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Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Reports: Eiffel Tower bomb threat was false alarm (AP)

PARIS ï¿½ The area under Paris' Eiffel Tower has been opened up to tourists again after an anonymous caller phoned in a bomb threat and police combed through the famous monument looking for suspicious objects.

France's BFM television and other French media reported that police found nothing suspicious at the tower, which is France's most popular tourist monument. Paris police headquarters did not immediately respond to calls seeking information.

Around midnight in Paris, people were walking around and riding bikes under the tower. The tower itself usually closes at 11 p.m.

French media say a second tourist hub ï¿½ the Saint-Michel subway station near Notre Dame Cathedral ï¿½ was also been briefly evacuated.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

PARIS (AP) ï¿½ Paris' Eiffel Tower and its immediate surroundings underneath were evacuated Tuesday evening after an anonymous caller phoned in a bomb threat, the French capital's police headquarters said.

French media reported that a second tourist hub ï¿½ the Saint-Michel subway station near Notre Dame Cathedral ï¿½ had also been evacuated following a similar threat.

A Paris police spokesman said he had no information about the reports on the Saint-Michel station, which was the target of a terrorist attack in 1995 that killed eight and injured scores of people.

Across town, about 2,000 people were cleared from the 324-meter (1,063-foot) Eiffel Tower on the banks of the Seine River, and police were checking it for suspicious objects, the spokesman at the police headquarters said. He declined to give his name, citing department policy.

Eiffel Tower security services made the decision to clear out tourists and workers following the threat, the spokesman said.

Despite the scare at the tower, tourists and curious Parisians continued to mill around the surrounding sidewalks, and traffic continued to circulate nearby. Several police trucks were posted under the tower, and officers stood guard.

The tower is France's most popular monument, and 6.6 million people visited it last year.

Bomb scares are frequent in Paris, and the city has experienced terrorism firsthand. Algerian Islamic insurgents bombed the Saint-Michel station on July 25, 1995, killing eight people and injuring 150.

It was the first attack in a campaign of violence that terrorized Paris subway commuters for a time. Gas cooking canisters loaded with nails, sometimes hidden in garbage cans, were used in many of the bombings.

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Reports: Eiffel Tower bomb threat was false alarm (AP)

Around midnight in Paris, people were walking around and riding bikes under the tower. The tower itself usually closes at 11 p.m.

French media say a second tourist hub ï¿½ the Saint-Michel subway station near Notre Dame Cathedral ï¿½ was also been briefly evacuated.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

French media reported that a second tourist hub ï¿½ the Saint-Michel subway station near Notre Dame Cathedral ï¿½ had also been evacuated following a similar threat.

A Paris police spokesman said he had no information about the reports on the Saint-Michel station, which was the target of a terrorist attack in 1995 that killed eight and injured scores of people.

Eiffel Tower security services made the decision to clear out tourists and workers following the threat, the spokesman said.

The tower is France's most popular monument, and 6.6 million people visited it last year.

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American woman freed by Iran after bail deal (AP)

TEHRAN, Iran ï¿½ In just a few dizzying hours, American Sarah Shourd exchanged a cell in Tehran's Evin Prison for a private jet crossing the Persian Gulf on Tuesday, after an apparent diplomatic deal to cover a $500,000 bail and secure a release that seemed in jeopardy from the start.

Shourd was met by her mother and U.S. diplomats at a royal airfield in the capital of Oman, which U.S. officials say played a critical role in organizing the bail payment and assuring it did not violate American economic sanctions on Iran.

Shourd stepped off the private Omani jet and into the arms of her mother in their first embrace since a brief visit in May overseen by Iranian authorities ï¿½ and her first day of freedom in more than 13 months. Shourd smiled broadly as they strolled arm-in-arm through the heat of the late summer night along the Gulf of Oman.

"I'm grateful and I'm very humbled by this moment," she said before boarding the plane in Tehran for the two-hour flight to Oman.

The whirlwind departure of the 32-year-old Shourd brought little change for two other Americans ï¿½ her fiance Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal ï¿½ who remained behind bars while authorities moved toward possible trials on spy charges that could bring up to 10 years in prison if they are convicted.

The three were detained along the Iraq border in July 2009. Their families say they were innocent hikers in the scenic mountains of Iraq's Kurdish region and if they did stray across the border into Iran, they did so unwittingly.

"All of our families are relieved and overjoyed that Sarah has at last been released, but we're also heartbroken that Shane and Josh are still being denied their freedom for no just cause ... They deserve to come home, too," said a statement by the three families.

Iran, however, has shown no hints of clemency for the two 28-year-old men. Indictments on espionage-related charges have been filed and Tehran's chief prosecutor has suggested the cases could soon move into the courts, with Shourd tried in absentia.

Any other scenario could bring more unwanted attention to the growing rivalries inside Iran's Islamic leadership.

Even the gesture to release Shourd on health grounds ï¿½ first raised as an act of Islamic benevolence last week by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ï¿½ turned into a spectacle of high-level political bullying and sniping over who controlled her fate and the overall wisdom of letting her go.

The open bickering seemed to harden the divisions that have been developing since the brush with chaos after Ahmadinejad's disputed re-election last year.

On one side are Ahmadinejad and his allies, led by the vast military and economic network of the Revolutionary Guard ï¿½ what some analysts have called the "militarization" of the Islamic state. The other pole reflects the old guard of Iran's once-unchallenged authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and the traditional pillars of the theocracy such as the judiciary.

In Shourd's case, the judges came out on top. They humbled Ahmadinejad and set the ground rules for her release with a staggeringly high bail.

But in the wider sense, the feuds display the fraying consensus among Iran's conservative leadership ï¿½ with Ahmadinejad's critics increasingly outspoken in their claims he is trying to expand his reach and redraw Iran's political map.

Such rifts could eventually make it harder for Iran to speak in one voice on key issues, such as its nuclear program and any future overtures to end 30 years of diplomatic estrangement with the United States.

"Iran's leadership managed to put down the opposition after Ahmadinejad's election, and now they are fighting among themselves," said Mehrzad Boroujerdi, a professor of Iranian affairs at Syracuse University.

Ahmadinejad may have felt the sting from the judiciary over the handling of Shourd's release. But he came away with the outcome he sought: a goodwill gesture less than a week before he is scheduled to arrive in New York ahead of the U.N. General Assembly.

Ahmadinejad has said Shourd was being released on compassionate grounds. Her mother says she has serious medical problems, including a breast lump and precancerous cervical cells.

Shourd's release, some analysts say, could be used by Iran as a way to deflect the international outcry over a stoning sentence for a woman convicted of adultery and the continued crackdown on opposition groups ï¿½ which led two Iranian ambassadors in Europe to quit this week and seek asylum.

"Ahmadinejad is possibly trying to make the environment less hostile in New York," said Rasool Nafisi, a researcher on Iranian affairs at Strayer University in Virginia.

Even in the last minutes, Ahmadinejad tried to put his stamp on the release. His adviser on women's affairs, Maruyam Mojtahedzadeh, was on hand to greet Shourd at Tehran's Mehrabad Airport.

In a statement to Iran's state-run Press TV before boarding the flight to Oman, Shourd thanked Ahmadinejad and other Iranian leaders for "this humanitarian gesture."

"I want to really offer my thanks to everyone in the world, all of the governments, all of the people, that have been involved," added Shourd, wearing a maroon headscarf and a tan coat.

Upon arrival in Oman, Shourd also thanked the sultan for his help and said she would turn her efforts to trying to win the release of her companions. Her immediate travel plans were unclear. A U.S. official said she would be in Oman for at least a day.

Shourd, who grew up in Los Angeles, Bauer, who grew up in Onamia, Minn., and Fattal, who grew up in Elkins Park, Pa., were detained on July 31, 2009, and accused of illegally crossing into Iran and spying in a case that has deepened tensions with Washington.

Up until the moment Shourd was led outside the gray walls of Evin Prison, it was unclear whether the opening for her release could just as suddenly close.

A day earlier, a commentary by a news agency linked to the Revolutionary Guard called the bail an insult to Iran's security and intelligence forces. Shourd's family then said they couldn't afford the amount and the State Department noted it would not offer financial help.

Then came the unexpected news from Tehran's chief prosecutor, Abbas Jafari Dowlatabadi, that bail had been paid to Iran's Bank Melli in the Omani capital Muscat. Shourd's family has not disclosed the source of the funds ï¿½ opening speculation that a diplomatic pact was cut with Oman.

A U.S. official said neither the U.S. government nor the families of the hikers put up the money, but could not say who else might have paid it.

All signs pointed to Oman, both a close Western and Iranian ally that wraps around the southeast corner of the Arabian peninsula.

Oman is seen as an important diplomatic bridge with Tehran because the two nations share close bonds as guardians of the Strait of Hormuz at the mouth of the Gulf, the seaway for an estimated 40 percent of the world's oil.

Another U.S. official said Omani negotiators had played a critical, behind-the-scenes role, working with Iran's judiciary and Swiss diplomats who handle U.S. affairs in Iran. Oman was key in coordinating the bail payment, the official said ï¿½ suggesting some kind of channel to avoid violating American sanctions on Iran.

Both U.S. officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

U.S. sanctions put blanket restrictions on transactions with Iran's main state bank, Bank Melli, which has been the channel for past bail payments to Iranian courts by foreign detainees. Washington accuses the bank of helping fund Iran's ballistic missile development and its nuclear program, which the U.S. says could eventually lead to atomic weapons. Iran says it only seeks peaceful nuclear reactors for energy.

In a statement, Oman's government said it "welcomes" Shourd's release and hoped "other positive steps will follow in the course of the Iranian-American relations."

President Barack Obama and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton both thanked Oman for its assistance.

Oman "in recent days and weeks became a key interlocutor to help us work this case with the Iranian government," State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said. "And we are very grateful to the role that Oman has played."

He could not say if any money had changed hands in winning Shourd's release, but noted that "arrangements were made that satisfied Iranian requirements under their judicial system."

At the same time, Crowley said the U.S. government had no information to suggest any U.S. or international sanctions on Iran had been violated.

"I am very pleased that Sarah Shourd has been released by the Iranian government, and will soon be united with her family," Obama said in a statement.

Shourd's mother, Nora, said she has hoped and prayed for this moment for 410 days.

"Sarah has had a long and difficult detainment and I am going to make sure that she now gets the care and attention she needs and the time and space to recover," she said. "I can only imagine how bittersweet her freedom must be for her, leaving Shane and Josh behind."

___

Murphy reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Associated Press writers Gretchen Ehlke in Milwaukee, Matthew Lee in Washington and Amy Forliti in Minneapolis, contributed to this report.

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Record level of US airstrikes hit Afghan militants (AP)

ISLAMABAD ï¿½ Drone aircraft unleashed two missile attacks in a lawless tribal region on the Afghan border Tuesday, making September the most intense period of U.S. strikes in Pakistan since they began in 2004, intelligence officials said.

The stepped-up campaign is focused on a small area of farming villages and mountainous, thickly forested terrain controlled by the Haqqani network, a ruthless American foe in Afghanistan, U.S. officials say. There is some evidence the network is being squeezed as a result, one official said.

American officials said the airstrikes were designed to degrade the Haqqanis' operations on the Pakistani side of the border, creating a "hammer-and-anvil" effect as U.S. special operations forces carry out raids against their fighters across the frontier in Afghanistan. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing classified operations.

The missiles have killed more than 50 people in 12 strikes since Sept. 2 in the Pakistani region of North Waziristan, according to an Associated Press tally based on Pakistani intelligence officials' reports. Many struck around Datta Khel, a town of about 40,000 people that sits on a strategically vital road to the Afghan border.

The border region has long been a refuge for Islamist extremists from around the world. Osama Bin Laden and other al-Qaida leaders are believed to have fled there after the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.

U.S. and Pakistani intelligence officials said most of this month's strikes have targeted the forces of Jalaluddin and Sirajuddin Haqqani, a former anti-Soviet commander and his son who are now battling American forces in eastern Afghanistan.

The raids targeting the group in Afghanistan are led mainly by the Joint Special Operations Command. Such raids across Afghanistan are now more frequent than at any previous time in the nearly nine-year war, with some 4,000 recorded between May and August as special operations numbers were boosted by troops arriving from Iraq.

The raids have focused on the Haqqanis for the last two years, officials said.

A senior American intelligence official in Afghanistan said the U.S. had reports that Haqqani commanders were under pressure from the operations.

"We're seeing from some of the raids that some of the more senior guys are trying to move back into Pakistan," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss matters of intelligence.

The official cautioned that the Haqqanis often employ military disinformation. And so far, the official said, neither the special operations raids nor the missile strikes on the Pakistan side of the border appear to have degraded the militants' ability to fill the ranks of the slain.

But sometimes, the U.S. official said, the replacements are far less competent than their predecessors.

The Pakistan army has launched several offensives in the tribal regions over the last 2 1/2 years, but has not moved in force into North Waziristan. The U.S. is unable to send ground forces into Pakistani territory, and must rely on the drone strikes.

A major offensive in North Waziristan became even less feasible last month after massive flooding forced tens of thousands of Pakistani soldiers to focus exclusively on rescuing stranded victims, redirecting flood waters and rebuilding damaged infrastructure.

Last month also saw a lull in U.S. airstrikes, until an attack on Sept. 2 began days of repetitive missile attacks.

U.S. officials did not discuss specific reasons for the surge of airstrikes this month. A former American military official said poor weather often hampers drone operations.

Until now, the highest number of airstrikes inside Pakistan in a single month had been the 11 launched in January 2010 after a suicide bomber killed a Jordanian intelligence officer and seven CIA employees at a base in Afghanistan.

"Usually when there's this type of intensity in strikes, they're going after something specific," Bill Roggio, of the Long War Journal, which tracks the strikes, said of this month's attacks. "They hit it, watch what moves, then hit it again. It becomes an intel feedback loop," that fuels further strikes, he said.

U.S. officials do not publicly acknowledge the missile strikes but have said privately that they have killed several senior Taliban and al-Qaida militants and scores of foot soldiers in a region largely out of the control of the Pakistani state.

Critics say innocents are also killed, fueling support for the insurgency.

A Pakistani intelligence official told the AP that "most of the fighters killed in recent weeks are from the Haqqani network," adding that Arab militants had also been killed. He spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic.

"We live in constant fear," said Munawar Khan, 28, who lives in the nearby village of Darpa Khel. "We have missile strikes every day."

U.S. forces began targeting Pakistan's tribal regions with aerial drones in 2004 but the number of strikes soared in 2008 and has been steadily climbing since then, with nearly 70 attacks this year, according to an AP tally.

There has been little evident public or official outrage inside Pakistan in the wake of September's airstrikes, but the Pakistani government says it has not altered its long-standing objection to such attacks, which have also targeted Pakistani Taliban militants who carry out attacks inside the country.

"The position of the army and government is the same, that it harms more than it helps," said Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, an army spokesman.

The Haqqanis worked closely with Pakistan's intelligence service during the anti-Soviet war and have not waged attacks inside Pakistan.

In Afghanistan, however, they often use suicide bombs in civilian areas and do not let suicide bombers back out of an attack, unlike the Afghan Taliban, the U.S. intelligence official told The Associated Press.

There's some disagreement in U.S. intelligence ranks as to whether the Haqqanis are part of the Taliban, or simply allied with them in what an intelligence official in the U.S. called "a marriage of convenience."

Many in the Haqqani leadership have roles as Taliban commanders. But officials say the Haqqanis seek dominion only over the areas in which they hold sway ï¿½ Afghanistan's mountainous eastern provinces of Paktika, Paktia, and Khost, stretching to the outskirts of the capital, Kabul. The Taliban, by contrast, want to take over the whole country. The two ruled those areas side by side when the Taliban governed Afghanistan ï¿½ though Haqqani was subservient to Taliban ruler Mullah Omar and did not have independence.

___

Dozier reported from Kabul. Associated Press writers Michael Weissenstein in Islamabad, Rasool Dawar in Mir Ali and Ishtiaq Mahsud in Dera Ismail Khan contributed to this report.

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GOP establishment vs tea party in primary showdown (AP)

WASHINGTON ï¿½ Establishment Republicans vied with challengers favored by tea party activists one last time Tuesday in a multistate finale to a primary election season marked by economic recession and political upheaval.

Highlighted by GOP-tea party showdowns in New Hampshire and Delaware, six states chose candidates for governor and five featured contests for nominations to the Senate.

In New York, 40-year veteran Democratic Rep. Charles Rangel faced the voters for the first time since the House ethics committee accused him of 13 violations, most of them relating to his personal finances.

So far this year, seven incumbent members of Congress have tasted defeat, four Republicans and three Democrats. And that does not include a lengthy list of GOP contenders who fell to tea party-supported challengers despite having the backing of party officials eager to maximize their gains in November.

With unemployment high and President Barack Obama's popularity below 50 percent, Republicans said the primaries reflected an enthusiasm that would serve the party well in the fall, when control of Congress will be at stake.

Democrats, however, said the presence of tea party-supported Republicans would prove costly to the GOP on Nov. 2 ï¿½ a proposition that remained to be tested in seven weeks' time.

In Delaware, Rep. Mike Castle sought the nomination to a Senate seat held for 36 years by Vice President Joe Biden in a primary that took a sharp turn for the negative three weeks ago when the Tea Party Express announced it would come to the aid of challenger Christine O'Donnell.

Castle, a former two-term governor and a veteran of nearly two decades in the House, was repeatedly assailed as a liberal, a Republican in name only. He and the party responded by challenging O'Donnell's fitness for public office and her ability to win a statewide election in the fall.

"There's a tidal wave that is coming to Delaware, and we're riding in it and he's drowning in it," O'Donnell said of Castle.

While Republicans brawled, New Castle County Executive Chris Coons coasted to the Democratic nomination without opposition. Biden resigned the seat in early 2009, and his successor, Democratic Sen. Ted Kaufman, pledged not to run for a full term.

Republicans in New Hampshire sorted through a crowded field of candidates for the nomination to a seat long held by retiring GOP Sen. Judd Gregg.

Former Attorney General Kelly Ayotte was the party-backed favorite, and she added support from prominent conservatives who have played a heavy role in several primaries this year, including former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

Her principal opposition came from Ovide Lamontagne, a lawyer and former head of the state board of education. He campaigned with the support of tea party activists and claimed to be the most conservative candidate in a race that also included businessmen Bill Binnie and Jim Bender.

The winner will face Democratic Rep. Paul Hodes, who is giving up his seat in the House to run for the Senate.

Republicans must gain 10 seats this fall if they are to win control of the Senate, and their chances count heavily on their ability to prevail in both Delaware and New Hampshire.

In Wisconsin, businessman Ron Johnson faced two minor opponents for the Republican nomination to oppose three-term Democratic Sen. Russ Feingold in November in what polls show is a tight race. Johnson has said he will spend millions of his own money to finance his campaign through Election Day.

In New York, Democratic Attorney General Andrew Cuomo faced no opposition for the party's nomination for governor, and he will be the prohibitive favorite in the fall for an office his father held for three terms a generation ago.

Former Rep. Rick Lazio vied with political novice Carl Paladino, a wealthy developer who got tea party support, for the Republican nomination.

In Maryland, former Republican Gov. Bob Ehrlich sought the nomination for a rematch against the man who ousted him from office in 2006, Democratic Gov. Martin O'Malley.

There were gubernatorial nomination contests in Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Wisconsin, where Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker collided with former Rep. Marc Neumann for the Republican line on the fall ballot. Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett was heavily favored for the Democratic nomination.

Rangel's principal challenger for the nomination in his Harlem-based district was Adam Clayton Powell IV, a state assemblyman whose father Rangel defeated 40 years ago. In the decades since, Rangel rose to become chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, with enormous power over taxes, trade, Medicare and more, but Democrats forced him to step aside from that panel while he battles ethics charges.

He is accused of accepting several New York City rent-stabilized apartments, and omitting information on his financial disclosure forms. He's also accused of failing to pay taxes from a rental property in the Dominican Republic, and improperly soliciting money for a college center to be named after him. He has vowed to fight the charges, and faces an ethics committee trial, possibly after the elections.

Rhode Island had a rare open seat in its two-member House delegation, following the decision of Democratic Rep. Patrick Kennedy to retire. Providence Mayor David Cicilline, who is openly gay, was favored over three rivals for the Democratic nomination.

In addition to the seven state primaries, Washington, D.C., chose nominees for local office.

Democratic Mayor Adrian Fenty drew a strong challenger for the nomination, and spent several weeks apologizing to voters for behaving arrogantly during four years in office.

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UN: Number of hungry people declines (AP)

ROME ï¿½ The number of chronically hungry people in the world dipped considerably below the 1 billion mark ï¿½ the first drop in 15 years ï¿½ thanks partly to a fall in food prices after spikes that sparked rioting a few years ago, U.N. agencies said Tuesday.

Still, an estimated 925 million people are undernourished worldwide, and the latest figures don't reflect the repercussions from the massive flooding in Pakistan.

The Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization's report suggested some progress in the battle to end hunger, but stressed the world is far from achieving the U.N. promoted Millennium Development Goal of halving the proportion of undernourished people from 20 percent in 1990-92 to 10 percent in 2015.

The report estimated there are 98 million fewer chronically hungry people than in 2009, when the figure just topped 1 billion.

U.N. officials announcing the figures said that 1,800 calories per day is considered the minimum energy intake on average. Anyone regularly without that intake would be considered undernourished, or "chronically hungry."

The drop in the chronically hungry is partly because food prices have fallen from peaks in 2007-2008, when they sparked violence in several developing countries, and because cereal and rice harvests have been strong. Cereal production this year was the third-highest ever recorded, despite a drought-fueled wheat shortfall in Russia, said FAO director-general Jacques Diouf.

Also heartening, Diouf noted, is that cereal stocks are high ï¿½ some 100 million tons more than the low levels of 2007-2008, when some 38 countries shut down their food export markets in reaction. Increased demand for biofuels and soaring petroleum prices took much of the blame for the spiraling upward prices then.

Food prices are still "stubbornly" high, but "we haven't seen the type of behavior .... panic buying" that helped feed the speculation and fears of a couple of years ago, said Josette Sheeran, the executive director of the U.N. World Food Program.

Earlier this month, a U.N. human rights expert urged governments to crack down on price speculation and boost food production. Deadly riots over food prices hit Mozambique recently, and FAO has called a special meeting for Sept. 24 to discuss recently rising food prices.

The drop below the 1 billion mark also reflects progress China and India have made in feeding their own.

Still, those two nations, with their huge populations, account for 40 percent of the world's undernourished people. Overall, two-thirds of the chronically undernourished live in either China, India, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Pakistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo or Ethiopia, the report said.

The flooding in Pakistan is also a variable that could affect future numbers. The floods have affected millions and robbed farmers of crops about to be harvested, next season's farmland and much seed.

While welcoming the dip in the number of hungry, the non-governmental aid agency Oxfam attributed the improvement largely "to luck" and not to a change in policies or increased investment "needed to address the underlying causes in hunger."

"There simply isn't enough agriculture investment today," added Yukiko Omura, vice president of the International Fund for Agricultural Development, a U.N. agency that emphasizes helping small-scale farming in developing countries.

FAO's Diouf noted that only a small fraction ï¿½ $420 million ï¿½ of the $20 billion in agricultural development assistance pledged by the 2009 Group of Eight developed nations summit and $2 billion more from a later G-20 meeting has materialized.

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Plea bargain announced in NY student beating case (AP)

BELGRADE, Serbia ï¿½ Lawyers reached a plea bargain Tuesday under which a Serb college basketball player charged with beating an American student into a coma would serve about two years in prison in his homeland, potentially ending a case that had strained relations with the U.S.

The victim's family denounced the deal as too lenient, and said Serb prosecutors should reconsider it.

Under the agreement, 23-year-old Miladin Kovacevic would plead guilty to the brutal beating of Bryan Steinhauer and be sentenced to two years and three months ï¿½ with three months of that having been served already in the U.S. and Serbia. He would have faced up to eight years in prison if convicted by the First Municipal Court in Belgrade of inflicting severe bodily harm with possible deadly consequences.

The plea bargain must still be approved by the court, which said it would rule on Sept. 27.

Kovacevic is accused of repeatedly kicking Steinhauer in the chest and head after a barroom brawl in May 2008, near Binghamton University in upstate New York. The beating left the 24-year-old New Yorker with skull fractures and a severe brain injury.

The agreement was confirmed by Kovacevic's lawyer, Borivoje Borovic, and the Serbian prosecutor's office.

In a statement Tuesday, Steinhauer's family said they were told about the potential deal Sunday and told prosecutors they could not accept it because "the proposed sentence was far too lenient."

"They have apparently decided to proceed with the deal despite our opposition," the statement said. "If this is the case, we are very disappointed. We have patiently waited for more than two years for justice to be served, and if this is to be the outcome, we feel our trust was misplaced. We hope that they will reconsider their position."

Kovacevic was first charged in the United States. But he jumped bail and fled to Serbia, which refused to hand him over to the U.S., citing local laws banning extradition.

Hillary Rodham Clinton intervened in the case, demanding Kovacevic's extradition ï¿½ first as a U.S. senator and later as secretary of state ï¿½ as did U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer, a Democrat from New York.

The Serbian government eventually paid $900,000 to Steinhauer's family as part of an agreement that also called for putting Kovacevic on trial in Belgrade.

In a statement Tuesday, Schumer also criticized the plea bargain.

"The punishment does not fit the crime," he said. "This was a dastardly deed that almost killed Bryan Steinhauer. His injuries and suffering are worth more than two years."

It was not immediately clear what prompted the prosecutor to offer the deal. Serbian authorities have been under U.S. pressure to speed up the trial, which already had been postponed twice ï¿½ first in June and again on Monday.

Judges ordered the second delay after Borovic filed a motion demanding that the court reject evidence provided by the U.S.

Kovacevic is additionally charged with obtaining the fake passport to flee the United States after the fight.

Also on trial with Kovacevic are two former Serbian diplomats, who are charged with abusing their positions when they provided a false passport to Kovacevic.

_________

Associated Press Writer Karen Matthews contributed to this story from New York.

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30 insurgents killed in Afghanistan ahead of vote (AP)

KABUL, Afghanistan ï¿½ Up to 30 insurgents have been killed in fighting ahead of this week's parliamentary elections in Afghanistan which the Taliban want to undermine, NATO and Afghan officials said Tuesday.

The military alliance said that up to 23 militants were killed in action in southern Helmand province Monday and three in eastern Wardak province Tuesday. An Afghan official said four Taliban were killed Tuesday in southeastern Zabul province.

There were no reports of casualties among joint NATO-Afghan forces.

Attacks and clashes are rising amid an allied offensive aimed at suppressing the continuing Taliban insurgency.

Meanwhile, tensions are rising ahead of Saturday's parliamentary elections. The Taliban has vowed to target polling stations and warned Afghans not to participate in what it calls a sham vote.

NATO said the coalition forces killed three "known manufacturers" of improvised explosive devices in Wardak, just west of capital Kabul.

"The removal of these criminals effectively removed a potential threat to the people of Afghanistan," Lt. Col. Dan Morgan, Regional Command-East chief of operations, said in a statement. "We will continue to work with our Afghan partners to provide a secure environment for the upcoming elections."

The insurgents want to oust the pro-West Afghan government and drive foreign troops out of the country, and have sought to sabotage all aspects of the political process, including elections.

The government and its Western allies hope the ballot for the lower house of parliament will help consolidate the country's shaky democracy, eventually leading to the withdrawal of the roughly 140,000 NATO-led foreign troops in the country.

On Tuesday, U.N. envoy for Afghanistan Staffan de Mistura said the upcoming elections "are not going to be perfect." But, he expressed hope they would be better than last year's presidential vote which was marred by allegations of widespread fraud and irregularities.

"Security is the biggest concern before these elections," de Mistura said. "Let's remember we are not in Switzerland, we are in Afghanistan at the most critical period of the conflict."

NATO said the coalition forces were attacked on three separate occasions during a patrol in the Sangin district of Helmand province on Monday. The forces responded with airstrikes, mortars, rocket and machine gun fire, killing up to 23 insurgents.

The allied forces stopped firing when women and children moved into the compound from where the insurgent fire had originated, NATO said.

Civilian deaths in NATO military operations are a major source of contention between the alliance and Afghanistan's government, even though the United Nations says the insurgents are responsible for most civilian deaths and injuries.

Mohammad Jan Rasoolyar, spokesman for the provincial governor of Zabul, said four militants were killed and four caught alive with explosive material on Tuesday.

Also Tuesday, 13 people were wounded in an explosion in the capital of the western province of Herat after a concert by Afghan rock star Farhad Darya, local health official Ghulam Zaid Rashid said.

Witnesses said a bomb planted on a motorbike went off in a parking lot as thousands of people were leaving the concert held at a packed stadium in the Herat city. No one immediately claimed responsibility for the blast.