Lance Armstrong biopic in the works from Paramount, J.J. Abrams

By Eric Kelsey

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Paramount Pictures and "Star Trek" producer J.J. Abrams' Bad Robot company have purchased the film rights to a forthcoming book about cyclist Lance Armstrong's fall from grace, according to a person with knowledge of the transaction.

Armstrong, whose name and celebrity status helped build a multimillion dollar cancer foundation, admitted on Thursday that he used performance-enhancing drugs to win a record seven consecutive Tour de France championships after denying doping allegations for years.

The forthcoming book, "Cycle of Lies: The Fall of Lance Armstrong" by New York Times reporter Juliet Macur, traces his recovery from cancer, inspirational return to cycling, and his fall to disgraced ex-champion.

The book is set for a June publication by HarperCollins.

Neither Paramount nor Bad Robot would comment on the deal, which was first reported on the Deadline Hollywood entertainment site.

Abrams, the producer and director of the forthcoming science-fiction thriller film "Star Trek into Darkness," co-founded Bad Robot with producer Bryan Burk.

Paramount will distribute the big-budget "Star Trek," which is scheduled for release in May. Paramount has distributed other Abrams-produced films, including 2011's "Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol," starring Tom Cruise.

Paramount Pictures is a subsidiary of Viacom Inc and HarperCollins is owned by News Corp . (Reporting by Eric Kelsey; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

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Poisoned U.S. lottery winner's body exhumed in murder probe

CHICAGO (Reuters) - The body of a man who died from cyanide poisoning shortly after winning a $1 million lottery prize was exhumed on Friday from a Chicago cemetery and major organs and stomach contents tested, authorities said.

The findings from the tests on Urooj Khan, 46, will not be known for several weeks as authorities try to determine how the cyanide was introduced into his body, said Mary Paleologos, a spokeswoman for the Cook County Medical Examiner.

"The body was in an advanced state of decomposition, but nevertheless, doctors were able to retrieve samples from his organs and also stomach contents, which is very key if he ingested the poison," Paleologos said.

Khan died on July 20 without a will, and his estate was mired in a legal battle in the probate division of Cook County Circuit Court. A judge on January 11 granted investigators permission to obtain the additional forensic samples.

A tent was erected over the burial vault in the cemetery, and Khan's body and other potential evidence were removed on Friday morning. The autopsy was completed by noon.

Investigators are trying to determine if the cyanide was ingested, injected or inhaled, Paleologos said. Khan will be reburied on Monday, she said.

Khan's death initially was ruled to be caused by heart disease, and no autopsy was performed. Toxicology results indicated no drugs or carbon monoxide present.

But several days after his body was released for burial, an unidentified family member asked the medical examiner to revisit the case. The medical examiner's office ordered comprehensive toxicological testing of samples already in its possession.

Final tests results confirmed in November that there was a lethal level of cyanide in Khan's blood, according to the medical examiner, which ruled his death a homicide.

Chicago police are investigating the death as a murder.

Khan presented his winning ticket to the lottery on May 31 and chose a lump-sum payment of about $424,500 after taxes. A check was sent to him from Springfield, Illinois, on July 19 or July 20, so it was unlikely he ever saw it, a spokesman for the Illinois Lottery said.

Khan, his wife, Shabana Ansari, and his daughter from his first marriage, Jasmeen Khan, gathered on June 26 at the store where he bought the ticket, according to the lottery.

The state of Illinois has placed a freeze on the lottery check, which Ansari is refusing to turn over to the estate, according to court filings by the administrator. (Reporting by John Gress in Chicago and David Bailey in Minneapolis; Editing by Greg McCune)

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Hostage's family says Algerian army attacked hostage jeeps

By Eamonn Mallie

BELFAST (Reuters) - A hostage who escaped unharmed from Islamist militants in Algeria on Thursday said the Algerian army bombed four jeeps carrying fellow captives and probably killed many of them, his brother told Reuters.

Irishman Stephen McFaul, who was among dozens of Western and local captives seized by militants at an Algerian natural gas plant on Wednesday, told his family that he survived because he was on the only one of five jeeps not hit by Algerian bombs, according to his brother Brian.

"They were moving five jeep-loads of hostages from one part of the compound. At that stage they were intercepted by the Algerian army. The army bombed four out of five of the trucks and four of them were destroyed," Brian McFaul said.

"The truck my brother was in crashed and at that stage Stephen was able to make a break for his freedom," he said. "He presumed everyone else in the other trucks was killed."

Brian McFaul said he did not speak to Stephen directly, but got an account from Stephen's wife Angela after she spoke to him. The hostages had their mouths taped and explosives hung from around their necks, McFaul added.

Thirty hostages and at least 11 Islamist militants were killed on Thursday when Algerian forces stormed the desert gas plant in a bid to free many dozens of captives, an Algerian security source said.

Western governments were unhappy at having been kept in the dark by Algeria before the raid and its bloody result.

Two Japanese, two Britons and a French national were among at least seven foreigners killed, the source told Reuters. Eight of the dead hostages were Algerian. The nationalities of the rest, along with perhaps dozens more who escaped, were unclear. (Writing by Conor Humphries; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

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Pay cuts may signal 'new normal' on Wall Street

By Aaron Pressman and Lauren Tara LaCapra

BOSTON (Reuters) - In the past few days, major global banks have taken the axe to pay with unusual zeal.

JPMorgan Chase & Co slashed the compensation of CEO Jamie Dimon, one of the world's top bankers, by half despite record earnings in 2012. His crime? Being in charge when an investment unit ran amok with the botched "London whale" derivative trades that cost the bank more than $6.2 billion.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc , which is known for handing out some of the most lucrative pay packages on Wall Street, paid just 37 percent of its 2012 adjusted revenue to employees - the second-lowest proportion since the Wall Street firm went public in 1999.

Earlier this week, sources said Barclays Plc and Deutsche Bank AG plan to cut banker pay by up to 20 percent, while Morgan Stanley took the unusual step of deferring 100 percent of 2012 bonuses for high-earning employees.

Morgan Stanley bankers and traders got word directly from their managers on Thursday, which one employee characterized as "bonus day, if you can even call it that anymore."

Wall Street employees might have to get used to that. Investors and analysts believe lower compensation is here to stay for some time as firms face unprecedented challenges, in some cases forcing them to fundamentally rethink how they operate. New regulations make many businesses on Wall Street less profitable and sometimes even impossible.

With tens of thousands of jobs shed in the past few years, bankers and traders have trouble demanding more money. Banks are also replacing employees with automated systems in areas such as bond trading, which reduces staffing.

"I hate this phrase, but I think their compensation levels at this point are the new normal," said Michael Cohn, chief investment strategist at Atlantis Asset Management, which owns Goldman Sachs shares. "The world isn't going back to the way it was anytime soon."

If Wall Street employees are the losers from these pay changes, there are some winners, as well.

"It's a good trend for the stocks and for investors," said Mark Morgan, senior analyst at Thrivent Asset Management, which oversees more than $80 billion in assets.

Less money for employees means more for shareholders.

"It's tougher to justify the expense if revenues aren't there," Morgan added.

Oppenheimer analyst Chris Kotowski called Goldman a "textbook example" of how banks can boost profitability even in a difficult business environment by cutting employee pay.

"It is simply not an option for bank managements to earn non-competitive returns in the long run," he said.

Goldman's return on equity for the quarter - a measure of how well the bank turns shareholder funds into profit - was 16.5 percent, nearly triple its level in the same quarter a year earlier.

SELLING APPLES?

However, there are some skeptics who say it is too early to declare the arrival of a new era when it comes to Wall Street pay. After all, they point out, banks are only taking drastic steps after punishing investors with weak returns for the past few years. If business really starts to pick up, they expect fat paychecks to return.

Senator Bernie Sanders, one of Wall Street's most vocal critics, said the boards might be more receptive to criticism in the short term.

"There is an extraordinary amount of anger at Wall Street; much more so I think than inside-the-beltway pundits perceive," said the senator, who is an Independent from Vermont. "I think maybe some of the boards there are beginning to catch on to that."

But once that anger died down, he expected Wall Street compensation to go right back up.

The steady decline in pay in large part follows demands from bank shareholders, who were increasingly exasperated with high pay levels that continued for years after the financial crisis and ate up shrinking revenue.

Reuters reported in October that top shareholders meeting with Morgan Stanley executives in 2011 had demanded to know why the bank could not cut compensation to just 30 percent of revenue from current levels above 40 percent.

Yet some observers point out there is not much sympathy for Wall Street, where pay packages for mid-level employees can run well into the six figures. That is still multiples higher than what the average U.S. worker earns.

"In the end, this is still going to be the most highly paid industry in finance," said Brad Hintz, a former Morgan Stanley treasurer who analyzes brokerage stocks for Bernstein Research.

"And so, no one is going to be crying over Goldman partners selling apples on the street corners." (Additional reporting by David Henry in New York, Emily Stephenson in Washington and Laura Noonan in London. Editing by Dan Wilchins, Paritosh Bansal, Martin Howell and Andre Grenon)

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Nearly $1 trillion of debt at risk of downgrade to junk in 2012 - SP

By Daniel Bases

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The amount of sovereign and corporate credit on the cusp of being downgraded to junk status more than quadrupled in 2012, due primarily to an erosion in the credit quality of the world's banking sector, Standard & Poor's data showed on Wednesday.

At the end of last year, S&P rated $984.8 billion worth of debt, from 52 separate issuers, one step away from speculative grade, also referred to as junk. At the end of 2011, the number of credits that were one downgrade away from junk status was 38, representing $227.4 billion.

"Most of the downward pressure that affected potential 'fallen angels' was because of the European credit crisis," Diane Vazza, credit analyst at S&P, told Reuters, referring to issuers whose ratings are close to being cut to junk.

Twenty-five issuers, or nearly half of the potential junk credits, were in the banking sector and of that group, eight were banks located in India.

S&P describes this group as issuers who are rated BBB-minus with either negative outlooks or ratings on its so-called CreditWatch with negative implications. The latter classification signifies that a decision on whether or not to downgrade is more imminent.

The United States and Europe had the most entities in danger, each with 15 issuers. The Asia-Pacific region was next with eleven issuers.

The consumer products sector had six potential fallen angels, four of which were based in the United States, S&P's report said.

However, the actual number of fallen angels last year was 43. These credits represented $302.4 billion in par value. That was a slight improvement over 2011's 45 credits, worth $363.4 billion, that were cut to junk.

On the flip side, the number of credits on the cusp of being lifted into investment grade status, referred to as potential rising stars, grew to 25 in 2012 from 22 in 2011.

Potential rising stars at the end of last year represented $229.1 billion in rated debt versus $78.7 billion at the end of 2011, Vazza said.

At year's end, 15 of the potential rising stars were located in the United States, with four from Europe representing the second-biggest concentration.

"The transportation and media and entertainment sectors have the most potential rising stars, with three issuers each," S&P said.

Rising stars are defined as issuers currently rated BB-plus with either a positive rating outlook or on CreditWatch positive.

Credits upgraded to investment grade territory totaled 29 last year, representing $63.6 billion in rated debt. That was a decline from 2011, when 38 so-called rising stars, accounting for $143.4 billion in credit, were raised to investment grade, Vazza said.

"The fallen angels count exceeded the rising stars' in 14 out of the past 25 years (1987-2011)," according to S&P.

Credit spreads over benchmark five-year U.S. Treasuries for issuers in the BBB category were 175 basis points to 254 basis points in 2012. Spreads widened to a range between 326 basis points and 493 basis points for credits in the BB category. (Reporting by Daniel Bases; Editing by Dan Grebler)

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Smarter infrastructure spending needed for growth - study

LONDON (Reuters) - Countries could increase the productivity of infrastructure investment to make savings of 40 percent, or $1 trillion a year, by adopting proven best practices, McKinsey Global Institute (MGI) said on Thursday.

MGI estimated that the world needs to spend $57 trillion on infrastructure - the sinews of an economy - between now and 2030 simply to keep up with projected growth. That is nearly 60 percent more than the $36 trillion spent over the past 18 years.

Yet government budgets are tight and banks wary of lending, so wringing more out of each dollar of investment is imperative to sustain growth, jobs and development, MGI, the research arm of the consultancy McKinsey & Co, said in a report.

MGI estimated that extending the best practices it identified in 400 projects worldwide could lead to a 60 percent productivity improvement. In the United States, Japan and Germany, for example, construction workers have not increased their productivity in the past 20 years.

"Countries could deliver $48 trillion of infrastructure for only $30 trillion in investment and reinvest the savings," the report said.

Those savings would come from three main sources: selecting projects more systematically and delivering them more efficiently; making the most of existing airports, roads and ports; and managing demand by using tools such as road pricing and water metering.

"The practices that would yield this $1 trillion a year are already in place. We are not looking into the future to see what new technology might bring," Herbert Pohl, one of the report's authors, told Reuters.

MGI cited South Korea, Ontario and Singapore as having model infrastructure organisations that others can emulate, while Switzerland shows how to develop a joined-up national strategy.

It commended Seoul and Stockholm for the integrated approach they took to easing clogged traffic and said Denmark had reduced its road maintenance bills by 20 percent.

JAPANESE SPENDING

By contrast, road congestion costs the United States an estimated $101 billion a year in time and fuel. Trucks entering the United States from Mexico still have to wait for up to two hours at the border.

Atlanta airport, the world's busiest, recently added an international terminal that has no direct links to existing public transport, MGI said.

"Until sound infrastructure systems are in place, countries will continue to fund the wrong projects, place priorities in the wrong areas, and fail to meet the needs of their people," the report said.

MGI said it recognised that governments and businesses face tough budget choices and that infrastructure, albeit important, is just one item of spending among others.

Indeed, one of the main thrusts of the report is that existing roads and railways can be operated much more efficiently, often obviating the need for new building.

Chile, South Korea and Britain have shown potential capital spending savings of 15 to 20 percent by reordering priorities and picking more cost-effective alternatives.

Without a more systematic approach, there will continue to be waste that has been exemplified by excess power generation capacity across Spain and redundant bridges in Japan, MGI said.

Richard Dobbs, another of the report's authors, said Japan on most measures had already ploughed too much in infrastructure.

As such, it was questionable whether spending 5.2 trillion yen in fast-acting public works projects, as proposed by new Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, was the right tool to galvanise the economy.

"At what point does overinvestment in infrastructure, given the government's debt level, become problematic?" Dobbs asked. (Reporting by Alan Wheatley)

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U.S. singer Jessica Simpson to star in TV comedy

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Pop singer Jessica Simpson is set to star in a television pilot in development for NBC that is loosely based on her life, executive producer Ben Silverman said on Tuesday.

The comedy could be Simpson's first step back into a major acting role in more than five years.

The former teen pop star is best known for her reality TV shows, including MTV's "Newlyweds: Nick and Jessica," which followed Simpson and her first husband and fellow pop singer Nick Lachey. She also served as a mentor on NBC's "Fashion Star."

Simpson, 32, will play a celebrity who must balance life as a mother and a public figure, Silverman told Reuters.

The singer gave birth to her first child in May 2012 and said last month that she was pregnant with her second.

"The show is inspired by her life as she's going through a new phase in her life becoming a mom," said Silverman, who is the creator of NBC's reality show "The Biggest Loser."

"It's a combination of 'I Love Lucy' and 'Curb Your Enthusiasm,'" he added, referring to the classic 1950s Lucille Ball comedy series and the HBO series by "Seinfeld" creator Larry David.

Simpson will also serve as an executive producer.

In 2004, Simpson taped a pilot for the ABC network about a pop star who becomes a TV news anchor, but it never became a series.

Simpson's film credits include 2005's "The Dukes of Hazzard" and 2006's "Employee of the Month." (Reporting by Eric Kelsey, editing by Jill Serjeant and Stacey Joyce)

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Anti-hacking law questioned after death of Internet activist

By Aaron Pressman

BOSTON (Reuters) - Lie about your identity on Facebook or delete files from your work laptop before you quit and you could run afoul of a 29-year-old U.S. computer security law that some experts say has been changed so often it no longer makes sense.

The U.S. Computer Fraud and Abuse Act has come under renewed criticism after last week's suicide of Internet activist Aaron Swartz, who could have faced prison time for alleged hacking to download millions of academic articles from a private database through a network at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The 26-year-old's family blamed the suicide on "intimidation" from what they described as an overzealous U.S. prosecutor, who threatened Swartz with prison and up to $1 million in fines.

Swartz, who helped found popular website Reddit, had "problems with depression for many years," his friend, science fiction author Cory Doctorow, wrote in an online eulogy on Saturday.

The U.S. attorney's case was based on the 1984 CFAA law, which some legal experts contend has been amended so many times that some portions of it no longer make sense. Penalties for minor offenses can exceed those for more serious crimes and key terms of the law, written before the arrival of the Internet as a cultural phenomenon, remain undefined.

"So much has changed and gotten more complicated and the law has kept Frankenstein-ing," said Eric Goldman, a professor at the Santa Clara University School of Law. "You step back and see that it's become a horrible, hideous monster."

Other legal experts said the prosecution, led by U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz in Boston, followed the law closely in bringing charges against Swartz, who argued that research created with public funds should be freely shared on the Internet.

Authorities charge that, when MIT tried to shut off the downloads, Swartz hid and altered his computer's network identity and eventually sneaked into a closet at the university's Cambridge, Massachusetts, campus to gain access to the 4 million articles.

"The prosecutors weren't stretching the law to fit the facts," said Orin Kerr, a professor at George Washington University law School and a former federal prosecutor. "The law is broad and seems to cover this kind of act."

PROSECUTORS PUSH ON

The act penalizes a person who accesses computers "without authorization, or exceeds authorized access" to obtain something of value worth at least $5,000. But courts across the United States have split about just what constitutes unauthorized access.

In one case, a court upheld a lawsuit against an employee who deleted files from his work laptop before quitting to form a competing business. Once the defendant decided to quit, he no longer was authorized to access his laptop, the court said.

In a better known case, a judge overturned hacking charges against a woman from Missouri after she created a false profile on social networking site MySpace to fool a teenage girl who later committed suicide. Prosecutors alleged the woman did not have authorization to access MySpace servers because she violated the site's terms of service.

The confusion has not slowed prosecutors, who have brought 297 federal criminal cases under the CFAA and related computer fraud laws from 2010 through 2012, about the same as in the prior three years, according to court filings reviewed in Westlaw, a legal data division of Thomson Reuters.

Over the same period, nearly 300 civil lawsuits were brought in private disputes citing the CFAA and related laws, up from 243 in the prior three years, the filings show.

Prosecutors have taken advantage of the vague terms to add huge penalties to lesser cases, said Marcia Hofmann, a senior staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a non-profit civil liberties organization.

"They make an aggressive reading of what unauthorized access means to try to throw the book at somebody," she said. "Usually, their real beef isn't with the hacking, but with something else the person did that the prosecutor didn't like."

Hofmann and many of Swartz's supporters believe that might be what happened to the popular online activist, one of the inventors of a key Internet standard called RSS, which is used by media companies and bloggers to distribute articles. More than 30,000 people have signed an online petition calling on the administration of President Barack Obama to remove U.S. Attorney Ortiz from Swartz's case, a move that would have little practical effect after his death.

Ortiz's office declined to comment.

Swartz had been investigated before after downloading almost 20 million pages of text from a government-run database of court records called PACER in 2008. No charges were filed.

But he got into more serious trouble in 2011 after the MIT incident, which led to his prosecution in a trial that had been due to start in a few months.

Following Swartz's death, MIT President Rafael Reif launched a review of the elite school's handling of the case.

Swartz's possible desire to make the articles public did not exempt him from prosecution, said Kerr, who represented the woman accused of hacking for using a fake MySpace profile.

"There's no 'good guy' exception to the criminal laws."

The outcry in the wake of Swartz's suicide may provide a rare opportunity for lawmakers to revisit the hacking statute, which has been repeatedly expanded over the past two decades.

"Usually, Congress wants to expand these laws," Kerr said. "This may be an unusual time when the public reaction is that the law gives government too much power." (Reporting by Aaron Pressman; Editing by Scott Malone and Andre Grenon)

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Joblessness is global crisis - IFC chief

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Joblessness is a global crisis, the head of the World Bank's private sector lender, the International Finance Corp, said on Monday, as the group examines ways its investments in developing countries can help generate more jobs.

"As the world's largest development institution focused on the private sector, we believe that job creation offers the surest path out of poverty," said Jin-Yong Cai, IFC's vice president. "Promoting it in developing countries is a top priority for us."

The World Bank has estimated about 200 million people globally are unemployed and that 600 million jobs must be created in developing nations by 2020 to keep up with population growth.

The International Labor Organization warned in September that unemployment among young people is likely to rise globally as slow growth in the euro zone and a weak economic recovery in the United States hits emerging economies.

For years institutions like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund focused on boosting economic growth as a way to spur jobs, but over the years evidence has shown the answer lies with the private sector, which provides nine out of every 10 jobs.

A new jobs study by IFC published on Monday, which looks at the experiences of more than 45,000 firms in over 100 countries in Asia, Africa and the Middle East, found that weak infrastructure, lack of financing for small and medium-sized enterprises, poor training and skills, and weak investment climates posed the biggest obstacles to companies and their efforts to generate more jobs.

It also found that small and medium-sized enterprises generate the most jobs but they are less productive and pay less, and do not offer as much training as bigger companies do. The largest number of jobs are created within companies' supply chains and their distribution networks, the study found.

Companies operating in Africa cited power shortages as their biggest constraint and the report said providing reliable electricity could boost annual job growth by at least four percent.

The study also found that 45 million people enter the workforce annually although more than one third of companies studied were unable to find enough people with skills they needed.

A two-day conference organized by IFC in Washington this week, involving 300 participants, hopes to shine the spotlight on what global development and financial institutions can do to help generate more jobs.

Nigel Twose, director of IFC's Development Impact Department, said it was important that more focus be put on jobs in IFC's investments "in order to make sure we are asking the right questions and then come up with a more jobs-focused strategy." (Reporting by Lesley Wroughton; Editing by Phil Berlowitz)

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Pakistan cleric tells followers: bring down govt now

By Mubasher Bukhari

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - A populist Pakistani cleric told tens of thousands of supporters gathered in the capital for an anti-corruption rally early on Tuesday morning that they could force the government to quit within hours.

Supporters of Sufi cleric Muhammad Tahirul Qadri heeded his call to move towards parliament and removed the barriers put in place to contain them until they reached the square in front of the building.

"The march is over and the revolution has started," said Qadri, who shot to fame since returning from Canada a few weeks ago, demanding an interim government.

"I give the president and prime minister until this morning to dissolve parliament and quit power," he told the crowd, who showered his bulletproof vehicle with rose petals as he arrived in the early hours of Tuesday.

He told his supporters to move from their official demonstration area - next to the city's main road, Jinnah Avenue - and head for parliament.

The chanting protesters responded by pushing aside barricades made of shipping containers and barbed wire. Riot police were on standby and authorities moved extra shipping containers into the road to block their way but the protesters pushed through.

Qadri said the stage set up for him should be dismantled and reassembled in front of parliament. He promised to address the crowd at 11 a.m. (0600 GMT).

Qadri says he wants the judiciary to bar corrupt politicians from running for office and has said elections scheduled for this spring should be delayed indefinitely until Pakistan's endemic corruption is rooted out.

Qadri's call has divided Pakistanis. Some hold him up as a champion of reform, others see him as a possible stooge of the military, which has a history of coups and interfering in elections. (Additional reporting by Katharine Houreld and Mehreen Zahra-Malik; Writing by Katharine Houreld; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

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Bin Laden film 'Zero Dark Thirty' leads box office

REUTERS - "Zero Dark Thirty," Hollywood's re-telling of the decade-long manhunt for Osama bin Laden, captured the No. 1 spot on movie box office charts over the weekend with $24 million in U.S. and Canadian ticket sales.

The movie starring Jessica Chastain as a dogged CIA agent edged out horror movie spoof "A Haunted House," which finished with $18.8 million as well as "Gangster Squad," a period crime drama that finished in third place with $16.7 million from Friday through Sunday.

The weekend marked a strong start for Hollywood in 2013 after 2012's record-setting box office numbers.

Sony Corp's <6758.T> movie studio released "Zero Dark Thirty." "Gangster Squad" was distributed by Warner Bros., a unit of Time Warner Inc . "A Haunted House" was released by Open Road Films, a joint venture between theater owners Regal Entertainment Group and AMC Entertainment Inc .

(Reporting By Lisa Richwine and Andrea Burzynski; Editing by Paul Simao)

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Narcotics seized in bulk near Indo-Pak border in 2012: BSF

Jalandhar, Jan 13 (PTI) Border Security Force (BSF) seized over 288 kgs of heroin and fake currency Indian notes with a face value of Rs 46 lakh in 2012 along the Indo-Pak border in the state. In addition to heroin and fake currency notes, the BSF has also seized 23 weapons, 33 magazines and 264 rounds during the various raids, Inspector General of BSF's Punjab Frontier Aditya Mishra said. Last year, 19 smugglers were arrested by the BSF, he said. 61 people were arrested for suspicious movement near the border area in 2012, Mishra said. Out of which, 34 were Pakistani nations, 12 Bangladeshis and 15 Indians, he added. The narcotics seized during 2012 including over 288 kgs of heroin, 5.5-kg poppy husk and 550 grams of opium. Mishra appreciated the efforts of BSF jawans saying their dedication and alertness prevented infiltration and smuggling of arms and drugs into the country. In 2013, the BSF has seized over 11-kg of heroin and counterfeit notes worth Rs 11.90 lakh near the border area, Mishra said. PTI Corr KAS

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Jamieson five clear in wet Durban as Oosthuizen slips up

By Michael Todt

DURBAN (Reuters) - Britain's Scott Jamieson capitalised on a rare bad round from 2010 British Open champion Louis Oosthuizen with a four-under-par 68 to seize a five-stroke lead in the Volvo Golf Champions on Saturday.

Second-round leader Oosthuizen's poor front nine of 40 on his way to a 74 left him in a three-way share of second at 10-under (206) with Frenchman Julien Quesne (67) and Thongchai Jaidee (73).

Triple major winner Padraig Harrington scorched back to the clubhouse in 31 over the closing nine holes and his 67 placed him joint-fifth at eight-under with Italian Francesco Molinari (68).

Jamieson, who claimed his first European Tour victory in Durban five weeks ago at the inaugural Nelson Mandela Championship, began his round in overcast conditions with a bogey at the first hole.

A birdie at the second was offset by another bogey at the par-three fourth hole but the Scot soon clicked into gear as the rain began to pour down on the par-five eighth, when a glorious iron from over 200 yards to six feet handed him an eagle.

"The eighth is definitely what got me kick started," the 29-year-old told reporters.

"I hit a great tee shot and then I was in the middle of the fairway and thought to myself that I had a good chance at birdie. I hit a great shot to five or six feet and holed it."

Jamieson later holed a chip at the par-four 11th which began a run of three consecutive birdies and although a wayward approach at the 17th cost him a shot, he recovered with a chip-and-putt birdie at the 18th to restore his five-stroke cushion.

"On 11, I was possibly looking at a bogey and managed to chip in for a birdie. So that was perhaps a little bit of a steal, but it kept up my momentum," said Jamieson.

"I didn't play as well as I did the first two days, especially yesterday from tee to green. But I managed to score well, which is the main thing. I'm delighted to be in the position I'm in."

SUNDAY SHOWDOWN

Jamieson said capturing his first win last month will stand him in good stead when he starts his final round.

"It's obviously slightly different circumstances, but I was very grateful that I got to the playoff and then won," said the world number 100, who beat Steve Webster and Eduardo de la Riva in the rain-shortened 36-hole event.

"I gained a lot of experience and had I shot one better in the morning and not gotten to experience a playoff, then I wouldn't have learned as much.

"There's still a long way to go, so I will just stick to my game plan as best I can. We'll see if I'm here tomorrow night."

Quesne, who last year won the Andalucia Open for his first title, fired a second consecutive 67 and the Frenchman feels he is right in contention despite the poor weather.

"I've played very well this week. I knew that I could have a low score on this course. It suits my game because it is tricky," Quesne told Reuters.

"I didn't feel too bad in the conditions. I like playing with the wind, so it's good for my game. I have a low trajectory, so I can control the ball well on days like today. I feel good about my chances tomorrow."

Four-times major winner Ernie Els was 10 strokes behind Jamieson after carding a one-under 71 while compatriot Retief Goosen, a double U.S. Open champion, continued his comeback from five months out with a 70 to lie on four-under (212). (Editing by Tom Pilcher)

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Qatar revives proposal to send an Arab force to Syria

CAIRO (Reuters) - Qatar has made a fresh call for an Arab force to end bloodshed in Syria if current diplomatic efforts by international peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi fail, according to the Doha-based al Jazeera television.

Brahimi is trying to build on an agreement reached in Geneva on June 30 calling for a transitional period in Syria. But differences between Russia and the United States over the future of President Bashar al-Assad continue to block a deal to end 21 months of violence that has killed more than 60,000 Syrians.

"Arabs must think seriously about sending forces to ensure security in Syria if diplomatic efforts fail to resolve the crisis," Qatar's Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim al-Thani, said in remarks broadcast by al Jazeera television.

"It is not a question of intervention in Syria in favour of one party against the other, but rather a force to preserve security," Sheikh Hamad, who also heads an Arab League committee on Syria, said.

The Gulf Arab state, a supporter of rebels seeking to overthrow Assad, made a similar proposal in September.

In a speech to the U.N. General Assembly, Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani said Arab states should intervene in Syria given the U.N. Security Council's failure to stop the civil war.

Apart from Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Turkey strongly support the mainly Sunni Muslim Syrian rebels, while Shi'ite Iran backs Assad, whose Alawite minority is an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam.

Russia on Saturday voiced support for Brahimi's efforts but insisted Assad's exit cannot be a precondition for a deal to end the country's conflict.

Brahimi indicated the issue of Assad, whom the United States, European powers and Gulf-led Arab states insist must step down to end the war, was a sticking point at a meeting on Friday with envoys from Russia and the United States.

"We support this effort," said Sheikh Hamad, refering to Brahimi's peace initiative. "But until when? We cannot wait forever on this issue." (Reporting by Ahmed Tolba; Writing by Sami Aboudi in Dubai; Editing by Rosalind Russell)

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