Teva CEO promises to reshape, refocus company by 2017

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Teva Pharmaceutical Industries‘ new Chief Executive Jeremy Levin promised on Tuesday to reshape the company into “the most indispensable medicines company in the world” and to provide significant value to its shareholders along the way.

At a meeting in New York with investors and analysts, Levin, who took over as CEO in May, said Teva would sustain “profitable growth” through 2017 and beyond despite numerous challenges, such as the looming 2015 patent expiration of its most important branded product, the multiple sclerosis drug Copaxone. It accounts for about 20 percent of Teva sales and some 50 percent of its profits.

Teva said it would continue to return money to shareholders through its dividend and $ 3 billion share buyback program, but it did not announce increases to either.

By 2017, Levin said, “Teva will be a reshaped company,” and one that will be more transparent and accountable to Wall Street and its investors than it has been in the past. The Israel-based company provided more details about its cost-cutting plans, areas of focus going forward and new product development.

Investors were not immediately convinced and Teva shares were down 1.9 percent just ahead of the market close in New York.

Levin said that in the future he does not want Teva to be so dependent on one product for a significant portion of its profits, in part through growth of branded generics in emerging markets and through its joint venture with Procter & Gamble Co on over-the-counter consumer products.

But Levin, a former executive of Bristol-Myers Squibb Co., said the world’s largest maker of generic drugs would increasingly focus on bringing new medicines to market in its core areas of expertise, such as central nervous system disorders and respiratory diseases.

He said it also would focus on what Teva is calling new therapeutic entities, or NTEs. Those could be new uses, formulations, delivery methods or combinations of existing products.

Levin said China represents an enormous opportunity for future sales of respiratory disease products. “We haven’t yet scratched the surface of how to get into that part of the world,” he said.

NEW DRUGS

Teva has 15 drugs in late-stage development and another 13 programs in mid-stage trials, but has discontinued 12 other products in its pipeline to focus on core areas of expertise.

The company has $ 10 billion available for business development over the next five years.

It took a step toward adding to its portfolio of branded medicines earlier on Tuesday by announcing a deal for worldwide rights to an experimental pain drug being developed by Xenon Pharmaceuticals, a biotech company founded by Michael Hayden, Teva’s new chief scientific officer .

Hayden said NTEs, as they come from proven effective medicines, would provide high returns with much lower risks than developing new molecules. He said the company set a goal of approving development of 10-15 NTEs in 2013 and getting them to market beginning in 2016.

Hayden was particularly enthused by the prospects for Teva’s experimental multiple sclerosis drug laquinimod, a neuroprotective medicine with potential to address progressive as well as relapsing MS. It could hit the European market next year, but U.S. regulators have asked for another Phase III study before considering the drug for the world’s largest market.

Teva also sees the possibility of combining laquinimod with Copaxone, which works through a different anti-inflammatory mechanism, to better treat MS as well as address other neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease, ALS and Parkinson’s disease.

The company sees prospects for extending Copaxone use beyond the patent expiration with a new, more convenient, three-times-a-week version compared with its current daily formulation. That could reach the market in 2014.

Teva is testing the sleep disorder drug Nuvigil, which it acquired with its $ 6.5 billion purchase of Cephalon last year, for bipolar disorder – a use that could substantially boost sales. The company sees 2013 Nuvigil sales of $ 280 million to $ 320 million, with a possible bipolar approval coming in 2014.

MIS-SIZED OR SMALL DEALS

While Teva was built through a series of large acquisitions, Levin reiterated his desire for mid-sized or small transactions, whether through licensing deals, acquisitions or strategic alliances with large pharmaceutical companies.

The company, whose shares have badly underperformed those of its smaller rivals during the last two years, said on November 30 that it would streamline operations and cut costs by $ 1.5 billion to $ 2 billion during the next five years, with most of the savings realized in 2014 and 2015.

Teva provided details on Tuesday of where it would find much of the savings, including $ 400 million to $ 700 million by centralizing global purchasing power rather than local procurement of goods. It sees another $ 150 million to $ 175 million in savings from shifting away from many small production facilities and instead relying on larger, more efficient manufacturing sites.

A move to centrally controlled supply chain inventory levels could save another $ 110 million to $ 140 million, the company said.

Levin said Teva would also continue to divest non-core assets, a process it began by selling its U.S. animal health business to Bayer for up to $ 145 million.

“We have a plan that’s reasonable and achievable,” Teva Chairman Phillip Frost said.

(Reporting by Bill Berkrot; Editing by Dan Grebler and Tim Dobbyn)

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Corruption probe shrouds Quebec in new darkness

MONTREAL (Reuters) – Half a century ago, a new crop of Quebec leaders sparked the so-called Quiet Revolution to eradicate the “Great Darkness” – decades of corruption that kept Canada‘s French-speaking province under the dominance of one party and the Catholic church.

The revolution’s reforms, including cleaning up the way lawmakers were elected and secularizing the education system, seemed to work, paving the way for decades of growth, progress and prominence as Canada emerged as a model of democracy.

Fifty years later, a public inquiry into corruption and government bid-rigging suggests the province’s politics are not as clean as Quebecers had hoped or believed.

Since May, when the inquiry opened in Montreal, Canadians have been getting daily doses of revelations of fraud through live broadcasts on French-language television stations. Corruption involving the Mafia, construction bosses and politicians, the inquiry has shown, drove up the average building cost of municipal contracts by more than 30 percent in Montreal, Canada’s second-largest city.

Last month, Montreal Mayor Gerald Tremblay resigned as did the mayor of nearby Laval, Gilles Vaillancourt. Both denied doing anything wrong, but said they could not govern amid the accusations of corruption involving rigging of municipal contracts, kickbacks from the contracts and illegal financing of elections.

Tremblay has not been charged by police. Vaillancourt’s homes and offices have been raided several times by Quebec’s anti-corruption squad, which operates independently of the inquiry, but no charges have been filed against him either. Police said the raids were part of an investigation but they would not release further details.

“Quebecers lived for several years under the impression that they had found the right formula, that their parties were clean,” said Pierre Martin, political science professor at the University of Montreal. Now, he said, “people at all levels are fed up.”

The inquiry must submit its final report to the Quebec government by next October. It has exposed practices worthy of a Hollywood noir thriller – a mob boss stuffing his socks with money, rigged construction contracts, call girls offered as gifts, and a party fundraiser with so much cash he could not close the door of his safe.

“Even though we are in the early days, what is emerging is a pretty troubling portrait of the way public contracts were awarded,” said Antonia Maioni, director of the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada in Montreal.

Quebec’s Liberals, the force behind the Quiet Revolution, launched the inquiry as rumors of corruption swirled. The government then called an election for September, a year ahead of schedule, in what was seen as an attempt to stop damaging testimony hurting its popularity.

The tactic did not help. Jean Charest’s Liberals lost to the Parti Quebecois, whose ultimate aim is to take the French-speaking province, the size of Western Europe, out of Canada.

‘IT WASN’T COMPLICATED’

According to allegations at the inquiry, the corruption helped three main entities: the construction bosses who colluded to bid on contracts, the Montreal Mafia dons who swooped in for their share, and the municipal politicians who received kickbacks to finance campaigns.

In Quebec, the Mafia has been dominated by the Rizzuto family, with tentacles to the rest of Canada and crime families in New York and abroad. But recently the syndicate has been facing challenges from other crime groups in Montreal, according to the Toronto-based Mafia analyst and author Antonio Nicaso.

The reputed godfather of the syndicate, Vito Rizzuto, has been subpoenaed to appear before the commission, but the date for his testimony has not been set.

The hearings have zeroed in on four construction bosses and how their companies worked with the Mafia, bribed municipal engineers and provided funds for mayoralty campaigns in Montreal, the business capital for Quebec’s 8 million people.

“It’s not good for the economy,” said Martin. “It’s not good for any kind of legitimate business that tries to enter into any kind of long-term relationship with the public sector.”

Quebec’s anti-corruption squad has arrested 35 people so far this year, staging well-publicized raids on mayoral offices and on construction and engineering companies. The squad has arrested civil servants and owners of construction companies, among others.

“I now must suffer an unbearable injustice,” Tremblay said in a somber resignation speech earlier this month after a decade as mayor of Montreal, saying he could not continue in office because the allegations of corruption were causing a paralysis at City Hall.

Some of the most explosive allegations at the inquiry, headed by Quebec Superior Court Justice France Charbonneau, came from Lino Zambito, owner of a now bankrupt construction company, and from a top worker for Tremblay’s political party, Union Montreal.

Zambito, who is seen as one of the smaller players and who also faces fraud charges, described a system of collusion between organized crime, business cartels and corrupt civil servants, with payments made according to a predetermined formula.

“The entrepreneurs made money, and there was an amount that was due to the Mafia,” Zambito told the inquiry. “It wasn’t complicated.”

Zambito said the Mafia got 2.5 percent of the value of a contract, 3 percent went to Union Montreal and 1 percent to the engineer tasked with inflating contract prices.

Tremblay did not respond to emails requesting comment on the allegations of corruption at city hall.

A former party organizer, Martin Dumont, alleged the mayor was aware of double bookkeeping used to hide illegal funding during a 2004 election.

Dumont said the mayor walked out of the room during a meeting that explained the double bookkeeping system, saying he did not want to know anything about it.

Dumont also described how he was called into the office of a fundraiser for Union Montreal to help close the door of a safe because it was too full of money.

“I think it was the largest amount I’d ever seen in my life,” Dumont said at the inquiry.

GOLF, HOCKEY, ESCORTS

The inquiry also saw videos linking construction company players with Mafia bosses. In one police surveillance video, a Mafia boss was seen stuffing cash into his socks.

A retired city of Montreal engineer, Gilles Surprenant, described how he first accepted a bribe in the late 1980s after being “intimidated” by a construction company owner. Over the years he said he accepted over $ 700,000 from the owners in return for inflating the price of the contracts.

Another retired engineer, Luc Leclerc, admitted to bagging half a million dollars for the same service. He said the system was well-known to many at city hall and simply part of the “business culture” in Montreal. He also got gifts and paid golf trips to the Caribbean with other businessmen and Mafia bosses.

Gilles Vezina, who is currently suspended from his job as a city engineer, concurred.

“It was part of our business relationships to get advantages like golf, hockey, Christmas gifts” from construction bosses, he told the inquiry in mid-November.

The gifts didn’t stop there. Vezina said he was twice offered the services of prostitutes from different construction bosses in the 1980s or early 1990s, which he said he refused.

The accusations are jarring for a country that prides itself on being one of the least corrupt places in the world, according to corruption watchdog Transparency International. But experts say corruption in Montreal was something of an open secret.

“The alarm signals have been going off here for 20 years and no one has done anything,” said Andre Cedilot, a former journalist who co-wrote a book on the Canadian Mafia.

Quebec’s new government has introduced legislation tasking the province’s securities regulator with vetting businesses vying for public contracts and allowing it to block companies that do not measure up.

Anti-corruption activist Jonathan Brun was not optimistic.

“You’ve got to use modern technology,” said Brun, a co-founder of Quebec Ouvert, a group that wants to make all information about contracts freely available rather than asking regulators to oversee individual companies. “You’ve got to change the entire system if you really want to fight corruption.”

(Writing by Russ Blinch; Editing by Janet Guttsman, Mary Milliken and Prudence Crowther)

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W.Va. natural gas line explosion melts road, burns homes

SISSONVILLE, W.Va. (AP) — Four homes went up in flames and collapsed in charred heaps Tuesday after a natural gas line exploded in an inferno that raged for at least an hour, melting guardrails and pavement on a swath of Interstate 77.

Five other homes had extensive external damage, and several people were treated for smoke inhalation, but authorities said there were no fatalities and all residents had been accounted for.

"We've been very fortunate," said Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin, who toured the damage then briefed the media. "They were just lucky enough not to be home."

Most were at work. One man had just left to go hunting, he said.

State Police spokesman Sgt. Michael Baylous said a slight risk of a secondary explosion remained, so people who had initially been told to stay inside nearby homes were later urged to evacuate.

The explosion occurred between Sissonville and Pocatalico just before 1 p.m. in a 20-inch transmission line owned by NiSource Inc., parent of Columbia Gas. The gas flow was shut off, but State Police 1st Sgt. James Lee said there was still pressure on the transmission line.

Kent Carper, president of the Kanawha County Commission, said flames had been shooting 50 to 75 feet into the air before the fire was extinguished.

"It sounded like a Boeing 757. Just a roar," he said. "It was huge. You just couldn't hear anything. It was like a space flight."

Trevor Goins lives about a half-mile from the explosion and was watching television in his apartment when he saw a ripple in his coffee cup and the floor shook.

"I thought possibly (it was) a plane crash," said Goins, who immediately went outside with several neighbors. "It was so loud it sounded like a turbine engine. You almost had to put your hands over your ears."

He got in his car and drove closer, seeing fire that stretched as high as the hilltops.

"The flames were so high, they were so massive," he said. "I could only imagine what had happened."

Carper said the flames spanned about a quarter of a mile and ran through a culvert under the interstate.

"It actually cooked the interstate," he said. "It looks like a tar pit."

Tomblin said a roughly 800-foot section both directions was baked by the heat.

"It turned the asphalt to cinder," he said, after walking across it. "Your feet were hot. It was like walking on a volcano."

Transportation Secretary Paul Mattox said contractors are already working on repairs, and the state hopes to have the highway reopened by Wednesday night. Crews were expected to work through the night to remove the asphalt and grind the roadway down to the original concrete before repaving.

"We're going to do everything we can to get it back," Mattox said.

Guardrails melted, utility poles burned, an ordinarily reflective green interstate sign was burned down to white metal and the blast blew a huge hole in the road, throwing dirt, rocks and debris across the interstate.

"Even the hillside was on fire," Tomblin said. "There are some homes in close proximity that are still smoking."

Tom Miller, training officer at the Sissonville Volunteer Fire Department, marveled at the destruction.

"Four lanes are gone," he said, adding that it was remarkable that no motorists were injured. "We were very lucky — no rush-hour traffic."

Federal and state investigators are now trying to determine the cause.

"It's one of those rare events that happen," the governor said, "and at this time we do not have those answers," he said

NiSource spokesman Mike Banas said the company was still gathering facts.

"Our first priority is the safety of our employees and the community," he said, adding that no impacts on customers are anticipated.

U.S. Sen. Jay Rockefeller, who chairs the Senate Commerce Committee and has made pipeline safety a priority, vowed to get answers.

The West Virginia Democrat said the National Transportation Safety Board is launching a team "imminently" to investigate, he said, as is the U.S. Department of Transportation's Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration.

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Smith reported from Morgantown.

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Obama election tweet most repeated but Olympics tops on Twitter

(Reuters) – An election victory tweet from President Barack Obama — “Four more years” with a picture of him hugging his wife — was the most retweeted ever, but the U.S. election was topped by the Olympics as the most tweeted event this year.

Obama’s tweet was retweeted (repeated) more than 810,000 times, Twitter said as it published a list of the most tweeted events in 2012. (http://2012.twitter.com/)

“Within hours, that Tweet simultaneously became the most retweeted of 2012, and the most retweeted ever. In fact, retweets of that simple message came from people in more than 200 countries around the world,” Twitter spokeswoman Rachael Horwitz said.

Twitter users were busiest during the final vote count for the presidential elections, sending 327,452 tweets per minute on election night on their way to a tally of 31 million election tweets for the day.

The 2012 Olympic Games in London had the most overall tweets of any event, with 150 million sent over the 16 days.

Usain Bolt’s golden win in the 200 meters topped 80,000 tweets per minute but he did not achieve the highest Olympic peak on Twitter. That was seen during the closing ceremony when 115,000 tweets per minute were sent as 1990s British pop band the Spice Girls performed.

Syria, where a bloody civil war still plays out, was the most talked about country in 2012 but sports and pop culture dominated the tally of tweets.

Behind Obama was pop star Justin Bieber. His tweet, “RIP Avalanna. i love you” sent when a six-year-old fan died from a rare form of brain cancer, was retweeted more than 220,000 times.

Third most repeated in 2012 was a profanity-laced tweet from Green Bay Packers NFL player TJ Lang, when he blasted a controversial call by a substitute referee officiating during a referee dispute. That was retweeted 98,000 times.

This was the third year running that the microblogging site published its top Twitter trends, offering a barometer to assess the biggest events in social media.

Superstorm Sandy, which slammed the densely populated U.S. East Coast in late October, killing more than 100 people, flooding wide areas and knocking out power for millions, attracted more than 20 million tweets between October 27 and November 1.

European football made the list of top tweets when Spain’s Juan Mata scored as his side downed Italy 4-0 in the Euro 2012 final — sparking 267,200 tweets a minute.

News of pop star Whitney Houston‘s death in February generated more than 10 million tweets, peaking at 73,662 per minute.

Romantic comedy “Think Like a Man” was the most tweeted movie this year, topping “The Hunger Games”, “The Avengers” and “The Dark Knight Rises.”

Rapper Rick Ross who notched his fourth No. 1 album on the Billboard 200 chart this year, was the most talked about music artist.

(Editing by Rodney Joyce)

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‘Skyfall’ launches back to top spot with $10.8M

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The James Bond blockbuster “Skyfall” has risen back to the No. 1 spot at the weekend box office, taking in $ 10.8 million.

That brought its domestic total to $ 261.4 million and its worldwide haul to a franchise record of $ 918 million.

The top 20 movies at U.S. and Canadian theaters Friday through Sunday, followed by distribution studio, gross, number of theater locations, average receipts per location, total gross and number of weeks in release, as compiled Monday by Hollywood.com are:

1. “Skyfall,” Sony, $ 10,780,201, 3,401 locations, $ 3,170 average, $ 261,400,281, five weeks.

2. “Rise of the Guardians,” Paramount, $ 10,400,618, 3,639 locations, $ 2,858 average, $ 61,774,192, three weeks.

3. “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn — Part 2,” Summit, $ 9,156,265, 3,646 locations, $ 2,511 average, $ 268,691,029, four weeks.

4. “Lincoln,” $ 8,916,813, 2,014 locations, $ 4,427 average, $ 97,137,447, five weeks.

5. “Life of Pi,” Fox, $ 8,330,764, 2,946 locations, $ 2,828 average, $ 60,948,293, three weeks.

6. “Playing For Keeps,” FilmDistrict, $ 5,750,288, 2,837 locations, $ 2,027 average, $ 5,750,288, one week.

7. “Wreck-It Ralph,” Disney, $ 4,859,368, 2,746 locations, $ 1,770 average, $ 164,402,934, six weeks.

8. “Red Dawn,” FilmDistrict, $ 4,236,105, 2,754 locations, $ 1,538 average, $ 37,240,920, three weeks.

9. “Flight,” Paramount, $ 3,130,305, 2,431 locations, $ 1,288 average, $ 86,202,541, six weeks.

10. “Killing Them Softly,” Weinstein Co., $ 2,806,901, 2,424 locations, $ 1,158 average, $ 11,830,638, two weeks.

11. “Silver Linings Playbook,” Weinstein Co., $ 2,171,665, 371 locations, $ 5,854 average, $ 13,964,405, four weeks.

12. “Anna Karenina,” Focus, $ 1,544,859, 422 locations, $ 3,661 average, $ 6,603,042, four weeks.

13. “The Collection,” LD Entertainment, $ 1,487,655, 1,403 locations, $ 1,060 average, $ 5,455,328, two weeks.

14. “Argo,” Warner Bros., $ 1,482,346, 944 locations, $ 1,570 average, $ 103,160,015, nine weeks.

15. “End of Watch,” Open Road Films, $ 751,623, 1,259 locations, $ 597 average, $ 39,989,766, 12 weeks.

16. “Hitchcock,” Fox Searchlight, $ 712,544, 181 locations, $ 3,937 average, $ 1,661,670, three weeks.

17. “Talaash,” Reliance Big Pictures, $ 449,195, 161 locations, $ 2,790 average, $ 2,397,909, two weeks.

18. “Taken 2,” Fox, $ 387,227, 430 locations, $ 901 average, $ 137,700,304, 10 weeks.

19. “Pitch Perfect,” Universal, $ 305,765, 387 locations, $ 790 average, $ 63,517,408, 11 weeks.

20. “The Sessions,” Fox, $ 218,973, 197 locations, $ 1,112 average, $ 4,948,342, eight weeks.

___

Online:

http://www.hollywood.com

___

Universal and Focus are owned by NBC Universal, a unit of Comcast Corp.; Sony, Columbia, Sony Screen Gems and Sony Pictures Classics are units of Sony Corp.; Paramount is owned by Viacom Inc.; Disney, Pixar and Marvel are owned by The Walt Disney Co.; Miramax is owned by Filmyard Holdings LLC; 20th Century Fox and Fox Searchlight are owned by News Corp.; Warner Bros. and New Line are units of Time Warner Inc.; MGM is owned by a group of former creditors including Highland Capital, Anchorage Advisors and Carl Icahn; Lionsgate is owned by Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.; IFC is owned by AMC Networks Inc.; Rogue is owned by Relativity Media LLC.

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C-Sections Save Kids and Moms in Tanzania

It never ceases to amaze me how much the world says it wants to save children’s lives and how rarely it tries to do the one thing that has been proven to protect more youngsters than anything else–keeping their mothers alive. (Maybe if it was called “orphan prevention?”) That is why I was so pleased to hear that Tanzania‘s efforts to expand skilled medical care to all women during labor and delivery have started to pay off. Dying during childbirth–typically from bleeding, high blood pressure or infection–is one of the most common causes of mortality for women in the poorest regions of the world–despite the fact that death in these situations is largely preventable.The president of Tanzania, Jakaya Kikwete, spoke on October 2 at the United Nations in New York about the encouraging results of a pilot program designed to safeguard the lives of pregnant women in the remotest parts of the country–far from any hospital or major medical center. He began, however, by reciting a few sobering statistics. Currently, about 454 pregnant women die for every 100,000 live births of children in Tanzania. That ratio translates to about 8,500 women dying during or shortly after childbirth each year in Tanzania (population 46 million). Or another way of looking at it, 23 women die during childbirth each and every day there. By contrast, the maternal death rate in the U.S. was 12.7 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2007, or 548 women across the country annually .The main idea for improving the maternal death rate in Tanzania (or any other poor country) is simple to explain and supported by solid evidence–although the logistics for putting it into place can be daunting. However it takes some getting used to–and a bit of background information–for people who are used to living in the richest parts of the world.First, the background information. Ideally, when a pregnant woman develops an infection, has a worrisome increase in blood pressure or starts bleeding excessively, you’d like to treat the cause–with antibiotics, antihypertensives or anti-clotting medication, as needed. But these medications or, more often, the people with the knowledge needed to administer them correctly during pregnancy are often not available in the poorest areas of the world. On the other hand, delivering the baby right away, via cesarean section, can frequently solve the immediate problem and save both the mom’s and child’s life or simplify their subsequent treatment.Now, you might think that correctly giving medication is easier than performing surgery, but in fact, that is not always the case. It can actually be easier and safer to train nurses and clinical officers (individuals who are trained to give basic medical care in many poor countries but who are not medical doctors) to perform cesarean sections in many areas of the world where access to sophisticate medical care is simply unavailable.And so that is what Tanzania did. With support from Bloomberg Philanthropy, the government’s Ministry of Health expanded access to emergency obstetric care in a few health care districts by training non-physicians to perform cesarean sections and upgrading rural health centers so that the operations could be performed there.The results were so promising that the country is expanding its efforts, this time with $ 8 million in support from Bloomberg Philanthropy and another group called the H & B Agerup Foundation. As announced at the October press conference, the rate of women dying during childbirth in one coastal Tanzanian health district where cesarean sections were more widely available fell by 32 percent in two years. That may not seem like a lot when the burden is so great, but it gives reason to hope that the trend can be turned around–even under very difficult circumstances. After all, as President Kikwete said, “It is not fair for a woman to die for giving birth, for giving life to another human being.” 

Follow Scientific American on Twitter @SciAm and @SciamBlogs.Visit ScientificAmerican.com for the latest in science, health and technology news.
© 2012 ScientificAmerican.com. All rights reserved.
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Egypt army given temporary power to arrest civilians

CAIRO (Reuters) – Egypt’s Islamist president has given the army temporary power to arrest civilians during a constitutional referendum he is determined to push through despite the risk of bloodshed between his supporters and opponents accusing him of a power grab.

Seven people were killed and hundreds wounded last week in clashes between the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood and their critics besieging Mohamed Mursi’s graffiti-daubed presidential palace. Both sides plan mass rallies on Tuesday.

The elite Republican Guard has yet to use force to keep protesters away from the palace, which it ringed with tanks, barbed wire and concrete barricades after last week’s violence.

Mursi, bruised by calls for his downfall, has rescinded a November 22 decree giving him wide powers but is going ahead with a referendum on Saturday on a constitution seen by his supporters as a triumph for democracy and by many liberals as a betrayal.

A decree issued by Mursi late on Sunday gives the armed forces the power to arrest civilians and refer them to prosecutors until the announcement of the results of the referendum, which the protesters want cancelled.

Despite its limited nature, the edict will revive memories of Hosni Mubarak’s emergency law, also introduced as a temporary expedient, under which military or state security courts tried thousands of political dissidents and Islamist militants.

But a military source stressed that the measure introduced by a civilian government would have a short shelf-life.

“The latest law giving the armed forces the right to arrest anyone involved in illegal actions such as burning buildings or damaging public sites is to ensure security during the referendum only,” the military source said.

Presidential spokesman Yasser Ali said the committee overseeing the vote had requested the army’s assistance.

“The armed forces will work within a legal framework to secure the referendum and will return (to barracks) as soon as the referendum is over,” Ali said.

Protests and violence have racked Egypt since Mursi decreed himself extraordinary powers he said were needed to speed up a troubled transition since Mubarak’s fall 22 months ago.

The Muslim Brotherhood has voiced anger at the Interior Ministry’s failure to prevent protesters setting fire to its headquarters in Cairo and 28 of its offices elsewhere.

Critics say the draft law puts Egypt in a religious straitjacket. Whatever the outcome of the referendum, the crisis has polarized the country and presages more instability at a time when Mursi is trying to steady a fragile economy.

On Monday, he suspended planned tax increases only hours after the measures had been formally decreed, casting doubts on the government’s ability to push through tough economic reforms that form part of a proposed $ 4.8 billion IMF loan agreement.

“VIOLENT CONFRONTATION”

Rejecting the referendum plan, opposition groups have called for mass protests on Tuesday, saying Mursi’s eagerness to push the constitution through could lead to “violent confrontation”.

Islamists have urged their followers to turn out “in millions” the same day in a show of support for the president and for a referendum they feel sure of winning with their loyal base and perhaps with the votes of Egyptians weary of turmoil.

The opposition National Salvation Front, led by liberals such as Mohamed ElBaradei and Amr Moussa, as well as leftist firebrand Hamdeen Sabahy, has yet to call directly for a boycott of the referendum or to urge their supporters to vote “no”.

Instead it is contesting the legitimacy of the vote and of the whole process by which the constitution was drafted in an Islamist-led assembly from which their representatives withdrew.

The opposition says the document fails to embrace the diversity of 83 million Egyptians, a tenth of whom are Christians, and invites Muslim clerics to influence lawmaking.

But debate over the details has largely given way to noisy street protests and megaphone politics, keeping Egypt off balance and ill-equipped to deal with a looming economic crisis.

“Inevitability of referendum deepens divisions,” was the headline in Al-Gomhuriya newspaper on Monday. Al Ahram daily wrote: “Political forces split over referendum and new decree.”

Mursi issued another decree on Saturday to supersede his November 22 measure putting his own decisions beyond legal challenge until a new constitution and parliament are in place.

While he gave up extra powers as a sop to his opponents, the decisions already taken under them, such as the dismissal of a prosecutor-general appointed by Mubarak, remain intact.

“UNWELCOME” CHOICE

Lamia Kamel, a spokeswoman for former Arab League chief Moussa, said the opposition factions were still discussing whether to boycott the referendum or call for a “no” vote.

“Both paths are unwelcome because they really don’t want the referendum at all,” she said, but predicted a clearer opposition line if the plebiscite went ahead as planned.

A spokeswoman for ElBaradei, former head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog, said: “We do not acknowledge the referendum. The aim is to change the decision and postpone it.”

Mahmoud Ghozlan, the Muslim Brotherhood’s spokesman, said the opposition could stage protests, but should keep the peace.

“They are free to boycott, participate or say no, they can do what they want. The important thing is that it remains in a peaceful context to preserve the country’s safety and security.”

The army stepped into the conflict on Saturday, telling all sides to resolve their disputes via dialogue and warning that it would not allow Egypt to enter a “dark tunnel”.

A military source said the declaration read on state media did not herald a move by the army to retake control of Egypt, which it relinquished in June after managing the transition from Mubarak’s 30 years of military-backed one-man rule.

The draft constitution sets up a national defense council, in which generals will form a majority, and gives civilians some scrutiny over the army – although not enough for critics.

In August Mursi stripped the generals of sweeping powers they had grabbed when he was elected two months earlier, but has since repeatedly paid tribute to the military in public.

So far the army and police have taken a relatively passive role in the protests roiling the most populous Arab nation.

(Additional reporting by Edmund Blair and Yasmine Saleh; editing by Philippa Fletcher)

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Obama blasts Michigan right-to-work bills

President Barack Obama at the Daimler Detroit Diesel plant in Redford, Mich., on Monday. (Jason Reed/Reuters)

President Barack Obama traveled to the Daimler Detroit Diesel plant in Redford, Mich., Monday to issue a speech on the economy, pressure Republicans in Congress to raise taxes on the nation's top earners, and highlight Daimler's new $120 million investment in the plant.

But it was the president's criticism of Michigan's right-to work legislation that stole the show for the audience of Daimler union employees.

"What we shouldn't be doing is trying to take away your rights to bargain for better wages," the president told the audience, which immediately roared with cheers, applause and whistles. "These so-called right-to-work laws, they don't have to do with economics, they have everything to do with politics." They're about "giving you the right to work for less money," he added, noting that Michigan's history shows how unions have helped "build a better America."

New state right-to-work legislation, which forbids requiring all employees who benefit from a labor contract to pay union dues, is scheduled to move through the Michigan Legislature for final action this week. Republican Gov. Rick Snyder has pledged to sign the final version.

Activists have mobilized against the legislation, which they view to be an anti-union effort, resulting in a state Capitol lockdown last Thursday.

The president's comments Monday were his first public statements on the situation in Michigan.
His appearance was pegged to Daimler's announcement of its investment in the Detroit Diesel plant, which created 115 good, new "union" jobs, the president said. "That's great for this plant, good for this community, but it's also good for American manufacturing."

The president highlighted the plant as a symbol of how American manufacturing and auto industries are rebounding and growing in the new global economy.

"The competitive balance is tipping a little," the president said.

Obama appealed to the audience, which he characterized as middle-class, on the issue of the "fiscal cliff" by warning that the average middle-class family stands to pay $2,200 more in taxes next year if the automatic spending cuts and tax increases go into effect Jan. 1.

The president said America will head into a "downward spiral" if this happens, and placed the onus once again on Republicans to resolve the crisis by agreeing to raise taxes on households making more than $250,000.

"We've got to get past this whole situation where we've manufactured crises because of politics," Obama said.

Obama met Sunday with House Republican Speaker John Boehner, the GOP's lead voice on "fiscal cliff" negotiations, but no details of that conversation have been offered.

White House spokesman Jay Carney, during Monday's briefing on Air Force One en route to Michigan, also would not reveal any information. "I won't characterize yesterday's meeting or other conversations, but the president does believe we can reach an agreement," Carney said.

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Bond movie “Skyfall” beats “Lincoln” at box office

(Reuters) – James Bond showed remarkable staying power as the latest installment of the spy series, “Skyfall,” captured the box office title and collected $ 11 million in its fifth week in U.S. and Canadian movie theaters, outgunning Steven Spielberg‘s “Lincoln” and “The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn – Part 2,” the final installment of the blockbuster vampire series.

“Skyfall,” the 23rd film in the series featuring Agent 007, also led movies at the box office when it first opened on November 2 and is already the best-selling movie in the 49-year old series. This weekend, it became the highest grossing movie in Sony Pictures‘ history with $ 918 million in ticket sales worldwide. The film distributed by Sony‘s Hollywood studio, has collected nearly $ 262 million in domestic sales, according to the movie tracking site Hollywood.com.

The animated “Rise of the Guardians” from Dreamworks Animation was second with $ 10.5 million in ticket sales. The movie, which was made for $ 145 million, opened with a disappointing $ 23.8 million when it first hit movie theaters on November 21. Since then, it has been steadily working its way toward becoming a solid family hit this season.

“Rise of the Guardians, which features Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny and other childhood favorites who join together to save the world, was one of two family movies in a season traditionally heavy in family films. The other, Disney’s “Wreck-it Ralph,” collected $ 4.9 million for seventh place.

“Breaking Dawn – Part 2,” the box office leader for the past three weeks, tallied $ 9.2 million in ticket sales. The five-movie series, released by Lions Gate Entertainment, is based on Stephenie Meyer‘s best-selling book about young vampire love and has collected more than $ 1.3 billion in overall domestic ticket sales.

“Lincoln,” which chronicles the 16th president’s successful fight to pass a constitutional amendment outlawing slavery, had total ticket sales of $ 9.1 million, according to studio estimates provided by the box office division of Hollywood.com.

“Life of Pi,” director Ang Lee’s movie about a boy who escapes a shipwreck but then shares his lifeboat with a tiger, sold $ 8.3 million in tickets to finish in fifth place. The movie, released by the Fox studio, is based on a best-selling 2001 novel by Yann Martel.

Hollywood studios shied away from scheduling major movies this weekend, steering clear of the expected blockbuster “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey,” which Warner Brothers will release on December 14. The movie, based on the J.R.R. Tolkien fantasy novel about wizards and dwarves, features many of the same actors from the blockbuster “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy.

The only new major release, the romantic comedy “Playing for Keeps” starring Gerard Butler and Jessica Biel, opened with a lackluster $ 6 million, which was on target with forecasts by industry experts.

(Reporting by Ronald Grover and Andrea Burzynski; Editing by Bill Trott and Jackie Frank)

Movies News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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