Sprint's coming identity shift offers hope

Sprint's flagship store in the Flatiron Building in Manhattan.

(Credit:
CNET/Marguerite Reardon)

Sprint Nextel is in for a massive overhaul.

The nation's third-largest wireless carrier will finally rid itself of the Nextel albatross -- both the service and the name -- by the end of the first half. It will merge with SoftBank, giving it access to cash to speed its network deployment. It will also acquire full control of Clearwire, giving the company the best spectrum position in the nation, according to one industry official.

The changes represent a massive identity shift for Sprint, and one that brings hope and optimism to the company and its leadership. Sprint, which has long struggled to juggle both networks while attempting to turn around several quarters of losses and customer defections, may finally be turning a corner with the big changes set to take effect in the coming months.

"We'll exit 2012 on a strong basis once you get past the first half when all the noise is cleared," said Chief Financial Officer Joe Euteneuer, his excitement about getting past the next few months evident in an interview with CNET.

Once Sprint merges with a holding company formed by SoftBank, the resulting company will be known only as Sprint, finally dropping the Nextel name that has hung around the business like a stench that just wouldn't go away.

The Sprint Nextel name was part of the merger of equals that combined the two wireless companies -- now regarded as one of the worst deals in the history of the industry. Right off the bat, the executives at the time demonstrated a lack of focus and execution in running the networks, allowing the once-vaunted Nextel service to deteriorate and spur an exodus that the company never really got over.

Sprint reported today more than 1 million customers from the Nextel side of the business left the service in the fourth quarter. The company, however, was able to recapture about half those subscribers and move them over to Sprint.

Sprint has been focusing a lot of its marketing dollars and efforts on bringing back customers lost on the Nextel side, but Euteneuer warned that the rate would fall to 30 to 40 percent in the coming months as the company lets some of the less profitable customers go.

Once the Nextel network is shut down, Sprint will only have to focus on its core service and continued network upgrade plans. Euteneuer said that much of those marketing dollars would be repurposed and used to go after organic growth. Once Nextel's network is shut down, the numbers should start to look better, with Sprint having added 683,000 customers in the fourth quarter, although that was more than offset by the losses at Nextel.

"Sprint has had consecutive growth over the last eight quarters," Euteneuer said. "With Nextel gone, you'll actually be able to see that."

A more focused Sprint will hopefully mean a more competitive carrier. The company has let AT&T and Verizon Wireless widen their respective leads, with Verizon in particular running away from the competition with its 4G LTE network.

Sprint CEO Dan Hesse acknowledged that there had been delays and issues with the 4G LTE rollout last year, but said the company was working hard to catch up. Euteneuer said most of those issues, which included equipment inventory shortages, delays with permits, and the timing of getting backhaul services in place, have been resolved.

Of course, Sprint is refocusing itself just as the wireless industry is beginning to mature. In particular, the bread and butter business of smartphones and contract services are starting to see slowing growth.

"Clearly, the smartphone market is maturing, as 80 percent-plus of postpaid phones being sold now are smartphones and an increasing number of prepaid phones, as well," said Tavis McCourt, an analyst at Raymond James. "We expect 2013 smartphone growth in the U.S. to be up about 5 percent or so and, again, to be skewed towards the next iPhone launch quarter."

AT&T and Verizon are already pushing to get other devices connected, and Sprint will have to do the same. T-Mobile, meanwhile, is looking for a turnaround of its own, and has promised to get aggressive to achieve its goals.

It's a big challenge for Sprint, but fortunately the carrier will be a lot nimbler and better financed in the coming months.

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Winter nor'easter sweeping into Northeast

A major snowstorm is passing through the Great Lakes Thursday morning, and by Friday night could make travel nearly impossible in parts of the Northeast.

CBS News weather consultant David Bernard says there is a potential for historic snows and blizzard conditions across the Northeast, with as much as 2 feet of snow in some areas.

The National Weather Service says this nor'easter-type storm system will bring strong winds and heavy snow to the region, with eastern New England experiencing the greatest effects. A blizzard watch was issued for Boston and surrounding areas, including Rhode Island, and has now been extended to the eastern end of Long Island and most of Connecticut.

A coastal flooding watch also is in effect for some shore communities in Massachusetts, Connecticut and Long Island.

Beginning late Thursday most of the Northeast will be under a winter storm watch. The snow will start Friday morning, with the heaviest amounts dumped going into Saturday as the storm moves past New England and upstate New York, the weather service said.

Bernard says the storm system - an area of low pressure over the Carolinas - is going to rapidly move to the Northeast during the day Friday; by Friday evening it may start as rain along the coast, but inland areas will get snow.

Late Friday night into Saturday morning, Bernard said, it should be all snow across the Northeast and New England. He said up to 2 feet of snow is not out of the question.

"This has the potential for being a dangerous storm, especially for Massachusetts into northeast Connecticut and up into Maine," said Louis Uccellini, director of the weather agency's National Centers for Environmental Prediction.

The storm would hit just after the 35th anniversary of the historic blizzard of 1978, which paralyzed the region with more than 2 feet of snow and hurricane force winds.

In New York City Friday's rain will turn to snow, with the potential of 6, maybe 12 inches of snow, Bernard said.

Assuming the snow clears out by the weekend with no major problems, ski areas in Massachusetts were excited by the prospect of the first major snowstorm they've seen since October 2011.

Tom Meyers, marketing director for Wachusett Mountain Ski Area in Princeton, Mass., said that at an annual conference of the National Ski Areas Association in Vermont this week, many participants were "buzzing" about the storm. He said the snow will arrive at an especially opportune time — a week before many schools in Massachusetts have February vacation.

"It is perfect timing because it will just remind everybody that it is winter, it's real, and get out and enjoy it," Meyers said.

"We'll be here with bells on," said Christopher Kitchin, inside operations manager at Nashoba Valley Ski Area in Westford, Mass. "People are getting excited. They want to get out in the snow and go snow-tubing, skiing and snowboarding."

At Mount Snow in Vermont, spokesman Dave Meeker said the true value of the storm will be driving traffic from southern New England northward.

"It's great when we get snow, but it's a tremendous help when down-country gets snow," he said. "When they have snow in their backyards, they're inspired."

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Ex-LA Cop Sought in Shootings of 3 Cops, 2 Slayings

Police in Southern California say they suspect that a fired cop is connected to the shootings -- one fatal -- of three police officers this morning, as well as the weekend slayings of an assistant women's college basketball coach and her fiancé in what cops believe are acts of revenge against the LAPD, as suggested in the suspect's online manifesto.

Former police officer Christopher Jordan Dorner, 33, who's a U.S. Navy reservist, has been publically named as a suspect in the killings of Monica Quan, 28, and her 27-year-old fiancé, Keith Lawrence, Irvine police Chief David L. Maggard said at a news conference Wednesday night.

"We are considering him armed and dangerous," Lt. Julia Engen of the Irvine Police Department said.

Police say Dorner shot at four officers in two incidents overnight, hitting three of them: one in Corona, Calif., and two in Riverside, Calif.

Sgt. Rudy Lopez of the LAPD said two LAPD officers were in Corona and headed out on special detail to check on one of the individuals named in Dorner's manifesto. Dorner allegedly grazed one of them but missed the other.

The Riverside Police Department said two of its officers were shot before one of them died, KABC-TV reported. The extent of the other's injuries is unclear.
Police suspected a connection to Dorner.

"They were on routine patrol stopped at a stop light when they were ambushed," Lt. Guy Toussant of the Riverside police department said.

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A badge and identification belonging to Dorner have been found in San Diego, according to San Diego police Sgt. Ray Battrick. Dorner's LAPD badge and ID were found by someone near the city's airport, and turned in to police overnight, The Associated Press reported.

Police around Southern California are wearing tactical gear, including helmets and guns across their chests. The light-up signs along California highways show the license plate number of Dorner's car, and say to call 911 if it is seen. The problem, police say, is that they believe Dorner is switching license plates on his car, a 2005 charcoal-gray Nissan Titan pickup truck.

Lawrence was found slumped behind the wheel of his white Kia in the parking lot of their upscale apartment complex in Irvine Sunday and Quan was in the passenger seat.

"A particular interest at this point in the investigation is a multi-page manifesto in which the suspect has implicated himself in the slayings," Maggard said.

Police said Dorner's manifesto included threats against members of the LAPD. Police say they are taking extra measures to ensure the safety of officers and their families.

The document, allegedly posted on an Internet message board this week, apparently blames Quan's father, retired LAPD Capt. Randy Quan, for his firing from the department.

"Your lack of ethics and conspiring to wrong a just individual are over," he allegedly wrote.

One passage from the manifesto reads, "I will bring unconventional and asymmetrical warfare to those in LAPD uniform whether on or off duty."

"I never had the opportunity to have a family of my own," it reads. "I'm terminating yours."

Dorner was with the department from 2005 until 2008, when he was fired for making false statements.

Randy Quan, who became a lawyer in retirement, represented Dorner in front of the Board of Rights, a tribunal that ruled against Dorner at the time of his dismissal, LAPD Capt. William Hayes told The Associated Press Wednesday night.

According to documents from a court of appeals hearing in October 2011, Dorner was fired from the LAPD after he made a complaint against his field-training officer, Sgt. Teresa Evans, saying in the course of an arrest she had kicked a suspect who was a schizophrenic with severe dementia.

After an investigation, Dorner was fired for making false statements.

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Khamenei rebuffs U.S. offer of direct talks

DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran's highest authority, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, on Thursday slapped down an offer of direct talks made by U.S. Vice President Joe Biden this week, saying they would not solve the problem between them.

"Some naive people like the idea of negotiating with America, however, negotiations will not solve the problem," Khamenei said in a speech to officials and members of Iran's air force carried on his official website.

"If some people want American rule to be established again in Iran, the nation will rise up to face them," he said.

"American policy in the Middle East has been destroyed and Americans now need to play a new card. That card is dragging Iran into negotiations."

Khamenei made his comments just days after Joe Biden said the United States was prepared to meet bilaterally with the Iranian leadership. "That offer stands but it must be real and tangible," Biden said in a speech in Munich.

With traditional fiery rhetoric, Khamenei lambasted Biden's offer, saying that since the 1979 revolution the United States had gravely insulted Iran and continued to do so with its threat of military action.

"You take up arms against the nation of Iran and say: 'negotiate or we fire'. But you should know that pressure and negotiations are not compatible and our nation will not be intimidated by these actions," he added.

Relations between Iran and the United States were severed in 1979 after the overthrow of Iran's pro-western monarchy and diplomatic meetings between officials have since been very rare.

ALL OPTIONS STILL "ON THE TABLE"

Currently U.S.-Iran contact is limited to talks between Tehran and a so-called P5+1 group of powers on Iran's disputed nuclear program which are to resume on February 26 in Kazakhstan.

Israel's Deputy Prime Minister Dan Meridor said he was skeptical the negotiations in Almaty could yield a result, telling Israel Radio that the United States needed to demonstrate to Iran that "all options were still on the table".

Israel, widely recognized to be the only nuclear power in the Middle East, has warned it could mount a pre-emptive strike on Iranian atomic sites. Israel sees its existence as directly threatened by the prospect of an nuclear-armed Iran, given Tehran's refusal to recognize the existence of the Jewish state.

"The final option, this is the phrasing we have used, should remain in place and be serious," said Meridor.

"The fact that the Iranians have not yet come down from the path they are on means that talks ...are liable to bring about only a stalling for time," he said.

Iran maintains its nuclear program is entirely peaceful but Western powers are concerned it is intent on developing a weapons program.

Many believe a deal on settling the nuclear issue is impossible without a U.S.-Iranian thaw. But any rapprochement would require direct talks addressing many sources of mutual mistrust that have lingered since Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution and the subsequent U.S. embassy hostage crisis in Tehran.

Moreover, although his re-election last November may give President Barack Obama a freer hand to pursue direct negotiations, analysts say Iran's own presidential election in June may prove an additional obstacle to progress being made.

(Additional reporting by Dan Williams; Editing by William Maclean and Jon Boyle)

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WP's Low says government driving with "upside down" population road map

SINGAPORE: The Workers' Party's Secretary-General Low Thia Khiang on Thursday said that the Singapore Government was "driving with an upside down (population) road map".

Mr Low, who is MP for Aljunid GRC, said that Singapore's low birth rate and ageing population were caused by a social and physical environment that is not conducive for family life. Therefore, solutions should focus on promoting quality of life for families, he said.

The WP chief also pointed out that the White Paper was still proposing incentives to have more babies under the Marriage and Parenthood package, when previous incentives had not worked.

"Without a TFR (Total Fertility Rate) recovery plan with clear targets, our birth rates are not going to go up. So when 2030 arrives, what solution are we going to turn to? Immigration again?" said Mr Low.

"The problem with the government is not that it lacks 20-20 foresight in infrastructure development, but (that) it fails to recognise that the problem is its immigration policy," he added.

Mr Low said that the key plank in the Workers' Party's proposal is to increase Singapore's resident workforce by encouraging women and senior citizens to work.

He noted that economic restructuring is necessarily painful and that the government can help ease the pain by providing more support to local SMEs as they go through the economic transition.

"Based on the upper end figure in the White Paper, our population is again expected to grow a million a decade up to 2030, and the 'Singaporean core' will drop to almost 50 per cent. The White Paper is not maintaining a strong Singapore core. It is shrinking it further," said Mr Png Eng Huat, MP for Hougang SMC.

In his speech, Nominated MP Laurence Lien proposed his own population parameter.

"Let me suggest that the long term policy should be to cap the total population by 2030 at 6 million… We should also slowdown the intake of new naturalised citizens to 10,000-15,000 of new births, otherwise, the impact on social cohesion and the building of our social identity will be too adverse," he said.

Senior Minister of State Heng Chee How, however, argued that with about 18,000 deaths each year, 10,000 new citizens would not be enough to even make up for those who pass away. Mr Heng also made several proposals to tap the silver workforce.

"I ask the tripartite partners to start working on further extending the re-employment age limit from age 65 to 67… A key part of this would be to ensure that employers in both private and public sector value their older workers as assets, pay them fairly even as they enter re-employment and not make mechanical cuts to their pay and benefits," said Mr Heng, who also MP for Whampoa SMC.

Mr Lim Swee Say, who is chief of the National Trades Union Congress as well as MP for East Coast GRC, called for consensus to address the population issue.

"I hope we can come to a clear consensus on the key priority areas for us to move forward. I hope we can speak in one voice, act in one heart and serve our people in one Parliament. Let us serve our people together regardless of parties, regardless of idealism, let us work together to maximise the upside, minimise the downside of a growing population," he said.

Former deputy prime minister and MP for Bishan-Toa Payoh GRC Mr Wong Kan Seng said that the White Paper is the government's effort to prevent a repeat of history.

"The point is that is not whether the population size should be 5.9 (million) or 6.9 (million). It is about how we keep our economy growing at a sustainable rate, create better jobs for Singaporeans and provide care and support for elders. These objectives are the key responsibilities of the government. But it must have the people's support," said Mr Wong.

- CNA/jc

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T-Mobile nixes Windows Phone 7.8 update for Lumia 710

Lumia 710 owners won't get a shot of Windows Phone 7.8 from T-Mobile.

(Credit:
T-Mobile)

Owners of Nokia's Lumia 710 who expected an update to Windows Phone 7.8 are out of luck.

The phone's sole U.S. carrier, T-Mobile, confirmed the news in a statement sent to CNET today:

At this time, the Nokia Lumia 710 will not receive the Windows Phone 7.8 software update. T-Mobile is committed to enhancing customers' experience with our devices, including providing upgrades to the latest operating systems, and T-Mobile aims to deliver software upgrades when it will provide a better experience for our customers. We'll share additional information on upgrades for the Nokia Lumia 710 when they are available.

T-Mobile didn't reveal any reason why the Lumia 710 is off the update list or if the decision is final. The statement used the phrase "at this time," dangling a carrot stick that the update may arrive in the future. But owners of the phone probably shouldn't hold their breath.

This leaves the Lumia 710 stuck at
Windows Phone 7.5 since an upgrade to Windows Phone 8 isn't possible for older Windows Phone devices.

Microsoft designed Windows Phone 7.8 for those older devices to offer certain features available only in Windows Phone 8. The company revealed last November that the update would begin rolling out for a host of phones early this year. Other
Nokia Lumia smartphones have already started to receive
Windows 7.8.

Nokia revealed a week ago that the update had kicked off for the Lumia 510, 610, 800, and 900. The company did include the 710 on the list as well. But ultimately, such updates are driven by the carrier, not by the manufacturer. Nokia even said that Windows Phone 7.8 would roll out to "owners with an unlocked phone or operator approved software during February."

Adventuresome Lumia 710 users can manually update to Windows Phone 7.8 via a hack posted on the XDA Developers forum. But those who try will want to proceed cautiously.

(Via TmoNews)

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Boy Scouts leaders make announcement on gay ban

Updated at 11:07 a.m. ET

IRVING, Texas The Boy Scouts of America put off a decision Wednesday on whether to lift its ban on gay members and leaders, saying the question will be taken up at the organization's national meeting in May.

"After careful consideration and extensive dialogue within the Scouting family, along with comments from those outside the organization, the volunteer officers of the Boy Scouts of America's National Executive Board concluded that due to the complexity of this issue, the organization needs time for a more deliberate review of its membership policy," Deron Smith, the BSA director of public relations, said in a statement.

Smith said the organization's national executive board will prepare a resolution for the 1,400 voting members of the national council to consider. The annual meeting will take place in May 2013 in Grapevine, Texas.

BSA announced last week it was considering allowing troops to decide whether to allow gay membership. That news has placed a spotlight on executive board meetings that began Monday in Irving, Texas, where scouting headquarters is located.

Smith said last week that the board could take a vote Wednesday or decide to discuss the policy, but that the organization would issue a statement either way. Otherwise, the board has remained silent, with reporters barred from the hotel where its meetings are taking place.

At nearby BSA headquarters, a handful of Scouts and leaders delivered petitions Monday in support of letting gay members join. The conservative group Texas Values, meanwhile, had organized a Wednesday morning prayer vigil urging the Scouts to keep their policy the same.

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Obama on women in combat, gay Boy Scouts

President Obama, an opponent of the policy, and Texas Gov. Rick Perry, an Eagle Scout who supports it, both have weighed in.

"My attitude is that gays and lesbians should have access and opportunity the same way everybody else does in every institution and walk of life," said Mr. Obama, who as U.S. president is the honorary president of BSA, in a Sunday interview with CBS News.

Perry, the author of the book "On My Honor: Why the American Values of the Boy Scouts Are Worth Fighting For," said in a speech Saturday that "to have popular culture impact 100 years of their standards is inappropriate."

The board faces several choices, none of which is likely to quell controversy. Standing pat would go against the public wishes of two high-profile board members — Ernst & Young CEO James Turley and AT&T Inc. CEO Randall Stephenson — who run companies with nondiscrimination policies and have said they would work from within to change the Scouts' policy.

Conservatives have warned of mass defections if Scouting allows gay membership to be determined by troops. Local and regional leaders, as well as the leadership of churches that sponsor troops, would be forced to consider their own policies. And policy opponents who delivered four boxes of signatures to BSA headquarters Monday said they wouldn't be satisfied by only a partial acceptance of gay scouts and leaders.

"We don't want to see Scouting gerrymandered into blue and red districts," said Brad Hankins, campaign director of Scouts for Equality.

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US Postal Service to End Saturday Mail Delivery

Feb 6, 2013 8:28am

                                              (Image Credit: Victor J. Blue/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Weekend mail delivery is about to come to an end.

The U.S. Postal Service will stop delivering mail on Saturdays, but will continue to deliver packages six days a week, the USPS announced at a news conference this morning.

While post offices that open on Saturdays will continue to do so, the initiative, which is expected to begin the week of August 5, will save an estimated $2 billion annually. The USPS had a $15.9 billion loss in financial year 2012.

“America’s mailing habits are changing and so are their shipping habits,” Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe said. “People will say this is a responsible decision. It makes common sense.”

The service reduction is the latest of Postal Service steps to cut costs as the independent agency of the U.S. government struggles with its finances.

To close its budget gap and reduce debt, it needs to generate $20 billion in cost reductions.

USPS officials have pushed for eliminating mail and package delivery on Saturdays for the past few years, but recent data showing growth in package delivery, which is up by 14 percent since 2010, and projected additional growth in the coming decade made them revise their decision to continue package delivery only.

Saturday mail delivery to P.O. boxes will also continue.

Research by the post office and major news organizations indicated that 7 out of 10 Americans support switching to five-day service.

Since 2006, the Postal Service has reduced annual costs by $15 billion, cut the career force by 28 percent and consolidated 200 mail-processing locations.

The USPS announced in May it was cutting back on the number of operating hours instead of shuttering 3,700 rural post offices. The move, which reduced hours of operation at 13,000 rural post offices from an eight-hour day to between two and six hours a day, was made with the aim of saving about $500 million per year.

The cutback in hours last year resulted in 9,000 full-time postal employees’ being reduced to part time plus the loss of their benefits, while another 4,000 full-time employees became part time but kept their benefits.

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Tunisia protests after government critic shot dead

TUNIS (Reuters) - A Tunisian opposition politician was shot dead on Wednesday, sending protesters onto the streets of cities nationwide two years after the uprisings that swept Tunisia's president from power and inflamed the Arab world.

The headquarters of the moderate Islamist Ennahda party, which rules in a fractious coalition with secularists, was set ablaze after Chokri Belaid, an outspoken critic of the government, was gunned down outside his home in the capital.

Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali, who said the identity of the attacker was not known, condemned Belaid's killing as a political assassination and a strike against the "Arab Spring" revolution. Ennahda denied any involvement by the part.

Despite calls for calm from the president, 8,000 protesters, massed outside the Interior Ministry, calling for the fall of the government, and thousands more demonstrated in cities including Mahdia, Sousse, Monastir and Sidi Bouzid, the cradle of the revolution, where police fired teargas and warning shots.

"This is a black day in the history of modern Tunisia ... Today we say to the Islamists, 'get out' ... enough is enough," said Souad, a 40-year-old teacher outside the Interior Ministry in Tunis. "Tunisia will sink in the blood if you stay in power."

The small North African state was the first Arab country to oust its leader and hold free elections as uprisings spread around the region, leading to the ousting of the rulers of Egypt, Yemen and Libya and to the civil war in Syria.

But like in Egypt, many who campaigned for freedom from repression under autocratic rulers and better prospects for their future now feel their revolutions have been hijacked by Islamists they accuse of clamping down on personal freedoms, with no sign of new jobs or improvements in infrastructure.

HARDSHIP

Since the uprising, the government has faced a string of protests over economic hardship and Tunisia's future path, with many complaining hardline Salafists were taking over the revolution in the former French colony dominated previously by a secular elite under the dictatorship of Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali.

Last year, Salafist groups prevented several concerts and plays from taking place in Tunisian cities, saying they violated Islamic principles, worrying the secular-minded among the 11 million Tunisians, who fear freedom of expression is in danger.

Declining trade with the crisis-hit euro zone has also left Tunisians struggling to achieve the better living standards many had hoped for following Ben Ali's departure. Any further signs of unrest could scare off tourists vital to an industry only just recovering from the revolution.

"More than 4,000 are protesting now, burning tires and throwing stones at the police," Mehdi Horchani, a Sidi Bouzid resident, told Reuters. "There is great anger."

Jobless graduate Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire in December 2010 in the city, 300 km (180 miles) southwest of Tunis, after police confiscated his unlicensed fruit cart, triggering the "Jasmine Revolution" that forced Ben Ali to flee to Saudi Arabia less than a month later, on January 14, 2011.

President Moncef Marzouki, who last month warned the tension between secularists and Islamists might lead to "civil war", canceled a visit to Egypt scheduled for Thursday and cut short a trip to France, where he addressed the European Parliament.

"We will continue to fight the enemies of the revolution," the secularist leader told European Union lawmakers in Strasbourg.

Belaid, who died in hospital, was a leading member of the opposition Popular Front party. A lawyer and human rights activist, he had been a constant critic of the government, accusing it of being a puppet of the rulers in the small but wealthy Gulf state of Qatar, which Tunisia denies.

"Chokri Belaid was killed today by four bullets to the head and chest," Ziad Lakhader, a leader of the Popular Front, told Reuters. "Doctors told us that he has died. This is a sad day for Tunisia."

DENIES INVOLVEMENT

Ennahda Prime Minister Jebali said the killers wanted to "silence his voice".

"The murder of Belaid is a political assassination and the assassination of the Tunisian revolution," he said.

Party President Rached Ghannouchi denied any involvement in the killing. Belaid said earlier this week that dozens of people close to the government attacked a meeting of his party.

"Is it possible that the ruling party could carry out this assassination when it would disrupt investment and tourism?" Ghannouchi told Reuters.

He blamed those seeking to derail Tunisia's democratic transition after a 2011 uprising. "Tunisia today is in the biggest political stalemate since the revolution. We should be quiet and not fall into a spiral of violence. We need unity more than ever," Ghannouchi said.

He accused secular opponents of stirring up sentiment against his party following Belaid's death. "The result is burning and attacking the headquarters of our party in many areas," he said.

French President Francois Hollande condemned the shooting, saying he was concerned by the rise of violence in Paris's former dominion, where the government says al Qaeda-linked militants linked to those in neighboring countries have been accumulating weapons with the aim of creating an Islamic state.

"This murder deprives Tunisia of one of its most courageous and free voices," Hollande's office said in a statement.

Riccardo Fabiani, Eurasia analyst on Tunisia, described it as a "major failure for Tunisian politics".

"The question is now what is Ennahda going to do and what are its allies going to do?" he said. "They could be forced to withdraw from the government which would lead to a major crisis in the transition."

Marzouki warned last month that the conflict between Islamists and secularists could lead to civil war and called for a national dialogue that included all political groupings.

Ennahda won 42 percent of seats in a parliamentary election in 2011 and formed a government in coalition with two secular parties, the Congress for the Republic, to which President Marzouki belongs, and Ettakatol.

Marzouki's party threatened on Sunday to withdraw from the government unless it dropped two Islamist ministers.

(Additional reporting by John Irish in Paris; Writing by Alison Williams; Editing by Alastair Macdonald)

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Govt to assess effectiveness of early travel discount scheme

SINGAPORE: Three to four per cent of MRT commuters have moved their travelling times into the Central Business District out of the peak 8am to 9am period since the SMRT implemented its Early Travel Discount Scheme.

In Parliament on Wednesday, Minister of State for Transport Josephine Teo said the scheme was enhanced from 10 cents to 30 cents in October 2011, and then to 50 cents last August when the scheme was extended to include the Circle Line.

Mrs Teo was replying to MP for Pasir Ris-Punggol GRC, Gan Thiam Poh had asked if the scheme could be extended to other stations with high human traffic, other lines and travel during other non-peak hours.

She said: "We should bear in mind that travel behaviours take time to change because commuters and employers need time to accommodate new travel and work arrangements. Accordingly, travel patterns cannot be expected to shift so rapidly. Therefore, we will continue to monitor and assess the effectiveness of the early travel discount scheme for a period of time before deciding whether to make further changes."

Mrs Teo thanked Mr Gan for his suggestions to enhance the scheme and assured him that the ministry will consider them for the next review of the scheme.

- CNA/fa

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