Ray Lewis' last ride has at least 1 more stop

DENVER (AP) — Deflated and nearly defeated, Ray Lewis slumped on the heated bench on the sideline, the hood of his heavy jacket pulled over his head. The final seconds of his brilliant career were slipping away, just like Demaryius Thomas had escaped his grasp minutes earlier.
"I've never been a part of a game so crazy in my life," he said.
Thomas' go-ahead touchdown had given Denver a 35-28 lead and now the Ravens were out of timeouts, deep in their territory. Under a minute to go, the "last ride" about to make its final stop on a frozen field in the Rocky Mountains.
Joe Flacco was buying time in the pocket, about to throw the ball away and bring up fourth down at his 30. Peyton Manning was about to beat Baltimore for a 10th straight time, and Lewis was about to call it a career.
Then Lewis spotted Jacoby Jones sprinting past him along the Baltimore sideline. More importantly, so did Flacco, who lofted a high-arcing pass into both double coverage and the frigid Denver night.
Safety Rahim Moore leaped for the interception, only he was a tad too early and a bit too shallow. The football settled into Jones' arms and he pranced into the end zone, his 70-yard touchdown with 31 seconds left tying the game.
Baltimore (12-6) would win on Justin Tucker's field goal in the second overtime.
Lewis' retirement party will wait for another day.
"Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Awesome. He grew up today," Lewis said of Flacco. "He grew up today and in the tunnel I told him, 'You're the general now. Lead us to a victory. You lead us today. I'm just here to facilitate things.'
"And to look in his eyes, he has something different about him today and I just wanted to encourage him. To watch what he did today is probably one of the greatest things I'll always sit back and remember."
Reminiscing can wait for at least another week. Lewis gets to play again, against either at Houston or New England in the AFC championship game.
Flacco was the hero, but Lewis wasn't a bystander. He was right in the middle of things, providing his usual unyielding leadership.
Lewis made 17 tackles one week after he led the Ravens with 13 stops against Indianapolis while playing for the first time in three months after being sidelined with a torn right triceps.
"We wanted to get this win for Ray and I was going to do everything I could possibly do to get this win," said cornerback Corey Graham.
He did just that, picking off Manning twice, taking the first one back for a touchdown and setting up Tucker's winner in the game's 77th minute with his second interception.
Lewis had a fumble recovery in the third quarter that was negated by a questionable hands-to-the-face call on cornerback Cary Williams, but the Ravens, who were thumped at home by the Broncos 34-17 a month ago, shook it off.
The Broncos (13-4) became the ninth top-seeded team to lose at home in its first game in the playoffs, and to a team that was coming off a short week and playing at altitude, no less.
"When you look back at it and let the emotions calm down, it will probably be one of the greatest victories in Ravens history," Lewis said. "It's partly because of the way everything was stacked against us coming in."
It was even better than his emotion-filled farewell to Baltimore last week, when he did his famous dance coming out of the tunnel and then again after lining up at fullback in victory formation.
"One thing about the playoffs," Lewis said, "the only way to top it is to win the following week."
He said he spoke to his team last week about dismissing all those who said they had no chance.
"What if we do the impossible?" Lewis recounted saying.
It wasn't just the lead-up to the game that was so daunting. The Ravens allowed Trindon Holliday to become the first player in NFL playoff history to return a punt and a touchdown for scores, and both his 90-yard punt return and 104-yard kickoff return were the longest in league postseason history.
"For us to come in here and win, nine- to 10-point underdogs, that's the beautiful part about sports," Lewis said. "That's the thing that, if I miss anything about my career, it will be to listen to what people say you can't do and then to go do it.

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Ravens show their spirit with stunning win in Denver

(Reuters) - The Baltimore Ravens fell behind the Denver Broncos four times on Saturday and each time they battled back to level the game with the final rally paving the way for a stunning playoffs win which epitomizes the team's fighting spirit.
"This is a team of destiny," said running back Ray Rice, who rushed for 131 yards and a touchdown in the thrilling 38-35 double overtime AFC divisional playoff victory.
"Just look at the way we played today - it wasn't pretty, it wasn't perfect, but it was us," he added.
Baltimore were 31 seconds away from elimination when quarterback Joe Flacco hurled a 70-yard touchdown pass to wide receiver Jacoby Jones to silence the home fans and send the game into overtime.
Then, after Peyton Manning threw an interception, Justin Tucker's 47-yard field goal sent the Ravens into the AFC Championship game for the second successive year.
"This will probably go down as one of the greatest victories in Ravens history," said linebacker Ray Lewis, Baltimore's undisputed leader, who will retire whenever this season finally ends.
Last week's 24-9 win over the Indianapolis Colts was Lewis' final home game for the team he has played for since being drafted in 1996 but his farewell could yet be at the Super Bowl in New Orleans.
"It's his last ride, why not send him off the right way," said Rice, who feels that the Ravens, beaten by the New England Patriots in last year's AFC Championship game, have made a leap in quality.
"These are the games we used to lose and now we are finding ways to win them," he said.
GREW UP
The pressure was certainly on Flacco who, despite everything he has achieved, still faced questions over whether he had what it took to win in the post-season.
Three touchdowns, including that memorable pass late in the fourth, and 331 yards without an interception, were the perfect answer to the lingering doubters.
"He grew up today," Lewis said.
"I told him in the tunnel, 'lead us to victory'. To look in his eyes he had something different about him today. I've always been a Joe Flacco fan, but to watch what he did, this was one of his greatest days," he said.
The quarterback agreed.
"It was pretty incredible, we overcame some things today and we fought to the very end," Flacco said.
"When some of those things happened, none of us blinked, we just sat on the sideline and said ‘alright, it's our turn'. Slowly but surely we were able to score points when we needed to and our defense was able to stop them," he said.
In next week's AFC championship game, Baltimore will face either the Houston Texans or the Patriots, who extinguished their Super Bowl hopes last year.
"We feel it is going to take a lot for somebody to kick us off the field in the AFC Championship," Flacco added.
"We know what it felt like last year without the win, we know what we have put in this year so far to get back to this point so it is going to be a great game.

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Ravens stun Broncos in double overtime playoff thriller

(Reuters) - The Baltimore Ravens fought back for a 38-35 overtime win over the Denver Broncos on Saturday in a thrilling playoff encounter that puts them one win away from their first Super Bowl berth in 12 years.
The visiting Ravens, who entered the game as 9-1/2 point underdogs, grabbed victory when Justin Tucker kicked a 47-yard field goal in the second overtime, six plays after Broncos quarterback Peyton Manning was intercepted.
Tucker's ice-cool kick in the freezing Mile High stadium ended a pulsating back-and-forth game that included a 90-yard punt return and 104-yard kickoff return for touchdowns from Denver's Trindon Holliday.
"That football game did the game of football proud," said Ravens head coach John Harbaugh, "It was one of the greatest football games you are ever going to see."
Denver were heading for victory in regulation until Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco threw a 70-yard touchdown pass to Jacoby Jones with 31 seconds left that tied the score at 35-35.
Then, after both defenses came up strong in overtime, Manning, who threw for 290 yards and three touchdowns, was intercepted for a second time when Corey Graham superbly picked off a pass intended for Brandon Stokley.
"A bad throw and the decision probably wasn't great either," said Manning.
With the win, the Ravens advance to the American Football Conference championship game on January 20, where they will play the winner of Sunday's game between the New England Patriots and Houston Texans.
The game was incident packed from the outset with Holliday opening the scoring with a spectacular punt return less than three minutes in. But Baltimore responded with quick touchdowns as Flacco found Torrey Smith with a 59-yard pass before Corey Graham intercepted Manning and ran in a 39-yard score.
Manning found Stokley with a 15-yard touchdown pass to tie the game at 14-14 after the first quarter.
BITTER DISAPPOINTMENT
The remaining three quarters followed the same pattern - a touchdown for Denver followed by a reply from Baltimore, ending with Jones's crowd-silencing score as he took advantage of some awful coverage from Denver safety Rahim Moore.
The Broncos had the ball with half a minute on the clock but chose to take the knee and go into overtime rather than try to make the ground needed for a field goal attempt.
Then came the overtime drama which will haunt Manning and the Broncos through the offseason.
The Ravens, with inspirational defensive leader Ray Lewis in his final season, were carried to victory by Flacco who completed 18-of-34 passes for 331 yards and three touchdowns.
"It puts Joe Flacco in the elite category where he deserves to be," said running back Ray Rice, who rushed for 131 yards and a touchdown from 30 carries while receiver Smith had two touchdowns and 98 yards.
The loss was be a bitter disappointment for Manning, who had been hoping for a Super Bowl appearance in his first season for Denver after missing last season with Indianapolis following several neck surgeries.
"We thought we were peaking at the right time but we played a good team," said Manning. "A stout defense with a lot of veteran players. Its very disappointing because of how much effort and hard work this team has put into this season."
Flacco acknowledged some good fortune, in the way that Jones was allowed to get open for the crucial game-tying touchdown.
"You have to get a bit lucky, it worked out and we were able to take a shot and everybody came through and when that opportunity arose, there is no way to explain it," he said.
"It was an awesome football game. It was just crazy."

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Libyan cop in Benghazi kidnapped

Abdelsalam al-Mahdawi, the head of Benghazi's criminal investigation department, was kidnapped on his way to work today by gunmen at an intersection in Libya's second largest city.
Benghazi was the heart of the uprising against Muammar Qaddafi in 2011, and since then it has failed to bring the militias that fought on the side of the revolution – some Islamist, some not – under any kind of government control. They remain armed and often a law unto themselves in the city. Criminal gangs, spawned from militias, are also at work.
The list of potential suspects is long, particularly since Mr. Mahdawi's personal background isn't immediately clear. Was he someone who served Mr. Qaddafi's regime at one point, and is being targeted for revenge? Could it be a personal or family dispute? Could his investigations of militias and/or criminals be the reason for his kidnapping? A simple matter of kidnap-for-ransom? All are possible.
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But what's likely is that sorting out what's happened to him will be confusing, subject to completing claims, and difficult for any neutral observer trying to get at the truth to figure out. That's been the pattern in violent incidents in Benghazi not just since the war ended, but before.
The attack on the US facility in Benghazi in September that left Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans dead is still not fully understood. Meanwhile, today's assault is the second attack on a senior police official in Benghazi since November, when Benghazi police chief Farraj al-Dursi was assassinated outside his house. Mr. Dursi, who served under Qaddafi's government, was appointed police chief during a shuffle of security in the city after the attack on the Americans in September.
One long-standing murder in Benghazi is taking a troubling turn.
Abdel Fateh Younes, a commander of rebel forces, was abducted and murdered in the city in July 2011. Gen. Younes defected from his long-standing stalwart support of Qaddafi that February and was abducted after being called back from the front of that civil war. What happened next remains uncertain.
Shortly after his murder, Mustapha Abdel Jalil, then head of Libya's Transitional National Council and himself a former minister in Qaddafi's government, insisted Younes was killed by agents of Qaddafi. Others in the rebel government in Benghazi said Younes' arrest had been sought on suspicion he was working as a double agent for Qaddafi. In the immediate aftermath, a civil war within a civil war in Benghazi looked possible, with angry loyalists of Younes demanding justice.
Mr. Jalil was a hero of the revolution for being one of the earliest defectors from Qaddafi's regime and for successfully navigating international intrigue and competing agendas domestically in winning NATO support for the rebellion. In December, he was threatened with a military trial for allegedly ordering the murder of Younes. Among the charges against Jalil were "undermining national unity."
Is there good reason to suspect him? It's unclear, as with so much else in Libya these days. The proposal to try Jalil in a military court, however, was clearly worrying. On Dec. 19, the military tribunal organized to try Jalil resigned and the case was thrown back to prosecutors. To top it all, one of the judges investigating Jalil was murdered in Benghazi last year.
What does all this mean? Hard to say. But the ongoing chaos and bloodshed, at high political levels in Libya, is not a positive sign.

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Amid bloodshed and chaos, Syrian wages a war for neutral reporting

While Syria's state-run news outlets run a steady stream of reports about "terrorists" and international conspiracies against President Bashar al-Assad, opposition activists roll out their own endless barrage of footage highlighting atrocities and destruction by regime forces, with little in the way of context.
With media access difficult or impossible in most of the country and no tradition of balanced journalism, reliable, objective coverage of Syria is scarce. Cairo-based Syrian activist and media entrepreneur Rami Jarrah, on the cusp of launching a radio station inside Syria, is trying to fix that – but he is starting from scratch. By providing Syrians with rational, fair reporting, he hopes to help them avoid the worst of the uncertainty in the aftermath of this conflict – now in its 22nd month – when it ends.
"When someone comes in and wants to work with us, and wants to do it to help Syria, you have to convince them that the way you do that is by being neutral," says Mr. Jarrah during an interview at the Cairo headquarters of New Media Association (ANA), which he co-directs.
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One of the major problems with Syrian troops, he insists, is not that most of them are "criminals," but that they simply "don’t know what’s going on" – and the same could be said of many of those in the extreme opposition.
Meanwhile, the international community is foundering amid attempts to understand what is happening on the ground. Because reporters have an easier time accessing opposition sources and visiting opposition-controlled areas, international coverage of Syria has been skewed, Jarrah argues.
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"You aren’t seeing any media coverage of Damascus and Latakia," where the government is still strong, both because reporters are not granted access and because "those who support Assad think they should not speak to journalists, that the media is trying to weaken the country," he says.
And coverage of the opposition isn't very fair either, he says, claiming that Western reporters "are only going in with the extreme opposition," such as Al Qaeda-linked groups like Jabhat al-Nusra, which the US recently designated a terrorist organization. Jarrah says reports about the prevalence of such groups are "over-exaggerated" because they sell more copy.
PRISON, PSEUDONYMS, AND FLIGHT
Born in Cyprus to Syrian dissident parents and raised in London, Jarrah was working toward a degree in journalism in Dubai when he visited Syria for the first time in 2004. He was arrested upon landing, accused of espionage, slapped with a three-year travel ban, and forced to remain in a country where he was initially unable even to read the language, although he spoke it fluently.
During the initial protests in early 2011, he was beaten, tortured, and released only after admitting to being a "terrorist." Left jobless after refusing to attend a pro-government rally, he became well known in the dissident community under the pseudonym Alexander Page for getting information to Western media outlets through his blog. His fluent English, training in journalism, anti-regime stance, and contacts all led to frequent requests for interviews in Western media. He granted them, but never revealed his real name.
In October 2011, Jarrah was tipped off that the pseudonym had been traced to him and fled the country with his wife and young daughter through Jordan to Cairo, where he has been since, working to get media equipment into Syria and get reliable information out. Last month, Canadian Journalists for Free Expression awarded him the 2012 International Press Freedom Award for his work supporting a network of independent journalists in Syria.
Now he is in Cairo, getting a media organization off the ground that he hopes will serve as a source for balanced reporting by Syrians and for Syrians. Much bloodshed could have been avoided, but much can still be saved, if appeals are made to Syrians’ critical thinking abilities, not their fears or sectarian and religious affiliations, he says – and objective reporting can do that.
NO AGENDA OTHER THAN OBJECTIVITY
Jarrah has high hopes for Radio ANA. A trial version is already available online and it will be available on satellite in late January, although the official launch isn't until June 10. The station will broadcast out of Aleppo’s Bustan Al Qasr district and eastern Damascus.
Radio ANA has 16 reporters inside Syria, all of whom his organization has worked with over the past year and trained in technical skills – six in Damascus and one or more in other major cities. It also has a wider network of hundreds of citizen journalists it can tap for further information and on-the-ground coverage of events in cities other than those where staff reporters live.
The Cairo staff of the organization, who come from all across Syria, make every possible effort to verify the information from the citizen journalists by cross-checking information and paying close attention to location identifiers like dialects and landmarks spotted in videos, Jarrah says.
Although ANA intends to continue providing reporting on Syria to the international community, Radio ANA is setting out to be the first Syrian non-regime radio station broadcasting from within Syria without a particular agenda – other than objectivity. The ultimate aim, as Jattah stressed throughout the interview, is to produce an informed Syrian population, necessary if the country is to be rebuilt with the freedoms for which the opposition is fighting.

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Good Taliban, Bad Taliban? Pakistani commander's killing exposes blurry lines

The US drone killing of Pakistani Taliban commander Maulvi Nazir threatens to unleash new anti-government violence against the country’s weak government or civilian targets, and expose fractures in the country’s military and security forces, analysts say.
Mr. Nazir was traveling in a car in troubled South Waziristan, bordering Afghanistan, Thursday, when his vehicle was hit by a missile, according to media reports. He and six other Pakistanis believed to be militants were killed.
The attacks highlight the convoluted interconnections among insurgent factions in Pakistan, some of whom are focused on fighting US forces in Afghanistan, others of whom seek to topple Pakistan’s government. Still other groups target Indian forces. Many of the factions are backed or financed by military and intelligence agencies in Pakistan, who have differing agendas themselves.
The killing was confirmed by Pakistani intelligence officials in the nearby city of Peshawar who spoke on condition of anonymity since they were not authorized to speak to the press.
Mr. Nazir, who survived a suicide attack in November reputedly organized by rival Taliban commanders, was considered to be pro-government, a rare stance among Pakistani Taliban. He had agreed in the past to restrain his fighters from targeting Pakistani government forces, instead focusing efforts on the Taliban-led anti-US insurgency in Afghanistan. That had led some to label him a “good" Taliban.
With his killing, however, some analysts say his successor and followers may now turn their guns on civilian and military targets within Pakistan.
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“Such [drone] attacks are not the first ones to have occurred and they have definitely created rifts between the Pakistani military and the likes of Maulvi Nazir-led Taliban,” says Mehreen Zahra Malik, an Islamabad-based columnist who recently visited Wana, the town in South Waziristan where Nazir was based.
Adding to the problem is widespread outrage among most Pakistanis toward US drone strikes. The government and military have harnessed that anger to pressure Washington. The “Good Taliban” forces increasingly suspect these attacks are being carried out with the consent of the Pakistani security establishment, Ms. Malik says.
“There is nothing to say the 'Good Taliban' won't also turn their guns on the Pakistani state in the coming days, which is definitely something the Pakistan Army would like to avoid,” Malik adds.
Other experts believe targeting Nazir could be part of a larger strategic alliance between Pakistan and the US, a relationship that has been strained by the 2011 secret US raid that killed Osama bin Laden without the knowledge of the government. The 2011 “Salala Incident” in which NATO aircraft killed 24 Pakistani soldiers at a post on the Afghan border also prompted anger toward Washington.
“By taking out the leadership of those Taliban based in Pakistan and fighting in Afghanistan like Maulvi Nazir, both countries can increase the pressure on the Taliban for talks because they will be in a stronger position,” says Ayesha Siddiqa, a defense analyst who has authored two books on the Pakistani military.
Some fear the drone attacks may end up backfiring.
“This drone attack belies the conventional wisdom... Why will the US target a militant close to the Afghan Taliban and antagonize those it wants to bring on the table for peace talks in?” says Fahd Husain, a noted columnist for the several leading Islamabad newspapers.

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Syrian moderates fear being edged out of uprising

Abdul Rahman, a quiet, even-tempered man, leads a collection of moderate Free Syrian Army battalions in Aleppo. He says groups like his are becoming harder to find as the 21-month uprising drags on and more groups lean either secular or Islamist extremist.
At a time when opposition fighters live and die by their ability to get equipment, Mr. Rahman says it’s become more difficult for those in the middle ideologically to get supplies, with most donors choosing to support hardened secularists or Islamists.
Recently, Rahman had to break with some of the battalions he formerly commanded, in part because some were involved in criminal activity and there were disagreements among leaders, but also because of shortages of equipment.
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“The moderates are the majority of people here in Syria, but now they are decreasing without any support,” he says. “If it continues like it is now, extremist groups will have a lot of influence after the Assad government falls.”
'PEOPLE ARE DESPERATE'
Abu Karam, the leader of the opposition’s Abu Bakar al Sadeq battalion, says that a number of well-funded, hardline groups are using their resources to enlarge their base of support. “People are desperate and they will take assistance from whoever is giving it,” he says.
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Many Syrians are worried about what Rahman and other moderates describe as an increasingly polarized political landscape among the Syrian opposition. Hardline groups exist among both the Islamists and secularists, but many Syrians say that conservative Islamist groups are gaining the most ground inside Syria right now. Throughout Aleppo, a number of civilians are also calling for a post-Assad government to be based on sharia, or Islamic law.
Despite moderates' fears, many Syrians, regardless of their affiliations and beliefs, say the trend toward conservative Islam is largely a response to decades of secular rule under the Assad regime and does not necessarily indicate the desire for an ultra-conservative regime in Syria.
“Wherever the extremists go, they try to impose themselves on the population. This is a civilian revolution, and it contains all the elements of our society,” says Abu Karam, the battalion leader.
CONFLICTED FEELINGS
Among the groups that have caused the greatest concern is Jabhat al-Nusra, a conservative Islamist group now fighting among the Syrian opposition. Last week, the US State Department classified the group as a terrorist organization, saying it had ties to Al Qaeda in Iraq, which was a major force within the anti-US Sunni insurgency.
Many Syrians do not agree with the classification of Jabhat al-Nusra as a terrorist organization and harbor conflicted feelings about the group. Its fighters, many of whom are foreign, have experience fighting in Iraq and Libya, among other places, and provide expertise to less experienced fighters. The group is also well equipped. Both aspects make the militant organization critical to the opposition’s ability to effectively challenge the army of President Bashar al-Assad.
Ideologically though, the group represents a marked departure from Syria’s longstanding moderate tradition. Opposition fighter Abu Osama started fighting with Jabhat al-Nusra before the group had fully formed, but decided to leave when they asked him to pledge a loyalty oath that could require him to fight for Jabhat al-Nusra in other countries when the war ended. He’d also grown concerned about some of the group's ultra-conservative practices.
“They’re always accusing people of being infidels,” he says. “They consider [Egyptian President and Muslim Brotherhood member Mohamed] Morsi to be an infidel because he’s not applying the sharia law in Egypt.”
AFTER ASSAD?
A number of opposition fighters now say that they fear an eventual battle with the group if and when Assad is no longer in power. Among those moderates who doubt such an extreme scenario, they still say they worry about the influence such a group could have on a new government in Syria.
“Jabhat al-Nusra is not going to accept someone saying, ‘Thanks for your help, now please go.’” says Abu Mohammad, commander of the opposition’s Dar al Wafa Battalion and a member of the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood. “We’re really betting on the awareness of the young people” to know better than to support Jabhat al-Nusra’s political agenda.

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Tunisia seeks gold in former dictator's assets

On a crisp December morning in Tunis, a finance ministry official named Mohamed Hamaied was demonstrating the horsepower of maroon V-12 BMW on the runway of a national guard airfield. Beside him sat an agent for a potential buyer.
“You know, this is the same runway that Ben Ali fled from,” remarked another passenger, automotive expert Mourad Bouzidi, from the back seat.
The BMW is among the seized possessions of deposed Tunisian President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and his inner circle that the government is selling to help fill depleted treasury coffers. But the sale of regime assets, which are often hard to track down and obtain, is not going to be enough. Long-term prosperity needs real reforms.
In Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, the fall of dictators has triggered a scramble for cash as new governments struggle to restore stability amid high expectations and damaged economies.
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In Tunisia, high unemployment has fueled labor strikes and rioting, which in turn provoke political squabbling. Last month, clashes in the rural town of Siliana between stone-throwing protestors and police – who fired birdshot – prompted some opposition politicians to demand Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali’s resignation.
Economic woes stem partly from last year’s revolution, which spooked tourists and foreign investors while the eurozone crisis hobbled key trading partners. But the roots of trouble go deeper, to a regime that spent years neglecting rural regions and letting unemployment rise while amassing great wealth for itself.
“Seemingly half of the Tunisian business community can claim a Ben Ali connection through marriage,” wrote then-US Ambassador Robert F. Godec in a June 2008 diplomatic cable published by WikiLeaks, describing an extended family seen as “the nexus of Tunisian corruption.”
TIGERS AND FRENCH ICE CREAM
A year later, Mr. Godec got a taste of regime opulence when Ben Ali’s son-in-law and heir-apparent, Sakher El Materi, invited him for dinner at his seaside villa. Godec’s July 2009 cable notes an infinity pool, ice cream flown in from St. Tropez, and a pet tiger named Pasha.
Ben Ali and most of his family fled Tunisia in January 2011 as protests brought down his regime. Two months later, then-interim president Fouad Embazaa ordered the seizure of assets belonging to 114 top regime figures, including Ben Ali and his wife, Leila Trabelsi.
It’s unclear how much the assets – from cars, yachts, and palaces to major stakes in Tunisian companies – are worth. One estimate last September by a government commission put their total value at around $13 billion.
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Ben Ali’s personal wealth is even harder to gauge, with most of his assets believed to be stashed abroad, says acting finance minister Slim Besbes. Many countries that froze his assets last year have been slow to unfreeze them – the European Union only did so last month – while other legal challenges remain.
The two largest known concentrations of Ben Ali wealth outside Tunisia are around $65 million in Switzerland and $28 million in an account under Mrs. Trabelsi’s name at Lebanon’s central bank, says Mr. Besbes. But while governments are cooperating, Ben Ali and his family's lawyers are fighting back.
Ben Ali’s Beirut-based lawyer, Akram Azoury, argues that a March 2011 seizure of his client's assets was illegal and says Ben Ali has no assets in his name outside Tunisia. Those in the country “are limited, to my knowledge, to his personal residence and a bank account whose value I cannot estimate, contrary to what Tunisian authorities have told the public,” he said by e-mail.
BIG NEEDS
Meanwhile, Tunisia relies heavily on foreign money. Last month it borrowed $500 million each from the World Bank and African Development Bank.
The government has also begun liquidating regime assets: 1.2 billion dinar ($776 million) generated from asset sales helped pay for a 2.5 billion dinar ($1.6 billion) increase in this year’s budget.
Latest on the block are thousands of personal items, including cars, jewelry, and fine art, which went on sale this week at a ritzy hotel near Tunis. To oversee things, the finance ministry tapped Mr. Hamaied, an old hand in commerce.
One morning earlier this month, Hamaied and Mr. Bouzidi, the car expert, were at the national guard facility in Tunisia, giving a preview of cars to the buyer’s agent. There was Ben Ali’s Maybach town car, with massage seats in back, a mini-fridge stocked with Evian, and a yard of leg room. Nearby was a black Aston Martin bearing a small plaque that read, “Handbuilt in England for Sakher El Materi.”
The scout was drawn to the BMW, seized from a Trabelsi. Hamaied popped the hood so he could photograph the big V-12 engine. The odometer showed 2,587 kilometers (about 1,600 miles).
“They’re all like that; these cars didn’t roll much – just between La Marsa and Hammamet,” Hamaied said, naming chic beachside towns near Tunis. Then he proposed a test drive. The men got in, Hamaied gunned the engine, and the BMW tore down the runway as the needle shot to 100 kilometers per hour (about 60 miles per hour).
Authorities hope the sale, which will last at least a month, will generate about $13 million. The government says the proceeds will be spent on development projects.
Ultimately, however, Tunisia has more work ahead to revitalize the economy, says Antonio Nucifora, lead economist on Tunisia for the World Bank. It must reform laws such as those governing foreign investment and labor, cut red tape, and combat a lingering penchant for cronyism.
“At present it is connections that make the system work,” he says. “They need to change from a system based on privileges and connections to one based on merit and competition.

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Russia's adoption ban exposes political rift

Russia's upper house of parliament today unanimously approved a ban on US citizens adopting Russian children, a highly charged move that appears to have prompted an unusual public split among government officials.
The Dima Yakovlev bill, named after one of 19 Russian children to die due to abuse or negligence at the hands of adoptive US parents in the past two decades, now goes to the Kremlin for President Vladimir Putin’s consideration. In his only comments so far on the anti-adoption measure, Mr. Putin said last week that it was "emotional but adequate," which is widely seen as an indication that he will sign it into law.
The legislation was originally framed as a tit-for-tat response to the Magnitsky Act, a US measure signed into law by President Barack Obama earlier this month that aims to punish officials connected to the 2009 prison death of Russian whistle-blowing lawyer Sergei Magnitsky. But the Russian legislation has been amended beyond recognition by hardline lawmakers and now looks like a shotgun law to punish US citizens who become involved in almost any kind of non-business activity in Russia.
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Many experts think that Putin may yet act as the "voice of reason" and strip the ban on adoption out of the bill before he signs it.
"This whole discussion over the adoption ban has served the purpose of shifting public attention from the corrupt Russian officials targeted under the US Magnitsky Act to the problems of orphans and the dangers they face in foreign homes," says Nikolai Petrov, an expert with the Moscow Carnegie Center.
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"It's perfectly possible that Putin will ultimately adjust the adoption ban, but leave in place many of the other tough measures in this bill that haven't gotten much attention," Mr. Petrov says. Those measures include even harsher restrictions that would prevent any US passport holder from holding a leadership post in any Russian organization that is deemed by authorities to engage in politics.
The adoption ban has also become the focus of controversy and prompted a rare government split inside Russia. This week a liberal radio station leaked news of a memo by Deputy Prime Minister Olga Golodets warning that the proposed ban would violate Russian law and at least two treaties that Russia is party to. It would also overturn a bilateral accord on adoptions, negotiated between the United States and Russia, which came into force last month.
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Education Minister Dmitry Livanov have also spoken out against the anti-adoption bill. Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, voiced annoyance that the government’s internal disagreements were being aired in public, but still signaled support for the measure.
"Learning about official correspondence from the media is not always pleasant," Mr. Peskov told the Kommersant FM radio station yesterday. But "it would be a mistake to think that there is staunch opposition to the bill within government. On the contrary, there are many arguments in favor of it," he said.
Many Russians believe it is a national shame that thousands of children are adopted by foreigners each year. According to a public opinion survey published this week by the state-run Public Opinion Fund, 56 percent of Russians support the proposed adoption ban, while just 21 percent oppose it.
Pavel Astakhov, the Kremlin's children's rights ombudsman and a strong supporter of the ban, said in a letter to Putin published today that Russia could simply pull out of the bilateral agreement with the US and that the move would violate no Russian laws.
Meanwhile, about 130,000 Russians have signed a petition at the website of opposition newspaper Novaya Gazeta asking the Kremlin to scrap the proposed ban.
In a sign that the ill will generated by the issue might snowball further, a petition posted at the White House's website, signed by over 54,000 Russians and Americans, urges President Obama to expand the so-called Magnitsky List by adding the names of all the Russian lawmakers in the two chambers who voted for the adoption ban. About 7,000 signed a petition calling for Obama to add Putin's name to the list.
Over the past two decades, about 60,000 Russian children have been adopted by US families. Of those, at least 19 died due to parental abuse or neglect. Each one of those cases ignited a firestorm of public outrage in Russia, and led to two suspensions of all foreign adoptions.
It also led to several efforts to tighten up Russia's once-lax foreign adoption process. Today, prospective parents are no longer able to arrange an adoption on their own, but must work through heavily regulated and fully accredited agencies, says Alyona Senkevich, a representative of Hand-in-Hand, one of fewer than 40 US-based adoption agencies still accredited to work in Russia.
"It's heartbreaking to think that we just signed the bilateral adoption agreement. . .. The main impact of this law (if Putin signs it) would be to strip Russian orphans of the right to be adopted abroad,” she says. “They will become the victims of political games."
Under Russian law, a child is not eligible for foreign adoption until the child has been rejected at least three times by prospective Russian adoptive parents— which usually happens for health reasons.
Albert Likhanov, president of the non-governmental Russian Children's Fund, says that the proposed ban would result in the approximately 1,000 orphans adopted each year by US families to be institutionalized instead of ending up in loving homes.
"I fully understand the wish of many Russians that our children would all be adequately cared for in Russia. But this is not the situation today, and a child cannot wait for everything to get stabilized," he says.
Mr. Likhanov said that Putin’s predecessor, Dmitry Medvedev, once pointed out that in 2008 alone there were 130,000 cases in Russia of violence against children and over 2,000 deaths.
"There is a crisis in our system, and this debate shows that there are people who are willing to use our orphans as political footballs. . . this conflict makes clear that all is not well in own kingdom,” he says.

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Italians, backed by the Catholic Church, aim to stop Sunday shopping

Italians are fighting a government lift of regulations on business operation hours, insisting that the move will eventually hurt the small shops and values that have long been the foundation of the Italian business community.
The deregulation, put into effect January 2012, removes restrictions on business operating hours, including Sundays and holidays. It is intended to stimulate competition in what has traditionally been a highly regulated market. However, it has been vehemently criticized by many shop owners, and the campaign against it has received a boost from the powerful Catholic Church.
Campaign organizers argue that working on Sunday has forced employees to sacrifice "important values" and benefited big companies at the expense of small businesses.
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Headed by Confesercenti, a leading retailers’ business association, and backed by the powerful Italian Bishops Conference, the campaign began at the end of November. Its organizers are hoping to collect the 50,000 signatures required to submit a bill to Parliament by April. The bill would give regions – rather than the national Parliament – the power to regulate Sunday openings. The goal of the bill isn’t to outlaw opening on Sundays but to eliminate “the excesses” brought by deregulation, say organizers.
If it gets the signatures, the bill would most likely be examined after the February election.
“People say: ‘It’s nice to have shops open on Sunday.’ But I don’t make extra sales on Sunday,” says Aldina Orlandini, who has run a clothing shop in a busy downtown street in Reggio Emilia, an affluent town near Bologna, since 1978.
Ms. Orlandini says deregulation hasn't hurt her business, since her store can count on a steady pool of customers. Still, she says, the measure is just wrong.
“People have the right to rest one day per week. Am I not a human being? Don’t I have a family?” Orlandini says. “The law should mandate a day off.”
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But for Mauro Bussoni, the vice director of Confesercenti and the coordinator of the “Free Sunday” campaign, the problem is more systemic. “This measure favors certain retailers,” he says.
Deregulation hasn’t increased sales, and it has only increased costs for small businesses, since putting together shifts during the holidays is easier for big stores, which are more able to pay the extra costs, including overtime, Mr. Bussoni argues.
Bussoni says he fears that without regulation of the days and hours stores can operate, a competition will emerge in which only the fittest survive at the expense of mom-and-pop operations, which are already being hit hard by the recession. Istat, Italy’s statistics bureau, recently reported that retail sales for October 2012 were 3.8 percent lower than in October 2011. The process, he says, would change the face of Italian cities, threatening the quality of life of people, such as senior citizens, who rely on neighborhood stores.
The campaign’s organizers argue it’s more than a matter of competing business models, but defending the right of workers and shop owners to spend time with their families.
“On Sunday, leave us alone,” says Mina Giannandrea, a shop owner and the president of FEDERstrade, a Rome retailers’ association that’s also participating in the campaign. “People who shop on Sunday are selfish; they don’t think about those who have to work on Sunday,” Ms. Giannandrea says.
The importance of family time is the message that has perhaps resonated the most with the Catholic Church, which has thrown its support behind the campaign.
“Freedom without truth, without a higher end is mere caprice,” said Archbishop Giancarlo Bregantini, stressing the importance of a day of rest as mandated by the Bible in an interview with Vatican Radio.
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Supporters of deregulation emphasize the freedom it gives consumers – a different notion of freedom than that embraced by the Confesercenti campaign. Deregulation has given customers the ability to make purchases whenever it suits them, and stores should take advantage of this during the economic downturn, says Giovanni Cobolli Gigli, the president of Federdistribuzione, an association of Italian retail chains.
“It’s not a matter of staying open 24/7, as some have self-interestedly suggested,” Mr. Cobolli Gigli says, adding that in many cases Sunday shifts are covered by workers who volunteer to get overtime, and that the increased store hours could eventually create a demand for new, part-time weekend jobs.
To think that small shops must stay open as much as chains at all costs is a mistake, says Serena Sileoni, a fellow at the pro-market think tank Istituto Bruno Leoni. Deregulation could be an opportunity for shop owners to design a schedule based on their customers’ needs and to find a profitable niche. This could ultimately lead to changes in the way Italian cities look, she argues.
“Cities are already different from how they used to be,” Ms. Sileoni says.
Andrea Moro, a professor of economics at Vanderbilt University, says markets are always working to respond to innovation, which often comes hand-in-hand with the destruction of old ideas or traditions.
While Mr. Moro is sympathetic to the challenges faced by retail workers, he says he can think of only one path for them: “In the modern economic structure, workers must reinvent themselves, no one excluded. Thankfully, these people still have jobs and they must adapt to the new working conditions,” he says.

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A year after being literally wiped out, a Russian hockey team flourishes

Wooden hockey sticks smack into rubber pucks as the metal blades of skates slice through the ice. The sounds echo through an empty arena in the Czech capital Prague in late November as a visiting hockey team prepares for another game in the Kontinental Hockey League.
But this is no ordinary squad. This is Lokomotiv Yaroslavl, a Russian team that was literally wiped out last year in an air tragedy that shocked the hockey world.
On Sept. 7, 2011, the team was set to fly to Minsk to play their first game of the new season amid high hopes of adding to its league titles from the 1990s. But the team’s plane, a Yak-42, never gained proper altitude and slammed into a tower. It went down in flames about a mile from Tunoshna Airport in Yaroslavl, Russia.
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Forty-five people on board died, among them some of the greats of the game, including Slovakia’s Pavol Demitra; Ruslan Salei, a hero back home in Belarus; and three Czech players with world championship medals. Only the flight engineer survived.
A government investigation found one of the pilots had literally stepped on the brakes, dragging the plane down when it should have been going up. It later emerged the pilot and co-pilot were not properly trained to fly the Yak-42, and had forged documents to prove otherwise.
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The crash provoked much soul-searching in Russia with then-President Dmitry Medvedev calling for an urgent upgrade of the country’s passenger jets.
More immediately for Lokomotiv, it left the club without its senior players or coaches. Of the entire senior roster, only one coach and one player, both of whom had stayed behind, were left.
REBUILDING
But now, just a year on, Lokomotiv is not only playing, but winning as well, sitting near the top of the Western Conference of the mostly Russian Kontinental Hockey League.
Tim Rowe, their American coach, credits Lokomotiv President Yuri Yakovlev with assembling a squad from scratch that can compete in the KHL, considered by hockey cognoscenti to be the world’s top league currently playing, as the NHL remains mired in a labor dispute between owners and players.
After the crash, Mr. Yakovlev rejected a KHL offer to craft a replacement team assembled with players from other KHL teams, along with some of Lokomotiv’s junior players. Instead, the junior team played last year in Russia’s Major Hockey League – the country’s top minor league, all with the hope of returning to the top flight this season.
And return they did, bouncing back even stronger than management had hoped.
“I knew we would have a good team; Mr. Yakovlev has been active signing good players. But even I’m surprised how quickly this team has gelled,” explains Mr. Rowe.
'A SEASON DEDICATED TO THOSE GUYS'
Rowe cites a form of divine intervention for the team’s success. "I'm not being strange when I say this, I think we're getting some help from up above in the type of season we're having."
They're definitely looking out over us, and it's a good feeling," he says. "There's a calmness over this team every night that I haven't been around too often, and it's an awful lot of fun to be a part of it.”
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Rowe was particularly impacted by the tragedy, being a friend of Brad McCrimmon, the team's Canadian coach who died in the crash. Mr. McCrimmon was set to start his first season with the team.
Russian Viktor Kozlov was playing for another team, Salavat Yulaev, last year when league commissioner Alexander Medvedev interrupted its first game to announce to disbelieving fans and players alike what had happened just a bit earlier in the day in Yaroslavl.
“I was shocked by the news. We all were. We couldn’t believe it,” says Mr. Kozlov, who plied his skills for years in the NHL.
Now, a year later, Kozlov is with Lokomotiv. Kozlov says he joined the team, partly for the chance to be part of the team’s rebirth. He says although life goes on, the former team must not be forgotten.
He points to a charity match played earlier in the year in Zlin, in the Czech Republic. That was the hometown of Karel Rachunek, one of three Czech players to die in the crash. "Yeah, of course, we remember the guys, like Karel Rachunek, with the game with Zlin."
Canadian Mark Flood says the constant reminders – including the ringing of a bell before each home game to honor the fallen players – are all part of what motivates the team.
"Every home game we have a little ceremony for the team that passed away last year. So, we're reminded of it every day," explains Mr. Flood. "Definitely our season is dedicated to those guys.

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Pakistan says 29 nationals beaten by Afghans

Afghan officials say they are investigating allegations by neighboring Pakistan that Afghan forces severely beat Pakistani nationals.
The Saturday protest note from Islamabad's Foreign Office provided no details other than to say that all 29 had valid travel documents.
Afghan Foreign Ministry spokesman Janan Mosazai says he has no information about the allegations, but Kabul will try to investigate them.
Relations between the neighboring countries are poor, with the Kabul government accusing Pakistan of harboring and supporting Taliban insurgents. But last month a top Afghan peace mediator hailed Pakistan's recent decision to free nine Taliban members who favor negotiations, saying it was a sign that Pakistan is willing to bring the militants to the table and end Afghanistan's 11-year war.

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Bombing at political rally kills 8 in Pakistan

 Pakistani police say a suicide bomber attacked a political rally in the country's northwest, killing eight people.
Police officer Arfan Khan says the bombing Saturday in Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, also wounded more than 20 people.
Khan says the rally was being held by the Awami National Party, whose members have been repeatedly targeted by the Taliban. A provincial Cabinet minister from the party, Bashir Balour, was wounded in the attack.

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Bombing at political rally kills 9 in Pakistan

A suicide bomber in Pakistan killed nine people including a provincial government official at a political rally held Saturday by a party that has opposed the Taliban, officials said.
The rally in Peshawar, the capital of northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, was held by the Awami National Party, whose members have been repeatedly targeted by the Taliban.
Among the dead was Bashir Bilour, the second most senior member of the provincial Cabinet, said Ghulam Ahmed Bilour, the politician's brother and federal railways minister.
Over 20 others were wounded by the blast, said local police officer Sabir Khan.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon condemned the bombing in a statement, reiterating the United Nations' support for Pakistani efforts "to combat the scourge of terrorism."
Bilour was leaving the rally after delivering the keynote speech when the attack occurred, said Nazir Khan, a local Awami National Party leader.
"There was smoke and dust all around, and dead and wounded people were lying on the ground," he said.
The suicide bomber was on foot, said another police officer, Imtiaz Khan.
Mian Iftikhar Hussain, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa information minister and a member of the Awami National Party, said both he and Bilour had repeatedly received threats from militants. He condemned the attack and said the government needed to intensify its battle against the Taliban.
"Terrorism has engulfed our whole society," said Hussain. "They are targeting our bases, our mosques, our bazars, public meetings and our security checkpoints."
Ten Taliban militants attacked the military area of an international airport in Peshawar with rockets and car bombs a week ago, killing four people and wounding over 40 others. Five of the militants were killed during the attack, and five others died the next day in a gunbattle with security forces.
Also Saturday, police said a mob in southern Pakistan stormed a police station to seize a mentally unstable Muslim man accused of burning a copy of Islam's holy book. The crowd beat him to death, and then set fire to his body.
The case is likely to raise further concerns about the country's harsh blasphemy laws, which can result in a death sentence or life in prison to anyone found guilty. An accusation or investigation alone can lead to deaths, as people take the law into their own hands and kill those accused of violating it. Police stations and even courts have been attacked by mobs.
Police arrested the man on Friday after being informed by residents that he had burned a Quran inside a mosque where he had been staying for a night, said local police official Biharud Deen.
An angry mob of more than 200 people then broke into the police station in the southern town of Dadu and took the accused man, who they say was under questioning. Deen said police tried their best to save the man's life but were unable to stop the furious crowd.
Police have arrested 30 people for suspected involvement in the attack, said Deen. The head of the local police station and seven officers had been suspended, he said.
Past attempts by governments in predominantly Muslim Pakistan to review these laws have met with violent opposition from hardline Islamist parties.
In southwestern Pakistan, gunmen late Friday killed 11 Pakistanis and Afghans who were trying to cross into neighboring Iran to travel on to Europe as illegal immigrants, said local government official Zubair Ahmed. The shooting took place in Sunsar town in Baluchistan province, he said.
It was not immediately clear who was behind the attack, but hundreds of Pakistanis and Afghans are captured by Iranian border guards every year for illegally trying to travel to Europe to find better jobs.

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Gang rape protesters clash with Indian police

Police in India's capital used tear gas and water cannons for a second day Sunday in a high-security zone to break up protests by thousands of people demonstrating against the gang rape and beating of a 23-year-old student on a bus.
Police chased angry protesters with batons some of whom fought pitched battles with steel rods and rocks as they tried to get past steel barricades and a wall created by hundreds of policemen to reach the president's mansion to present their demands. "We want justice," they shouted.
Television footage showed that some protesters were injured in the clashes.
The protesters made bonfires and damaged cars and police vehicles.
Police blamed the violence on hooligans. "A peaceful protest by people has been taken over by hooligans," Dharmendra Kumar, a senior police officer, told reporters. He urged people to go home to help police deal with the trouble makers.
The demonstrations continued Sunday despite Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde promising to consider their main demand for death penalties for all six suspects who have been arrested by police following the Dec. 16 attack.
Shinde said Saturday night that the government was taking steps to better ensure the safety of women.
A group of protesters met Sonia Gandhi, the governing Congress party chief, and her son and lawmaker Rahul Gandhi, on Sunday and demanded a speedy trial of the suspects.
Popular yoga guru Babar Ramdev stood on the roof of a bus and pledged support to the protesters. "The government must set up fast-track courts to punish the offenders in rape attacks," he said.
The attack one week ago has sparked days of protests across the country. The victim is recovering from injuries in a New Delhi government hospital but is still in critical condition.
After battling the protesters throughout the day on Saturday, authorities early on Sunday banned their entry into the high-security zone, which also houses the offices of the prime minister and defense, home and external affairs ministries. Police evicted dozens of protesters who had spent the night there.
However, as groups of protesters marched through the streets of New Delhi and began converging on the high-security area on Sunday, authorities withdrew the ban on the assembly of more than five people there. But it set up barricades to keep them away from the president's residence.
Protesters tried to break the police cordon repeatedly by hurling stones and water bottles and pressing against the steel barricades. Policemen responded by firing tear gas and using water cannons against them. The battle continued throughout the day.

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In Afghan Taliban birthplace, US troops step back

President Barak Obama will decide in the coming weeks how many American troops to send home from Afghanistan next year. A major factor in his decision will be the question of how successful U.S. troops have been in preparing the Afghans to secure their country at bases like this one, located in one of the country's most violent areas — the birthplace of the Taliban.
There have been calls in Congress for Obama to increase the size of a planned drawdown of U.S. forces before the end of summer 2013, when the Afghan military is supposed to take the lead in security across the country. Afghan President Hamid Karzai, as well, has suggested he wants the drawdown accelerated.
"We are working to make this transition of security happen sooner. We want all the foreign forces to come out of the villages and go to their bases so the Afghan forces can carry out security," Karzai said last week.
But too large a pullout too soon could undermine the fight against the Taliban insurgency if Afghan forces are not fully prepared. It is widely thought that Gen. John Allen, the top military commander in Afghanistan, and his senior staff want to keep a large force in place for the summer fighting season, before international forces move into an entirely back-up and training role behind the Afghan forces by the start of autumn — an event known as "Milestone 13."
Obama is expected to decide on the size of the withdrawal after meeting with Karzai in Washington in early January. Their talks will also be key on determining what the U.S. military's role will be in Afghanistan after December 2014, when the foreign combat mission is set to end and almost all international troops are scheduled to leave. The U.S. currently has 66,000 thousand troops in Afghanistan out of an international force totaling about 102,000.
The work of training Afghan army units being done at this dusty base in the Zhari district of Kandahar province and at other bases scattered around the country will help shape Obama's decision.
U.S. and Afghan officers here say the district is a success story: Violence has not gone up more than two months after the American presence here was brought down from around 3,500 troops to around 300, with Afghan forces taking the lead in more areas.
But the situation remains tenuous. Residents say Taliban fighters remain in control of large parts of the district.
Zhari is where Taliban leader Mullah Omar was born, where he founded the movement that ruled Afghanistan in the 1990s and has battled U.S. and Afghan forces for the past 11 years. Three years ago, Taliban forces controlled the district, and it has been one of the three most violent areas of Kandahar, the province that is the Taliban's traditional heartland.
U.S soldiers had a hard fight in Zhari when they moved into the south in large force as part of the surge in American troops early in the Obama administration. The district has rich farmland that produces pomegranates and grapes used for raisins, and the fields, covered in dirt mounds, formed natural trenches the Taliban could fight from. Food, which was abundant, was easily coerced by the Taliban from villagers.
Lt. Col. Tim Davis, commander of Combined Task Force Buffalo, said, "the density of mines was impressive" when his task force arrived and that it required "an entire combat operation just to put a road in."
The commander of international forces in Kandahar and three other southern provinces, U.S. Army Maj. Gen. Robert Abrams, told reporters recently that progress in Zhari had been "astounding." Afghan forces are already in the lead of security duties in many parts of the district, he said. Across the south, the Afghans carry out 400 to 500 daily patrols without coalition assistance.
Afghan military officers in Zhari contend they can now handle the fight without much help from the U.S.-led International Security Assistance Force.
"Zhari is about 70 percent safe now," said Col. Abdul Rahimi, operations officer of the Afghan army's 3rd Brigade 205th Corps at Pasab base, though he acknowledged neighboring Maiwand district remains a problem. The number of Taliban fighters was down to around 100 in Zhari and Maiwand, compared to some 900 two years ago, he said.
"The enemy is not able right now to fight against the government, nor can it take over if ISAF leaves," Rahimi said.
Residents in Zhari, however, give a different picture. Some said the government has control of the main highway but not much else.
"Government claims that they control most of the area are just a dream not related to any reality," Allahnoor Taraki, a 38-year-old farmer, said.
Mohammed Salim Danghar, a taxi driver, said the province remains hotly contested. While the government has improved its position, he said, "we all know that most of the area is controlled by the Taliban."
The American drawdown in Zhari is a model of plans for the pullback elsewhere.
Here, large American combat units have been replaced by smaller teams made up of about 18 soldiers each. The teams are embedded with Afghan units, advising them on tactics, leadership and strategy — but not fighting.
In Zhari, attacks "have not only decreased, but significantly decreased," said Davis.
"The challenge is when we start pulling back," he said. The key to a successful transition will be "to see if the local security forces can take up the slack."
The U.S. military plans to repeat that process elsewhere in the south and east by creating 400 such teams. At the same time, eight of the 14 U.S. brigades in Afghanistan will be reduced in size to 1,400-1,900 personnel, down from 3,500, to act as support for the teams. That role change alone will mean a reduction of between 13,000 to 17,000 NATO troops.
The U.S. military has not made public its recommendations to Obama about the size or timing of next year's drawdown. Outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said recently that NATO and the Afghan government intend to begin the final phase of transition by the mid to latter part of 2013 — suggesting he prefers a later start to the drawdown, as opposed to earlier in 2013.
The top contender for Panetta's job, former Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel, is thought to support a more rapid withdrawal of U.S. troops.
British Prime Minister David Cameron has already announced that about 3,800 of his country's troops will leave by the end of 2013, leaving 5,000 to stay into 2014.
The Afghan army now numbers about 350,000 and has taken the lead on security in areas that are home to 76 percent of Afghanistan's population of 30 million. Still, despite their progress, only one of Afghanistan's 23 brigades around the country can operate on its own without coalition help of some kind, the U.S. Defense Department said in its most recent semi-annual report to Congress.
Attacks by insurgents around the country have not decreased, but the violence has been pushed out of most population centers, the report said. Civilian and NATO casualties have fallen. But Afghan forces are taking an increasing toll. More than 300 Afghan soldiers and policemen are dying each month, according to Afghan Defense Ministry spokesman Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi, who said that represented an increase, though he did not provide comparative figures.
"We still face challenges in southern Afghanistan," Abrams acknowledged in his headquarters at Kandahar Air Field.

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