AP, WASHINGTON: The Obama administration on Tuesday condemned "appalling" violence in Libya, where security forces unleashed a bloody crackdown on protesters demanding the ouster of longtime leader Moammar Gadhafi.
"This violence is completely unacceptable," Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said. "We believe that the government of Libya bears responsibility for what is occurring and must take actions to end the violence."
But as it sought to safely extricate U.S. diplomats and other Americans from the spreading chaos, Washington stopped short of criticizing Gadhafi personally or demanding that he step down. U.S. officials who spoke to the matter publicly on Tuesday, including Clinton, would not mention Gadhafi by name.
Unease over the safety of U.S. citizens intensified after attempts to get some out on Monday and Tuesday were unsuccessful amid concern about Gadhafi's unpredictable behavior, and late Tuesday the State Department announced that American citizens would be evacuated from Libya by ferry to the Mediterranean island of Malta.
In a notice sent to U.S. citizens in Libya, the department said Americans wishing to leave the country should be at the As-shahab port in Tripoli with their passports starting at 9 a.m. local time Wednesday for a departure no later than 3 p.m. local time.
The mercurial Gadhafi — once termed the "mad dog of the Middle East" by President Ronald Reagan — has long flummoxed U.S. officials. He is notoriously unpredictable and has been known to fly into rages at real or perceived slights.
The Obama administration did not outline any specific steps to coerce or punish the Libyan regime, with which the U.S. has built a wary partnership after years of branding Gadhafi a terrorist sponsor. After decades of hostility, the U.S. and Libya normalized ties during President George W. Bush's presidency after Gadhafi renounced terrorism and weapons of mass destruction but relations have been far from fully cordial.
U.S. officials said Washington would join other nations to address Libyan behavior at the U.N. Security Council. They renewed calls for Gadhafi's government to talk with opponents, and cast the political unrest there as part of a regional uprising against political and economic stagnation that must be addressed by the Arab governments of the Middle East and North Africa.
Gadhafi delivered a defiant speech on national television in which he vowed he will not step aside. He said he would die a martyr's death fighting those rebelling against his 42-year-old rule. The address was filled with references to his standing up to the United States and other world powers and threats to execute protesters.
In addition to the tone, the speech unnerved U.S. officials because it was delivered in front of the rubble of the Tripoli compound that the U.S. bombed in 1986, killing Gadhafi's young daughter. As he spoke state-run television repeatedly showed a courtyard statue of a clenched fist crushing a U.S. fighter jet.
With the potential for Gadhafi to foment anti-American or anti-western sentiment and Libya teetering on the brink of what some fear will explode into a full-blown civil war, administration officials repeatedly invoked their primary concern of ensuring the safety of U.S. citizens there.
"As always, the safety and well-being of Americans has to be our highest priority. We are in touch with many Libyan officials directly and indirectly and with other governments in the region to try to influence what is going on inside Libya," Clinton told reporters at the State Department.
Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said U.S. officials had been assured by Libyan authorities that embassy workers and families will be able to leave safely. He said the United States expected those pledges to be honored.
"They've pledged to support us in our evacuation, and we hope that cooperation will be forthcoming," he said.
Crowley said the department was trying to get 35 nonessential staff and family members of personnel at the U.S. Embassy in Libya out of the country. The State Department ordered them to leave on Monday but they have not yet been able to depart, he said without elaborating on the reason.
The department also believes there are several thousand dual U.S.-Libyan nationals and about 600 private U.S. citizens in Libya. Crowley said the U.S. was working with other countries and airlines to increase the capacity of commercial flights and was also prepared to charter planes if necessary. But he noted that would require Libyan consent.
In January, the U.S. ambassador to Libya, Gene Cretz, was recalled to Washington for consultations amid concerns that his detailed accounting of Gadhafi's eccentricities in secret diplomatic cables published by the website WikiLeaks would compromise his ability to work with the Libyan government. More than a month later, Cretz has yet to return to Libya.
In 2010, Crowley was forced to apologize for a joking remark he made about Gadhafi's rambling speech to the U.N. General Assembly a year earlier. Libya had threatened diplomatic retaliation unless he apologized.
Asked about Gadhafi's fiery speech on Tuesday, Crowley demurred.
"We want to see the bloodshed stopped," he said. "We want to see the government engage its citizens, rather than attack its citizens."
"This is ultimately and fundamentally an issue between the Libyan government, its leader and the Libyan people," Crowley said. "They, like others, are standing up and demanding a greater say in the events of their country. We have grave concerns about the Libyan response to these protesters."
Earlier, White House spokesman Jay Carney called on Gadhafi's regime to respect the universal rights of its citizens and allow peaceful protests to take place. Echoing earlier White House statements about anti-government protests in Egypt, he said the future of Libya needs to be decided by the Libyan people.
Meanwhile, top lawmakers said the U.S. should consider imposing new sanctions on the regime and called for foreign energy companies to immediately shut down operations in the oil-rich North African nation.
Sen. John Kerry, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called the violent crackdown "cowardly" and "beyond despicable." He urged U.S. and international oil companies to immediately suspend their Libyan operations until attacks on civilians stop.
The Massachusetts Democrat also called on the Obama administration to consider re-imposing sanctions against Libya that were lifted by President George W. Bush after Gadhafi renounced terrorism and abandoned development of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.
Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., called for the administration to support a no-fly zone over Libya to prevent air attacks.
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Fla., chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, also called for the imposition of new sanctions, including asset freezes and travel bans on senior Libyan officials.
"The Libyan regime's widespread attacks on the Libyan people are deplorable, and all responsible for these attacks must be held to account," she said in a statement.
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Security Council condemns Libya crackdown
AP, UNITED NATIONS: The U.N. Security Council further isolated Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi on Tuesday, condemning his regime's crackdown on anti-government protesters and demanding that violence against civilians end immediately.
A press statement agreed by all 15 members of the U.N.'s most powerful body expressed "grave concern" at the situation in Libya, "deplored the repression against peaceful demonstrators, and expressed deep regret at the deaths of hundreds of civilians."
The council called for an "immediate end to the violence and for steps to address the legitimate demands of the population, including through national dialogue."
The council issued the statement after several hours of closed consultations.
It came hours after Gadhafi vowed in a television address to keep fighting to his "last drop of blood" and urged his supporters to take to the streets, setting the stage for even more deadly violence.
Council members said the Libyan government should "meet its responsibility to protect its population," act with restraint, and respect human rights and international humanitarian law. They said the Libyan government should hold accountable those people, including government forces, who have attacked civilians.
International human rights monitors and humanitarian agencies should be given immediate access, council members said. They appealed for humanitarian assistance amid reports of shortages of medical supplies to treat the wounded.
Council members also said Libyan government needed to respect the rights of its citizens to peaceful assembly, free expression and press freedom.
British Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant, among five permanent council members with veto power, said the statement was "extremely strong" and indicated more action was likely coming.
Lyall Grant said the body would ask for action next week by the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva. There have been demands that Libya's seat on the rights council be withdrawn.
"No doubt we will be meeting again and reviewing what further measures may be appropriate in the light of events," Lyall Grant said.
The international community has spoken in "one clear and unified voice" for the bloodshed in Libya to end, said Ambassador Rosemary DiCarlo, deputy representative for the U.S., another permanent council member. She said her country hoped for "an immediate end to this unacceptable situation."
Still, a stronger action would have been a "presidential statement," which becomes part of the council's record.
Philippe Bolopion, the U.N. advocacy director for Human Rights Watch, said the action was a "positive first step" that nevertheless "falls short of the firm action needed to prevent large-scale atrocities." He said the body should also impose a travel ban and asset freeze on senior Libyan officials and military commanders found responsible for grave human rights violations.
Libya's deputy U.N. ambassador Ibrahim Dabbashi, who has called for Gadhafi to step down, said the statement was "not strong enough" but still "a good message to the regime in Libya about stopping the bloodshed."
Dabbashi and other diplomats at Libya's U.N. mission are at odds with Ambassador Mohamed Shalgham, who on Tuesday called Gadhafi "my friend" and said he had been speaking hourly with top government officials appealing for the violence to end.
In signs of waning support for the Libyan strongman inside his own government, the Libyan ambassador to the U.S. has also urged Gadhafi to step down, and the ambassadors to India and Bangladesh have resigned.
"There's no other solution," Ambassador Ali Aujali, Libya's ambassador in Washington, told The Associated Press. "He should step down and give the chance for the people to make their future."
The council issued its statement after meeting several hours of closed consultations, included briefings by Ambassador Shalgam, and U.N. Undersecretary-General B. Lynn Pascoe, who oversees political affairs. "The situation is deteriorating and can get much worse," Pascoe told reporters after the briefing.
The U.N. political chief expressed "huge concern" at Gadhafi's speech and warned that "asking some people to attack other people, particularly if some of those are peaceful demonstrators, is a very dangerous thing."
Gadhafi's security forces have unleashed the most deadly crackdown of any Arab country against the wave of protests sweeping the region. The eruption of turmoil in the capital of Tripoli has especially escalated the challenge to Gadhafi's 40-year rule.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he spoke to Gadhafi on Monday for 40 minutes and "forcefully urged him to stop violence against demonstrators and again strongly underlined the importance of respecting the human rights of those demonstrators."
On Tuesday, the U.N. chief discussed the Libyan situation with the emir of Qatar. U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky said they agreed on the need for Arab leaders and the U.N. to call for an immediate end to the violence, and for the launch of a broad-based dialogue.
Ban has expressed outrage at what he described as "very disturbing and shocking scenes" of Libyan authorities firing at demonstrators from warplanes and helicopters.
___
Associated Press writers Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations, Raquel Maria Dillon in Beverly Hills, California, and Douglass K. Daniel and Bradley Klapper in Washington contributed to this report along with writers at AP bureaus.
A press statement agreed by all 15 members of the U.N.'s most powerful body expressed "grave concern" at the situation in Libya, "deplored the repression against peaceful demonstrators, and expressed deep regret at the deaths of hundreds of civilians."
The council called for an "immediate end to the violence and for steps to address the legitimate demands of the population, including through national dialogue."
The council issued the statement after several hours of closed consultations.
It came hours after Gadhafi vowed in a television address to keep fighting to his "last drop of blood" and urged his supporters to take to the streets, setting the stage for even more deadly violence.
Council members said the Libyan government should "meet its responsibility to protect its population," act with restraint, and respect human rights and international humanitarian law. They said the Libyan government should hold accountable those people, including government forces, who have attacked civilians.
International human rights monitors and humanitarian agencies should be given immediate access, council members said. They appealed for humanitarian assistance amid reports of shortages of medical supplies to treat the wounded.
Council members also said Libyan government needed to respect the rights of its citizens to peaceful assembly, free expression and press freedom.
British Ambassador Mark Lyall Grant, among five permanent council members with veto power, said the statement was "extremely strong" and indicated more action was likely coming.
Lyall Grant said the body would ask for action next week by the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva. There have been demands that Libya's seat on the rights council be withdrawn.
"No doubt we will be meeting again and reviewing what further measures may be appropriate in the light of events," Lyall Grant said.
The international community has spoken in "one clear and unified voice" for the bloodshed in Libya to end, said Ambassador Rosemary DiCarlo, deputy representative for the U.S., another permanent council member. She said her country hoped for "an immediate end to this unacceptable situation."
Still, a stronger action would have been a "presidential statement," which becomes part of the council's record.
Philippe Bolopion, the U.N. advocacy director for Human Rights Watch, said the action was a "positive first step" that nevertheless "falls short of the firm action needed to prevent large-scale atrocities." He said the body should also impose a travel ban and asset freeze on senior Libyan officials and military commanders found responsible for grave human rights violations.
Libya's deputy U.N. ambassador Ibrahim Dabbashi, who has called for Gadhafi to step down, said the statement was "not strong enough" but still "a good message to the regime in Libya about stopping the bloodshed."
Dabbashi and other diplomats at Libya's U.N. mission are at odds with Ambassador Mohamed Shalgham, who on Tuesday called Gadhafi "my friend" and said he had been speaking hourly with top government officials appealing for the violence to end.
In signs of waning support for the Libyan strongman inside his own government, the Libyan ambassador to the U.S. has also urged Gadhafi to step down, and the ambassadors to India and Bangladesh have resigned.
"There's no other solution," Ambassador Ali Aujali, Libya's ambassador in Washington, told The Associated Press. "He should step down and give the chance for the people to make their future."
The council issued its statement after meeting several hours of closed consultations, included briefings by Ambassador Shalgam, and U.N. Undersecretary-General B. Lynn Pascoe, who oversees political affairs. "The situation is deteriorating and can get much worse," Pascoe told reporters after the briefing.
The U.N. political chief expressed "huge concern" at Gadhafi's speech and warned that "asking some people to attack other people, particularly if some of those are peaceful demonstrators, is a very dangerous thing."
Gadhafi's security forces have unleashed the most deadly crackdown of any Arab country against the wave of protests sweeping the region. The eruption of turmoil in the capital of Tripoli has especially escalated the challenge to Gadhafi's 40-year rule.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he spoke to Gadhafi on Monday for 40 minutes and "forcefully urged him to stop violence against demonstrators and again strongly underlined the importance of respecting the human rights of those demonstrators."
On Tuesday, the U.N. chief discussed the Libyan situation with the emir of Qatar. U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky said they agreed on the need for Arab leaders and the U.N. to call for an immediate end to the violence, and for the launch of a broad-based dialogue.
Ban has expressed outrage at what he described as "very disturbing and shocking scenes" of Libyan authorities firing at demonstrators from warplanes and helicopters.
___
Associated Press writers Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations, Raquel Maria Dillon in Beverly Hills, California, and Douglass K. Daniel and Bradley Klapper in Washington contributed to this report along with writers at AP bureaus.
NZ earthquake death toll at 75 as search continues
AP, CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand: Rescuers used their bare hands, dogs, and heavy machines Wednesday in an urgent search for survivors still trapped in crumbled buildings more than 24 hours after an earthquake devastated one of New Zealand's largest cities.
The confirmed death toll from Tuesday's magnitude-6.3 quake centered near Christchurch rose to 75, and officials said it was almost sure to climb further. Some 300 people were listed as missing.
Prime Minister John Key declared a national state of emergency as hundreds of soldiers, police and other emergency workers — including specialist teams from the U.S. and other countries — rushed to Christchurch.
Parts of the city of 350,000 people lay in ruins, and all corners of it were suffering cuts to water supplies, power and phones. The city was virtually shut down Wednesday, with officials urging residents to stay inside their homes.
The immediate focus was on about a dozen buildings downtown where finding survivors was still a possibility. In other places, rubble was being left untouched — even if bodies were thought buried there — until the urgency of the survivor search passes.
Near the smoldering remains of the Cantebury Television building, brother and sister Kent and Lizzy Manning sat on a rain-sodden patch of grass Wednesday waiting for news of their mother, Donna, a television presenter who they hadn't heard from since the quake.
"My mum is superwoman, she'd do anything," said Lizzy Manning, 18, with tears running down her face.
At that moment, a police official knelt down beside the pair.
"I have some horrible news ...," the officer began, before telling the siblings that there was no hope for anyone left trapped inside the building.
The siblings bowed their heads and wept. Their father rushed over and enclosed them in an embrace.
Officials pointed thermal cameras into the wreckage, and sniffer dogs clambered on top looking for signs of life. Officials at one point said they believed they had found a pocket of at least 15 people buried alive in one building — but the report turned out to be false.
Mayor Bob Parker said early Wednesday that 120 people were rescued from wrecked buildings as teams worked through the night, while more bodies were also recovered. About 300 people were still unaccounted for, but this did not mean they were all still trapped, he said.
Some survivors emerged without a scratch, while others had to have a limb amputated before they could be freed.
"There are bodies littering the streets, they are trapped in cars, crushed under rubble and where they are clearly deceased our focus ... has turned to the living," police Superintendent Russell Gibson said.
Military units patrolled near-empty streets disfigured by the huge cracks and canyons created in Tuesday's earthquake, the second powerful temblor to hit the city in five months. The quake toppled the spire of the city's historic stone cathedral and flattened tall buildings.
Parker said an unknown number of people, possibly 20 or more, were believed to have been inside the cathedral tower — climbing it was a popular activity for tourists.
The quake struck just before 1 p.m. local time on Tuesday, when the city was thronging with workers, tourists, and shoppers. The quake was not as powerful as a magnitude 7.1 temblor that struck before dawn on Sept. 4 that damaged buildings but killed no one. Experts said Tuesday's quake was deadlier because it was closer to the city and because more people were about.
Mall worker Tom Brittenden told of how he had helped pull victims from the rubble in the immediate aftermath of the quake, including a woman who died cradling her baby in her arms.
"There was a lady outside we tried to free with a child," Brittenden told National Radio. "A big bit of concrete or brick had fallen on her and she was holding her child. She was gone. The baby was taken away."
Christchurch's airport reopened for domestic flights Wednesday, and military planes were brought in to fly tourists to other cities.
Thousands of people in the city, including tourists who had abandoned their hotels, spent the night in temporary shelters at schools and community halls.
Downtown was cordoned off to keep people away from wobbly buildings and to give free-rein to rescue workers and maintenance crews. Officials urged residents elsewhere to stay off the streets unless their journeys were absolutely necessary. All schools in the city were closed until further notice.
Denis Torrey, president of the city's junior school principals' association, said there were no reports of students or teachers being harmed in the quake, though some schools were badly shaken.
"It was very scary, there were some staff thrown to the ground," she told National Radio. "The teachers very calmly gathered children into groups. There were lots of group hugs and lots of comforting going on."
During the emergency, teachers took roll calls and kept track of students as frantic parents rushed to reach them.
More than 400 rescue workers were joining the search, including teams from Australia, Singapore, Taiwan, the United States and Britain.
New Zealand's worst earthquake struck in 1931 at Hawke's Bay on the country's North Island, killing at least 256 people.
___
Associated Press videojournalist Joe Morgan in Christchurch, and writers Steve McMorran and Ray Lilley in Wellington, New Zealand contributed to this report.
The confirmed death toll from Tuesday's magnitude-6.3 quake centered near Christchurch rose to 75, and officials said it was almost sure to climb further. Some 300 people were listed as missing.
Prime Minister John Key declared a national state of emergency as hundreds of soldiers, police and other emergency workers — including specialist teams from the U.S. and other countries — rushed to Christchurch.
Parts of the city of 350,000 people lay in ruins, and all corners of it were suffering cuts to water supplies, power and phones. The city was virtually shut down Wednesday, with officials urging residents to stay inside their homes.
The immediate focus was on about a dozen buildings downtown where finding survivors was still a possibility. In other places, rubble was being left untouched — even if bodies were thought buried there — until the urgency of the survivor search passes.
Near the smoldering remains of the Cantebury Television building, brother and sister Kent and Lizzy Manning sat on a rain-sodden patch of grass Wednesday waiting for news of their mother, Donna, a television presenter who they hadn't heard from since the quake.
"My mum is superwoman, she'd do anything," said Lizzy Manning, 18, with tears running down her face.
At that moment, a police official knelt down beside the pair.
"I have some horrible news ...," the officer began, before telling the siblings that there was no hope for anyone left trapped inside the building.
The siblings bowed their heads and wept. Their father rushed over and enclosed them in an embrace.
Officials pointed thermal cameras into the wreckage, and sniffer dogs clambered on top looking for signs of life. Officials at one point said they believed they had found a pocket of at least 15 people buried alive in one building — but the report turned out to be false.
Mayor Bob Parker said early Wednesday that 120 people were rescued from wrecked buildings as teams worked through the night, while more bodies were also recovered. About 300 people were still unaccounted for, but this did not mean they were all still trapped, he said.
Some survivors emerged without a scratch, while others had to have a limb amputated before they could be freed.
"There are bodies littering the streets, they are trapped in cars, crushed under rubble and where they are clearly deceased our focus ... has turned to the living," police Superintendent Russell Gibson said.
Military units patrolled near-empty streets disfigured by the huge cracks and canyons created in Tuesday's earthquake, the second powerful temblor to hit the city in five months. The quake toppled the spire of the city's historic stone cathedral and flattened tall buildings.
Parker said an unknown number of people, possibly 20 or more, were believed to have been inside the cathedral tower — climbing it was a popular activity for tourists.
The quake struck just before 1 p.m. local time on Tuesday, when the city was thronging with workers, tourists, and shoppers. The quake was not as powerful as a magnitude 7.1 temblor that struck before dawn on Sept. 4 that damaged buildings but killed no one. Experts said Tuesday's quake was deadlier because it was closer to the city and because more people were about.
Mall worker Tom Brittenden told of how he had helped pull victims from the rubble in the immediate aftermath of the quake, including a woman who died cradling her baby in her arms.
"There was a lady outside we tried to free with a child," Brittenden told National Radio. "A big bit of concrete or brick had fallen on her and she was holding her child. She was gone. The baby was taken away."
Christchurch's airport reopened for domestic flights Wednesday, and military planes were brought in to fly tourists to other cities.
Thousands of people in the city, including tourists who had abandoned their hotels, spent the night in temporary shelters at schools and community halls.
Downtown was cordoned off to keep people away from wobbly buildings and to give free-rein to rescue workers and maintenance crews. Officials urged residents elsewhere to stay off the streets unless their journeys were absolutely necessary. All schools in the city were closed until further notice.
Denis Torrey, president of the city's junior school principals' association, said there were no reports of students or teachers being harmed in the quake, though some schools were badly shaken.
"It was very scary, there were some staff thrown to the ground," she told National Radio. "The teachers very calmly gathered children into groups. There were lots of group hugs and lots of comforting going on."
During the emergency, teachers took roll calls and kept track of students as frantic parents rushed to reach them.
More than 400 rescue workers were joining the search, including teams from Australia, Singapore, Taiwan, the United States and Britain.
New Zealand's worst earthquake struck in 1931 at Hawke's Bay on the country's North Island, killing at least 256 people.
___
Associated Press videojournalist Joe Morgan in Christchurch, and writers Steve McMorran and Ray Lilley in Wellington, New Zealand contributed to this report.
Countries scramble to evacuate citizens from Libya
AP, ANKARA, Turkey: Governments scrambled by air and sea to pick up their citizens stranded by Libya's bloody unrest on Tuesday, with thousands of people crowding the airport to await evacuation and Egyptians gathering at the border to escape the chaos.
"The airport was mobbed, you wouldn't believe the number of people," said Kathleen Burnett, of Baltimore, Ohio, as she stepped off an Austrian Airlines flight from Tripoli to Vienna on Tuesday.
"It was total chaos. Everybody was being checked out by the police but everyone was very obedient."
The U.S. State Department said it will begin evacuating American citizens from Libya by ferry to the Mediterranean island of Malta on Wednesday.
In a notice sent to U.S. citizens in Libya late Tuesday, the department said Americans wishing to leave Libya in a government-chartered ferry should be at the As-shahab port in Tripoli with their passports starting at 9 a.m. local time Wednesday. The ferry will depart for Malta no later than 3 p.m. local time.
At least two airlines, British Airways and Emirates, the Middle East's largest, said they were canceling flights to Tripoli, as reports spread that bodies of protesters littered the streets of neighborhoods in the capital.
Britain said it was redeploying a warship, the HMS Cumberland, off the Libyan coast in readiness for a possible sea-borne evacuation of British citizens stuck in the north African country.
Two civilian ferries from Turkey arrived in the hard-hit eastern city of Benghazi late Tuesday to evacuate about 3,000 Turkish citizens, the Anatolia news agency reported. The ferries were expected to set sail back for Turkey as soon as the evacuees had boarded. Turkey sent the ferries and another military vessel after the country was unable to get permission to land at the city's airport.
Turkey's Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek said Turkish ferries could help evacuate up to 6,000 people per day, if Libyan authorities allow the vessels to dock at Benghazi.
Meanwhile, about 5,000 Egyptians have returned home from Libya by land and about 10,000 more are waiting to cross the Libya-Egypt border, an Egyptian security official said. Egypt says it will also send six commercial and two military planes to repatriate thousands more caught in the revolt against Moammar Gadhafi's regime.
Some people were still getting out on regularly scheduled flights, but many countries were sending planes to fetch their citizens, with Serbia, Russia, the Netherlands, Germany and France reporting they had permission to land in Tripoli, a process made more difficult by the uncertainty about who is in charge.
"The situation is very variable and our basic issue is who is in control of what in the country so that our landing and overflight requests are answered," Greek Deputy Foreign Minister Dimitris Dollis said.
Greek officials later said the country was ready to evacuate 15,000 Chinese nationals by transferring them by merchant ships to the Greek island of Crete.
Libya is one of the world's biggest oil producers, and many oil companies were also evacuating their expat workers and their families.
Turkey has a huge presence in Libya, with about 25,000 citizens in the country and more than 200 Turkish companies involved in construction projects worth more than $15 billion. Some of the construction sites came under attack by protesters but no Turkish citizen has been harmed, authorities said.
Turkey has so far, evacuated more than 2,000 of its citizens, the Foreign Ministry said. On Tuesday, a Turkish Airlines plane flew back about 250 Turks — who crossed into Egypt by land — from the Egyptian city of Alexandria.
One passenger told Turkey's NTV television at Istanbul airport the journey between the Libyan city of Tobrus and the Egyptian border was "frightening because of the gangs armed with guns and machines guns who are roaming the streets."
Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said 10 other countries have also asked for help from Turkey to evacuate their citizens, though he did not identify them.
In Egypt, Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit accused Gadhafi's son Seif al-Islam of inciting violence against Egyptians by suggesting they joined the protests against his father.
The Egyptian security official said troops have beefed up their presence on the border with Libya and set up a field hospital there. He did not give details and spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not allowed to share such information.
Italians who returned to Rome from Tripoli on a regularly scheduled Alitalia flight said the situation in the Libyan capital appeared relatively calm Tuesday, but that they expected it would degenerate.
"There are no big troubles in Tripoli, we heard some shots and gunfights, nothing special, and above all we didn't see any airplanes," said Marco Albi as he arrived at Rome's Leonardo da Vinci airport.
In addition to the continuing commercial Alitalia flights, Italy was prepared to mobilize four to five C-130 aircraft, navy ships and if necessary even military troops to help with any possible evacuation of Italians, Defense Minister Ignazio La Russa said.
The Italian navy destroyer Franceso Mimbelli, which has a crew of 400 people and is based in Taranto, in southern Italy, has been mobilized but its itinerary wasn't announced.
A Dutch air force transport plane landed in Tripoli to pick up about 100 Dutch citizens. It was expected to arrive back in The Netherlands on Tuesday night.
Two German military planes fetched stranded Europeans in Tripoli and took them over the Mediterranean Sea to Valetta, Malta. In addition, a Lufthansa Airbus A340-600 jet, with a capacity of some 300 passengers, from Tripoli landed at Frankfurt airport late Tuesday.
"The airport was an absolute chaos — many people from North Africa trying to leave and go home, thousands," said John Dowley from London upon his arrival in Frankfurt.
Eva Kling Leonardt, who works for German industrial conglomerate Siemens in Tripoli, seemed relieved to have left the country on time. "Everything that happens in Libya comes out only filtered. It is an uprising. It is a revolution," she said.
The first of four planes Russia dispatched to evacuate employees of Russian companies, including Russian Railways and Gazprom, also landed at Tripoli on Tuesday. A total of 405 Russian nationals, as well as hundreds of Turkish and Serbian nationals working for the Russian Railways, would be evacuated, the Russian Emergencies Ministry said.
Ukraine, Bulgaria, Poland and Spain said they were all planing to send a plane to Tripoli to fetch stranded citizens.
The French Foreign Ministry said two French military planes had arrived in Tripoli, where French citizens had begun to board them.
Dozens of French citizens also arrived at Paris' Charles de Gaulle airport on a commercial flight from Tripoli. One French man who did not provide his name as a scrum of reporters huddled around him said foreigners were not being targeted. "It's an internal conflict," he said.
___
Frances D'Emilio in Rome, Mike Corder in Amsterdam, Matthew Lee in Washington, David Nowak in Moscow, Alan Clendenning in Madrid, Geir Moulson and Juergen Baetz in Berlin, Jamey Keaten in Paris, Salah Nasrawi in Cairo and Adam Schreck in Dubai, Nicholas Paphitis in Athens contributed to this report.
"The airport was mobbed, you wouldn't believe the number of people," said Kathleen Burnett, of Baltimore, Ohio, as she stepped off an Austrian Airlines flight from Tripoli to Vienna on Tuesday.
"It was total chaos. Everybody was being checked out by the police but everyone was very obedient."
The U.S. State Department said it will begin evacuating American citizens from Libya by ferry to the Mediterranean island of Malta on Wednesday.
In a notice sent to U.S. citizens in Libya late Tuesday, the department said Americans wishing to leave Libya in a government-chartered ferry should be at the As-shahab port in Tripoli with their passports starting at 9 a.m. local time Wednesday. The ferry will depart for Malta no later than 3 p.m. local time.
At least two airlines, British Airways and Emirates, the Middle East's largest, said they were canceling flights to Tripoli, as reports spread that bodies of protesters littered the streets of neighborhoods in the capital.
Britain said it was redeploying a warship, the HMS Cumberland, off the Libyan coast in readiness for a possible sea-borne evacuation of British citizens stuck in the north African country.
Two civilian ferries from Turkey arrived in the hard-hit eastern city of Benghazi late Tuesday to evacuate about 3,000 Turkish citizens, the Anatolia news agency reported. The ferries were expected to set sail back for Turkey as soon as the evacuees had boarded. Turkey sent the ferries and another military vessel after the country was unable to get permission to land at the city's airport.
Turkey's Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek said Turkish ferries could help evacuate up to 6,000 people per day, if Libyan authorities allow the vessels to dock at Benghazi.
Meanwhile, about 5,000 Egyptians have returned home from Libya by land and about 10,000 more are waiting to cross the Libya-Egypt border, an Egyptian security official said. Egypt says it will also send six commercial and two military planes to repatriate thousands more caught in the revolt against Moammar Gadhafi's regime.
Some people were still getting out on regularly scheduled flights, but many countries were sending planes to fetch their citizens, with Serbia, Russia, the Netherlands, Germany and France reporting they had permission to land in Tripoli, a process made more difficult by the uncertainty about who is in charge.
"The situation is very variable and our basic issue is who is in control of what in the country so that our landing and overflight requests are answered," Greek Deputy Foreign Minister Dimitris Dollis said.
Greek officials later said the country was ready to evacuate 15,000 Chinese nationals by transferring them by merchant ships to the Greek island of Crete.
Libya is one of the world's biggest oil producers, and many oil companies were also evacuating their expat workers and their families.
Turkey has a huge presence in Libya, with about 25,000 citizens in the country and more than 200 Turkish companies involved in construction projects worth more than $15 billion. Some of the construction sites came under attack by protesters but no Turkish citizen has been harmed, authorities said.
Turkey has so far, evacuated more than 2,000 of its citizens, the Foreign Ministry said. On Tuesday, a Turkish Airlines plane flew back about 250 Turks — who crossed into Egypt by land — from the Egyptian city of Alexandria.
One passenger told Turkey's NTV television at Istanbul airport the journey between the Libyan city of Tobrus and the Egyptian border was "frightening because of the gangs armed with guns and machines guns who are roaming the streets."
Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said 10 other countries have also asked for help from Turkey to evacuate their citizens, though he did not identify them.
In Egypt, Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit accused Gadhafi's son Seif al-Islam of inciting violence against Egyptians by suggesting they joined the protests against his father.
The Egyptian security official said troops have beefed up their presence on the border with Libya and set up a field hospital there. He did not give details and spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not allowed to share such information.
Italians who returned to Rome from Tripoli on a regularly scheduled Alitalia flight said the situation in the Libyan capital appeared relatively calm Tuesday, but that they expected it would degenerate.
"There are no big troubles in Tripoli, we heard some shots and gunfights, nothing special, and above all we didn't see any airplanes," said Marco Albi as he arrived at Rome's Leonardo da Vinci airport.
In addition to the continuing commercial Alitalia flights, Italy was prepared to mobilize four to five C-130 aircraft, navy ships and if necessary even military troops to help with any possible evacuation of Italians, Defense Minister Ignazio La Russa said.
The Italian navy destroyer Franceso Mimbelli, which has a crew of 400 people and is based in Taranto, in southern Italy, has been mobilized but its itinerary wasn't announced.
A Dutch air force transport plane landed in Tripoli to pick up about 100 Dutch citizens. It was expected to arrive back in The Netherlands on Tuesday night.
Two German military planes fetched stranded Europeans in Tripoli and took them over the Mediterranean Sea to Valetta, Malta. In addition, a Lufthansa Airbus A340-600 jet, with a capacity of some 300 passengers, from Tripoli landed at Frankfurt airport late Tuesday.
"The airport was an absolute chaos — many people from North Africa trying to leave and go home, thousands," said John Dowley from London upon his arrival in Frankfurt.
Eva Kling Leonardt, who works for German industrial conglomerate Siemens in Tripoli, seemed relieved to have left the country on time. "Everything that happens in Libya comes out only filtered. It is an uprising. It is a revolution," she said.
The first of four planes Russia dispatched to evacuate employees of Russian companies, including Russian Railways and Gazprom, also landed at Tripoli on Tuesday. A total of 405 Russian nationals, as well as hundreds of Turkish and Serbian nationals working for the Russian Railways, would be evacuated, the Russian Emergencies Ministry said.
Ukraine, Bulgaria, Poland and Spain said they were all planing to send a plane to Tripoli to fetch stranded citizens.
The French Foreign Ministry said two French military planes had arrived in Tripoli, where French citizens had begun to board them.
Dozens of French citizens also arrived at Paris' Charles de Gaulle airport on a commercial flight from Tripoli. One French man who did not provide his name as a scrum of reporters huddled around him said foreigners were not being targeted. "It's an internal conflict," he said.
___
Frances D'Emilio in Rome, Mike Corder in Amsterdam, Matthew Lee in Washington, David Nowak in Moscow, Alan Clendenning in Madrid, Geir Moulson and Juergen Baetz in Berlin, Jamey Keaten in Paris, Salah Nasrawi in Cairo and Adam Schreck in Dubai, Nicholas Paphitis in Athens contributed to this report.
4 American hostages killed by pirates off Somalia
AP, NAIROBI, Kenya: A U.S. Navy destroyer was shadowing a hijacked yacht with four Americans aboard when a pirate fired a rocket-propelled grenade, followed by bursts of gunfire. U.S. special forces scrambled onto the occupied vessel only to find the four Americans fatally wounded.
The yachting enthusiasts from California and Washington killed off the coast of East Africa on Tuesday were the first Americans slain by Somali pirates since a wave of attacks began six years ago. One of the American couples had been sailing around the world since 2004 handing out Bibles.
The deaths of the four travelers, all in their late 50s or 60s, appeared to underscore an increasingly brutal and aggressive shift by pirates in their treatment of hostages.
Killing hostages "has now become part of our rules," said a pirate who identified himself as Muse Abdi. He referred as a turning point to last week's sentencing of a pirate to 33 years in prison for the 2009 attack on the U.S. cargo vessel the Maersk Alabama — just two days before the hijacking.
"From now on, anyone who tries to rescue the hostages in our hands will only collect dead bodies," Abdi said. "It will never, ever happen that hostages are rescued and we are hauled to prison."
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton strongly condemned the killing of the Americans as "deplorable," saying in a statement the slayings underscored the need for international cooperation in fighting the scourge of piracy in waters off the Horn of Africa.
Jean and Scott Adam of Marina del Rey, near Los Angeles, had been sailing their 58-foot yacht Quest around the world since December 2004, and had been joined in recent months by Phyllis Macay and Bob Riggle of Seattle.
Four U.S. warships had been shadowing the Quest since shortly after it was seized south of Oman on Friday, and U.S. officials were in radio contact with the captors as the pirates tried to sail it to the Somali shore. The power behind such abductions for ransom — a multimillion-dollar business — lies not with the pirates at sea but their financial backers on land. And once the kidnappers reach shore with their hostages, options for rescue are limited.
A channel of negotiations had been opened, and on Monday two pirates boarded the USS Sterett, a guided-missile destroyer some 600 yards (meters) from the seized yacht, and they stayed overnight, said Vice Adm. Mark Fox, commander of the U.S. 5th Fleet in Bahrain.
By the next morning, though, things quickly turned deadly, with all signs pointing to a dispute among the pirates
At 8 a.m. local time, Fox said, a rocket-propelled grenade was fired from the Quest at the Sterett and missed, followed almost immediately by the sound of small arms fire coming from the yacht.
Several pirates then appeared on the yacht deck with their hands up. U.S. naval forces rushed aboard the vessel and found all four Americans had been shot; two pirates also lay dead from gun shot wounds.
The special forces troops tried to provide lifesaving care to the Americans, but they died, Fox said.
Fifteen pirates were taken into custody — 13 aboard the yacht as well as the two who had been negotiating aboard the Sterett, Fox said. In addition, two pirates were killed in the operation, including one who was knifed by a member of the U.S. force, Fox said.
President Barack Obama, who was notified about killing of the Americans at 4:42 a.m. Washington time, had authorized the military on Saturday to use force in case of an imminent threat to the hostages, said White House spokesman Jay Carney.
Pirates have increased attacks off the coast of East Africa despite an international flotilla of warships dedicated to protecting vessels and stopping the pirate assaults.
But the conventional wisdom in the shipping industry had been that Somali pirates are businessmen looking for a multimillion-dollar ransom payday, not insurgents looking to terrorize people.
"We have heard threats against the lives of Americans before but it strikes me as being very, very unusual why they would kill hostages outright," said Graeme Gibbon-Brooks, the head of Dryad Maritime Intelligence, adding that the pirates must realize that killing Americans would invite a military response.
Friends, family and fellow sailors said that despite an adventurous spirit, the four Americans were meticulous planners who knew the dangers they faced.
Jean and Scott Adams, both in their 60s, had been sailing around the world since December 2004 with a yacht full of Bibles to distribute to remote regions. They were joined by Riggle, a veterinarian who volunteered at the Seattle Animal Shelter, and 59-year-old Macay, a sailing enthusiast.
"Great sailors, good people. They were doing what they wanted to do, but that's small comfort in the face of this," said Joe Grande of the Seattle Singles Yacht Club, where Riggle and Macay were members.
Around Christmas, the Quest joined the Blue Water Rally, an around-the-world race. But race organizers said the Americans recently left the race despite what Fox said were warnings about the dangers of sailing in the Horn of Africa region.
The Blue Water Rally said in a statement Tuesday that though yachtsmen are discouraged from sailing in the region, the only other choices are to sail around the stormy and dangerous tip of South Africa or sail back across the Pacific.
The Adams had traveled from Panama in 2005 to Fiji in 2007 and Cambodia last year. They most recently sailed from Thailand to Sri Lanka and India, and were on their way to Oman when captured.
Pirates have become increasingly bold in their attacks despite a flotilla of international warships patrolling the waters off East Africa. The last time pirates kidnapped a U.S. citizen — during the 2009 hijacking of the Maersk Alabama — Navy sharpshooters killed two pirates and rescued the cargo ship's captain.
But Tuesday's bloody events are apt to leave U.S. military planners in a quandary: Do they go after the pirates harder? Do they attack their bases on Somalia's ungoverned shores?
One maritime expert said it's too early to tell.
"This is a first," said Gibbon-Brooks, the analyst. "We don't know if the situation is related to a straight execution. We don't know if it was related to an attempt to break free. We don't know if it was related to an accident."
He said the killings were "extremely unwise" by the Somalis, and that the deaths threaten what has been a lucrative if illicit business.
After last week's sentencing by a New York court of a Somali pirate in the Maersk Alabama attack, some pirates warned that Americans would be targeted.
"It's a black day for us and also the Americans, but they lost bigger than us," a pirate who gave his name as Bile Hussein told the AP. "If they still want a solution and safety for their citizens in the oceans, let them release our men they arrested."
Just minutes before the news of the American deaths, a pirate who gave his name as Abdullahi Mohamed told AP by phone that if the yacht were attacked, "the hostages will be the first to go."
"Some pirates have even suggested rigging the yacht with land mines and explosives so as the whole yacht explodes with the first gunshot," said Mohamed, who claimed to be a friend of the pirates holding the four Americans.
The military said U.S. forces have been monitoring the Quest for about three days, since shortly after the Friday attack. Four Navy warships were involved, including the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise.
Mohamed, the pirate in Somalia, told AP that pirate leaders had been expecting the yacht to make landfall soon.
Five cars full of pirates were headed toward the pirate dens of Eyl and Gara'ad in anticipation of the Quest reaching land Monday, he said.
Had the Americans been brought ashore, they may have faced a long hostage ordeal like the 388 days the British sailing couple Paul and Rachel Chandler spent in the hands of pirates. The two were released in November.
"This incident is a clear message ... that it's time the world community quickly steps up to stop these pirate criminal activities. They should be treated mercilessly," said Gen. Yusuf Ahmed Khayr, the security minister in the northern Somalia region of Puntland, a pirate haven.
The yachting enthusiasts from California and Washington killed off the coast of East Africa on Tuesday were the first Americans slain by Somali pirates since a wave of attacks began six years ago. One of the American couples had been sailing around the world since 2004 handing out Bibles.
The deaths of the four travelers, all in their late 50s or 60s, appeared to underscore an increasingly brutal and aggressive shift by pirates in their treatment of hostages.
Killing hostages "has now become part of our rules," said a pirate who identified himself as Muse Abdi. He referred as a turning point to last week's sentencing of a pirate to 33 years in prison for the 2009 attack on the U.S. cargo vessel the Maersk Alabama — just two days before the hijacking.
"From now on, anyone who tries to rescue the hostages in our hands will only collect dead bodies," Abdi said. "It will never, ever happen that hostages are rescued and we are hauled to prison."
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton strongly condemned the killing of the Americans as "deplorable," saying in a statement the slayings underscored the need for international cooperation in fighting the scourge of piracy in waters off the Horn of Africa.
Jean and Scott Adam of Marina del Rey, near Los Angeles, had been sailing their 58-foot yacht Quest around the world since December 2004, and had been joined in recent months by Phyllis Macay and Bob Riggle of Seattle.
Four U.S. warships had been shadowing the Quest since shortly after it was seized south of Oman on Friday, and U.S. officials were in radio contact with the captors as the pirates tried to sail it to the Somali shore. The power behind such abductions for ransom — a multimillion-dollar business — lies not with the pirates at sea but their financial backers on land. And once the kidnappers reach shore with their hostages, options for rescue are limited.
A channel of negotiations had been opened, and on Monday two pirates boarded the USS Sterett, a guided-missile destroyer some 600 yards (meters) from the seized yacht, and they stayed overnight, said Vice Adm. Mark Fox, commander of the U.S. 5th Fleet in Bahrain.
By the next morning, though, things quickly turned deadly, with all signs pointing to a dispute among the pirates
At 8 a.m. local time, Fox said, a rocket-propelled grenade was fired from the Quest at the Sterett and missed, followed almost immediately by the sound of small arms fire coming from the yacht.
Several pirates then appeared on the yacht deck with their hands up. U.S. naval forces rushed aboard the vessel and found all four Americans had been shot; two pirates also lay dead from gun shot wounds.
The special forces troops tried to provide lifesaving care to the Americans, but they died, Fox said.
Fifteen pirates were taken into custody — 13 aboard the yacht as well as the two who had been negotiating aboard the Sterett, Fox said. In addition, two pirates were killed in the operation, including one who was knifed by a member of the U.S. force, Fox said.
President Barack Obama, who was notified about killing of the Americans at 4:42 a.m. Washington time, had authorized the military on Saturday to use force in case of an imminent threat to the hostages, said White House spokesman Jay Carney.
Pirates have increased attacks off the coast of East Africa despite an international flotilla of warships dedicated to protecting vessels and stopping the pirate assaults.
But the conventional wisdom in the shipping industry had been that Somali pirates are businessmen looking for a multimillion-dollar ransom payday, not insurgents looking to terrorize people.
"We have heard threats against the lives of Americans before but it strikes me as being very, very unusual why they would kill hostages outright," said Graeme Gibbon-Brooks, the head of Dryad Maritime Intelligence, adding that the pirates must realize that killing Americans would invite a military response.
Friends, family and fellow sailors said that despite an adventurous spirit, the four Americans were meticulous planners who knew the dangers they faced.
Jean and Scott Adams, both in their 60s, had been sailing around the world since December 2004 with a yacht full of Bibles to distribute to remote regions. They were joined by Riggle, a veterinarian who volunteered at the Seattle Animal Shelter, and 59-year-old Macay, a sailing enthusiast.
"Great sailors, good people. They were doing what they wanted to do, but that's small comfort in the face of this," said Joe Grande of the Seattle Singles Yacht Club, where Riggle and Macay were members.
Around Christmas, the Quest joined the Blue Water Rally, an around-the-world race. But race organizers said the Americans recently left the race despite what Fox said were warnings about the dangers of sailing in the Horn of Africa region.
The Blue Water Rally said in a statement Tuesday that though yachtsmen are discouraged from sailing in the region, the only other choices are to sail around the stormy and dangerous tip of South Africa or sail back across the Pacific.
The Adams had traveled from Panama in 2005 to Fiji in 2007 and Cambodia last year. They most recently sailed from Thailand to Sri Lanka and India, and were on their way to Oman when captured.
Pirates have become increasingly bold in their attacks despite a flotilla of international warships patrolling the waters off East Africa. The last time pirates kidnapped a U.S. citizen — during the 2009 hijacking of the Maersk Alabama — Navy sharpshooters killed two pirates and rescued the cargo ship's captain.
But Tuesday's bloody events are apt to leave U.S. military planners in a quandary: Do they go after the pirates harder? Do they attack their bases on Somalia's ungoverned shores?
One maritime expert said it's too early to tell.
"This is a first," said Gibbon-Brooks, the analyst. "We don't know if the situation is related to a straight execution. We don't know if it was related to an attempt to break free. We don't know if it was related to an accident."
He said the killings were "extremely unwise" by the Somalis, and that the deaths threaten what has been a lucrative if illicit business.
After last week's sentencing by a New York court of a Somali pirate in the Maersk Alabama attack, some pirates warned that Americans would be targeted.
"It's a black day for us and also the Americans, but they lost bigger than us," a pirate who gave his name as Bile Hussein told the AP. "If they still want a solution and safety for their citizens in the oceans, let them release our men they arrested."
Just minutes before the news of the American deaths, a pirate who gave his name as Abdullahi Mohamed told AP by phone that if the yacht were attacked, "the hostages will be the first to go."
"Some pirates have even suggested rigging the yacht with land mines and explosives so as the whole yacht explodes with the first gunshot," said Mohamed, who claimed to be a friend of the pirates holding the four Americans.
The military said U.S. forces have been monitoring the Quest for about three days, since shortly after the Friday attack. Four Navy warships were involved, including the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise.
Mohamed, the pirate in Somalia, told AP that pirate leaders had been expecting the yacht to make landfall soon.
Five cars full of pirates were headed toward the pirate dens of Eyl and Gara'ad in anticipation of the Quest reaching land Monday, he said.
Had the Americans been brought ashore, they may have faced a long hostage ordeal like the 388 days the British sailing couple Paul and Rachel Chandler spent in the hands of pirates. The two were released in November.
"This incident is a clear message ... that it's time the world community quickly steps up to stop these pirate criminal activities. They should be treated mercilessly," said Gen. Yusuf Ahmed Khayr, the security minister in the northern Somalia region of Puntland, a pirate haven.
Gadhafi's vow: Will fight to 'last drop of blood'
AP, CAIRO: A defiant Moammar Gadhafi vowed to fight to his "last drop of blood" and roared at supporters to strike back against Libyan protesters to defend his embattled regime Tuesday, signaling an escalation of the crackdown that has thrown the capital into scenes of mayhem, wild shooting and bodies in the streets.
The speech by the Libyan leader — who shouted and pounded his fists on the podium — was an all-out call for his backers to impose control over the capital and take back other cities. After a week of upheaval, protesters backed by defecting army units have claimed control over almost the entire eastern half of Libya's 1,000-mile (1,600-kilometer) Mediterranean coast, including several oil-producing areas.
"You men and women who love Gadhafi ... get out of your homes and fill the streets," he said. "Leave your homes and attack them in their lairs."
Celebratory gunfire by Gadhafi supporters rang out in the capital of Tripoli after the leader's speech, while in protester-held Benghazi, Libya's second-largest city, people threw shoes at a screen showing his address, venting their contempt.
State TV showed a crowd of Gadhafi supporters in Tripoli's Green Square, raising his portrait and waving flags as they swayed to music after the address. Residents contacted by The Associated Press said no anti-government protesters ventured out of their homes after dark, and gun-toting guards manned checkpoints with occasional bursts of gunfire heard throughout the city.
International alarm rose over the crisis, which sent oil prices soaring to the highest level in more than two years on Tuesday and sparked a scramble by European and other countries to get their citizens out of the North African nation. The U.N. Security Council held an emergency meeting that ended with a statement condemning the crackdown, expressing "grave concern" and calling for an "immediate end to the violence" and steps to address the legitimate demands of the Libyan people.
Germany Chancellor Angela Merkel called Gadhafi's speech "very, very appalling," saying it "amounted to him declaring war on his own people." Libya's own deputy ambassador at the U.N., who now calls for Gadhafi's ouster, has urged the world body to enforce a no-fly zone over the country to protect protesters.
"This violence is completely unacceptable," added Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Click image to see photos of protests in Libya
AFP/Abbas Momani
Gadhafi's retaliation has already been the harshest in the Arab world to the wave of anti-government protests sweeping the Middle East. Nearly 300 people have been killed, according to a partial count by the New York-based Human Rights Watch.
In two nights of bloodshed, Tripoli residents described a rampage by pro-Gadhafi militiamen — a mix of Libyans and foreign mercenaries — who shot on sight anyone found in the streets and opened fire from speeding vehicles at people watching from windows of their homes.
In a sign of the extent of the breakdown in Gadhafi's regime, one of his closest associates, Abdel Fattah Younis, his interior minister and commander of the powerful Thunderbolt commando brigade, announced in Benghazi that he was defecting and other armed forces should join the revolt.
"I gave up all my posts in response to the February 17 Revolution and my conviction that it has just demands," Younis, who was among the army officers who joined Gadhafi in his 1969 coup, told Al-Jazeera, referring to the date of the start of the protests.
The performance by Gadhafi on state TV Tuesday night went far beyond even the bizarre, volatile style he has been notorious for during nearly 42 years in power. Swathed in brown robes and a turban, wearing reflective sunglasses, he at times screamed, his voice breaking, and shook his fists — then switched to reading glasses to read from a green-covered law book, losing his train of thought before launching into a new round of shouting.
He spoke from behind a podium in the entrance of his bombed-out Tripoli residence hit by U.S. airstrikes in the 1980s and left unrepaired as a symbol of defiance.
At times the camera panned back to show the outside of the building and its towering monument of a gold-colored fist crushing an American fighter jet. But the view also gave a bizarre image of Gadhafi, waving his arms wildly alone in a broken-down lobby with no audience, surrounded by torn tiles dangling from the ceiling, shattered concrete pillars and bare plumbing pipes.
"Libya wants glory, Libya wants to be at the pinnacle, at the pinnacle of the world," he proclaimed, pounding his fist on the podium. "I am a fighter, a revolutionary from tents. ... I will die as a martyr at the end," he said, vowing to fight "to my last drop of blood."
Gadhafi portrayed the protesters as misguided youths, who had been given drugs and money by a "small, sick group" to attack police and government buildings. He said the uprising was fomented by "bearded men" — a reference to Islamic fundamentalists — and Libyans living abroad.
He urged supporters to take to the streets to attack demonstrators, saying police would not interfere.
"Go out and fight them," he added, urging youth to form local committees across the country "for the defense of the revolution and the defense of Gadhafi."
"Forward, forward, forward!" he barked at the speech's conclusion, pumping both fists in the air as he stormed away from the podium. He was kissed by about a dozen supporters, some in security force uniforms. Then he climbed into a golf cart-like vehicle and puttered away.
In New York, Libya's deputy U.N. ambassador Ibrahim Dabbashi, who has called for Gadhafi to step down, said he had received information that Gadhafi's collaborators have started "attacking people in all the cities in western Libya." He said those being attacked are unarmed. He said Gadhafi was using foreign mercenaries to fight protesters.
"I think the genocide has started now in Libya," Dabbashi said. "The Gadhafi statement was just code for his collaborators to start the genocide against the Libyan people. It just started a few hours ago. I hope the information I get is not accurate but if it is, it will be a real genocide."
Libyans were critical of what they saw as the lack of a forceful international response.
Dabbashi said the Security Council statement was "not strong enough" but was "a good step to stopping the bloodshed."
Gadhafi's call for a popular attack on protesters reflected the deeply unstable nature of the system he has created over his rule — the longest of any current Arab leader. He has long kept his military and other security forces relatively weak, fearing a challenge to his rule and uncertain of loyalties in a population of multiple tribal allegiances.
So far, the crackdown has been waged chiefly by militias and so-called "revolutionary committees," made up of Libyans and foreign fighters, many hired from other African nations.
Many army units in the east appear to have sided with protesters, and other more institutional parts of his regime have weakened. A string of ambassadors abroad have defected, as has the justice minister.
Protesters claim to control a string of cities, from the Egyptian border in the east — where guards at the crossing fled — to the city of Ajdabiya, about 450 miles (725 kilometers) farther west along the Mediterranean coast, said Tawfiq al-Shahbi, a protest organizer in the eastern city of Tobruk.
Ajdabiya is a key city near the oil fields of central and eastern Libya. Protesters and local tribesmen were protecting several of the fields and facilities around the city, said one resident, Ahmed al-Zawi.
Residents are also guarding one of Libya's main oil export ports, Zuweita, and the pipelines feeding into it, he said. The pipelines are off and several tankers that had been waiting in the port to load left empty, said al-Zawi, who said he visited Zuweita on Tuesday morning.
The first major protests to hit an OPEC country — and major supplier to Europe — sent oil prices to $95.42 per barrel. Only a small amount of Libya's oil production appeared to have been affected, though analysts fear that revolts will spread to OPEC heavyweights like Iran. Libya holds the most oil reserves in Africa.
Two oil companies on Tuesday suspended production in the country: Italy's Eni — the biggest energy producer in Libya, producing about a quarter of its exports — and Spain's Repsol-YPF, which produced 34,777 barrels in the country last year, about 3.8 percent of national output. A string of international oil companies have begun evacuating their expatriate workers or their families.
In the eastern cities of Tobruk and Benghazi, protesters raised the pre-Gadhafi flag of Libya's monarchy on public buildings. Protesters over the weekend overran police stations and security headquarters in Benghazi, taking control of the streets.
In Benghazi, celebratory residents organized themselves into units to protect property and manage traffic after pro-Gadhafi forces fled, said Farag al-Warfali, a banker. A committee was set up to organize and distribute the use of weapons confiscated from government warehouses, recruiting policemen and officers to carry the weapons for city protection, fearing a new attack.
"These are his dying words. He is a criminal and is ready to do anything. But we are ready for him," al-Warfali said of Gadhafi's speech. "Besides, most of his officers have deserted him anyway. He only has the mercenaries left."
Since Sunday, the fiercest fighting has been in Tripoli, the center of Gadhafi's rule.
At least 62 people were killed in violence in the capital since Sunday, according to the New York-based Human Rights Watch, but it cautioned that that figure came from only two hospitals. That comes on top of at least 233 people killed across the so far in the uprising, counted by the group from hospitals around the country.
Tripoli residents on Tuesday were recovering from the militia rampage through multiple neighborhoods that began the night before and lasted until dawn. Some resident ventured out to find stores open for food, wary of militia attacks.
One man in his 50s said residents of his neighborhood were piling up roadblocks of concrete, bricks and wood to try to slow attackers. He said he had seen several streets with funeral tents mourning the dead.
The night before, he had spent barricaded in his home, blankets over the windows — sitting with a kitchen knife on the table in front of him — as militiamen opened fire in nearby districts.
Buses unloaded militia fighters in several locations, he said. Others sped in vehicles with guns mounted on the top, opening fire, including at people watching from windows. "I know of two different families, one family had a 4-year-old who was shot and killed on a balcony in the eastern part of the city, and another lady on the balcony was shot in the head," he said.
He, like other residents, contacted by The Associated Press, spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation.
One of the heaviest battlegrounds was the impoverished, densely populated district of Fashloum. There, militiamen shot any "moving human being" with live ammunition, including ambulances, so wounded were left in the streets to die, one resident said.
He said that as he fled the neighborhood Monday night, he ran across a group of militiamen, including foreign fighters. "The Libyans (among them) warned me to leave and showed me bodies of the dead and told me: `We were given orders to shoot anybody who moves in the place,'" said the resident.
He and other residents described dozens of bodies still in the street at daybreak Tuesday.
The head of the U.N. human rights agency, Navi Pillay, called for an investigation, saying widespread and systematic attacks against civilians "may amount to crimes against humanity."
In the early hours of Wednesday, several Libyan military officers held a news conference with Libyan journalists broadcast on state television in what they described as an effort to set the record straight on a number of issues.
Lt. General Jibril al-Qadiki, an air force pilot, denied reports of airstrikes on civilians and said there had been strikes but only on ammunition warehouses after "rebels" used them. He named four storage area in eastern Libya in desert areas, and insisted there were no people in those areas.
He also accused western countries, including the U.S., of providing logistics to the protesters aiming to "destroy Libya."
___
Associated Press writers Hamza Hendawi in Cairo; Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations; Colleen Barry in Milan, Italy; Matthew Lee in Washington; John Heilprin in Geneva; and Barbara Whitaker in New York contributed to this report.
The speech by the Libyan leader — who shouted and pounded his fists on the podium — was an all-out call for his backers to impose control over the capital and take back other cities. After a week of upheaval, protesters backed by defecting army units have claimed control over almost the entire eastern half of Libya's 1,000-mile (1,600-kilometer) Mediterranean coast, including several oil-producing areas.
"You men and women who love Gadhafi ... get out of your homes and fill the streets," he said. "Leave your homes and attack them in their lairs."
Celebratory gunfire by Gadhafi supporters rang out in the capital of Tripoli after the leader's speech, while in protester-held Benghazi, Libya's second-largest city, people threw shoes at a screen showing his address, venting their contempt.
State TV showed a crowd of Gadhafi supporters in Tripoli's Green Square, raising his portrait and waving flags as they swayed to music after the address. Residents contacted by The Associated Press said no anti-government protesters ventured out of their homes after dark, and gun-toting guards manned checkpoints with occasional bursts of gunfire heard throughout the city.
International alarm rose over the crisis, which sent oil prices soaring to the highest level in more than two years on Tuesday and sparked a scramble by European and other countries to get their citizens out of the North African nation. The U.N. Security Council held an emergency meeting that ended with a statement condemning the crackdown, expressing "grave concern" and calling for an "immediate end to the violence" and steps to address the legitimate demands of the Libyan people.
Germany Chancellor Angela Merkel called Gadhafi's speech "very, very appalling," saying it "amounted to him declaring war on his own people." Libya's own deputy ambassador at the U.N., who now calls for Gadhafi's ouster, has urged the world body to enforce a no-fly zone over the country to protect protesters.
"This violence is completely unacceptable," added Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Click image to see photos of protests in Libya
AFP/Abbas Momani
Gadhafi's retaliation has already been the harshest in the Arab world to the wave of anti-government protests sweeping the Middle East. Nearly 300 people have been killed, according to a partial count by the New York-based Human Rights Watch.
In two nights of bloodshed, Tripoli residents described a rampage by pro-Gadhafi militiamen — a mix of Libyans and foreign mercenaries — who shot on sight anyone found in the streets and opened fire from speeding vehicles at people watching from windows of their homes.
In a sign of the extent of the breakdown in Gadhafi's regime, one of his closest associates, Abdel Fattah Younis, his interior minister and commander of the powerful Thunderbolt commando brigade, announced in Benghazi that he was defecting and other armed forces should join the revolt.
"I gave up all my posts in response to the February 17 Revolution and my conviction that it has just demands," Younis, who was among the army officers who joined Gadhafi in his 1969 coup, told Al-Jazeera, referring to the date of the start of the protests.
The performance by Gadhafi on state TV Tuesday night went far beyond even the bizarre, volatile style he has been notorious for during nearly 42 years in power. Swathed in brown robes and a turban, wearing reflective sunglasses, he at times screamed, his voice breaking, and shook his fists — then switched to reading glasses to read from a green-covered law book, losing his train of thought before launching into a new round of shouting.
He spoke from behind a podium in the entrance of his bombed-out Tripoli residence hit by U.S. airstrikes in the 1980s and left unrepaired as a symbol of defiance.
At times the camera panned back to show the outside of the building and its towering monument of a gold-colored fist crushing an American fighter jet. But the view also gave a bizarre image of Gadhafi, waving his arms wildly alone in a broken-down lobby with no audience, surrounded by torn tiles dangling from the ceiling, shattered concrete pillars and bare plumbing pipes.
"Libya wants glory, Libya wants to be at the pinnacle, at the pinnacle of the world," he proclaimed, pounding his fist on the podium. "I am a fighter, a revolutionary from tents. ... I will die as a martyr at the end," he said, vowing to fight "to my last drop of blood."
Gadhafi portrayed the protesters as misguided youths, who had been given drugs and money by a "small, sick group" to attack police and government buildings. He said the uprising was fomented by "bearded men" — a reference to Islamic fundamentalists — and Libyans living abroad.
He urged supporters to take to the streets to attack demonstrators, saying police would not interfere.
"Go out and fight them," he added, urging youth to form local committees across the country "for the defense of the revolution and the defense of Gadhafi."
"Forward, forward, forward!" he barked at the speech's conclusion, pumping both fists in the air as he stormed away from the podium. He was kissed by about a dozen supporters, some in security force uniforms. Then he climbed into a golf cart-like vehicle and puttered away.
In New York, Libya's deputy U.N. ambassador Ibrahim Dabbashi, who has called for Gadhafi to step down, said he had received information that Gadhafi's collaborators have started "attacking people in all the cities in western Libya." He said those being attacked are unarmed. He said Gadhafi was using foreign mercenaries to fight protesters.
"I think the genocide has started now in Libya," Dabbashi said. "The Gadhafi statement was just code for his collaborators to start the genocide against the Libyan people. It just started a few hours ago. I hope the information I get is not accurate but if it is, it will be a real genocide."
Libyans were critical of what they saw as the lack of a forceful international response.
Dabbashi said the Security Council statement was "not strong enough" but was "a good step to stopping the bloodshed."
Gadhafi's call for a popular attack on protesters reflected the deeply unstable nature of the system he has created over his rule — the longest of any current Arab leader. He has long kept his military and other security forces relatively weak, fearing a challenge to his rule and uncertain of loyalties in a population of multiple tribal allegiances.
So far, the crackdown has been waged chiefly by militias and so-called "revolutionary committees," made up of Libyans and foreign fighters, many hired from other African nations.
Many army units in the east appear to have sided with protesters, and other more institutional parts of his regime have weakened. A string of ambassadors abroad have defected, as has the justice minister.
Protesters claim to control a string of cities, from the Egyptian border in the east — where guards at the crossing fled — to the city of Ajdabiya, about 450 miles (725 kilometers) farther west along the Mediterranean coast, said Tawfiq al-Shahbi, a protest organizer in the eastern city of Tobruk.
Ajdabiya is a key city near the oil fields of central and eastern Libya. Protesters and local tribesmen were protecting several of the fields and facilities around the city, said one resident, Ahmed al-Zawi.
Residents are also guarding one of Libya's main oil export ports, Zuweita, and the pipelines feeding into it, he said. The pipelines are off and several tankers that had been waiting in the port to load left empty, said al-Zawi, who said he visited Zuweita on Tuesday morning.
The first major protests to hit an OPEC country — and major supplier to Europe — sent oil prices to $95.42 per barrel. Only a small amount of Libya's oil production appeared to have been affected, though analysts fear that revolts will spread to OPEC heavyweights like Iran. Libya holds the most oil reserves in Africa.
Two oil companies on Tuesday suspended production in the country: Italy's Eni — the biggest energy producer in Libya, producing about a quarter of its exports — and Spain's Repsol-YPF, which produced 34,777 barrels in the country last year, about 3.8 percent of national output. A string of international oil companies have begun evacuating their expatriate workers or their families.
In the eastern cities of Tobruk and Benghazi, protesters raised the pre-Gadhafi flag of Libya's monarchy on public buildings. Protesters over the weekend overran police stations and security headquarters in Benghazi, taking control of the streets.
In Benghazi, celebratory residents organized themselves into units to protect property and manage traffic after pro-Gadhafi forces fled, said Farag al-Warfali, a banker. A committee was set up to organize and distribute the use of weapons confiscated from government warehouses, recruiting policemen and officers to carry the weapons for city protection, fearing a new attack.
"These are his dying words. He is a criminal and is ready to do anything. But we are ready for him," al-Warfali said of Gadhafi's speech. "Besides, most of his officers have deserted him anyway. He only has the mercenaries left."
Since Sunday, the fiercest fighting has been in Tripoli, the center of Gadhafi's rule.
At least 62 people were killed in violence in the capital since Sunday, according to the New York-based Human Rights Watch, but it cautioned that that figure came from only two hospitals. That comes on top of at least 233 people killed across the so far in the uprising, counted by the group from hospitals around the country.
Tripoli residents on Tuesday were recovering from the militia rampage through multiple neighborhoods that began the night before and lasted until dawn. Some resident ventured out to find stores open for food, wary of militia attacks.
One man in his 50s said residents of his neighborhood were piling up roadblocks of concrete, bricks and wood to try to slow attackers. He said he had seen several streets with funeral tents mourning the dead.
The night before, he had spent barricaded in his home, blankets over the windows — sitting with a kitchen knife on the table in front of him — as militiamen opened fire in nearby districts.
Buses unloaded militia fighters in several locations, he said. Others sped in vehicles with guns mounted on the top, opening fire, including at people watching from windows. "I know of two different families, one family had a 4-year-old who was shot and killed on a balcony in the eastern part of the city, and another lady on the balcony was shot in the head," he said.
He, like other residents, contacted by The Associated Press, spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation.
One of the heaviest battlegrounds was the impoverished, densely populated district of Fashloum. There, militiamen shot any "moving human being" with live ammunition, including ambulances, so wounded were left in the streets to die, one resident said.
He said that as he fled the neighborhood Monday night, he ran across a group of militiamen, including foreign fighters. "The Libyans (among them) warned me to leave and showed me bodies of the dead and told me: `We were given orders to shoot anybody who moves in the place,'" said the resident.
He and other residents described dozens of bodies still in the street at daybreak Tuesday.
The head of the U.N. human rights agency, Navi Pillay, called for an investigation, saying widespread and systematic attacks against civilians "may amount to crimes against humanity."
In the early hours of Wednesday, several Libyan military officers held a news conference with Libyan journalists broadcast on state television in what they described as an effort to set the record straight on a number of issues.
Lt. General Jibril al-Qadiki, an air force pilot, denied reports of airstrikes on civilians and said there had been strikes but only on ammunition warehouses after "rebels" used them. He named four storage area in eastern Libya in desert areas, and insisted there were no people in those areas.
He also accused western countries, including the U.S., of providing logistics to the protesters aiming to "destroy Libya."
___
Associated Press writers Hamza Hendawi in Cairo; Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations; Colleen Barry in Milan, Italy; Matthew Lee in Washington; John Heilprin in Geneva; and Barbara Whitaker in New York contributed to this report.
Man jumps barricade at NBC's 'Today' show
AP, NEW YORK: A man who briefly interrupted "Today" show personalities at the NBC show's outdoor studio is being evaluated for emotional problems.
New York City Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said Tuesday that it's not clear whether the man, who was not identified, will face charges. He jumped a barricade that kept people away from Meredith Vieira, Al Roker and guest host Willie Geist as they stood outside and talked on the air.
Roker said the man said something to the effect of being God's gift to music. "Today" security and New York City police officers quickly subdued him.
News anchor Ann Curry, who was inside at the time, wrote on Twitter that everyone at the show was OK.
"Weirded out," she wrote, "but OK."
New York City Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said Tuesday that it's not clear whether the man, who was not identified, will face charges. He jumped a barricade that kept people away from Meredith Vieira, Al Roker and guest host Willie Geist as they stood outside and talked on the air.
Roker said the man said something to the effect of being God's gift to music. "Today" security and New York City police officers quickly subdued him.
News anchor Ann Curry, who was inside at the time, wrote on Twitter that everyone at the show was OK.
"Weirded out," she wrote, "but OK."
Reggae star Buju Banton convicted in drug case
Reuters, TAMPA, Florida: Jamaican reggae star and Grammy winner Buju Banton was found guilty on federal drug charges on Tuesday and could face 15 years to life in prison.
A 12-member jury in Tampa found Banton, 37, guilty of conspiring with two other men to possess 11 pounds (5 kg) or more of cocaine in Sarasota, Florida, in December 2009. The verdict came after a four-day trial.
Banton, whose real name is Mark Myrie, won a Grammy for the best reggae album of 2010 for "Before the Dawn" on February 13. He was unable to attend the ceremony in Los Angeles because he was preparing for the start of his trial the next day in Tampa.
Banton testified at the trial that he was entrapped by federal informant Alexander Johnson and never wanted to buy drugs. Banton said he met Johnson on a transatlantic flight and talked about drugs to impress him because he thought Johnson had connections in the music industry.
Jurors were shown a video of Banton tasting cocaine in a Sarasota warehouse two days before his two associates were arrested trying to buy the drugs from an undercover officer. Banton was arrested at his home in Miami.
About 20 supporters of Banton prayed for his acquittal in the hallway of the U.S. District Courthouse while the jury deliberated.
This was Banton's second trial on the drug charges. The first trial ended last year when the jury could not agree on a verdict.
A sentencing date has not been scheduled.
A 12-member jury in Tampa found Banton, 37, guilty of conspiring with two other men to possess 11 pounds (5 kg) or more of cocaine in Sarasota, Florida, in December 2009. The verdict came after a four-day trial.
Banton, whose real name is Mark Myrie, won a Grammy for the best reggae album of 2010 for "Before the Dawn" on February 13. He was unable to attend the ceremony in Los Angeles because he was preparing for the start of his trial the next day in Tampa.
Banton testified at the trial that he was entrapped by federal informant Alexander Johnson and never wanted to buy drugs. Banton said he met Johnson on a transatlantic flight and talked about drugs to impress him because he thought Johnson had connections in the music industry.
Jurors were shown a video of Banton tasting cocaine in a Sarasota warehouse two days before his two associates were arrested trying to buy the drugs from an undercover officer. Banton was arrested at his home in Miami.
About 20 supporters of Banton prayed for his acquittal in the hallway of the U.S. District Courthouse while the jury deliberated.
This was Banton's second trial on the drug charges. The first trial ended last year when the jury could not agree on a verdict.
A sentencing date has not been scheduled.
Sandra Bullock's ex-husband to pen memoir
Reuters, NEW YORK: The ex-husband of actress Sandra Bullock who admitted infidelities caused the collapse of their marriage has signed a deal to pen a memoir, Simon & Schuster's Gallery Books imprint said on Tuesday.
Jesse James, 41, has signed a deal for a tell-all book tentatively titled "American Outlaw," that will be released later this year.
A spokeswoman for Gallery Books would not comment on what the deal was worth.
James was vilified by the media when his five-year marriage to Bullock ended days after the popular actress won a best actress Oscar in March 2010 for "The Blind Side." He later admitted cheating on Bullock and their divorce was finalized last June.
Last month the tattooed, motorcycle-riding James announced he was engaged to tattoo artist and reality star Kat Von D. They have been dating since last summer.
"2010 was actually the best year of my life because I fell in love with my best friend. An amazing woman who stood behind me when the world turned their backs," James, 41, told People magazine in January.
(Reporting by Christine Kearney, editing by Patricia Reaney)
Jesse James, 41, has signed a deal for a tell-all book tentatively titled "American Outlaw," that will be released later this year.
A spokeswoman for Gallery Books would not comment on what the deal was worth.
James was vilified by the media when his five-year marriage to Bullock ended days after the popular actress won a best actress Oscar in March 2010 for "The Blind Side." He later admitted cheating on Bullock and their divorce was finalized last June.
Last month the tattooed, motorcycle-riding James announced he was engaged to tattoo artist and reality star Kat Von D. They have been dating since last summer.
"2010 was actually the best year of my life because I fell in love with my best friend. An amazing woman who stood behind me when the world turned their backs," James, 41, told People magazine in January.
(Reporting by Christine Kearney, editing by Patricia Reaney)
Trees or not, Toomer's Corner will live on
AP, Before anyone starts calling Auburn fans a bunch of tree huggers, remember this: No one has ever actually been seen locked in an embrace with the suddenly endangered trees at Toomer's Corner.
They have been seen covering them in toilet paper, though. More than a few trees from other places have been sacrificed over the years to make the two-ply that festoons the two oaks at the intersection of College and Magnolia streets in Auburn on major occasions — like a win over hated rival Alabama.
Toomer's Corner has always been a place to celebrate, and if the trees are wrapped in toilet paper there are good reasons to celebrate. That was especially true last month when the Tigers won the national championship and the rolls of paper flew with every cry of "War Eagle!"
The toilet paper was back over the weekend, but this time mostly in rolls left at the base of the towering 130-year-old trees. Written on them were messages of sorrow and hope.
"Get well soon," read one toilet paper roll with the Auburn logo drawn in ink.
Unfortunately, there's little chance of the trees getting well soon — or at all. They were poisoned with a herbicide used specifically to kill trees, and experts say so much of it was used that their fate has likely already been determined.
The people of Auburn may not be the tree hugging types, but they're devastated by the impending loss.
"It's more than these oak trees, it's the role they played in Auburn history," former Auburn athletic director David Housel said. "People in Auburn feel violated because their tradition has been attacked."
Making matters worse, the man who allegedly attacked those traditions has children named "Crimson Tyde" and "Bear."
Yes, a `Bama fan.
His name is Harvey Almorn Updyke Jr. and court documents say he admitted to being "Al from Dadeville," who phoned a radio show late last month and claimed he poured herbicide around the oaks. He then signed off by saying, "Roll Damn Tide."
The 62-year-old — who has denied the actual poisoning — is being called a lot of other things by outraged Auburn fans, though stupid has to be at the top of the list for bragging about what he allegedly did. He's so toxic in Auburn that the attorney appointed to his case immediately filed a motion to withdraw so he can walk around town without a disguise.
Updyke is free on $50,000 bond on charges of first-degree criminal mischief, and if there's one safe bet it's that whatever attorney finally takes his case will ask that his trial be moved as far from Auburn as possible.
Those of us outside Alabama can't even begin to imagine the depth of the rivalry between the two schools, though the stories of those on the inside are telling. For more than 40 years at one point the schools refused to even meet on the football field because of arguments over money, officiating and just about everything else.
In Alabama, it is said, you have a choice at birth: Auburn or Alabama, and don't take long making your decision.
Supporters of either college have fought each other, pulled pranks on each other, and found creative ways to express their hate for each other. But this went beyond malicious, because of what Toomer's Corner means to people in Auburn goes way beyond football.
It's not just the trees, but the place.
"I'm guessing Auburn people gathered there to celebrate secession in 1861 and to celebrate the election of Barack Obama a few years ago," Housel said. "That's how historic it is."
To their credit, Auburn coach Gene Chizik and Alabama's Nick Saban were quick to issue a joint statement, calling the tree poisoning "an isolated incident by one individual that is not representative of what the greatest rivalry in college football is all about."
They're right, though that doesn't make it any less painful for the Auburn faithful. Laugh all you want at the idea of grown people celebrating with toilet paper, but there are stranger traditions in college football in places supposedly a lot more sophisticated than Auburn.
And while the trees may not live, it's a safe bet the toilet paper will continue to fly.
"The tradition of rolling Toomer's Corner will go on whether these trees survive or not," Housel said."The next football game we win I bet there's going to be one heck of a rolling at Toomer's Corner."
They have been seen covering them in toilet paper, though. More than a few trees from other places have been sacrificed over the years to make the two-ply that festoons the two oaks at the intersection of College and Magnolia streets in Auburn on major occasions — like a win over hated rival Alabama.
Toomer's Corner has always been a place to celebrate, and if the trees are wrapped in toilet paper there are good reasons to celebrate. That was especially true last month when the Tigers won the national championship and the rolls of paper flew with every cry of "War Eagle!"
The toilet paper was back over the weekend, but this time mostly in rolls left at the base of the towering 130-year-old trees. Written on them were messages of sorrow and hope.
"Get well soon," read one toilet paper roll with the Auburn logo drawn in ink.
Unfortunately, there's little chance of the trees getting well soon — or at all. They were poisoned with a herbicide used specifically to kill trees, and experts say so much of it was used that their fate has likely already been determined.
The people of Auburn may not be the tree hugging types, but they're devastated by the impending loss.
"It's more than these oak trees, it's the role they played in Auburn history," former Auburn athletic director David Housel said. "People in Auburn feel violated because their tradition has been attacked."
Making matters worse, the man who allegedly attacked those traditions has children named "Crimson Tyde" and "Bear."
Yes, a `Bama fan.
His name is Harvey Almorn Updyke Jr. and court documents say he admitted to being "Al from Dadeville," who phoned a radio show late last month and claimed he poured herbicide around the oaks. He then signed off by saying, "Roll Damn Tide."
The 62-year-old — who has denied the actual poisoning — is being called a lot of other things by outraged Auburn fans, though stupid has to be at the top of the list for bragging about what he allegedly did. He's so toxic in Auburn that the attorney appointed to his case immediately filed a motion to withdraw so he can walk around town without a disguise.
Updyke is free on $50,000 bond on charges of first-degree criminal mischief, and if there's one safe bet it's that whatever attorney finally takes his case will ask that his trial be moved as far from Auburn as possible.
Those of us outside Alabama can't even begin to imagine the depth of the rivalry between the two schools, though the stories of those on the inside are telling. For more than 40 years at one point the schools refused to even meet on the football field because of arguments over money, officiating and just about everything else.
In Alabama, it is said, you have a choice at birth: Auburn or Alabama, and don't take long making your decision.
Supporters of either college have fought each other, pulled pranks on each other, and found creative ways to express their hate for each other. But this went beyond malicious, because of what Toomer's Corner means to people in Auburn goes way beyond football.
It's not just the trees, but the place.
"I'm guessing Auburn people gathered there to celebrate secession in 1861 and to celebrate the election of Barack Obama a few years ago," Housel said. "That's how historic it is."
To their credit, Auburn coach Gene Chizik and Alabama's Nick Saban were quick to issue a joint statement, calling the tree poisoning "an isolated incident by one individual that is not representative of what the greatest rivalry in college football is all about."
They're right, though that doesn't make it any less painful for the Auburn faithful. Laugh all you want at the idea of grown people celebrating with toilet paper, but there are stranger traditions in college football in places supposedly a lot more sophisticated than Auburn.
And while the trees may not live, it's a safe bet the toilet paper will continue to fly.
"The tradition of rolling Toomer's Corner will go on whether these trees survive or not," Housel said."The next football game we win I bet there's going to be one heck of a rolling at Toomer's Corner."
St. John's is painting New York City red again
AP, NEW YORK: One sign that you've made it in New York City is being recognized by the man in the street. Steve Lavin might soon need a disguise.
"The FedEx guy is always stopping me in my neighborhood, a big fan," the first-year St. John's coach said Tuesday, three days after the Red Storm beat No. 4 Pittsburgh, a victory that moved them into the Top 25 for the first time in over a decade.
"He was raving about Dwight Hardy yesterday as if I didn't see the game. He's just excited about basketball. He'll just jump out of the truck to talk while I'm trying to get my coffee. He's been giving me some good pep talks."
Need another sign you've made it? Text messages.
"From the time I left the court until I got to the locker room, I had 56 text messages," senior forward Justin Burrell said, referring to the last-second win over Pittsburgh. "From then until I was done with the media it was up to 84. Then when we got ranked I got another 30. It's a good thing I have an unlimited plan."
Lavin has him beat easily.
"After the big wins I'll get 400 to 450 texts," he said. "It's pretty consistent of 300 to 350 after a win. After the losses to Notre Dame and Louisville I got six or seven. My sisters text and one of my staff and that's about it."
There's a feeling around St. John's that hasn't been there for quite some time.
Since the 2000-01 season, the Red Storm have had two 20-win seasons and those records can't be found in the media guide since the NCAA vacated 47 wins over four seasons for infractions over off-court issues that resulted in probation and a loss of scholarships.
In Norm Roberts' six seasons there were two winning records, both one game over .500.
Enter Lavin, the former UCLA coach who spent the last seven seasons as a TV analyst.
He took a roster with 10 seniors and introduced an uptempo, pressing game. The 23rd-ranked Red Storm are 17-9 overall and 9-5 in the Big East, considered the best conference in the country. The five marquee wins are over Georgetown, Notre Dame, Duke, Connecticut and Pittsburgh — all ranked in the top 10 this season.
With the winning comes crowds at Madison Square Garden, the program's second home. Last season, in seven home games there, the crowd topped 10,000 once. There were four crowds that didn't reach 6,000.
On Saturday, more than 14,000 people were in the building to see Hardy's underhanded flip with 1.2 seconds left win it.
"The first time playing in the Garden, I don't know the numbers but it didn't feel like the Garden attendancewise," Burrell said. "So now we play Garden games and I can't see two empty seats next to each other. That's exciting to have fans there cheering. Before it used to be the opposing team's fans outcheering ours. So this great."
Hall of Fame coaches Joe Lapchick and Lou Carnesecca were most responsible for the school's 1,720 victories, seventh most in Division I.
"They pulled a Lazarus," said Carnesecca, turning theological and referencing those who rise from the dead. "These kids have been through the wars. There's a buzz. These kids are the toast of the town and New York was begging for this. It wakes up the whole neighborhood."
The most wins this senior class has had is the 17 last season, a figure already matched with four regular-season games and the Big East and NCAA tournaments still to play.
An NCAA berth — it would the school's first since 2002 — is pretty much a certainty given the Red Storm's list of wins, strength of schedule (No. 1 in the nation) and RPI ranking (12). St. John's is also tied for fourth in a conference projected to get eight to 11 NCAA tournament bids.
"Last year I felt we were on the verge," senior Paris Horn said. "We were right there, but things didn't click."
They are clicking now and Burrell doesn't want that to change.
"When you're losing everything is dark," he said. "It's terrible to lose. I didn't want to speak to my mother, everything she said sounded bad. Classwork is so much harder, all that stuff. Now, my mom's nice, puts a couple of extra dollars in my account. Teachers are being extra nice. Everyone is smiling a little harder. The campus life is a little bit more fun. Everything is great."
And Lavin and his inherited rotation of 10 seniors, one sophomore and one freshman are giving St. John's fans a ride they haven't had in a while.
"Being seniors and going through the tough times we had we want to maintain what we have now so there's no letdown," forward Sean Evans said.
And to keep the team's mind on the task at hand, Lavin placed a copy of Rudyard Kipling's poem "If" in every player's locker.
"This is different for me," said Lavin, who had a 145-78 record in seven seasons at UCLA and took the Bruins to six NCAA tournaments, reaching the round of 16 four times.
"At 46 everything is different," he said. "I was 32 when I got the job at UCLA. At 46, you're more deliberate. Maybe you appreciate things more because you slow down and have more life experience to look back on."
"This is really a special team," he added. "And they're in the middle of an impressive run, yet we have so much work ahead of us and there's only a month or so to go. It's been a very rewarding group to work with, gratifying to see the breakthroughs."
"The FedEx guy is always stopping me in my neighborhood, a big fan," the first-year St. John's coach said Tuesday, three days after the Red Storm beat No. 4 Pittsburgh, a victory that moved them into the Top 25 for the first time in over a decade.
"He was raving about Dwight Hardy yesterday as if I didn't see the game. He's just excited about basketball. He'll just jump out of the truck to talk while I'm trying to get my coffee. He's been giving me some good pep talks."
Need another sign you've made it? Text messages.
"From the time I left the court until I got to the locker room, I had 56 text messages," senior forward Justin Burrell said, referring to the last-second win over Pittsburgh. "From then until I was done with the media it was up to 84. Then when we got ranked I got another 30. It's a good thing I have an unlimited plan."
Lavin has him beat easily.
"After the big wins I'll get 400 to 450 texts," he said. "It's pretty consistent of 300 to 350 after a win. After the losses to Notre Dame and Louisville I got six or seven. My sisters text and one of my staff and that's about it."
There's a feeling around St. John's that hasn't been there for quite some time.
Since the 2000-01 season, the Red Storm have had two 20-win seasons and those records can't be found in the media guide since the NCAA vacated 47 wins over four seasons for infractions over off-court issues that resulted in probation and a loss of scholarships.
In Norm Roberts' six seasons there were two winning records, both one game over .500.
Enter Lavin, the former UCLA coach who spent the last seven seasons as a TV analyst.
He took a roster with 10 seniors and introduced an uptempo, pressing game. The 23rd-ranked Red Storm are 17-9 overall and 9-5 in the Big East, considered the best conference in the country. The five marquee wins are over Georgetown, Notre Dame, Duke, Connecticut and Pittsburgh — all ranked in the top 10 this season.
With the winning comes crowds at Madison Square Garden, the program's second home. Last season, in seven home games there, the crowd topped 10,000 once. There were four crowds that didn't reach 6,000.
On Saturday, more than 14,000 people were in the building to see Hardy's underhanded flip with 1.2 seconds left win it.
"The first time playing in the Garden, I don't know the numbers but it didn't feel like the Garden attendancewise," Burrell said. "So now we play Garden games and I can't see two empty seats next to each other. That's exciting to have fans there cheering. Before it used to be the opposing team's fans outcheering ours. So this great."
Hall of Fame coaches Joe Lapchick and Lou Carnesecca were most responsible for the school's 1,720 victories, seventh most in Division I.
"They pulled a Lazarus," said Carnesecca, turning theological and referencing those who rise from the dead. "These kids have been through the wars. There's a buzz. These kids are the toast of the town and New York was begging for this. It wakes up the whole neighborhood."
The most wins this senior class has had is the 17 last season, a figure already matched with four regular-season games and the Big East and NCAA tournaments still to play.
An NCAA berth — it would the school's first since 2002 — is pretty much a certainty given the Red Storm's list of wins, strength of schedule (No. 1 in the nation) and RPI ranking (12). St. John's is also tied for fourth in a conference projected to get eight to 11 NCAA tournament bids.
"Last year I felt we were on the verge," senior Paris Horn said. "We were right there, but things didn't click."
They are clicking now and Burrell doesn't want that to change.
"When you're losing everything is dark," he said. "It's terrible to lose. I didn't want to speak to my mother, everything she said sounded bad. Classwork is so much harder, all that stuff. Now, my mom's nice, puts a couple of extra dollars in my account. Teachers are being extra nice. Everyone is smiling a little harder. The campus life is a little bit more fun. Everything is great."
And Lavin and his inherited rotation of 10 seniors, one sophomore and one freshman are giving St. John's fans a ride they haven't had in a while.
"Being seniors and going through the tough times we had we want to maintain what we have now so there's no letdown," forward Sean Evans said.
And to keep the team's mind on the task at hand, Lavin placed a copy of Rudyard Kipling's poem "If" in every player's locker.
"This is different for me," said Lavin, who had a 145-78 record in seven seasons at UCLA and took the Bruins to six NCAA tournaments, reaching the round of 16 four times.
"At 46 everything is different," he said. "I was 32 when I got the job at UCLA. At 46, you're more deliberate. Maybe you appreciate things more because you slow down and have more life experience to look back on."
"This is really a special team," he added. "And they're in the middle of an impressive run, yet we have so much work ahead of us and there's only a month or so to go. It's been a very rewarding group to work with, gratifying to see the breakthroughs."
No UConn postseason ban, but Calhoun suspended
AP, UConn coach Jim Calhoun was suspended by the NCAA for three games next season for recruiting violations committed under his watch, though the program dodged a major sanction when it was spared a postseason ban.
Calhoun was cited by the NCAA on Tuesday for failing to create an atmosphere of compliance within his program and was suspended for the first three Big East games during the 2011-12 season.
The NCAA also hit UConn with scholarship reductions for three academic years, recruiting restrictions, permanent disassociation of a booster and three years probation.
As a part of the disassociation of the booster, not named in the report, the university will not be able to accept financial contributions, recruiting assistance or provide him with any benefit and privileges.
"We think the penalty is appropriate," said Dennis Thomas, chairman of the Committee on Infractions. "The head coach should be aware, but, also in the same frame, the head coach obviously cannot be aware of everything that goes on within the program. However, the head coach bears that responsibility."
Thomas said Calhoun will serve the suspension next year because UConn could appeal the decision.
"I am very disappointed with the NCAA's decision in this case," Calhoun said. "My lawyer and I are evaluating my options and will make a decision which way to proceed. In the meantime, I will not make any further statements about the case as our program prepares for what I hope will be an exciting and successful postseason."
The NCAA and the school have been investigating the program since shortly after a report by Yahoo! Sports in March 2009 that former team manager Josh Nochimson helped guide recruit Nate Miles to Connecticut, giving him lodging, transportation, meals and representation.
As a former team manager, Nochimson is considered a representative of UConn's athletic interests by the NCAA and prohibited from giving Miles anything of value.
"We cited the head coach for not being on top of these issues with the agent, the booster," Thomas said. "The head coach stated that the booster was a member of the family during his days as team manager."
The school said it found that the basketball staff exchanged more than 1,400 calls and 1,100 text messages with Nochimson between June 2005 and December 2008.
Members of the coaching staff also provided 32 impermissible complimentary tickets to individuals responsible for teaching or directing activities with prospective student-athletes.
Miles was expelled from UConn in October 2008 without ever playing for the Huskies.
Nochimson was attempting to become an NBA agent.
The school imposed sanctions on itself, including reducing scholarships from 13 to 12 for the 2010-11 and 2011-12 academic years. It also put itself on probation for two years.
The NCAA also tacked on scholarship reductions from 13 to 12 for 2012-13.
"When we submitted our response to the NCAA Committee on Infractions acknowledging violations in the men's basketball program, we immediately self-imposed a series of penalties and corrective measures that are included as part of the NCAA Committee on Infractions report," UConn athletic director Jeffrey Hathaway said. "We are disappointed that the committee determined that additional penalties needed to be imposed."
Two members of last year's basketball staff, Beau Archibald, the director of basketball operations, and assistant coach Patrick Sellers lost their jobs after allegations they provided false and misleading information to NCAA investigators.
The Division I Committee on Infractions levied a two-year show-cause penalty on Archibald.
The report states Hathaway said Calhoun's pursuit of Miles was the "most intense" he has ever seen him recruit a player.
Calhoun had admitted mistakes were made, but insisted he was not a cheater.
This was the first time the program has received a letter from the NCAA accusing the school of major violations. Calhoun turned sleepy UConn into an elite program, winning two national championships and 575 games in 24 years.
Thomas said a postseason ban was considered, but the committee was not swayed because the case involved a high-profile coach and program.
UConn will be on probation from Feb. 22, 2011 through Feb. 21, 2014.
Calhoun can't be present in the arena during his suspension where the games are played, nor have contact with the coaching staff or athletes during the games.
The program is banned from recruiting calls during the 2011-12 academic year until 30 days after the first day that phone calls are allowed. The number of men's basketball coaches allowed to make phone calls was cut from three to two, not including the head basketball coach, for six months after the university's response to the notice of allegations.
UConn also faces a reduction of the number of men's basketball off-campus recruiting days by 40, from 130 to 90, for the 2010-11, 2011-12 and 2012-13 recruiting periods.
Calhoun was cited by the NCAA on Tuesday for failing to create an atmosphere of compliance within his program and was suspended for the first three Big East games during the 2011-12 season.
The NCAA also hit UConn with scholarship reductions for three academic years, recruiting restrictions, permanent disassociation of a booster and three years probation.
As a part of the disassociation of the booster, not named in the report, the university will not be able to accept financial contributions, recruiting assistance or provide him with any benefit and privileges.
"We think the penalty is appropriate," said Dennis Thomas, chairman of the Committee on Infractions. "The head coach should be aware, but, also in the same frame, the head coach obviously cannot be aware of everything that goes on within the program. However, the head coach bears that responsibility."
Thomas said Calhoun will serve the suspension next year because UConn could appeal the decision.
"I am very disappointed with the NCAA's decision in this case," Calhoun said. "My lawyer and I are evaluating my options and will make a decision which way to proceed. In the meantime, I will not make any further statements about the case as our program prepares for what I hope will be an exciting and successful postseason."
The NCAA and the school have been investigating the program since shortly after a report by Yahoo! Sports in March 2009 that former team manager Josh Nochimson helped guide recruit Nate Miles to Connecticut, giving him lodging, transportation, meals and representation.
As a former team manager, Nochimson is considered a representative of UConn's athletic interests by the NCAA and prohibited from giving Miles anything of value.
"We cited the head coach for not being on top of these issues with the agent, the booster," Thomas said. "The head coach stated that the booster was a member of the family during his days as team manager."
The school said it found that the basketball staff exchanged more than 1,400 calls and 1,100 text messages with Nochimson between June 2005 and December 2008.
Members of the coaching staff also provided 32 impermissible complimentary tickets to individuals responsible for teaching or directing activities with prospective student-athletes.
Miles was expelled from UConn in October 2008 without ever playing for the Huskies.
Nochimson was attempting to become an NBA agent.
The school imposed sanctions on itself, including reducing scholarships from 13 to 12 for the 2010-11 and 2011-12 academic years. It also put itself on probation for two years.
The NCAA also tacked on scholarship reductions from 13 to 12 for 2012-13.
"When we submitted our response to the NCAA Committee on Infractions acknowledging violations in the men's basketball program, we immediately self-imposed a series of penalties and corrective measures that are included as part of the NCAA Committee on Infractions report," UConn athletic director Jeffrey Hathaway said. "We are disappointed that the committee determined that additional penalties needed to be imposed."
Two members of last year's basketball staff, Beau Archibald, the director of basketball operations, and assistant coach Patrick Sellers lost their jobs after allegations they provided false and misleading information to NCAA investigators.
The Division I Committee on Infractions levied a two-year show-cause penalty on Archibald.
The report states Hathaway said Calhoun's pursuit of Miles was the "most intense" he has ever seen him recruit a player.
Calhoun had admitted mistakes were made, but insisted he was not a cheater.
This was the first time the program has received a letter from the NCAA accusing the school of major violations. Calhoun turned sleepy UConn into an elite program, winning two national championships and 575 games in 24 years.
Thomas said a postseason ban was considered, but the committee was not swayed because the case involved a high-profile coach and program.
UConn will be on probation from Feb. 22, 2011 through Feb. 21, 2014.
Calhoun can't be present in the arena during his suspension where the games are played, nor have contact with the coaching staff or athletes during the games.
The program is banned from recruiting calls during the 2011-12 academic year until 30 days after the first day that phone calls are allowed. The number of men's basketball coaches allowed to make phone calls was cut from three to two, not including the head basketball coach, for six months after the university's response to the notice of allegations.
UConn also faces a reduction of the number of men's basketball off-campus recruiting days by 40, from 130 to 90, for the 2010-11, 2011-12 and 2012-13 recruiting periods.
Villanova fading in Big East
AP, PHILADELPHIA: Maalik Wayns picked off the cross-court pass, sped to the basket, then — bam! — crashed on his tailbone on the unforgiving court.
Strong start, end with a thud.
That might be the tale of Villanova's season.
For the second straight season, the No. 15 Wildcats (21-7, 9-6) are experiencing a second-half swoon in the rugged Big East and it's impossible to tell when the malaise will end.
The preseason pick to finish second in the conference, Villanova will be fortunate just to finish above .500 in the Big East with three games left. The Wildcats are 5-6 after a 16-1 start and face the grim — yet realistic — potential of dropping their last three games: No. 23 St. John's on Saturday, then on the road at No. 9 Notre Dame and No. 4 Pittsburgh.
Each year under coach Jay Wright, the same theme is pounded into the playbook of every Wildcat. Win or lose, play your best basketball at the end of the season.
If the season ended Jan. 15, then, hey, sign up the Wildcats for the Final Four. But after a 69-64 loss to No. 17 Syracuse on Monday night, the only thing the Wildcats need to sign up for are some shooting drills. They started 1 for 17 from the field and shot 24 percent in the first half against the Orange. Toss out Corey Stokes' 5 for 10 from the 3-point line, and Villanova was 0 for 16 in the loss.
The Wildcats have lived in the 30-percent shooting range for most of the last month and that's not going to win games in the NIT, much less earn a high seed in the NCAA tournament.
"There's always concern," Wright said. "But I still think we can get better."
He should hope so.
The Wildcats shot 36 percent in the first half of an overtime win over DePaul, which came two games after a 36-percent night (18 for 50) in a loss against Pittsburgh, which was one game after a 39-percent first half in a stunning loss at Rutgers.
Wright puts unconditional trust in his guards to create shots, run the offense and dictate the pace of the game. But his freewheeling backcourt mates were the biggest misfiring offenders against Syracuse. Corey Fisher and Wayns (who sat out most of the second half with back spasms) went 4 for 25 from the floor.
Time for concern? Not for Fisher.
"Not at all," he said. "This league is so good, one day you could be in third, next day you could be in fifth. We're not worried about rankings. We're not worried about nothing."
Let's rewind a bit to last March.
The Wildcats raced to a 20-1 start, the best for a program that began play in 1920, and they won their first nine Big East games. They stumbled to a 2-5 finish, needed overtime to get past mid-major Robert Morris in the NCAA's first round and former guard Scottie Reynolds proclaimed, "There ain't nothing wrong with our team."
The Wildcats were then knocked out of the tournament the next day by 10th-seeded Saint Mary's.
So, this boast that all is well on the Main Line is hardly new.
"We're not as good as I think people would like us to be, but we're not that far off," Wright said. "We're not going to panic. We're going to keep getting better, keep working. Our defense isn't bad, it can get a little better. Maybe it can get us some easier shots. We'll get there. I think this team will get there."
Wright has asked his starters to play heavy minutes because the roster is dangerously thin. He rarely fields a full team — Stokes was back after a three-game absence because of turf toe, but center Maurice Sutton was suspended for missing curfew. Sutton was benched for a game last month for a throat-slashing gesture, Dominic Cheek missed a game with an injury and JayVaughn Pinkston is out for the season after he was charged with assault.
Each game seems to bring a new rotation.
"I don't want to use it as an excuse, but that's the rhythm thing," Wright said. "You play one way when you've got the bigs in there. (On Monday vs. Syracuse), we played small. We haven't played small in a while. You just don't do that at this point in the season and look good. We're trying to grind our way through it and figure out how we can do it."
The Wildcats have dreadful losses at Big East lightweights Providence and Rutgers; and they lost to UConn, Georgetown, Pittsburgh and the Orange by a combined 13 points.
Wright confidently stated after the Syracuse loss that he still believes in his team. Even with the woeful shooting percentages, the Wildcats were still in position to win in the closing minutes. Plus, Fisher, Stokes and the senior class are only two years removed from a Final Four appearance. So, the talent is in place to believe another deep run is possible.
"We're going to keep getting better until the last game of the season," Wright said.
At this pace, that will come sooner than expected.
Strong start, end with a thud.
That might be the tale of Villanova's season.
For the second straight season, the No. 15 Wildcats (21-7, 9-6) are experiencing a second-half swoon in the rugged Big East and it's impossible to tell when the malaise will end.
The preseason pick to finish second in the conference, Villanova will be fortunate just to finish above .500 in the Big East with three games left. The Wildcats are 5-6 after a 16-1 start and face the grim — yet realistic — potential of dropping their last three games: No. 23 St. John's on Saturday, then on the road at No. 9 Notre Dame and No. 4 Pittsburgh.
Each year under coach Jay Wright, the same theme is pounded into the playbook of every Wildcat. Win or lose, play your best basketball at the end of the season.
If the season ended Jan. 15, then, hey, sign up the Wildcats for the Final Four. But after a 69-64 loss to No. 17 Syracuse on Monday night, the only thing the Wildcats need to sign up for are some shooting drills. They started 1 for 17 from the field and shot 24 percent in the first half against the Orange. Toss out Corey Stokes' 5 for 10 from the 3-point line, and Villanova was 0 for 16 in the loss.
The Wildcats have lived in the 30-percent shooting range for most of the last month and that's not going to win games in the NIT, much less earn a high seed in the NCAA tournament.
"There's always concern," Wright said. "But I still think we can get better."
He should hope so.
The Wildcats shot 36 percent in the first half of an overtime win over DePaul, which came two games after a 36-percent night (18 for 50) in a loss against Pittsburgh, which was one game after a 39-percent first half in a stunning loss at Rutgers.
Wright puts unconditional trust in his guards to create shots, run the offense and dictate the pace of the game. But his freewheeling backcourt mates were the biggest misfiring offenders against Syracuse. Corey Fisher and Wayns (who sat out most of the second half with back spasms) went 4 for 25 from the floor.
Time for concern? Not for Fisher.
"Not at all," he said. "This league is so good, one day you could be in third, next day you could be in fifth. We're not worried about rankings. We're not worried about nothing."
Let's rewind a bit to last March.
The Wildcats raced to a 20-1 start, the best for a program that began play in 1920, and they won their first nine Big East games. They stumbled to a 2-5 finish, needed overtime to get past mid-major Robert Morris in the NCAA's first round and former guard Scottie Reynolds proclaimed, "There ain't nothing wrong with our team."
The Wildcats were then knocked out of the tournament the next day by 10th-seeded Saint Mary's.
So, this boast that all is well on the Main Line is hardly new.
"We're not as good as I think people would like us to be, but we're not that far off," Wright said. "We're not going to panic. We're going to keep getting better, keep working. Our defense isn't bad, it can get a little better. Maybe it can get us some easier shots. We'll get there. I think this team will get there."
Wright has asked his starters to play heavy minutes because the roster is dangerously thin. He rarely fields a full team — Stokes was back after a three-game absence because of turf toe, but center Maurice Sutton was suspended for missing curfew. Sutton was benched for a game last month for a throat-slashing gesture, Dominic Cheek missed a game with an injury and JayVaughn Pinkston is out for the season after he was charged with assault.
Each game seems to bring a new rotation.
"I don't want to use it as an excuse, but that's the rhythm thing," Wright said. "You play one way when you've got the bigs in there. (On Monday vs. Syracuse), we played small. We haven't played small in a while. You just don't do that at this point in the season and look good. We're trying to grind our way through it and figure out how we can do it."
The Wildcats have dreadful losses at Big East lightweights Providence and Rutgers; and they lost to UConn, Georgetown, Pittsburgh and the Orange by a combined 13 points.
Wright confidently stated after the Syracuse loss that he still believes in his team. Even with the woeful shooting percentages, the Wildcats were still in position to win in the closing minutes. Plus, Fisher, Stokes and the senior class are only two years removed from a Final Four appearance. So, the talent is in place to believe another deep run is possible.
"We're going to keep getting better until the last game of the season," Wright said.
At this pace, that will come sooner than expected.
All-stars energized for NBA playoff run
AFP, LOS ANGELES: They were teammates on the winning Western Conference side in Sunday's 60th NBA all-star game but now it's back to business for Kevin Durant and Blake Griffin.
The second half of the 2010-11 NBA season begins with Durant's Oklahoma City Thunder taking on Griffin's Los Angeles Clippers as one of nine NBA games on Tuesday.
Durant said he is taking not only good memories from the all-star weekend but also a renewed sense of purpose in trying to help the Thunder win the Northwest Division.
"My shots felt good. So hopefully during the next couple of days, they will feel good, as well," said Durant who had 34 points in the West's 148-143 win over the East at Staples Center arena.
"This was a great experience for me. I can't take anything for granted."
Carmelo Anthony expects this to be his last all-star appearance as a Denver Nugget.
Anthony had eight points and seven rebounds Sunday as a starting West forward. The Denver Post reported late Monday that Anthony had been dealt to New York by the Nuggets in a blockbuster trade.
The Nuggets were trying to get a deal done before the NBA's trading deadline Thursday at 12pm Los Angeles time (2000 GMT).
"Time is ticking, man, and time is money," Anthony said during Friday's media day at the all-star game.
Clippers rookie Blake Griffin soared over a car Saturday to win the slam-dunk contest. Griffin, who will turn 21 next month, was the busiest all-star, competing in the rookie game, dunk contest and making his main all-star game debut.
"Oh man. I can barely move right now," Griffin said following Sunday's game. "The last time I was this tired was probably at training camp."
Since Griffin's arrival, the Clippers have been playing in front of sold-out houses and even taking some of the limelight in Los Angeles from storied Lakers franchise.
"I am excited about that," Griffin said. "But the big reason is not just for me but for how we have been playing as a team. We have not accomplished anything yet. We are still learning. I am glad to be part of it."
The defending champion Lakers head into the second half with a 38-19 record and a commanding nine and a half game lead over second place Phoenix in the Pacific Division.
All-star game MVP Kobe Bryant said the Lakers were in contact with each other during the all-star break and are ready to get back at it.
"We are looking forward to it," Bryant said of the second half of the season.
"We are up for the challenge. Pau (Gasol) and I have been talking this whole time. We have been in communication with the rest of the fellas, and we all can't wait to get started."
While it appears Anthony's short-term future is being sorted out nobody knows what is going to happen with the league's long-term future.
The players union and the owners are in limbo over negotiations on a new collective bargaining agreement and if the two sides can't agree on a deal by midnight on June 30 there could be a lockout.
"Nobody knows what's going to happen with the lockout," Anthony said.
"At the end of the day, if I was to sit here and say I'm not thinking about that, I would be lying to you guys. I don't want to go into no lockout. I don't think none of the players want to go into a lockout."
The second half of the 2010-11 NBA season begins with Durant's Oklahoma City Thunder taking on Griffin's Los Angeles Clippers as one of nine NBA games on Tuesday.
Durant said he is taking not only good memories from the all-star weekend but also a renewed sense of purpose in trying to help the Thunder win the Northwest Division.
"My shots felt good. So hopefully during the next couple of days, they will feel good, as well," said Durant who had 34 points in the West's 148-143 win over the East at Staples Center arena.
"This was a great experience for me. I can't take anything for granted."
Carmelo Anthony expects this to be his last all-star appearance as a Denver Nugget.
Anthony had eight points and seven rebounds Sunday as a starting West forward. The Denver Post reported late Monday that Anthony had been dealt to New York by the Nuggets in a blockbuster trade.
The Nuggets were trying to get a deal done before the NBA's trading deadline Thursday at 12pm Los Angeles time (2000 GMT).
"Time is ticking, man, and time is money," Anthony said during Friday's media day at the all-star game.
Clippers rookie Blake Griffin soared over a car Saturday to win the slam-dunk contest. Griffin, who will turn 21 next month, was the busiest all-star, competing in the rookie game, dunk contest and making his main all-star game debut.
"Oh man. I can barely move right now," Griffin said following Sunday's game. "The last time I was this tired was probably at training camp."
Since Griffin's arrival, the Clippers have been playing in front of sold-out houses and even taking some of the limelight in Los Angeles from storied Lakers franchise.
"I am excited about that," Griffin said. "But the big reason is not just for me but for how we have been playing as a team. We have not accomplished anything yet. We are still learning. I am glad to be part of it."
The defending champion Lakers head into the second half with a 38-19 record and a commanding nine and a half game lead over second place Phoenix in the Pacific Division.
All-star game MVP Kobe Bryant said the Lakers were in contact with each other during the all-star break and are ready to get back at it.
"We are looking forward to it," Bryant said of the second half of the season.
"We are up for the challenge. Pau (Gasol) and I have been talking this whole time. We have been in communication with the rest of the fellas, and we all can't wait to get started."
While it appears Anthony's short-term future is being sorted out nobody knows what is going to happen with the league's long-term future.
The players union and the owners are in limbo over negotiations on a new collective bargaining agreement and if the two sides can't agree on a deal by midnight on June 30 there could be a lockout.
"Nobody knows what's going to happen with the lockout," Anthony said.
"At the end of the day, if I was to sit here and say I'm not thinking about that, I would be lying to you guys. I don't want to go into no lockout. I don't think none of the players want to go into a lockout."
AP source: Knicks, Nuggets agree on Anthony deal
AP, NEW YORK: Carmelo Anthony is getting his wish, and the New York Knicks are getting a second superstar.
The Knicks have agreed to a trade with the Denver Nuggets for Anthony, a person familiar with the deal told The Associated Press on Monday night.
The deal that would end the season-long trade saga involving Denver's All-Star forward and send him to his desired destination can't be finalized until Tuesday during a conference call with the NBA office. Assuming it goes through, it puts Anthony alongside Amare Stoudemire in a potentially explosive frontcourt — at a heavy cost to the Knicks.
The person provided no other details of who was in the deal, which was first reported Monday by the Denver Post. The person spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment publicly on the trade.
The Post, citing a league source, said the Knicks would send Wilson Chandler, Raymond Felton, Danilo Gallinari, Timofey Mozgov and a 2014 first-round draft pick to the Nuggets, who would get additional picks and cash.
Along with Anthony, New York would acquire Chauncey Billups, Shelden Williams, Anthony Carter and Renaldo Balkman, according to the Post.
ESPN later reported it was a three-way deal with Minnesota, which would acquire Eddy Curry and Anthony Randolph from the Knicks for Corey Brewer.
The Nuggets have explored an Anthony trade since he refused to sign the three-year contract extension worth nearly $65 million they offered him last summer. They appeared on the verge of sending him to the New Jersey Nets on multiple occasions, but the Knicks increased their offer enough to land Anthony, who was believed to prefer New York all along.
The Knicks would hope he could be in uniform Wednesday when they host the Milwaukee Bucks.
Denver coach George Karl said there was "some sadness" to the deal, which sends away not only Anthony but Billups, the popular Denver native. But he added it was "time to move on, reinvent."
Anthony led the Nuggets to the playoffs in each of his first seven seasons in Denver after winning a national title at Syracuse as a freshman and had them positioned for another playoff run this year. But Denver advanced out of the first round just once in that time.
He stood to become the headliner of the 2011 free agent class, but didn't want to risk free agency knowing a new collective bargaining agreement could cost him millions. But once he refused the extension with the Nuggets — plus put his Denver mansion on the market last year — the Nuggets' new front office team of general manager Masai Ujiri and team president Josh Kroenke had to begin trade talks so they wouldn't risk losing him and getting nothing in return as the Cavaliers did with LeBron James and the Toronto Raptors did with Chris Bosh last year.
There were persistent rumors Anthony wouldn't take the extension if traded to the Nets, which was a prerequisite for them agreeing to a trade. He instead gets his apparent wish to join a Knicks team that is in sixth place in the Eastern Conference and in position for its first playoff berth since 2004.
But they'll make their postseason run without the core of the team. Felton, Gallinari, Mozgov and Chandler were four of New York's top six players, and there is some thought the Knicks gave up too much to get Anthony, a sensational scorer headed to a team that doesn't necessarily need more scoring.
However, the Knicks felt they couldn't pass on the opportunity to land a 26-year-old superstar once he became available. Assuming he extends with the Knicks, Anthony and Stoudemire would be under contract for four more seasons, though the uncertain salary cap situation could wreck New York's plans to be spenders over the next two summers.
The Nets wanted Anthony, hoping the Brooklyn native would be the face of their franchise when they open their new Barclays Center in 2012. But though he never publicly confirmed the speculation that he wouldn't have extended with the Nets, he did note Friday during the All-Star weekend in Los Angeles that the Knicks were further along after acquiring Stoudemire — his good friend — last summer.
Anthony met with both Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov and Madison Square Garden chairman James Dolan over the weekend and hoped there would be a resolution before he returned to the Nuggets. That indeed happened — he was excused from practice Monday so he could remain in California to appear on Conan O'Brien's show.
The Nuggets made out well, considering they could have lost Anthony for nothing in the summer. The Nets' offer, centered around rookie Derrick Favors and draft picks, would have meant a rebuilding situation, while the players they acquire from New York could keep them in postseason contention in the Western Conference. The Nuggets host Memphis on Tuesday night.
Karl said he'll miss Billups, a hometown favorite and consummate professional who helped Denver reach the Western Conference finals in 2009-10, when the Nuggets nearly eliminated the eventual champion Lakers.
"I think Chauncey will go down as one of the greatest winners," Karl said. "His record of seven or eight conference finals is, I mean, that's incredible. I think that's who he is, that's what he stands for. He brought one of them to us. Last year we had a miserable ending. I think there's many people, including myself, that will be sad for Chauncey. I know he loves Denver and we love him, but things happen. There's decisions that have to be made.
"I'm 100 percent behind the decision we made, even though it will be dangerous and there won't be the veteran point guard back there," Karl added. "Felton, I thought was having a great season this year. But I think Ty (Lawson) and Felton are going to have a great challenge to live up to what Chauncey has given us in past years."
Asked who his starting point guard would be, Karl said, "Probably Ty," then got into his maroon SUV and drove away.
The Knicks have agreed to a trade with the Denver Nuggets for Anthony, a person familiar with the deal told The Associated Press on Monday night.
The deal that would end the season-long trade saga involving Denver's All-Star forward and send him to his desired destination can't be finalized until Tuesday during a conference call with the NBA office. Assuming it goes through, it puts Anthony alongside Amare Stoudemire in a potentially explosive frontcourt — at a heavy cost to the Knicks.
The person provided no other details of who was in the deal, which was first reported Monday by the Denver Post. The person spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to comment publicly on the trade.
The Post, citing a league source, said the Knicks would send Wilson Chandler, Raymond Felton, Danilo Gallinari, Timofey Mozgov and a 2014 first-round draft pick to the Nuggets, who would get additional picks and cash.
Along with Anthony, New York would acquire Chauncey Billups, Shelden Williams, Anthony Carter and Renaldo Balkman, according to the Post.
ESPN later reported it was a three-way deal with Minnesota, which would acquire Eddy Curry and Anthony Randolph from the Knicks for Corey Brewer.
The Nuggets have explored an Anthony trade since he refused to sign the three-year contract extension worth nearly $65 million they offered him last summer. They appeared on the verge of sending him to the New Jersey Nets on multiple occasions, but the Knicks increased their offer enough to land Anthony, who was believed to prefer New York all along.
The Knicks would hope he could be in uniform Wednesday when they host the Milwaukee Bucks.
Denver coach George Karl said there was "some sadness" to the deal, which sends away not only Anthony but Billups, the popular Denver native. But he added it was "time to move on, reinvent."
Anthony led the Nuggets to the playoffs in each of his first seven seasons in Denver after winning a national title at Syracuse as a freshman and had them positioned for another playoff run this year. But Denver advanced out of the first round just once in that time.
He stood to become the headliner of the 2011 free agent class, but didn't want to risk free agency knowing a new collective bargaining agreement could cost him millions. But once he refused the extension with the Nuggets — plus put his Denver mansion on the market last year — the Nuggets' new front office team of general manager Masai Ujiri and team president Josh Kroenke had to begin trade talks so they wouldn't risk losing him and getting nothing in return as the Cavaliers did with LeBron James and the Toronto Raptors did with Chris Bosh last year.
There were persistent rumors Anthony wouldn't take the extension if traded to the Nets, which was a prerequisite for them agreeing to a trade. He instead gets his apparent wish to join a Knicks team that is in sixth place in the Eastern Conference and in position for its first playoff berth since 2004.
But they'll make their postseason run without the core of the team. Felton, Gallinari, Mozgov and Chandler were four of New York's top six players, and there is some thought the Knicks gave up too much to get Anthony, a sensational scorer headed to a team that doesn't necessarily need more scoring.
However, the Knicks felt they couldn't pass on the opportunity to land a 26-year-old superstar once he became available. Assuming he extends with the Knicks, Anthony and Stoudemire would be under contract for four more seasons, though the uncertain salary cap situation could wreck New York's plans to be spenders over the next two summers.
The Nets wanted Anthony, hoping the Brooklyn native would be the face of their franchise when they open their new Barclays Center in 2012. But though he never publicly confirmed the speculation that he wouldn't have extended with the Nets, he did note Friday during the All-Star weekend in Los Angeles that the Knicks were further along after acquiring Stoudemire — his good friend — last summer.
Anthony met with both Nets owner Mikhail Prokhorov and Madison Square Garden chairman James Dolan over the weekend and hoped there would be a resolution before he returned to the Nuggets. That indeed happened — he was excused from practice Monday so he could remain in California to appear on Conan O'Brien's show.
The Nuggets made out well, considering they could have lost Anthony for nothing in the summer. The Nets' offer, centered around rookie Derrick Favors and draft picks, would have meant a rebuilding situation, while the players they acquire from New York could keep them in postseason contention in the Western Conference. The Nuggets host Memphis on Tuesday night.
Karl said he'll miss Billups, a hometown favorite and consummate professional who helped Denver reach the Western Conference finals in 2009-10, when the Nuggets nearly eliminated the eventual champion Lakers.
"I think Chauncey will go down as one of the greatest winners," Karl said. "His record of seven or eight conference finals is, I mean, that's incredible. I think that's who he is, that's what he stands for. He brought one of them to us. Last year we had a miserable ending. I think there's many people, including myself, that will be sad for Chauncey. I know he loves Denver and we love him, but things happen. There's decisions that have to be made.
"I'm 100 percent behind the decision we made, even though it will be dangerous and there won't be the veteran point guard back there," Karl added. "Felton, I thought was having a great season this year. But I think Ty (Lawson) and Felton are going to have a great challenge to live up to what Chauncey has given us in past years."
Asked who his starting point guard would be, Karl said, "Probably Ty," then got into his maroon SUV and drove away.
Carmelo Anthony joins Knicks in nine player deal: report
Reuters, NEW YORK: Four-time All-Star Carmelo Anthony will join the New York Knicks in a nine-player deal with the Denver Nuggets, the NBA's website reported Tuesday.
"He wanted to be in New York and we worked with him and his people," a Nuggets team source was quoted on NBA.com.
"We worked it out. It's a win-win. You never get fair value for a player like that, but we have to move on as an organization.
"I don't think the fans have gotten the true Nuggets this season" with the constant distractions.
There has been speculation about Anthony's future throughout the season with the Knicks well understood to be his preferred destination.
The 26-year-old, Brooklyn-born Anthony will team up with fellow All-Star Amar'e Stoudemire in what is the latest concentration of power in the NBA.
Along with Anthony, guards Chauncey Billups and Anthony Carter, center Shelden Williams and forward Renaldo Balkman will go to New York.
Heading in the opposite direction, according to the report, will be guard Raymond Felton, forwards Danilo Gallinari and Wilson Chandler and Russian center Timofey Mozgov.
On top of those players, Denver will also get the Knicks' first-round pick in 2014 and second-round picks in 2012 and 2013 plus $3 million in cash.
Neither the Knicks nor the Nuggets officially confirmed the trade but Nuggets coach George Karl told the Denver Post, "I'm glad it's over."
"I'm glad it's an opportunity to reinvent," he told the newspaper. "I think everybody handled it as classy as you could handle it. There's some sadness to it, there always will be."
(Reporting by Simon Evans in Miami; Editing by Steve Ginsburg)
"He wanted to be in New York and we worked with him and his people," a Nuggets team source was quoted on NBA.com.
"We worked it out. It's a win-win. You never get fair value for a player like that, but we have to move on as an organization.
"I don't think the fans have gotten the true Nuggets this season" with the constant distractions.
There has been speculation about Anthony's future throughout the season with the Knicks well understood to be his preferred destination.
The 26-year-old, Brooklyn-born Anthony will team up with fellow All-Star Amar'e Stoudemire in what is the latest concentration of power in the NBA.
Along with Anthony, guards Chauncey Billups and Anthony Carter, center Shelden Williams and forward Renaldo Balkman will go to New York.
Heading in the opposite direction, according to the report, will be guard Raymond Felton, forwards Danilo Gallinari and Wilson Chandler and Russian center Timofey Mozgov.
On top of those players, Denver will also get the Knicks' first-round pick in 2014 and second-round picks in 2012 and 2013 plus $3 million in cash.
Neither the Knicks nor the Nuggets officially confirmed the trade but Nuggets coach George Karl told the Denver Post, "I'm glad it's over."
"I'm glad it's an opportunity to reinvent," he told the newspaper. "I think everybody handled it as classy as you could handle it. There's some sadness to it, there always will be."
(Reporting by Simon Evans in Miami; Editing by Steve Ginsburg)
DeRozan done competing in 'prop dunk contest'
AP, CHARLOTTE, N.C: Toronto Raptors guard DeMar DeRozan vows he's finished competing in the NBA's slam dunk contest unless the myriad of props that dominated Saturday's event are eliminated.
Asked Tuesday if he thinks he was robbed when he didn't reach the final of the competition, DeRozan replied, "I think so." Blake Griffin of the Los Angeles Clippers won by leaping over a car to edge Washington's JaVale McGee in the last round.
"I'm a dunker. Dunk contests, you go out there and dunk. I'm not into all the props and everything," DeRozan said at shootaround before Tuesday's game against Charlotte. "I try to come out with a creative dunk and do it and go from there. My fans liked it and you can see the reaction from a lot of people afterward.
"If there's a dunk contest next year I'll do it. But not no prop dunk contest."
A Los Angeles native and former player at Southern California, DeRozan says he was disappointed in how the contest played out in his hometown after spending extra time practicing and preparing creative dunks. He didn't include props such as the car, a stuffed toy and using an extra basket as other competitors did.
DeRozan feels the extra elements cheapens the contest.
"I think a lot of people probably look at it like that. It seems that way when you watch it," he said. "This year I put thought into it. I practiced, had dunks ready and everything. It is what it is. I did it two years in a row. I'm good."
Asked if he would reconsider, DeRozan said he would only compete again if the All-Star game is held in Toronto or if the rules are changed to eliminate props.
"There's no telling what might happen next year," DeRozan said. "Somebody might use a trampoline."
Asked Tuesday if he thinks he was robbed when he didn't reach the final of the competition, DeRozan replied, "I think so." Blake Griffin of the Los Angeles Clippers won by leaping over a car to edge Washington's JaVale McGee in the last round.
"I'm a dunker. Dunk contests, you go out there and dunk. I'm not into all the props and everything," DeRozan said at shootaround before Tuesday's game against Charlotte. "I try to come out with a creative dunk and do it and go from there. My fans liked it and you can see the reaction from a lot of people afterward.
"If there's a dunk contest next year I'll do it. But not no prop dunk contest."
A Los Angeles native and former player at Southern California, DeRozan says he was disappointed in how the contest played out in his hometown after spending extra time practicing and preparing creative dunks. He didn't include props such as the car, a stuffed toy and using an extra basket as other competitors did.
DeRozan feels the extra elements cheapens the contest.
"I think a lot of people probably look at it like that. It seems that way when you watch it," he said. "This year I put thought into it. I practiced, had dunks ready and everything. It is what it is. I did it two years in a row. I'm good."
Asked if he would reconsider, DeRozan said he would only compete again if the All-Star game is held in Toronto or if the rules are changed to eliminate props.
"There's no telling what might happen next year," DeRozan said. "Somebody might use a trampoline."
Sox GM says talk of $30 million players `asinine'
AP, GLENDALE, Ariz: Chicago White Sox general manager Kenny Williams says talk of $30 million-a-year players is "asinine" and he would support a work stoppage to bring fiscal sanity.
Williams doesn't want a stoppage but said the sport's future needs to be protected for fans and smaller markets.
In an earlier interview with Comcast SportsNet, Williams said discussion of a $30 million average salary was "asinine." He said baseball has reached the point of no return and something needs to happen.
With St. Louis Cardinals slugger Albert Pujols eligible for free agency after the World Series, there has been speculation he could be the first with a $30 million average salary. Williams said Tuesday his comments were not personally directed at Pujols.
"I said what I said. I said what I felt," Williams said as he sat in his golf cart watching his team's first full-squad workout.
His comment about a shutdown drew attention.
"Do I want that? Who does? Come on. Come on. This is a game where millions upon millions of people watch on television and come to the ballpark to get away from some of the things that are going on in life, to have a little bit of entertainment," Williams said. "That's all I'm saying. That's exactly what I'm saying, is that we have to protect that. We are stewards of the game and we have to protect it."
In his interview with Comcast, Williams said: "For the game's health as a whole, when we're talking about $30 million players, I think it's asinine."
"We have gotten to the point of no return. Something has to happen. And if it means the game being shut down for the sake of bringing sanity to it, to franchises that aren't going to stop the insanity, I'm all for it. ... You're not going to get any disagreement from me or argument from me if the game is shut down for a while until something is put in place where there is some sort of (salary) cap on the board."
While discussing his reasoning, Williams mentioned championship teams from Oakland, Cincinnati and Pittsburgh in the '70s and Kansas City in the '80s as small markets that helped popularize baseball.
"I think it's important that the people and the cities that I just mentioned and many more have just as much chance to hope and dream about their team winning a World Series as anybody else," he said. "Right now that's not happening."
Asked about a White Sox payroll that could exceed $125 million this season, Williams said the White Sox might operate at a loss this year. Chicago signed Adam Dunn to a $56 million, four-year contract and brought Paul Konerko back for three years at $37.5 million.
"Hell no, I'm not comfortable with the payroll right now. We're out on a limb. But that's our choice," he said. "We made the choice in an effort to give our fans hope and give ourselves a chance to compete for a championship. If things don't fall our way, if we don't get the support, we'll lose money."
Williams doesn't want a stoppage but said the sport's future needs to be protected for fans and smaller markets.
In an earlier interview with Comcast SportsNet, Williams said discussion of a $30 million average salary was "asinine." He said baseball has reached the point of no return and something needs to happen.
With St. Louis Cardinals slugger Albert Pujols eligible for free agency after the World Series, there has been speculation he could be the first with a $30 million average salary. Williams said Tuesday his comments were not personally directed at Pujols.
"I said what I said. I said what I felt," Williams said as he sat in his golf cart watching his team's first full-squad workout.
His comment about a shutdown drew attention.
"Do I want that? Who does? Come on. Come on. This is a game where millions upon millions of people watch on television and come to the ballpark to get away from some of the things that are going on in life, to have a little bit of entertainment," Williams said. "That's all I'm saying. That's exactly what I'm saying, is that we have to protect that. We are stewards of the game and we have to protect it."
In his interview with Comcast, Williams said: "For the game's health as a whole, when we're talking about $30 million players, I think it's asinine."
"We have gotten to the point of no return. Something has to happen. And if it means the game being shut down for the sake of bringing sanity to it, to franchises that aren't going to stop the insanity, I'm all for it. ... You're not going to get any disagreement from me or argument from me if the game is shut down for a while until something is put in place where there is some sort of (salary) cap on the board."
While discussing his reasoning, Williams mentioned championship teams from Oakland, Cincinnati and Pittsburgh in the '70s and Kansas City in the '80s as small markets that helped popularize baseball.
"I think it's important that the people and the cities that I just mentioned and many more have just as much chance to hope and dream about their team winning a World Series as anybody else," he said. "Right now that's not happening."
Asked about a White Sox payroll that could exceed $125 million this season, Williams said the White Sox might operate at a loss this year. Chicago signed Adam Dunn to a $56 million, four-year contract and brought Paul Konerko back for three years at $37.5 million.
"Hell no, I'm not comfortable with the payroll right now. We're out on a limb. But that's our choice," he said. "We made the choice in an effort to give our fans hope and give ourselves a chance to compete for a championship. If things don't fall our way, if we don't get the support, we'll lose money."
Salman’s Thai First: Films Action Fare In ‘Tuk Tuk’ Ricks!
We’ve seen Shah Rukh chase baddies on a cycle rickshaw in ‘Main Hoon Na’. If there’s anyone who ‘Khan’ do it bigger and better, it has to be Salman Khan! The ‘Dabangg’ star recently filmed some explosive action scenes for Anees Bazmee’s ‘Ready’, while zipping around on the streets of Pattaya in a ‘tuk tuk’ rick!
Apparently, Sallu suggested a thrilling action sequence involving the Thai rickshaws to director Bazmee. And what Sallu wants, he gets! The actor soon shot for a sequence in which he had to jump on to a third ‘tuk tuk’ after the first two crash into each other and blow up into pieces.
Procuring the Thai rickshaws turned out to be an expensive affair, but producer Bhushan Kumar didn’t bat an eyelid as he wants nothing but the best for his 57 crore flick. A reliable source reveals, “Since no owner wanted to have his vehicle blown up, producer Bhushan Kumar had to buy three at a cost of approximately Rs. 2 lakh each. Salman drove the tuk tuk expertly, although it was his first time doing so.”
Though Himesh Reshammiya employed the services of our local ‘rikshawallas’ for ‘Aap Kaa Surroor’, this is the first time ever that anyone’s used ‘tuk tuks’ for an action sequence in a Bollywood flick. Trust Salman Khan to come up with this innovative idea!
Producer Kumar told a tabloid, “It was Bhai’s (Salman) idea to shoot with ‘tuk tuks’ which are very fast and powerful. He wanted to shoot an action sequence nobody has done before. People have shot romantic songs or scenes perhaps but such a high voltage action sequence will be seen for the first time in ‘Ready’. People will enjoy this unique Thai action.”
Read the original story on in.movies.yahoo.com
Apparently, Sallu suggested a thrilling action sequence involving the Thai rickshaws to director Bazmee. And what Sallu wants, he gets! The actor soon shot for a sequence in which he had to jump on to a third ‘tuk tuk’ after the first two crash into each other and blow up into pieces.
Procuring the Thai rickshaws turned out to be an expensive affair, but producer Bhushan Kumar didn’t bat an eyelid as he wants nothing but the best for his 57 crore flick. A reliable source reveals, “Since no owner wanted to have his vehicle blown up, producer Bhushan Kumar had to buy three at a cost of approximately Rs. 2 lakh each. Salman drove the tuk tuk expertly, although it was his first time doing so.”
Though Himesh Reshammiya employed the services of our local ‘rikshawallas’ for ‘Aap Kaa Surroor’, this is the first time ever that anyone’s used ‘tuk tuks’ for an action sequence in a Bollywood flick. Trust Salman Khan to come up with this innovative idea!
Producer Kumar told a tabloid, “It was Bhai’s (Salman) idea to shoot with ‘tuk tuks’ which are very fast and powerful. He wanted to shoot an action sequence nobody has done before. People have shot romantic songs or scenes perhaps but such a high voltage action sequence will be seen for the first time in ‘Ready’. People will enjoy this unique Thai action.”
Read the original story on in.movies.yahoo.com
‘Dabangg’ Baddie Bonds With Rajinikanth, Sonu Plays Villain In ‘Rana’
His antagonist act in ‘Dabangg’ has won Sonu Sood many fans, but none as special as Rajinikanth! The Southern megastar was so impressed with the on screen Cheddi Singh that he’s confirmed Sonu for ‘Rana’, reported to be India’s most expensive film ever!
Sood’s thrilled to be sharing screen space with his idol and is looking forward to start shooting for ‘Rana’. In a recent tabloid quote he said, “I’ve seen ‘Robot’ twice…and I was spellbound by the film’s special effects and Raijni sir’s star charisma. Rajini sir hugged me the day we met and said he was looking forward to working with me. I can’t wait for the camera to roll.”
Apparently the superstar insisted on casting Sonu, after watching his villainous acts in ‘Dabangg’ and ‘Jodhaa Akbar’. Rajini was also blown away by Sood’s electrifying performance as Pasupati in the Tamil superhit ‘Arundhati’.
The B’Townie is thanking his lucky stars and can’t believe the tremendous journey he’s made as an actor. “In a week’s time, I start shooting ‘Buddha’ with Mr. Bachchan and then in April, I will be working with Rajini sir. Imagine a small town boy with no film background working with legends we’ve grown up idolising and still in awe of. I feel blessed,” Sonu told the tabloid.
In the meantime, Sonu’s excited about returning as Cheddi Singh’s revengeful twin in ‘Dabangg 2’, which is still in it’s scripting stages. “’Dabangg’ is a huge brand today and the responsibility will now be greater,” he said.
Read the original story on in.movies.yahoo.com
Sood’s thrilled to be sharing screen space with his idol and is looking forward to start shooting for ‘Rana’. In a recent tabloid quote he said, “I’ve seen ‘Robot’ twice…and I was spellbound by the film’s special effects and Raijni sir’s star charisma. Rajini sir hugged me the day we met and said he was looking forward to working with me. I can’t wait for the camera to roll.”
Apparently the superstar insisted on casting Sonu, after watching his villainous acts in ‘Dabangg’ and ‘Jodhaa Akbar’. Rajini was also blown away by Sood’s electrifying performance as Pasupati in the Tamil superhit ‘Arundhati’.
The B’Townie is thanking his lucky stars and can’t believe the tremendous journey he’s made as an actor. “In a week’s time, I start shooting ‘Buddha’ with Mr. Bachchan and then in April, I will be working with Rajini sir. Imagine a small town boy with no film background working with legends we’ve grown up idolising and still in awe of. I feel blessed,” Sonu told the tabloid.
In the meantime, Sonu’s excited about returning as Cheddi Singh’s revengeful twin in ‘Dabangg 2’, which is still in it’s scripting stages. “’Dabangg’ is a huge brand today and the responsibility will now be greater,” he said.
Read the original story on in.movies.yahoo.com
Aamir Set To ‘Dhoom Machao’; To Record Number For YRF Film
Maybe he secretly pines to be a singer. It certainly seems like it, as Aamir never loses an opportunity to flex his vocal chords, this time getting ready to record a song for ‘Dhoom 3’.
Aamir, who made waves for signing up to play the baddie in the third instalment of the action adventure series, will be ‘singing’ a song for the movie in his own, trademark style. Tabloid sources have been quoted saying that Aamir will be voicing a few lyrics rhythmically, just like he has done in the past, rather than actually sing.
The first two entries in the ‘Dhoom’ series have been huge chartbusters, just like their box office performance. And music director Pritam is hoping to stick with the formula and repeat this musical success, even recruiting Aamir for some extra good luck.
In the past, B’town’s biggest star has sung for films like ‘Mela’, ‘Fanaa’ and ‘Taare Zameen Par’. And of course, there was his smash hit duet with Alka Yagnik, ‘aati kya Khandala’, from ‘Ghulam’, that turned the title of the track into a catchphrase for all aspiring ‘roadside Romeos’...
Read the original story on in.movies.yahoo.com
Aamir, who made waves for signing up to play the baddie in the third instalment of the action adventure series, will be ‘singing’ a song for the movie in his own, trademark style. Tabloid sources have been quoted saying that Aamir will be voicing a few lyrics rhythmically, just like he has done in the past, rather than actually sing.
The first two entries in the ‘Dhoom’ series have been huge chartbusters, just like their box office performance. And music director Pritam is hoping to stick with the formula and repeat this musical success, even recruiting Aamir for some extra good luck.
In the past, B’town’s biggest star has sung for films like ‘Mela’, ‘Fanaa’ and ‘Taare Zameen Par’. And of course, there was his smash hit duet with Alka Yagnik, ‘aati kya Khandala’, from ‘Ghulam’, that turned the title of the track into a catchphrase for all aspiring ‘roadside Romeos’...
Read the original story on in.movies.yahoo.com
Berlin’s Oscar Reunion: ‘Lagaan’ Aamir Finally Meets ‘Land’ Competitor!
In a cinematic twist that’s worthy of media attention, Aamir Khan met up with director Danis Tanovic at the Berlin Film Festival. For the uninitiated, Aamir’s ‘Lagaan’ was pitted against and had lost out to Tanovic’s ‘No Man’s Land’ in 2002, at the Foreign Language category of the Oscars. The two competitors finally managed to catch up with each other, having missed the opportunity earlier.
Incidentally, Davis was supremely impressed with Aamir’s act in ‘Lagaan’ and reportedly, had also asked his agents way back in 2002 to get in touch with Khan, but he’d already left for India, and they couldn’t meet up earlier.
This time around, Providence was kinder. Khan was a jury member at the Berlinale, while Tanovic was part of the panel discussion on ‘filming war’. When the Bosnian director heard that Aamir was in the German capital, he sought the Indian actor out.
States a highly placed source, “When Danis realised that Aamir was in Berlin, he just went up to Aamir’s room and knocked at his door. To his surprise, Aamir remembered him and was deeply touched that he’d wanted to meet him since then. Their meeting lasted for over an hour, and Kiran insisted that they join them for dinner.”
Apparently, the one to be shocked even greater at the momentous meeting was Kiran Rao. She was stunned and immensely flattered that Danis had heard about her debut effort ‘Dhobi Ghat,’ and was keen on viewing it!
An elated Kiran states in a media quote, “I didn’t imagine that a top Bosnian director like Danis Tanovic would have heard about my debut film. I’m really feeling on top of the world.”
No less dazzled was Aamir Khan who wasted no time in gushing to the scribe tribe over his meeting with Tanovic. States Aamir in a tabloid chat, “Danis is such an amazing and down to earth guy. Kiran and I hosted him for dinner and it was one big memorable experience.”
Read the original story on in.movies.yahoo.com
Incidentally, Davis was supremely impressed with Aamir’s act in ‘Lagaan’ and reportedly, had also asked his agents way back in 2002 to get in touch with Khan, but he’d already left for India, and they couldn’t meet up earlier.
This time around, Providence was kinder. Khan was a jury member at the Berlinale, while Tanovic was part of the panel discussion on ‘filming war’. When the Bosnian director heard that Aamir was in the German capital, he sought the Indian actor out.
States a highly placed source, “When Danis realised that Aamir was in Berlin, he just went up to Aamir’s room and knocked at his door. To his surprise, Aamir remembered him and was deeply touched that he’d wanted to meet him since then. Their meeting lasted for over an hour, and Kiran insisted that they join them for dinner.”
Apparently, the one to be shocked even greater at the momentous meeting was Kiran Rao. She was stunned and immensely flattered that Danis had heard about her debut effort ‘Dhobi Ghat,’ and was keen on viewing it!
An elated Kiran states in a media quote, “I didn’t imagine that a top Bosnian director like Danis Tanovic would have heard about my debut film. I’m really feeling on top of the world.”
No less dazzled was Aamir Khan who wasted no time in gushing to the scribe tribe over his meeting with Tanovic. States Aamir in a tabloid chat, “Danis is such an amazing and down to earth guy. Kiran and I hosted him for dinner and it was one big memorable experience.”
Read the original story on in.movies.yahoo.com
Priyanka Chopra, Shahid Kapoor Pairing On Hold, Kohli Awaits PC’s Nod
Priyanka Chopra’s blowing hot and cold again! And we’re not referring to her equation with alleged lover Shahid Kapoor. While the industry has been rife with news about PC’s next on screen outing with Sasha, fresh reports reveal that she hasn’t yet given the go ahead to Kunal Kohli’s period romance yet!
According to a reliable source, “Kunal announced his next film with Sasha a couple of months ago. He naturally believed, given Priyanka’s status in Sasha’s life, that she would consent to being the leading lady in the film.” But as Kohli found out, B’Town’s Piggy Chops is not one to be taken for granted!
The source adds, “Sasha and PC would never let their personal equations affect their professional decisions. They both know that among the younger generation of actors, they make for a great onscreen pair.”
PC’s indecisiveness about the flick stems from the fact that she already has her hands full with ‘Agneepath’, ‘Barfee’ and ‘Krrish 2’ and is finding it hard to accommodate Kunal Kohli in her busy schedule.
Priyanka recently admitted in a tabloid that she hasn’t signed on the dotted line for Kohli’s movie yet. She said, “The film is not confirmed yet and I am still in talks with Kunal.”
Read the original story on in.movies.yahoo.com
According to a reliable source, “Kunal announced his next film with Sasha a couple of months ago. He naturally believed, given Priyanka’s status in Sasha’s life, that she would consent to being the leading lady in the film.” But as Kohli found out, B’Town’s Piggy Chops is not one to be taken for granted!
The source adds, “Sasha and PC would never let their personal equations affect their professional decisions. They both know that among the younger generation of actors, they make for a great onscreen pair.”
PC’s indecisiveness about the flick stems from the fact that she already has her hands full with ‘Agneepath’, ‘Barfee’ and ‘Krrish 2’ and is finding it hard to accommodate Kunal Kohli in her busy schedule.
Priyanka recently admitted in a tabloid that she hasn’t signed on the dotted line for Kohli’s movie yet. She said, “The film is not confirmed yet and I am still in talks with Kunal.”
Read the original story on in.movies.yahoo.com
Playing a romantic hero at 40 is amusing: R Madhavan
He started his showbiz career playing the “cute boy” in “Sea Hawks” and “Rehna Hai Tere Dil Mein” but R Madhavan finds it amusing that he is still offered romantic roles at the age of 40.
Madhavan says he never tried to bank on the “chocolate boy” image and his upcoming film “Tanu Weds Manu” is only his second Bollywood romance but somehow he is still stuck with the tag.
“”Rehna... “ was 10 years back. It does not even feature in my memory now, but I am just amused that I am doing a romantic film at 40,” Madhavan told PTI.
“I am not chocolate and definitely not a boy. I am a man and I have no clue how this image has stuck to me despite all these years. I think may be, inspite of trying to shell off my chocolate boy image, love stories excite me and some how I land up in such roles,” Madhavan said.
Madhavan has been part of many multistarrer in Bollywood like “Rang De Basanti”, “Guru” and “3 Idiots” but single hits have eluded him so far.
The actor hopes to change things with his latest movie, which is again a boy meets girl story in the traditional wedding set-up. Madhavan plays the role of Manoj Sharma a.k.a. Manu, a smart, intelligent, but shy NRI who possess all the qualities of a good husband.
But unlike his larger-than-life characters in previous films, Madhavan found it difficult to play a common man onscreen.
“It was a real hard work to play Manu as the character is strong and silent, unlike my real personality. I have certain style sense but Manu is devoid of such styles. It was a challenge indeed,” Madhavan said.
Madhavan, who has worked with Aamir twice, says he is learning the business of cinema from the Bolllywood superstar.
“Right now its just “Tanu....” I do only one film at a time. I am just following Aamir Khan”s lead and trying to know what a film is worth, what is its market value and how much to risk,” said Madhavan.
Madhavan, who has always been the good guy in Bollywood, says he would love to explore his grey side if the script is fascinating.
Ask him about his bit part in “3 Idiots”, Madhavan says he is a die-hard fan of Rajkumar Hirani and would even do a standing part for the celebrated filmmaker.
“If Hirani offers me anything, I think I will accept it blindly. He is the only man in the industry for whom I would do a role blindly.”
“Tanu Weds Manu” depicts the story of how two seemingly opposite people end up falling in love. The film hits theatres this Friday.
Read the original story on Yahoo News
Madhavan says he never tried to bank on the “chocolate boy” image and his upcoming film “Tanu Weds Manu” is only his second Bollywood romance but somehow he is still stuck with the tag.
“”Rehna... “ was 10 years back. It does not even feature in my memory now, but I am just amused that I am doing a romantic film at 40,” Madhavan told PTI.
“I am not chocolate and definitely not a boy. I am a man and I have no clue how this image has stuck to me despite all these years. I think may be, inspite of trying to shell off my chocolate boy image, love stories excite me and some how I land up in such roles,” Madhavan said.
Madhavan has been part of many multistarrer in Bollywood like “Rang De Basanti”, “Guru” and “3 Idiots” but single hits have eluded him so far.
The actor hopes to change things with his latest movie, which is again a boy meets girl story in the traditional wedding set-up. Madhavan plays the role of Manoj Sharma a.k.a. Manu, a smart, intelligent, but shy NRI who possess all the qualities of a good husband.
But unlike his larger-than-life characters in previous films, Madhavan found it difficult to play a common man onscreen.
“It was a real hard work to play Manu as the character is strong and silent, unlike my real personality. I have certain style sense but Manu is devoid of such styles. It was a challenge indeed,” Madhavan said.
Madhavan, who has worked with Aamir twice, says he is learning the business of cinema from the Bolllywood superstar.
“Right now its just “Tanu....” I do only one film at a time. I am just following Aamir Khan”s lead and trying to know what a film is worth, what is its market value and how much to risk,” said Madhavan.
Madhavan, who has always been the good guy in Bollywood, says he would love to explore his grey side if the script is fascinating.
Ask him about his bit part in “3 Idiots”, Madhavan says he is a die-hard fan of Rajkumar Hirani and would even do a standing part for the celebrated filmmaker.
“If Hirani offers me anything, I think I will accept it blindly. He is the only man in the industry for whom I would do a role blindly.”
“Tanu Weds Manu” depicts the story of how two seemingly opposite people end up falling in love. The film hits theatres this Friday.
Read the original story on Yahoo News
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Share
