Suicide bomber hits Somali graduation, 22 dead

MOGADISHU, Somalia — A suicide bomber disguised as a woman attacked a graduation ceremony in Somalia on Thursday, turning a rare reason to celebrate into carnage that killed at least 22 people — including medical students, doctors and three government ministers.

The blast was blamed on Islamic militants who have shown a rising ability to carry out sophisticated large-scale bombings against high-profile targets — and highlighted the inability of Somalia's weak government to protect even the small section of the capital it controls.

"Today should have been a day of celebration — not mourning," said Somalia's ambassador to Kenya, Mohamed Ali Nur. "The hopes of many parents who eagerly awaited their sons' graduation were recklessly dashed ... cutting short the lives of ambitious Somalis."

Several hundred people had gathered in the Shamo Hotel to watch the 43 medical, engineering and computer science students from Benadir University receive their diplomas when the blast ripped through the festively decorated ballroom.

Amateur video of the attack obtained by AP Television News showed the dead, including at least three journalists, lying in pools of blood amid the sound of wails and screams from the wounded. Soldiers, their AK-47 rifles slung over their shoulders, picked through the wreckage with their hands as survivors climbed over the debris of the bombed-out room.

The attack targeted one of Somalia's most important efforts to extricate itself from anarchy and violence, explaining the presence of so many top government officials. The graduating medical students were only the second class to receive diplomas from the medical school.

"The loss of our ministers is disastrous, but it is an outrage to target the graduation of medical students and kill those whose only aim in life was to help those most in need in our stricken country," Somali Prime Minister Omar Sharmarke said.

Before last year's graduation, almost two decades had passed since anyone earned a medical degree in Somalia. At the December 2008 ceremony, graduates proudly hoisted their diplomas into the air.

This year, there was mayhem as the bomb went off while a Somali official addressed the gathering, sending metal shards and other debris flying and leaving dead and wounded in bloody heaps.

The bomb exploded about a yard from journalists covering the event.

"The explosion occurred really close to me, about a meter away. I jumped over some of the dead people laying on the ground and I went outside," said Associated Press reporter Mohamed Olad Hassan.

"What I think is I was lucky and people who were next to me, closer to the explosion shielded me from the explosion. The explosion was still thundering in my ears when I got back to the office."

Abdul Rahman Bukhari, a reporter for the Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya television station whose colleague, cameraman Hassan Zubeir, was killed, said the bombing "was the worst moment of my life."

After the attack, overturned white plastic chairs and tables littered the floor, which was stained red with blood. A single sandal lay in a pool of congealed blood, along with a briefcase and graduation programs.

Bodies, some draped with blue cloths, lay alongside the wounded. One man in khaki pants and a white shirt sat in his own blood, twisting his head to watch as victims were dragged out of the building.

On the steps outside, a dead man lay doubled over, his head resting on the blood-soaked ground as though he were praying.

Sharmarke said it was "beneath contempt" to attack and kill students and called for urgent help from the international community to prevent the further rise of al-Shabab, a militant group with links to al-Qaida.

"What happened today is a national disaster," said Somali Information Minister Dahir Mohamud Gelle, who confirmed that the ministers for education, higher education and health were killed in the blast. The ministers for sports and tourism were among the 46 wounded, he said.

Twenty-two people were killed, along with the suicide bomber, Gelle said. The bomber "disguised himself as a woman, complete with a veil and a female's shoes," he said.

In New York, the U.N. Security Council condemned the attack, saying: "This was a criminal attack on people dedicated to building a peaceful, stable and prosperous future for the people of Somalia."

No group immediately claimed responsibility, but suspicion fell upon al-Shabab, which controls much of the country and has carried out past suicide attacks.

African troops protecting the government wage near daily battles with Islamic militants who hold much of central and southern Somalia. Bombings have become deadlier as al-Shabab militants receive training from Arab militants and veteran insurgents from the Afghanistan and Pakistan conflicts.

Three journalists were reported killed. Besides Zubeir, two other Somali journalists working for local outlets also died, said Bashir Khalif, a reporter for the Somali government's radio service.

The Committee to Protect Journalists confirmed the deaths of two journalists, bringing the number killed in Somalia this year to nine.

"Somalia is the worst place for journalism in Africa and is very close to being the worst place in the world," said a committee official, Tom Rhodes. "Reporters are not only the victims of the conflict but the targets of the conflict."

Top Somali officials, including the president and prime minister, met for an emergency session at the presidential palace after the attack.

Benadir University was established in 2002 by a group of Somali doctors who wanted to promote higher education in a country where physicians have become victims of the seemingly endless violence. Medical degrees are obtained there after six years of study.

More than 500 students are enrolled in the university, according to its Web site, which said the school "strives to establish an open system of innovation and critical thinking similar to that in developed countries."

Governments and organizations around the world condemned the attack, including a joint statement issued by the U.S., European Union, U.N., African Union and the Arab League.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a statement the bombing marred "what should have been an event filled with hope for Somalia."

Somalia has been ravaged by violence since warlords overthrew dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991, then turned on each other. A moderate Islamist was elected president in January amid hopes he could unite the country's feuding factions, but the violence has continued.

Suicide bombings, unheard of in Somalia before 2007, have become increasingly frequent and the lawlessness has raised concerns that al-Qaida is trying to gain a foothold in the Horn of Africa. The anarchy has also allowed piracy to flourish off the country's coast.

The three ministers killed in the blast were Qamar Aden Ali, the health minister and a British citizen; Ibrahim Hassan Adow, the minister for higher education and an American citizen, and Ahmed Abdullahi Wayel, the minister for education.

___

Straziuso reported from Nairobi, Kenya. AP writers Malkhadir M. Muhumed in Nairobi and Fisnik Abrashi in London contributed to this report.

Benadir University, http://www.benadiruniversity.net/

German military's inspector general removed

BERLIN — The German military's top official was removed Thursday for failing to properly pass on information to political leaders about a September airstrike in Afghanistan that killed civilians.

The new defense minister, Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, told parliament that the military's inspector general, Gen. Wolfgang Schneiderhan — the equivalent of chief of staff — had asked to be relieved of his duties.

That came after Germany's top-selling Bild newspaper published what it said were still captures from confidential videos of the incident. Peter Wichert, a deputy defense minister who was in office at the time of the airstrike, also stepped down.

Bild reported that the videos and a confidential military report suggested it was likely civilians were killed, and that they were in German hands at a time when then-Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung was insisting that there was no evidence of civilian victims.

Guttenberg said, however, that Jung had not seen the material, and that he himself had only been shown it on Wednesday. Jung became Germany's labor minister last month.

A German colonel called in the NATO airstrike against two tanker trucks that had been seized by Taliban insurgents near Kunduz, fearing they could be used to attack troops.

Thirty civilians and 69 armed Taliban died in the strike, according to a probe by an Afghan presidential commission.

Chancellor Angela Merkel said that "there must be full transparency so that there is confidence in this deployment."

Jung, who faced calls from some opposition lawmakers to quit the government, defended himself in parliament later Thursday. He said, "I correctly informed both the public and parliament about what I knew regarding these events."

Earlier this month, Guttenberg said a classified NATO report concluded there were "procedural errors" in the Sept. 4 airstrike, but defended the decision by the colonel to request it as "appropriate in military terms."

At the time, Guttenberg said he assumed there were civilian victims, based on his assessment of the NATO report.

"I regret ... every civilian victim deeply," he said.

The report was prepared by the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force.

The top U.S. and NATO commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal, appointed a Canadian major general to lead the investigation along with officers from the U.S. Air Force and German military.

Germany has more than 4,000 troops serving in northern Afghanistan and 36 have been killed in the mission.

Guttenberg has taken a plain-talking approach to the unpopular mission in Afghanistan since taking over the Defense Ministry after September elections.

He has acknowledged that the situation in parts of Afghanistan is "similar to war" — a description Jung always avoided.

New climate targets may not change daily life much

WASHINGTON — Americans' day-to-day lives won't change noticeably if President Barack Obama achieves his newly announced goal of slashing carbon dioxide pollution by one-sixth in the next decade, experts say.

Except for rising energy bills. And how much they'll go up depends on who's doing the calculating.

The White House will commit the U.S. to a goal of cutting carbon dioxide emissions in 2010 to about 17 percent below 2005 levels at a U.N.-sponsored climate change summit in Copenhagen early next month. That's about 12.5 percent below 2008 levels, according to the Department of Energy. He also set a goal of cutting emissions by 83 percent by 2050, which is what European nations want.

So the question is how big a burden would those double-digit cuts be for the average American.

Experts say it will mean higher energy bills, fewer deaths from air pollution, and maybe even a dividend check at the end of the year. But mostly, they say, it'll be small, slowly evolving changes that the public won't even notice.

Princeton University geosciences and international affairs professor Michael Oppenheimer compares what would happen under Obama's 2020 target to what has happened the past 30 years to refrigerators. Without consumers noticing much, they have become three times more energy efficient. You only notice when you buy one, because they cost more, or if you look at reduced energy usage on your electric bill, Oppenheimer said.

But what would the overall cost of the big cuts in emissions actually be?

White House climate czar Carol Browner cites a $173 a year cost for a family of four that was calculated by the Congressional Budget Office for the House climate bill, which has the same roughly 17 percent target. That summer CBO study said the poorest households would save $40 a year, while those in the highest income ranges would face a jump of $245 a year.

The Environmental Protection Agency put the overall cost at between $80 and $111 for the average household. But much of those estimates have lots of caveats, such as increased nuclear power use.

Energy companies, business interests, and Republicans say the costs will be far higher and hurt the average American far more.

A number of studies done at the request of business groups have pegged the cost for the average household at $900 to $1,539 a year by 2020.

Scott Segal, a Washington attorney who represents top carbon dioxide emitters such as power plants and refineries, said Wednesday a lot of the cost will depend on the details of how the goal is achieved. But he said the White House is quoting the lower, not the higher end of cost analyses.

"Price increases in those areas could be significant," Segal said.

Taking the White House and Congressional Budget Office figure, it amounts to less than half a buck a day, nowhere near the cost of a cup of coffee. But if the bulk of the increases came in four peak months in winter and summer, that would be an extra $40 a month, which would be noticeable. And industry's figures are closer to $5 a day.

John Reilly, associate director of MIT's Joint Program on the Science and Policy of Global Change, has conducted a detailed analysis of congressional plans. He says electricity bills could increase by more than 50 percent and a gallon of gas could jump by 26 cents by 2020, but those won't be as onerous as they sound.

The latest proposal for the intricate cap-and-trade system for pollution credits involves auctioning off the right to pollute, with the proceeds being returned to consumers. That means consumers would pay more in monthly bills and then get checks back from utilities at the end of the year, which would encourage them to use less energy, Reilly said.

That end-of-the-year check, he maintained, would offset some of the higher electricity prices.

And the projected gas price increase would be about the same as what happened a couple years ago, Reilly added.

"It's a gradual evolution," he said. "The idea is to gently direct us in another direction so it isn't a big dramatic shift ... to do this with the least amount of pain as possible."

Eventually cars may be made of different materials, Princeton's Oppenheimer said. Some coal power plants may be replaced with cleaner natural gas. Big cars will be more costly and discouraged. Smaller cars may be built to be more comfortable and inviting.

There will be "a million small changes ... most of them you will never know happen, some you will," Oppenheimer said.

"We don't see the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere," he said. "We're not going to see most of the measures to remove it from emissions. And we're not going to notice when it's gone except that very gradually over the long term the rate of warming of the world will slow down."

Public health officials from around the world on Wednesday released a series of studies showing that reducing greenhouse gas emissions — by the same 83 percent by 2050 that Obama targeted — would save millions of lives because of reduced air pollution.

Cutting carbon dioxide pollution and encouraging more exercise and less meat consumption to reduce emissions would reduce deaths from heart and lung diseases worldwide, study authors and health officials said.

Even a 17 percent emissions cut by 2020, as Obama outlined, would mean hundreds if not thousands of U.S. lives saved because there would be less air pollution to worsen heart and lung diseases, said Christopher Portier, associate director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.

"Relying on fossil fuels leads to unhealthy lifestyles, increasing our chances for getting sick and in some cases takes years from our lives," U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said. "As greenhouse gas emissions go down, so do deaths from cardiovascular and respiratory diseases. This is not a small effect."

Suicide bomber kills 16 in western Afghanistan

KABUL — A suicide bomber killed 16 people and wounded at least 23 others Friday in a busy city square in western Afghanistan, while near Kabul a powerful former warlord narrowly escaped an assassination attempt, officials said.

The attacks came a day after Afghan President Hamid Karzai took the oath of office for a second term amid escalating violence across the country. Karzai said he has put national reconciliation with Taliban insurgents at the top of his agenda.

Lawmaker Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, a former Northern Alliance leader who has been accused by Human Rights Watch of war crimes, was in a convoy with his bodyguards when a remote-controlled bomb hidden in an irrigation canal beside the road exploded in the Paghman district north of the Afghan capital, said district chief of police Abdul Razaq.

One car in the convoy was destroyed, and Razaq said five of Sayyaf's bodyguards had been killed. Sayyaf himself was not injured.

In the suicide bombing earlier Friday in western Afghanistan, a bomber on a motorcycle blew himself up about 55 yards (50 meters) from the Farah provincial governor's compound in a crowded square, said Gov. Rohul Amin. The dead included two children and a police officer, he said.

Afghan police shouted "Stop! Stop!" at the motorcyclist before he detonated the explosives, provincial police chief Gen. Mohammad Faqir Askar said. It was unclear what the bomber was targeting.

Dr. Shir Agh Asas at the hospital in Farah city said several children also were among the wounded.

"These days Taliban are causing high casualties because the foreign forces and Afghan forces have been conducting operations against the insurgency in the region," Askar said.

An operation three days ago in another part of the province killed five insurgents, including a Taliban commander and a bomb-maker, Askar said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for either of Friday's attacks.

Sayyaf was a key U.S.-backed mujahedeen leader during the 1980s invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet Union. His group was known for its close links to Arab fighters, including Osama bin Laden. He controlled the interior ministry when the mujahedeen ruled Afghanistan between 1992 and 1996, when their bitter internecine fighting led to the Taliban takeover in 1996.

Sayyaf was close to slain Northern Alliance leader Ahmed Shah Masood and opposed to the Taliban. When the Northern Alliance, backed by U.S. forces, toppled the Taliban regime after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks for hosting al-Qaida in Afghanistan, Sayyaf became a powerful figure in Kabul once more.

He has since been elected to Parliament and has close ties to Karzai, campaigning for him during the August presidential elections.

On Thursday, Karzai invited insurgents to lay down arms.

"We invite dissatisfied compatriots, who are not directly linked to international terrorism, to return to their homeland," he said.

Karzai also set a five-year timetable for the Afghan security forces to take the lead in defending the nation, a goal that would allow international forces to take on more of a support role.

As the inaugural ceremony took place in Kabul on Thursday, a suicide bomber killed two U.S. service members in the southern province of Zabul, local officials and NATO said. Hours later, another suicide bomber blew himself up in a busy marketplace in another province, killing 10 civilians, including three boys, and wounding 13 other people.

Also Friday, three civilians were wounded by a roadside bomb in Khost province, according to Wazir Pacha, deputy police chief of Khost.

Separately, NATO said Afghan and international forces killed a man in Takhar province in northern Afghanistan on Friday believed to be an operative with the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan who was responsible for financing militant activities and transporting foreign fighters into the region. The man was killed during a search of a compound in rural Bangi district, it said.

According to NATO, there has been an increase in the number of Uzbek fighters in the ranks of the Taliban in northern Afghanistan from the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan.

The Maltese falcon: The thin man ; Red harvest By Dashiell Hammett

Western hero Sam Steele's story coming to TV

CBC plans to create a TV movie about Sam Steele, a member of the North-West Mounted Police and distinguished military veteran who rode out against the Red River Rebellion and fought in the Boer War.

CBC is working with the Alberta Film Development Program and Knight Enterprises to recreate the life of one of the country's most famous Mounties.

Steele, who lived from 1849 to 1919, was born into an Ontario military family and joined the North-West Mounted Police, precursors to the RCMP, in 1873.

He negotiated with the First Nations chief Sitting Bull, fought against Big Bear and solved a famous murder, before leading a force to the Klondike Gold Rush. He also led a private cavalry unit in the Boer War in South Africa and lived to serve in the First World War.

"From the Red River Expedition to the Boer War, Sir Sam Steele has been at the forefront of several monumental events around the world," Kirstine Stewart, general manager of CBC Television English Services, said Thursday in announcing the movie deal.

In 2008, the Sir Samuel Benfield Steele Collection, which includes his letters, artifacts and papers, was repatriated to Canada from his descendants in Britain. It is now housed at the Glenbow Museum in Calgary and the University of Alberta in Edmonton.

Steele was a hero in the 19th century but is little known today. Scriptwriters are expected to work on the story using his letters and papers — about 86 boxes were handed over to the University of Alberta and the Glenbow.

No production date has been announced for the movie.

Review: 'Modern Warfare 2' has combat, weak story

"Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2," almost certain to be the year's best-selling video game, has also become its most notorious. That's because of a prerelease leak showing a terrorist raid on an airport — exactly the sort of thing that's guaranteed to rile up anti-violence watchdogs and generate free publicity.

Now that I've played "Modern Warfare 2" (Activision, for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, $59.99), I can report that the airport massacre is absolutely essential to its story. The rationale behind your character's participation in the assault, however, is idiotic: You're really a good guy who has infiltrated the terrorist cell. So fire away.

The remainder of "MW2" deals with the repercussions from the terrorist attack, which causes escalating global tensions to explode into all-out war. Tanks rumble through the Virginia suburbs, helicopters circle the Washington Monument and millions die — all because of an awesomely ill-conceived plan to get intel on a terrorist.

I'm not giving anything away that you haven't already seen in Activision's TV ads. The sight of D.C. in flames is spectacular, and it's a terrific setting for virtual combat. "MW2" is filled with such mind-blowing set pieces, from the slums of Rio de Janeiro to the snowy mountains of Russia.

It's in getting from one set piece to the next that developer Infinity Ward stumbles. The overarching story concerns a special forces team's efforts to bring down Vladimir Makarov, the terrorist mastermind who engineered the airport attack. But it's easy to lose sight of that goal when the White House is under siege.

Granted, the plot isn't that much more ridiculous than a typical season of "24." In comparison with some other video games — say, "Metal Gear Solid 4" — the "MW2" script is almost elegant.

And most players won't give much thought to the story, given the frenetic, headlong action. The controls are tight, giving you an intuitive feel for even the most exotic weapons. Combat varies nicely between levels: Sometimes you need to be sneaky, sometimes you need to be destructive, and sometimes you just need to run like hell. Occasionally it's difficult to figure out what your goal is, but such confusion isn't entirely out of place in the fog of combat.

The solo campaign is short — about eight hours — and "Modern Warfare" veterans will race through it to get to the multiplayer offerings. The major innovation is a collection of 23 cooperative, two-player missions, which can be completed online or with a friend on the same couch. It also has a full complement of competitive modes, with enough new maps, weapons and gameplay tweaks to keep franchise fans fighting for months.

If you're into online combat, "MW2" is a must-buy. I just wish Infinity Ward had taken the time to write a more coherent story for the single-player adventure. Three stars out of four.

On the Net:

• "Call of Duty: http://modernwarfare2.infinityward.com

Saudis take mountain from Yemen rebels

SAN'A, Yemen — Saudi Arabian forces seized a strategic mountain straddling the border with Yemen and cleared it of Shiite rebels after five days of fighting that have left three Saudi soldiers dead, a Saudi defense official said Sunday.

Meanwhile, rebels said they shot down a Yemeni fighter jet. While Yemen acknowledged the crash, it attributed it to a "technical error."

Saudi forces began shelling and bombing rebel positions last week, dramatically escalating a five-year conflict between Yemen's weak central government and rebels in the north of the impoverished country.

The Saudi government cooperates with Yemen to fight the Shiite rebels, known as Hawthis, out of fears that extremism and instability in Yemen could spill into its country, the world's largest oil exporter.

Assistant Saudi Defense Minister Khaled Bin Sultan said Sunday's advance was a step toward sealing the Saudi border against the rebels.

"All the mountain slopes inside the Saudi border have been cleared," he said, according to the official Saudi Press Agency.

Saudi forces were still trying to stop rebel infiltrators elsewhere, he said.

Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya TV aired footage of Saudi soldiers capturing and blindfolding men in traditional Arab robes whom the station identified as Hawthi fighters.

Among the areas Bin Sultan said Saudi forces seized was Dokhan mountain, a strategic high point in the rugged border region, where rebels seized a Yemeni army base last month. The mountaintop gives commanding views of Saudi border installations and other military sites in the kingdom.

Saudi officials say their military has fought only in its own territory, focusing on rebel infiltrators, but Yemeni rebels, military officials and Arab diplomats say Saudi strikes have hit deep inside northern Yemen.

Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh vowed on Saturday to quash the rebels.

Rebel spokesman Mohammed Abdel-Salam denied that rebels had crossed the Saudi border, saying those detained were Yemeni migrants hoping to work in the much richer country.

He said the "lies" about rebel infiltrators "reveal the failure of Yemeni government in confronting our forces, and that has pushed the Yemeni regime to seek help from the Saudis."

Abdel-Salam also said rebel fighters shot down a Yemeni fighter jet on Sunday, and that both Yemeni and Saudi jets have carried out continuous strikes in the region, "damaging many villages and killing civilians."

A Yemeni defense official said one of its Sukhoi jets crashed on Sunday near the Saudi border due to a technical error.

He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the press.

The rebels also sent footage to the Associated Press showing fighters dancing on an army truck carrying a heavy machine gun that appeared to have belonged to Saudi border guards.

The Shiite rebels claim the needs of their communities are ignored by a Yemeni government that is increasingly allied with hard-line Sunni fundamentalists, who consider Shiites heretics.

Besides the northern rebels, Yemen's government is also confronting a separatist movement in the south and a lingering threat from al-Qaida militants.

Yemen, the ancestral homeland of Osama bin Laden, has cooperated with the U.S. in fighting terrorism but has struggled to confront Islamic extremists.

US 'deplores' Fiji's expulsion of NZealand, Australian envoys

WASHINGTON — The United States said Wednesday it "deplores" Fiji's decision to expel diplomats from New Zealand and Australia, saying the moves were "unjust."

"The United States deplores the decision by Fiji's de facto government to expel New Zealand's acting head of mission as well as Australia's high commissioner," State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters.

"This latter act is unprecedented in that Australia now holds the chairmanship of the Pacific Islands Forum," he said.

On Wednesday Australia and New Zealand announced tit-for-tat expulsions of Fiji's top envoys, a day after the Pacific island state ordered their own envoys out, claiming interference in its judicial affairs.

It is the third time Fiji has thrown out a New Zealand envoy since its latest coup in 2006, but the first expulsion of a diplomat from Australia, current chair of the Pacific Islands Forum.

"These actions have undermined any opportunity for progress toward re-engagement and constructive dialogue with its neighbors," Kelly said.

"The United States calls for the restoration of Fiji's independent judiciary and the rights to free speech and assembly that are essential to the country's return to democracy.

"We consider it to be an unjust act to expel them out of the country," Kelly added.

Climate delegates call on US for robust policy

BARCELONA, Spain — As China's actions to curb gas emissions garnered praise at U.N. climate talks, the United States came under renewed pressure to come up with a plan to cut pollution blamed for hastening global warming.

Delegates at the weeklong talks in Barcelona pressed Monday for Washington to make specific commitments on reducing carbon emissions and contributing to a global climate fund to help poor countries cope with damage caused by climate change.

"We expect the United States to be able to deliver on one of the major challenges of our century," Denmark's Minister for Climate and Energy Connie Hedegaard said.

Delegates expressed frustration Monday that, after two years of talks on drafting a new pact, the U.S. has been unable to make firm commitments because it is waiting for Congress to enact legislation.

World nations hope to finalize a new global warming pact in time for it to be adopted at a major U.N. conference next month in Copenhagen. The deal would replace the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, but require both industrial countries and developing countries to rein in emissions of carbon and other heat-raising greenhouse gases. Kyoto applied only to industrialized nations, and was rejected by the United States.

Hedegaard noted that President Barack Obama, cited for raising hopes of a more peaceful and climate friendly world, will receive the Nobel Peace Prize in nearby Norway on Dec. 10 — just after the decisive climate conference gets under way.

"It's very hard to imagine how the American president can receive the Nobel Prize ... and at the same time has sent an empty-handed delegation to Copenhagen," said the Danish minister, who will chair the Dec. 7-18 talks in Copenhagen.

U.S. chief delegate Jonathan Pershing said the U.S. intended to be part of a deal, but would ensure that any deal it signed would be accepted by Congress. "We don't want to be outside an agreement," he said.

He said the U.S. would avoid the mistake of 1997 when its delegation signed onto the Kyoto Protocol, but found unanimous opposition in Congress and was not submitted for ratification.

In Stockholm, Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt said EU leaders wanted Obama to clarify the U.S. position on climate change this week as they meet in Washington. Reinfeldt — whose country holds the rotating EU presidency — was traveling to Washington along with European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana.

In an indirect slap at Washington, Yvo de Boer, head of the U.N. climate secretariat, said countries like China, India, Mexico, Brazil and South Korea were moving faster on climate change than the wealthy industrial countries.

"China is probably the world leader in limiting greenhouse gas emissions," de Boer said.

China has tried to shift to low-carbon development, but it's growth rate is so fast — more than 8 percent a year — that it's carbon emissions will continue to climb for decades. Between them, the U.S. and China emit 40 percent of the world's man-produced carbon.

But while the U.S. lagged in developing alternatives to fossil fuels, China became a world leader in the use of wind energy, and President Hu Jintao has said China would generate 15 percent of its energy from renewable sources within a decade. He promised in a speech at the U.N. General Assembly in September that China also would make "substantial" reductions in its carbon emissions per unit of economic output.

Pershing acknowledged that China "has a list of impressive activities" to curb its emissions, but said it still needs to define what it intends to do to fulfill Hu's pledge of substantial reductions.

Earlier, de Boer warned that the Copenhagen agreement must have legal force because developing countries do not trust promises from the wealthy nations.

The legal status of the agreement and whether nations will face consequences for failing to meet their commitments are contentious issues in the talks.

"We live in a world of broken promises," de Boer told The Associated Press. Developing countries are concerned the rich countries "will commit to targets and not deliver."

Pershing, in a separate AP interview, said compliance with the agreement in Copenhagen should rest with the domestic laws of each country, which can be very strong.

Countries should register the actions they intend to take to lower the growth rate of carbon emissions, which would then face international inspection. But they would not face punishment for failing to meet their promises, he said.

"I don't think people here are talking about sanctions at all. That's not the discussion," he said.

But many countries want tough compliance measures to be part of any agreement.