth and depth of his tradition with those outside it. And, in the process, he gave Indian musical tradition what it lacked: a theoretical understanding of ideas and concepts of its history that our gurus - being practitioners raised strictly within the oral tradition of gharanas - never needed.

Ravi Shankar's impact was more than musical - it was cultural, even spiritual. "Even before 1952, Western elite were aware of Hindu and Buddhist philosophy. In the 1960s, with the Beatles, the influence percolated to popular level," writes Peter Lavezzoli in Bhairavi: The Global Impact of Indian Music. It is hard to overstate the significance of George Harrison composing songs based on khayal, bhajan, Carnatic songs, playing sitar or travelling to Haridwar. If people also readily took to yoga, it was perhaps because they were seeking alternatives to Judeo-Christian philosophy.

"To the Indian quality of serenity, Ravi Shankar brought an exalted personal expression of union with the infinite," Yehudi Menuhin once said to TOI. "Few modern composers in the West achieve this although we revere it in Bach, Beethoven or Mozart." Ravi Shankar filled the void when he crafted a synthesis of eastern and western expressions - of immediacy and spontaneity with intuitive and eternal truth.

If this penchant for improvisation proved a gain for rock and jazz, it also opened Indian music to new concepts and took it to new heights.

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DA investigating Texas' troubled $3B cancer agency

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — Turmoil surrounding an unprecedented $3 billion cancer-fighting effort in Texas worsened Tuesday when its executive director offered his resignation and the state's chief public corruption prosecutor announced an investigation into the beleaguered agency.

No specific criminal allegations are driving the latest probe into the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas, said Gregg Cox, director of the Travis County district attorney's public integrity unit. But his influential office opened a case only weeks after the embattled agency disclosed that an $11 million grant to a private company bypassed review.

That award is the latest trouble in a tumultuous year for CPRIT, which controls the nation's second-largest pot of cancer research dollars. Amid the mounting problems, the agency announced Tuesday that Executive Director Bill Gimson had submitted his letter of resignation.

"Unfortunately, I have also been placed in a situation where I feel I can no longer be effective," Gimson wrote in a letter dated Monday.

Gimson said the troubles have resulted in "wasted efforts expended in low value activities" at the agency, instead of a focused fight against cancer. Gimson offered to stay on until January, and the agency's board must still approve his request to step down.

His departure would complete a remarkable house-cleaning at CPRIT in a span of just eight months. It began in May, when Dr. Alfred Gilman resigned as chief science officer in protest over a different grant that the Nobel laureate wanted approved by a panel of scientists. He warned it would be "the bomb that destroys CPRIT."

Gilman was followed by Chief Commercialization Officer Jerry Cobbs, whose resignation in November came after an internal audit showed Cobbs included an $11 million proposal in a funding slate without a required outside review of the project's merits. The lucrative grant was given to Dallas-based Peloton Therapeutics, a biomedical startup.

Gimson chalked up Peloton's award to an honest mistake and has said that, to his knowledge, no one associated with CPRIT stood to benefit financially from the company receiving the taxpayer funds. That hasn't satisfied some members of the agency's governing board, who called last week for more assurances that no one personally profited.

Cox said he has been following the agency's problems and his office received a number of concerned phone calls. His department in Austin is charged with prosecuting crimes related to government officials; his most famous cases include winning a conviction against former U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay in 2010 on money laundering charges.

"We have to gather the facts and figure what, if any, crime occurred so that (the investigation) can be focused more," Cox said.

Gimson's resignation letter was dated the same day the Texas attorney general's office also announced its investigation of the agency. Cox said his department would work cooperatively with state investigators, but he made clear the probes would be separate.

Peloton's award marks the second time this year that a lucrative taxpayer-funded grant authorized by CPRIT instigated backlash and raised questions about oversight. The first involved the $20 million grant to M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston that Gilman described as a thin proposal that should have first been scrutinized by an outside panel of scientific peer-reviewers, even though none was required under the agency's rules.

Dozens of the nation's top scientists agreed. They resigned en masse from the agency's peer-review panels along with Gilman. Some accused the agency of "hucksterism" and charting a politically-driven path that was putting commercial product-development above science.

The latest shake-up at CPRIT caught Gilman's successor off-guard. Dr. Margaret Kripke, who was introduced to reporters Tuesday, acknowledged that she wasn't even sure who she would be answering to now that Gimson was stepping down. She said that although she wasn't with the agency when her predecessor announced his resignation, she was aware of the concerns and allegations.

"I don't think people would resign frivolously, so there must be some substance to those concerns," Kripke said.

Kripke also acknowledged the challenge of restocking the peer-review panels after the agency's credibility was so publicly smeared by some of the country's top scientists. She said she took the job because she felt the agency's mission and potential was too important to lose.

Only the National Institutes of Health doles out more cancer research dollars than CPRIT, which has awarded more than $700 million so far.

Gov. Rick Perry told reporters in Houston on Tuesday that he wasn't previously aware of the resignation but said Gimson's decision to step down was his own.

Joining the mounting criticism of CPRIT is the woman credited with brainstorming the idea for the agency in the first place. Cathy Bonner, who served under former Texas Gov. Ann Richards, teamed with cancer survivor Lance Armstrong in selling Texas voters in 2007 on a constitutional amendment to create an unprecedented state-run effort to finance a war on disease.

Now Bonner says politics have sullied an agency that she said was built to fund research, not subsidize private companies.

"There appears to be a cover-up going on," Bonner said.

Peloton has declined comment about its award and has referred questions to CPRIT. The agency has said the company wasn't aware that its application was never scrutinized by an outside panel, as required under agency rules.

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Follow Paul J. Weber on Twitter: www.twitter.com/pauljweber

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Obama Recognizes Syrian Opposition Group

In a diplomatic shift, President Obama said today his administration now formally recognizes the newly-formed, leading coalition of Syrian rebels who are fighting to topple Syria's embattled President Bashar Assad.

"We've made a decision that the Syrian Opposition Coalition is now inclusive enough, is reflective and representative enough of the Syrian population that we consider them the legitimate representative of the Syrian people in opposition to the Assad regime," Obama said.

The announcement, made during an exclusive interview with ABC News' Barbara Walters, grants new legitimacy to the rebel group and marks a new phase in U.S. efforts to isolate the Assad regime.

"It's a big step," Obama said of the decision. The United States follows Britain and the European Union, both of which last month recognized the Syrian opposition group.

More of Barbara Walters' exclusive first joint, post-election interview with President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama airs Friday, Dec. 14, on "20/20" at 10 p.m. ET on ABC stations.

The diplomatic designation will allow the United States to more closely support rebel efforts, including the organization of a future post-Assad government, administration officials said.

"Obviously, with that recognition comes responsibilities," Obama said of the young coalition. "To make sure that they organize themselves effectively, that they are representative of all the parties, [and] that they commit themselves to a political transition that respects women's rights and minority rights."

Official White House Photo by Pete Souza

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The move does not include the provision of weapons, but it opens the door for that possibility in the future.

"Providing arms has to be done in a way that helps promote a political solution," one senior Obama administration official said today. "And until we understand how these arms promote a political solution, we do not see how provision of arms is a good idea."

But the official added, "the president has never ruled out in the future providing arms."

Obama expressed caution today about some Syrian factions involved with the coalition, warning that the United States will not support extremist elements.

"Not everybody who's participating on the ground in fighting Assad are people who we are comfortable with," Obama told Walters. "There are some who, I think, have adopted an extremist agenda, an anti-U.S. agenda, and we are going to make clear to distinguish between those elements."

The president specifically singled out the group Jabhat al-Nusrah for its alleged affiliation with Al Qaeda in Iraq. The State Department says the jihadist group is responsible for nearly 600 violent attacks in major Syrian cities in the past year.

"Through these attacks, al-Nusrah has sought to portray itself as part of the legitimate Syrian opposition while it is, in fact, an attempt by [Al Qaeda in Iraq] to hijack the struggles of the Syrian people for its own malign purposes," State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.

The Obama administration blacklisted al-Nusrah earlier this week, imposing economic sanctions and branding it a terrorist organization.

Recognition of the Syrian rebel group has been expected. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was to formally announce the new relations with the United States during a meeting of international allies supporting Syria's rebels in Marrakech, Morocco, on Wednesday.

She has since cancelled her trip because of an illness. Her deputy, Bill Burns, will attend in her place.

President Obama also discussed the looming "fiscal cliff" and suggested a new flexibility on cuts to entitlement spending. Read that report here.

ABC News' Martha Raddatz contributed to this report.

More of Barbara Walters' exclusive first joint, post-election interview with President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama airs Friday, Dec. 14, on "20/20" at 10 p.m. ET on ABC stations.

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