The New Nation - Internet Edition

Obama, McCain head toward voters’ verdict

AP, Chicago

Democrat Barack Obama's bid to become the first black president faced the final test of his remarkable two-year journey Tuesday, while Republican John McCain pressed for an Election Day upset.

The contest pitted the 47-year-old Obama, a first-term Illinois senator who rocketed to stardom on the power of his oratory and a call for change, against the 72-year-old McCain, a 26-year lawmaker known whose mettle was tested during 5 ½ years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam.

"I'm feeling kind of fired up. I'm feeling like I'm ready to go," Obama told nearly 100,000 people gathered for his final rally Monday night in Virginia.

"At this defining moment in history, Virginia, you can give this country the change it needs," Obama said to voters in a state that hasn't voted for a Democratic presidential nominee in 44 years.

The Illinois senator's final day of campaigning was bittersweet: he was mourning the loss of his grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, who helped raise him but died of cancer Sunday night and never got to see the results of the historic election.

McCain completed a cross-country trek through seven battleground states before arriving at home in Phoenix early Tuesday morning.

"This momentum, this enthusiasm convinces me we're going to win tomorrow," McCain told a raucous evening rally in Henderson, Nev. It was the fifth campaign stop in an 18-hour odyssey that took him across three time zones.

Obama planned a quick campaign stop in Indiana on Election Day before a massive outdoor rally in front of the skyline in his adopted hometown of Chicago. The day's forecast was for an unseasonably warm 70 degrees.

McCain planned events in Colorado and New Mexico, then a party at the Biltmore Hotel in Phoenix. Obama urged his supporters against overconfidence. "Even if it rains tomorrow, you can't let that stop you. You've got to wait in line. You've got to vote," he said.

Another report adds: Barack Obama radiated confidence and John McCain displayed the grit of an underdog Monday as the presidential rivals reached for the finish line of a two-year marathon with a burst of campaigning across battlegrounds from the Atlantic Coast to Arizona.

"We are one day away from change in America," said Obama, a Democrat seeking to become the first black president - a dream not nearly as distant on election eve as it once was.

McCain, too, promised to turn the page of the era of George W. Bush and said he sensed an upset in the making.

"This momentum, this enthusiasm convinces me we're going to win tomorrow," McCain told a raucous evening rally in Henderson, Nev., part of a seven-state campaign sprint that was to end in Arizona early Tuesday.

Republican running mate Sarah Palin was more pointed as she campaigned in Ohio. "Now is not the time to experiment with socialism," she said. "Our opponent's plan is just for bigger government."

Late-season attacks aside, Obama led in virtually all the pre-election polls in a race where economic concerns dominated and the war in Iraq was pushed - however temporarily - into the background.

China, Taiwan sign deals on closer economic ties

AFP, Taipei

Taiwan and China Tuesday signed a range of deals aimed at bringing the two sides closer economically, after almost 60 years of hostilities that often took them to the brink of war.

Officials from the two sides were shown live on television signing four agreements that are potentially worth billions of dollars, after talks that marked a significant warming of ties between the former bitter enemies.

The two sides have agreed to introduce direct cargo shipping and postal services, to add passenger flights and to discuss food security in the wake of health problems caused by poisonous Chinese food imports.

Tourism cooperation was also part of the talks, which took place Tuesday morning in Taipei's Grand Hotel between Beijing's envoy Chen Yunlin, head of China's Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait, and Chiang Pin-kung, his local counterpart as head of the Strait Exchange Foundation.

Sri Lankan army chief says war nearly complete

AFP, Colombo

Sri Lanka's decades-old war against Tamil Tiger rebels is close to being completed, the island's army chief was quoted as saying Tuesday as the military reported further gains in the rebel-held north.

Lieutenant General Sarath Fonseka said the military had killed thousands of Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) fighters in the past two-and-a-half years. "Over 80 per cent of the war against the LTTE has been completed after regaining 80 per cent of the areas under them and killing over 12,000 of their cadres," the state-run Daily News quoted Fonseka as saying.

Government forces are currently locked in a major offensive against the Tigers to capture the rebel political capital of Kilinochchi, 330 kilometres (206 miles) north of Colombo.

Gunmen kill Mexican police chief

AP, Mexico City

Gunmen killed a state police chief in the border city of Nogales and three police detectives in central Guanajuato state, as a wave of drug-related violence batters Mexican security forces, authorities said Monday.

In Tijuana, across the border from San Diego, authorities on Monday found the bullet-riddled bodies of six men in a vegetable warehouse along with more than 100 shell casings from assault rifles.

Swiss magistrate alleges priest abused boys

AP, Fribourg

Swiss officials said Monday they have evidence that a Roman Catholic priest sexually abused two dozen boys in France and Switzerland over a 35-year period.

The priest has admitted committing some sex acts with children between the ages of 9 and 14, two of whom had disabilities, said investigating magistrate Yvonne Gendre.

India's moon mission enters lunar space

AFP, Bangalore

India's first unmanned moon mission entered lunar space early Tuesday as part of its final journey this week into the moon's orbit, a top space official said.

The Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft was launched with an Indian-built rocket on October 22 from the country's southeastern coast.

"The operation to put Chandrayaan into lunar space went off very well," S. Satish, director of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) told AFP.

The spacecraft is now 1,000 kilometres (600 miles) from the moon, enabling its terrain-mapping camera to shoot pictures of it. Scientists are preparing for the next major stage to enable the spacecraft to enter lunar orbit on Saturday and position itself about 100 kilometres from the moon's surface.

Once the mission is in the lunar orbit, it will stabilise in about a week, after which it will send a probe instrument to the moon's surface.

Pakistan warns US commander over missile strikes

AFP, Islamabad

President Asif Ali Zardari warned the new US commander for Iraq and Afghanistan on Monday that missile strikes on Pakistani territory were "counterproductive" and detrimental to the 'war on terror.'

The most high-profile protest yet from Islamabad came as General David Petraeus made his first visit here since he took over the position last week, amid claims that it could signal a shift in strategy in Afghanistan. "Continuing drone attacks on our territory, which result in loss of precious lives and property, are counterproductive and difficult to explain by a democratically-elected government," Zardari said. "It is creating a credibility gap," the state-run Associated Press of Pakistan quoted him as saying. The series of strikes by unmanned drones against suspected Al-Qaeda and Taliban militants hiding in Pakistan's tribal badlands bordering Afghanistan have raised tensions between the two countries. Defence Minister Chaudhry Ahmad Mukhtar earlier told Petraeus that Pakistan's sovereignty and territorial integrity should be respected, warning that future incidents could affect the battle for hearts and minds.

Report clears Palin in Troopergate investigation

AP, Anchorage

Gov. Sarah Palin violated no ethics laws when she fired her public safety commissioner, the state personnel board concluded in a report released Monday. "There is no probable cause to believe that the governor, or any other state official, violated the Alaska Executive Ethics Act in connection with these matters," the report says.

"Gov. Palin is pleased that the independent investigator for the Personnel Board has concluded that she acted properly in the reassignment of Public Safety Commissioner Walt Monegan," her attorney, Thomas Van Flein, said in a statement. An earlier, separate investigation by the Legislature found that Palin had abused her office.

Monegan said he felt pressure from Palin, her husband and her staff to fire a state trooper who had gone through a nasty divorce from Palin's sister. Palin denied the claim, and said Monegan was fired last July because she wanted the department to head in a new direction.

Iran parliament to impeach minister over fake degree

AFP, Tehran

Iran's parliament on Tuesday began a process to impeach Interior Minister Ali Kordan for "dishonesty" after he confessed to holding a fake Oxford University degree.

The row has caused major embarrassment to the government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who has defended Kordan throughout the controversy and who refused to appear in parliament for the impeachment session. "A person who has to be entrusted with the country's security has mocked parliament's trust," MP Ebrahim Nekunam said in a speech carried live on state radio. "The sensitive position of interior minister requires that Mr Kordan serve in another post. What is important today is the reputation of the Islamic republic system," added another lawmaker, Ali Asghar Dastgheib.

Kordan had been under pressure to quit the cabinet post he took up in August after the prestigious British university denied awarding him any qualification through a representative, as he had claimed.

Israel cuts off funding for West Bank outposts

AP, Givat Assaf Outpost

Israel announced that it would cut off funding for illegal settlement outposts and crack down on extremist squatters, but settler leaders vowed Monday to resist the order and accused the government of fanning hatred toward them.

The government decision Sunday to cut off funding was a new acknowledgment that Israel has been complicit in the development of dozens of unauthorized outposts throughout the West Bank, despite repeated pledges to the U.S. to dismantle them. This ambivalence was on display Monday near the hilltop outpost of Migron north of Jerusalem. Israeli security forces tore down several shacks built months ago as an "outpost of an outpost."

But army guards continued to protect Migron, which is linked to the electricity grid, has a paved access road and is home to more than 40 families.