Sudan: Many Voters Register for Elections

Sudanese are registering in substantial numbers for their first multi-party elections in 24 years, although opposition is citing irregularities and those displaced from Darfur are refusing to take part unless peace is established, reports Le Potentiel of Kinshasa.

Registration began in November, without much enthusiasm in Khartoum and other regions. Surprisingly, 11 million voters have signed up to the roll and the authorities have extended the registration period to December 7.

"This is a very high and unexpected result," a source who preferred to remain anonymous said. "There has been a high turnout from most regions."

A South Sudanese electoral commission spokesman, Mac Maika, told Agence France-Presse: "There has been a great shift from what we experienced at the beginning." But he said ethnic tensions and the accessibility of remote villages had been a problem in the south.

The Carter Center of Altanta in the United States, an independent electoral monitoring organization, expressed concern that inequalities still exist as a result of lack of registration infrastucture in some area.

FIFA to increase prize money for World Cup Finals teams

The soccer's world governing body FIFA said on Thursday that the prize money for the 2010 World Cup teams would be increased by 60 percent.

After a meeting on Robben Island, South Africa, FIFA's executive committee approved the increase in prize money for the 2010 World Cup finals teams in South Africa from 261 million to 420 million US dollars.

FIFA secretary general Jerome Valcke said the winner will take home 31 million while each of the 32 teams will receive at least 9million from the first round.

China, Canada sign green deal

Canada and China signed a series of agreements on issues including climate change Thursday, during a visit by Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper aimed at jump-starting ties between the two countries.

Harper held talks with Chinese leaders on the second day of his four-day visit, during which both sides called for an improvement in ties that have languished in recent years.

For years, Harper's government has been outspoken in criticizing Beijing over its human rights record and allegations of Chinese spying, sparking fears in the Canadian business community of a potential backlash in trade ties.

"Canada has great advantages in the fields of environmental protection, green economy and energy and chemistry,"Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao told Harper.

Harper told China's President Hu Jintao in earlier talks that there was "great potential"in further developing trade and economic relations.

After the talks, ministers from China and Canada signed five agreements, including a renewed memorandum on mineral resources and a memorandum of understanding on climate change, just days ahead of UN talks in Copenhagen aimed at tackling global warming.

Harper will also visit Shanghai and Hong Kong.

Ancient Volcano's Devastating Effects Confirmed

A massive volcanic eruption that occurred in the distant past killed off much of central India's forests and may have pushed humans to the brink of extinction, according to a new study that adds evidence to a controversial topic.

The Toba eruption, which took place on the island of Sumatra in Indonesia about 73,000 years ago, released an estimated 800 cubic kilometers of ash into the atmosphere that blanketed the skies and blocked out sunlight for six years. In the aftermath, global temperatures dropped by as much as 16 degrees centigrade (28 degrees Fahrenheit) and life on Earth plunged deeper into an ice age that lasted around 1,800 years.

In 1998, Stanley Ambrose, an anthropology professor at the University of Illinois, proposed in the Journal of Human Evolution that the effects of the Toba eruption and the Ice Age that followed could explain the apparent bottleneck in human populations that geneticists believe occurred between 50,000 and 100,000 years ago. The lack of genetic diversity among humans alive today suggests that during this time period humans came very close to becoming extinct.

To test his theory, Ambrose and his research team analyzed pollen from a marine core in the Bay of Bengal that had a layer of ash from the Toba eruption. The researchers also compared carbon isotope ratios in fossil soil taken from directly above and below the Toba ash in three locations in central India — some 3,000 miles from the volcano — to pinpoint the type of vegetation that existed at various locations and time periods.

Heavily forested regions leave carbon isotope fingerprints that are distinct from those of grasses or grassy woodlands.

The tests revealed a distinct change in the type of vegetation in India immediately after the Toba eruption. The researchers write in the journal Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology that their analysis indicates a shift to a "more open vegetation cover and reduced representation of ferns," which grow in humid conditions, all of which "would suggest significantly drier conditions in this region for at least 1,000 years after the Toba eruption."

The dryness probably also indicates a drop in temperature "because when you turn down the temperature you also turn down the rainfall," Ambrose said. "This is unambiguous evidence that Toba caused deforestation in the tropics for a long time."

He also concluded that the disaster may have forced the ancestors of modern humans to adopt new cooperative strategies for survival that eventually permitted them to replace Neanderthals and other archaic human species.

Although humans survived the event, researchers have detected increasing activity underneath a caldera at Yellowstone National Park, where some suspect another supervolcanic eruption will eventually take place. Though not expected to occur anytime soon, a Yellowstone eruption could coat half the United States in a layer of ash up to 3 feet (1 meter) deep.

US Marines launch large offensive in Afghanistan

By ALFRED de MONTESQUIOU, Associated Press Writer

KABUL – U.S. Marines and Afghan troops on Friday launched the first offensive since President Barack Obama announced an American troop surge, striking against Taliban communications and supply lines in a southern insurgent stronghold, a military spokesman said.

Hundreds of troops from the 3rd Battalion, 4th Marines and the Marine reconnaissance unit Task Force Raider were dropped by helicopter and MV-22 Osprey aircraft behind Taliban lines in the northern end of the Now Zad Valley of Helmand province, scene of heavy fighting last summer, according to Marine spokesman Maj. William Pelletier.

A U.S. military official in Washington said it was the first use of Ospreys, aircrafts that combine features of helicopters and fixed wing aircraft, in an offensive involving units larger than platoons.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to detail the operation, said that Ospreys have previously been used for intelligence and patrol operations.

A second, larger force pushed northward from the Marines' Forward Operating Base in the town of Now Zad, Pelletier said. Combat engineers were forcing a corridor through Taliban minefields with armored steamrollers and explosives, Pelletier said.

In all, about 1,000 Marines as well as Afghan troops were taking part in the operation, known as "Cobra's Anger," he said.

There were no reports of NATO casualties. The spokesman for the Afghan governor of Helmand province, Daood Ahmadi, said the bodies of four slain Taliban had been recovered. Ahmadi said 150 Afghan troops were taking part in the operation, which had located more than 300 mines and roadside bombs by Friday evening.

The operation began three days after Obama announced that he was sending 30,000 reinforcements to Afghanistan to help turn the tide against the Taliban. America's European allies will send an estimated 7,000 more troops to Afghanistan next year "with more to come," NATO chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen announced Friday.

Most of the new troops are expected to be sent to southern Afghanistan, including Helmand, where Taliban influence is strongest.

The new offensive aims to cut off the Taliban communication routes through Helmand and disrupt their supply lines, especially those providing explosives for the numerous lethal roadside bombs, or improvised explosive devices, that litter the area, known by Marines as "IED Alley."

Pelletier said several arms caches and at least 400 pounds of explosive materials had been found so far Friday.

"Right now, the enemy is confused and disorganized," Pelletier said by telephone from Camp Leatherneck, the main Marines base in Helmand. "They're fighting, but not too effectively."

Pelletier said insurgents were caught off guard by the early morning air assault.

Now Zad used to be one of the largest towns in Helmand province, the center of Afghanistan's lucrative opium poppy growing industry.

However, three years of fighting have chased away Now Zad's 30,000 inhabitants, leaving the once-thriving market and commercial area a ghost town.

British troops who were once stationed there left graffiti dubbing the town "Apocalypse Now-Zad," a play on the title of the 1979 Vietnam War movie Apocalypse Now. The British base was nearly overrun on several occasions with insurgents coming within yards (meters) of the protection wall. The area was handed over in 2008 to the Marines, who have struggled to reclaim much of the valley.

In August, the Marines launched their first large-scale offensive in the barren, wind-swept and opium-poppy growing valley surrounded by steep cliffs with dozens of caves providing cover to Taliban units.

More than 100 hardline insurgents are believed to operate in the area, their positions so solid that a fixed frontline runs just a few hundred yards (meters) north of the Marines' base, according to Associated Press reporters who were with the Marines there last summer.

Solar plane pioneer says first short flight OK

GENEVA – A Swiss adventurer said his first flight using a prototype of a solar-powered plane he will try to fly around the world in was successful.

The short, low altitude flight at a Swiss airfield Thursday proved the prototype can fly, said adventurer Bertrand Piccard, pilot of the first hot-air balloon to fly nonstop around the world.

"It was absolutely great to see this plane in the air," Piccard told The Associated Press. "It's a completely new flight domain. There has never been an airplane so big and so light flying with so little energy."

The "Solar Impulse," which has a wingspan of a Boeing 747 but weighs less than a small car, flew 1,150 feet (350 meters) at just one meter above the ground, Piccard said.

"The goal was not to make a big flight, but to see if this airplane is behaving the way the engineers designed it," he said. "And the result was excellent.

"On the other hand, we see how long the road is still before we fly around the world with it," Piccard said.

Solar panels will be attached next year for the first flight at night powered by solar energy, followed by a series of other tests, he said.

Piccard and co-pilot Andre Borschberg will alternate in the cockpit when they try to take the plane around the world in 2012.

Piccard set a world record in 1999 when he and Brian Jones of Britain took their balloon, Breitling Orbiter III, on a 20-day circumnavigation of the globe — an achievement that had eluded many before them, including tycoons Steve Fossett and Richard Branson.

Cruise companies expand their fleets

PORT EVERGLADES, Fla., Dec. 4 (UPI) -- The Oasis of the Seas berthed in Florida -- with 24 restaurants -- sets the stage cautiously for a wave of bigger cruise ships, industry executives said.

The massive ship, scheduled to set sale Saturday with 5,400 passengers and 12,000 plants and trees on board, cost Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. $1.4 billion to build, but will end up with "one of the highest returns on investment our industry has ever seen," Chief Executive Officer Richard Fain said.

Royal Caribbean has plans to add a sister ship, Allure of the Seas, to its fleet next year and other companies, not quite as grandly, are joining in the race, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday.

Carnival Corp. said it had placed a $750 million order this week for a ship similar to its 3,650- passenger Carnival Dream, which it launched in September. Norwegian Cruise Line, the third largest cruise company, said it is going ahead with a $1.2 billion vessel that can carry 4,200 guests.

With a life expectancy of 30 years, executives are taking the long view of their investments. Per passenger earnings are down this year, but "big ups and big downs" are expected, Fain said.