iPad App Video Review: Anomaly Korea






The tower offense pioneers over at 11 Bit Studios finally released the sequel to their smash hit, Anomaly Warzone Earth. They branched out a bit, releasing the amusing Funky Smugglers and the dreamlike puzzler, Sleepwalker’s Journey, but now they’re back, and as this game will remind you a few times, Baghdad was just the beginning. The battle against a mysterious alien tower menace continues with new visuals, units, modes, and an awesome but sometimes hilarious Korean undertone.


The core game here is still the same, with you planning convoy routes through enemy infested streets, able to change your route on the fly. You technically continue to play as the invisible but ever-present commando unit, with your various power-ups, such as smoke screen, repair field, and others, activating and placing them with a simple tap or two. New units like the Horangi tank join your ranks, with unique unit abilities, like the aforementioned tank’s area of effect blast. As you make your way through the world, you’ll collect resources and upgrade units as well.






It’s not just new unit and enemy types mixing things up. For example, there are now artillery zones that will automatically be targeted and be fired upon as you pass through them, but only after a short countdown. Subtle additions like this are quite elegant, adding more dimensions of strategy without changing anything from previous games. Another great new addition is the Art of War trials. As you play and do well, you’ll unlock these brief but brutal challenges, and they are very satisfying to complete.


The visuals have received an upgrade, as has the voice acting. Still, there’s something kind of funny about all the Korean accented English speaking, along with the still excellent Asian-styled soundtrack. It’s not bad at all, but can feel out of place at first. All in all, Anomaly Korea offers more of the same, but improved, building upon the last game in all the right ways. You don’t even need to have played the first game to enjoy this one, so go ahead and download it for the current price of three dollars. I can’t wait to see where in the world this anomaly pops up next.


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Title Post: iPad App Video Review: Anomaly Korea
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Dick Clark New Year's Eve Love Story - Same Couple Dancing Since 1972















12/30/2012 at 02:45 PM EST



This New Year's Eve will be just like any other for Kathy and Louie Novoa, except without their dear friend Dick Clark, who passed away in April.

The pair met on American Bandstand and have since taken part in every one of his New Year's Rockin' Eves since they began on the Queen Mary in 1972.

"To be there from the very first one he did and to still be a part of it, I think, wow, I can't believe it," Louie tells PEOPLE. "I still have the original invitation to the very first one."

As for being a part of Rockin' Eve for the first time since Clark's death, Kathy says, "It's very sad and heartbreaking to know he started this tradition and was so important in so many homes. Everybody watches Dick Clark's New Year's Eve. It's very hard [with him gone], but it's also great knowing that it's still going on. That's what he would want."

Dick Clark New Year's Eve Love Story – Same Couple Dancing Since 1972| Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve, Dick Clark

Kathy and Louie Novoa with Dick Clark in 1976

Courtesy Louie Novoa

Now officially a couple for 36 years, Louie says that starting the New Year with a kiss is his favorite tradition on the show, which kicks off at 8 p.m. ET/PT this year on ABC.

"Kathy and I started doing it, and right after that, Dick's wife Kari [Wigton] goes, 'Why don't we follow up with that?' " he says. "It became a tradition. We had a lot of clips of that. That's what we're going to miss. We always looked forward to that."

The happy pair, who declined to provide their age, would only joke about it.

"People ask us, 'How old are you? You don't look that old,' " Louie explained with a chuckle. "I say, 'We've been around for a while. We are [old].' We really are. You can tell on the dance floor. We're out there dancing with the kids. We call them kids because we try to blend in with them. We still have it though."

Although Louie says they miss Clark "every day," he is a big fan of his replacement, Ryan Seacrest.

"He's incredible," he says. "He's awesome. He does a great job and he has the same personality as Dick Clark. He gets along with everybody."

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Kenya hospital imprisons new mothers with no money


NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The director of the Pumwani Maternity Hospital, located in a hardscrabble neighborhood of downtown Nairobi, freely acknowledges what he's accused of: detaining mothers who can't pay their bills. Lazarus Omondi says it's the only way he can keep his medical center running.


Two mothers who live in a mud-wall and tin-roof slum a short walk from the maternity hospital, which is affiliated with the Nairobi City Council, told The Associated Press that Pumwani wouldn't let them leave after delivering their babies. The bills the mothers couldn't afford were $60 and $160. Guards would beat mothers with sticks who tried to leave without paying, one of the women said.


Now, a New York-based group has filed a lawsuit on the women's behalf in hopes of forcing Pumwani to stop the practice, a practice Omondi is candid about.


"We hold you and squeeze you until we get what we can get. We must be self-sufficient," Omondi said in an interview in his hospital office. "The hospital must get money to pay electricity, to pay water. We must pay our doctors and our workers."


"They stay there until they pay. They must pay," he said of the 350 mothers who give birth each week on average. "If you don't pay the hospital will collapse."


The Center for Reproductive Rights, which filed the suit this month in the High Court of Kenya, says detaining women for not paying is illegal. Pumwani is associated with the Nairobi City Council, one reason it might be able to get away with such practices, and the patients are among Nairobi's poorest with hardly anyone to stand up for them.


Maimouna Awuor was an impoverished mother of four when she was to give birth to her fifth in October 2010. Like many who live in Nairobi's slums, Awuor performs odd jobs in the hopes of earning enough money to feed her kids that day. Awuor, who is named in the lawsuit, says she had saved $12 and hoped to go to a lower-cost clinic but was turned away and sent to Pumwani. After giving birth, she couldn't pay the $60 bill, and was held with what she believes was about 60 other women and their infants.


"We were sleeping three to a bed, sometimes four," she said. "They abuse you, they call you names," she said of the hospital staff.


She said saw some women tried to flee but they were beaten by the guards and turned back. While her husband worked at a faraway refugee camp, Awuor's 9-year-old daughter took care of her siblings. A friend helped feed them, she said, while the children stayed in the family's 50-square-foot shack, where rent is $18 a month. She says she was released after 20 days after Nairobi's mayor paid her bill. Politicians in Kenya in general are expected to give out money and get a budget to do so.


A second mother named in the lawsuit, Margaret Anyoso, says she was locked up in Pumwani for six days in 2010 because she could not pay her $160 bill. Her pregnancy was complicated by a punctured bladder and heavy bleeding.


"I did not see my child until the sixth day after the surgery. The hospital staff were keeping her away from me and it was only when I caused a scene that they brought her to me," said Anyoso, a vegetable seller and a single mother with five children who makes $5 on a good day.


Anyoso said she didn't have clothes for her child so she wrapped her in a blood-stained blouse. She was released after relatives paid the bill.


One woman says she was detained for nine months and was released only after going on a hunger strike. The Center for Reproductive Rights says other hospitals also detain non-paying patients.


Judy Okal, the acting Africa director for the Center for Reproductive Rights, said her group filed the lawsuit so all Kenyan women, regardless of socio-economic status, are able to receive health care without fear of imprisonment. The hospital, the attorney general, the City Council of Nairobi and two government ministries are named in the suit.


___


Associated Press reporter Tom Odula contributed to this report.


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Fiscal deal stalls as clock ticks to deadline


WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Efforts to prevent the economy from tumbling over a "fiscal cliff" stalled on Sunday as Democrats and Republicans remained at loggerheads over a deal that would prevent taxes for all Americans from rising on New Year's Day.


One hour before they had hoped to present a plan, Democratic and Republican leaders said were still unable to reach a compromise that would stop the automatic tax hikes and spending cuts that could push the economy into recession.


"There are still serious differences between the two sides," Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid said.


A sticking point appeared to be a Republican proposal floated late on Saturday, which would slow the growth of Social Security retirement benefits in an effort to narrow trillion-dollar budget deficits. Many Democrats, including Reid, have said Social Security should not be touched.


With negotiations at an apparent standstill on Capitol Hill, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said he would now try to hammer out an agreement with Vice President Joe Biden.


"I'm willing to get this done, but I need a dance partner," McConnell said.


Any agreement needs to be rushed through both chambers of Congress before midnight on Monday. Even if the two sides reach an agreement, procedural barriers in the Senate and the House of Representatives make quick action difficult.


If the politicians cannot agree, then tax increases and across-the-board government spending cuts will begin on January 1. That would take $600 billion out of the economy, push unemployment up and curb federal spending.


Another major disagreement was over tax hikes on the wealthy, an increase sought by President Barack Obama but opposed by Republicans, particularly fiscal conservatives in the House of Representatives.


Republicans aim to pair any tax increase with spending cuts to benefit programs that are projected to grow ever more expensive as the population ages in coming decades.


But their proposal to slow the growth of Social Security benefits by changing the way they are measured against inflation met fierce resistance from Democrats. Obama included the proposal, known as "chained CPI," in an earlier proposal, but many of his fellow Democrats remain opposed.


"POISON PILL"


"We consider it a poison pill - they know we can't accept it. It is a big step back from where we were on Friday," a Senate Democratic aide said.


Obama made a rare appearance on NBC's "Meet the Press" to pressure lawmakers into forging a deal.


Senators appearing on other Sunday morning shows expressed optimism that an agreement could be reached.


Republican Senator Lindsey Graham conceded that an agreement would end up raising income taxes on the wealthy, thus sparing the rest of the country from the looming income tax hikes.


"President Obama is going to get tax rate increases. The president won," Graham tweeted, echoing earlier comments he made on "Fox News Sunday." He told the show that the chances of a bipartisan deal before the New Year's deadline were "exceedingly good."


Obama has alternatively offered Republicans a deal to increase income taxes for households earning over $250,000 a year, and over $400,000 a year.


A White House aide said the president and his staff had been in touch with congressional leaders through the weekend.


Any deal on taxes in the Senate might meet resistance in the House from conservative Republicans.


On NBC, Obama warned of the fallout in financial markets if the two sides did not reach an agreement.


"If people start seeing that on January 1st this problem still hasn't been solved, that we haven't seen the kind of deficit reduction that we could have, had the Republicans been willing to take the deal that I gave them ... then obviously that's going to have an adverse reaction in the markets," Obama said, adding that he had offered Republicans significant compromises that had been rejected repeatedly.


He said he would avoid tax increases for most Americans, even if the talks fall apart.


"If Republicans do in fact decide to block it, so that taxes on middle class families do in fact go up on January 1st, then we'll come back with a new Congress on January 4th and the first bill that will be introduced on the floor will be to cut taxes on middle class families," Obama said.


John Boehner, the speaker of the House of Representatives, rejected Obama's accusations that Republicans were not being amenable to compromise.


"The president's comments today are ironic, as a recurring theme of our negotiations was his unwillingness to agree to anything that would require him to stand up to his own party," Boehner, who has had trouble convincing his Republican colleagues to support his own proposals, said in a statement.


(Additional reporting by Tabassum Zakaria, Rachelle Younglai, David Lawder, Fred Barbash and Richard Cowan. Writing by Andy Sullivan, Editing by Alistair Bell and Jackie Frank)



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Body of India rape victim cremated in New Delhi


NEW DELHI (Reuters) - The body of a woman, whose gang rape provoked protests and rare national debate about violence against women in India, arrived back in New Delhi on Sunday and was cremated at a private ceremony.


Scuffles broke out in central Delhi between police and protesters who say the government is doing too little to protect women. But the 2,000-strong rally was confined to a single area, unlike last week when protests raged up throughout the capital.


Riot police manned barricades along streets leading to India Gate war memorial - a focal point for demonstrators - and, at another gathering point - the centuries-old Jantar Mantar - protesters held banners reading "We want justice!" and "Capital punishment".


Most sex crimes in India go unreported, many offenders go unpunished, and the wheels of justice turn slowly, according to social activists, who say that successive governments have done little to ensure the safety of women.


The unidentified 23-year-old victim of the December 16 gang rape died of her injuries on Saturday, prompting promises of action from a government that has struggled to respond to public outrage.


The medical student had suffered brain injuries and massive internal injuries in the attack and died in hospital in Singapore where she had been taken for treatment.


She and a male friend had been returning home from the cinema, media reports say, when six men on a bus beat them with metal rods and repeatedly raped the woman. The friend survived.


New Delhi has the highest number of sex crimes among India's major cities, with a rape reported on average every 18 hours, police figures show. Reported rape cases rose by nearly 17 percent between 2007 and 2011, according to government data.


Six suspects were charged with murder after her death and face the death penalty if convicted.


In Kolkata, one of India's four biggest cities, police said a man reported that his mother had been gang-raped and killed by a group of six men in a small town near the city on Saturday.


She was killed on her way home with her husband, a senior official said, and the attackers had thrown acid at the husband, raped and killed her, and dumped her body in a roadside pond.


Police declined to give any further details. One officer told Reuters no criminal investigation had yet been launched.


"MISOGYNY"


The leader of India's ruling Congress party, Sonia Gandhi, was seen arriving at the airport when the plane carrying the woman's body from Singapore landed and Prime Minister Mannmohan Singh's convoy was also there.


A Reuters correspondent saw family members who had been with her in Singapore take her body from the airport to their Delhi home in an ambulance with a police escort.


Her body was then taken to a crematorium and cremated. Media were kept away but a Reuters witness saw the woman's family, New Delhi's chief minister, Sheila Dikshit, and the junior home minister, R P N Singh, coming out of the crematorium.


The outcry over the attack caught the government off guard. It took a week for the prime minister to make a statement, infuriating many protesters. Last weekend they fought pitched battles with police.


Issues such as rape, dowry-related deaths and female infanticide rarely enter mainstream political discourse.


Analysts say the death of the woman dubbed "Amanat", an Urdu word meaning "treasure", by some Indian media could change that, though it is too early to say whether the protesters can sustain their momentum through to national elections due in 2014.


U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon added his voice to those demanding change, calling for "further steps and reforms to deter such crimes and bring perpetrators to justice".


Commentators and sociologists say the incident earlier this month has tapped into a deep well of frustration many Indians feel over what they see as weak governance and poor leadership on social issues.


Newspapers raised doubts about the commitment of both male politicians and the police to protecting women.


"Would the Indian political system and class have been so indifferent to the problem of sexual violence if half or even one-third of all legislators were women?" the Hindu newspaper asked.


The Indian Express said it was more complicated than realizing that the police force was understaffed and underpaid.


"It is geared towards dominating citizens rather than working for them, not to mention being open to influential interests," the newspaper said. "It reflects the misogyny around us, rather than actively fighting for the rights of citizens who happen to be female."


(Additional reporting by Ross Colvin and Diksha Madhokin New Delhi and Sujoy Dhar in Kolkata; Editing by Louise Ireland)



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Hidden Powers of Your Mouse






You use your mouse for just about everything: you drag, you drop, you highlight, you scroll. But even if you click your mouse a thousand times a day, I bet I’ve got a few secret mouse tricks you’ve never heard of.


Click Tricks
You surely know that double clicking highlights a word, and you might even know that triple clicking highlights a paragraph. But have you ever wanted to select a column of text in a Word document, without getting all the text to the left and right of it? Here’s how you can: Hold down the alt and left mouse button (on a Mac, option-left mouse), and drag the cursor over the section you want to select. The coolest thing about this trick is that the text you are selecting does not even need to be formatted as a column for this to work.3e0bc  uyl ep83 large1 Hidden Powers of Your Mouse






[Related: 8 Microsoft Word Shortcuts You Probably Don't Know]


Scroll Tricks
Most mice have a scroll wheel. Sure, it takes you up and down on a page, but in combination with other keys, it can do much more:


  • Scroll sideways: In many versions of Excel, holding down the shift key while scrolling will take you sideways. That’s super helpful in a big spreadsheet.

  • Scroll wheel as back button: In most web browsers, if you hold the shift key while using the scroll wheel, it works like the back button: You can fly through all the sites you’ve recently visited. (Some mice have side buttons that work like back and forward buttons in your browser, too.)

  • Scroll to zoom: Holding ctrl and scrolling lets you zoom in or out of the page you’re viewing. Ctrl-scroll up zooms you in; ctrl-scroll down zooms you back out. On a Mac, this trick will zoom in and out your whole screen, not just the document you’re in.

Windows-Specific Tricks
While most of the tricks I’ve listed so far work in either Windows or Mac OS, here are a few that are specific to Windows machines:


  • To maximize a window: drag the title bar to the top.

  • To minimize all windows except the active window: “Shake” the title bar. Then if you want to restore all the windows you just minimized with this shortcut, just click again on the title bar of the window in view.

  • To view two windows in a 50-50 split: Drag the title bar of one document to the left edge of your screen, then drag a second document to the right edge; they will snap into position in a nifty side-by-side view.

Bonus Sneaky Trick
Suppose you want to walk away from your hyper-secure work computer for a few minutes and not have to re-log in when you get back. Sure, you could change the sleep settings, but this idea is much more clever: Set your mouse on top of your analog watch or a clock. The mouse tracks the second hand’s movement and it tricks your computer into thinking you’re still busy working. Of course, there are valid security reasons for NOT using this trick, but I still think it’s cool that it works.


Did we miss your favorite mouse trick? Like us on Facebook, and share your secret there.


[Related: How to Speed Up Your Internet Browsing]


Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News





Title Post: Hidden Powers of Your Mouse
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Phaedra Parks Is Pregnant with Baby No. 2















12/28/2012 at 03:00 PM EST



It's a very special holiday season for The Real Housewives of Atlanta star Phaedra Parks and her husband Apollo Nida!

The reality star couple tell PEOPLE exclusively they're expecting a second child together next year.

Parks showed off her growing baby bump while on the beach in the Bahamas, where she's vacationing with her family and friends.

The Atlanta entertainment lawyer married Nida, a certified personal trainer, in 2009 and the couple welcomed son Ayden a year later.

The pair recently released their first fitness DVD, Phine Body on Amazon.com.

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Kenya hospital imprisons new mothers with no money


NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — The director of the Pumwani Maternity Hospital, located in a hardscrabble neighborhood of downtown Nairobi, freely acknowledges what he's accused of: detaining mothers who can't pay their bills. Lazarus Omondi says it's the only way he can keep his medical center running.


Two mothers who live in a mud-wall and tin-roof slum a short walk from the maternity hospital, which is affiliated with the Nairobi City Council, told The Associated Press that Pumwani wouldn't let them leave after delivering their babies. The bills the mothers couldn't afford were $60 and $160. Guards would beat mothers with sticks who tried to leave without paying, one of the women said.


Now, a New York-based group has filed a lawsuit on the women's behalf in hopes of forcing Pumwani to stop the practice, a practice Omondi is candid about.


"We hold you and squeeze you until we get what we can get. We must be self-sufficient," Omondi said in an interview in his hospital office. "The hospital must get money to pay electricity, to pay water. We must pay our doctors and our workers."


"They stay there until they pay. They must pay," he said of the 350 mothers who give birth each week on average. "If you don't pay the hospital will collapse."


The Center for Reproductive Rights, which filed the suit this month in the High Court of Kenya, says detaining women for not paying is illegal. Pumwani is associated with the Nairobi City Council, one reason it might be able to get away with such practices, and the patients are among Nairobi's poorest with hardly anyone to stand up for them.


Maimouna Awuor was an impoverished mother of four when she was to give birth to her fifth in October 2010. Like many who live in Nairobi's slums, Awuor performs odd jobs in the hopes of earning enough money to feed her kids that day. Awuor, who is named in the lawsuit, says she had saved $12 and hoped to go to a lower-cost clinic but was turned away and sent to Pumwani. After giving birth, she couldn't pay the $60 bill, and was held with what she believes was about 60 other women and their infants.


"We were sleeping three to a bed, sometimes four," she said. "They abuse you, they call you names," she said of the hospital staff.


She said saw some women tried to flee but they were beaten by the guards and turned back. While her husband worked at a faraway refugee camp, Awuor's 9-year-old daughter took care of her siblings. A friend helped feed them, she said, while the children stayed in the family's 50-square-foot shack, where rent is $18 a month. She says she was released after 20 days after Nairobi's mayor paid her bill. Politicians in Kenya in general are expected to give out money and get a budget to do so.


A second mother named in the lawsuit, Margaret Anyoso, says she was locked up in Pumwani for six days in 2010 because she could not pay her $160 bill. Her pregnancy was complicated by a punctured bladder and heavy bleeding.


"I did not see my child until the sixth day after the surgery. The hospital staff were keeping her away from me and it was only when I caused a scene that they brought her to me," said Anyoso, a vegetable seller and a single mother with five children who makes $5 on a good day.


Anyoso said she didn't have clothes for her child so she wrapped her in a blood-stained blouse. She was released after relatives paid the bill.


One woman says she was detained for nine months and was released only after going on a hunger strike. The Center for Reproductive Rights says other hospitals also detain non-paying patients.


Judy Okal, the acting Africa director for the Center for Reproductive Rights, said her group filed the lawsuit so all Kenyan women, regardless of socio-economic status, are able to receive health care without fear of imprisonment. The hospital, the attorney general, the City Council of Nairobi and two government ministries are named in the suit.


___


Associated Press reporter Tom Odula contributed to this report.


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Wall Street extends losses, Dow slides 1 percent

When Mommy is away, Dad and son will play. And if your dad works in the video production business, that playtime gets filmed, turned into a time-lapse video and instantly goes viral. Emio Tomeoni, 30, of Kansas City, Mo., works odd hours and often finds...
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Syria opposition leader rejects Moscow invitation


ALEPPO PROVINCE, Syria/BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syria's opposition leader has rejected an invitation from Russia for peace talks, dealing another blow to international hopes that diplomacy can be resurrected to end a 21-month civil war.


Russia, President Bashar al-Assad's main international protector, said on Friday it had sent an invitation for a visit to Moaz Alkhatib, whose six-week-old National Coalition opposition group has been recognized by most Western and Arab states as the legitimate voice of the Syrian people.


But in an interview on Al Jazeera television, Alkhatib said he had already ruled out such a trip and wanted an apology from Moscow for its support for Assad.


"We have clearly said we will not go to Moscow. We could meet in an Arab country if there was a clear agenda," he said.


"Now we also want an apology from (Russian Foreign Minister Sergei) Lavrov because all this time he said that the people will decide their destiny, without foreign intervention. Russia is intervening and meanwhile all these massacres of the Syrian people have happened, treated as if they were a picnic."


"If we don't represent the Syrian people, why do they invite us?" Alkhatib said. "And if we do represent the Syrian people why doesn't Russia respond and issue a clear condemnation of the barbarity of the regime and make a clear call for Assad to step down? This is the basic condition for any negotiations."


With the rebels advancing steadily over the second half of 2012, diplomats have been searching for months for signs that Moscow's willingness to protect Assad is faltering.


So far Russia has stuck to its position that rebels must negotiate with Assad's government, which has ruled since his father seized power in a coup 42 years ago.


"I think a realistic and detailed assessment of the situation inside Syria will prompt reasonable opposition members to seek ways to start a political dialogue," Lavrov said on Friday.


That was immediately dismissed by the opposition: "The coalition is ready for political talks with anyone ... but it will not negotiate with the Assad regime," spokesman Walid al-Bunni told Reuters. "Everything can happen after the Assad regime and all its foundations have gone. After that we can sit down with all Syrians to set out the future."


BRAHIMI TO MOSCOW


Russia says it is behind the efforts of U.N. mediator Lakhdar Brahimi, fresh from a five-day trip to Damascus where he met Assad. Brahimi, due in Moscow for talks on Saturday, is touting a months-old peace plan for a transitional government.


That U.N. plan was long seen as a dead letter, foundering from the outset over the question of whether the transitional body would include Assad or his allies. Brahimi's predecessor, Kofi Annan, quit in frustration shortly after negotiating it.


But with rebels having seized control of large sections of the country in recent months, Russia and the United States have been working with Brahimi to resurrect the plan as the only internationally recognized diplomatic negotiating track.


Russia's Middle East envoy, Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov, who announced the invitation to Alkhatib, said further talks were scheduled between the "three B's" - himself, Brahimi and U.S. Undersecretary of State William Burns.


Speaking in Damascus on Thursday, Brahimi called for a transitional government with "all the powers of the state", a phrase interpreted by the opposition as potentially signaling tolerance of Assad remaining in some ceremonial role.


But such a plan is anathema to the surging rebels, who now believe they can drive Assad out with a military victory, despite long being outgunned by his forces.


"We do not agree at all with Brahimi's initiative. We do not agree with anything Brahimi says," Colonel Abdel-Jabbar Oqaidi, who heads the rebels' military council in Aleppo province, told reporters at his headquarters there.


Oqaidi said the rebels want Assad and his allies tried in Syria for crimes. Assad himself says he will stay on and fight to the death if necessary.


In the rebel-held town of Kafranbel, demonstrators held up cartoons showing Brahimi speaking to a news conference with toilet bowls in front of him, in place of microphones. Banners denounced the U.N. envoy with obscenities in English.


DIPLOMATS IMPOTENT


Diplomacy has largely been irrelevant to the conflict so far, with Western states ruling out military intervention like the NATO bombing that helped topple Libya's Muammar Gaddafi last year, and Russia and China blocking U.N. action against Assad.


Meanwhile, the fighting has grown fiercer and more sectarian, with rebels mainly from the Sunni Muslim majority battling Assad's government and allied militia dominated by his Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam.


Still, Western diplomats have repeatedly touted signs of a change in policy from Russia, which they hope could prove decisive, much as Moscow's withdrawal of support for Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic heralded his downfall a decade ago.


Bogdanov said earlier this month that Assad's forces were losing ground and rebels might win the war, but Russia has since rowed back, with Lavrov last week reiterating Moscow's position that neither side could win through force.


Still, some Moscow-based analysts see the Kremlin coming to accept it must adapt to the possibility of rebel victory.


"As the situation changes on the battlefield, more incentives emerge for seeking a way to stop the military action and move to a phase of political regulation," said Dmitry Trenin, director of the Carnegie Moscow Center.


Meanwhile, on the ground the bloodshed that has killed some 44,000 people continues unabated. According to the pro-opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group based in Britain, 150 people were killed on Thursday, a typical toll as fighting has escalated in recent months.


Government war planes bombarded the town of Assal al-Ward in the Qalamoun district of Damascus province for the first time, killing one person and wounding dozens, the observatory said.


In Aleppo, Syria's northern commercial hub, clashes took place between rebel fighters and army forces around an air force intelligence building in the Zahra quarter, a neighborhood that has been surrounded by rebels for weeks.


(Additional reporting by Omar Fahmy in Cairo, Dominic Evans in Beirut and Steve Gutterman and Alissa de Carbonnel in Moscow; Writing by Peter Graff; Editing by Giles Elgood)



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