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LOS ANGELES (AFP) - - Pop icon Michael Jackson died Thursday after suffering a cardiac arrest, the entertainment website TMZ.com reported.

The website reported that Jackson, 50, suffered a heart attack just after 12:00 pm (1900 GMT) local time and paramedics were unable to revive him.

Jackson’s manager Tohme E. Tohme was not immediately available for comment when contacted by AFP. Officials at UCLA Medical Center where Jackson was treated also could not be reached for comment.

Los Angeles Fire Department spokesman Devin Gales would not confirm Jackson’s identity but said paramedics went to an address corresponding to the star’s home at 12:21 pm (1921 GMT) and the person was taken to UCLA Medical Center.

Iran’s ‘Angel of Freedom’ Neda Soltan Vowed to Protest Against Injustice

Relatives and friends of Neda Soltan, the 26-year-old protester who’s become an international symbol of Iranian resistance, wanted her to be remembered for her love of music and passion for travel.

“She was a person full of joy,” the Los Angeles Times quotes her music teacher and close friend Hamid Panahi, who was among mourners at her family home. “She was a beam of light. I’m so sorry. I was so hopeful for this woman.”

Details continue to emerge Tuesday about the murdered protester nickamed “Angel of Freedom,” after graphic videos of her apparent murder at a Tehran protest hit the Internet.

Images of Soltan’s bloody death on Saturday have galvanized the country and many insist on speaking out about this young woman and who she was, despite authorities banning anyone from mourning her.

Neda was reportedly gunned down during protests in the capital city. Videos posted on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter show her bleeding from the nose and mouth as a crowd tries unsuccessfully to stanch the flow and save her life.

The video also shows a moving clip of a man identified as Panahi cradling her head and yelling out, “Neda, don’t be afraid. Neda, stay with me. Neda stay with me!”

WASHINGTON (AFP) - - President Barack Obama hinted at the lethal force he will bring to bear on intruders who float past his security detail when he squashed a fly during an interview at the White House.

Midway through answering a question during an interview filmed Tuesday with financial news network CNBC, the commander-in-chief found himself the focus of a particularly pesky critter buzzing around his head.

“Hey, get out of here!” he said, cutting short an answer about the US financial system to wave the fly away.

When the bug alit on Obama’s left wrist, the most powerful man in the world steadied himself, stiffened his lower lip in concentration, and killed it with a swift — and loud — slap of his right hand.

“Now, where were we?” a grinning Obama asked as the fly lay motionless on the carpet.

“That was pretty impressive, wasn’t it?” he quipped, before encouraging the cameraman to zoom in on the president’s victim.

“I got the sucker.”

Almost immediately, comedy mashups of the presidential swat popped up on the Internet and cable television, while People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, an animal protection group, said it sent Obama its “Katcha Bug Humane Bug Catcher” for the next time he is pestered by an insect.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - - The harmful effects of global warming are being felt “here and now and in your backyard,” a groundbreaking US government report on climate change has warned.

“Climate change is happening now, it is not something that will happen decades or centuries in the future,” Jerry Melillo of the Marine Biological Laboratory in Massachusetts, one of the lead authors of the report, told AFP.

Climate change, which the report blames largely on human-induced emissions of heat-trapping gases, “is under way in the United States and projected to grow,” said the report by the US Global Change Research Program, a grouping of a dozen government agencies and the White House.

The report is the first on climate change since President Barack Obama took office and outlines in plain, non-scientific terms how global warming has resulted in an increase of extreme weather such as the powerful heatwave that swept Europe in 2003, claiming tens of thousands of lives.

Hurricanes have become fiercer as they gather greater strength over oceans warmed by climate change.

Global warming impacts everything from water supplies to energy, farming to health. And those impacts are expected to increase, according to the report titled “Global Change Impacts in the United States.”

Areas of the country that already had high levels of rain or snowfall have seen increases in precipitation because of climate change, says the report, which focuses on the United States but also tackles global climate change issues.

“We focused on regions of the US because another big message we wanted to get across is that not only is climate change happening now, but it’s happening in your backyard,” said Melillo.

“You care a great deal more about a tornado in your own backyard than one half a world away,” said David Doniger, senior policy director at the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC).

Arid areas, such as the largely desert US Southwest, are experiencing more droughts.

On the US Gulf Coast, sea level rise is particularly pressing; in the Northwest, how long snowpack sits on the mountains might be an issue, and farmers in the Midwest are concerned because winters have become milder, allowing more pests to survive the season.

But climate change also operates in a global nexus and the United States cannot be viewed in isolation, the 196-page report says.

Climate change-related food production problems in one part of the world can affect food prices and production decisions in the United States, he added.

“There is a whole host of connections when you discuss climate change; the US cannot be viewed as an island,” Melillo said.

The chief aim of the report is to help US policymakers and the general public make decisions on how to act to halt climate change, Melillo said.

The report’s release comes just six months before countries from around the world meet in the Danish capital Copenhagen for a UN conference that aims to produce an ambitious, new climate pact aimed at rolling back global warming.

Experts have been thrashing out a draft of a negotiating text for the new pact meant to take effect from the end of 2012, spelling out curbs on emissions by 2020 that will be deepened by 2050.

Reports issued by the previous administration of president George W. Bush — who famously rejected the Kyoto Protocol, the previous UN framework on climate change — were highly technical and did not cover as many issues as the sweeping first report issued by the Obama White House, said Melillo.

The report stresses the need for immediate action against global warming, saying: “Future climate change and its impacts depend on choices made today.”

“We have the power to determine how bad this could be and to avoid the worst impacts of global warming,” said Doniger.

“It’s like Charles Dickens’ ‘A Christmas Carol,’ where the ghosts come and show Scrooge the way the future could unfold into either a happy future or a disastrous future.

“This shows us that the future is in our hands, just as it was in Scrooge’s hands,” said Doniger.

DETROIT, Michigan (AFP) - - A summit seeking a new economic agenda for America kicks off Monday, with debate among a broad array of leaders aiming to find ways to maintain US leadership and competitiveness.

The three-day summit “is a bold new initiative to help re-imagine, rebuild and revitalize our economy in an increasingly difficult global market,” said Beth Chappell, president and chief executive of the Detroit Economic Club, which convened the gathering.

“It will bring together the country’s top business, government, labor and academic leaders to create consensus recommendations for increasing America’s competitiveness in four critical disciplines — technology, energy, environment and manufacturing.”

The Detroit, Michigan meeting, billed as “Davos in Detroit,” aims to stimulate ideas in a manner similar to the World Economic Forum annual gathering in Switzerland.

Organizers say the world’s biggest economy needs a new vision to maintain leadership and competitiveness, and that they will seek consensus among leaders in the corporate, academic, labor and political sectors.

Tom Dekar, vice chairman at Deloitte LLC — one of four so-called “knowledge partners” defining the agenda — said the summit aims to produce a “to do list” for the American economy.

“This is a great opportunity for people who are significant players in the economy to come together and talk about their visions of the future and the policy implications,” Dekar said.

The summit, which may continue as an annual event, grew out of conversations at the Detroit Economic Club about the future of the US economy.

The speakers include chief executives Richard Anderson of Delta Air Lines, Steve Ballmer of Microsoft Corp., Vikram Pandit of Citigroup, Fritz Henderson of General Motors and Alan Mulally of Ford Motor Co.

From government, new US chief technology officer Aneesh Chopra and Commerce Secretary Gary Locke will appear among the 90-plus speakers.

Called in September, the summit has taken on new importance amid a recession that is the worst in decades, costing more than six million US jobs.

The meeting reflects growing momentum for the US to formalize an “industrial policy” similar to those used in Asia and elsewhere to help nurture businesses in a tough global environment.

Dow Chemical Co. chairman Andrew Liveris, who is a co-chair of this week’s summit, told the club last year that the US needs better policies to nurture growth in an increasingly competitive global economy.

“Today, the emerging economic powers like China and India understand that when you build an economy from the ground up — make a strong manufacturing base as its foundation — benefits flow to everyone,” he said.

“Those nations are our competitors and many of them are beating us at our own game.”

According to Liveris, “the truth is that in this country today we already have an industrial policy, except, in reality, it’s mostly an anti-industrial policy — a set of contradictory, ill-planned and ultimately self-defeating laws and regulations that are creating havoc at the manufacturing base.”

The notion of industrial policy is taboo for many free market economists, who say America’s strength is derived largely from the laissez-faire, freewheeling environment that lets firms innovate without government interference.

Joel Naroff of Naroff Economic Advisors said the role of government in the economy needs to be reassessed in the current environment, in which the United States can no longer count on being the global leader in every sector.

“I think what needs to be discussed now is what is the correct role of the government in a world economy where other governments take an active role in assisting their industries,” Naroff said.

The openness of the US economy, he added, “is both a strength and a weakness” and that a careful examination of the role of government is needed.

“Just like everything else in economics, there is no one answer,” said Naroff.

LOS ANGELES (AFP) - - A forensics expert hired by actor David Carradine’s family has said the “Kill Bill” star did not commit suicide, but stressed that a final cause of death was still to be determined.

Forensic pathologist Michael Baden said initial investigations into the death of the 72-year-old actor, found hanging in a Bangkok hotel room last week, indicated he had not killed himself.

“The autopsy findings and the evidence thus far available demonstrate that Mr Carradine’s death was not the result of suicide,” Baden said in a statement released by a spokesman for the Carradine family.

“However, to reach a final determination as to the cause and the manner of death we must wait for further information from Thailand as to the scene findings and the completion of the crime laboratory and toxicology studies that are still being performed.”

Baden, who has appeared as an expert defense witness in several high-profile US murder trials, most notably those of American football star O.J. Simpson and music producer Phil Spector, had carried out a second autopsy on Carradine.

Thai police have said they suspect Carradine died from a sex act that went wrong after his body was discovered on June 4 hanging from a wardrobe rail in a Bangkok hotel room, naked and with ropes attached to his neck and penis.

Carradine, star of 1970s TV series “Kung Fu” and the hit “Kill Bill” movies, was in the Thai capital to shoot a film called “Stretch.”

An initial autopsy report revealed that the actor died from a sudden lack of oxygen and his body showed no signs of struggle.

A Thai forensic expert told AFP the death appeared to have been caused by auto-erotic asphyxiation, the practice of intentionally cutting off oxygen to the brain for sexual arousal.

Family and friends of Carradine have all rejected suggestions the actor was suicidal. The actor’s brother Keith Carradine thanked fans for messages of support received since news of the death broke.

“First of all, we would like to thank everyone for their heartfelt expressions of love and sympathy for what we are going through,” Carradine said in a statement Thursday.

“This is a devastating loss for our family and we greatly appreciate the compassion pouring in from all over the world.

“We wish to express our gratitude to the government of Thailand and the Lumpini Police Station in Bangkok for their support and cooperation and to the US Department of State for their assistance.”

PARIS (AFP) - - Ministers from economies accounting for 80 percent of the globe’s greenhouse gases met Monday to warnings that “the world’s destiny” may lie in the outcome of a mooted pact on climate change.

The so-called Major Economies Forum (MEF) met in Paris ahead of a new round of UN talks aimed at culminating in a sweeping global treaty in Copenhagen in December.

“The world’s destiny will probably be at stake in Copenhagen,” French Ecology Minister Jean-Louis Borloo said as he opened the two-day meeting in Paris.

He spoke out against skeptics who predict the accord will cripple the world’s economy.

“Copenhagen is not a retrograde vision, it’s not the start of negative growth, but a new start for strong, sustainable, sober carbon development,” he said.

The 192-nation process under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) aims at securing cuts in emissions of heat-trapping carbon gases and building defences for poor countries most exposed to changing weather patterns.

It would take effect after 2012, when the current provisions of the convention’s Kyoto Protocol run out.

But the negotiations — due to resume in Bonn on Monday — are extremely complex and have been hampered by many differences.

The MEF’s role is to try to identify common ground among the world’s biggest emitters and then hand this consensus back to the UNFCCC for approval.

The Paris meeting will cover financing and the transfer of clean technology, Borloo said.

In Copenhagen, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso admitted the climate negotiations would be “extremely difficult” but argued momentum was building.

“There is now a new situation that would have been unthinkable just a few weeks ago,” he said, referring to commitments signalled by China and the United States.

“Some of our partners who a few years ago denied the existence of the climate change problem are now discussing the texts for a possible agreement.”

One of the stumbling blocks is a demand by developing countries that rich economies, which are chiefly to blame for today’s warming, pledge deep cuts in future carbon emissions.

China has demanded reductions of at least 40 percent by 2020, as compared to a benchmark of 1990.

Supporters say a cut of this order will encourage the big developing countries — led by China, now the world’s number-one emitter by some estimates — to give ground.

But the only advanced economy making concessions on such a scale is the European Union, which is unilaterally targeting a 20 percent cut by 2020 over 1990 levels, and offering 30 percent if other advanced economies follow suit.

By comparison, US President Barack Obama has proposed reducing America’s greenhouse gas emissions by 14 percent by 2020 compared to their 2005 level. Analysts say this roughly translates to a three percent cut from 1990 levels.

US climate envoy Todd Stern told AFP on Sunday that China’s demand of 40 percent “is not realistic” and cautioned that domestic US politics meant the Obama administration could only go so far with its concessions.

“We are jumping as high as the political system will tolerate,” he added.

At a press conference on Monday, Borloo said “there can’t be any compromise over assuring others that we will do” a 25-to-40 percent reduction.

The essential thing was to “work in a very imaginative fashion” to achieve a consensus among rich countries so that a 25-to-40 package was put on the table, he said.

“We can have flexibility between us, some of us will do more, more quickly, and others a bit later… there could be commitments that take effect two, three years later, there could be other commitments in other areas,” he said.

He spoke of the possibility of “sectoral” agreements in industries that are big carbon emitters, such as electricity or steel.

The MEF was launched by Obama last month on the back of a similar initiative by his predecessor, George W. Bush.

Its participants include Australia, Brazil, Britain, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Russia, South Africa and the United States, as well as the 27-nation European Union.

MONTE CARLO (AFP) - - World championship leader Jenson Button of the Brawn GP team won the Monaco Grand Prix here on Sunday, his fifth victory in six races.

The Englishman, who started from pole and led throughout the 78-lap race, finished ahead of Brazilian team-mate Rubens Barrichello with Finn Kimi Raikkonen of Ferrari third.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - - Popular US breakfast cereal Cheerios is a drug, at least if the claims made on the label by its manufacturer General Mills are anything to go by, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has said.

“Based on claims made on your product’s label, we have determined that your Cheerios Toasted Whole Grain Oat Cereal is promoted for conditions that cause it to be a drug,” the FDA said in a letter to General Mills which was posted on the federal agency’s website Tuesday.

Cheerios labels claim that eating the cereal can help lower bad cholesterol, a risk factor for coronary heart disease, by four percent in six weeks.

Citing a clinical study, the product labels also claim that eating two servings a day of Cheerios helps to reduce bad cholesterol when eaten as part of a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol, the FDA letter says.

Those claims indicate that Cheerios — said by General Mills to be the best-selling cereal in the United States — is intended to be used to lower cholesterol and prevent, lessen or treat the disease hypercholesterolemia, and to treat and prevent coronary heart disease.

“Because of these intended uses, the product is a drug,” the FDA concluded in its letter.

Not only that, but Cheerios is a new drug because it has not been “recognized as safe and effective for use in preventing or treating hypercholesterolemia or coronary heart disease,” the FDA said.

That means General Mills may not legally market Cheerios unless it applies for approval as a new drug or changes the way it labels the small, doughnut-shaped cereal, the FDA said.

General Mills defended the claims on Cheerios packaging, saying in a statement that Cheerios’ soluble fiber heart health claim has been FDA-approved for 12 years, and that its “lower your cholesterol four percent in six weeks” message has been featured on the box for more than two years.

The FDA’s quibble is not about whether Cheerios cereal is good for you but over “how the Cheerios cholesterol-lowering information is presented on the Cheerios package and website,” said General Mills.

“We look forward to discussing this with FDA and to reaching a resolution.”

Meanwhile, the FDA warned in its letter that if General Mills fails to “correct the violations” on its labels, boxes of Cheerios could disappear from supermarket and wholesaler shelves around the United States and the company could face legal action.

According to General Mills, one in eight boxes of cereal sold in the United States is a box of Cheerios. The cereal debuted on the US market in 1941.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - - Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu arrived in the US on Sunday ahead of his maiden meeting with President Barack Obama amid divisions over Middle East peacemaking and Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

The hawkish premier, who wants a “fresh” approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, will unveil in the White House meeting on Monday his long-awaited policy for regional peace focused on countering Iran, aides said.

Contents are still secret but one Netanyahu aide told AFP that differences between Israel and the United States are “more on the outside.”

Disagreements have surfaced on several key issues since Netanyahu’s right-leaning government was sworn in at the end of March but the two leaders are likely to use the summit to reaffirm the strong ties between the close allies, aide Zalman Shoval said.

They were planned to give a brief press conference after their meeting which will precede intimate lunch together with their wives.

One major cause of friction has been Netanyahu’s refusal thusfar to publicly endorse the creation of a Palestinian state, a bedrock principle of US-backed peace efforts in the region.

Obama himself admitted in March that Netanyahu’s election and hawkish coalition did not make peacemaking any “easier” and his administration has fired off several sharp public messages towards Israel.

Netanyahu has assigned top priority to halting Iran’s nuclear bid.

Obama, however, has pledged to act vigorously to end the decades-old Middle East conflict and sees its resolution as a key component in a comprehensive regional policy for resolving the crisis with the Islamic republic.

Netanyahu is expected to irk his hosts and the Palestinians by telling Obama that Israel will keep building in existing settlements in the occupied West Bank, a key obstacle in the stuttering peace process.

The tone of the Obama administration has raised fears in Israel that Washington may sacrifice the interests of its staunchest ally in its attempt to end the Iranian estrangement.

Despite the friction, Netanyahu hopes to convince Obama of the viability of his new plan which will effectively replace the latest Israeli-Palestinian peace talks launched in Annapolis, near Washington in 2007.

“If we bring forward a new plan, the Americans will not reject it if they feel it can help their policy,” a senior Israeli official said.

Israeli and US officials have played down the chances of an open clash following the key summit.

“There will be no surprises at the meeting. There is a strong, natural alliance between the two states and I see no reason for this to change now,” a senior Israeli official told AFP en route to Washington.

The 59-year-old premier this month called for a “fresh” approach to the Middle East peace process based on a three-pronged approach including talks, security cooperation and development of the Palestinian economy.

He advocates bolstering the West Bank economy before negotiating a full peace deal, arguing the Palestinians are not ready for independence and that any Israeli concessions will only strengthen radical groups such as Hamas.

Netanyahu has also said he wishes to renew negotiations with Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas in the coming weeks.

Yet that may not be enough for Obama.

“The Obama administration has said it is after a comprehensive peace in the Middle East. A resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by a two-state solution is an important component of the peace,” a senior US official said.

“But there are other important issues that a comprehensive peace would have to address,” he told AFP, alluding to Iran’s nuclear program.

Obama’s decision to break away from his predecessor George W. Bush’s tough approach to Iran by engaging the Islamist republic in talks to defuse the nuclear standoff has raised concern in Israel.

The Jewish state says the negotiations must be limited in time and accompanied by economic and diplomatic sanctions.

Like Obama, Netanyahu is seeking to form a regional coalition with moderate states such as Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey to counter Iran’s growing regional influence.

He appealed alongside Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak at their meeting on Monday in the Red Sea resort town of Sharm al-Sheikh for tight cooperation against “radical forces”.

“In the Arab world there is agreement with our views of the Iranian danger,” Netanyahu added after he met Jordan’s King Abdullah II in Amman on Thursday.