Tsunami warning after quake off Alaska

OFFICIALS have cancelled a tsunami warning for parts of southern Alaska and coastal Canada.

The Alaska Tsunami Warning Centre says a tsunami was generated by a strong earthquake, but the waves don't pose a threat to the areas.

The centre says some areas are seeing small sea level changes, but there will be no widespread destructive wave that had earlier been warned about.

The warning area included coastal areas from Cape Fairweather, Alaska, to the north tip of Vancouver Island, Canada. The area extended for more than 1,125 kilometres.

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Tsunami warning canceled for Alaska, Canada

OFFICIALS have canceled a tsunami warning for parts of southern Alaska and coastal Canada.

The Alaska Tsunami Warning Centre says a tsunami was generated by a strong earthquake, but the waves don't pose a threat to the areas.

The centre says some areas are seeing small sea level changes, but there will be no widespread destructive wave that had earlier been warned about.

The warning area included coastal areas from Cape Fairweather, Alaska, to the north tip of Vancouver Island, Canada. The area extended for more than 700 miles.

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Cooler weather helps Vic firefighters

Victorian firefighters hope to gain control over two major bushfires as the temperature cools. Source: AAP

FIREFIGHTERS are making progress against a major bushfire in Victoria's southwest.

About 40 trucks and several aircraft were at the scene of the blaze at Kentbruck, in the state's southwest, on Saturday.

The fire began in a pine plantation on Friday and has so far burned more than 2700 hectares in the Lower Glenelg National Park area.

No property is under threat, but smoke from the fire is visible several hundred kilometres away.

As the temperature cooled, Victorian firefighters made the most of conditions.

At Ensay in East Gippsland a blaze which burned out of control about 7km north of the town has been contained.

Crews will remain on site overnight, patrolling the fire edge and mopping up.

Temperatures on Saturday were much cooler than Friday, when the mercury peaked above 40C across much of the state.

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Afghan govt releases 80 Taliban prisoners

SOME 80 Taliban prisoners once held at the US military Bagram jail have been released by the Afghan government amid hopes that it might help reconciliation efforts.

Their release was secured through a special complaints committee that looked into each case.

Most of them had been incarcerated without charge, said a senior member of the High Peace Council, a government initiative seeking peace and reconciliation efforts with the Taliban insurgency, which has been waging a deadly war for more than 11 years.

"Many were imprisoned on political grounds ... We hope their release will strengthen the peace efforts," council member Ismail Qasimyar said.

"We want those who have been released to be peace workers and spread the word of peace."

A total of 275 prisoners had already been released from Bagram jail, which hosts around 3000 inmates and came under Afghan control in September.

A further 585 prisoners are to be released in the coming days, General Ghulam Farooq Barakzai, the commander of the Bagram Jail, told reporters, adding that a total of 1200 prisoners are set to be freed in the coming months.

"Justice causes security and stability. If we fear an individual's release will cause an effect on security, we will keep him jailed," he stressed.

Last year, an Afghan government investigation found "many cases of violations" of Afghan law and human rights at the then US-run Bagram prison, which is located north of Kabul city.

The Afghan government also accused the United States military of holding some prisoners for more than two years without charge.

The mood was sombre during Friday's release ceremony, which was held inside the infamous Pul-e-Charkhi jail in the Afghan capital.

Obaidullah, an Afghan teacher, was one of those released on Friday. He had spent 20 months in Bagram after being arrested during a US special forces raid on a school in eastern Logar province.

Teary-eyed, his relatives greeted him and handed him a mobile phone to talk to his family in the village.

"They arrested me without any reason. Later they told me that I had links with the Haqqani network and the Taliban," he said.

"They could not find any proof. Now I am free."

Obaidullah said he was tortured mentally, with the US army keeping him in an uncomfortable position for hours each day.

He was also kept in a dark cold room without any blankets for weeks, he said, and could leave the room only for one hour each day.

On many occasions, his meals were limited to one a day, he alleged.

"We all faced different types of problems ... I am still suffering from deep mental pressure," he said, adding he was still surprised as to why he had been arrested in the first place.

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Man seriously hurt in Qld machete attack

A MAN is in a critical condition in hospital with serious head injuries after being attacked with a knife and a machete by two men at Landsborough in the Sunshine Coast hinterland.

Police said the 49-year-old victim also suffered wounds to his arms in the attack about 2.15pm (AEDT) on Friday.

He was taken to the Nambour Hospital where he is in a critical condition.

Police want anyone who saw a vehicle leave Gateway Avenue or any suspicious activity around the time of the incident to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.

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Death report as Tas bushfire razes homes

TASMANIAN police are investigating reports of a death in a huge bushfire in the state's south that has destroyed homes, and damaged a school and an RSL club.

Police say up to 65 buildings could have been damaged or destroyed in the small community of Dunalley, 55 kilometres southeast of Hobart.

Damaged buildings include the local school, the RSL club, a service station and houses, ABC television reported.

Around 15 houses at nearby Boomer Bay could also have been lost as the impact of catastrophic fire conditions in southern Tasmania begins to emerge.

Tasmania deputy police commissioner Scott Tilyard said a team was on the ground to investigate a fire crew's concerns that a man may have been trapped while trying to defend his house.

"We can't at this early stage rule out that there has been loss of life," Mr Tilyard told reporters in Hobart.

He said around 50 people were awaiting the arrival of police boats to help them leave the waterfront near the top of the Tasman Peninsula where they had taken refuge.

The Tasman Peninsula, including the popular Port Arthur tourist destination, was completely cut off by the closure of the major Arthur Highway.

Around 600 people were taking refuge at temporary accommodation at Nubeena and 1500 people were reported to have visited the Port Arthur convict ruins on Friday.

"Those people are being looked after as best we can," Mr Tilyard said.

"The main thing is they are safe."

People had also been told to leave the beachside town of Dodges Ferry.

Fire crews were monitoring potential spot fires further south at Eaglehawk Neck and banking on a southerly change due late on Friday night to stop the fire from spreading.

Huge plumes of smoke were visible from Hobart as the island capital sweltered through its hottest day on record. The temperature reached 41.8C at 4.05pm (AEDT), the hottest it has been since record keeping started in 1883.

Winds gusting to 100km/h whipped up the two largest blazes that had started on Thursday; at Forcett, near Dunalley, and Lake Repulse near Mt Field National Park northwest of Hobart.

Tasmania Fire Service (TFS) Chief Officer Mike Brown said conditions on Friday had reached the catastrophic level in the rating system that was developed after the Black Saturday fires in Victoria.

"We reached catastrophic fire danger ratings at times during this afternoon," Chief Officer Brown told reporters.

"I don't think we're quite out of the woods yet."

The threat posed by the second major fire, which authorities suspect was started by a campfire, had eased by Friday night.

A grass fire at Epping in the state's north had been contained, but reports had emerged of a property being lost near Bicheno on the east coast.

Mr Brown said the change would bring lower temperatures and higher humidity but little rain.

"Tonight we still consider that there's a serious danger," he said.

Acting premier Bryan Green said the state government would provide whatever emergency assistance was needed and would liaise with the federal government.

Authorities say smoke is likely to be visible for several hours and people sensitive to it should stay indoors.

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Bid to restore Vic fire website and app

WORK is under way to restore Victoria's Country Fire Authority (CFA) website to full capacity.

The crash occurred as the state sweltered through its hottest day in several years. At some points up to 700 people a second tried to access the website and FireReady App.

In a statement late on Friday, Victoria's fire services commissioner Craig Lapsley said he had asked CFA chief Mick Bourke to investigate why some people were still experiencing delays on the website.

Mr Lapsley said the CFA would work throughout the weekend to respond to the issue as a "key priority".

"We recognise it has been frustrating for people who rely on the website and app for fire information," he said.

"Seeking out the appropriate information is exactly what we have been asking the community to do and we know people are relying on this technology to keep themselves updated about their fire risk."

The capacity of the website and the FireReady App were increased after the crash.

Mr Lapsley says important fire information is also available from ABC radio, SKY NEWS, and CFA social media channels such as Facebook and Twitter as well as the Victorian Bushfire Information Line on 1800 240 667.

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Chavez suffers lung woes, aides allege war

VENEZUELA'S government has accused opposition leaders of waging a "psychological war" to destabilise the country, as cancer-stricken president Hugo Chavez battles a serious lung infection.

The hardline stance was adopted after Vice President Nicolas Maduro returned from a visit with the ailing Chavez in Cuba, where he is suffering from complications more than three weeks after undergoing cancer surgery.

Information Minister Ernesto Villegas said on Friday Chavez developed a "severe pulmonary infection" after the surgery.

Villegas then levelled the charge that the president's health had become the target of a campaign to destabilise the government and end its socialist revolution.

The government "warns the Venezuelan people about the psychological war that the transnational media complex has unleashed around the health of the chief of state, with the ultimate goal of destabilising the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela," he said in a televised statement.

The statement came amid rising demands at home for a detailed accounting of Chavez's condition and whether he is fit to take the oath of office on January 10 for another six year term.

Venezuela's constitution calls for new elections to be held within 30 days if the president is unable to take the oath of office.

But Maduro and National Assembly speaker Diosdado Cabello, the regime's number two and three leaders, made clear on their return from Cuba that they were not preparing for a transfer of power.

"Here there is only one transition and it began at least six years ago and it was decreed by comandante Hugo Chavez," Maduro said, referring to the launch in 2006 of the president's socialist revolution.

Maduro and Cabello spoke on Venezuelan state television, as they toured a coffee packaging plant in Caracas that had been taken over by the state.

Both men went out of their way to deny rumours of an internal power struggle between them, with Maduro saying they had sworn before Chavez that they would remain united.

"We are here more united than ever," said Maduro, who is Chavez's handpicked successor. "And we have sworn before comandante Hugo Chavez, and we reaffirmed to him today in our oath ... that we would be united with our people."

Referring to the reported rift, Cabello said the opposition would have to wait "2000 years for that to happen" and said "no conciliation is possible with this opposition".

Maduro accused the opposition of "lies and manipulation", a campaign to try to create uncertainty.

"We know that the United States is where these manipulations are being managed," he said. "They think that their time has come. And we have entered a kind of crazy hour of offensive by the right, here and internationally."

It was unclear whether Maduro was referring to US-based Venezuelans or the US government.

A leading opposition leader, Henrique Capriles, who was defeated by Chavez in October's presidential election, has indicated that he would be willing to accept a delay in next week's scheduled inauguration ceremony.

Capriles, former governor of the state of Miranda, is seen as a possible presidential challenger.

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Superstorm Sandy tops insurance claims

A LEADING insurance company says natural disasters cost the industry $US65 billion ($A62.20 billion) last year and Superstorm Sandy accounted for nearly two-fifths of the total.

However, Munich Re AG said on Thursday total insured losses from natural catastrophes were down from a record $US119 billion in 2011, when devastating earthquakes in Japan and New Zealand cost the industry dear.

The company said total economic costs in 2012 from natural disasters - including uninsured losses - amounted to $US160 billion, compared with the previous year's $US400 billion.

Sandy was blamed for at least 120 deaths when it battered eastern coastline areas at the end of October.

New York, New Jersey and Connecticut were the hardest-hit states.

Munich Re estimated insured losses from Sandy at $US25 billion and total losses at $US50 billion.

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Tycoon blames government for land prices

A CHINESE property tycoon is blaming a government "land famine" for high property prices after he paid one billion yuan ($A153.10 million) for a plot in Beijing.

Ren Zhiqiang, a prominent real estate tycoon, paid the mammoth price for development land in a suburb of the capital before turning to Weibo, China's version of Twitter, where he has 13 million followers.

"For fear of sky-high prices, (the government) has stopped holding many land auctions and reduced the supply of land, creating a land famine that has led to sky-high prices," he said on Thursday.

"Does the government think it can control property price increases by reducing the land supply?

"This is neither good for companies nor for society," he added. "But to survive in a land monopoly and shortage means doing whatever you can."

Ren's purchase was a soaring 490 per cent above the auction starting price, the highest such premium since 2010, the Beijing News said, marking an extreme case of the spiralling prices that China has struggled for years to control.

Authorities are concerned that escalating prices could shut more ordinary homebuyers out of the market, fuelling discontent and possible social unrest.

Measures announced in early 2010 have ranged from restrictions on second and third home purchases, higher down payments and taxes in some cities on multiple homes and homes owned by outsiders.

The restrictions have frustrated players such as Ren and cooled the once red-hot market, with analysts estimating that prices nationwide have risen only four to seven per cent since then.

But pent-up demand, easing government monetary policy and inflows of speculative funds from abroad have brought the property market out of the doldrums.

Some Weibo users shared Ren's frustration, with one lamenting that high prices were "good for the government, of no choice for the developer and bad for homebuyers".

But others blamed the businessman, with one pointing out: "How could you buy at such a high price? Doesn't that make you an accomplice?"

"Crocodile tears!" wrote another.

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German jobless rate up to 6.7 percent

GERMANY'S unemployment rate crept up to 6.7 per cent in December due to seasonal factors and a more sluggish economy, but the labour market remained robust.

The Federal Labor Agency said on Thursday the unadjusted jobless rate was up from 6.5 per cent in November.

About 2.84 million people were registered unemployed in Germany, Europe's biggest economy - 80,000 more than the previous month and 60,000 higher than a year earlier.

Germany's economy has enjoyed robust growth that kept down unemployment even as many debt-troubled European partners have seen output shrink and joblessness soar.

Still, the economy saw slower growth in 2012 than in previous years.

In seasonally adjusted terms, the unemployment rate was static at 6.9 per cent in December, while the number of jobless was 3000 higher than the previous month.

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China denies rejecting journo's visa

BEIJING has denied rejecting the visa of an Australian journalist working for the New York Times after the paper - which has published a series of exposes on Premier Wen Jiabao's family - said he had been forced to leave mainland China.

Chris Buckley, a longstanding China correspondent recently employed by the New York Times, departed Beijing for Hong Kong on Monday after the authorities did not issue him a working visa for 2013, the newspaper said.

"There has not been any so-called rejection," an official from the spokesman's office of the ministry of foreign affairs told AFP in response to faxed questions about Buckley on Thursday.

His visa application was still being processed, she said, adding that at present it "did not meet all requirements, but has not been delayed".

The official declined to give her name and also refused to specify which requirements had not been fulfilled, adding that Buckley "should be clear about that himself".

The Foreign Correspondents' Club of China, which represents foreign journalists in the country, said on Thursday it "strongly regrets" what it called "delays" in Buckley's accreditation.

In a statement it linked the apparent delay to a Times investigation into the huge riches amassed by the family of Wen, who is soon to step down as premier.

The New York Times in October published reports saying relatives of Wen have controlled assets worth at least $2.7 billion during his tenure.

Lack of clarity over Buckley's accreditation "inevitably raises suspicions that the authorities are punishing the New York Times" for the articles, the statement said.

Buckley, who has worked as a reporter in China for 12 years, was previously employed as a correspondent for Britain-based newswire Reuters, and rejoined the New York Times in October.

David Barboza, the New York Times Shanghai bureau chief who wrote the Wen articles, was among six other New York Times correspondents in China who had their visas renewed.

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Russia's oil output hits post-Soviet high

WORLD energy power Russia says its 2012 oil output hit a post-Soviet record high while natural gas production declined amid stalling European sales.

The energy ministry's reporting unit said on Wednesday oil and gas condensate production grew by 1.3 per cent last year to reach 518.0 million tonnes or 10.4 million barrels per day.

Russia had established its previous post-Soviet high in 2011 when output stood at 10.28 million barrels per day.

Its current rate outpaces that of Saudi Arabia and clinches for Russia the title of the world's biggest oil producer.

But Russia lacks the quick ability of Saudi Arabia to boost output in case of a global economic rebound or more serious turmoil in the Middle East.

The state-owned oil firm Rosneft accounted for 22.8 per cent of Russia's oil market - its share this year expected to reach more than 40 per cent following its October acquisition of the Anglo-Russian venture TNK-BP.

But Russia's natural gas production fell by 2.3 per cent to 655.0 billion cubic metres as its European sales shrivelled up.

Production of the state natural gas giant Gazprom was reported at 478.8 billion cubic metres - well off its 2011 figure of 513.1 billion cubic metres.

The drop reflects the reality that almost all of Gazprom's foreign sales are focused on European and post-Soviet countries which are now experiencing some of the slowest growth rates in the world.

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Goldfinger scene is Bond favourite: poll

A sucessful Goldfinger would have brought Bond's fame, and philandering, to an end. Source: Supplied

IN a scene voted the all-time favourite by James Bond fans, 007 is strapped to a table, a laser beam creeping towards his crotch. He asks his adversary: "Do you expect me to talk?"

Goldfinger exclaims: "No, Mr Bond, I expect you to die."

A poll of 2500 people in the homeland of Her Majesty's Secret Service asked fans to name the best scene in a 007 film, with the sequence from 1964's Goldfinger emerging a clear winner with 10.3 per cent of votes.

On hearing the result, current Bond Daniel Craig acknowledged the scene "would take some beating".

The survey was conducted by Sky Movies HD at the end of 2012, a year which celebrated half a century of Bond films.

Naked, golden dead woman is perhaps as famous as the winning scene, but not so popular.

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US sperm donor fights child support bid

A SPERM donor in Kansas is fighting a state effort to force him to pay child support for a child conceived through artificial insemination by a lesbian couple.

William Marotta, 46, told The Topeka Capital-Journal he's "a little scared about where this is going to go, primarily for financial reasons".

When he donated sperm to Angela Bauer and Jennifer Schreiner in 2009, Marotta relinquished all parental rights, including financial responsibility.

When Bauer and Schreiner filed for state assistance this year, the state demanded the donor's name so it could collect child support for the now three-year-old girl.

The state contends the agreement between Marotta and the women is not valid because Kansas law requires a doctor to perform artificial insemination.

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Angola stampede kills 10

TEN people, including four children, have died in a stampede during a religious gathering at a sports stadium in Luanda, the Angolan capital.

Angop, the Angolan news agency, cited officials as saying on Tuesday 120 people were also injured.

The incident happened on New Year's Eve when tens of thousands of people gathered at the stadium and panic ensued.

Faustino Sebastiao, spokesman for the national firefighters department, says those who died were crushed and asphyxiated.

The event in the southern African nation was organised by the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God, an evangelical group founded in Brazil.

In western Africa, a crowd in Ivory Coast stampeded after leaving a New Year's fireworks show early on Tuesday, killing 61 people and injuring more than 200.

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Iran warning to foreign jets, ships

IRAN'S navy has issued dozens of warnings to foreign planes and warships that approached its forces during a five-day sea manoeuvre near the strategic Strait of Hormuz.

Admiral Amir Rastgari said naval and air defence forces on 30 occasions hade warned off reconnaissance planes, drones and warships belonging to "extraregional forces" that approached the drill, using a term that the Islamic Republic commonly employs to refer to the militaries of the US and its allies.

The five-day naval drill, dubbed Velayat-91, is Iran's latest show of strength in the face of mounting pressures over its disputed nuclear program. The West suspects it may be aimed at producing nuclear weapons, a charge Iran denies.

Iran has threatened to close the strait over Western sanctions but has not repeated the threats lately. The strait is the passageway for one-fifth of the world's oil supply.

Rastgari said the aircraft and warships heeded the warnings and stayed away.

"Various reconnaissance aircraft that sought to penetrate into the drill area were given warnings by the navy and the Khatam-ol-Anbia (air defence force)," he said.

"Subsequently, the intelligence planes and drones distanced from the area after receiving the warnings."

Iran has used the manoeuvres to highlight its newly developed weapons systems.

State TV said Ghader (Capable), a sea-launched anti-ship missile with a range of 200 kilometress, was among the weapons used in the final day of navy drills on Tuesday.

The Ghader missile was delivered in late 2011 to the Iranian military and the powerful Revolutionary Guard's naval division, which is assigned to protect Iran's sea borders. Iranian officials say the missile can skim the sea to avoid detection and can sink large warships.

Iran's growing arsenal includes short- and medium-range ballistic missiles that are capable of hitting targets in the region such as Israel and US military bases in the Gulf.

The Iranian government began a military self-sufficiency program in 1992 under which it produces a large range of weapons including tanks, missiles, jet fighters, unmanned drone aircraft and torpedoes.

The manoeuvres cover nearly one million square kilometres from the Strait of Hormuz to the northern part of the Indian Ocean, including the Sea of Oman.

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Charity workers shot dead in Pakistan

SIX women and a man working for a charity have been shot dead in a drive-by shooting after they left a community centre in northwest Pakistan.

All the victims were Pakistani citizens and the incident happened on Tuesday in the Swabi area, close to a junction for the motorway which connects the northwestern city of Peshawar to the capital Islamabad and the eastern city of Lahore.

Swabi district police chief Abdul Rashid Khan confirmed seven deaths.

"They were on their way back home when unknown gunmen on a motorcycle opened fire on their vehicle," he told AFP.

"Six women and a man have died. The driver is injured. We are investigating the motives of the attack."

At least five of the women were teachers.

Police said the victims worked for a local charity involved with health and education, and they were attached to a community centre in a Swabi village.

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Aleppo airport closed due to rebel attacks

THE international airport in Syria's second city of Aleppo has been temporarily closed due to repeated attacks by rebel fighters.

"There have been continued attempts by opposition militants to target civilian aircraft, which could cause a humanitarian disaster," an airport official told AFP on Tuesday.

The official said the critical transportation hub would be closed for a "very short period of time" while the army worked to regain control of surrounding areas where large numbers of rebels have set up base.

Fighting in Aleppo, located in the largely rebel-held north of Syria, has been at a stalemate for months since opposition fighters launched a massive assault on the former commercial hub in mid-July.

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Ivory Coast NYE stampede kills 60

AT least 60 people have died and dozens have been injured in Abidjan as crowds stampeded during celebratory New Year's fireworks, Ivory Coast rescue workers say.

The head of military rescue workers, Lieutenant Colonel Issa Sako, told public television on Tuesday that "60 people" died and 200 were injured based on a preliminary toll.

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Asian markets weighed by US fiscal cliff

ASIAN markets fell in New Year's Eve-shortened trade as hopes that US lawmakers will reach a deal to avert the fiscal cliff faded just a day before a deadline.

However on Monday there was some bright news out of China, where a survey by HSBC showed manufacturing activity hit a 19-month high in December.

Hong Kong closed flat, edging down 9.67 points to 22,656.92, but it closed out the year 22.91 per cent higher.

Sydney closed 0.48 per cent lower, shedding 22.4 points to 4,648.9, although the index is up 14.60 per cent over the past 12 months.

Wellington was 0.35 per cent lower, shedding 14.39 points to 4,066.51, but adding 24.51 per cent for 2012.

In the afternoon Shanghai surged 1.12 per cent.

Tokyo, Seoul, Taipei, Jakarta, Bangkok and Manila were all closed for public holidays.

Despite the losses on Monday all the region's stock markets ended the year higher, with Bangkok the standout performer, surging almost 36 per cent, while Shanghai was the weakest, adding less than three per cent over the 12 months.

Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill ended Sunday without reaching a compromise over a deficit-cutting budget that would be less painful than the deep spending cuts and tax hikes due to take effect on Tuesday.

Leaders remained locked in talks that appeared to be making little headway, with each side blaming the other as analysts warned the measures could tip the economy into recession.

Senate Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell warned that, despite through-the-night talks, negotiators were still a long way from success, with Democrats not responding to a "good faith offer" from his party.

Senate Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid agreed talks were at a standstill, adding: "There is still significant distance between the two sides, but negotiations continue."

If talks fail on Monday President Barack Obama has demanded a vote on his fallback plan that would preserve lower tax rates for families on less than $250,000 a year and extend unemployment insurance for two million people.

But Stan Shamu, a market strategist at IG in Sydney, said he expected some sort of plan to come out.

"No one knows how this will play out, but the most likely scenario is a patch-up deal to avoid a fiscal catastrophe in the New Year," he told Dow Jones Newswires.

On currency markets the euro rose to $US1.3207 from $US1.3217 in late US trade Friday, but the US dollar rose to 86.06 yen from 85.98 yen. The Japanese unit continued to be weighed by expectations the country's central bank will unveil fresh monetary easing measures next month.

The euro bought 113.67 yen from 113.62 yen.

News out of Beijing was better, however, with banking giant HSBC saying its final purchasing managers' index (PMI) of the year hit 51.5, up from 50.5 in November and a fourth straight month of improvement.

A reading above 50 indicates expansion in the key sector, while one below signals shrinkage.

The figures reinforce recent indications that the world's second-largest economy is finally emerging from its slumber.

"Such a momentum is likely to be sustained in the coming months when infrastructure construction runs into full speed and property market conditions stabilise," Qu Hongbin, HSBC's chief economist for China, said in the release.

On oil markets New York's main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in February, shed 28 cents to $US90.85 a barrel and Brent North Sea crude for February slipped one cent to $US110.61.

Gold was at $US1,660.60 at 0445 GMT compared with $US1,658.90 late Friday.

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Over it - banish the term fiscal cliff

SPOILER alert: This story contains words and phrases that some people want to ban from the English language. 'Spoiler alert' is among them. So are 'kick the can down the road,' 'trending' and 'bucket list'.

A dirty dozen have landed on the 38th annual List of Words to be Banished from the Queen's English for Misuse, Overuse and General Uselessness.

The nonbinding, tongue-in-cheek decree released on Monday by northern Michigan's Lake Superior State University is based on nominations submitted from the United States, Canada and beyond.

Spoiler alert, the seemingly thoughtful way to warn readers or viewers about looming references to a key plot point in a film or TV show, nevertheless passed its use-by date for many, including Joseph Foly, of Fremont, California.

He argued in his submission the phrase is "used as an obnoxious way to show one has trivial information and is about to use it, no matter what."

The phrase receiving the most nominations this year is 'fiscal cliff', banished because of its overuse by media outlets when describing across-the-board federal tax increases and spending cuts that economists say could harm the economy in the new year without congressional action.

University spokesman Tom Pink said that in nearly four decades, the Sault Ste. Marie school has "banished" around 900 words or phrases, and somehow the whole idea has survived rapidly advancing technology and diminishing attention spans.

Nominations used to come by mail, then fax and website, he said, and now most come through the university's Facebook page. That's fitting, since social media has helped accelerate the life cycle of certain words and phrases, such as this year's entry 'YOLO' - "you only live once."

"The list surprises me in one way or another every year, and the same way every year: I'm always surprised how people still like it, love it," he said.

As usual, the etymological exercise - or exorcise - only goes so far. Past lists haven't eradicated 'viral,' 'amazing,' 'LOL' or 'man cave' from everyday use.

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Sydney's firework go off with a roar

Sydney's lord mayor says the city is spending $6.6 million on its New Year's Eve event. Source: AAP

SYDNEY'S skyline has exploded in gold, pink, green and blue as part of the traditional New Year's Eve family-oriented curtain raiser.

The ten minute spectacular at 9pm (AEDT)- which illuminated the city and dazzled spectators - is a warm-up for the city's midnight show-stopper.

Under balmy and clear skies, tens of thousands of revellers lined Darling Harbour and other viewing hotspots, and about 1.5 million filled the harbour foreshore.

As streams of incandescent colour shot into the heavens, families on picnic blankets cheered and clapped along with others aboard luxury yachts.

Colours streamed from four barges situated around the harbour, with gold flashes cascading like tinsel as a gold butterfly-like design lit up the bridge.

At one stage fireworks fell from the structure like a waterfall, with the display reaching a kaleidoscopic climax of green, red and blue fireworks.

"It was all great, amazing," said Lee Whittaker, from Denistone, who brought her kids Mel and Leon with her.

Kallya Alffonso, from Maroubra, said festivities in Sydney were much better than her native Brazil.

"Sydney is a very pretty city, the Harbour Bridge and Opera House make it looks spectacular," she said.

"It's the spirit too, everybody is here together, and it's just the whole atmosphere."

Event organisers estimate a record 130,000 people packed Sydney's Darling Harbour for the 9pm display.

"There is definitely more people here than last year," organiser Sal Sharah told AAP.

"We've had great weather and a great lead up to this evening."

The early show was greeted with cheers from the thousands of spectators at Lady Macquarie's Chair, many of whom had waited much of the day under a hot sun.

"I think they were awesome," said nine-year-old Nell Whittaker.

"I loved the sparkle effect, and they were really loud too."

A much-hyped show-stopper is then set to wow the world at midnight.

All eyes are on Sydney, one of the first major cities to ring in the new year, with more than a billion people expected to tune in to watch the $6.6 million party worldwide.

Many local partygoers are only now emerging to gather at pubs and clubs in time for midnight.

Others will cram onto rooftops or gather in backyards for a VB and sausage sambo to say goodbye to 2012

Celebrations in Sydney dwarf rival cities, with only 100,000 attending Paris fireworks, while 700,000 revellers gather for festivities in London.

Pop princess Kylie Minogue, chosen as the event's creative ambassador, will be honoured with a one-of-a-kind sparkling musical note firework at the turn of the year.

The semiquaver will be one of 100,000 individual pyrotechnic creations this year, including brand new koala, octopus and hand images up in lights.

People going to the CBD to watch the fireworks have been urged to leave their cars behind and take public transport, with road closures in place and extra + and buses laid on for the night.

The Sydney Harbour Bridge will be closed in both directions from 11pm on Monday to 1am on Tuesday.

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UK singer remanded on child sex charges

ROCKER Ian Watkins has reappeared before a Welsh court to face allegations of plotting to rape a baby girl.

The 35-year-old vocalist, whose band Lostprophets has sold more than 3.5 million records worldwide, was arrested with two women earlier in December.

As well as being charged with conspiring to rape a child under the age of 13, Watkins faces five other sex abuse charges.

They include conspiring to engage in sexual activity with two young children as well as making, downloading and distributing child pornography and accessing "extreme pornography" - relating to animals.

During a previous hearing at Cardiff Magistrates Court, Watkins' legal team said the Last Summer singer would be denying the charges against him.

He was remanded in custody over the Christmas period with two women - who face similar child sex charges.

The pair, aged 20 and 22, cannot be named for legal reasons.

On Monday Watkins and his co-defendants appeared in Cardiff Crown Court via video-link.

All three only spoke to confirm their names at the preliminary hearing, a formality in the legal process, which lasted less than 10 minutes.

Watkins was refused bail and remanded in custody with a plea and case management hearing scheduled at Cardiff Crown Court for March 11.

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Syrian troops hit Homs, kill 23 children

SYRIAN regime forces have pressed a fierce offensive in Homs after overrunning a key neighbourhood of the central city, according to a watchdog, which also listed 23 children killed in violence across the country.

The latest bloodletting on Sunday came after international peace envoy Lakhdar Brahimi warned in Moscow that Syria was facing a choice between "hell or the political process" after talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the army, after Saturday seizing the Deir Baalbeh district in fighting which left dozens dead, fired off barrages of rockets into surrounding rebel-held neighbourhoods on Sunday as it sought to capitalise on its victory.

Troops also bombarded the nearby opposition stronghold of Rastan.

The Britain-based Observatory, which gathers its information from a network of activists and medics in civilian and military hospitals, said the final death toll from Saturday's clashes had not been finalised due to communications difficulties in the area.

A video released by the Syrian Revolution General Commission, a grassroots network of anti-regime activists, showed the bodies of nine male victims from Deir Baalbeh lying on the ground, their faces bloody and mutilated.

The authenticity of the video could not immediately be verified.

Near the capital on Sunday, loyalist troops carried out air raids on towns along the eastern outlying belt and on Daraya in the southwest, while fighting between rebels and the army erupted in the northeastern and southwestern suburbs.

The Observatory said 13 children were among the victims of bombardments in and around Damascus on Saturday, while 10 children were killed in air strikes across Aleppo province, including on rebel-held Aazaz near the Turkish border.

Analysts said the surge in air strikes by Syrian forces were a desperate attempt by President Bashar al-Assad's regime to reverse rampant gains by rebel fighters, especially in the north of the country.

Meanwhile, rebels made further advances on Sunday in the battle for the Hamidiyeh military post in the northwest province of Idlib which they stormed the previous day, the watchdog said.

During Sunday's clashes, three insurgents were wounded by machinegun fire, while warplanes raided a nearby village, the Observatory said.

A takeover of the Hamidiyeh post would pave the way for a rebel offensive against the nearby Wadi Deif base, one of the government's last outposts in the north.

Opposition fighters, mostly from the jihadist Al-Nusra Front, have been closing in on the base since overrunning the nearby town of Maaret al-Numan in early October.

In the south, a rebel was killed on Sunday in battles for control of several small border crossings along the regime-held frontier with Jordan, the Observatory said.

Syria and Jordan share a 370-kilometre-long border which hundreds of people cross on foot every day to escape the bloody civil war that the Observatory says has killed at least 45,000 people.

Brahimi on Saturday held talks with Lavrov on his end-of-year bid to accelerate moves to halt the Syria conflict.

He painted a stark picture of Syrian neighbours Jordan and Lebanon being overrun by a million refugees should heavy fighting for the seat of power break out in Syria's five-million-strong capital.

If this fighting "develops into something uglier ... (refugees) can go to only two places - Lebanon and Jordan", Brahimi said.

"So if the alternative is hell or the political process, we have all of us got to work ceaselessly for a political process," he said.

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East Timor hailed a UN success

TROOPS sent by Australia and New Zealand have all gone home and only a handful of United Nations police will be left when the UN flag comes down in East Timor's capital of Dili after six years.

"As of Monday, the liquidation team will be there. They are the ones who are unscrewing all the lightbulbs," said Ameerah Haq, UN under-secretary general and former head of the UN mission in East Timor.

The UN played a key role in the birth of East Timor, officially known as Timor Leste. It organised the 1999 referendum that ended 24 years of Indonesian occupation in which an estimated 183,000 people died through conflict, starvation or disease.

It helped run East Timor until 2002 when an independent government took over.

For many Timorese leaders it was a national humiliation to seek UN help in 2006 when soldiers sacked from the army launched a mutiny which sparked factional violence that left dozens dead and 150,000 people in makeshift camps.

"You don't want to say that a country learned by crisis," said Haq, but in this case there was "good benefit" from the Timorese seeing in a few days the burning, looting and destruction threatening all they had built in the past seven years.

"They just saw it collapse before their eyes and it was like: we did this to ourselves," she told AFP.

"It was a watershed moment in their experience."

The UN was able to make an impact because it was the East Timorese government which asked for help and working in a country the size of Timor was not like bringing peace to Sudan or the Democratic Republic of Congo.

"In Timor, everything happened as it should," Haq said. "We had great access to the leadership, we had complete freedom of movement within the country."

The country has now had two relatively calm presidential elections, the 3000-strong police force has been retrained district by district, and the judiciary reformed.

Haq said she had seen political tensions boil up again. There were times when she would tell political leaders to "tone down the rhetoric".

"They would always tell me 'we all struggled together, we all saw what happened in 2006'," she said.

"They always assured me they would always stop short of the trigger. I learned to have confidence in that."

The big powers are now taking a more intense look at East Timor, which has significant oil and gas reserves even though it remains one of the most impoverished countries.

As a result US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited in September and China built the presidential palace and military headquarters.

Brazil is also a key source of aid while Cuba has trained hundreds of Timorese doctors.

Haq said East Timor knows that it must now concentrate on lifting the half of the 1.1 million population living below the poverty line.

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Russia investigates Moscow plane crash

RUSSIAN medics have begun identifying the bodies of four crew killed when a passenger jet careened off the runway of a Moscow international airport and smashed into a highway.

Rescue workers recovered the flight recorders from the four-year-old Tu-204 of tycoon Alexander Lebedev's Red Wings airlines late on Saturday as Russia began mourning its latest post-Soviet crash.

"The plane touched down in the proper landing area but for some reason was unable to stop on the strip," Federal Air Transport Agency chief Alexander Neradko said in televised remarks.

A bigger loss of life was averted only because the 210-seat liner was empty except for eight crew on their return from a charter flight to the Czech Republic.

Mobile-phone footage of the accident posted on the internet showed large chunks of debris hurtling over the highway and smashing into cars speeding on the highway whose drivers had to make sudden emergency stops.

The jet split into three pieces and required the temporary shutdown of both the Kiev Highway and Vnukovo, Moscow's third-largest airport and the site of a special terminal for Kremlin officials.

A security source said investigators had brushed aside poor weather conditions or pilot error and were focusing on technical problems with the Tupolev as the most likely cause.

"According to preliminary information, the Vnukovo catastrophe may have been caused by problems with the plane, which became exposed in difficult weather conditions," the unnamed official told the Interfax news agency.

Witnesses said heavy gusts accompanying a light snowfall were swirling over the airport at the time the plane came in for landing on Saturday afternoon.

Red Wings owner Lebedev - a billionaire famous for his critical view of the Kremlin and his ownership of the London Evening Standard and The Independent in Britain - said the jet had passed a meticulous check in November.

"Plane number 47 had accumulated 8500 flight hours and underwent its last serious check on November 23," Lebedev tweeted.

He also suggested that traffic controllers' initial refusal to authorise landing - requiring the plane to complete several circles over Vnukovo - might have been a contributing factor.

"All machinery has its limits, even when it is new," Lebedev wrote.

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French paper to publish comic on Mohammed

A FRENCH weekly known for publishing cartoons of Prophet Mohammed to the ire of conservative Muslims says it plans to release a comic book biography of Islam's founder that will be researched and educational.

Satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo has on several occasions depicted Islam's prophet in an effort to defend free speech and defy the anger of Muslims who believe depicting Mohammed is sacrilegious.

"It is a biography authorised by Islam since it was edited by Muslims," said Charlie Hebdo's publisher and the comic's illustrator, who goes by the name Charb.

"I don't think higher Muslim minds could find anything inappropriate," Charb said on Sunday.

The biography will be published on Wednesday and was put together by a Franco-Tunisian researcher known only as Zineb, Charb said.

The publisher said the idea for the comic book came to him in 2006 when a newspaper in Denmark published cartoons of Mohammed, later republished by Charlie Hebdo, drawing angry protests across the Muslim world.

"Before having a laugh about a character, it's better to know him. As much as we know about the life of Jesus, we know nothing about Mohammed," Charb said.

In September, Charlie Hebdo published cartoons of a naked Mohammed as violent protests were taking place in several countries over a low-budget film made in the United States that insults the prophet.

In 2011 Charlie Hebdo's offices were hit by a firebomb and its website pirated after publishing an edition titled "Charia Hebdo" featuring several Mohammed cartoons.

Charb, who has received death threats, lives under police protection.

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