Obama details conservation action plan

President Barack Obama called Wednesday for a series of steps to help Americans conserve and get in touch with nature, including full funding of the $900 million Land and Water Conservation Fund for only the third time in its existence.

At a White House event, Obama also proposed creating a Conservation Service Corps to help young people find work in the outdoors, and extending the tax deduction for donating private land for conservation.

The proposals are part of an action plan by the America's Great Outdoors Initiative, which Obama launched last year to promote community conservation efforts to protect the nation's natural heritage and help people experience it.

Mobile Wars! Apple vs. Google vs. Those Other Guys

After Nokia's software surrender, the five-way struggle for mobile dominance heats up 

It's been a big couple of weeks in mobile. Verizon Wireless finally got the iPhone. Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) unveiled the first fruits of its Palm purchase last year. Nokia (NOK), the world's biggest handset maker, abandoned its once-dominant Symbian mobile software system and demoted itself to a kind of glorified contract manufacturer of Microsoft (MSFT)-powered devices.

The struggle for mobile dominance has entered a new phase. Why would Nokia throw out Symbian, with its 37 percent market share, in favor of software with less than one-seventh of that? Because recently hired Chief Executive Officer Stephen Elop is convinced that Microsoft has better odds of going up against the four other mobile powers—Apple (AAPL), Google (GOOG), Research In Motion (RIMM), and HP—and making its new Windows Phone 7 software a center of gravity for the world's programmers, manufacturers, and consumers. "The game has changed from a battle of devices to a war of ecosystems," Elop told investors at a London press conference on Feb. 11.

Security forces move on protesters in Bahrain's capital

Security forces in Bahrain's capital stormed an encampment of protesters in the dead of night Thursday, killing at least three people and injuring about 200.

The charge occurred early Thursday in the Pearl Roundabout, a landmark city circle located in the center of Manama, and the clampdown swiftly drew local and international condemnation.

Witnesses described a blunt show of force, with police firing pellets, rubber bullets and tear gas to force protesters out of the square.

One 15-year-old boy who said he and others were sleeping when police swooped and he had buckshot wounds to his arm and abdomen, and one reporter attacked while he was describing the melee said the security forces weren't "screwing around."

Three people were killed and at least 195 others were injured, the country's health minister, Dr. Faisal Ben Yacoub Al Hamar, said on state television.

Human rights advocates sharply criticized the security forces.

A series of blasts levelled several arms depots at a Tanzanian army base and killed at least 17 people, Prime Minister Mizengo Pinda said Thursday, in the second such incident in two years.

The blasts, which the prime minister said also left 145 people wounded, went off inside the Gongola Mboto army base in Dar es Salaam late Wednesday and destroyed several arms and ammunition depots.

"By this morning, there were 13 bodies at Amana hospital, two at Temeke hospital and two more at Muhimbili national hospital," he told parliament in a session aired live on state radio.

Pinda said he had convened an emergency security meeting over the blasts and added that the country's armed forces were investigating the incident.

There was no indication of foul play and such incidents have happened before in Tanzania.

In April 2009, 26 people were killed and hundreds wounded by a string of powerful blasts at an arms depot in Dar es Salaam, which officials said were accidental.

The series of explosions showered the entire city with debris and shrapnel, causing a panic among the population and bringing back memories of the 1998 bombing of the US embassy.

The 2009 blasts in the Mbagala district, located around 13 kilometres (eight miles) from the city centre, set off rockets, artillery and mortar shells, and displaced thousands of people.

Pakistani judge delays hearing for jail U.S. diplomat

A Pakistani court on Thursday postponed a hearing until March 14 for a captured American diplomat accused of shooting and killing two men, a government official said.

Thursday hearing was postponed after the Ministry of Foreign Affairs requested that given three weeks to respond to questions from the Lahore High Court on whether Raymond Davis is entitled to diplomatic immunity, according to Khawaja Haris, a senior government official lawyer.

Davis was not in court, nor was his lawyer or a representative of the U.S. Embassy, Haris said.

Last week, a Pakistani court Davis remain in custody for 14 days. Another hearing on a separate issue will be held on the matter later this month. Davis' attorney has filed a petition, challenging jurisdiction of the Court on the case. A judge will hear arguments on Feb. 25.

Davis said he was attacked by two men when he drove through a busy district of Lahore, according to the American Embassy in Pakistan.

Lahore Police Chief Aslam has Taren Davis' claim is rejected, the men he shot in self-defense, told reporters, "It was clearly murder."

Taren acknowledged that the two men were armed and that one of them pointed his gun at Davis. However, he said, the man not to shoot because "all the bullets were in their room."

A police report in the court appears to contradict that assertion, saying that the Boards of both the victims' guns were empty.

The report quotes witnesses said Davis first fired at the victims of the inside of his car, got out and shot twice in the back of one of the victims.

On Wednesday, an American official who has seen the first report of the Lahore police after the shooting incident, the report indicates that it was an attempted robbery.