Prime Minister Julia Gillard on Tuesday demanded that Pakistan investigate and explain the brutal killing of 21,000 Australian sheep in Karachi, a slaughter officials have described as appalling.

The shipment of Australian sheep was sent to the port city after being turned away by Bahrain, with Pakistan livestock officials ordering them to be culled over disease concerns.

Graphic footage of their slaughter was aired by ABC's Four Corners programme on Monday, including images of a man sawing at a sheep's neck before throwing it into a bloody trench.

Other sheep were bulldozed into the pit after being killed last month, but some were seen the next morning still breathing, sparking angry condemnation of their treatment.

Gillard said she had spoken to her Pakistani counterpart Raja Pervez Ashraf at a summit of European and Asian leaders in Laos to express her concern.

"I did raise with the prime minister of Pakistan my concern about the graphic and very cruel images we've seen of the treatment of Australian sheep," she told reporters in Vientiane.

"I explained to him that Australians are distressed to see these acts of cruelty and that I wanted the matter investigated.

"He undertook to investigate the matter ... I was very clear about Australia's concerns, very strong in raising those concerns and very clear that this is something that has distressed the Australian people."

Australia Agriculture Minister Joe Ludwig earlier called the slaughter "appalling" and his department disputed that the sheep were unhealthy.

"We do not know the reasoning behind the Pakistan authority's decision to cull the sheep in Pakistan or their choice of the method used," the agriculture ministry said.

"We continue to hold that both the decision and the method used were unnecessary."

Livestock officials ordered the sheep to be culled after they tested positive for salmonella and actinomyces bacteria.

Although samples from the sheep were sent to a British laboratory and came back clean, clearing the meat for human consumption, municipal officials in Karachi rejected the tests.

Pakistani officials insisted the animals were slaughtered in keeping with Islamic practice, but said enquiries would be made.

"As far as we know the culling was done in accordance with the rules. The animals were slaughtered in Islamic manner," a senior official with Sindh provincial livestock ministry said.

"However, we will investigate the reports alleging the Australian sheep were brutalised during the slaughter."

Australian farmers urged against a ban on the live export trade, saying significant improvements had been made in regulating Australia's live export market since a controversy in Indonesia last year.

Canberra suspended live cattle exports to Indonesia for a month last year after a television documentary revealed mistreatment inside its abattoirs, only reinstating the trade under a strict new licensing system.

Australia's National Farmers Federation said "decisive action" had been taken to temporarily suspend exports of sheep to Pakistan and Bahrain while investigations were carried out.

The farming lobby group stressed that Australia was a world leader in animal treatment in exports and warned that banning the trade would see welfare standards fall.

"If Australia was to stop exporting livestock, global animal welfare standards would unquestionably decline," it said.

In a separate development, a US-based animal rights group on Tuesday urged Australia to ban livestock exports to Egypt, where a government-tasked committee is recommending the ears of hormone-treated cattle be chopped off.

Egyptian newspapers say the committee made the recommendation in a bid to rid livestock imported from Australia of hormone implants found in their ears.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals urged Australia's government to ban cattle exports to Egypt to avoid the practice.

Australia's live export trade is worth about US$1 billion a year and employs thousands of people.

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It was hard to imagine champagne corks popping in the Israeli prime minister's Jerusalem residence as Barack Obama took to the stage to make his victory speech. Much more likely was a mood of sombre resignation, possibly spiked with trepidation, as Binyamin Netanyahu reflected on his heavy bet on the wrong horse.

Judging by the swiftly delivered official response, there is no problem: Netanyahu and Obama will continue their close, warm and strategically aligned partnership.

No one who has observed the deepening chill and distance between the two leaders over the past four years is likely to buy that. But, assuming Netanyahu is still prime minister after Israel's general election on 22 January, the day after Obama's re-inauguration, both men will be forced to recalibrate their difficult relationship.

In this, Obama has the moral advantage after the Israeli leader was widely perceived to have openly backed a Romney victory. Obama is unlikely to make the same mistake in the Israeli election, however much he may privately hope for Netanyahu's demise.

If the US leader is inclined to make nice with Netanyahu, one possibility is a presidential visit to Israel in 2013 – something which, as Romney repeatedly pointed out, was notably missing from his first term. Asked just minutes after Obama's victory speech if a visit could help repair the relationship, Dan Shapiro, the US ambassador to Israel, said: "I know President Obama looks forward to an opportunity to visit, obviously visits are an important part of this relationship."

But some observers believe Obama will seek "payback" for Netanyahu's perceived high-handedness, attempts to browbeat the US into a tougher line on Iran, refusal to restrain settlement growth in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and meddling in the US election process.

Netanyahu's official response to the result was, of course, congratulatory. "I will continue working with President Obama to ensure Israel's vital national security interests," he said, adding: "The strategic union between Israel the US is stronger than ever."

The defence minister, Ehud Barak, issued a more nuanced statement, referring to differences between the allies. "I have no doubt that the Obama administration will continue its policy whereby Israel's security is at its very foundations as well as its efforts to tackle the challenges facing all of us in the region; all the while continuing to strive for further progress in the peace process. I believe that in the tradition of deep friendship and with a backdrop of shared experiences accrued with President Obama, it will also be possible to overcome any differences in stance; should they arise."

Some politicians perhaps sought political advantage from the tensions of recent years. Yair Lapid, a former television presenter challenging Netanyahu in January's election, said the prime minister "acted and spoke in a manner that was interpreted as blatant intervention on behalf of the Republican candidate, contrary to the customary relations between states". He should "take immediate steps to mend the shaky relationship between him and the administration in Washington".

Offering a different point of view, Danny Danon, the deputy speaker of the Knesset, urged Obama to "reset his course relating to Israel and our region for the next four years. Rather than dictating ill-advised policies that endanger the well-being of America's only true ally in the Middle East, now is the time for President Obama to return to the wise and time-honoured policy of 'zero daylight' between our respective nations."

Two issues will characterise the relationship between the US and Israel over the next year. The first is Iran. Netanyahu has, for now, drawn back from his bellicose rhetoric of earlier this year, clearly indicating in his speech to the United Nations in September that Israel was unlikely to launch a military strike against Iran's nuclear installations before next spring or summer.

This followed Obama's refusal, despite Netanyahu's best efforts, to be forced into specifying the point at which the US would be prepared to take military action, while insisting that remains an option if diplomacy and sanctions fail to halt the Iranian programme.

Israel – the political, military and security leadership, as well as the general public – would much prefer joint action with the US, not least because of questions over Israel's military capability to strike unilaterally. But Obama's reference in his victory speech to moving "beyond this time of war" indicates his strong aversion to military confrontation with Iran.

The second issue is progress towards a settlement of the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians. This is the most likely arena for any possible "payback", especially if Obama decides, as so many previous second-term presidents have, that he wants to make this a legacy issue.

Netanyahu, whose inclination is to "manage" the current situation in which millions of Palestinians live under occupation, rather than advance towards a two-state settlement of the conflict, will attempt to resist pressure.

The assumption is that Netanyahu continues to be prime minister, as current opinion polls suggest. But the result of the US contest may shape Israel's own election by encouraging the formation of a new centrist party or block, led by the former prime minister Ehud Olmert and former foreign minister Tzipi Livni, which would make the dysfunctional relationship between Netanyahu and Obama, and consequent threat to the "special relationship", a key plank of its campaign. Such a move could upset the electoral apple cart in Israel, and change the paradigm regarding both Iran and the Palestinians.

This article originally appeared on guardian.co.uk

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The Defense Advanced Research Project Agency wants to fuse Android mobile phones with its PIXNET (Pixel Network for Dynamic Visualization) system to help individual soldiers see on the battlefield.

The way researchers imagine it, soldiers would wear an Android smartphone strapped to their forearm, which would serve as the processor for information gathered remotely via a small, powerful camera attached to the helmet. The smartphone would then send the information directly to something like combat Google Glasses.

But here's the kicker — the views available include near-infrared, infrared, high definition, and other forms of sight, allowing soldiers to cut through smoke and darkness. It's like 'Predator' vision on the battlefield.

It doesn't stop there though: the system, which as of yet does not have a name, also may integrate quick information sharing on the battlefield — linking soldiers together in a way unprecedented on the battlefield. So if a commander wants active frontline intelligence on the battlefield, he would just reach down to his forearm and dial in that particular individual's network, and bango, he's seeing what his soldier is seeing.

There have been a few iterations of this HUD-tech in the past, but none as affordable ($4 thousand) or as speedy and light as the one DARPA imagines (previous units were about $40 thousand a pop and much bulkier).

Researchers are also working on algorithms that automatically define targets and friendly units on the battlefield. Friendly units are much easier, as each soldier can wear a signal device which communicates with local HUDs. The algorithms for enemies are based on behavior and weapon-recognition. 

NOW SEE: This Flying Tech Can Shut Down The Power Grid In Any Given City With Just A Flyby >

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We are often surprised by the speed of the latest computer or smartphone, but the supercomputers that do the world's craziest calculations will always put our dinky consumer electronics to shame. 

These supercomputers are incredibly powerful. They are made up of giant mainframes linking tens of thousands of processors to achieve incredible computing speeds, measured in petaflops. One petaflop equals 1 quadrillion calculations per second. For comparison, that's more than 12,000 times faster than a MacBook Pro. 

The United States is currently home to the world's fastest supercomputer, Sequoia, according to the Top 500 List. The Sequoia supercomputer, housed at the Department of Energy's lab in California, reached a speed of 16 petaflops when it was ranked in June.  

Another American supercomputer, called Titan, which can hit a peak of 20 petaflops, is on track to dethrone Sequoia as the fastest machin0Titan replaces Jaguar, which is ranked sixth on the latest list.    

#10 Nebulae

Speed: 1.27 petaflops 

Date Created: 2009

Country: China 

Located at the National Supercomputing Centre in Shenzen, China, Nebulae is used for geological studies, oil exploration, space exploration, and avionics.

[Source]

#9 Curie

Speed: 1.36 petaflops 

Country: France

Date Created: 2012

The Curie supercomputer was created by a French organization called the Grand Equipment National de Calcul Intensif and is located in the supercomputer center Très Grand Centre de Calcul (which is French for "the very large computing center"). Current research includes simulating the creation of the universe to discover the origins of life.

[Source]

#8 JuQUEEN

Speed: 1.38 petaflops 

Country: Germany

Date Created: 2012

The Jülich Research Centre in Germany is home to the JuQUEEN, which is used for computational science, engineering, climatology, physics, and materials science.

[Source]

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As the world was eagerly awaiting the results of last nights U.S. presidential election, Syrian rebels planned a major offensive, bombing a hilltop area in Damascus mostly populated by members of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's Alawite sect.

Reports of the attack offer slightly conflicting details of what actually occurred.

What is clear is that bombs were fired into the Muhajireen neighborhood in central Damascus, aimed at one of Bashar al-Assad's two palaces. Most reports claim that Assad's home was not hit — a claim which Bassam al-Dada, an adviser to the commander of the Free Syrian Army, Col. Riad al-Assad, confirmed to the Associated Press. But Israel National News cites unconfirmed reports that claim Assad's palace was actually hit.

The rebels in Damscus also planted  explosives under the car of Judge Abad Nadhwah today, which killed him instantly after they were detonated.

“This was a very special operation that was planned for a while,” al-Dada added. The AP also reports that rebels bombed a Palestinian refugee camp in Syria as well.

Rebels also shelled the Mazzeh military airport, according to Haaretz and Al Arabiya. State-run media claims that three were killed in Mazzeh, according to Reuters (which Haaretz and Al Arabiya also reported).

The attacks seem to be a form of retribution. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Local Coordination Committees claims that the Syrian military has killed 18 people while shelling the suburb of Beit Saham this week.

Russia's Latest Move Shows Its Support For Assad Is Waning >

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No one was surprised to see that the military population heavily favored a Mitt Romney presidency. What was surprising is how thoroughly Barack Obama crushed Romney among voters who cared most about foreign policy— winning over nearly twice as many of these voters as Romney.

All of a sudden we have to ask if Obama — despite plenty of criticism — is some kind of foreign policy genius.

Let's go over the reasons why he won.

1. Obama's is actually pretty pro-military, which appeals to most American voters

He didn't "gut" the military, as was complained about during and after the Clinton administration. He didn't "cut and run," as was the popular phrase in the run up to the 2008 election. No, the military stayed pretty much intact (made technological leaps, actually), and Obama hurled 30,000 more troops into Afghanistan.

He increased the drone war (which, obviously, pretty much only Americans love) and he ended the war in Iraq.

Technically he was kicked out of Iraq because he couldn't settle contractor immunity issues under a new status of forces agreement, and technically the Afghan surge was a miserable failure — but again, most of these details are beyond your everyday voter.

For all intents and purposes, the appearance is that Obama had wrapped up one war, taken steps to resolving the other, and killed a whole lot of bad folks with flying pilotless technology.

2. The GOP's military policies are too one dimensional

Do what we say or we'll bomb you. Maybe we'll even invade.

That cannot be a foreign policy philosophy. More accurately, that cannot be a platform presented to a people generally weary of all the wars, which when initiated, were pitched as not lasting but a couple of months, maybe a couple of years at most.

Foreign policy in modern times requires significant nuance and subtle national body language. The U.S. can't be the guy who's always yelling and punching other guys in the face, which is pretty much the stance of the modern GOP.

3. Obama doubled down on how true conservatives wage war

Doesn't everybody remember all the operations Reagan waged in South America? No? Exactly.

Obama's use of Navy SEALs, special forces, drones and the intelligence community to root out, kill and capture international criminals (let's call them what they are), while simultaneously throwing the economic weight of the country around to gain diplomatic access to their governments (Yemen, Pakistan, Somalia, Libya) is exactly how a true conservative would wage war.

Obama's approach not only yielded the most wanted criminal on the globe ("and General Motors is alive!"), but, for better or worse, it launched the special operations community and America's special operations capability into international consciousness.

This PR move, deliberate or not, plays out in two ways; a gigantic deterrent to any criminal organization thinking of targeting the US; and it makes Obama look like a special operations genius, surgically removing terrorist threats without the use of 100,000 boots on the ground.

4. Meanwhile he appeared willing to compromise for both American AND Global good

Appeared is the operative word here, because most of what he's done internationally is still up for debate.

Obama's open-mic flub of telling the Russian president he'd "be more flexible" about missile defenses after the election had the Right Wing punditry screeching for a week after the fact. Although, in all their appeals for strength, they forgot that the vast majority of the country was desperate for some measure of compromise from either political party.

Compromise and flexibility are synonyms.

Plus, Americans don't feel like Russia plans to launch missiles any time soon. Here's the GOP posturing against threats in an empty room.

When the Arab Spring rolled through the Middle East, rather than rush in to suppress democracy in Egypt (a move wildly unpopular among Americans), he encouraged it without getting overtly involved (we did supply and fund the regime for three decades). When new president Morsi said some inflammatory things about the US, he was quickly threatened to cut off the money supply — to great effect.

No need for troops.

There are equal examples of democratic support and information suppression (if you haven't heard about it, then he's succeeded) all around the Middle East, from Libya (bombing Ghaddafi, keeping mum on potential weapons smuggling — no mention of riots in Bahrain) to Iran, where he, contrary to the GOP party line, clearly voiced his support for democracy, but reaffirmed that no military or even paramilitary intervention would occur.

In doing as much, Obama appeared to be both a steward of democracy, and of American national interests.

So it's not hard to see why he outscored Mitt Romney among voters.

It's also not hard to see why he out fundraised Mitt Romney among the military (by more than two to one) — though the support of troops in general was to Romney's advantage, the members with the money and political will to donate, namely senior personnel, leaned toward Obama.

Finally there was that presidential foreign policy debate that featured Romney agreeing non-stop with Obama. A while back we called that debate for Romney, but now it's clear it was the foundation of Obama's victory.

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Military armor progressed from steel plates to kevlar (ceramic) plates on the basis that lighter, less bulky materials can and should do the job of their heavier counterparts.

Now a new piece of research out of MIT and Rice University suggests that military body armor can be as thin as several nanometers, and proportionately lighter. For those who don't know (I didn't), current cutting edge body armor is approximately 6 pounds and 1 inch thick — and there are 25.5 million nanometers in an inch.

Now six pounds doesn't seem like much, but double it to 12 for front and back plates, and then add in all the other gear Marines and soldiers carry in combat, and the military is looking for anywhere it can to cut some weight (usually from the Marines themselves).

Researchers for a long time postulated that by, on an atomic level, layering slivers of lightweight composite material, each only a nanometer thick, you could create a hyperdurable, superlightweight, razor thin material that could stop bullets.

Only problem is there was no way to test it.

David Chandler of the MIT News Office reports:

The key is to use composites made of two or more materials whose stiffness and flexibility are structured in very specific ways — such as in alternating layers just a few nanometers thick. The team developed a self-assembling polymer with a layer-cake structure: rubbery layers, which provide resilience, alternating with glassy layers, which provide strength. They then developed a method for shooting glass beads at the material at high speed ... (the beeds were) big enough to simulate impacts by larger objects, such as bullets, but small enough so the effects of the impacts could be studied in detail using an electron microscope.

The work, according to Dr. Jae-Hwang Lee, the lead researcher, “can be an extremely useful quantitative tool for the development of protective nanomaterials. Our work presents some valuable insights to understand the contribution” of the nanoscale structure to the way such materials absorb an impact, he told the MIT News Office.

Chandler writes that Donald Shockey, director of the Center for Fracture Physics at SRI International (consequently, the same place where Apple's Siri was founded) said these studies were integral for developing new impact technologies.

These results “provide the data required to develop and validate computational models” to predict the behavior of impact-protection materials and to develop new, improved materials, he said.

Researchers also note that the new materials devised could be applied to satellites, cars, space suits and shuttles, basically everything that might take an impact.

But soldiers would definitely come first.

These two sentences sum up the report: "The experimental work was conducted at MIT’s Institute for Soldier Nanotechnologies. The work was supported by the U.S. Army Research Office."

Oh, and 91% of research at the MIT Lincoln Lab is Pentagon funded.

NOW SEE: Apple's Siri Actually Started From Defense Funding And Was Called Soldier's Servant >

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Two men on opposite sides of one of the biggest scandals in sports history share an air of secrecy granted by their work for the U.S. government.

Former Penn St. president Graham Spanier was arraigned today on charges he attempted to cover-up the massive child abuse scandal involving former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky.

The investigator that revealed Spanier's alleged crimes, Louis Freeh, has also been accused of heading a massive cover-up when he was director of the FBI.

Spanier's lawyers previously argued that Freeh's report was unfounded in part because it didn't take into account another investigation of Spanier "conducted simultaneously by federal officials responsible for our national security."

That investigation reaffirmed Spanier’s Top Secret security clearance, which he holds from being chairman of the FBI National Security Higher Education Advisory Board until he was fired from Penn State last November.

Spanier, who had been PSU president since 1995, subsequently began consulting for the U.S. government on a project “relating to national security.” The details regarding his most recent federal gig—like which agency he works for—remain a mystery.  

Freeh, who was FBI Director from 1993 to 2001, has a mystique of his own. He is a member of the secretive group Opus Dei. The international Roman Catholic order, founded in 1928 and championed early by Spanish dictator Francisco Franco, is dedicated to establishing its members in high political, corporate, and religious offices all over the world.

It's interesting—if not highly relevant given that 1.4 million Americans have Top Secret clearance—that both the man charged with orchestrating the Penn St. cover-up and the investigator who exposed his alleged role have worked on classified projects for the government.

SEE ALSO: Penn State Investigator Louis Freeh Accused Of Heading A Massive Cover-Up As Director Of FBI >

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A lot of people are going to be watching National Geographic's film about the Seal 6 team and the bin Laden raid.

Watching it, right away you know you're going to love it, but feel guilty for doing so. The big reveal is instantaneous, from the very first line: "what do you want me to talk about." Spoken by a man, strangely enough, who's speaking right at the camera. And then you realize: this whole movie will be narrated as if the raid participants are in some faux reality TV/documentary confessional.

It makes you shudder.

The cliches dont stop there. The whole picture is actually a frankenmovie, with every modern and maybe a little older than modern TV and military cliche stitiched into one one hour and thirty minute National Geographic movie.

Here a few of the most notable cliches:

• Military guys that speak like civilians think they speak: The producer (oddly enough, poached from the same The Hurt Locker crew who is now producing the competing Zero Dark Thirty) and director say they talked to "former SEALs and members of the intelligence community" for their material. Even if they did, the quotes pulled sound exactly like what a civilian would expect a SEAL to say.
• CSI Crime-type graphic animations and concurrent 'suspense' soundtrack: This is almost unbearable. Moving on.
• The Reality TV confessional style of faux nonfiction: This isn't Modern Family, this isn't the Jersey Shore, so why are pretending like it is? Weinstein, the executive producer for the movie, didn't have the biggest budget, that could be why. It could also be because most of America responds to this format.
• Digital military typing sounds and Black Hawk Down map sequencing: If you've seen it, you know what I mean. Does every military movie have to use those digital sounds to identify new contexts and names of people?
• Combination of documentary footage with produced footage: A lot of films do this to juxtapose competing images (Obama at the Press Dinner with SEALs preparing for the raid), but this film goes a bit overboard. Admittedly, it does set a tone, but it's as cheaply established as the use of confessional style interviews.

All that being said, the movie was incredibly gripping and I couldn't help but keep watching it, but I felt intellectually guilty afterward.

Here's the trailer and the you can watch the movie on Netflix.

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ZAATARI, Jordan (AP) — Western efforts to oust Syrian President Bashar Assad shifted dramatically Wednesday, with Britain announcing it will deal directly with rebel military leaders.

A Turkish official also said his nation has held discussions with NATO allies, including the United States, on using Patriot missiles to protect a safe zone inside Syria.

The developments came within hours of President Barack Obama's re-election. U.S. allies anticipate a new, bolder approach from the American leader to end the deadlocked civil war that has killed more than 36,000 people since an uprising against Assad began in March 2011.

U.S. officials said Patriots or other assets could be deployed to Turkey's side of the border for defensive purposes against possible incursions, mortar strikes and the like.

But Washington isn't prepared to send any such equipment inside Syria, which would amount to a violation of sovereignty and a significant military escalation, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to speak publicly on the matter.

Like Britain, American officials are considering meeting with rebel military commanders. If the contacts were to happen, they would be most likely conducted by Robert Ford, the former U.S. ambassador in Damascus, who is currently in Doha for Syrian opposition talks, a U.S. official said. But no final decision has been made.

British Prime Minister David Cameron, visiting a camp for Syrian refugees in Jordan, said the U.S., Britain and other allies should do more to "shape the opposition" into a coherent force and open channels of communication directly with rebel military commanders.

Previously, Britain and the U.S. have acknowledged contacts only with exile groups and political opposition figures — some connected to rebel forces — inside Syria.

"There is an opportunity for Britain, for America, for Saudi Arabia, Jordan and like-minded allies to come together and try to help shape the opposition, outside Syria and inside Syria," Cameron said. "And try to help them achieve their goal, which is our goal of a Syria without Assad."

The foreign ministry official, who spoke on condition of anonymity in line with department policy, said discussions about the deployment of Patriot missiles to protect a safe zone had been put on hold until after the U.S. election.

Since the summer, Assad's regime has significantly increased its use of air power against rebels as government forces are stretched thin on multiple fronts.

The Turkish official said any missile deployment might happen under a "NATO umbrella," though NATO has insisted it will not intervene without a clear United Nations mandate.

"With the re-election of Obama, what you have is a strong confidence on the British side that the U.S. administration will be engaged more on Syria from the get-go," said Shashank Joshi, an analyst at London's Royal United Services Institute, a military and security think tank.

On the ground in Syria, rebels made a new push into the capital Wednesday. Opposition fighters fired mortar shells toward the presidential palace — but missed their target — and clashed heavily with troops in the suburbs of Damascus. The regime's capital stronghold has seen a surge in violence this week with some of the fiercest clashes in months.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Local Coordination Committees said the Syrian military was shelling another suburb, Beit Saham, with tanks and mortar shells, killing at least 18 people in that neighborhood alone.

In London, British Foreign Secretary William Hague said talks with rebel military leaders would not involve advice on military tactics or support for their operations. Hague also insisted that Britain would not consider offering weapons to Assad's opponents.

Face-to-face meetings with military figures will take place outside Syria, Hague said. Diplomats from the U.S., Britain, France and Turkey are already scheduled to meet with Syrian opposition groups Thursday in Doha, Qatar, though there has been no announcement that those talks will include discussions with rebel fighters.

He said British diplomats will tell rebel commanders to respect the human rights of captured Assad loyalists, amid concern over abuses carried out by both sides.

"In all contacts, my officials will stress the importance of respecting human rights and international human rights norms, rejecting extremism and terrorism, and working towards peaceful political transition," Hague told lawmakers.

At the Zaatari camp, which houses about 40,000 of the estimated 236,000 people who have fled into Jordan from Syria, Cameron said he would press Obama at the first opportunity to drive forward efforts to end the 19-month-old conflict.

Cameron plans to convene a meeting of Britain's National Security Council in London devoted entirely to Syria and discuss how the U.K. can encourage Obama to pursue a more direct strategy.

"Right here in Jordan I am hearing appalling stories about what has happened inside Syria, so one of the first things I want to talk to Barack about is how we must do more to try and solve this crisis," he said.

Talks with those who had fled the violence had redoubled his "determination that now, with a newly elected American president, we have got to do more to help this part of the world, to help Syria achieve transition," Cameron added.

He flew to the camp by helicopter with Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh and announced that Britain would offer an extra 14 million pounds ($22 million) in humanitarian aid, bringing its total funding to 53.5 million pounds ($85.5 million) — making it the second largest donor after the United States.

Cameron later held talks with Jordan's King Abdullah II in the capital, Amman.

___

Stringer reported from London. Associated Press writer Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey, contributed to this report.

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China Aviation Industry Corporation has been trotting out videos and pictures of their cloned prototype U.S. MQ-1 Predator drone called the Wing Loong (Pterodactyl) for years, but this UAV is on display for an upcoming air show.

From Strategy Page:

While Wing Loong is similar in shape to the larger American MQ-9 Reaper, in size it's almost identical to the 1.2 ton Predator. Wing Loong weighs 1.1 tons, has a 14 meter (46 feet) wingspan, and is 9 meters (28 feet) long. It has max altitude of 5,300 meters (16,400 feet) and an endurance of over 20 hours.

Already believed to be marketed abroad, the Wing Loong has been seen carrying at least two unidentified missiles.

The following photo was taken at the Zhuhai Airshow running in China from November 13 to 18.

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Russia would like to see US Senator John Kerry replace Hillary Clinton once the US Secretary of State steps down at the start of President Barack Obama's second term, a news report said on Thursday.

US officials said on Wednesday that Mrs Clinton intended to keep her promise to leave the White House administration after the presidential ballot, despite her boss having firmly secured a new four years in office.

Speculation has been rife that Washington's top foreign policy assignment may go to either the Senate Foreign Affairs committee chairman Kerry or Washington's UN ambassador Susan Rice.

An unnamed source in the Russian foreign ministry told the Kommersant business daily that Moscow would "much prefer" to see Mr Kerry take the post.

The source said Ms Rice was viewed as "too ambitious and aggressive" in Russian diplomatic circles. The UN ambassador had fought fiercely with Moscow over its refusal to back firmer action in the Syria crisis in the past year.

"It would be more difficult for Moscow to work with Washington" if Ms Rice became Secretary of State, the unnamed Russian official said.

The source added that Moscow's only fear was that Mr Obama may choose against naming Mr Kerry because this could see the Democratic Party lose an important Senate seat.

Source: AFP

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BEIJING (AP) — Chinese patrol boats have harried the Japanese Coast Guard many times a week for more than a month in an unusually relentless response to their latest maritime spat.

Four Chinese craft typically push to within hailing distance of Japan's ships. They flash illuminated signs in Japanese to press Beijing's argument that it has ancient claims to a set of tiny East China Sea islands now controlled by Tokyo. China says its craft have tried to chase the Japanese away at least once, although Japan denies any of its ships fled.

The huge uptick in incidents has brought the sides into dangerously close proximity, reflecting a campaign by Beijing to wear down Japanese resolve with low-level, non-military maneuvers but also boosting the risk of a clash.

Although China wields a formidable arsenal, it has yet to deploy military assets in such encounters. Instead, Beijing has dispatched ships from government maritime agencies — only one of which is armed — to keep a lid on gunfire. Those agencies are now receiving added attention, with new ships on order and a national call going out for recruits.

China says ships from its Marine Surveillance service are merely defending Chinese sovereignty and protesting illegal Japanese control over the uninhabited islands, known as Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China. The missions began after Japan's government purchased three of the five islands from their private Japanese owner in September, enraging a Chinese government that saw it as an attempt to boost Japan's sovereignty claim. It also sparked violent anti-Japanese protests in dozens of Chinese cities.

China's short-term goal has been primarily to force Japan to at least acknowledge that the islands are in dispute — something it has refused to do — but the boost in patrols raises the likelihood of a bigger confrontation, said Wang Dong, director of the Center for Northeast Asian Strategic Studies at Peking University.

"I'm very concerned about the current situation. The possibility of escalation cannot be ruled out," Wang said.

With emotions running high, any accident or miscalculation in these maritime missions could yield unexpected outcomes.

"One side might deploy a naval vessel in a support fashion, a move that the other would match," said M. Taylor Fravel of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who is closely following the dispute.

Japan has made it clear that it intends to meet the Chinese challenge in kind.

Japanese Coast Guard spokesman Yasuhiko Oku said the dispute was a factor behind the government's allocation last week of 17 billion yen ($212 million) to beef up the Coast Guard fleet with seven new patrol ships and three helicopters, though he said the new assets are not only for use around the islands.

Oku declined, for national security reasons, to say how many ships patrol the islands. But he said the dispute has been a "significant draw" on resources.

Tensions in the region were highlighted by U.S.-Japan naval exercises that began Monday at various locations, involving some 37,400 Japanese and 10,000 U.S. troops. At the same time, Japanese and Chinese diplomats were in consultation in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, the Japanese Foreign Ministry said.

China's Foreign Ministry said the exercises were "not conducive to mutual trust in regional security," and urged the parties to "do more that helps regional peace and stability."

Already, the near-constant presence of Chinese ships around the disputed islands has stretched the Japanese Coast Guard, which pulled out of a recent fleet review to free up ships for patrols. That's a victory of sorts for Beijing's vow to claim what it calls sacred territory, between Taiwan and Japan's Okinawa. Taiwan also claims the islands, which were under U.S. administration after World War II before reverting to Japanese control in 1972.

Chinese outrage stems partly from lingering resentment over Japan's brutal World War II occupation of much of China, feelings that are constantly stoked by China's education system and state-controlled media. But control of sea lanes and potentially rich undersea minerals are also at play, along with China's burning desire for respect as a world power.

China and Japan have no formal agreement on preventing unintended incidents at sea, making it easier for events to spin out of control as they did when a Chinese fishing boat rammed a Japanese cutter in 2010, leading to a diplomatic standoff and anti-Japanese protests in China.

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell said last week that the sides need to calm down. "It's incredibly important that both countries appreciate what they have built and step back from the brink," Campbell said in Washington.

Chinese craft entered waters near the islands for the third consecutive day on Sunday, marking at least the 11th incursion in recent weeks. The Japanese Coast Guard has described all the incidents as routine without a risk of clashes, and said none of its ships have backed down.

However, the Chinese government said last week that its boats had performed "expulsion measures" against Japanese ships.

"Chinese law enforcement vessels have a foothold in the waters around Diaoyu and are expanding their activities to safeguard Chinese sovereignty," China's stridently nationalistic Communist Party tabloid Global Times said last Wednesday. It called that a warning to the Philippines, Vietnam and other neighbors to "think twice before they provoke China."

Some scholars say China's apparent strategy to gradually erode Japanese control through low-key actions has been abetted by a non-committal response from Washington, who has said it takes no stance on the islands' sovereignty despite recognizing its treaty obligations to back Tokyo in a conflict.

China uses a similar approach in the South China Sea where it has maritime disputes with several other nations.

Earlier this year, Beijing managed to nudge the Philippines out of a disputed shoal by entering a lengthy but nonviolent maritime standoff. After both sides stood down, China set up barriers with ropes and buoys to block further access. Chinese ships have also sought to cut sonar cables and otherwise harass ships of the U.S. Navy.

___

Associated Press writers Eric Talmadge and Mari Yamaguchi in Tokyo contributed to this report.

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The Internet Control Police, part of the Ministry of Intelligence, burst into the home of a citizen, upturned his furniture, and dragged him out of the house, in all likelihood with a black bag over his head.

This isn't fiction. It's is the life of an activist blogger in Iran.

It also turned out to be his death.

Following eight days of brutal beatings, torture really, the family of Sattar Beheshti, 35, received a phone call Tuesday from the "notorious Kahrizak detention center" to come and collect his remains. According to eyewitnesses at the prison, prior to his death Beheshti had become a lumped up, barely recognizable version of himself.

Zahra Sadr's, a reporter for Keleme.com, a Persian language media site, wrote:

Beheshti had been severely beaten during his interrogation process, with bruises and evidence of torture visible on his head, face and body. The political prisoners at Evin's general ward 350 ... described his body as black and blue.

"[Guards] put him under the most severe torture [treatment] in order to obtain forced confession," reports the National Council of The Resistance of Iran. "Such that witnesses said his body was “crushed” due to torture marks."

Upon the death notification phone call, the guards flatly told the family, "He died of sickness," and left it at that.

Beheshti's sister told the Keleme reporter: "They summoned my husband and told him to prepare our mother. 'Buy a casket and show up tomorrow to collect his body' they said. That's it! We know nothing else! We have no idea why they killed him! We have no idea what transpired.  My brother left the house healthy. He left voluntarily.  Everyone witnessed that he was healthy. My brother never even took headache medicine. He was 100% healthy!"

Beheshti had a long time history of resistance to Iran's brutal media censorship. He was detained in 1999 for taking part in activism, and his final blog posting prior to his arrest illustrates perfectly the type of regime he felt compelled to resist.

The website Freedom Messenger, which popped up following elections in 2009 as an anonymous collaboration of students and activists, received and translated Beheshti's final blog post, written days before his arrest.

Here are quotes from Beheshti:

They threaten us, and say that we should not give information otherwise they’ll shut our mouths.

It’s been a while now that the Iranian regime has put a lot of pressure against activists and other independent Iranians to maintain their opinions and thoughts to themselves.

Threats from detention and torture to public executions in order to scare the people!

If I write anything I hear and see, they will deal with me in any way that they want until I shut up otherwise they would make sure that I would be silenced without leaving any marks and signs for anyone to know what happened to me! “You will be in no one’s memory and you are a traitor to this nation!”

My intentions are not against my nation thus I’m not a traitor, I love my people, you are the real traitors in our country who does this to our people!

But I have a suggestion, if you’re afraid of information, resign this government, stop this injustice, do not arrest, do not torture, do not slaughter our people, otherwise this injustice will be brought upon yourselves.

And a day following his death notice, police contacted Beheshti's family to tell them that they cannot attend his burial.

The translator of the Kaleme Persian news story posted an update just this morning:

In a follow up interview with Kaleme that took place today, Wednesday November 7th, Beheshti's family announced that security agents have threatened them stating that they are not allowed to be present during the washing of the body in preparation for burial.  A reliable source within Kahrizak prison's forensic team informed Kaleme that the body of a young man who had been killed as a result torture was at Kahrizak.  Another reliable source with the police claimed that Beheshti died because he was unable to withstand the interrogation process.

NOW SEE: Iranian President Ahmadinejad Just Got Shredded In Front Of His Own Parliament >

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Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Thursday rejected calls that he seek a safe exit, vowing he would "live in Syria and die in Syria" in an interview with Russian-backed international channel RT.

"I am not a puppet. I was not made by the West to go to the West or to any other country," Assad, who is facing a nearly 20-month revolt against his rule, told the channel in English, according to transcripts posted on the state-backed Russian news channel's website.

"I am Syrian, I was made in Syria, I have to live in Syria and die in Syria," he said.

British Prime Minister David Cameron on Tuesday floated the idea of granting Assad safe passage from the country, saying it "could be arranged" though he wanted the Syrian leader to face international justice.

Assad also warned against a foreign intervention to deal with Syria's escalating conflict, saying such a move would have global consequences and shake regional stability.

"We are the last stronghold of secularism and stability in the region... it will have a domino effect that will affect the world from the Atlantic to the Pacific," he said.

"I do not think the West is going (to intervene), but if they do so, nobody can tell what is next," Assad said.

In a separate video extract of the interview, Assad also said: "The price of this invasion, if it happens, is going to be big, more than the whole world can afford."

Many in Syria's opposition, including armed rebels waging fierce battles with pro-regime forces, have urged the international community to intervene to stop escalating bloodshed in the country that rights groups say has left more than 37,000 people dead.

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Yesterday, more than two years after his arrest, Private Bradley Manning offered to admit he gave information to WikiLeaks.

Manning, who is accused of leaking confidential documents on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, is not submitting a guilty plea, but will rather accept responsibility for some of the offenses included in the government's charges, writes his lawyer, David Coombs.

If the judge accepts the plea, Manning could face less severe punishment, according to Kevin Gosztola, co-author of Truth and Consequences, a book about Manning.

However, the "aiding the enemy" charge, which would still be in play, could lead to life in prison without parole for Manning, Gosztola writes.

The U.S. government will still have to decide on how to handle the court's decision if Manning's plea is accepted, according to Gosztola.

The trial is set for February.

SEE ALSO:'Innocence Of Muslims' Filmmaker Is Heading To Federal Prison >

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The Marine Scout Sniper school is the most elite military sniper school on earth, and one of the toughest special operations courses in the U.S. Military.

See the Scout Snipers >

Not only do the Army, Navy, and the Air Force, send troops to this here, but foreign services like the Israelis and the British, often trade students for the opportunity to earn the Marine Sniper designation.

One of the profiled students in this Discovery video was actually attached the the unit I recently covered in Afghanistan. Not only did he supply the company with absurdly accurate intelligence on the enemy, but he also took a couple of them out when we needed it most.

Those are the two primary missions of Marine Scout Snipers: Recon and targeted strikes on enemy personnel and equipment. They can be more devastating on enemy forces than a plane full of bombs.

There are less than 300 active snipers in the U.S. Marine Corps — and only four schools including this one in Camp Pendleton, California

The 32 elite students who enter the course need almost perfect physical fitness (PT) scores, expert rifle qualifications, and superior intelligence test scores

Here is where Professionally Instructed Gunmen (PIG), become Hunters Of Gunmen (HOG)

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Elephants could be wiped out across Africa in 10 to 15 years if poaching continues at its current pace, Ginny Stein of ABC News reports. 

Poachers are outnumbering and outgunning rangers in elephant havens like the Garamba National Park in the Republic of Congo, leading to the slaughter of tens of thousands of elephants each year.

As much as 70 percent of the illegal ivory feeds insatiable demand in China.

"We are going to lose the largest animal on earth just so people can have trinkets," Cynthia Moss,  an American conservationist who has spent the past 30 years studying elephants in Kenya, told ABC News.

Infamous warlord Joseph Kony's Lords Resistance army has turned to killing elephants for their ivory tusks as their main source of income.

Stein notes that there are now only an estimated 2,500 elephants remaining from a herd once as large as 20,000. But saving the elephant will be a tough task.

"You would have to have a huge army and it still might not work and you have to stop the demand, you have to raise the consciousness of people in the far east to tell them, 'do not buy ivory, it kills elephants'," Moss said.

SEE ALSO: WikiLeaks: Makers of KONY2012 Spied For Ugandan Regime >

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Recently appointed Hawaiian Democratic congresswoman and Iraq War veteran Tulsi Gabbard plans to swear her oath on Hindu sacred texts.

Rachel Rickard Straus of the Daily Mail reports:

Proud of her Hindu religion, she is not Indian or of Indian heritage. Ms Gabbard was born in American Samoa to a Catholic father - Hawaii State Senator Mike Gabbard - and a Hindu mother. She moved to Hawaii when she was two and fully embraced her religion as a teenager.

Gabbard is the first Hindu and the first female combat veteran elected to the Hill, at a time when Congressional Veterans are waning in number.

Her accomplishment highlights the fact that many units in the U.S. Military are accurate demographic representation of America. The military is relatively tolerant too.

Gabbard told the Huffington Post about how her religion helped her through Iraq, "First thing in the morning and the last thing at night, I meditated upon the fact that my essence was spirit, not matter, that I was not my physical body, and that I didn't need to worry about death because I knew that I would continue to exist and I knew that I would be going to God," she said.

She may have faith, but still there could be a little blowback though, from a Congress beholden to tradition — in fact, the last time a Hindu prayer was attempted in Congress, a group of self-dubbed "patriots" interrupted it.

Her opponent, Kawika Crowley, even went so far as to say Gabbard's religion "was incompatible with the Constitution."

Gabbard retorted with an appeal to her service, via an email to HuffPo: "It is stunning that some people in Congress would so arrogantly thumb their nose at the Bill of Rights. When I volunteered to put my life on the line in defense of our country, no one asked me what my religion was."

NOW SEE: When this woman was killed in combat it exposed just how the government treats it's same sex employees >

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Two Iranian fighter jets fired on an unarmed US drone last week, according to reports on CNN.

According to Pentagon sources, the drone was in the international airspace of Kuwait. It was not hit in the attack, and it was not clear if the two fighter jets were actually trying to down the drone.

The incident happened just a few days before the US election as the drone conducted surveillance on crucial Gulf oil shipping lanes.

Fox News have confirmed the news with the Pentagon. Spokesman George Little said the incident happened November 1 and that US authorities have protested to the Iranians. He told reporters, "We have a wide range of options from diplomatic to military." 

CNN reporters questioned on air whether the act could be considered an "act of war."

Iran downed a U.S. RQ-170 Sentinel drone late last year, and are thought to have studied the technology.

SEE ALSO: The Drone Shot Down By Israel Was Apparently Sent By Iran >

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