China invests $40 bln in Iran oil, gas: minister

TEHRAN — Iran's main economic partner China has invested around 40 billion dollars in the Islamic republic's oil and gas sector, a senior Iranian official said on Saturday.

Deputy Oil Minister Hossein Noqrehkar Shirazi also said that Tehran's oil exports to China fell by 30 percent in the first six months of 2010 compared with the corresponding period last year.

"The volume (of Chinese investment) in upstream projects is 29 billion dollars," Noqrehkar Shirazi told Mehr news agency, adding that Beijing had signed contracts worth another 10 billion dollars in petrochemicals, refineries and oil and gas pipeline projects.

He said China has also put forward proposals to participate in building seven new refineries in Iran.

Iran, OPEC's second largest oil exporter, has a dilapidated refining sector, forcing it to import petroleum products such as gasoline to meet domestic needs.

Noqrehkar Shirazi said that Chinese imports of Iranian oil fell in the first half of the year.

"Although Iran is still among top 10 oil exporters to China, it is the only country which in the first six months of 2010 has seen its exports to China falling," he said.

"The volume of oil exports to China in the first six months of this year decreased to less than 9.02 million tonnes or 66.12 million barrels. This shows a 30 percent decrease" over the first half of 2009, he added.

In recent years, China has filled the gaps in Iran's energy sector left by Western firms forced out by international sanctions.

In 2009, China became Iran's premier trading partner, with bilateral trade worth 21.2 billion dollars against 14.4 billion dollars three years earlier.

Commercial ties between the two countries were almost non-existent 15 years ago, amounting to just 400 million dollars.

According to official data, Western sanctions opened the way for Chinese companies, which last year directly supplied Iran with 13 percent (7.9 billion dollars) of its imports.

Iranian estimates also suggest that an equivalent amount was imported indirectly through the United Arab Emirates in 2009.

China backed the fourth set of UN sanctions against Iran over its contested nuclear programme, but Beijing has consistently urged the world powers to resolve the crisis diplomatically.

On Friday, it also opposed the latest unilateral sanctions on Iran imposed by the European Union.

Thailand to end emergency rule in six provinces

BANGKOK — Thailand's premier said Thursday he would end emergency rule in six provinces but maintain the strict laws in Bangkok, where a weekend bomb blast rekindled tensions in the wake of deadly street protests.

The emergency decree, which bans public gatherings of more than five people and gives security forces the right to detain suspects for 30 days without charge, will remain in place in 10 provinces, out of a total of 76.

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said he would revoke the laws in Chonburi, Ayutthaya, Nong Bua Lam Phu, Maha Sarakham, Mukdahan and Chaiyaphum in central and northeastern Thailand on the advice of security officials.

Abhisit has pledged to roll back the state of emergency gradually, saying it is still needed in the capital after a weekend bomb attack at a Bangkok bus stop killed one person and wounded 10.

Defence Minister Prawit Wongsuwon told AFP on Thursday that security officials were confident they could handle the situation in the areas where the state of emergency has been lifted.

"All of the state security agencies... said there is little political movement in these provinces," he said.

The government has come under pressure from the United States and rights groups to end emergency rule to help the country recover from deadly civil unrest that has left it deeply divided.

Authorities have used the powers -- introduced in Bangkok on April 7 -- to arrest hundreds of Red Shirt suspects and silence anti-government media.

The protests by the Reds, many of whom back fugitive ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra, attracted up to 100,000 people demanding immediate elections but were crushed by the army in a bloody crackdown in May.

About 90 people died and some 1,900 were injured in a series of street clashes between armed troops and demonstrators.

Critics say the government may in effect be fanning the crisis as it clamps down and censors the protest movement rather than addressing its grievances.

Thailand's Department of Special Investigation said Thursday it had forwarded cases against 25 people linked to the Red Shirt protests, including Thaksin, to the attorney general, recommending they be indicted for terrorism.

The Supreme Court meanwhile issued a new arrest warrant for Thaksin in connection with allegations he presented false asset declarations to an anti-corruption agency while in office.

Thai courts have issued a series of warrants for Thaksin for charges including terrorism. The government has accused the ex-premier of inciting the unrest.

The former telecoms tycoon was ousted in a bloodless military coup in 2006 and lives in self-imposed exile to avoid a prison jail imposed in absentia for corruption.

The Reds, who hail Thaksin's policies for the poor, view the current government as elitist and undemocratic because it came to power after a court ruling threw out the previous administration.

Europe bank test transparency gets cautious thumbs-up

LONDON/SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Investors gave European banks the benefit of the doubt on Monday over stress tests that prompted more transparency from Spanish banks needing to raise capital than from German banks cagey about sovereign debt.

Spain's smaller regional lenders, or cajas, will start a roadshow in London on Monday aimed at reassuring investors after the test results on Friday showed five of their peers were among the seven banks that failed.

However, problems among the cajas have long been flagged and are being remedied, and Europe's banking index rose 1.1 percent on Monday to help the wider stock market push 0.2 percent higher by 5:40 a.m. ET.

The euro firmed slightly in the absence of any real shocks in the test of whether 91 banks in 20 countries could withstand another recession in the next two years, including some losses on government bonds.

Skepticism still lingered over the assessment that the seven banks that failed had a combined capital shortfall of 3.5 billion euros ($4.5 billion) -- much smaller than expected.

Some German banks, including Deutsche Bank, were also criticized for not providing as much information as rivals about their exposure to sovereign debt in the euro zone -- the major worry that prompted the tests. Deutsche Bank shares were down 1.4 percent, the weakest of the top names.

"On the surface, if anything, you have to take these tests with a pinch of salt," said Jonathan Cavenagh, currency strategist at Westpac, Sydney. "Sovereign debt problems remain, funding constraints for their banks are still there and these have the potential to weigh on the euro."

Even so, investors welcomed the chance to dig into more detail on banks' holdings of sovereign debt than they had before.

Sources familiar with the discussions said Germany fought hard behind closed doors to limit the extent of disclosure.

Attention was also on 17 banks who only scraped a pass, some of whom may opt to raise cash if the test fails to reduce their funding costs or soothe worries about risks, analysts said.

The euro was changing hands around $1.2934, slightly up from $1.2916 in New York on Friday.

Fears of a euro zone debt crisis and its impact on European banks had driven the euro below $1.19 last month, its lowest since 2006. But it began a swift recovery in July and hit a 10-week high above $1.30 last week.

AVOIDING DOUBLE-DIP

The subdued response in Europe was a far cry from the high anxiety in early May over Greece's debt crisis that global markets feared might spread like wildfire through Europe and beyond.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said then that Europe's fate was at stake.

Stronger-than-expected economic data, and business confidence surveys suggesting the euro zone will avoid a double-dip recession despite fiscal austerity measures, have also helped revive investor confidence in Europe.

The detailed breakdowns should enable investors critical of the official test results to run their own risk simulations to gauge a counterparty's solidity.

That should help reopen the interbank lending market, which partially froze at the height of the euro zone debt crisis and has remained tight on fears banks have been hiding big exposures.

The stress test scenarios included how banks would cope with a double-dip recession, a 20-percent drop in stock markets and sharp rises in interest rates.

Investors chastised EU authorities for refusing to test the impact of a debt default by Greece. But European Central Bank governing council member Christian Noyer said euro zone states "have put several hundreds of billions of euros on the table with the support of the IMF to make this hypothesis completely excluded."

($1=.7746 Euro)

Veteran journalist Daniel Schorr dies at 93

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Veteran journalist Daniel Schorr, whose career ranged from reporting on the building of the Berlin Wall to the Watergate scandal, died on Friday at the age of 93, National Public Radio said.

Schorr, who spent the past 25 years as a senior news analyst at NPR, died peacefully on Friday morning at a Washington hospital, surrounded by his family, after what NPR described in a statement as a short illness.

Schorr, who once described himself as a "living history book," started his career as a foreign correspondent in 1946. He later joined Edward R. Murrow's legendary radio and TV team at CBS, helped to create CNN in 1979, and then joined NPR becoming a senior news analyst in 1985.

His award-winning career included landing the first U.S. interview with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev in 1957, covering the Sputnik space program, and reporting in the 1970s on secret CIA assassinations.

He counted his inclusion on the so-called enemies list drawn up by President Richard Nixon's White House during the Watergate scandal as his greatest achievement.

Schorr worked for NPR until a few days before his death. His last "Week In Review" commentary was aired on July 10.

NPR's Scott Simon, the host of "Weekend Edition", described Schorr as a "fierce journalist, and a tender friend and father."

"What other person was personally acquainted with both Richard Nixon and Frank Zappa? Dan was around for both the Russian Revolution and the Digital Revolution," Simon said in a statement.

"Nobody else in broadcast journalism -- or perhaps any field -- had as much experience and wisdom. I am just glad that, after being known for so many years as a tough and uncompromising journalist, NPR listeners also got to know the Dan Schorr that was playful, funny and kind. In a business that's known for burning out people, Dan Schorr shined for nearly a century," he added.

Schorr won three Emmys for his political reporting in the 1970s, and later a lifetime achievement Peabody award.

He was born in the Bronx in 1916, the son of Belorussian immigrants. He got his first scoop at age 12, when he saw the body of a woman who had jumped or fallen from the roof of his apartment building. He called the police and the Bronx Home News, which paid him $5 for the information.

Health watchdogs sound alarm over TB/HIV deaths

VIENNA — Two global health agencies joined forces here on Thursday in a campaign aimed at averting 200,000 deaths each year by co-infection from TB and the AIDS virus.

"Every three minutes a person living with HIV has his or her life cut off prematurely by TB," said Jorge Sampaio, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's special envoy on stopping tuberculosis.

"This is completely unacceptable. TB is a preventable and curable disease."

Sampaio presided over a signing of a memorandum of understanding on the sidelines of the 18th International AIDS Conference, gathering the UN agency UNAIDS and Stop TB, a public-private health partnership.

They pledged to work towards halving the mortality from TB/HIV in 2015 compared to a base line of 2004, a year in which 400,000 people died.

"We are talking about a massive human tragedy," the executive secretary of Stop TB, Marcos Espinal, told AFP. "African countries in particular have been devastated by co-infection."

Espinal estimated that several billion dollars each year would be needed to reach the 2015 objective, but said much of this could come from smarter use of existing resources.

"There is a package of activities that if properly implemented by countries will work," he said.

Several dozen activists demonstrated before the event, pounding drums and holding up a black coffin symbolising the death toll from co-infection by the two microbes.

In the middle of the past decade, researchers uncovered the dismaying consequence from these two overlapping pandemics: people who were co-infected were often placed on the fast track to deaths.

TB is a lung disease that is caused by a germ, Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Around two billion people around the world are infected by the bacteria, but the vast majority never fall sick. A far smaller number -- nine million a year -- develop symptoms of the disease.

However, the risk doubles when an individual is infected by HIV, which weakens the immune system, allowing the germ to run riot.

Without TB treatment, which costs around 25 dollars a person, 90 percent of co-infected people die within a matter of months. Of the two million deaths that occur from HIV infection each year, around one in four is linked to TB.

Alasdair Reid, HIV/TB advisor at UNAIDS, said tackling co-infections could to a large degree be done through simple measures and under existing guidelines.

Investment in health clinics and labs should focus on facilities that can diagnose and treat both infections at the same time.

Frontline careworkers should be trained to ask a patient with HIV whether he has been coughing recently, to see whether antibiotics should be initiated. There is a test for detect TB, but it is largely ineffective for patients with with HIV.

"We already have the tools to keep people living with HIV from dying of TB," said UNAIDS Executive Director Michel Sidibe.

The strategy set by UNAIDS and Stop TB will be essentially an awareness campaign.

The two agencies' chiefs will make at least two joint visits to countries badly hit by co-infection each year to lobby for action, and to showcase the initiative in at least one international forum per year.

South Africa bids for UN Security Council seat

UNITED NATIONS — Invoking Nelson Mandela's legacy, South Africa's foreign minister made a global appeal Friday for her country's bid to secure a non-permanent seat on the UN Security Council in 2011-2012.

As the world prepares to celebrate the first Nelson Mandela International Day on the anti-apartheid hero's 92nd birthday Sunday, Maite Nkoana-Mashabane urged all UN members to back South Africa's efforts to return to the 15-member council.

"We ask for support of all (UN) member countries for South Africa's membership once again in the Security council," she told reporters at UN headquarters.

The powerful council has five permanent veto-wielding members -- Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States -- and 10 non-permanent members elected to serve two-year terms. South Africa last sat on the council in 2007-2008.

"We believe we would want in Mandela's name to continue to contribute to peacemaking, peacekeeping, peace maintenance" not only in Africa but around the world, said the South African minister.

She earlier attended a UN Security Council debate on conflict prevention chaired by her Nigerian counterpart Henry Odein Ajumogobia.

The UN General Assembly meanwhile held an informal session in honor of Mandela, with its president, former Libyan foreign minister Ali Triki, saying that Sunday's celebration of Mandela International Day was "a call to action to make the world a better place, one day at a time."

South Africa's elder statesman is to celebrate his birthday at his Johannesburg home with his family and nearly 100 children from villages around his childhood home in the rural Eastern Cape province.

Last November, the UN General Assembly decided that Nelson Mandela International Day would be observed every year on his birthday, July 18, in recognition of his "outstanding contribution" to the creation of a "non-racial, non-sexist, democratic South Africa."

Rapid weight loss best way to slim down: studies

STOCKHOLM — Losing a lot of weight at once is the best way to permanently slim down, studies presented at Stockholm's International Congress on Obesity showed, going against accepted wisdom even among doctors.

Katrina Purcell of the University of Melbourne in Australia, presented a study in which she compared a rapid diet to lose around 1.5 kilos (three pounds) a week over 12 weeks, to a gradual 36-week diet to lose 0.5 kilos per week.

"Surprisingly, and against current beliefs, this study shows rapid weight loss appears to be superior to gradual weight loss in achieving target weight," she said of the study conducted on subjects weighing around 100 kilos.

Her results showed that 78 percent of those on the rapid diet achieved the target of losing 15 percent of their body weight within the determined period, while only 48 percent of those on the gradual diet met the target.

One of the reasons, she said, is psychological and has to do with motivation.

On the rapid diet, "subjects lose 1.5 kg a week and that keeps them going. On the gradual diet, when you lose 0.5 kg now and then" motivation is harder to keep, she said.

In fact, four of the participants following the gradual diet gave up before the end of the experiment, against only one in the rapid diet group.

Purcell is however quick to warn against so-called crash diets, in which weight is lost very quickly by drastically slashing calories.

"Don't do it by yourself, do it with a dietician," she cautioned.

But her study carried a heavy handicap: it does not say what happened to participants after the initial weight loss, with many doctors and dieticians believing that more weight loss is related to more weight gain thereafter, and therefore less weight maintenance.

That is why the researcher is currently following the two groups to see who of the rapid or gradual dieters best keeps the weight off for good. Those results are expected in about three years.

But already, the Netherlands' National Institute for Public Health and the Environment has studied the link between the amount of weight lost during a weight loss programme and the maintenance of the weight loss afterwards.

According to the institute's study, also presented at the conference in Stockholm, 54 percent of those who went down in size during a weight loss programme kept the kilos off, regardless of the amount initially lost.

Furthermore, the study found that net weight loss one year after the intervention was higher for those with a higher initial weight loss.

That means "weight loss of 10 percent or more should be encouraged and favoured above lower weight losses," researcher Jeroen Barte said, adding that his team's findings "dispel a myth."

The researcher however warned "more research is need to determine optimal weight loss targets, and to establish best practices for optimal maintenance of weight losses."

And despite her findings, Katrina Purcell continues to advocate long-term diets because they imply a life-long change in eating habits.

In fact, researchers agree that eating and lifestyle habits are among the main culprits contributing to obesity.

At the congress, experts advocated controlling portion sizes, fighting against aggressive marketing from the food industry, product reformulation to lower salt and sugar contents, different fiscal measures and labelling menus for calorie content.

"We need a cultural change," summed up Bruce Silverglade of the International Association of Consumer food organisations (IACFO), an association of non-governmental organisations.

NBA's Miami Heat throws a party for its new stars

MIAMI — The Miami Heat officially welcomed LeBron James to south Florida in a glitzy ceremony in their home town arena that featured James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh signing their new contracts.

The former free-agent trio wore their white Heat uniforms to the welcoming bash in front of a crowd of 13,000 Miami fans at American Airlines Arena.

"It feels right," James said. "When we step on the floor, every single night, we're going to make the world know that the Heat is back."

The event took place one day after reigning two-time MVP James announced he would be joining the Heat.

James' made-for-TV event, in which he dictated the terms of the broadcast to ESPN, attracted plenty of criticism, including a scathing letter from Cleveland Cavaliers owner Dan Gilbert who accused James of quitting on the team in last year's playoffs. James did not talk personally to the owner before making his decision.

But Cleveland's loss is Miami's gain and the Heat couldn't be happier.

James' jerseys were being sold Friday as soon as they could be taken out of the box. A line of fans formed around the arena Friday morning hoping to put their names on a waiting list to buy tickets.

The switchboard at American Airlines Arena was overwhelmed for much of the day, and the 13,000 free seats for the welcoming bash were gone in an hour.

Fans lucky enough to get inside for the party chanted "Beat LA! Beat LA!" referring to dethroning the reigning NBA champion Los Angeles Lakers.

"It's going to be amazing to be on the court and to know that connection that we have," Wade said. "It's just a look, but it's time to turn it on. I feel sorry for whoever has to guard both of us."

Heat president Pat Riley was in attendance. James, Wade and Bosh sat on a stage and were interviewed about the upcoming season.

"It's still surreal, man," Wade said. "Me, Chris and 'Bron. We ready. We want to go to the gym now."

"This is surpassing a dream come true," Wade said. "You always want to put yourself in the best position possible. To have an opportunity to team up with arguably the best trio to ever play the game of basketball is amazing."

Said Bosh, "We wanted to come here, then LeBron wanted to come. Let's get it done, man. Let's get this thing going."

James will wear No. 6 instead of his usual 23. Bosh will wear No. 1 instead of No. 4

Wade said the NBA's newest star lineup can handle the hype.

"Yeah, it's going to be Hollywood down here," Wade said. "But when we step on the court, it's going to be about business. And everyone who wants to be part of this organization is going to have to make that sacrifice."

Federal court presses Canada on Guantanamo inmate

OTTAWA — Canada's federal court on Monday gave the government up to seven days to remedy its breach of Guantanamo inmate Omar Khadr's rights.

In its ruling, the federal court said the government has so far failed to suitably rectify the transgression, even after being ordered to do so by Canada's highest court at the start of the year.

Khadr is entitled to "procedural fairness and natural justice," judge Russell Zinn said in his decision. "The steps taken to date were found not to remedy the breach."

"Canada is expected to continue advancing potential curative and ameliorative remedies until the breach of Mr. Khadr?s Charter rights have been cured, or if no cure is possible, until the breach has been ameliorated, or if there is no remedy, until it has exhausted all possible remedies," he said.

The judge ordered both Ottawa and Khadr to weigh in on possible remedies. If his deadline lapses with no change in Khadr's situation, the federal court said it may step in and impose a remedy, such as ordering Ottawa to seek his repatriation.

US forces in Afghanistan took Khadr prisoner when he was just 15 years old in July 2002. He was later charged with war crimes for allegedly throwing a grenade that killed a US soldier.

The last Westerner at the US naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, Khadr, now 23, is to have his case heard by a US military tribunal on August 10.

The US government alleges that Khadr killed a US soldier with a grenade in 2002 after rising from the rubble of an Al-Qaeda compound, the lone survivor of a four-hour US bombardment.

Khadr has denied throwing the grenade that killed the soldier, and reportedly turned down a plea offer in April that would have meant five years in a US prison for war crimes.

The Canadian government has steadfastly refused to seek his repatriation, saying it preferred to allow the US proceedings to run their course, despite pressure from opposition parties and rights groups.

In February, Ottawa asked the United States not to use shared evidence to prosecute Khadr, after Canada's high court ruled sharing his statements to Canadian officials with Washington breached his rights.

The United States did not accede to Canada's request.

Canada's high court pointed in its January decision to three interrogations of Khadr by Canadian foreign affairs and spy agency officials in 2003 and 2004, in one case after he had been deprived of sleep to make him more inclined to talk.

The extracted statements were shared with US authorities, and could "prove inculpatory in upcoming proceedings against him," it said.

The high court, however, also left it up to Ottawa to decide on a remedy, citing the government's prerogative over foreign relations.

The latest judgment comes after Khadr's lawyers asked the federal court to review the government's response to the Supreme Court ruling.

Netanyahu rules out apology to Turkey over deadly raid

JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday praised secret talks with Ankara aimed at mending ties after a deadly raid on a Gaza-bound Turkish aid ship but ruled out any apology.

On May 31, Israeli special forces stormed a flotilla of six ships carrying aid for blockaded Gaza, killing nine Turks on board one of the vessels and sparking international outrage and straining ties with one-time ally Ankara.

"Israel cannot apologise because its soldiers had to defend themselves to avoid being lynched by a crowd," Netanyahu said in an interview with Channel 1 public television.

"We regret the loss of life," Netanyahu said.

The raid on the Mavi Marmara Turkish-owned ferry killed eight Turks and a dual US-Turkish citizen, prompting Ankara to recall its ambassador from Tel Aviv and cancel three planned joint military exercises.

Netanyahu's remarks come two days after Trade Minister Benjamin Ben Eliezer and Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu held secret talks in Brussels, to try and ease the feud sparked by the deadly raid.

Netanyahu praised the talks.

"This meeting was important in itself. It is important for Turkey and for Israel that such meetings take place to prevent the deterioration of relations," he said.

Davutoglu told Ben Eliezer in Brussels that Turkey demanded an apology for the bloodshed and that Israel should compensate the families of the victims as well as agree to an international inquiry into the raid, Turkish foreign ministry spokesman Burak Ozugergin has said.

But Netanyahu said that no compensation has been discussed and insisted that a commission set up by Israel to investigate the raid "meets the demands" of the international community for an investigation.

Israel has resisted calls for an international probe into the raid, but appointed a commission of inquiry headed by a retired Supreme Court judge with two international observers.

"This commission has asked for widespread prerogatives and we have agreed to its request because we have nothing to hide," said Netanyahu.

The Israeli military also has launched its own internal investigation.

Israel has defended the raid by its special forces saying it had to stop vessels from travelling to Gaza since they could be carrying weapons for the Islamist Hamas rulers of the blockaded coastal enclave.

Meanwhile, the Brussels talks have sparked tensions in Israel as it emerged that Netanyahu gave the go-ahead for the meeting without informing hardline Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman.

On Friday, Netanyahu met Lieberman to mend ties.

At the meeting, Lieberman reiterated that he does not want Israel to apologise or pay the compensation Turkey is seeking, saying it would harm Israel's international standing, an official said.

Elsewhere, Netanyahu said that during a visit to Washington next week for talks with US President Barack Obama he will discuss Iran's nuclear programme and peace talks with the Palestinians.

"I will do everything possible to stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons, and to promote the peace process," with the Palestinians, Netanyahu said of his July 6 talks with Obama.

Netanyahu had to cancel a scheduled meeting with Obama to return home after the deadly May 31 raid.

US State Department spokesman Philip Crowley said on Thursday that he anticipated Netanyahu would give Obama "a report on the early stages of the Israeli investigation into the flotilla tragedy."