Syria has "categorically rejected" an Arab League resolution calling for a joint Arab-UN peacekeeping mission to end the country's 11-month conflict.
Yusuf Ahmed, Syria's envoy in Cairo, said the plan "reflected the hysteria of these governments".
Russia said it was studying the proposal but Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said violence must end before peacekeepers could be sent.
The UN General Assembly is set for a key debate on the crisis in Syria.
UN human rights chief Navi Pillay, who has been sharply critical of the actions of President Bashar al-Assad's government, is expected to address the assembly.
Earlier, the Arab League said it was ending all diplomatic co-operation with Syria, and promised to give "political and material support" to the opposition.
he league's moves come a week after a UN Security Council resolution on Syria, which would have endorsed a previous Arab League peace initiative, was vetoed by Russia and China.
The BBC's Jeremy Bowen in Cairo says the new resolution contains the toughest language on Syria by the Arab League so far and makes it much more likely that the issue will return to the Security Council.
The fact that they are considering these moves shows the extent of the Syrian regime's isolation, our correspondent adds.
But, he says, it remains to be seen whether Moscow will continue to lend its support to its old allies and trading partners.
The League's resolution also formally ends the observer mission it sent to Syria in December. It was suspended in January amid criticism that it was ineffective in the face of continuing violence.
The head of that mission, the controversial Sudanese General Mohammed al-Dabi, had submitted his resignation on Sunday.
Earlier, al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri backed the Syrian uprising in a video message, telling the opposition not to rely on the West or Arab countries for support.
There have been reports that US officials suspect al-Qaeda involvement in two deadly blasts in the second city of Aleppo last week.
Meanwhile, fresh violence in the Syrian city of Homs was reported on Monday.
"Tank shelling has been non-stop on Baba Amr and the bombardment on al-Waer [district] began overnight," activist Mohammad al-Hassan told Reuters.
Following a brief lull in fighting, at least four people were killed in Baba Amr on Sunday, the Syrian Observatory on Human Rights said.
At least 35 were reported dead on Saturday.
Activists say more than 400 people have been killed since security forces launched an assault on opposition-held areas on the city this month.
Human rights groups say more than 7,000 have died throughout Syria since last March. The government says at least 2,000 members of the security forces have been killed combating "armed gangs and terrorists".
Syria restricts access to foreign media and it is not possible to verify casualty figures.
www.bbc.co.uk
On Sunday, the job of making the argument for job-creation measures now and budget austerity later fell to Jacob J. Lew, Mr. Obama’s chief of staff and until recently his budget director, who made the rounds of five television talk shows.
“There’s pretty broad agreement that the time for austerity is not today. We need to go on a path where, over the next several years, we bring our deficit under control,” Mr. Lew said on the NBC program “Meet the Press.” “Right now we have a recovery that’s taking root, and if we were to put in austerity measures right now, it would take the economy in the wrong way.”
“The challenge,” Mr. Lew added, “is how do you do two things at the same time? How do you put money forward for things like the payroll tax holiday, for things like getting a jump-start on infrastructure, for building schools, and make the decisions for long-term deficit reduction? The president has proposed a plan that would do that.”
That combination — temporary, immediate stimulus measures, together with spending cuts and tax increases that would take effect only after 2012, when the economy presumably is stronger — is one that many economists and business leaders endorse. But as Mr. Obama starts his fourth year in office, explaining the two-track approach continues to test him and his administration.
In his budget Mr. Obama again will commit to $4 trillion in deficit reduction over 10 years, including $1.5 trillion in tax revenue from the wealthy and from closing some corporate tax breaks, and reductions in spending for a range of programs, including the military, Medicare, farm subsidies and federal pensions. But Republicans are sure to criticize the president’s proposals as heavy on gimmickry and double-counting, and reject his proposed tax increases.
For all the debate over deficits, Mr. Obama on Monday will highlight spending increases and tax cuts that he seeks, which are popular despite their impact on the federal debt.
He will start the year’s debate by releasing his budget plan outside Washington at Northern Virginia Community College, part of a statewide coalition of community colleges and employers that was among the first winners in September of federal grants to ensure that students are learning skills that businesses need. In his budget, Mr. Obama proposes to make that initiative an $8 billion multiyear effort.
The initiative is one of many — both temporary measures and programs intended to be permanent — that serve as a statement of Mr. Obama’s priorities in promoting government investment in infrastructure, manufacturing, education and job training, and innovation, even as he calls for considerable deficit reduction to counter the nation’s mounting debt.
Presidents of both parties typically do much the same, going into great detail about the budget’s winners and leaving the losers vague or unspoken. What makes Mr. Obama’s effort stand out is the sheer size of the proposed deficit reduction as the nation emerges from the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, a crisis that resulted in lower revenue for the Treasury and large doses of temporary spending and tax cuts to keep the economy from collapse.
In Congress, Democrats and Republicans continue to negotiate over a package that would extend a temporary two-percentage-point cut in workers’ payroll taxes through this year, along with unemployment compensation for those out of work for more than six months and a delay in a scheduled deep reduction in Medicare reimbursements to doctors.
“I do believe this will be extended,” Representative Paul D. Ryan, the Republican chairman of the House Budget Committee, said on the ABC program “This Week.” The two sides are split over how to offset the cost of the package, but lawmakers who worked over the weekend reported making progress.
The Obama budget request for fiscal year 2013, which begins Oct. 1, reflects the White House agreement with Congress last August to cut nearly $1 trillion over 10 years from annual discretionary spending, which covers most government programs but not the entitlement programs like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, whose costs, especially for the health programs, are driving the long-term projections of unsustainable debt.
In a summary of the budget released on Friday, the administration said “difficult trade-offs had to be made” to comply with the reduced levels of discretionary spending and still provide increases for the president’s priorities. But it did not disclose who got cut, only what was increased or newly created.
Congress is not likely to accept much of Mr. Obama’s budget, given Republicans’ opposition. Its value is more as a political document as he fights for re-election, contrasting his approach to the other party’s.
Mr. Obama will propose spending $476 billion over six years for transportation projects. Because federal fuel taxes will not cover the cost, he proposes to offset about half the cost with savings projected over 10 years from ending the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Republicans and some budget groups call that a gimmick, saying much of the money would not be spent anyway.
On “Fox News Sunday,” Mr. Lew countered, “I think that if we don’t lower the caps that permit that spending, there will be a natural process of seeing military spending grow.” He added, “I guarantee you that if we don’t take the action that’s been proposed, there will be leakage, and that money will end up being spent.”
Mr. Obama will propose $141 billion in spending for research and development over all, increasing nondefense research by 5 percent above the current level and maintaining his commitment to double the budgets of three federal research agencies.
Among new initiatives, Mr. Obama seeks a $5 billion competitive program to encourage states, school districts and teachers’ unions to coordinate in attracting and training more teachers, a new one-year tax credit for small businesses that increase their payroll, and tax incentives for manufacturers that bring jobs back from overseas or invest in depressed communities.
www.nytimes.com
Residents of the towns of Jaar and Azzan said two Saudis and one Yemeni were beheaded at dawn by the militant group Ansar al-Sharia.
A spokesman for the group later said none of those executed were Saudi citizens, but all three had been working for the intelligence services of the kingdom, a close ally of the United States.
A number of important figures in Al Qaeda' s wing in Yemen are Saudi militants wanted by the authorities in Riyadh.
The United States has been launching drone strikes against militants in the south. Last month, at least 12 people were killed in one such attack.
Federal prosecutors in the United States said Friday that Anwar al-Awlaki, a leader of Al Qaeda’s Yemen affiliate who was killed in a drone strike last year, had personally directed and approved the 2009 attempt to blow up an airliner over Detroit.
Weakened by months of protests against President Ali Abdullah Saleh, Yemen’s government has lost control of whole chunks of the country, giving Islamist militants room to tighten their grip in the south.
In Aden late on Saturday, witnesses said, separatists set fire to a tent camp housing about 100 antigovernment protesters, in opposition to an election on Feb. 21 to replace Mr. Saleh. About 10 people were injured.
Last year, southern separatists joined protesters calling for Mr. Saleh to leave, but the two sides have since grown apart.
The separatists want to revive a southern socialist state that was united with the north in 1990. They fear that the election will not serve their goal.
Anti-Saleh demonstrators broadly back the vote as a step toward ending his 33-year rule.
Northern Shiite rebels have said they too will boycott the vote, in which acting leader Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi is the sole candidate.
Mr. Saleh is in the United States receiving medical treatment for injuries inflicted during an assassination attempt, but he has said he will return home before the vote, shedding doubt on his commitment to leave office in line with a Persian Gulf-brokered plan to end a year of political upheaval.
http://www.nytimes.comThe boys, named Nasibullah and Azizullah, were described by officials from the National Directorate of Security, Afghanistan’s intelligence agency, as 12-year-olds who had been trained in Pakistani madrasas. The officials refused to give their names for security reasons.
Both boys appeared calm and outspoken at the news conference, and it was unclear if they understood the gravity of what it would mean to carry out suicide bombings.
Azizullah said he went to a madrasa in Quetta. The teachers told him, “ ‘You won’t be hurt; just go and carry out a suicide attack,’ ” he said.
There have been a number of children caught in the last two years with the intention of carrying out suicide attacks. Most have attended madrasas across the border in Pakistan and told to detonate the explosives near foreign soldiers or Afghan government security forces. The indoctrination is intense, with heavy pressure at the schools to engage in a holy war against the foreigners, said the intelligence officials in Kandahar.
Azizullah said that from the school, he was ferried across the border. He was arrested with a suicide vest in Kandahar, he said.
“Now I am requesting the government to forgive me and let me join my family. I won’t go back to the madrasa,” said Azizullah, who is from Gardez in Paktia Province.
The other boy, Nasibullah, has already been forgiven once. He said he was pardoned by Mr. Karzai during Ramadan last summer, but then returned to a madrasa in Pakistan where he was persuaded for a second time to carry out a suicide bombing.
Mr. Karzai follows the tradition of pardoning criminals during Ramadan, the Muslim holy month, and in 2011 he pardoned a dozen children who had been arrested either for planning or attempting suicide attacks. The children were mostly under the age of 12 and one was only 8, according to Afghan and foreign news reports.
“The last time I was arrested by officials, I was sent to Kabul and I was brought before President Karzai,” Nasibullah said at Sunday’s news conference. “Mr. Karzai asked me what had happened. I explained that the Taliban wanted me to carry out a suicide attack and they put a vest on me and said ‘you can carry out a suicide attack,’ but I was arrested by policemen. Karzai told me, ‘Don’t worry son, we will send you back home,’ and so he pardoned me.”
Nasibullah, who officials from the intelligence directorate said was originally from Pishin in the Baluchistan region of Pakistan, said he was hoping for a second reprieve. “I am again arrested by officials and now again I am requesting from the government to forgive me,” he said. “This time I won’t go back to the madrasa.”
Greek MPs have approved a controversial package of austerity measures, demanded by the eurozone and IMF in return for a 130bn euro ($170bn; £110bn) bailout.
The vote was carried by 199 in favour to 74 against.
Coalition parties expelled more than 40 deputies for failing to back the bill.
Tens of thousands protested in Athens, where there were widespread clashes and buildings were set on fire. Violent protests were reported in cities across the country.
Protesters outside parliament threw stones and petrol bombs, and police responded with tear gas. Scores of police and protesters were injured.
Prime Minister Lucas Papademos urged calm, insisting that the austerity package would "set the foundations for the reform and recovery of the economy".
"Vandalism, violence and destruction have no place in a democratic country and won't be tolerated," he said in a speech in parliament before the vote.
The bill passed parliament easily as the two largest parties in the coalition - Pasok and New Democracy - account for more than two-thirds of the deputies.
The austerity measures include:
Eurozone ministers must now ratify the measures at a meeting in Brussels on Wednesday before bailout funds can be released.
The ministers rejected proposals put forward by the Greeks last week, which they said fell 325m euros short of the cuts needed.
The BBC's Mark Lowen in Athens says the public are increasingly angry with the austerity measures and feel that the impact is beyond the value of the bailout.
At least 80,000 people were reported to have joined demonstrations in Athens, with another 20,000 protesting in Thessaloniki.
Running battles with police continued in the capital until late on Sunday, although no new clashes were reported after the vote.
Protesters hurled flares and chunks of marble torn up from the square. Some had tried to break through a cordon of riot police around the parliament.
Several historic buildings, including cafes and cinemas, were set alight.
Ioannis Simantiras, 34, said the protesters were boxed in by police.
"Nobody could get away from the gas," he told the BBC.
"When it engulfed everybody, and everybody was choking the police drew back and opened up a corridor for us away from the parliament - that's when everybody made a run for it."
Violent protests also spread to other Greek towns and cities, including the islands of Corfu and Crete, according to state TV.
Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos said the question was not "whether some salaries and pensions will be curtailed, but whether we will be able to pay even these reduced wages and pensions".
"When you have to choose between bad and worse, you will pick what is bad to avoid what is worse," he said.
Greece needs the bailout the make its next repayment on its huge sovereign debt.
If it cannot make the payment, it will default and in effect become bankrupt.
Analysts say such a "chaotic default" could endanger Europe's financial stability and possibly even leading to a break-up of the eurozone.
As part of the deal with international lenders, Greece will also be able to write off 100bn euros of privately held debt.
Earlier this week several ministers from the coalition government, including two from Pasok, quit in protest at the measures.
The leader of the far-right Laos party, the junior coalition member, announced his 15 deputies would not back the austerity measures.
George Karatzaferis complained that the measures amounted to Greeks being "humiliated" by Germany.
The eurozone bloc has demanded "strong political assurances" that the packages will be implemented regardless of which party wins a general election due in April.
http://www.bbc.co.uk
LAS VEGAS -- Newt Gingrich's increasingly quixotic quest for the
Republican presidential nomination will go on, even after he received a
drubbing in Saturday night's Nevada caucuses.
