US to press on trade in China talks

WASHINGTON: The United States said Monday it would press China on intellectual property rights and other key concerns as the world's two largest economies hold top-level trade talks next week.

The Commerce Department said that Vice Premier Wang Qishan would visit Washington on December 18-19 for the annual Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade, the main US-China forum to discuss trade policies.

US Trade Representative Ron Kirk called the forum "critical" for the future of the often fractious commercial relationship between the United States and China.

"This year, we're focused on delivering meaningful results on issues including enforcement of intellectual property rights, combating pressures to transfer technology, eliminating trade-distortive industrial policies and removing key obstacles to our exports," he said in a statement.

Trade has been a frequent irritant in relations, with the United States accusing China of hurting US companies by not cracking down on widespread counterfeiting and favoring domestic competitors.

China, in turn, has warned the United States against protectionism and called for the removal of restrictions on the sale of sensitive technologies.

The talks come in the wake of the US election, in which defeated Republican challenger Mitt Romney vowed to take a tougher stance on China over trade and other issues if he defeated President Barack Obama.

This year's talks will likely be the last involving longstanding players in trade negotiations, adding a level of uncertainty into future rounds.

Wang, an economic expert who is widely known and largely respected in Washington, was named last month as China's top official tasked with fighting corruption -- seen by the Communist Party as a major threat to its rule.

Kirk, a former mayor of Dallas, is widely expected to leave his position as the top US trade negotiator when Obama names his new cabinet.

-AFP/ac

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SEAL killed in Afghan rescue identified

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• The Defense Department identifies the SEAL slain in the rescue effort


• Dr. Dilip Joseph was among three abducted while returning from a rural clinic, officials say


• Two local Afghan leaders say smugglers were responsible; ISAF blames the Taliban

Read a version of this story in Arabic.

Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) -- The U.S. Defense Department on Monday identified the SEAL killed during a successful raid to free a captive doctor in Afghanistan.

Petty Officer 1st Class Nicolas D. Checque, 28, of Monroeville, Pennsylvania, died Saturday during the effort to free Dr. Dilip Joseph, the Navy said. NATO commanders believed Joseph was in imminent danger from his captors when the raid took place.

While the Defense Department announcement said only that Checque belonged to an "East Coast-based Special Warfare Unit," a U.S. official said the man was a member of the Navy's Special Warfare Development Group, more commonly known as SEAL Team Six. The elite unit is the same one that took part in the raid that killed al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

The official didn't know if the SEAL who died was involved in that operation.

"He gave his life for his fellow Americans, and he and his teammates remind us once more of the selfless service that allows our nation to stay strong, safe and free," President Barack Obama said of the slain SEAL before his identity was made public.

Armed men kidnapped Joseph and two other staff members for the international aid group Morning Star on Wednesday as they returned from a rural medical clinic in eastern Kabul province.

Tribal leader Malik Samad and district chief Muhammad Haqbeen told CNN that Joseph and an Afghan doctor were abducted near the village of Jegdalek in the Sarobi district, just outside Kabul.

The International Security Assistance Force said Taliban insurgents kidnapped the men. Samad and Haqbeen identified the kidnappers as smugglers.

Morning Star said negotiations began "almost immediately" with the captors and went on sporadically into Saturday night, when two of the three were released.

The Afghan doctor's family paid $12,000 to the smugglers, Haqbeen and Samad said. Morning Star denied paying any "ransom, money or other consideration" to win the release of its staffers, and the raid to free Joseph came 11 hours later after the other two were released.

U.S. officials provided few details about the rescue effort, but Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta said the SEALs "knew they were putting their lives on the line to free a fellow American from the enemy's grip."

Checque joined the Navy in 2002, according to a brief service record provided by the Defense Department. After attending recruit training in Illinois and advanced training in Virginia, he entered the seal program in April 2003.

He was assigned to his first SEAL unit in August 2004, and transferred to a second unit, presumably SEAL Team Six, in September 2008.

He received the Bronze Star and several other awards during his 10-year Naval career.

The rescued doctor, Joseph, has worked with Morning Star for three years. He serves as its medical adviser, and travels frequently to Afghanistan, the agency said.

Morning Star did not release the identities of the other two men, citing safety concerns.

Joseph is expected to return home to Colorado Springs, Colorado, within a few days, after medical examinations and debriefings, the agency sad.

On Sunday, his family extended condolences to the slain sailor's family.

"We are incredibly grateful for the multiple agencies of the U.S. government that have supported us in this difficult time, and especially the quick response by our military and partner allies to rescue Dilip," the family said. "They showed great heroism and professionalism."

Despite the kidnappings of Joseph and its two other staffers, Morning Star reiterated its "commitment to continue its work" in Afghanistan.

Read more: Low-key general thrust into spotlight as he takes over Afghanistan command

Read more: U.S. has work cut out to make sure Afghan forces are combat ready

Read more: Karzai says assassination try planned in Pakistan

CNN's Barbara Starr, Maria Ebrahimji, Deborah Doft and Greg Botelho contributed to this report.

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Chicago gang violence shows no signs of stopping

(CBS News) CHICAGO - There is a war going on -- not overseas, but right here on the streets of America. A gang war has taken over parts of Chicago.

Over the weekend, 14 people were shot. Two were killed.

So far this year, there have been more than 2,364 shootings and 487 homicides.

CBS News National Correspondent Dean Reynolds rode along with Commander Leo Schmitz of Chicago Police Department's 7th district. The area is a gang-related swath of the city's South Side. They started to drive as children were leaving school for the day.

"When you have them coming out of school, and there's any kind of gang conflicts, you've got a mix like fire and gasoline," Schmitz said.

The gangs are fighting a war over turf, drugs and money.

"It's crazy," he said. "What used to be a fist fight now turns into, 'Let's go to the guns,'" Schmitz said.

Bullet tax eyed in bid to curb Chicago crime

Report: Chicago shootings leave 9 dead, 28 wounded over the weekend

Chicago police sergeant: "Tribal warfare" on the streets

Shooting deaths are up 20 percent in the city this year, though in the 7th district Schmitz and his team have managed to cut homicides by 30 percent.

He credits better intelligence from informants, increased patrols and a citywide crime-tracking database.

"We use the knowledge," Schmitz said. "So, if there's a shooting right here, we know that the retaliation will be a block down."

The police gave us a bulletproof vest for the trip, and within minutes it because crystal clear why.

A block away, a man walking was a target. The suspect was fleeing the scene.

"He done shot at me right here!" the man said.

Police apprehended a Chicago suspect who allegedly shot another man. The shooting supposedly has roots in gang violence.

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CBS News

The commander and his men ran down the suspected shooter, 21-year-old Julian Gayles. Police think the shooting was probably gang-related.

The police also received the weapon. Schmitz described it as a 9mm Beretta.

"If you can see the hammer's already (up)," he said. "That means he just shot it."

Chicago has seized more guns this year than New York and Los Angeles combined. The violence is so bad that the heavily armed police now attend gang funerals to prevent revenge killings. Schmitz said he doesn't just want to maintain a level of clam.

"I want to win," Schmitz said. "So, we're going to always try to do better than we did before."

It didn't get much better this weekend. Among the victims was an off-duty cop.

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Syrian Ex-General: Assad Will Use Chemical Weapons

A former top general in Syria's chemical weapons program says he doesn't doubt for a moment that President Bashar al-Assad will deploy his chemical weapons arsenal as he tries to hold onto power and crush the uprising that started almost two years ago.

"The regime started to fall and deteriorate. It's coming to its end," said retired Major General Adnan Sillou in an interview in a hotel near Antakya, on Turkey's southern border with Syria. "It's highly possible that he'll start using [chemical weapons] to kill his own people because this regime is a killer."

Sillou told ABC News that until September 2008, he was chief of staff on the defensive side of the chemical weapons program. He said he was in charge of training soldiers against attacks and contact with the weapons, as well as procuring safety equipment to guard against them.

Courtesy Major-General Adnan Sillou

He listed mustard gas along with the sarin, VX and tabun nerve agents as the main elements in Syria's chemical arsenal, whose existence Syria doesn't even acknowledge. Foreign intelligence officials and analysts have focused on the first three as the main threats, and last week U.S. officials said there was evidence sarin had not only been moved, but its binary components, usually stored separately, had been combined and placed into bombs for use.

Sillou accuses Assad's forces of already spraying pesticides and dropping white phosphorous, claims also made by opposition activists.

"They're idiots, crazy. Simply they are killers," he said.

Sillou believes the regime could step it up to more serious chemical weapons if Aleppo, Syria's most populous city where fighting has raged for months, falls to the rebels.

In July, Sillou left Syria for Turkey almost four years after he said he retired from the military. Sillou told ABC News that in his last post, which he held for six years, he was second in command behind a man named Said Ali Khalil, a member of Assad's ruling Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam.

After defecting, Sillou said he was debriefed by an Arabic-speaking agent from the Central Intelligence Agency in Turkey's capital, Ankara. The meeting lasted three hours and was the last contact he said he had with them or any other intelligence agency.

Fighting is raging around the capital, Damascus, notably on the airport road where rebels are trying to take the airport to hamper outside support and deal a highly symbolic blow to the regime. The uptick in violence near the seat of Assad's power has raised American fears that he could resort to using his chemical weapons.

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Female lemurs avoid the wrong love in the dark

IT IS the ultimate voice-recognition system. Without ever meeting him, a female lemur still knows the call of her father.

The ability to identify family members is important to avoid inbreeding. For large-brained mammals like apes that engage in complex social interactions this is relatively straightforward. Now, a team has shown that nocturnal grey mouse lemurs appear to do the same, even though lemurs are reared exclusively by their mothers (BMC Ecology, doi.org/jvx).

Study leader Sharon Kessler of Arizona State University in Tempe, believes that the young lemurs may associate calls similar to their own, or to those of male siblings, with their fathers.

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Japan on alert as window opens for N. Korean rocket

TOKYO: Japan said Monday it was on full alert over North Korea's planned rocket launch as a 13-day lift-off window opened, despite a suggestion from Pyongyang that it could delay the much-criticised move.

North Korea said Sunday that the launch, originally scheduled for December 10-22, could be changed "for some reasons", giving no further details.

South Korea's Yonhap news agency, citing a government official in Seoul, later said the North had stopped all preparations at the launch site in the country's northwest.

Japan has deployed missile defence systems to intercept and destroy the rocket if it looks set to fall on its territory.

"We are taking all possible measures for vigilance," Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda told reporters as he entered his office on Monday before the launch window opened at 7:00 am (2200 GMT Sunday).

Defence Minister Satoshi Morimoto said Tokyo would keep a close eye on developments despite the comments from North Korea.

"We don't think enough changes are occurring to change our posture," he said. "We will maintain our current posture unless North Korea issues a formal notice or announcement" on the delay, he said.

Analysts said technical problems or snow, rather than overseas political pressure, are likely to be behind the delay in what the North calls a satellite launch.

The impoverished but nuclear-armed nation insists the long-range rocket launch -- its second this year after a much-hyped but botched mission in April -- is for peaceful scientific purposes.

But the United States, and allies South Korea and Japan, say Pyongyang plans a disguised ballistic missile test that violates UN resolutions triggered by its two nuclear tests in 2006 and 2009.

- AFP/ck

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Plane of missing singer found in Mexico

By CNN Staff

updated 7:16 PM EST, Sun December 9, 2012

The plane Jenni Rivera was flying in took off from Monterrey, Mexico, on Sunday morning, officials say.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• NEW: Officials say they found the wreckage of a plane believed to have been carrying Rivera


• NEW: "Everything points to that this is the plane," says a minister


• NEW: Besides Rivera, six others were on board


• The plane lost contact with air traffic controllers outside Monterrey, Mexico

Mexico City (CNN) -- Mexican authorities said Sunday they found the wreckage of a small plane that they believe was carrying singer Jenni Rivera.

Six others, including two pilots, were also thought to be on board the plane, which took off from Monterrey, Mexico, early Sunday and soon lost contact with air traffic controllers.

"Everything points to that this is the plane," Communication and Transportation Minister Gerardo Ruiz Esparza told CNN affiliate Foro TV, about a wreckage site in the northern state of Nuevo Leon.

Alejandro Argudin, director general of Civil Aviation, said he believes no one on board survived the crash.

"The aircraft was destroyed, totally fragmented," he told CNN affiliate Televisa.

The private LearJet took off from Monterrey at 3:15 a.m. and lost contact with air traffic controllers about 60 miles away, according to a statement from Mexico's transportation ministry. The Mexican-American singer had a concert in the northern Mexican city Saturday night.

Two helicopters were assisting in the search for the missing plane, which had as its destination the airport in Toluca, near Mexico City. The cause of the suspected crash was not immediately clear, and the ministry has opened an investigation.

Born in Long Beach, California, to Mexican immigrant parents, Rivera, 43, released her debut album in 1999, according to her website. She sings traditional Mexican ballads, and was nominated for a Latin Grammy Award in 2002 in the category of "Best Banda Album."

In October, People en Espanol named Rivera to its list of the 25 most powerful women.

Famous for her music, she is also known for her tumultuous personal life. Rivera was a single mom at the age of 15 and is the mother of five, her website said.

Rivera's "I Love Jenni" reality show began airing on Telemundo's mun2 network last year.

She is a judge on the popular TV show, "The Voice, Mexico," which was scheduled to air Sunday night. Noting its concern for Rivera, Televisa said it would air a special report on the singer instead.

A fellow judge on the show took to Twitter following news of Rivera's disappearance.

"My heart is devastated," wrote Beto Cuevas. "All my prayers are with you, Jenni, and your family."

CNNMexico.com contributed to this report.

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Boehner and Obama meet on "fiscal cliff"

President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, met at the White House Sunday for their first face-to-face meeting on the "fiscal cliff" in weeks, indicating that negotiations are continuing despite a public stalemate over the requirements for a deal.

The two have spoken over the phone as recently as Wednesday but on Friday, Boehner held a news conference to announce that "no progress" had been made.

While details of today's discussion weren't disclosed both Mr. Obama's and Boehner's spokesmen released the same exact statement to reporters, revealing some coordination - even if it's just how to talk to the press.

"This afternoon, the President and Speaker Boehner met at the White House to discuss efforts to resolve the fiscal cliff. We're not reading out details of the conversation, but the lines of communication remain open," Boehner spokesma Brendan Buck and White House deputy press secretary Josh Earnest separately emailed.

The "fiscal cliff" is a series of automatic spending cuts and tax increases that are set to go into affect at the beginning of the year unless Congress passes an alternative proposal. Most economists say the jolt to the economy would harm any recovery, and could throw the country back into recession.

Both sides have laid out their demands. Republicans are adamant that spending be greatly reduced, especially for entitlements. Democrats, however, are demanding that tax rates increase for the wealthy, something that some Republicans, including Boehner, have indicated is up for discussion.

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Remains of Banda Superstar Jenni Rivera's Jet Reported Found

UPDATED: Multiple reports, including one from Gerardo Ruiz Esparza, Mexico's Secretary of Communications and Transports, claim that the remains of the private jet carrying Jenni Rivera have been found, with no survivors. Rivera, 43, was one of seven passengers.

Rivera's parents are believed to be en route to Mexico. Her brother, fellow singer Lupillo Rivera, and eldest daughter Chiquis have still not made any statements.

Celebrity reactions on Twitter have poured in since news of the disappearance of Rivera's jet, including Paulina Rubio (who was set to co-host the Mexican edition of The Voice with Rivera) William Levy, Joan Sebastian, Ricky Martin, and others.

See also: Jenni Rivera Immortalized in new Track 'La Misma Gran Señora

Mexican officials have confirmed the disappearance of a private jet carrying regional Mexican music superstar Jenni Rivera that took off from the northern Mexican city of Monterrey at 3:15 a.m. local time on Sunday and fell off the radar 10 minutes (or 62 miles) after take-off.

The Learjet 25 jet is believed to have been carrying seven people – five passengers and two pilots. It was headed for Toluca International Aiport, located outside of Mexico City, where it was meant to arrive at 4:40 a.m. An official search for the jet was initiated at sunrise.

Rivera's publicist Arturo Rivera and her make-up artist Jacob Yebale are believed to have been on that flight. Their most recent tweets are of photos from Rivera's concert in Monterrey on Saturday night.

The Mexican American singer's most recent tweet is a re-tweet of what appears to be a fan's message.

Rivera was due in Toluca this evening for the taping of a Mexican TV show, La Voz. Televisa has canceled tonight's show given Rivera's disappearance.

Known as La Diva de la Banda and beloved by fans on both sides of the border, Rivera, 43, has had a groundbreaking career in regional Mexican music, selling some 15 million records. Among her many feats in a male-dominated genre, she made history in September 2011 when she sold out the Staples Center in Los Angeles, the first female regional Mexican artist to do so. Her reality show on mun2, I Love Jenni, is one of the network's highest rated shows. Rivera made her film debut at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival in the indie family drama Filly Brown, due in theaters in January 2013.

See Also: 'Filly Brown Gives Jenni Rivera a Chance to Grow and Gina Rodriguez a Chance to Shine

The Long Beach, Calif.-born singer's personal life has often called for as much attention as her career. A mother of five, Rivera had filed for divorce from baseball player Esteban Loaiza in October after two years of marriage, citing "irreconcilable differences." Soon after, rumors of an affair between Loaiza and Rivera's own daughter Chiquis surfaced, which Chiquis addressed on Twitter in October by saying, "I would NEVER do that, Ever! That's a horrible accusation."

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