LOS ANGELES Taylor Swift was the most high-profile absence at the MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs) but on Monday but the singer happily took photos with fans after reporting for jury duty in Nashville.
Swift, 26, was photographed by other potential jurors as she was waiting to be selected as a jury member ahead of a trial in a Nashville court, according to Twitter user Tracy Bates (@TracysActivism).
Bates had initially tweeted, "I am on jury duty with @taylorswift13" and said at first Swift's security personnel initially would not let her take a picture. But later she posted a video and numerous photos, including a selfie with Swift, who was wearing a simple black dress and smiling, in the waiting room.
Bates said Swift was happy to pose with other potential jurors and she also posted an autograph from the pop star that said "So nice to meet you!!"
While Bates was happy to snap the star doing her civil duty, she said she did not consent for any media to use her photos, saying they were not for sale. Another user who posted a photo of Swift with her mother on jury duty made her account private.
Swift, named Forbes' top-earning female celebrity this year with $170 million in earnings, did not receive a single nomination at Sunday's MTV's VMAs and did not appear at the New York show.
She was however mentioned on stage by rapper Kanye West, with whom she has a long-running feud, as he rambled about asking her for permission to use her in an explicit lyric in his song "Famous."
A representative for the singer did not respond for comment on Swift's jury duty or on West's VMAs speech.
(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy and Melissa Fares; Editing by Bill Trott)

Taylor Swift poses with fans at jury duty a day after VMA snub


Taylor Swift was the most high-profile absence at the MTV Video Music Awards (VMAs) but on Monday but the singer happily took photos with fans after reporting for jury duty in Nashville.


Express Scripts Holding, the largest U.S. pharmacy benefit manager, said on Wednesday it will implement a program next year that guarantees per-patient spending caps on diabetes drug costs in an effort to limit soaring increases for its customers.
U.S. diabetes prescription drug spending increased 14 percent in 2015 and is forecast to rise at an even faster rate this year and next, according to an Express Scripts report.
The company said a goal of its Diabetes Care Value Program is for participants to incur drug spending increases of about half of the industry forecast of a nearly 18 percent rise in 2017.
For example, if an employer is expected to incur a 20 percent increase in diabetes drug spending in 2017, Express might set a per person/per year cap of no more than a 10 percent increase for its employees. Should diabetes spending hit that cap for a plan participant, Express Scripts would cover all excess costs.
"If they go over the cap, we're on the hook dollar for dollar," Glen Stettin, chief innovation officer at Express Scripts, said in a telephone interview.
For many customers diabetes costs will be "significantly less than what they've experienced in the past several years and significantly less than what would have been projected for the future had they not participated in this program," Stettin said.
Prescription benefit managers, which negotiate drug benefits for health plans and employers, have become increasingly aggressive players in efforts to hold down prescription drug costs.
They achieve this by demanding steep discounts from drugmakers in exchange for including their medicines on preferred use formularies, and by limiting use of expensive new medicines to patients who fit certain criteria.
The Express Scripts program also aims to improve patient compliance rates, in part by allowing them to receive 90 days of drugs at one time rather than a one-month supply, either through the Express Scripts mail order pharmacy, or through more than 10,000 pharmacies across the United States, including all Walgreens pharmacies.
More than 29 million Americans have diabetes, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Patients not taking their medications regularly, often due to high costs or inconvenience, is a constant lament of physicians and can lead to serious and expensive health complications.
(Reporting by Bill Berkrot; Editing by Dan Grebler)

Express Scripts diabetes program aims to cap costs for customers


Express Scripts Holding, the largest U.S. pharmacy benefit manager, said on Wednesday it will implement a program next year that guarantees per-patient spending caps on diabetes drug costs in an effort to limit soaring increases for its customers.


BRUSSELS The European Union grinds back into action this week after its August break, still dazed by Britain's midsummer vote to quit the EU and facing much the same "polycrisis" as a year ago: a mass of refugees, a fragile economy, hostile Russians and, yes, those Brits, now more awkward than ever.
When President Jean-Claude Juncker makes his annual State of the Union address to Parliament in Strasbourg on Sept. 14, he might easily repeat last year's warning: the EU had a "last chance" to save itself from a tide of centrifugal nationalisms.
Last week, the EU's remaining Big Three -- German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande and their host, Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi -- felt they needed to renew their vows at the wellspring of the union, the island of Ventotene, where in 1941 prisoners of Mussolini wrote a manifesto for a united Europe.
That they met on the deck of the aircraft carrier Garibaldi reinforced the sense of beleaguered leaders rallying to the EU's defense as they contemplated an obstacle-strewn political calendar for the year ahead.
The EU leaders are first preparing for a summit on Sept. 16 in Bratislava -- without Britain -- that aims to sketch out a post-Brexit future for the Union.
On Oct. 2, Hungary's right-wing prime minister, Viktor Orban, is set to deliver another slap to Brussels: a largely symbolic referendum to reject an EU quota system for relocating refugees among member states -- a scheme Juncker invested much capital in a year ago, but which has barely got off the ground.
TRUMP
On Nov. 8, Orban is hoping for victory for a man he calls the "valiant" Donald Trump in the U.S. presidential election. Few of Orban's EU peers are so enthusiastic. They see Trump as a disruptive maverick whose endorsement of and by Brexiteer-in-chief Nigel Farage marks him as no friend of the Union.
A Trump win could snap a transatlantic coalition on Russia that is already fraying in Europe, where governments from Paris to Bratislava are seeking a review of Ukraine-related sanctions when measures expire at year's end. Trump might also inject a new dose of post-Brexit uncertainty for world trade.
At home, all the Big Three leaders face their own electoral challenges from euroskeptics.
It starts with Renzi, today trying to persuade Italians he has the youthful energy for rebuilding after the latest earthquake in the Apennines, unlike the scandal-tainted Silvio Berlusconi at L'Aquila in 2009, when more than 300 people died.
Probably in November, Renzi will put to a referendum the constitutional reforms he says are needed to break a political deadlock that is choking the Italian economy. Polls are tight and the euroskeptic upstarts 5-Star are gunning for the socialist premier, who is expected to resign if he loses.
Hollande is threatened with a drubbing on April 23 at the hands of far-right National Front leader Marine Le Pen in the first round of France's presidential election.
Her appeal has been enhanced by Islamic State carnage in Paris and Nice and the summer row about burkinis on the beaches, although pollsters doubt she can win a May 7 runoff vote against Hollande or any other survivor from a mainstream party.
As for Merkel, she has yet to confirm she wants a fourth term at parliamentary elections due in just over a year. The biggest threat to her re-election remains her decision last year to welcome a million migrants to Germany as EU borders buckled. That has already weakened support for her conservative party.
HARDBALL
Such threats to domestic survival have often spurred leaders to take potshots at Brussels -- even if only the British have taken it to the length of turning most voters against the EU entirely. But even if little has changed in Brussels since last summer, optimists might see reason to hope for more unity now.
While rows go on about how, indeed whether, EU states should share out the burden of asylum-seekers stranded in Greece and Italy, what is new is how few are arriving, at least in Greece.
Rights groups were outraged this year by hard-nosed deals with non-EU Balkan states to bar the routes north from Greece and with Turkey to stop Syrian refugees reaching Greece in the first place. But those deals did slash the numbers arriving.
It's something EU officials find hard to boast of. Many admit privately to unease at policies that, along with efforts to pay African governments to stop people setting off for Italy, sit uncomfortably with the Union's lofty humanitarian ideals.
But look again at Merkel, Hollande and Renzi on the Garibaldi, flagship of an EU mission off Libya that is part rescue operation and military deterrent against people smugglers, and a slightly different image of today's EU emerges.
EU ARMY
All three spoke of Europe getting tougher and more cohesive on security. It is the kind of language that may resonate with skeptical voters dissatisfied with Europe's struggle to thrive in a globalizing world and with the likes of Orban and other eastern leaders alarmed by Merkel's earlier open-door policy.
Relieved of the need to keep Britons from bolting, Juncker wrung howls of outrage last week from London's europhobic press when he called national borders "the worst invention ever". He also renewed his call for a "European army", which was long just a pipe dream for the Luxemburger as long as Britain had a veto.
The past few days have seen Merkel and a succession of other leaders she has met, including Orban, echo such hopes of joint military structures, indicating one area where EU integration may now forge ahead in response to the British departure.
That still leaves a host of issues dividing European leaders in the coming year: whether to be nice or nasty to Britain once it decides to open negotiations; how to shore up weaknesses in the economic cooperation that underpins the euro; how far to ease sanctions in the hope of better ties with Moscow.
Consensus will be a tall order. Merkel, standing on the deck of the Garibaldi, cited security, investment and youth opportunities as three priorities for a post-Brexit new start for a Europe united and strong. But, she warned: "Danger exists, of fragmentation, of selfishness, of retreating into ourselves."
(Editing by Larry King)

New tans, same old 'polycrisis' as Europe's summer ends


The European Union grinds back into action this week after its August break, still dazed by Britain's midsummer vote to quit the EU and facing much the same "polycrisis" as a year ago: a mass of refugees, a fragile economy, hostile Russians and, yes, those Brits, now more awkward than ever.


Monsanto logo is displayed on a screen where the stock is traded on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in New York City, U.S. on May 9, 2016. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/File Photo
NEW DELHI Major international seed companies formed an alliance on Friday to oppose a proposal by India that would force them to share their genetically modified crop technology with local players.
Executives from the India businesses of Monsanto, Bayer, Dow, Dupont Pioneer and Syngenta, which have formed the alliance, said seed prices should be set by the market rather than by regulation.
The show of solidarity comes after Monsanto, which pioneered the use of GM cotton in India, pulled an application for its next-generation product from the approvals process on concerns over the security of its intellectual property.
An executive from Bayer India said nobody would invest in research if the proposed introduction of compulsory licensing - which would force a company to share its intellectual property if the government so orders - is implemented.
India does not yet allow GM food crops, whose introduction could help reduce heavy import bills for items like edible oils that it needs to feed its huge and growing population. A domestically developed GM mustard product is, however, inching its way through the approvals process.
But political and public opposition to lab-altered food remains strong amid fears that GM crops could compromise food safety and biodiversity.
(Reporting by Krishna N. Das and Mayank Bhardwaj; Writing by Malini Menon; Editing by Douglas Busvine)

Foreign seed firms team up to oppose new India GM crop rules


Major international seed companies formed an alliance on Friday to oppose a proposal by India that would force them to share their genetically modified crop technology with local players.


LAKE SAN CRISTOBAL, COLORADO Jetpack pilot Eric Scott shot out of the water and navigated his jet pack above a remote Colorado lake before landing safely, all the while strapped to an 800-horsepower rocket.
Scott, also known as "Rocket Man," performed the 21-second-long feat at Lake San Cristobal in southern Colorado on Tuesday.
Although jet packs have existed for decades now, Scott's stunt highlights how the gadget's technology has evolved.
In 2011, Scott used a rocket pack powered by hydrogen peroxide to deliver the game ball at a University of Michigan football game in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
Scott labeled his most recent stunt as the "coolest thing" he has ever experienced.
"The best way I can describe it is to imagine the dramatic change in environment - from water, to air, to land, all while strapped to an insanely powerful machine," said Scott. "It was awesome."
(Reporting by Reuters TV)

Jetpack pilot rockets out of Colorado Lake in stunt


Jetpack pilot Eric Scott shot out of the water and navigated his jet pack above a remote Colorado lake before landing safely, all the while strapped to an 800-horsepower rocket.


A tomato plant is seen in among planter boxes on the 700 square metre (7500 square feet) rooftop of the Bon Marche, where the store's employees grow some 60 kinds of fruits and vegetables such as strawberries, zucchinis, mint and other herbs in their urban garden with a view of the capital in Paris, France, August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau
Herbs grow in planter boxes on the 700 square metre (7500 square feet) rooftop of the Bon Marche, where the store's employees grow some 60 kinds of fruits and vegetables such as strawberries, zucchinis, mint and other herbs in their urban garden with a view of the capital in Paris, France, August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau
A man waters plants in planter boxes on the 700 square metre (7500 square feet) rooftop of the Bon Marche, where the store's employees grow some 60 kinds of fruits and vegetables such as strawberries, zucchinis, mint and other herbs in their urban garden with a view of the capital in Paris, France, August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau
Planter boxes are seen on the 700 square metre (7500 square feet) rooftop of the Bon Marche, where the store's employees grow some 60 kinds of fruits and vegetables such as strawberries, zucchinis, mint and other herbs in their urban garden with a view of the capital in Paris, France, August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau
A tomato plant is seen in a planter box on the 700 square metre (7500 square feet) rooftop of the Bon Marche, where the store's employees grow some 60 kinds of fruits and vegetables such as strawberries, zucchinis, mint and other herbs in their urban garden with a view of the capital in Paris, France, August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau
Charlotte Arnoux, recruitment officer and first-time gardener, waters plants on the 700 square metre (7500 square feet) rooftop of the Bon Marche, where the store's employees grow some 60 kinds of fruits and vegetables such as strawberries, zucchinis, mint and other herbs in their urban garden with a view of the capital in Paris, France, August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau
Planter boxes are seen on the 700 square metre (7500 square feet) rooftop of the Bon Marche, where the store's employees grow some 60 kinds of fruits and vegetables such as strawberries, zucchinis, mint and other herbs in their urban garden with a view of the capital in Paris, France, August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau
A man walks between planter boxes on the 700 square metre (7500 square feet) rooftop of the Bon Marche, where the store's employees grow some 60 kinds of fruits and vegetables such as strawberries, zucchinis, mint and other herbs in their urban garden with a view of the capital in Paris, France, August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Regis Duvignau
PARIS Le Bon Marche and La Grande Epicerie, two landmark Paris luxury stores have turned their joint rooftops into an urban garden for staff who can grow their own crops in their free time.
In the past months, the LVMH-owned adjoining stores on Paris's residential left bank have built planter boxes on a 700 square meter (7,500 square feet) roof area, where the store's employees grow 60 or so kinds of fruit, vegetables and herbs such as strawberries, zucchinis, mint and lavender.
The stunning views over Paris and the chance to learn about gardening have attracted 200 of the stores' 1,500 employees, selected by lottery, and put the stores at the forefront of the city's urban gardening drive.
By 2020, the Paris city government wants to have 100 hectares (1 square km) of green roofs, sidewalks and walls, with one third dedicated to the production of fruits and vegetables.
"In the beginning we spent more time looking at the amazing view than at the planter boxes, but this is a great place to grow vegetables and meet colleagues," said Charlotte Arnoux, recruitment officer and first-time gardener.
Arnoux and seven colleagues take turns taking care of three one square meter (11 square feet) planter boxes in which they grow sorrel, basil and different varieties of tomatoes, all without the use of pesticides.
The stores' customers are not aware of the garden over their heads and cannot visit it, but the initiative has drawn visitors from other companies in France and abroad who want to set up similar rooftop gardens for staff.
"Given the impact this has on staff morale, the cost of investment was minimal," said technical director Hubert Genet.
The stores' own technical staff built the planters and converted the narrow rooftop into an urban garden.
Crops are sown in one-meter high planters which takes the back-breaking out of the gardening, but the plants will grow in just 15 cms of soil to limit the extra weight on the roof.
Nicolas Bel, founder of urban gardening pioneer Topager, said micro-drip irrigation and a pebbles-and-membrane water retention system simulate the moist, deep soil that plants need to grow.
Head of alterations at Le Bon Marche clothing department Veronique Roussin said she had made a rhubarb tart with stems grown on the roof and brought it in to share with colleagues.
"We often come up here to have breakfast or lunch together and take care of our plants," she said. "And it gives us something to talk about other than alterations".
(Reporting by Geert De Clercq; Editing by Richard Balmforth)

Office workers turn urban gardeners on Paris luxury store rooftops


Le Bon Marche and La Grande Epicerie, two landmark Paris luxury stores have turned their joint rooftops into an urban garden for staff who can grow their own crops in their free time.


Delegates protesting against the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement hold up signs during the first sesssion at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio, U.S. July 25, 2016. REUTERS/Carlos Barria
WASHINGTON The successful conclusion of the Trans Pacific Partnership trade talks remains the top legislative item for the United States, a top economic adviser to President Barack Obama said on Tuesday.
White House National Security Council adviser Christina Segal-Knowles told a news conference ahead of the Sept. 4-5 G20 summit in China that talks on a trade pact with Europe were still in progress, despite comments from France and Germany that they were in doubt.
The Asian talks are stalled in Congress and both Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump have said they would not approve the deal in its current form, if elected president in November.
Segal-Knowles said corporate tax issues would be on the G20's agenda in China, although when asked whether the European Union's tax ruling on Apple Inc's deal with Ireland would be discussed, she did not directly address the issue facing the company.
(Reporting by David Chance; Editing by Peter Cooney)

Pacific trade pact remains top issue for Obama administration


The successful conclusion of the Trans Pacific Partnership trade talks remains the top legislative item for the United States, a top economic adviser to President Barack Obama said on Tuesday.


EpiPen auto-injection epinephrine pens manufactured by Mylan NV pharmaceutical company for use by severe allergy sufferers are seen in Washington, U.S. August 24, 2016. REUTERS/Jim Bourg/File Photo
WASHINGTON Democrat Elizabeth Warren and 19 other U.S. senators voiced concern to the chief executive of Mylan NV (MYL.O) about the high cost of its EpiPen on Tuesday, calling the device used in the case of life-threatening allergies "exorbitantly expensive."
Mylan has been under fire for steadily raising the price of the device from about $100 in 2008 to about $600 currently.
In a letter to Mylan CEO Heather Bresch, the daughter of Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, the lawmakers asked the company to spell out the company's programs to provide some people with lower cost EpiPens.
Such discount programs are often an "industry tactic to keep costs high through a complex shell game," the letter said.
"Insurance companies, the government and employers still bear the burden of these excessive prices. In turn, those costs are eventually passed on to consumers in the form of higher premiums," the senators wrote.
Mylan said this week it would launch the first generic version of its allergy auto-injector EpiPen for $300, half the price of the branded product, the drugmaker's second step in less than a week to counter the backlash over the product's steep price. It also reduced the out-of-pocket costs of EpiPen for some patients last week.
EpiPen has a 94 percent market share for auto-injector devices, which jab a dose of the drug epinephrine into the thigh to counter dangerous allergic reactions such as to peanuts, other foods and bee stings.
Asked about the letter, Mylan spokeswoman Lauren Kashtan said in an email statement: "We have acknowledged receipt of letters from congressional offices and intend to respond to them."
Mylan has defended EpiPen's high price, saying it spent hundreds of millions of dollars to improve the product since acquiring it in 2007. It has also said it recoups less than half the list price for EpiPens.
In their letter, the lawmakers asked Mylan how much insurers paid for the EpiPen in 2009 and how much they pay now. They also asked how many EpiPens Mylan provided to low income, uninsured consumers and how many schools purchased EpiPens versus how many received them for free.
In addition to Warren, other signatories included Senators Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee; Barbara Boxer, a California Democrat; Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat; Jack Reed and Sheldon Whitehouse, both Democrats from Rhode Island and Sherrod Brown, an Ohio Democrat.
(Reporting by Diane Bartz; Editing by Tom Brown)

Senators press Mylan on 'exorbitantly expensive' EpiPen


Democrat Elizabeth Warren and 19 other U.S. senators voiced concern to the chief executive of Mylan NV (MYL.O) about the high cost of its EpiPen on Tuesday, calling the device used in the case of life-threatening allergies "exorbitantly expensive."


A sign hangs outside a GAP clothing retail store in Manhattan, New York, U.S., May 13, 2016. REUTERS/Mike Segar
Apparel retailer Gap Inc (GPS.N) said there was a "serious" fire at its distribution center in Fishkill, New York, on Monday.
All employees at the site were safe and an investigation was underway, Gap spokeswoman Debbie Felix said.
"While it will take time to understand the full impact and cause of the fire, we have contingency plans in place and are working across our North American network of distributions centers to continue to serve our customers," Felix said.
(Reporting by Gayathree Ganesan and Supantha Mukherjee in Bengaluru; Editing by Shounak Dasgupta)

Gap reports fire at Fishkill distribution center, employees safe


Apparel retailer Gap Inc (GPS.N) said there was a "serious" fire at its distribution center in Fishkill, New York, on Monday.


A Chevron gas station sign is pictured at one of their retain gas stations in Cardiff, California October 9, 2013. REUTERS/Mike Blake
NEW YORK A U.S. judge has dismissed a lawsuit by Chevron Corp (CVX.N) workers who said the oil company breached its fiduciary duties by putting costly and poorly performing investment options in a $19 billion employee savings plan.
In a decision on Monday, Chief Judge Phyllis Hamilton of the U.S. District Court in Oakland, California, wrote that the workers failed to raise a "plausible inference" of wrongdoing.
Hamilton gave the plaintiffs until Sept. 30 to file an amended complaint.
"The mere fact that the fund's price dropped is not sufficient to state a claim for breach of fiduciary duty," she wrote.
The judge also said it was acceptable for the plan to offer a money market fund rather than a higher-return stable value fund for plan participants seeking to preserve capital.
Neither Jerome Schlichter, whose firm represents the plaintiffs, nor a spokesman for San Ramon, California-based Chevron immediately commented.
Schlichter's St. Louis firm has pursued many lawsuits accusing companies of mismanaging 401(k) and other retirement plans. This month it also brought similar claims against a number of major universities.
The case is White et al v. Chevron Corp et al, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, No. 16-00793.
(Reporting by Ross Kerber; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn)

Chevron wins dismissal of claims of poor savings plan oversight


A U.S. judge has dismissed a lawsuit by Chevron Corp (CVX.N) workers who said the oil company breached its fiduciary duties by putting costly and poorly performing investment options in a $19 billion employee savings plan.


U.S. Federal Reserve Vice Chair Stanley Fischer addresses The Economic Club of New York in New York March 23, 2015. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid/Files
WASHINGTON The U.S. job market is nearly at full strength and the pace of interest rate increases by the Federal Reserve will depend on how well the economy is doing, Fed Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer said on Tuesday.
In an interview with Bloomberg TV, Fischer did not comment on the timing of the next Fed rate hike but said "we choose the pace on basis of data," and that U.S. "employment is very close to full employment."
Fed Chair Janet Yellen said on Friday she thought the case had grown stronger in recent months for an interest rate increase, remarks that Fischer later that day said were consistent with a view that the U.S. central bank might raise rates at its next policy meeting in September.
Asked about the dollar on Tuesday, Fischer said the currency's strength affected U.S. inflation and company profits but improvements in the labor market showed the economy had withstood this headwind.
The Fed has signaled since March it would lift rates twice this year, but investors have been skeptical.
Prices for Fed funds futures on Tuesday suggested they expect about a 20 percent chance of a hike next month and just over even odds for such a move in December <0#FF:> FFZ6. The Fed also has a policy meeting scheduled for early November.
The U.S. Labor Department's monthly employment report on Friday is expected to show the economy added 180,000 jobs in August, according to the median forecast in a Reuters poll.
(Reporting by Jason Lange; Editing by Bernadette Baum)

Fed's Fischer says U.S. job market 'very close' to full strength


The U.S. job market is nearly at full strength and the pace of interest rate increases by the Federal Reserve will depend on how well the economy is doing, Fed Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer said on Tuesday.


A general view shows a damaged street with sandbags used as barriers in Aleppo's Saif al-Dawla district, Syria March 6, 2015. REUTERS/Hosam Katan
A boy eats yogurt near a girl selling cigarettes in the rebel held al-Shaar neighborhood of Aleppo, Syria, August 30, 2016. REUTERS/Abdalrhman Ismail
WASHINGTON The U.S.-led coalition battling Islamic State, eager to avoid more clashes between Turkey and U.S.-backed Syrian fighters, is establishing communications channels to better coordinate in a "crowded battlespace," the Pentagon said on Tuesday.
"The improved coordination of armed activities in Northern Syria will seek to assure the safety of all forces," said Pentagon spokesman Matthew Allen. "We will not discuss coordination and de-confliction procedures in detail in the interest of preserving operational security."
(Reporting by Idrees Ali and Phil Stewart; Editing by James Dalgleish)

U.S. sets up 'communications channels' for crowded Syria war


The U.S.-led coalition battling Islamic State, eager to avoid more clashes between Turkey and U.S.-backed Syrian fighters, is establishing communications channels to better coordinate in a "crowded battlespace," the Pentagon said on Tuesday.


UPDATE 1-Truck carrying Takata air bag inflators explodes in U.S., killing one
Aug 29 A truck that was transporting Takata Corp air bag inflators and propellants at the centre of a global recall exploded in Texas last week, killing one woman and injuring four other people, the auto parts supplier said on Monday.

BRIEF-NeutriSci International announces dual listing on the Frankfurt stock exchange


PARIS/BRUSSELS France cast serious doubt on Tuesday on the prospects of an EU free trade deal with the United States, adding to opposition within Germany just two months after their countries' leaders reaffirmed support for an accord.
Washington and Brussels are officially committed to sealing the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) before U.S. President Barack Obama leaves office in January, but their chances of doing so are being eroded by approaching elections and Britain's vote in June to leave the European Union.
"Everything is moving. In this situation it's just not going to happen," said Peter van Ham, senior research fellow at Dutch think tank Clingendael and author of a paper on Tuesday called "TTIP is dead, long live transatlantic trade".
French Trade Minister Matthias Fekl said he would request a halt to TTIP talks at next month's EU trade ministers' meeting in Bratislava after German Economy Minister Sigmar Gabriel declared at the weekend that talks were "de facto dead".
Observers say both are responding to public mistrust of a deal that critics say would lower environmental and food standards and allow foreign multinationals to challenge government policies.
Stop TTIP campaigns have been particularly vocal in Germany and Austria, which supporters of TTIP say are among the countries most likely to benefit from increased U.S. trade.
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, of Gabriel's Social Democratic Party (SPD), urged diplomats and business chiefs on Tuesday to counter anti-globalisation sentiments that are fuelling opposition to free trade deals.
Ahead of elections in France and Germany next year, politicians are keenly aware that TTIP is not a vote winner.
The Bertelsmann Foundation poll showed only 17 percent of Germans saw TTIP as a good thing in April, down from 55 percent two years earlier.
"There may be an economic rationale, but everyone is scrapping for votes and you lose votes if you support TTIP," Van Ham said, adding that any credit from potential free trade gains would be two to three years away.
Supporters say TTIP could boost each economy by $100 billion, creating jobs at a time of economic uncertainty as growth and consumption slow in China and emerging markets. EU leaders backed TTIP talks at a summit in June.
Speaking to reporters in Washington, White House spokesman Josh Earnest admitted "significant aspects" of the deal were unresolved, but said U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman would travel to Europe in an effort to push the talks forward.
"I anticipate that when he travels to Europe in mid-September that they'll be engaged in substantive discussions and hopefully will be able to make some additional progress," Earnest said.
Three years of negotiations have failed to resolve multiple differences, however, including over public procurement and rules to protect foods from particular regions, such as Parma ham, which the EU wants, and greater access to services and for its agricultural products, as demanded by the United States.
"Practically there's no real change. It's been stuck for the better part of two years," said Hosuk Lee-Makiyama, director of Brussels-based think tank ECIPE.
EU trade chief Cecelia Malmstrom told journalists negotiations had not failed and that many EU countries had said they still backed TTIP.
They included Italy, whose trade and industry minister said it was essential for Italian exporters that the negotiations bore fruit.
Germany's Gabriel is the chairman of the SPD who share power with Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives. Merkel backs the talks and her spokesman insisted on Monday that they should continue.
Malmstrom added that it made no sense to suspend talks in September because the two sides could still make advances in regulatory cooperation, agreeing standards that are important to industries such as the auto sector, and that could be picked up by Obama's successor even a deal was not sealed this year.
"The more work we have done, the easier it is to resume," she said before a planned video conference with Froman.
Froman has said Britain's EU exit will affect TTIP because Britain consumes about a quarter of U.S. exports to the bloc.
Trade analysts say that Washington may be preparing for the end of trade talks, which typically conclude with each side holding the other responsible for failure.
President Francois Hollande told ambassadors on Tuesday that talks were "bogged down" and "unbalanced" and it was an illusion to imagine that a deal could be sealed during Obama's term.
"Very soon you end in a blame game," said Lee-Makiyama. "But trade negotiations never really die. They just go into a stock-taking phase."
(Reporting by Sophie Louet and John Irish in Paris, Crispian Balmer in Rome, Madeline Chambers, Andrea Shalal in Berlin; Writing by Andrew Callus and Philip Blenkinsop; Editing by Catherine Evans)

EU-U.S. trade deal in doubt as France urges end to talks


France cast serious doubt on Tuesday on the prospects of an EU free trade deal with the United States, adding to opposition within Germany just two months after their countries' leaders reaffirmed support for an accord.


WASHINGTON The U.S. Commerce Department said on Monday truck and bus tires from China were being dumped in the United States at below-market prices, a potential step toward the imposition of duties.
In a preliminary determination, the department said the tires were being dumped at margins ranging from 20.87 percent to 22.57 percent. In a related preliminary finding in June, it said China was also unfairly subsidizing the products.
The department said it would announce its final determination in the anti-dumping case no later than Jan. 17, 2017. It had previously said it would announce a final finding in the companion anti-subsidy case on or about Nov. 10.
Any duties would be contingent on a final determination by the U.S. International Trade Commission that the domestic industry was being harmed. An estimated $1.07 billion worth of truck and bus tires were imported from China in 2015.
(Reporting by Eric Beech; Editing by Mohammad Zargham)

U.S. moves toward anti-dumping duties on truck and bus tires from China


The U.S. Commerce Department said on Monday truck and bus tires from China were being dumped in the United States at below-market prices, a potential step toward the imposition of duties.


Policemen sneak a look inside the Holey Artisan Bakery and the O'Kitchen Restaurant as others inspect the site after gunmen attacked, in Dhaka, Bangladesh, July 3, 2016. REUTERS/Adnan Abidi/File Photo
DHAKA Bangladesh security forces killed four militants on Saturday, including the alleged mastermind of an attack on a cafe in Dhaka last month in which 22 people, mostly foreigners, were killed, the head of Dhaka's counter-terrorism police unit told Reuters.
The militants were cornered in an early morning raid on their hideout in Naraynganj, on the outskirts of the capital, and were killed after refusing to surrender, Additional Commissioner of Police Monirul Islam said.
Bangladesh-born Canadian citizen Tamim Ahmed Chowdhury, the alleged mastermind of the attack on the cafe, was among those killed.
Islamic State had claimed responsibility for the cafe attack and, while the government has dismissed the claim, security experts say the scale and sophistication of the assault suggested links to trans-national networks.
Analysts say Islamic State in April identified Chowdhury as its national commander.
The suspected Islamist militants singled out non-Muslims and foreigner hostages in the July 1 evening attack, killing Italians, Japanese, an American and an Indian before security forces stormed the eatery to end the 12-hour siege that has weighed on Bangladesh's multi-billion dollar garments industry.
The government says the July 1 attack -- and another on July 26 in which police killed nine militants believed to be plotting a similar assault-- were the work of domestic militants.
(Reporting by Serajul Quadir; writing by Krishna N. Das; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore)

Bangladesh security forces kill 'mastermind' of Dhaka cafe attack


Bangladesh security forces killed four militants on Saturday, including the alleged mastermind of an attack on a cafe in Dhaka last month in which 22 people, mostly foreigners, were killed, the head of Dhaka's counter-terrorism police unit told Reuters.


(Editor's note: This story contains language that may offend some readers in paragraph five)
By Scott Malone
BOSTON Combative Maine Governor Paul LePage said on Tuesday he would consider resigning as he faces a wave of criticism from both fellow Republicans and rival Democrats after leaving a lawmaker a profanity-filled voicemail last week.
LePage's latest outburst came after a newspaper reporter told the two-term, Tea Party-backed governor that state Representative Drew Gattine had described the governor as racist for focusing on black people as bearing primary responsibility for the drug trade in the state.
"I'm looking at all options," LePage said in a weekly interview on WVOM-FM radio when asked if he would finish his term.
"I'm not going to say that I'm not going to finish it, I'm not saying that I am going to finish it. What I'm going to do right now is I'm taking one step at a time. I want to meet with Mr. Gattine and then I want to meet with my team at my office and we're going to look at what the proper steps are to move the state forward."
In last week's voicemail, LePage called Gattine a "little son-of-a-bitch, socialist cocksucker" and encouraged him to share the message publicly "because I am after you."
LePage, 67, said he had lost his temper when he was told that Gattine had described his views as racist. He told reporters he would like to engage in a duel with Gattine, a remark he later described as metaphoric.
"I just want to apologize to the Maine people, to Gattine's family and most of all to my family," LePage said during the 15-minute interview. "And we will take action."
LePage had scheduled a Wednesday town hall meeting in the Portland suburb of Westbrook, part of Gattine's district, but the event was canceled on Tuesday after officials at the youth center selected to host it voted against having the event.
Some Democratic lawmakers have called for a special session of the legislature to censure LePage, who earlier this year fought off an impeachment effort. State Senate President Michael Thibodeau and other Republican legislative leaders late Tuesday convened a closed-door meeting with LePage to discuss his future.
(Reporting by Scott Malone; Editing by Bill Trott)

Maine governor says may not finish term amid racism flap


Combative Maine Governor Paul LePage said on Tuesday he would consider resigning as he faces a wave of criticism from both fellow Republicans and rival Democrats after leaving a lawmaker a profanity-filled voicemail last week.


WASHINGTON The U.S. State Department said on Tuesday that authorities were assessing the validity of a video released by Afghan militants that depicts U.S. hostage Caitlan Coleman and her Canadian husband, Joshua Boyle, who were seized four years ago.
State Department spokesman John Kirby said the United States was concerned about the welfare of the couple and their family and "continue to urge for their immediate release on humanitarian grounds."
Coleman and Boyle vanished a few days after arriving in Afghanistan while on a backpacking trip near the Pakistani border in 2012. Coleman, who was pregnant at the time, has given birth to two boys while in captivity, ABC News reported earlier this year, citing her parents.
The Daily Beast online news organization said on Tuesday it had obtained the new video, which depicted Coleman saying her captors were threatening to kill the family if Taliban prisoners were executed in Afghan jails. Coleman pleaded for U.S. intervention, the newspaper said.
The Daily Beast said the Haqqani network, a Taliban affiliate operating in the Pakistan-Afghanistan border region, was holding the family captive and made the video and posted it online.
Kirby said the United States was "regularly engaged with the governments of both Afghanistan and Pakistan at the highest levels to emphasize our commitment to seeing our citizens return safely to their families."
(Reporting by David Alexander; Editing by Peter Cooney)

U.S. aware of Afghan hostage video, assessing it: State Dept.


The U.S. State Department said on Tuesday that authorities were assessing the validity of a video released by Afghan militants that depicts U.S. hostage Caitlan Coleman and her Canadian husband, Joshua Boyle, who were seized four years ago.


The marquee sign at Caesars Palace hotel is seen on the strip in Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S. February 16, 2011. REUTERS/Steve Marcus/File Photo
CHICAGO A federal judge on Tuesday gave Caesars Entertainment Corp (CZR.O) a five-week shield from $13 billion in lawsuits, capping a week of frantic court hearings as the casino group struggles to salvage a high-stakes debt-cutting plan for its bankrupt subsidiary.
Judge Robert Gettleman said at an emergency court hearing in Chicago that he will decide on Oct. 5 whether he should overturn a U.S. Bankruptcy Court ruling from Friday that cleared the way for bondholders to sue Caesars.
"It's an uphill appeal," Gettleman said. Bondholders are pressing to have their cases decided in New York and Delaware by early next year.
In January, Caesars will seek to confirm a plan of reorganization that would slash the $18 billion of debt held at its bankrupt Caesars Entertainment Operating Co Inc, subsidiary. It is desperate to keep bondholders at bay until then.
Shares of Caesars plummeted on Monday after a federal judge in Chicago ruled the company must face lawsuits that lawyers on Tuesday said were worth more than $13 billion. Previously, they had said those cases were worth $11.4 billion, but the amount continues to inflate with interest.
Gettleman's ruling by will put on hold a summary judgment hearing in New York federal court originally scheduled for Tuesday. Caesars had warned a ruling in favor of bondholders in that case could force it into bankruptcy.
Shares of Nevada-based Caesars rose less than 1 percent in Nasdaq trading on Tuesday, to $6.38.
The lawsuits were brought by investors who allege that Caesars reneged on guarantees of bonds issued by its subsidiary, known as CEOC, which filed for Chapter 11 protection in January 2015.
The bondholders have also alleged that Caesars stripped CEOC of its best hotels and casinos, such as the Linq Hotel & Casino complex in Las Vegas, leaving the subsidiary unable to pay its debts.
Caesars, which is controlled by Apollo Global Management (APO.N) and TPG Capital Management [TPG.UL], has denied those allegations.
CEOC has argued its parent should be shielded from litigation because Caesars has committed to contributing billions of dollars to CEOC's reorganization plan.
(Writing by Tom Hals in Wilmington, Delaware; Editing by Meredith Mazzilli and Dan Grebler)

Caesars wins lawsuit shield to pursue 'uphill' appeal


A federal judge on Tuesday gave Caesars Entertainment Corp (CZR.O) a five-week shield from $13 billion in lawsuits, capping a week of frantic court hearings as the casino group struggles to salvage a high-stakes debt-cutting plan for its bankrupt subsidiary.


Thousands of tables are seen inside a hall at Asia-World Expo near Hong Kong Airport in Hong Kong, China October 2, 2015, one day before SAT examinations to be taken place. REUTERS/Bobby Yip
WASHINGTON Federal agents searched the home of a former employee-turned-outspoken critic of the College Board, the standardized testing giant, as part of an investigation into the breach of hundreds of questions from the SAT college entrance exam.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation seized computers and other material on Friday from Manuel Alfaro, who left his job as executive director of assessment design and development at the College Board in February 2015. The FBI is investigating alleged computer intrusion and theft against an unidentified “victim corporation” involving “confidential or proprietary information,” including tests, test forms and internal emails, according to a search warrant issued in the case.
Alfaro had contacted officials of seven state governments in recent months, accusing the College Board of making false claims about its tests when bidding for public contracts with the states. The College Board, he alleged, misled the states about the process it used to create questions for the new version of the SAT, resulting in an inferior exam. He also aired those allegations publicly, largely through postings on his LinkedIn account.
Lawyers for Alfaro could not be reached for comment. An FBI official confirmed that agents were present at Alfaro’s home in Maryland but declined to elaborate.
College Board spokesman Zach Goldberg said the leak of test questions constituted a crime. “We are pleased that this crime is being pursued aggressively,” he said. He dismissed Alfaro’s criticisms of the SAT test-making process as “patently false.”
The FBI raid comes after Reuters reported earlier this month (reut.rs/2b3gtyE) that the news agency had obtained about 400 unpublished questions from the newly redesigned SAT exam, which debuted in March. Some experts said the leak constituted one of the most serious breaches of security ever to come to light in the standardized testing industry.
Reuters reported previously that the SAT (reut.rs/1RL4ZSI) and its rival, the ACT, (reut.rs/2akY3uf) are being systematically gamed by test-prep operators in Asia. The SAT has proved particularly vulnerable to cheating because of its practice of reusing test questions. Test-preparation companies obtain previously administered questions that are scheduled for reuse and feed those questions to students, who can score higher by practicing on the exam items before the test.
BROADSIDES ON LINKEDIN
The SAT and ACT are taken by millions of students a year and are major criteria used by U.S. colleges in selecting applicants. The cheating rings and leaks, testing experts say, call into question the fairness and validity of the standardized exams.
Alfaro, who oversaw the development of parts of the new SAT, jolted the staid world of standardized testing in May with a barrage of criticism of the College Board.
In a series of posts on LinkedIn and Twitter, he charged the New York-based not-for-profit with skipping a crucial step in the test development process, which he says resulted in a lower-quality exam. He also alleged in a June 1 post that the shortcut may fail to comply with federal guidance on peer review for state testing programs.
Alfaro wrote to seven states that have granted public contracts to the College Board to use the SAT as an official tool for assessing high school students. In a May 7 email to the education chiefs for those states, Alfaro said that while he was a College Board employee, he "became aware of patterns of concealment, fabrication, and deception used by the College Board to misrepresent the SAT and PSAT.” He alleged that the College Board didn’t follow the process to develop the SAT and PSAT that it publicly says it uses.
The PSAT is a test primarily aimed at high school sophomores and juniors used as practice for the SAT and to screen applicants for tens of millions of dollars awarded by the National Merit Scholarship Corporation.
Alfaro emailed his complaints to the states of Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, Michigan and New Hampshire.
A spokesman for the Michigan Department of Education, Bill DiSessa, said the state “checked with the College Board” and decided not to look into Alfaro’s claims. Jeremy Meyer of the Colorado Department of Education said the state discussed Alfaro’s email with the College Board and was “satisfied with the response we received.”
Kelly Donnelly, spokesperson for the Connecticut State Department of Education, said the state considered Alfaro’s email to be “replete with hyperbole, but scant on actual facts. We did not take further action.” Donnelly said the state hadn’t reviewed Alfaro’s detailed posts on LinkedIn.
A New Hampshire official said the state had no immediate comment. Officials in Delaware, Illinois and Maine didn’t respond to requests for comment.
ALLEGATIONS OF SHORTCUTS
A member of Congress, meanwhile, has asked federal regulators to look into Alfaro's allegations. U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski, a Democrat from Maryland, has "been in touch with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau," according to a July 28 letter she wrote to Alfaro.
Asked Friday about Alfaro’s criticisms of the new exam, College Board spokesman Goldberg said: “Mr. Alfaro does not speak with any authority about our tests. With the new SAT, we have made an unprecedented commitment to transparency and have published our test specifications, which include the test development process. Any claims that counter the published information are patently false.”
The document cited by Goldberg contains a nine-step process for developing the new SAT and ensuring that exams contain fair and valid questions. It’s the fourth of those steps that Alfaro says the College Board routinely skipped, according to his posts on LinkedIn. That step, known as “external content & fairness reviews prior to pretesting,” relates to the checks that new questions are supposed to undergo before they are included on an actual test.
According to the College Board document, newly written SAT questions are scrutinized by external, independent reviewers, who look for mistakes and potential bias. After that initial review, the questions are field tested on actual test-takers in an unscored section of a regular SAT exam.
The field testing helps determine whether questions are statistically valid and whether they should be included on a future, scored portion of the exam. After the field test, questions once again go through external reviews before they’re put on a live, scored section of the test.
The external reviews before field testing didn’t always happen, Alfaro alleged.
“The Content Advisory Committee reviewed the items for the first time, not before they were pretested, but after the items were assembled into operational SAT forms,” he wrote in a May 27 post on LinkedIn. In a June 9 post, he added: "We first implemented Step 4 in August of 2014, after thousands of items had already been developed and pretested without this crucial step."
An internal document from 2014 describes what the College Board called the “rigorous process of vetting new test items that could potentially become part of the Math Test in the redesigned SAT.” The document says changing items after pretesting was “rare.”
Alfaro said such changes were actually common. “I’m not talking about adding a missing comma here, fixing a typo there,” he wrote in a May 20 post. “Sometimes the revised items,” or questions, “are completely different than the version that was pretested.”
An outside attorney for the College Board wrote to Alfaro on May 10, three days after Alfaro contacted the states with his allegations, and requested a meeting. Alfaro declined to see the attorney. But he said he would be open to explaining his concerns to the organization’s Board of Trustees and to lawyers for the seven states, according to an email he sent the states. No such sessions took place.
Inside the organization, the College Board’s top attorney has called Alfaro a “disgruntled former employee” and told staff to avoid him.
“I am writing to alert you that the College Board is dealing with a disgruntled former employee who has expressed anger at the College Board in a very public way,” College Board general counsel Peter Schwartz wrote in an email to staff. “Please be aware that he has no reason to visit our offices, and in the event that he does, he should not be allowed in.”
Reached by phone on Friday, Schwartz declined to comment.
(Edited by Michael Williams)

Exclusive: FBI raids home of ex-College Board official in probe of SAT leak


Federal agents searched the home of a former employee-turned-outspoken critic of the College Board, the standardized testing giant, as part of an investigation into the breach of hundreds of questions from the SAT college entrance exam.


A worker sprays insecticide along the perimeter of a construction site, at an area where locally transmitted Zika cases were discovered in Singapore August 30, 2016. REUTERS/Edgar Su
A worker mists the common area of a public housing estate with insecticide, near the vicinity where locally transmitted Zika cases were discovered in Singapore August 30, 2016. REUTERS/Edgar Su
A worker mists with insecticide the perimeter of a construction site, at an area where locally transmitted Zika cases were discovered in Singapore August 30, 2016. REUTERS/Edgar Su
A worker sprays insecticide along the common areas of a public housing estate at an area where locally transmitted Zika cases were discovered in Singapore August 30, 2016. REUTERS/Edgar Su
SINGAPORE Australia, Taiwan and South Korea advised pregnant women and those attempting to get pregnant to avoid travel to Singapore after an outbreak of the Zika virus infected more than 50 people in the city-state.
The outbreak and the warnings come as a potential blow to tourism in one of the world's busiest travel hubs, which is already struggling to recover from a slump amid tepid global growth.
Singapore reported its first case of locally-transmitted Zika at the weekend, and the number of reported infections of the mosquito-borne virus has since jumped to 56. At least three dozen of those have since made a full recovery.
The Zika virus was detected in Brazil last year and has since spread across the Americas. It poses a risk to pregnant women because it can cause severe birth defects. It has been linked in Brazil to more than 1,800 cases of microcephaly, a rare birth defect where babies are born with abnormally small heads and brains.
The 56 confirmed cases in Singapore include only one woman.
Taiwan, Australia and South Korea advised pregnant women and those planning pregnancy to postpone trips to Singapore. Those returning from the country should avoid pregnancy for two months. South Korean travelers will receive text messages with the warning when they arrive in Singapore.
Malaysia and Indonesia, Singapore's closest neighbors, have stepped up protective measures following the outbreak, introducing thermal scanners at airports and border checkpoints.
Singapore's Tourism Board said it was monitoring developments, adding the city state remained a "safe travel destination", and it was premature to consider any impact.
More than 55 million people pass through Singapore's Changi airport every year. In the first half of this year, tourism arrivals reached almost 8.2 million, compared with around 7.3 million in the same period of last year.
Online retailer Lazada Singapore said on Tuesday it has seen sales of mosquito repellent and other deterrent products rise fivefold over the past three days compared to a week ago.
FOREIGN WORKERS
Authorities continued to inspect thousands of homes in seven parts of Singapore, including five foreign worker dormitories, on Tuesday. Officials sprayed insecticide and removed potential mosquito breeding habitats such as stagnant water and moist dirt from drains.
The majority of those infected with Zika in Singapore were foreign workers, but the government has not disclosed their nationalities. The High Commission of Bangladesh, which represents the largest community of foreign workers, said none of the workers were Bangladeshis.
The Chinese and Myanmar embassies in Singapore said they had not been notified by Singapore whether their citizens were among those infected. The Thai embassy did not immediately return a call seeking comment.
Foreign workers in Singapore, employed mostly in the construction and marine industries, can earn as little as S$2 ($1.47) an hour, often work 12-14 hours a day and take few days off. They are unlikely to travel often.
The GuocoLand construction site, where the infected workers were found, remained closed on Tuesday morning, according to a Reuters photographer at the scene. It was ordered on Sunday to halt work and rectify the conditions that allowed mosquitoes to breed.
Regional health experts said the Zika virus is likely to be significantly under-reported across tropical Southeast Asia as local health authorities fail to conduct adequate screening.
(Reporting by Marius Zaharia, with additional reporting by Edgar Su, Aradhana Aravindan, Masayuki Kitano and Mark Tay in Singapore and Jeong Eun Lee in Seoul; Editing by Jane Wardell and Ian Geoghegan)

Australia, Taiwan, South Korea issue travel warnings for Singapore


Australia, Taiwan and South Korea advised pregnant women and those attempting to get pregnant to avoid travel to Singapore after an outbreak of the Zika virus infected more than 50 people in the city-state.


Minnesota's governor on Friday ordered the broadest restrictions yet in a U.S. state on the use of agricultural pesticides that have been blamed for hurting bees, fueling concerns that farmers there will not be able to protect crops from insects.
Gov. Mark Dayton issued an executive order that requires farmers to verify that they face "an imminent threat of significant crop loss" before using the chemicals, called neonicotinoids.
Details of how farmers would prove their need have not yet been determined.
Minnesota, the country's third-largest soybean producer, carried out a special review of neonicotinoids that prompted the new limits, the first U.S. state to do so.
Honey bees have been in serious decline in the United States for three decades, threatening billions of dollars in crops. In recent years, their death rate has become economically unsustainable, according to the U.S. government.
A survey of more than 20,000 honey beekeepers conducted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and released in May showed there were 2.59 million or 8 percent fewer honey bee colonies on January 1, 2016 than the 2.82 million a year earlier for beekeeper operations with five or more colonies.
Honey bees pollinate plants that produce about a quarter of the food consumed by Americans.
"Minnesota just became the national leader in protecting pollinators," said Lex Horan, an organizer for Pesticide Action Network, a U.S. activist group.
EU LED THE WAY
Restrictions on neonicotinoids come two years after the European Union limited use of the chemicals, made and sold by companies including Bayer CropScience and Syngenta, after research pointed to the risks for bees.
Neonicotinoids are used worldwide in a range of crops and have been shown in lab-based studies to be harmful to certain species of bee, notably commercial honeybees and bumblebees.
The chemicals can be sprayed on crops to fight insects, but it is more common for U.S. farmers to plant seeds treated with neonicotinoids to keep pests, such as aphids, off crops.
State officials said they want Minnesota lawmakers to grant them the authority to regulate the sale and use of such seeds, a power that now lies with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
Removing the pesticides would leave farmers more dependent on a smaller number of chemicals to control bugs, said Seth Naeve, an extension soybean agronomist for the University of Minnesota, thereby making it more likely that pests would develop resistance to those chemicals.
"We're concerned about losing tools and a lack of flexibility to address issues," said David Kee, director of research for Minnesota Soybean Growers Association.
Farmers said they hoped other U.S. states would not follow Minnesota's lead.
Paul Schlegel, director of environment and energy policy for the American Farm Bureau Federation, said the governor was "restricting the ability of farmers to use all the tools the EPA has said they can use."
"I don't think that we're aware of any other state that's going to start taking away tools from farmers," Schlegel said.
(Reporting by Tom Polansek; Editing by Toni Reinhold)

Minnesota sets broadest U.S. limits on chemicals blamed for bee declines


Minnesota's governor on Friday ordered the broadest restrictions yet in a U.S. state on the use of agricultural pesticides that have been blamed for hurting bees, fueling concerns that farmers there will not be able to protect crops from insects.


Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke sits in the courtroom during a hearing in his shooting case of Laquan McDonald at the Leighton Criminal Court Building in Chicago, Illinois March 23, 2016. REUTERS/Nancy Stone/Chicago Tribune/Pool File Photo
Black Lives Matter protesters chant slogans in Grand Central Terminal as they protest the 2014 death of Laquan McDonald from Chicago in the Manhattan borough of New York December 14, 2015. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri
CHICAGO The chief of Chicago's police department recommended on Tuesday that five officers be fired over their role in the 2014 shooting death of an black teenager, an incident that heaped national scrutiny on the nation's second largest police force.
Superintendent Eddie Johnson recommended to the Chicago Police Board that officer Jason Van Dyke who shot Laquan McDonald 16 times, be fired, along with another four officers.
The shooting made national headlines and sparked wide protests after the release of a dashboard video more than a year after the incident. The video shows the officer continued to fire after McDonald, 17, had fallen to the ground.
The Chicago Police Department has been under federal investigation over officers' use of lethal force.
The recommendation marks the start of formal proceedings in the officers' firing. The Police Board, whose nine members are appointed by Mayor Rahm Emanuel, must consider Johnson's recommendation and then make the decision on firing the officers.
Van Dkye is facing charges of first-degree murder and is on unpaid leave. He has pleaded not guilty.
"Today, the Superintendent filed with the Police Board charges against five members of the Police Department alleging multiple rule violations stemming from the police involved fatal shooting of Laquan McDonald," a statement from the Police Board said.
"The Superintendent has recommended that each of the five officers be discharged from the Chicago Police Department."
The Police Board, whose nine members are appointed by Mayor Rahm Emanuel, must consider Johnson's recommendation and then make the decision on firing the officers.
"The public is reminded that the filing of charges is not evidence of guilt," the statement added.
Sergeant Stephen Franko, officers Janet Mondragon, Daphne Sebastian and Ricardo Viramontes are named along with Van Dyke. According to charges released on Tuesday, all allegedly made false or inaccurate statements about the circumstances surrounding McDonald's death.
An initial status hearing for the cases is scheduled for Sept. 19.
The police reports on the October 2014 shooting conflicted with video footage of the incident, sparking accusations that Van Dyke's fellow officers were trying to cover up an unjustified shooting.
Emanuel fired police Superintendent Garry McCarthy in the wake of the video release, and thousands of protesters took to the streets of Chicago over McDonald's death and the subsequent handling of the case.
Initially Johnson recommended that 10 officers be terminated, though that number dropped to seven because some officers retired, among other reasons, the Chicago Tribune reported. It was unclear why that number dropped to five officers.
(Reporting by Timothy Mclaughlin in Chicago; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)

Five Chicago officers face firing over slaying of black teen


The chief of Chicago's police department recommended on Tuesday that five officers be fired over their role in the 2014 shooting death of an black teenager, an incident that heaped national scrutiny on the nation's second largest police force.


Jurist Janaina Paschoal (C), co-author of the complaint that originated the impeachment process against suspended president Dilma Rousseff, gestures during the final session of debate and voting on Rousseff's impeachment trial in Brasilia, Brazil August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino
Jurist Janaina Paschoal (C), co-author of the complaint that originated the impeachment process against suspended president Dilma Rousseff, speaks with senators during the final session of debate and voting on Rousseff's impeachment trial in Brasilia, Brazil August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino
Brazil's Senator Aecio Neves (L) speaks with Suspended Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff's attorney in the impeachment proceedings, Jose Eduardo Cardozo (R) during the final session of debate and voting on suspended President Dilma Rousseff's impeachment trial in Brasilia, Brazil August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino
Jurist Janaina Paschoal (C), co-author of the complaint that originated the impeachment process against suspended president Dilma Rousseff, speaks with senators during the final session of debate and voting on Rousseff's impeachment trial in Brasilia, Brazil August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino
Jurist Janaina Paschoal, co-author of the complaint that originated the impeachment process against suspended president Dilma Rousseff, gestures during the final session of debate and voting on Rousseff's impeachment trial in Brasilia, Brazil August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino
Brazil's Senate President Renan Calheiros (3rd L) gestures to Senator Gleisi Hoffmann during the final session of debate and voting on suspended President Dilma Rousseff's impeachment trial in Brasilia, Brazil August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino
Brazil's Senate President Renan Calheiros looks on during the final session of debate and voting on suspended President Dilma Rousseff's impeachment trial in Brasilia, Brazil, August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino
Brazil's Senate President Renan Calheiros (top R) speaks with senators during the final session of debate and voting on suspended President Dilma Rousseff's impeachment trial in Brasilia, Brazil August 26, 2016. REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino
BRASILIA The impeachment trial of suspended Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff in the Senate descended into a shouting match between her political supporters and opponents during its second day on Friday, forcing a halt in proceedings.
Supreme Court Chief Justice Ricardo Lewandowski was obliged to intervene and suspend the session after Senate President Renan Calheiros was unable to stop the arguments, in a sign that the build up to a final vote expected on Wednesday morning will be fraught with tensions.
Lewandowski adjourned early for lunch and will restart the session at 1 p.m. local (1600 GMT)
(Reporting by Anthony Boadle; Editing by Daniel Flynn)

Brazil chief justice suspends Rousseff trial amid senators' row


The impeachment trial of suspended Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff in the Senate descended into a shouting match between her political supporters and opponents during its second day on Friday, forcing a halt in proceedings.


PRESS DIGEST- British Business - Aug 31
The following are the top stories on the business pages of British newspapers. Reuters has not verified these stories and does not vouch for their accuracy.

BRIEF-Viacom Director Dauman sold 749,281 of co's class B common stock - SEC filing


NEW YORK It's empty now, but in four days New York's Madison Square Garden will be filled with some of the world's biggest music stars for the annual MTV Video Music Awards show.
Beyonce leads the nominations with a career-high 11 nods, Adele has notched seven and Rihanna has multiple nods for her collaborations with DJ Calvin Harris on "This is What You Came For," and with Drake on "Work."
One of the most anticipated moments on Sunday will be Rihanna receiving the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award - the equivalent of a lifetime achievement award - and performing live on stage .
"I think everyone wants to tune in for Rihanna ... What she's doing with the Video Vanguard moment is like no one has ever done," executive producer Jesse Ignjatovic said on Thursday.
Other confirmed performers include Britney Spears, Ariana Grande, Nicki Minaj and Nick Jonas.
The always unpredictable rapper Kanye West will attend and be seated in the front row with his reality star wife, Kim Kardashian. Producers will not say whether he will perform.
"We were happy to have him coming and I'm excited to hear what he's going to do," Ignjatovic said.
Other celebrity presenters include U.S. Olympic champion swimmer Michael Phelps and the Rio gold medal-winning women's gymnastics team.
The show will air live on MTV on Aug. 28.
(Reporting by Reuters Television; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)

Rihanna, Ariana Grande set to perform at MTV Video Music awards


It's empty now, but in four days New York's Madison Square Garden will be filled with some of the world's biggest music stars for the annual MTV Video Music Awards show.


Millennium Award recipient Britney Spears performs a medley of songs at the 2016 Billboard Awards in Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S., May 22, 2016. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni/File Photo
NEW YORK Britney Spears is hitting up pop culture one more time, releasing a new album, singing retro karaoke hits and about to take the MTV Video Music Awards (VMA) stage for the first time since 2007.
Spears, 34, who became a teen pop phenomenon with breathy, sexually-charged hits like "Toxic" and "Oops!.. I Did it Again," released new album "Glory" on Friday ahead of a much anticipated return to the VMA show on Sunday in New York.
She also became the latest superstar to ride, sing and chat with U.S. talk show host James Corden for his viral "Carpool Karaoke" segment, where both donned the schoolgirl uniforms that shot her to fame as a 16-year old in the 1998 music video for "... Baby One More Time."
Spears dominated pop music before undergoing a personal and career meltdown in 2006-2007 that included shaving her signature blonde locks, losing custody of her two children and being placed under a court-ordered conservatorship.
She made a comeback in late 2008 and for the past three years has been performing a nightly show in Las Vegas. But the new album and the anticipation surrounding her VMA performance have thrust her back in the national spotlight.
Rolling Stone's Rob Sheffield said "Glory" was "another fantastic comeback" for Spears, in which she "goes back to the fizzy electro-stomp mode she does best."
"Glory" was top of the iTunes charts in more than 40 nations on Friday, including Saudi Arabia, Chile and Russia.
Billboard's Jennifer Keishin Armstrong said that with the single and music video for "Make Me", Spear had "reclaimed her standout talent, a distinctive dance style that combines cheerleader precision with slinky bits of burlesque."
Spears will perform "Make Me," with rapper G-Eazy, at the live VMA show, her first appearance there since her halting performance of "Gimme More" in 2007 when her career hit a low.
"She has had such a huge impact on this show throughout her career, so for us to have her back is a no-brainer," said Garrett English, executive producer of the VMA show.
"She embodies what the VMAs is to a large extent and she has had some of the biggest moments on this stage, and I think Sunday night will be the same," English added.
Spears is also to be the subject of a 2017 TV biopic for the Lifetime cable channel that will chart her rise to fame along with her stumbles, and her romances with Justin Timberlake and ex-husbands Jason Alexander and Kevin Federline.
(Reporting by Jill Serjeant; Editing by Alistair Bell)

Oops! Britney Spears does it again in latest pop culture comeback


Britney Spears is hitting up pop culture one more time, releasing a new album, singing retro karaoke hits and about to take the MTV Video Music Awards (VMA) stage for the first time since 2007.


UPDATE 4-EU hits Apple with 13 billion euro Irish tax demand
BRUSSELS/DUBLIN, Aug 30 The European Commission ordered Apple Inc. to pay Ireland unpaid taxes of up to 13 billion euros ($14.5 billion) on Tuesday as it ruled the firm had received illegal state aid.

BRIEF-Potash Corp, Agrium planning to merge - Bloomberg


Aug 30 (Reuters) -* Potash Corp, Agrium Inc planning to merge; combinationcould be announced as soon as next week - Bloomberg, citingsourcesSourc


Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is seen on stage during a town hall at Facebook's headquarters in Menlo Park, California September 27, 2015. Picture taken February 27, 2015. REUTERS/Stephen Lam/File Photo
ROME Facebook Inc. will not become a media company, its founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on Monday, telling students the firm would remain a technology platform.
An increasing number of users are turning to social media networks, such as Facebook (FB.O) and Twitter (TWTR.N), to find their news, but Zuckerberg said his firm had no ambitions to become a content provider.
"No, we are a tech company, not a media company," said Zuckerberg, after a young Italian asked him whether Facebook intended to become a news editor.
While acknowledging the role Facebook has in supplying users with news through their connections and stressing the advantages of obtaining information from different parts of the world, Zuckerberg said Facebook was "a technology company, we build the tools, we do not produce any content".
"The world needs news companies, but also technology platforms, like what we do, and we take our role in this very seriously," he said, speaking from Rome's Luiss university.
Earlier on Monday, Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan had a private audience with Pope Francis. It was the latest in a string of meetings the pontiff has held with Silicon Valley leaders, including Apple (AAPL.O) CEO Tim Cook and Alphabet's (GOOGL.O) boss Eric Schmidt.
Zuckerberg said he gave the Argentine pontiff a model of Aquila, Facebook's lightweight solar-powered drone aimed at beaming lasers to extend internet access to places that have yet to be connected.
"We ... discussed the importance of connecting people, especially in parts of the world without internet access," Zuckerberg posted on his personal Facebook profile after the meeting.
Zuckerberg also on Monday met Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, who is pushing to upgrade Italy's limited internet infrastructure.
(Reporting by Giulia Segreti; Editing by Ruth Pitchford)

Facebook CEO says group will not become a media company


Facebook Inc. will not become a media company, its founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on Monday, telling students the firm would remain a technology platform.


In this still image from video Olympic gold medallist swimmer Ryan Lochte of the U.S. gives an interview to Globo TV at their studios in New York City, August 20, 2016. Courtesy Globo TV via REUTERS
NEW YORK Disgraced Olympic swimmer Ryan Lochte is joining the "Dancing With the Stars" cast, ABC television announced on Tuesday, as the gold medalist said he thought reaction to his tale about being held up at a Rio de Janeiro gas station had been blown out of proportion.
Lochte, 32, was dropped by four of his major sponsors after admitting he "overexaggerated" a tale about being robbed and held at gunpoint with three other swimmers after a party during the Rio Olympics. Brazilian authorities say the group destroyed a bathroom and urinated in public, and have recommended that Lochte be charged with falsely reporting a crime.
The swimmer, who was also vilified in the media over the incident, did not say whether he planned to return to Brazil to face the charges.
"I think it’s everyone blowing this way out of proportion. I think that’s what happened," Lochte told ABC television's "Good Morning America" on Tuesday, when asked whether he had embarrassed the United States with his actions.
"Like I said, I did lie about that one part," said Lochte, referring to his claim that a gun was held to his head. "I take full responsibility. I’m human. I made a mistake. A very big mistake."
"Everyone has got to be sick and tired about hearing about this. I just want to move forward," added Lochte, his silver-dyed hair now returned to a more natural brown.
The 12-time Olympic medalist said his appearance on the 23rd season of "Dancing With the Stars," was under discussion before he went to the Rio games. After the London Olympics in 2012 he was given his own, short-lived, TV reality show "What Would Ryan Lochte Do?"
Other "Dancing With the Stars" contestants in the season starting on Sept. 12 will include 16 year-old U.S. Olympic gymnast Laurie Hernandez, former Texas governor Rick Perry, and rapper Vanilla Ice.
"Dancing With the Stars," in which celebrities are paired with professional ballroom dancers and voted off by the public, has been a popular venue for those seeking a comeback or trying to change their public image. Past contestants have included Bristol Palin, daughter of the 2008 Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, singer Donny Osmond, and retired Olympic speed skater Apolo Ohno.
(Reporting by Jill Serjeant; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)

Ryan Lochte to dance with stars, says Rio scandal overblown


Disgraced Olympic swimmer Ryan Lochte is joining the "Dancing With the Stars" cast, ABC television announced on Tuesday, as the gold medalist said he thought reaction to his tale about being held up at a Rio de Janeiro gas station had been blown out of proportion.


SINGAPORE Oil prices fell early on Monday as output from Iraq rose and as Iran said it would only cooperate in upcoming producer talks to freeze output if fellow exporters recognized its right to fully regain market share.
International Brent crude oil futures LCOc1 were trading at $49.54 per barrel at 0043 GMT (8.43 p.m. ET), down 38 cents from their previous close.
U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were down 43 cents at $47.21 a barrel.
Traders said the price falls were a result of climbing output from the Middle East, where oil exports from Iraq's southern ports have averaged 3.205 million barrels per day (bpd) in August, exceeding the average level seen in July, according to two officials from state-run South Oil Company said. Exports in July averaged 3.202 million bpd.
Also, Iran said late last week that it would only cooperate in upcoming producer talks in September if other exporters recognized Tehran's right to regain market share lost during international sanctions that were only lifted in January.
Analysts said that disagreements within the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), and especially its key members Saudi Arabia and Iran, meant few expected a significant impact on global output from the upcoming talks.
"The market is increasingly likely to discount the outcome of the event, given, even in the instance of a freeze being agreed, compliance will be an issue," Barclays said.
Despite this, the British bank said that it saw "incoming oil market data (both demand and supply) as a source for price strength in Q4".
(Reporting by Henning Gloystein; Editing by Joseph Radford)

Oil prices fall on rising Iraq output, doubt over producer talk prospects


Oil prices fell early on Monday as output from Iraq rose and as Iran said it would only cooperate in upcoming producer talks to freeze output if fellow exporters recognized its right to fully regain market share.


FRANKFURT The head of Deutsche Bank (DBKGn.DE) called on Wednesday for cross-border bank mergers in Europe, seeing the sector's fragmentation as placing an unacceptable squeeze on bank profits and long-term sustainability.
John Cryan's remarks will likely spur further discussion about the future of the bank, although he was quick to throw cold water on a report that Deutsche had examined a merger with Commerzbank (CBKG.DE), partly owned by the German state.
Criticizing what he called the "scattered regionalism among banks", Cryan said at a financial conference: "We need more mergers, at a national level, but even also across national borders."
Asked if he sees the time coming when Deutsche will engage in large takeovers, Cryan, himself a former M&A banker specializing in financial services during a long career at UBS (UBSG.S), said: "Not any time soon".
His comments come weeks after Deutsche scraped through regional stress tests of the sector and as European Central Bank (ECB) money printing saps banks' ability to turn a profit.
Deutsche warned last month it may need deeper cost cuts to turn itself around after revenue fell sharply in the second quarter due to challenging markets and low interest rates.
Some analysts have argued that Deutsche would be advised to find a partner once it has stabilized its business, cut costs, and put capital and regulatory concerns behind it.
Both Deutsche and Commerzbank - the two biggest lenders in Europe's biggest economy - have been slipping down the rankings of the continent's top banks, hamstrung by a fragmented and competitive home market, growing regulation and negative interest rates.
Their combined market value of around 26 billion euros ($29 billion) is less than half of France's BNP Paribas (BNPP.PA) for example.
Deutsche shares rose 3 percent in midday trading while Commerzbank's were up 4 percent, outpacing a 2.4 percent rise in the STOXX Europe 600 banking index .SX7P.
LOW EBB
Both lenders were shown to be weaker than most peers in European stress tests last month, while profits across Europe's banks have been under pressure with economic growth at low ebb, interest rates at rock bottom and the task of sifting through billions of euros of risky loans incomplete.
At the same time, European companies are wondering if their home banks will be able to support them internationally or whether they should turn to U.S. banks for help, Cryan said.
"This situation in Europe cannot go on," Cryan said. "We need a strategy for our financial sector."
Both Cryan and Commerzbank chief Martin Zielke, speaking at the same conference, said Germany was burdened by too many banks.
German banks have almost exclusively focused on earning money from charging a margin on the difference between short-term borrowing and long-term lending, using the revenue to subsidize retail and payments operations that were low-cost and often free for customers.
ECB money printing has exposed the flaws in that strategy, forcing some banks to try to charge for services or even deposits, until recently a taboo in Germany.
Mergers among banks could help remove capacity, increasing banks' pricing power and opening the way to healthier profits.
"If we look at Germany in particular, it hasn't gone through that wave of consolidation like Spain has, Italy seems to be moving in that direction and France has been through it," Cryan said.
Such trends could affect Deutsche itself.
"Deutsche is a very juicy takeover target," said Neil Wilson, analyst at ETX Capital. "It trades at about a quarter of book value and its shares are now worth a tenth what they were in 2007. In the last year its shares have halved in value, while it posted a 6.8 billion euros loss for 2015 - low-hanging fruit for those who can reach."
Yet enthusiasm for mergers is not shared by the country's politically powerful public savings banks.
"Recent demands for fundamental consolidation among banks are not appropriate," savings bank association head Georg Fahrenschon told the conference, noting bigger banks had shown they could be "poison" for financial market stability.
($1 = 0.8971 euros)
(Additional reporting by Andreas Kroener; Writing by John O'Donnell; Editing by Maria Sheahan and David Holmes)

Deutsche Bank chief urges European banks to merge


The head of Deutsche Bank (DBKGn.DE) called on Wednesday for cross-border bank mergers in Europe, seeing the sector's fragmentation as placing an unacceptable squeeze on bank profits and long-term sustainability.


NEW YORK In a landmark ruling for non-traditional families in New York, the state's highest court on Tuesday held a person need not have a biological or adoptive relationship with a child to be considered a parent.
The decision by the New York Court of Appeals gives such individuals legal standing to seek custody or visitation rights.
The state's earlier definition of parent had become "unworkable" given today's increasingly varied family relationships, Judge Sheila Abdus-Salaam wrote on behalf of five members of a six-judge panel.
According to the ruling, a person can claim parenthood by presenting "clear and convincing evidence that the parties agreed to conceive a child and to raise the child together."
New York has been a laggard in expanding the definition of parenthood, as a majority of states already recognize non-biological, non-adoptive parents.
The ruling mainly affects unmarried couples with children, as married spouses with children are presumed to have parental rights. Many of the former are same-sex pairings, as New York did not allow gay marriage until 2011.
Tuesday's ruling arose from two cases involving same-sex couples. In one, a woman became pregnant through artificial insemination and, after the relationship deteriorated, cut off her former partner's contact with the child. The partner subsequently sought joint custody and visitation, but was turned down because she was not a biological or adoptive parent.
The second case involved an unmarried same-sex couple who had a child before splitting up. The biological mother sought child support from her former partner.
The court granted her request but also allowed a visitation petition by the child's non-biological mother, ruling it would be inconsistent to consider the latter a parent only for purposes of paying support.
Court of Appeals Judge Eugene Pigott issued a separate opinion in the cases, concurring with the results but saying the state's definition of parenthood should properly be set by the legislature.
Eric Wrubel, who represented the child in one of the cases, hailed the ruling, saying it would make sure "one parent doesn't disappear because one person doesn't like the other anymore."
(This version of the story was refiled to remove errant word after ruling in seventh paragraph)
(Reporting By Karen Freifeld; Editing by Alan Crosby)

N.Y. high court broadens definition of parent in landmark ruling


In a landmark ruling for non-traditional families in New York, the state's highest court on Tuesday held a person need not have a biological or adoptive relationship with a child to be considered a parent.


U.S. President Barack Obama speaks from the Rose Garden of the White House to announce his three nominees to fill vacancies on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in Washington June 4, 2013. The nominees will be attorney Patricia Ann Millett (R),... REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque/File Photo
WASHINGTON When President Barack Obama entered the White House in 2009, the federal appeals court based in Virginia was known as one of the most conservative benches in the country.
Two Obama terms later, Democratic appointees hold a 10-5 majority on the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, a panel of which issued a groundbreaking ruling this April backing transgender rights.
The shift to the left on the court, which hears cases from Virginia, Maryland, West Virginia, South Carolina and North Carolina, highlights a widely overlooked aspect of Obama's legacy.
His appointments of dozens of judges to the country's influential federal appeals courts have tilted the judiciary in a liberal direction that will influence rulings for years to come and be further entrenched if Democrat Hillary Clinton wins this November's presidential election.
A Reuters review of rulings by the courts over the last two years shows Obama’s appointees to the appeals courts have influenced major legal battles likely to ultimately reach the Supreme Court.
Obama-appointed judges have voted in favor of broad civil rights protections, major Obama administration regulations and gun regulations and against Republican-backed voting rules.
(FACTBOX on recent rulings: [L1N1B41BM])
(Graphic showing the changes under Obama tmsnrt.rs/2blUhmV)
When seeking to appoint judges, the White House has said it is looking for highly credentialed lawyers reflecting the diversity of U.S. society. Conservative critics say he has picked judges who are willing to circumvent the law in order to reach preferred outcomes.
"There’s no question President Obama’s nominees have absolutely been part of his effort to transform the country and move it dramatically to the left," said Carrie Severino, a conservative legal activist.
White House spokesman Eric Schultz said in a statement that Obama's appointees "all share impeccable qualifications, unquestioned integrity, and a steadfast commitment to equal justice under the law."
The appeals courts are the first stop for any case appealed from the lower U.S. district courts and often have the last word. The next and final destination is the Supreme Court, but it hears fewer than 100 cases a year. The appeals courts handle 35,000 a year according to the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts.
Of the 13 appeals courts, nine now have a majority of Democratic appointees, compared with one when Obama took office, according to research carried out by Russell Wheeler, a scholar at the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank.
In addition to appointing two Supreme Court justices and dozens of district court judges, Obama appointments now make up 55 of the current 168 appeals court judges, according to the judiciary. Obama’s current total of 323 district and appeals court appointments, most of them district court judges, is similar to the tallies achieved by other recent two-term presidents.
The regional appeals courts are currently more powerful than ever because of the vacancy on the Supreme Court caused by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, which has left the court divided equally between liberals and conservatives. If the ideologically divided court splits 4-4, the appeals court ruling is left intact. Such an outcome occurred four times in the Supreme Court term that recently ended.
Scalia's seat is unlikely to be filled until next year due to political opposition from Republicans in the Senate, which has the job of confirming nominees.
COURTS TRANSFORMED
One of the most dramatic transformations has been on the 4th Circuit.
In July 2007, 18 months before Obama became president, Republican appointees held a 7-5 majority. Through a mix of seven Obama appointments and retirements, Democratic appointees now hold sway.
In April, a three-judge panel featuring two Obama appointees ruled in favor of a transgender student seeking to use a boys' restroom. The two Obama appointees were in the majority, with a Republican appointee dissenting.
Three months later, a three-judge panel featuring two Obama appointees and one judge appointed by Democratic President Bill Clinton struck down North Carolina's strict voter identification law on a 3-0 vote, saying the state legislature had enacted it with discriminatory intent.
It is one of several recent court rulings pushing back on Republican-led efforts to impose new voting regulations, which Democrats say is intended to deter minorities from voting.
Caroline Fredrickson, president of liberal legal group the American Constitution Society, said Republican-appointed judges are generally less likely to rule in favor of broad interpretations of civil rights. The transgender case would "very likely" have come out differently with a more conservative panel of judges, she said.
The federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. is another where the balance of power has been flipped. Often known in legal circles as the second highest court in the land because it hears important cases concerning the federal government, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit was dominated by conservatives 6-3 when Obama took office.
Obama was able to force through four appointments after a major showdown in the Senate. The court now has a 7-4 split in favor of Democratic appointees.
In June, an Obama appointee, Judge Sri Srinivasan, cast the deciding vote as a three-judge panel upheld the Federal Communication Commission's so-called "net neutrality" regulation. Srinivasan joined a Clinton appointee in the majority. A judge appointed by Republican President Ronald Reagan dissented. The regulation is widely opposed by the telecommunications industry and backed by digital rights advocates.
Obama’s appointees do sometimes vote in favor of conservative outcomes. Paul Watford, a judge on the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, has on several occasions reached a different conclusion to his more liberal colleagues. In one recent decision from Aug. 15, he dissented along with conservative judges when the court ruled that a death row inmate should be able to file a new appeal.
When announcing three of his nominees to the appeals court in Washington at a White House press conference in June 2013, Obama rejected any notion that they were political pawns, emphasizing their strong credentials.
"These are no slouches. These are no hacks," he said.
(Reporting by Lawrence Hurley; editing by Stuart Grudgings.)

Obama's judges leave liberal imprint on U.S. law


When President Barack Obama entered the White House in 2009, the federal appeals court based in Virginia was known as one of the most conservative benches in the country.


Dr. Ben Carson (L) and Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump (C) and Pierry Benjamin (R) attend a round table with the Republican Leadership Initiative at Trump Tower in the Manhattan borough of New York,, U.S., August 25, 2016. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri
WASHINGTON Democrat Hillary Clinton called on Friday for voters to reject what she called the "bigotry" of Donald Trump's White House campaign, releasing a television ad criticizing his efforts to appeal to black voters and saying she was reaching out to people from all parties who are troubled by his candidacy.
The ad shows video of Trump's controversial pitch to black voters, in which the Republican candidate urges them to support him by asking, "What do you have to lose?" It also shows headlines about a racial discrimination lawsuit the New York real estate mogul faced in the 1970s.
Clinton's presidential campaign said the ad, released a day after she gave a speech accusing Trump of fuelling America's "radical fringe," would air in the hotly contested states of Florida, North Carolina, Ohio and Pennsylvania.
Clinton followed up her tough speech by saying on Friday that Trump's temperament and divisiveness made him unfit for the White House.
"I am reaching out to everyone, Republicans, Democrats, independents, everyone who is as troubled as I am by the bigotry and divisiveness of Donald Trump's campaign," she told MSNBC, adding she was asking "fair-minded Americans to repudiate this kind of divisive demagoguery."
Trump countered on Friday by releasing a video showing Clinton in the 1990s discussing a crime bill and referring to "super-predators," or at-risk youth she said needed to be brought under control. Trump's video also shows U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, Clinton's main opponent in the Democratic primary this year, calling that a "racist term."
Republican National Committee spokesman Sean Spicer told MSNBC on Friday that Clinton was trying to deflect attention from controversy around her family's charitable foundation and her use of private email address and server rather than a government one while she was secretary of state from 2009-2013.
In targeting what she terms Trump's bigotry, Clinton hopes to remind voters of controversial statements he has made over the course of the campaign. Those include describing some Mexican immigrants as criminals and rapists, suggesting a judge could not be fair because of his Mexican-American heritage, and proposing a temporary ban on Muslim immigrants to combat terrorism.
Trump also has been criticized for vowing to deport millions of people living in the United States illegally. In recent days, he had appeared to hold out the possibility of toning down his hardline stance, but on Thursday, he denied he would loosen his proposed immigration restrictions.
"I don't think it's a softening," Trump told CNN. "I've had many people say it's a hardening, actually." He said he was still weighing what would become of the 11 million people already in the country illegally.
(Reporting by Emily Stephenson and Susan Heavey; Editing by Frances Kerry)

New Clinton ad attacks Trump's outreach to black voters


Democrat Hillary Clinton called on Friday for voters to reject what she called the "bigotry" of Donald Trump's White House campaign, releasing a television ad criticizing his efforts to appeal to black voters and saying she was reaching out to people from all parties who are troubled by his candidacy.