Today's Reuters World News Headlines - Yahoo! News:
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Romney wins Ohio but fails to shake off rivals
Tue,6 Mar 2012 10:49 PM PST
Reuters -  STEUBENVILLE, Ohio (Reuters) - Mitt Romney secured a close victory in Ohio but failed to land a knockout blow against rival Rick Santorum on "Super Tuesday," raising the chances of a drawn-out battle for the Republican presidential nomination between the party's establishment and its grassroots conservatives. Romney won five of the 10 state contests on Tuesday but his margin of victory was uncomfortably slim in Ohio, the night's biggest prize. ...
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Suicide bomber kills 5 police in Russia's Dagestan
Tue,6 Mar 2012 10:45 PM PST
Reuters - MOSCOW (Reuters) - A female suicide bomber has killed at least five policemen by blowing herself up at a traffic police post in the restive Dagestan region of southern Russia. The woman detonated her bomb late on Tuesday outside Karabudakhkent, a village 40 km (24 miles) south of the provincial capital Makhachkala, Russia's RIA news agency quoted local police as saying. Dagestan faces almost daily shootings and bomb attacks as part of an Islamist insurgency across the mainly Muslim North Caucasus following two separatist wars in Chechnya. ... Full Story | Top |
China official sees militant links in Pakistan
Tue,6 Mar 2012 10:31 PM PST
Reuters - BEIJING (Reuters) - China is facing a network of militants entrenched in neighboring states, but authorities, especially in Pakistan, are trying to stamp out violence and protect China's interests, the governor of China's Xinjiang region said on Wednesday. China has blamed incidents of violence in Xinjiang on Islamic separatists who want to establish an independent state called East Turkestan. Some Chinese officials have blamed attacks on Muslim militants trained in Pakistan, though China's Foreign Ministry has refrained from public criticism of Pakistan. ... Full Story | Top |
China official sees militant links in Pakistan
Tue,6 Mar 2012 10:25 PM PST
Reuters - BEIJING (Reuters) - China is facing a network of militants entrenched in neighboring states, but authorities, especially in Pakistan, are trying to stamp out violence and protect China's interests, the governor of China's Xinjiang region said on Wednesday. China has blamed incidents of violence in Xinjiang on Islamic separatists who want to establish an independent state called East Turkestan. Some Chinese officials have blamed attacks on Muslim militants trained in Pakistan, though China's Foreign Ministry has refrained from public criticism of Pakistan. ... Full Story | Top |
China pulls workers from Syria, seeks Libya compensation
Tue,6 Mar 2012 09:58 PM PST
Reuters - BEIJING (Reuters) - China is bringing workers home from Syria, its Commerce Minister said on Wednesday, in an apparent attempt to avoid a repeat of last year's eleventh-hour rescue of Chinese nationals from Libya when violence engulfed the country. Only about 100 Chinese workers will be left behind to guard work camps and equipment, Minister Chen Deming said, without giving figures for the total number of Chinese citizens or projects in Syria. ... Full Story | Top |
Obama says new Iran talks should calm "drums of war"
Tue,6 Mar 2012 09:18 PM PST
Reuters -  WASHINGTON/BRUSSELS (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said an announcement of six-power talks with Iran offered a diplomatic chance to defuse a crisis over its nuclear program and quiet the "drums of war." EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who represents the United States, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany in dealings with Iran, announced Tuesday a fresh bid to allay suspicions that Iran is developing nuclear weapons after weeks of consultations with the other powers. ...
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Big powers meet at U.N. on "weak" U.S. Syria draft
Tue,6 Mar 2012 08:58 PM PST
Reuters - UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The five permanent U.N. Security Council members and Morocco met behind closed doors on Tuesday to discuss a U.S.-drafted resolution urging an end to the Syrian government's crackdown on demonstrators, a text some Western envoys said was too weak. It remains unclear whether the U.S. draft resolution, which follows two earlier proposed condemnations of Damascus that Russia and China vetoed, has any chance of success in the 15-nation council, which has been deadlocked over Syria's military operations against pro-democracy protesters for almost a year. The U.S. ... Full Story | Top |
Insight: China gambles on Cambodia's shrinking forests
Tue,6 Mar 2012 07:37 PM PST
Reuters -  BOTUM SAKOR, Cambodia (Reuters) - It was once the unspoiled jungle home for tigers, elephants, bears and gibbons. But today Botum Sakor National Park in southwest Cambodia is fast disappearing to accommodate a much less endangered species: the Chinese gambler. "This was all forest once," says Chut Wutty, director of the Natural Resource Protection Group, an environmental watchdog based in the capital, Phnom Penh, gesturing across a near-treeless landscape. "But then the government sold the land to rich men. ...
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Obama says Syria's Assad "will fall", U.N. assesses draft
Tue,6 Mar 2012 07:03 PM PST
Reuters -  WASHINGTON/BEIRUT (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said it was only a matter of time before Syrian President Bashar al-Assad left office, but squarely opposed a call to launch U.S. military action to force him out. Obama said what was happening in Syria was "heartbreaking and outrageous", and witness accounts of the devastation after government troops bombarded the rebel stronghold of Baba Amr into submission have given attempts to reach a diplomatic solution renewed urgency. "The atrocities we saw were beyond our imagination," said one former resident, speaking from a secret location. U.N. ...
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Insight: Japan missed tsunami wake-up call for change
Tue,6 Mar 2012 06:13 PM PST
Reuters -  TOKYO (Reuters) - Three months after Japan's March 11 triple disaster, a long-time expert on the country arrived in Tokyo to research a book he intended to entitle "Rebirth of a Nation." Months later, Richard Samuels is calling his work "The Rhetoric of Crisis." A year after the huge earthquake, deadly tsunami and the world's worst nuclear disaster in a quarter century jolted the country, it is clear that even a shock of such magnitude failed to snap it out of its economic and political torpor. "So far it seems there was more talk of change than change itself. ...
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Romney, Santorum look to Ohio for Super Tuesday breakthrough
Tue,6 Mar 2012 03:57 PM PST
Reuters -  COLUMBUS, Ohio (Reuters) - Mitt Romney fought to establish an unassailable lead over chief rival Rick Santorum in the race for the Republican U.S. presidential nomination, with Ohio the biggest prize among 10 states holding contests on Tuesday. Romney, the winner of the past five state contests, carried momentum into "Super Tuesday," the biggest day so far in the roller coaster Republican campaign. Some 419 of the 1,144 delegates needed to win the party's nomination are at stake. ...
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Stanford guilty of bilking investors of billions
Tue,6 Mar 2012 03:46 PM PST
Reuters -  HOUSTON (Reuters) - Allen Stanford was convicted on Tuesday of running a $7 billion Ponzi scheme, a verdict that caps a riches-to-rags trajectory for the former Texas financier and Caribbean playboy. It was a vindication for the U.S. government, which closed down Stanford's financial empire in February 2009 but had failed for years to address signs that the business was built on air. The Stanford case was the biggest investment fraud since Bernard Madoff's. Stanford was found guilty on 13 of 14 criminal counts, including fraud, conspiracy and obstructing an investigation by the U.S. ...
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Factbox: Key quotes as Obama, Republicans spar over Iran
Tue,6 Mar 2012 03:31 PM PST
Reuters - (Reuters) - Below are quotes about Iran on Tuesday from U.S. President Barack Obama and Republican presidential candidates Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich. ROMNEY IN AN OP-ED PUBLISHED BY THE WASHINGTON POST "The same Islamic fanatics who took our diplomats hostage are racing to build a nuclear bomb. Barack Obama, America's most feckless president since (Jimmy) Carter, has declared such an outcome unacceptable, but his rhetoric has not been matched by an effective policy. "The United States cannot afford to let Iran acquire nuclear weapons. ... Full Story | Top |
Obama says new Iran talks should calm "drums of war"
Tue,6 Mar 2012 03:23 PM PST
Reuters -  WASHINGTON/BRUSSELS (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said an announcement on Tuesday of six-power talks with Iran offered a diplomatic chance to defuse a crisis over its nuclear program and quiet the "drums of war." EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who represents the United States, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany in dealings with Iran, announced a fresh bid to allay suspicions that Iran is developing nuclear weapons after weeks of consultations with the other powers. ...
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Former Iceland central bank chief warned of looming crisis
Tue,6 Mar 2012 03:02 PM PST
Reuters -  REYKJAVIK (Reuters) - Iceland's former central bank chief had warned about the country's over-sized banks before they went bust in 2008, he said Tuesday at the trial of a former prime minister for failing to prevent the crisis. David Oddsson was speaking on the second day of witness hearings at the trial of Geir Haarde, the only political leader to face prosecution over the crisis that hit the world economy. He has denied the charges. Iceland's top three banks all collapsed in late 2008 after years of debt-fuelled expansion. ...
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Insight: Catch me if you can - oil sanctions against Iran
Tue,6 Mar 2012 03:00 PM PST
Reuters -  LONDON (Reuters) - International sanctions have a patchy history, and Iran's oil elite have been dodging them for decades. As Washington and its allies tighten the screws on Tehran over its nuclear program, Iran is coming up with new ways to sell its oil - offering special deals to allies China and India, delivering oil to clients and swapping it for gold and grain. Tehran may also be devising ways to make its oil more saleable on international markets, switching it between tankers and blending crudes to disguise the origin, oil trading and shipping sources have told Reuters. ...
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Two UK Murdoch journalists in apparent suicide bids
Tue,6 Mar 2012 03:00 PM PST
Reuters - LONDON (Reuters) - Two senior journalists working for Rupert Murdoch's News International have apparently attempted suicide as pressure mounts at the scandal-hit publisher of the now-defunct News of the World. Three sources close to the company told Reuters on Tuesday the two journalists at the Sun daily appeared to have tried to take their own lives. Investigations sparked by a phone-hacking scandal continue to expose dubious practices by present and past employees. ... Full Story | Top |
Big powers meet at U.N. on "weak" U.S. Syria draft
Tue,6 Mar 2012 02:51 PM PST
Reuters - UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The five permanent U.N. Security Council members and Morocco met behind closed doors on Tuesday to discuss a U.S.-drafted resolution urging an end to the Syrian government's crackdown on demonstrators, a text some Western envoys said was too weak. It remains unclear whether the U.S. draft resolution, which follows two earlier proposed condemnations of Damascus that Russia and China vetoed, has any chance of success in the 15-nation council, which has been deadlocked over Syria's military operations against pro-democracy protesters for almost a year. The U.S. ... Full Story | Top |
U.S. defense chief warns Iran on nuclear program
Tue,6 Mar 2012 02:05 PM PST
Reuters - WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta vowed on Tuesday that the United States would take military action to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon if diplomacy fails. "Military action is the last alternative when all else fails," he told an annual policy conference of the biggest U.S. pro-Israel lobbying group, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). "But make no mistake, when all else fails, we will act. ... Full Story | Top |
EU's Ashton accepts Iranian offer of nuclear talks
Tue,6 Mar 2012 02:05 PM PST
Reuters - BRUSSELS (Reuters) - European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton wrote to Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Tuesday, accepting an offer to meet to discuss Tehran's nuclear program. Ashton represents six powers - the United States, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany - in dealings with Iran, and her offer of talks came after weeks of consultations with them. It follows the expansion of sanctions by Europe and the United States to exert economic pressure and force Tehran to hold back on its nuclear program, which they fear aims to produce atomic weapons. ... Full Story | Top |
Hollande widens lead as French campaign drags: poll
Tue,6 Mar 2012 01:26 PM PST
Reuters -  PARIS (Reuters) - French presidential candidate Francois Hollande has widened his lead over his opponent, incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy, just seven weeks before the election but most voters find the campaign so far has been disappointing, a poll showed on Tuesday. The poll by CSA showed the Socialist Hollande getting 30 percent support in the first round of a two-round election, up two percentage points, while Sarkozy gained one point to 28 percent. ...
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Africans live in fear of inner-city arms depots
Tue,6 Mar 2012 01:13 PM PST
Reuters - BRAZZAVILLE (Reuters) - An arms depot blast which tore through Congo Republic's capital Brazzaville is a reminder that millions of Africans live dangerously close to munitions stored near thickly populated areas, an expert in the field said on Tuesday. Around 200 people were killed on Sunday in explosions which flattened entire districts of the riverside city. More than 1,300 were injured. It was the most lethal of a string of such accidents on the continent, following two blasts in Tanzania's commercial capital Dar es Salaam in 2011 and 2009 that together killed around 50. ... Full Story | Top |
Libyan leader says autonomy call a foreign plot
Tue,6 Mar 2012 01:00 PM PST
Reuters -  BENGHAZI, Libya (Reuters) - Delegates announced plans for greater autonomy Tuesday in the Libyan city of Benghazi, prompting an immediate warning from the central government of a foreign-inspired plot to break up the country. About 3,000 delegates in the eastern city announced they were setting up a council to run Cyrenaica, the province which is home to Libya's biggest oil fields, in defiance of the government in Tripoli. ...
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Al Qaeda says Yemen attack follows U.S. troop increase
Tue,6 Mar 2012 12:40 PM PST
Reuters - ADEN (Reuters) - The Yemeni branch of al Qaeda said Tuesday it attacked a U.S. intelligence officer after U.S. soldiers were sent to the country, whose new leader has vowed to fight the militant Islamist group. In a statement posted on an Islamist website, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula said the attack last week came after surveillance showed a rising U.S. military presence in the southern city of Aden. The Pentagon confirmed the attack but disputed the group's claim that it succeeded in killing its target. The identify of the person who came under attack has not been made public. ... Full Story | Top |
Obama: Syria's Assad "will fall," but no air strikes
Tue,6 Mar 2012 12:34 PM PST
Reuters -  WASHINGTON/BEIRUT (Reuters) - President Barack Obama said on Tuesday it was only a matter of time before Syria's President Bashar al-Assad left office, but added it was a mistake to think the U.S. could take unilateral action there. "Ultimately this dictator will fall," Obama said at a news conference, adding that it was not a question of if but when Assad would be forced out. But he squarely opposed a call by U.S. Senator John McCain who on Monday urged U.S. air strikes on Assad's forces. ...
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Syrian torture increasingly serious, U.N. investigator
Tue,6 Mar 2012 11:47 AM PST
Reuters - (Reuters) - A video aired by a British television station purporting to show Syrian patients being tortured in hospital appears to support increasingly grave allegations pointing to crimes against humanity, the U.N. torture investigator said on Tuesday. Juan Mendez, United Nations special rapporteur on torture worldwide, said that while he had not seen the Channel 4 video, it seemed in line with recent reports he has received on Syrian forces torturing opponents. "Unfortunately this new allegation is consistent with what my mandate (office) has been receiving over the last several months. ... Full Story | Top |
Gorbachev says Russia should discuss fresh election
Tue,6 Mar 2012 11:22 AM PST
Reuters - MOSCOW (Reuters) - Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev said Tuesday he was troubled by a presidential election in which Vladimir Putin claimed victory and called for a discussion of whether to hold a new election. Prime Minister Putin says he won the election fairly but international monitors said the vote was skewed in his favor. Putin's opponents accept that he won the most votes but say the official election results exaggerate his popularity. ... Full Story | Top |
Corrected: Belarus's Lukashenko: "Better a dictator than gay"
Tue,6 Mar 2012 10:13 AM PST
Reuters -  BERLIN (Reuters) - Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko Sunday criticized EU politicians who have threatened him with further sanctions and in an apparent reposte to the German Foreign Minister's branding him "Europe's last dictator," said: "Better to be a dictator than gay." Guido Westerwelle is Germany's first openly gay minister. European Union leaders at a summit in Brussels Friday called for new measures to pressure the Belarus President, in power since 1994, over alleged human rights abuses. ...
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U.S. wants "early" return of U.N. inspectors to North Korea
Tue,6 Mar 2012 09:31 AM PST
Reuters -  VIENNA (Reuters) - The United States hopes for an "early" return of U.N. nuclear inspectors to North Korea, three years after they were expelled from the Asian state, a senior U.S. official said on Tuesday. In a surprise move, North Korea last week said it would suspend nuclear tests, long-range missile launches and enrichment of uranium at its Yongbyon nuclear facility and allow back inspectors of the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency. It was part of a deal with the United States that could see the eventual resumption of nuclear disarmament talks that broke down in 2008. ...
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Russian protesters fear Putin will get tough
Tue,6 Mar 2012 08:50 AM PST
Reuters -  MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's opposition said on Tuesday they feared Vladimir Putin had decided to use force to smother their protests after riot police detained hundreds of demonstrators challenging his presidential election victory. After three months of peaceful anti-Putin protests, police hauled away more than 500 people, including opposition leaders, who attended unsanctioned protests in Moscow and St Petersburg on Monday or refused to leave after a rally that was permitted. ...
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"Honor killings" require tougher laws, say Iraqi women
Tue,6 Mar 2012 08:10 AM PST
Reuters - BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Near the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, a father doused his three teenage daughters with boiling water and shot them because, he told a court, he suspected they were having sex. Two died. He said he killed them to defend his honor. Murder in Iraq can carry a death sentence but under laws that activists say are far too lenient for so-called "honor killings," the father was jailed for just two years. Medical examinations showed the girls were virgins. The light sentence was a result of Article 409 of Iraq's penal code which is often used in cases of "honor killings" by men. ... Full Story | Top |
Ill-armed Syrian rebels wage unequal struggle
Tue,6 Mar 2012 08:08 AM PST
Reuters -  QUSAIR, Syria (Reuters) - The computer engineer from Homs had hoped to work in Dubai after his military service. Make some money, marry his fiancee. Carve out a comfortable life in Syria's slowly liberalizing economy. His dreams and those of thousands of other young Syrians collapsed when the revolt against President Bashar al-Assad, 46, broke out a year ago. ...
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Analysis: For Putin, dumping ally Assad may be step too far
Tue,6 Mar 2012 08:01 AM PST
Reuters - LONDON (Reuters) - As veteran mediator Kofi Annan prepares to visit Damascus to try to rein in Syria's turmoil, he could be forgiven for thinking his time would be far more usefully spent in Moscow, the Arab state's old strategic ally. Analysts say Russia is the one outside power that could determine whether the March 10 mission by the joint UN-Arab League special envoy prevents a fragmented global response from degenerating into a violent scramble for regional supremacy. ... Full Story | Top |
Ousted deputy leader of Pakistan Taliban favors government talks
Tue,6 Mar 2012 07:49 AM PST
Reuters - PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - A deputy leader of the Pakistan Taliban, reportedly ousted at the weekend by a militant council, still favors peace talks with the Pakistani government, he told Reuters on Tuesday. Maulvi Faqir Mohammad, who commands militants of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), or Pakistan Taliban, in the tribal region of Bajaur near the Afghan border, has reportedly been in talks with the government in Islamabad over a peace deal. The TTP, allied with the Afghan Taliban movement fighting U.S. ... Full Story | Top |
Two Palestinian children killed in West Bank explosion
Tue,6 Mar 2012 07:26 AM PST
Reuters - RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - Two Palestinian children were killed when abandoned ordnance exploded in the occupied West Bank on Tuesday, Palestinian officials said. Ramadan Awad, police chief in the city of Hebron, said two 12-year-old boys, Hamza and Zayed Jradat, were killed and three teenagers were injured when an old Israeli mortar exploded. The group had been playing in a field filled with scrap metal in the nearby village of Sier, Awad said. The Israeli military was investigating the report, a spokesman said. ... Full Story | Top |
Afghan government says likely to reach U.S. prison deal
Tue,6 Mar 2012 06:11 AM PST
Reuters - KABUL (Reuters) - An agreement on the transfer of U.S.-managed detention centers to Afghan authorities is likely soon, the Afghan presidential spokesman said Tuesday, a move that could advance efforts to reach a long-term strategic partnership. "Both sides are studying a memorandum of understanding now. I am optimistic we will reach an agreement in the next three days," the spokesman, Aimal Faizi, told Reuters. U.S. embassy officials were not immediately available for comment. ... Full Story | Top |
No policy shift from new North Korea leader despite nuclear deal
Tue,6 Mar 2012 05:37 AM PST
Reuters -  BEIJING (Reuters) - North Korea's willingness to cut a surprise deal with the United States on the future of its nuclear program does not signal any policy shift by the reclusive state's young new leader, a source with links to both Pyongyang and Beijing said. The source, speaking on condition of anonymity, also warned against applying pressure similar to sanctions on Iran to get it to jettison its nuclear ambitions, saying any perceived insincerity from Washington would quickly drive Pyongyang from the table. ...
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Iran to allow IAEA visit Parchin military site: ISNA
Tue,6 Mar 2012 05:29 AM PST
Reuters -  TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran said it will give the U.N. nuclear watchdog access to its Parchin military complex, ISNA news agency reported on Tuesday, a site where the agency believes Tehran pursued high explosives research relevant to nuclear weapons. An International Atomic Energy Agency report last year said that Iran had built a large containment chamber at Parchin, southeast of Tehran, to conduct explosives tests that are "strong indicators" of efforts to develop an atom bomb. ...
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Residents returning to Baba Amr: Syrian TV
Tue,6 Mar 2012 05:18 AM PST
Reuters - BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syrian state television aired footage of residents returning to the battered Homs district of Baba Amr on Tuesday while the Red Cross said it was still unable to deliver aid to the neighborhood. Footage showed dozens of men, women and children walking through grubby streets, passing pock-marked and semi-destroyed buildings. Baba Amr was shelled by Syrian forces for almost a month in February before rebels who are fighting President Bashar al-Assad's government fled the area last week. ... Full Story | Top |
Venezuela to ship more fuel to Syria as crackdown spreads
Tue,6 Mar 2012 05:18 AM PST
Reuters - CARACAS (Reuters) - Venezuela is readying a third shipment of diesel to the government of Syria even as President Bashar al-Assad intensifies a crackdown against protesters, said a Venezuelan lawmaker on Monday. Last month, Venezuela's government confirmed it had sent at least two shipments of fuel to Syria, potentially undermining Western sanctions as a rare supplier to the increasingly isolated Assad regime. ... Full Story | Top |
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