Man in Afghan uniform kills foreign service member

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — A gunman wearing an Afghan army uniform on Sunday shot and killed a member of the U.S.-led coalition forces fighting in Afghanistan — the latest in a spate of insider attacks that are fracturing the trust between NATO and Afghan forces.

Separately, officials said 11 Afghan civilians were killed by land mines on Sunday in explosions in the east and south.

U.S. Army Maj. Martyn Crighton, a spokesman for the coalition, said the service member was killed in the south. His identity and nationality were not disclosed.

Mohammad Zarak, spokesman for the governor of Helmand province, said the shooting took place in Nad Ali district after an argument between an Afghan soldier and coalition service members.

Coalition figures show at least 60 coalition service members have been killed so far this year and others have been wounded in about 45 insider attacks, where members of the Afghan security forces or insurgents dressed in their uniforms turn their guns on U.S. and allied troops.

The insider attacks have raised questions about how effectively the allied forces can train the Afghans to take over security of their own country in 2014 and beyond. Foreign forces are due to turn over security responsibility to the local military by the end of 2014.

A roadside bomb killed three men, two women and a baby in Khost province of eastern Afghanistan, deputy provincial police chief Youqib Khan said. He said their vehicle hit the bomb as they were returning from a hospital.

Three other civilians were killed when their vehicle detonated a land mine on the road between Helmand and Kandahar provinces, a government statement said.

Also in the south, two civilians who were walking were killed by a land mine in Khakrez district of Kandahar province, said Ahmad Jawed Faisal, a spokesman for the provincial governor.

The United Nations says homemade bombs continue to be the weapons that kill the most civilians in the war.

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Associated Press Writers Rahim Faiez and Mirwais Khan contributed to this report.

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Malaysian charged with Facebook insult of sultan

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — The sister of a Malaysian man who has been charged with insulting a state sultan on Facebook said Friday that he is innocent and will lodge a complaint over his detention.

Anisa Abdul Jalil said her brother Ahmad Abdul Jalil was charged Thursday with making offensive postings on Facebook last month. But she said there is no evidence linking Ahmad to the posts in question, which were made by someone using the name “Zul Yahaya.”

“This is ridiculous as they have failed to build a case against him. We are very angry. It is a dirty game and an abuse of power, an abuse of the court process,” Anisa told the Associated Press.

Ahmad was freed on bail Thursday after six days of detention, during which he was denied access to lawyers and family members.

Anisa said Ahmad told the family that police tried to force a confession from him but he stood firm. She said Ahmad will file a complaint with police for unlawful detention and intimidation.

Defense lawyer Fadiah Nadwa Fitri said they would appeal to throw out the charges against Ahmad when the case is next heard Nov. 28.

The posts in question were directed at Sultan Ibrahim Iskandar of southern Johor state. Fadiah said that according to the charge sheet, the postings likened the sultan’s skin and behavior to that of a pig, which is viewed as a dirty animal in Islam.

“The charges are unfounded. Ahmad is vocal and is critical about political matter but he didn’t write the postings. It seems that Ahmad is being prosecuted for exercising his rights,” Fadiah said. Ahmad faces up to a year in jail if convicted, she added.

Nine Malaysian states have sultans and other royal figures. Though their roles are largely ceremonial, they command wide respect after centuries of hereditary rule.

Under Malaysian law, acts that provoke hatred against royal rulers are considered seditious. Only a few people have been charged with the crime in recent years.

Social Media News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Bond soars with record $87.8M 'Skyfall' debut

LOS ANGELES (AP) — James Bond's "Skyfall" has extended its worldwide box-office rule to North America, hauling in a franchise-record $87.8 million in its first weekend at U.S. theaters.

Adding in $2.2 million from Thursday night previews at IMAX and other large-format theaters, "Skyfall" has taken in $90 million domestically, according to studio estimates Sunday.

That lifts the worldwide total for "Skyfall" to $518.6 million since it began rolling out overseas in late October. Internationally, the 23rd Bond flick added $89 million this weekend to raise its overseas revenue to $428.6 million.

The third installment starring Daniel Craig as British super-spy Bond, "Skyfall" outdid the $67.5 million U.S. debut of 2008's "Quantum of Solace," the franchise's previous best opening. "Skyfall" more than doubled the $40.8 million debut of Craig's first Bond film, 2006's "Casino Royale."

"Skyfall" already has passed the $407.7 million overseas total for "Quantum of Solace" and by Monday, it will top the $432.2 million international haul for "Casino Royale."

The Craig era has reinvigorated one of Hollywood's most-enduring franchises, whose first big-screen Bond adventure, "Dr. No," debuted 50 years ago.

"It's quite a testament to Bond, considering it's the 50th anniversary. What a great anniversary present," said Rory Bruer, head of distribution at Sony, which produces the Bond films along with MGM.

"Skyfall" was the weekend's only new wide release, but Steven Spielberg's "Lincoln" had a huge start in a handful of theaters. Starring Daniel Day-Lewis as the 16th president, "Lincoln" took in $900,000 in 11 theaters for a whopping average of $81,818 a cinema. By comparison, "Skyfall" averaged $25,050 in 3,505 theaters.

"Lincoln" centers on the months leading up to the president's assassination in April 1865, as he maneuvers to pass the 13th amendment abolishing slavery and end the Civil War. Distributor Disney will expand "Lincoln" into nationwide release of about 1,600 theaters Friday and may widen the film further over Thanksgiving week.

The film has strong Academy Awards prospects for two-time directing winner Spielberg, two-time acting recipient Day-Lewis and the rest of the cast, which includes Oscar winners Sally Field and Tommy Lee Jones.

"The performances are some of the greatest of recent time," said Dave Hollis, head of distribution for Disney. "I don't know if you're ever going to think about it again without seeing our actor as Lincoln. Daniel is extraordinary in the role."

"Skyfall" took over the top spot at the weekend box office from Disney's animated comedy "Wreck-It Ralph," which fell to No. 2 with $33.1 million, raising its domestic total to $93.7 million.

While "Skyfall" marked a new high for Bond's opening-weekend revenue, the film has a long way to go to match the biggest audiences 007 has ever drawn. Adjusted for inflation, Sean Connery's 1965 Bond adventure "Thunderball" would have taken in an estimated $508 million domestically in today's dollars, with its 1964 predecessor "Goldfinger" not far behind at $444 million, according to box-office tracker Hollywood.com.

The Bond films over the last two decades have come in around the $200 million range domestically in inflation-adjusted dollars.

Still, Craig's Bond is setting a new critical standard for the franchise. While "Quantum of Solace" had a so-so critical reception, "Skyfall" and "Casino Royale" are among the best-reviewed Bond films, with critics and fans enjoying the darker edge Craig has imprinted on 007.

"'Skyfall' is to the Bond franchise what 'The Dark Knight' was to the Batman franchise," said Hollywood.com analyst Paul Dergarabedian. "By taking it to a whole other level, this is a different kind of Bond that can be taken really seriously."

Directed by Sam Mendes, the Academy Award-winning filmmaker behind "American Beauty" and Craig's director on "Road to Perdition," ''Skyfall" continues the current franchise's exploration into the emotional traumas that have shaped Bond's cool, aloof manner.

The film reveals secrets out of the past of Bond's boss, British spymaster M (Judi Dench), and pits 007 against a brilliant but unstable former agent (Javier Bardem) who's out for revenge.

Hollywood remains on a brisk pace this fall as the busy holiday season approaches. Overall domestic revenues totaled $172 million, up 26 percent from the same weekend last year, when "Immortals" led with $32.2 million.

For the year, domestic revenues are at $9.1 billion, up 4.3 percent from 2011's, according to Hollywood.com.

Estimated ticket sales for Friday through Sunday at U.S. and Canadian theaters, according to Hollywood.com. Where available, latest international numbers are also included. Final domestic figures will be released Monday.

1. "Skyfall," $87.8 million.

2. "Wreck-It Ralph," $33.1 million.

3. "Flight," $15.1 million.

4. "Argo," $6.7 million.

5. "Taken 2," $4 million.

6. "Here Comes the Boom," $2.6 million

7. "Cloud Atlas," $2.53 million.

8. "Pitch Perfect," $2.5 million.

9. "The Man with the Iron Fists," $2.49 million.

10. "Hotel Transylvania," $2.4 million.

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Estimated weekend ticket sales at international theaters (excluding the U.S. and Canada) for films distributed overseas by Hollywood studios, according to Rentrak:

1. "Skyfall," $89 million.

2. "Argo," $12 million.

3. "Wreck-It Ralph," $11.2 million.

4. "Hotel Transylvania," $11.1 million.

5. "A Werewolf Boy," $10.5 million.

6. "Cloud Atlas," $8.7 million.

7. "Paranormal Activity 4," $6 million.

8 (tie). "Asterlix and Obelix: God Save Britannia," $4.4 million.

8 (tie). "Confession of Murder," $4.4 million.

10. "Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted," $4.1 million.

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Online:

http://www.hollywood.com

http://www.rentrak.com

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Universal and Focus are owned by NBC Universal, a unit of Comcast Corp.; Sony, Columbia, Sony Screen Gems and Sony Pictures Classics are units of Sony Corp.; Paramount is owned by Viacom Inc.; Disney, Pixar and Marvel are owned by The Walt Disney Co.; Miramax is owned by Filmyard Holdings LLC; 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight are owned by News Corp.; Warner Bros. and New Line are units of Time Warner Inc.; MGM is owned by a group of former creditors including Highland Capital, Anchorage Advisors and Carl Icahn; Lionsgate is owned by Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.; IFC is owned by AMC Networks Inc.; Rogue is owned by Relativity Media LLC.

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Food labels multiply, some confuse consumers

FRESNO, Calif. (AP) — Want to avoid pesticides and antibiotics in your produce, meat, and dairy foods? Prefer to pay more to make sure farm animals were treated humanely, farmworkers got their lunch breaks, bees or birds were protected by the farmer and that ranchers didn't kill predators?

Food labels claim to certify a wide array of sustainable practices. Hundreds of so-called eco-labels have cropped up in recent years, with more introduced every month — and consumers are willing to pay extra for products that feature them.

While eco-labels can play a vital role, experts say their rapid proliferation and lack of oversight or clear standards have confused both consumers and producers.

"Hundreds of eco labels exist on all kinds of products, and there is the potential for companies and producers to make false claims," said Shana Starobin, a food label expert at Duke University's Nicholas School of the Environment.

Eco-labels have multiplied in recent years in response to rising consumer demand for more information about products and increased attention to animal and farmworker welfare, personal health, and the effects of conventional farming on the environment.

"Credible labels can be very helpful in helping people get to what they want to get to and pay more for something they really care about," said Urvashi Rangan, director of consumer safety at Consumer Reports. "The labels are a way to bring the bottom up and force whole industries to improve their practices."

The problem, Rangan and other said, is that few standards, little oversight and a lot of misinformation exist for the growing array of labels.

Some labels, such as the USDA organic certification, have standards set by the federal government to which third party certifiers must adhere. Some involve non-government standards and third-party certification, and may include site visits from independent auditors who evaluate whether a given farm or company has earned the label.

But other labels have little or no standards, or are certified by unknown organizations or by self-interested industry groups. Many labels lack any oversight.

And the problem is global, because California's products get sold overseas and fruits and vegetables from Europe or Mexico with their own eco-labels make it onto U.S. plates.

The sheer number of labels and the lack of oversight create a credibility problem and risk rendering all labels meaningless and diluting demand for sustainably produced goods, Rangan said.

Daniel Mourad of Fresno, a young professional who likes to cook and often shops for groceries at Whole Foods, said he tends to be wary of judging products just by the labels — though sustainable practices are important to him.

"Labels have really confused the public. Some have good intentions, but I don't know if they're really helpful," Mourad said. "Organic may come from Chile, but what does it mean if it's coming from 6,000 miles away? Some local farmers may not be able to afford a label."

In California, voters this week rejected a ballot measure that would have required labels on foods containing genetically modified ingredients.

Farmers like Gena Nonini in Fresno County say labels distinguish them from the competition. Nonini's 100-acre Marian Farms, which grows grapes, almonds, citrus and vegetables, is certified biodynamic and organic, and her raisins are certified kosher.

"For me, the certification is one way of educating people," Nonini said. "It opens a venue to tell a story and to set yourself apart from other farmers out there."

But other farmers say they are reluctant to spend money on yet another certification process or to clutter their product with too much packaging and information.

"I think if we keep adding all these new labels, it tends to be a pile of confusion," said Tom Willey of TD Willey Farms in Madera, Calif. His 75-acre farm, which grows more than 40 different vegetable crops, carries USDA organic certification, but no other labels.

The proliferation of labels, Willey said, is a poor substitute for "people being intimate with the farmers who grow their food." Instead of seeking out more labels, he said, consumers should visit a farmers' market or a farm, and talk directly to the grower.

Since that's still impossible for many urbanites, Consumer Reports has developed a rating system, a database and a web site for evaluating environmental and food labels — one of several such guides that have popped up recently to help consumers.

The guides show that labels such as "natural" and "free range" carry little meaning, because they lack clear standards or a verification system.

Despite this, consumers are willing to pay more for "free range" eggs and poultry, and studies show they value "natural" over "organic," which is governed by lengthy federal regulations.

But some consumers and watchdog groups are becoming more vigilant.

In October, the Animal Legal Defense Fund filed a lawsuit against Petaluma, Calif., organic egg producer of Judy's Eggs over "free range" claims. The company's packaging depicts a hen ranging on green grass, and the inside reads "these hens are raised in wide open spaces in Sonoma Valley..."

Aerial photos of the farm suggest the chickens actually live in factory-style sheds, according to the lawsuit. Judy and Steve Mahrt, owners of Petaluma Farms, said in a statement that the suit is "frivolous, unfair and untrue," but they did not comment on the specific allegations.

Meanwhile, new labels are popping up rapidly. The Food Justice label, certified via third party audits, guarantees a farm's commitment to fair living wages and adequate living and working conditions for farmworkers. And Wildlife Friendly, another third-party audited program, certifies farmers and ranchers who peacefully co-exist with wolves, coyotes, foxes and other predators.

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Follow Gosia Wozniacka at http://twitter.com/GosiaWozniacka

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Obama hails veterans, pledges continued support

ARLINGTON, Virginia (Reuters) - President Barack Obama laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier to mark the Veterans Day holiday on Sunday, declaring that soldiers' needs would be met even as the country winds down wars in the Middle East and Asia.

In the ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery, Obama pledged continuing support for veterans as they make the transition to civilian life.

"This is the first Veterans Day in a decade in which there are no American troops fighting and dying in Iraq," the president said at the cemetery across the Potomac River from Washington, where soldiers' graves are marked with row upon row of simple white stones.

"After a decade of war, our heroes are coming home," he said. "Over the next few years more than a million service members will transition back to civilian life."

The president touted the work of first lady Michelle Obama and Jill Biden, wife of Vice President Joe Biden, for their work in the Joining Forces campaign, which urges businesses to hire veterans. He also reaffirmed his commitment to continuing the post-9/11 GI Bill program, which provides college education funding for those who have served, and said soldiers suffering war-related health problems will get the care they need.

"No one who fights for this country overseas should ever have to fight for a job, or a roof over their head, or the care that they have earned when they come home," he said.

After the ceremony, Obama visited with people in an area of the cemetery known as Section 60, where many of the solders who died in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars are buried.

The Democratic president won re-election to a second four-year term on Tuesday and now faces tough negotiations with Republican congressional leaders to avoid sharp spending cuts that loom at the end of the year. A big chunk of those reductions would come through a decline in defense spending.

During the campaign, Obama and Biden regularly pledged their commitment to bringing troops home from Afghanistan and taking care of American veterans. Obama criticized his opponent, Republican Mitt Romney, for failing to mention the war in Afghanistan during his speech to the Republican National Convention.

(Reporting by Samson Reiny, writing by Mark Felsenthal; Editing by Doina Chiacu)

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US computer graphics scientist wins Kyoto Prize

TOKYO (AP) — An American regarded as a father of computer graphics, an Indian literary critic and a Japanese molecular cell biologist have received the Kyoto Prize, Japan's highest private award for global achievement.

The Inamori Foundation awarded its advanced technology prize on Saturday to U.S. computer scientist Ivan Sutherland, who developed the graphic interface program Sketchpad in 1963.

Gayatri Chakrovoty Spivak , an Indian literary critic and professor at Columbia University, won the arts and philosophy prize.

Yoshinori Ohsumi, a molecular biologist at the Tokyo Institute of Technology, received the basic sciences prize for his work on autophagy, a cell-recycling system that could be used to help treat neurodegenerative and age-related diseases such as Alzheimer's and cancer.

The Kyoto-based Inamori Foundation was set up in 1984 by Kyocera Corp.'s founder, Kazuo Inamori.

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Steam for Linux Launches Its Beta; 60,000 Sign Up in First Week

The creators of Portal, Team Fortress 2, and a ton of other AAA titles announced a few months ago that they were planning to bring their Steam digital distribution service to Linux. It’s basically an app store just for games, and it’s one of the most popular places to buy games for PC or Mac. Now the first wave of outside beta testers has been accepted, and gamers are buying and playing Steam games — including Valve’s — on Linux.

Buy why Linux?

Gabe Newell, Steam’s co-founder, isn’t optimistic about Steam’s future on Microsoft’s new version of Windows, Windows 8. In an interview with VentureBeat, he called it “a catastrophe for everyone” who works with PCs, and said that “margins are going to be destroyed” and they should “have alternatives to hedge against that.”

Why is Windows 8 a “catastrophe?”

From Newell’s perspective, one big reason is probably the new Windows Store. Both Windows 8 and OS X (on Macs) now have built-in app stores, which threaten to make Steam redundant. That’s because you have to go out of your way to install Steam and buy games from them, whereas on Windows 8 and OS X you can just click a button to buy from their stores.

Isn’t Valve unlikely to sell many games on Linux?

You’d think! Linux has always been pretty obscure, and there haven’t been comparatively many brand-name games or apps made for it.

A Linux OS called Ubuntu, however, has made it a lot more attractive to developers, by making Linux more popular and easier to use. Since then, the Humble Indie Bundle made pretty much all of its games run on Linux, and its publicly available sales figures show that a big chunk of its profits come from Linux gamers.

Newell said in the interview that “we’re trying to make sure that Linux thrives.” Valve is staking its reputation on helping make Linux a world-class gaming platform, and it’s been at this for longer than most people probably realize.

How many people would actually use Steam on Linux, though?

Well, as of right now more than 60,000 people have signed up to test out the beta. Not all of them have been accepted yet, but in true Linux fashion some of the ones who haven’t been accepted have figured out how to get in anyway (which may or may not violate Valve’s terms of service).

But what games are there? Aren’t they all Mac and Windows games?

A lot of the games on Steam already have Linux versions, thanks to the Humble Indie Bundle (which gives out Steam keys for all of its games). Meanwhile, Valve’s been working behind the scenes for awhile now to bring the Source engine, which powers many of its games, to Linux. There’s already an official Linux version of Team Fortress 2, Valve’s free-to-play multiplayer first-person shooter, and there are 25 titles in all which are supported for the Linux beta right now.

More games will almost definitely be available soon, as the title Valve’s internal testers were using to work out the bugs in the Steam client — Left 4 Dead 2 — hasn’t appeared in their Linux store yet. And, for the record? It ran faster on Linux than on Windows 7.

Jared Spurbeck is an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about technology and electronics since 2008.

Linux/Open Source News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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War photography exhibit debuts in Houston museum

HOUSTON (AP) — It was a moment Nina Berman did not expect to capture when she entered an Illinois wedding studio in 2006. She knew Tyler Ziegel had been horribly injured, his face mutilated beyond recognition by a suicide bombing in the Iraq War. She knew he was marrying his pretty high school sweetheart, perfect in a white, voluminous dress.

It was their expressions that were surprising.

"People don't think this war has any impact on Americans? Well here it is," Berman says of the image of a somber bride staring blankly, unsmiling at the camera, her war-ravaged groom alongside her, his head down.

"This was even more shocking because we're used to this kind of over-the-top joy that feels a little put on, and then you see this picture where they look like survivors of something really serious," Berman added.

The photograph that won a first place prize in the World Press Photos Award contest will stand out from other battlefield images in an exhibit "WAR/PHOTOGRAPHY: Images of Armed Conflict and Its Aftermath" that debuts Sunday — Veterans Day — in the Houston Museum of Fine Arts. From there, the exhibit will travel to The Annenberg Space for Photography in Los Angeles, the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington and The Brooklyn Museum in Brooklyn, N.Y.

The exhibit was painstakingly built by co-curators Anne Wilkes Tucker and Will Michels after the museum purchased a print of the famous picture of the raising of the flag at Iwo Jima, taken Feb. 23, 1945, by Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal. The curators decided the museum didn't have enough conflict photos, Tucker said, and in 2004, the pair began traveling around the country and the world in search of pictures.

Over nearly eight years and after viewing more than 1 million pictures, Tucker and Michels created an exhibit that includes 480 objects, including photo albums, original magazines and old cameras, by 280 photographers from 26 countries.

Some are well-known — such as the Rosenthal's picture and another AP photograph, of a naked girl running from a napalm attack during the Vietnam War taken in 1972 by Huynh Cong "Nick" Ut. Others, such as the Incinerated Iraqi, of a man's burned body seen through the shattered windshield of his car, will be new to most viewers.

"The point of all the photographs is that when a conflict occurs, it lingers," Tucker said.

The pictures hang on stark gray walls, and some are in small rooms with warning signs at the entrance designed to allow visitors to decide whether they want to view images that can be brutal in their honesty.

"It's something that we did to that man. Americans did it, we did it intentionally and it's a haunting picture," Michels said of the image of the burned Iraqi that hangs inside one of the rooms.

In some images, such as Don McCullin's picture of a U.S. Marine throwing a grenade at a North Vietnamese soldier in Hue, it is clear the photographer was in danger when immortalizing the moment. Looking at his image, McCullin recalled deciding to travel to Hue instead of Khe Sahn, as he had initially planned.

"It was the best decision I ever made," he said, smiling slightly as he looked at the picture, explaining that he took a risk by standing behind the Marine.

"This hand took a bullet, shattered it. It looked like a cauliflower," he said, pointing to the still-upraised hand that threw the grenade. "So the people he was trying to kill were trying to kill him."

McCullin, who worked at that time for The Sunday Times in London, has covered conflicts all over the world, from Lebanon and Israel to Biafra. Now 77, McCullin says he wonders, still, whether the hundreds of photos he's taken have been worthwhile. At times, he said, he lost faith in what he was doing because when one war ends, another begins.

Yet he believes journalists and photographers must never stop telling about the "waste of man in war."

"After seeing so much of it, I'm tired of thinking, 'Why aren't the people who rule our lives ... getting it?' " McCullin said, adding that he'd like to drag them all into the exhibit for an hour.

Berman didn't see the conflicts unfold. Instead, she waited for the wounded to come home, seeking to tell a story about war's aftermath.

Her project on the wounded developed in 2003. The Iraq War was at its height, and there was still no database, she said, to find names of wounded warriors returning home. So she scoured local newspapers on the Internet.

In 2004 she published a book called "Purple Hearts" that includes photographs taken over nine months of 20 different people. All were photographed at home, not in hospitals where, she said, "there's this expectation that this will all work out fine."

The curators, meanwhile, chose to tell the story objectively — refusing through the images they chose or the exhibit they prepared to take a pro- or anti-war stance, a decision that has invited criticism and sparked debate.

And maybe, that is the point.

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

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Malaria vaccine a letdown for infants

LONDON (AP) — An experimental malaria vaccine once thought promising is turning out to be a disappointment, with a new study showing it is only about 30 percent effective at protecting infants from the killer disease.

That is a significant drop from a study last year done in slightly older children, which suggested the vaccine cut the malaria risk by about half — though that is still far below the protection provided from most vaccines. According to details released on Friday, the three-shot regimen reduced malaria cases by about 30 percent in infants aged 6 to 12 weeks, the target age for immunization.

Dr. Jennifer Cohn, a medical coordinator at Doctors Without Borders, described the vaccine's protection levels as "unacceptably low." She was not linked to the study.

Scientists have been working for decades to develop a malaria vaccine, a complicated endeavor since the disease is caused by five different species of parasites. There has never been an effective vaccine against a parasite. Worldwide, there are several dozen malaria vaccine candidates being researched.

In 2006, a group of experts led by the World Health Organization said a malaria vaccine should cut the risk of severe disease and death by at least half and should last longer than one year. Malaria is spread by mosquitoes and kills more than 650,000 people every year, mostly young children and pregnant women in Africa. Without a vaccine, officials have focused on distributing insecticide-treated bed nets, spraying homes with pesticides and ensuring access to good medicines.

In the new study, scientists found babies who got three doses of the vaccine had about 30 percent fewer cases of malaria than those who didn't get immunized. The research included more than 6,500 infants in Africa. Experts also found the vaccine reduced the amount of severe malaria by about 26 percent, up to 14 months after the babies were immunized.

Scientists said they needed to analyze the data further to understand why the vaccine may be working differently in different regions. For example, babies born in areas with high levels of malaria might inherit some antibodies from their mothers which could interfere with any vaccination.

"Maybe we should be thinking of a first-generation vaccine that is targeted only for certain children," said Dr. Salim Abdulla of the Ifakara Health Institute in Tanzania, one of the study investigators.

Results were presented at a conference in South Africa on Friday and released online by the New England Journal of Medicine. The study is scheduled to continue until 2014 and is being paid for by GlaxoSmithKline and the PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative.

"The results look bad now, but they will probably be worse later," said Adrian Hill of Oxford University, who is developing a competing malaria vaccine. He noted the study showed the Glaxo vaccine lost its potency after several months. Hill said the vaccine might be a hard sell, compared to other vaccines like those for meningitis and pneumococcal disease — which are both effective and cheap.

"If it turns out to have a clear 30 percent efficacy, it is probably not worth it to implement this in Africa on a large scale," said Genton Blaise, a malaria expert at the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute in Basel, who also sits on a WHO advisory board.

Eleanor Riley of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said the vaccine might be useful if used together with other strategies, like bed nets. She was involved in an earlier study of the vaccine and had hoped for better results. "We're all a bit frustrated that it has proven so hard to make a malaria vaccine," she said. "The question is how much money are the funders willing to keep throwing at it."

Glaxo first developed the vaccine in 1987 and has invested $300 million in it so far.

WHO said it couldn't comment on the incomplete results and would wait until the trial was finished before drawing any conclusions.

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Four days later, Obama wins Florida

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - President Barack Obama was declared the winner of Florida's 29 electoral votes Saturday, ending a four-day count with a razor-thin margin that narrowly avoided an automatic recount that would have brought back memories of 2000.

No matter the outcome, Obama had already clinched re-election and now has 332 electoral votes to Romney's 206.

The Florida Secretary of State's Office said that with almost 100 per cent of the vote counted, Obama led Republican challenger Mitt Romney 50 per cent to 49.1 per cent, a difference of about 74,000 votes. That was over the half-per cent margin where a computer recount would have been automatically ordered unless Romney had waived it.

There is a Nov. 16 deadline for overseas and military ballots, but under Florida law, recounts are based on Saturday's results. Only a handful of overseas and military ballots are believed to remain outstanding.

It's normal for election supervisors in Florida and other states to spend days after any election counting absentee, provisional, military and overseas ballots. Usually, though, the election has already been called on election night or soon after because the winner's margin is beyond reach.

But on election night this year, it was difficult for officials — and the media — to call the presidential race here, in part because the margin was so close and the voting stretched into the evening.

In Miami-Dade, for instance, so many people were in line at 7 p.m. in certain precincts that some people didn't vote until after midnight.

The hours-long wait at the polls in some areas, a lengthy ballot and the fact that Gov. Rick Scott refused to extend early voting hours has led some to criticize Florida's voting process. Some officials have vowed to investigate why there were problems at the polls and how that led to a lengthy vote count.

If there had been a recount, it would not be as difficult as the lengthy one in 2000. The state no longer uses punch-card ballots, which became known for their hanging chads. All 67 counties now use optical scan ballots where voters mark their selections manually.

Republican George W. Bush won the 2000 contest after the Supreme Court declared him the winner over Democrat Al Gore by a scant 537 votes.

The win gave Obama victories in eight of the nine swing states, losing only North Carolina. In addition to Florida, he won Ohio, Iowa, New Hampshire, Wisconsin, Virginia, Colorado and Nevada.

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