David Beckham: China Tour Will Boost Game

By Mark Stone, China Correspondent

David Beckham has arrived in Beijing as China's first global football ambassador.

The Paris Saint-Germain midfielder, who is as big a star here as he is anywhere else, is spending four days on a whistle-stop tour across the country.

Beckham's role will involve helping to promote the Chinese Super League (CSL) to the world, raising the profile of the game within China itself and to restore its image after recent match-fixing scandals.

The star said: "This is a significant year in Chinese football history as we usher in 20 years of developing this sport professionally and mark the 10-year milestone of the Chinese Super League - which today reaches 300 million television viewers and 4.49 million spectators annually."

A group of fans wait to welcome Beckham to Beijing (Pic:@Stone_SkyNews)

Beckham arrived to an unusual scene in the Chinese capital: thick snow and blue skies with no hint of the smog that has blanketed the city for so many days this year.

Day one of his trip included visits to two schools in the city as well as a kick-around with children. He hosted a news conference at one of the schools explaining his motivation for the visit.

Professional football in China is celebrating its 20th anniversary. Nicolas Anelka and Didier Drogba and coaches Marcello Lippi and Sergio Batista are among the high profile names to move to China. Drogba and Anelka lasted just one season.

However, the game in China has been tainted by corruption. The Chinese Football Association found 58 people guilty of involvement in match fixing.

Beckham says he's excited about promoting the game to Chinese sports fans

Beckham will spend two days in Beijing visiting the Workers Stadium, home to Beijing Guo'an Football Club. He will meet players and fans and tour the stadium.

He will then travel south to the coastal city of Qingdao, home to Qingdao Jonoon Football Club. His visit there will follow the same format as the Beijing leg: visiting schools and promoting the game at the grassroots level.

From Qingdao he will fly to the central Chinese city of Wuhan, the home of Wuhan Zall Football Club.

"The guy is a huge, huge brand. To say that the trip isn't some sort of publicity stunt would be a very, very silly thing to say," Pete Davis, China Correspondent for Goal Asia, told Sky News.

A fan of the football star with a book to sign (Pic:@Stone_SkyNews)

"Having said that, Chinese football does need the boost that Beckham can provide and it can only be good, I think. Him coming over is not going to create a massive improvement in terms of grassroots football ... but Beckham can brand the league and bring the right kind of notoriety to it," he said.

Late last year, before his move to Paris, there was significant speculation that Beckham might sign with a Chinese team. Pete Davis believes there is still a chance he could move there.

"His contract with Paris Saint-Germain is only five months long - that nicely coincides with the middle of the Chinese season when Chinese teams are allowed to sign people, so it may be that we see him for a short six-month spell like we did Drogba and Anelka and in that time he may be able to work wonders. We don't know yet," he said.

Officials at all levels, including the new President Xi Jinping - said to be a big football fan - are hoping that Brand Beckham will significantly boost the game and clean up its image.

"Corruption has tarnished the image of Chinese football but what happened was 10 years ago," continued Mr Davis.

David Beckham making his debut for Paris Saint-Germain last month

"The goalkeeper of Shanghai Shenhua is a highly rated guy called Wang Dalei and he would have been 14 years old when this match fixing happened. Yes it's current news, but actually it's old news in terms of Chinese football. It's just that the punishment has only just occurred."

Beckham is being paid for the trip - it's not clear who the funding is coming from. His management company IMG said that it was not a significant amount.

"This is not about money, this is about a guy that loves football," Jeff Slack, IMG's vice president is quoted by the South China Morning Post as saying.

Victoria Beckham is not joining her husband on the trip

The newspaper claimed that he was being paid by Chinese Central Television (CCTV) which is giving significant coverage to the trip.

Victoria Beckham is not accompanying her husband. Her previous visits to the country, though, have generated significant interest.

"She came all the way through China and she developed quite a large following and had some very nice things to say about Chinese girls and their fashion sense and that is a whole different way of looking at it." said Mr Davis.

"It can be good for both of them to get involved in China. It's a huge market with a lot of money involved and if Victoria and David can benefit from it then what's the harm in a six-month stay here," he added.

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Mali: French Hostage 'Beheaded By Al Qaeda'

Al Qaeda says it has beheaded a French hostage in reprisal for France's military intervention in Mali, according to reports.

Its North African arm claimed responsibility, Mauritania's ANI news agency reported, citing a commander for the group.

A French foreign office spokesman said they were trying to verify the report of the killing of Philippe Verdon, adding that "we don't know at the moment" whether it is reliable.

In a telephone call to the news agency, the group spokesman said Mr Verdon had been beheaded on March 10 "in response to the French military intervention in the north of Mali", ANI reported.

The AQIM commander described Mr Verdon as a French spy and said France's President Francois Hollande "bore the responsibility for the remaining hostages".

Mr Verdon and another Frenchman, Serge Lazarevic, were kidnapped from their hotel room on November 24, 2011, in the northern Mali town of Hombori.

Their families denied that the two men were mercenaries or secret service agents.

It is not known whether Mokhtar Belmokhtar is dead or alive

The killing, if proved true, would be a worrying development for Mr Hollande.

Another 14 French hostages are detained in Western Africa, including seven believed to be held in the Sahel region by al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) and its affiliates.

In August last year a video showing Mr Verdon describing the "difficult living conditions" was released on a Mauritanian website.

The hostages' families have in recent weeks expressed growing fears for their loved ones in the light of France's military actions in Mali.

Earlier Tuesday, Mr Verdon's father Jean-Pierre, complained that the families were hearing nothing from the French authorities.

"We are in a total fog and it is impossible to live this way," he told RTL radio. "We have no information."

French soldiers on the ground in Timbuktu

Asked about France's refusal to pay ransoms to kidnappers, he replied that the families had no say in such "decisions of state".

Terror chief Mokhtar Belmokhtar, an AQIM leader and one of the world's most wanted men, had pledged revenge and vowed to attack western targets in Africa after France launched a campaign to help the country's embattled government drive Islamist militants out of northern Mali.

France now has more than 4,000 troops on the ground in Mali.

It launched a nine-week assault in January to dislodge the group and other Islamist militants who had hijacked a Tuareg rebellion in Sahel and seized the northern half of the country.

They were driven out from the main cities of Gao, Timbuktu and Kidal, after which some 1,600 French and Chadian troops began searching for Islamist rebels in their pocket hideouts in the mountainous region of northern Mali.

When asked by the ANI news agency whether Belmokhtar had been killed, the AQIM commander neither denied nor confirmed it.

There have been conflicting reports on whether he was killed in the French military campaign against the rebels.

Soldiers from Chad fighting Islamists in Mali had claimed to have killed Belmokhtar, who is said to have been the mastermind behind the recent Algerian hostage crisis at a remote gas facility in the Algerian desert.

The one-eyed gangster, nicknamed Mr Marlboro because of his involvement in cigarette smuggling, had also been dubbed "The Uncatchable" by French intelligence after being linked to a series of kidnappings of foreigners in north Africa over the past decade.

France has been carrying out DNA tests to determine whether militant leaders Belmokhtar and Abdelhamid Abou Zaid are among those killed in recent fighting in Mali.

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South Korea: North Suspected Of Cyber Attack

An investigation is under way into the simultaneous shutdown of computer networks at several major broadcasters and banks in South Korea, with suspicion falling on North Korea.

The shutdown came days after North Korea blamed the South and the US for cyber attacks that temporarily closed websites in Pyongyang.

While the cause was not immediately clear, there has been speculation of a possible North Korean cyber attack.

Officials at the two South Korean public broadcasters KBS and MBC said that all computers at their companies blacked out - but did not cause any damage to their daily TV broadcasts.

YTN cable news channel reported that the company's internal computer network was completely paralysed.

The servers of YTN were brought down

Local TV showed workers staring at blank computer screens, and at one coffee shop employees asked for cash, saying their credit card machine was not working.

The state-run Korea Information Security Agency confirmed that computers at at least five South Korean companies were down. The agency was investigating what caused the outage.

Shinhan Bank, a lender of South Korea's fourth-largest banking group, said the bank's system, including online banking and cash machines, had stopped working.

The company was unable to conduct any transactions with customers at bank windows, including retail banking and corporate banking.

Tensions between the neighbouring countries are high following North Korea's recent nuclear test and the UN sanctions that followed.

Accusations of cyber attacks on the Korean Peninsula are not new. Seoul believes Pyongyang was behind at least two cyber attacks on its companies in 2011 and 2012.

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Hotel Sex Attack Scare Briton 'Heads Home'

A Briton who leapt from an Indian hotel because she feared a sex attack is heading back to the UK - after two suspects appeared in court, Indian police said.

The tourist told police she had requested a 4am wake-up call but the manager who came to the door allegedly offered her a massage and refused to leave.

The woman was admitted to hospital with minor leg injuries after she fled by jumping from the window of the Hotel Agra Mahal in Agra, close to the Taj Mahal.

Two men, including the hotel owner, have been charged over the incident and appeared in court this morning.

Their lawyer said they would deny any charges when they reappeared in court tomorrow and would also seek bail.

A Foreign Office spokesman said: "We are in touch with a British national and local authorities following an assault in Agra.

"They are now safe and we are offering consular assistance."

The episode comes days after a Swiss woman was gang-raped while cycling through a neighbouring state with her husband.

The woman was attacked on Friday night when the couple stopped to camp in a forest in the Datia district of Madhya Pradesh, 124 miles (200km) south of Agra.

She told police she was raped by seven or eight men but was unable to specify the precise number because it was dark.

A group of six men, said to be farmers from nearby villages, appeared in court on Monday charged with gang rape.

The attack came three months after the fatal gang rape of a woman on a New Delhi bus which sparked outrage across India and made headlines around the world.

The city of Agra, in the state of Uttar Pradesh, is part of India's famed Golden Triangle and draws hordes of tourists every year.

British Government advice urges women to "exercise caution" in India, even when travelling as part of a group.

The FCO website states: "Reported cases of sexual assault against women and young girls are increasing; recent sexual attacks against female visitors in tourist areas and cities show that foreign women are also at risk.

"British women have been the victims of sexual assault in Goa, Delhi, Bangalore and Rajasthan and women travellers often receive unwanted attention in the form of verbal and physical harassment by individuals or groups of men."

Women travelling through the country are advised to respect local dress codes and customs and avoid visiting isolated areas, including beaches, alone at any time of day.

The FCO also warns women against travelling alone on public transport, in taxis or auto-rickshaws, especially at night.

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Obama Arrives In Israel On Three-Day Tour

American President Barack Obama has arrived in the Middle East on Air Force One for a three-day tour of Israel and the Palestinian Territories.

Making his first overseas tour since the start of his second term in office, Obama is due to continue on to neighbouring Jordan on Friday.

He was met at Tel Aviv airport by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli President Shimon Peres after Air Force One stopped next to a huge red carpet laid out down the tarmac.

After the countries' respective national anthems were played Israeli President Shimon Peres said: "A world without America's leadership, without her moral voice, would be a darker world. A world without your friendship, would invite aggression against Israel."

Mr Obama called the US Israel's "strongest ally and your greatest friend."

Mr Obama will hold lengthy talks with Mr Netanyahu later in the day, with the two set to hold a news conference at 8.10pm local time (18.10 GMT).

He will travel to the occupied West Bank on Thursday to meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

According to Israeli commentators, Obama and Netanyahu 'dislike each other'

US officials say Mr Obama will try to coax the Palestinians and Israelis back to peace talks.

He will also seek to reassure Mr Netanyahu he is committed to preventing Iran from getting a nuclear bomb and discuss ways of containing Syria's civil war.

However, the White House has deliberately minimised hopes of any major breakthroughs, a reversal from Obama's first four years in office when aides said he would visit the Jewish state only if he had something concrete to accomplish.

Analysts say some of the lack of earlier diplomatic results, has been down to their relationship between the Democrat president and right wing prime minister.

"To tell the truth, they can't stand one another," a commentator for Israel's Channel 10 television said in a live broadcast from the airport as Air Force One came to a halt.

Mr Obama president will inspect an Iron Dome anti-missile battery at Tel Aviv airport before flying up to Jerusalem by helicopter for the start of his official meetings.

Seeking to connect directly with an often sceptical Israeli public, the president will make a speech to a group of carefully screened students on Thursday afternoon where he is expected to touch on major topics of concern, including Iran.

US officials say Obama, the fifth sitting U.S. president to travel to Israel, will urge further patience, with Washington worried that a threatened Israeli unilateral strike might drag the United States into another Middle East war.

Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank protested against Obama's visit

Mr Obama will then fly to the West Bank city of Ramallah to meet Mr Abbas and is expected to encourage the restart of negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians which broke down in 2010.

In Ramallah on Tuesday, Palestinian police scuffled with scores of demonstrators protesting against Obama's visit.

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Lazio Fans Raided Over Spurs Attacks In Rome

By Nick Pisa, Sky News Reporter

Police in Rome have made a series of dawn raids as they continue their investigations into an attack on a city centre pub that left several Tottenham Hotspur fans injured.

Nine addresses were targeted in the operation, which is part of the ongoing probe into violence that erupted in The Drunken Ship, where Spurs fans had gathered ahead of a Europa League match against Lazio last November.

Officials said they were focusing on nine men, aged between 22 and 40 years old, who were described as "Lazio fans, known for their radical links".

Police said they had been traced after tracking telephone data between the men, which showed they had been in close contact with each other in the area of the Drunken Ship both before and after the attack.

Officers believe the men had probably been acting as "spotters for the main group" which attacked the pub.

All the men will have samples of DNA taken to compare them with traces found on weapons seized outside the pub following the attack.

The men held were all automatically given stadium banning orders of three years.

Last month, nine other homes were raided while two men have already been charged with wounding.

Police said 20 people are currently under investigation in connection with the attack.

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Iraq Bombings: Al Qaeda Behind Attacks

Al Qaeda in Iraq has claimed responsibility for a wave of bombings and suicide attacks that killed around 60 people on the 10th anniversary of the US-led invasion.

A decade after US and Western troops swept into Iraq to oust Saddam Hussein, Iraq still struggles to overcome violence, sectarian tensions and political instability.

Islamic State of Iraq, the country's al Qaeda wing, is regaining strength, invigorated by the Sunni Muslim rebellion in neighbouring Syria and has carried out dozens of high-profile attacks since the start of the year.

Car bombs, roadside explosions and suicide attacks on Tuesday hit mainly Shi'ite districts and security forces in Baghdad and other cities, including a bomber who detonated his blast inside a restaurant in the northern city of Mosul.

"What has reached you on Tuesday is just the first drop of rain, and a first phase, for by God's will, after this we will have our revenge," the al Qaeda statement posted on a jihadist website said.

Sunni Islamists see Iraq's Shi'ite-led government as oppressors of the country's Sunni minority and target Shi'ites to try to provoke a sectarian confrontation like the inter-communal slaughter that killed thousands in 2006-7.

Suicide bombers have struck nearly twice a week since January, a rate Iraq has not seen for several years.

The Iraq war began on March 20, 2003, with US air strikes on the capital.

Iraq's sectarian and political rivalries are still raw. Its power-sharing government split among Shi'ite, Sunnis and Kurdish factions has been all but paralysed by disputes for more than a year.

Syria's growing conflict over the border is stirring up Iraq's volatile mix, exposing the country to the rivalry between Turkey, which backs Sunni rebels fighting President Bashar al Assad, and Shi'ite power Iran which sponsors him.

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Cyprus Bailout Crisis: No Deal Yet With Russia

Sacrificing Trust In The Banks

Updated: 8:16am UK, Wednesday 20 March 2013

By Ed Conway, Economics Editor

I'm rather glad that the Pope managed to mention Abraham in his inaugural mass.

After all, of all the Old Testament, the tale of Abraham and Isaac is probably about the most comparable to the current imbroglio in Cyprus.

The father and guardian takes his son to the top of the mount, binds him and is on the point of sacrificing him when, at the last minute, God sends down an angel to stop him.

In an analogous way, the Cypriot government, on orders from on high (the eurogroup in this case, not God) has come to the brink of gouging an unprecedented tax out of its peoples' savings, and, at the last minute, seems to have been offered a reprieve.*

Now, if this were the Bible, the story would end there. Abraham's faith was tested, and he passed the test. Conveniently, the ancients glossed over the question of what this incident did to the father-son relationship.

However, this is not the Bible, and so we're left unpicking a relationship that has gone very wrong indeed. There is clearly a widespread sense of betrayal in Nicosia, and one can understand why.

Even if, as is the current plan, small savers with less than 20,000 euros in their accounts are let off the deposit tax, this episode will leave a lasting scar in place.

After all, the Government had spent the past few years insisting to savers that any deposits below 100,000 euros would be safe, protected by its deposit insurance scheme.

That it could subsequently play fast and loose with the bank accounts is unlikely to be forgotten.

Even if the Government were to stop short of a deposit tax, it's hard to see why savers wouldn't simply withdraw all their cash in droves when the banks reopen (whenever that is) – even if it's simply to put it underneath a mattress at home.

This episode has fatally undermined the element of trust in the banking system – something which is fundamental to the way capitalist economy functions in its current form.

Whether this triggers chaos elsewhere is difficult to predict. Markets have become more unsteady as the situation in Cyprus has deteriorated, but we haven't yet seen any kind of depositor panic elsewhere, for instance in Portugal and Spain.

However, the story in Cyprus is far from over. Anger is mounting, the parliamentary system is creaking under the weight of the demands coming over from Brussels, and the threats from Frankfurt to cut off emergency funding to the banks if the country doesn't co-operate haven't made them any more willing.

Short of a papal intervention, it's hard to imagine how to get a happy ending out of this story.

*Yes I know there are some inconsistencies. For instance, it's debatable whether the eurocrats have ditched the plan or whether it's simply being rejected by the government, the latter of which would be akin to Isaac breaking free of his bindings and escaping.

Plus, Isaac had not borrowed himself so far into penury that he was facing bankruptcy. Nor had he become a go-between for Russian tax avoiders but let's leave that aside for the time being.

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Christine Lagarde: IMF Chief's Flat Raided

French police have searched the flat of IMF chief Christine Lagarde in relation to a probe into a supporter of Nicolas Sarkozy.

Ms Lagarde's lawyer said her Paris apartment was examined as part of an investigation into her handling of a 2008 compensation payment to a businessman supporter of the French ex-president.

Police are investigating claims that Ms Lagarde, when finance minister under Mr Sarkozy, acted illegally in approving the 285m euro (£250m) arbitration payout to Bernard Tapie.

Ms Lagarde in 2007 ordered a panel of judges to arbitrate in a dispute between Mr Tapie and the bank Credit Lyonnais, which led to the disgraced tycoon being awarded the payout.

She denies any wrongdoing.

"This search will help uncover the truth, which will contribute to exonerating my client from any criminal wrongdoing," Ms Lagarde's lawyer, Yves Repiquet, told Reuters.

It was conducted a day after France's budget minister resigned after being targeted in a tax fraud inquiry.

Socialist President Francois Hollande came to power last May vowing to crack down on the cozy relationships between politicians and businessmen he said were rife under Mr Sarkozy.

Ms Lagarde was in Frankfurt and not in her Paris flat at the time of the search, a spokesman for the IMF chief said. She arrived in the city on Tuesday for the Frankfurt Finance Summit.

In the last few days, she has been involved in the discussions over the bailout for Cyprus, amid the country's impending bankruptcy.

She joined the finance ministers of the 17 Eurozone countries in weekend discussions that put together a rescue plan for the beleagured island that involved a raid on savings.

She told Time Magazine that the Cyprus crisis risked spreading to other countries.

Yesterday, the rescue plan put together by the Eurogroup and the IMF was rejected by Cypriot MPs, forcing the search for an alternative solution.

The International Monetary Fund refused to comment  on the raid on Wednesday.

"As we have said before, it would not be appropriate to comment on a case that has been and is currently before the French judiciary," said IMF spokesman Gerry Rice in a statement made shortly after the raid.

"Prior to its selection of the Managing Director, however, the IMF's Executive Board discussed this issue and expressed its confidence that Madame Lagarde would be able to effectively carry out her duties as Managing Director," Mr Rice said.

Lagarde, previously France's finance minister, was chosen to lead the global crisis lender in 2011 after her predecessor, ex-French politician Dominique Strauss-Kahn, was forced to resign after being arrested in New York in a scandal involving sex with a hotel chambermaid.

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Colorado Prisons Chief Shot Dead At Home

The head of the Colorado Department of Corrections has been shot and killed on his own doorstep.

Authorities in Monument, north of Colorado Springs, are warning that the gunman is still on the loose.

They are are looking for a dark-coloured "boxy" car seen near Tom Clements' house on Tuesday night.

He was shot at around 8.30pm when he answered his front door.

The vehicle's engine was running and a witness reported seeing one person driving away in the car.

A family member called the emergency services to report the shooting of the 58-year-old.

An aerial view of Tom Clement's home. Pic: KMGH-TV

"We have no known suspect at this time," Sheriff's Lt. Jeff Kramer told reporters.

"Whether he was specifically targeted or this was random, we don't know," he added.

"We know of his position and realise that it is a possible motive for a crime such as this."

Search dogs were brought in to search a surrounding wooded area, while police went house-to-house trying to find out what neighbours knew about the shooting.

Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper appointed Mr Clements in 2011.

"I can hardly believe it, let alone write words to describe it," he said in a statement to corrections department staff early on Wednesday.

"As your Executive Director, he helped change and improve DOC in two years more than most people could do in eight years. He was unfailingly kind and thoughtful, and sought the "good" in any situation," he added.

Prior to his move to Colorado, Mr Clements served for more than three decades in the Missouri Department of Corrections.

He is survived by his wife, Lisa, their two daughters and their family.

Flags will fly at half-mast at all public buildings statewide until the day after his funeral.

The shooting came just hours before Governor Hickenlooper signed new gun laws for Colorado.

They are aimed at limiting ammunition magazines and expanding background checks, in light of the Aurora movie theatre massacre last July.

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