Hillary: Secretary of empowerment

Girls hug U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during a 2010 tour of a shelter run for sex trafficking victims in Cambodia.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Donna Brazile: Clinton stepping down as Secretary of State. Maybe she'll run for president


• She says as secretary she expanded foreign policy to include effect on regular people


• She says she was first secretary of state to focus on empowering women and girls


• Brazile: Clinton has fought for education and inclusion in politics for women and girls

Editor's note: Donna Brazile, a CNN contributor and a Democratic strategist, is vice chairwoman for voter registration and participation at the Democratic National Committee. She is a nationally syndicated columnist, an adjunct professor at Georgetown University and author of "Cooking with Grease." She was manager for the Gore-Lieberman presidential campaign in 2000.

(CNN) -- As Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton steps down from her job Friday, many are assuming she will run for president. And she may. In fact, five of the first eight presidents first served their predecessors as secretary of state.

It hasn't happened in more than a century, though that may change should Clinton decide to run. After all, she has been a game changer her entire life.

But before we look ahead, I think we should appreciate what she's done as secretary of state; it's a high profile, high pressure job. You have to deal with the routine as if it is critical and with crisis as if it's routine. You have to manage egos, protocols, customs and Congress. You have to be rhetorical and blunt, diplomatic and direct.

CNN Contributor Donna Brazile

As secretary of state you are dealing with heads of state and with we the people. And the president of the United States has to trust you -- implicitly.

On the road with Hillary Clinton

Of all Clinton's accomplishments -- and I will mention just a few -- this may be the most underappreciated. During the election, pundits were puzzled and amazed not only at how much energy former President Bill Clinton poured into Obama's campaign, but even more at how genuine and close the friendship was.

Obama was given a lot of well-deserved credit for reaching out to the Clintons by appointing then-Sen. Hillary Clinton as his secretary of state in the first place. But trust is a two-way street and has to be earned. We should not underestimate or forget how much Clinton did and how hard she worked. She deserved that trust, as she deserved to be in the war room when Osama bin Laden was killed.

By the way, is there any other leader in the last 50 years whom we routinely refer to by a first name, and do so more out of respect than familiarity? The last person I can think of was Ike -- the elder family member who we revere with affection. Hillary is Hillary.

It's not surprising that we feel we know her. She has been part of our public life for more than 20 years. She's been a model of dignity, diplomacy, empathy and toughness. She also has done something no other secretary of state has done -- including the two women who preceded her in the Cabinet post.

Rothkopf: President Hillary Clinton? If she wants it

Hillary has transformed our understanding -- no, our definition -- of foreign affairs. Diplomacy is no longer just the skill of managing relations with other countries. The big issues -- war and peace, terror, economic stability, etc. -- remain, and she has handled them with firmness and authority, with poise and confidence, and with good will, when appropriate.

But it is not the praise of diplomats or dictators that will be her legacy. She dealt with plenipotentiaries, but her focus was on people. Foreign affairs isn't just about treaties, she taught us, it's about the suffering and aspirations of those affected by the treaties, made or unmade.

Most of all, diplomacy should refocus attention on the powerless.

Of course, Hillary wasn't the first secretary of state to advocate for human rights or use the post to raise awareness of abuses or negotiate humanitarian relief or pressure oppressors. But she was the first to focus on empowerment, particularly of women and girls.

She created the first Office of Global Women's Issues. That office fought to highlight the plight of women around the world. Rape of women has been a weapon of war for centuries. Though civilized countries condemn it, the fight against it has in a sense only really begun.

Ghitis: Hillary Clinton's global legacy on gay rights

The office has worked to hold governments accountable for the systematic oppression of girls and women and fought for their education in emerging countries. As Hillary said when the office was established: "When the Security Council passed Resolution 1325, we tried to make a very clear statement, that women are still largely shut out of the negotiations that seek to end conflicts, even though women and children are the primary victims of 21st century conflict."

Hillary also included the United States in the Trafficking in Person report. Human Trafficking, a form of modern, mainly sexual, slavery, victimizes mostly women and girls. The annual report reviews the state of global efforts to eliminate the practice. "We believe it is important to keep the spotlight on ourselves," she said. "Human trafficking is not someone else's problem. Involuntary servitude is not something we can ignore or hope doesn't exist in our own communities."

She also created the office of Global Partnerships. And there is much more.

She has held her own in palaces and held the hands of hungry children in mud-hut villages, pursuing an agenda that empowers women, children, the poor and helpless.

We shouldn't have been surprised. Her book "It Takes a Village" focused on the impact that those outside the family have, for better or worse, on a child's well-being.

As secretary of state, she did all she could to make sure our impact as a nation would be for the better.

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The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Donna Brazile.

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Murderer released despite warnings in court documents

A convicted murderer from Indiana is on the loose because of some bad paperwork in Cook County. (WGN - Chicago)

Paperwork filled out by Cook County sheriff’s officers this week made it clear that Steven Robbins was serving a 60-year sentence for murder in Indiana and was to be returned to authorities there after being brought to Chicago to dispose of an old case against him, documents reviewed today by the Tribune show.

“Please be advised that this subject is in our custody under the temporary custody provision of the interstate agreement on detainers,” a sheriff’s order accompanying Robbins’ paperwork read. The order noted Robbins’ murder conviction and 60-year sentence and then stated he “must be returned to the custody of Indiana DOC.”

In addition, Judge Rickey Jones, assigned to the Leighton Criminal Court Building, ordered the Illinois case dismissed on Wednesday and wrote on paperwork that Robbins was to be released for “this case only,” the records show.
 
Yet Robbins was allowed to walk free out of the Cook County Jail Wednesday evening after his court appearance.

This afternoon, the FBI and U.S. Marshals Service announced they had joined the manhunt for Robbins and offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to Robbins' arrest. Anyone with information is asked to call the Cook County Sheriff's tipline, 847-635-1188, or local law enforcement.

Authorities were scrambling today to review the paperwork in Robbins’ file to see how the mistake was made and who was responsible, sources told the Tribune.

Also under investigation was why Robbins – whose 1992 charges of armed violence and drug possession had been dismissed by prosecutors nearly six years ago – was even brought to Chicago in the first place.

Robbins spent the night in the Cook County Jail on Tuesday to attend a court date Wednesday on a warrant issued when he skipped bail in his 1992 case, Frank Bilecki, a spokesman for the Cook County sheriff’s office, said on Thursday.

Cook County authorities picked up Robbins on Tuesday at a prison in Michigan City, Ind., explaining he needed to answer to pending charges in Chicago, said Doug Garrison, a spokesman for the Indiana Department of Corrections. The requisite paperwork spelled out the terms of his release and return, Garrison said.

“It sounds almost too simple to say, but when someone comes and picks up a prisoner, they acknowledge they will bring him back,” Garrison said. “There are certain things they have to provide us, they do their business with him and then they give him back.  Obviously in this case, for whatever reason, they didn’t give him back.”

One document in the Indiana prison paperwork was stamped “do not release this offender from court before contacting” Indiana authorities, Garrison said.

Garrison said Cook County authorities had contacted Indiana prison officials to review who had contact with Robbins in the prison and the identities of any visitors since his incarceration in 2004.

“I’m sure they’re just as anxious to get this guy back in custody as we are,” he said of Cook County officials.

According to court records, prosecutors had dismissed the armed violence and drug charges in April 2007 after Robbins sent a letter to Cook County telling them he was serving time for murder and that his earliest projected release date was in 2032.
 
Bilecki said that Robbins was released from the jail’s main entrance at 7 p.m. Wednesday because there was no indication in his jail paperwork that he was ordered to remain in custody.

On Thursday, the Cook County fugitive warrant unit called the jail to make arrangements to send Robbins back to an Indiana prison. Jail staff realized that Robbins was gone, according to Bilecki.

But the office didn't alert the public that Robbins, who was convicted of a 2002 fatal shooting of a Kentucky man, was on the loose until Thursday evening.

Authorities said they didn’t immediately go public because they didn't want Robbins to know that they were on to him, Bilecki said.

"We were trying to hit all the spots where we thought he might be before he became aware that we were looking for him," he said.

A warrant for Robbins has been issued in Illinois and Indiana.

A similar issue occurred at the Cook County Jail in 2009 when convicted sex offender Jonathan Cooper, who was serving a 30-year prison sentence in Mississippi for manslaughter, was mistakenly freed after prosecutors here dropped sex-related charges against him.

In a telephone interview, Robbins' ex-wife, Nicole Robbins, who divorced him in 2008, said she hadn't spoken with or heard from him in a year and a half.

"He was mistakenly released? I haven't heard from him," she said. "I don't know where he is."

Steven Robbins was serving time in Indiana State Prison when he was brought to Cook County to appear on the warrant.

In 2002, Robbins was arrested at a Day's Inn in Merrillville, Ind., according to an archived story in the Merrillville Post-Tribune. He was convicted of shooting Richard Melton, 24, with whom he'd gotten into a fight at a party. Robbins shot Melton on Mother's Day, authorities said.

He was sentenced in 2004 to 60 years in prison for murder and carrying a handgun without a license, according to Indiana Department of Correction documents. He was eligible for parole in 2029. Robbins has relatives in Gary and Bloomington, according to the archived story.

Robbins was described as black, 5 feet 5 inches tall and 190 pounds, with a tattoo on the right side of his neck that reads "Nicole." Anyone with information on Robbins' whereabouts is asked to call 708-865-4915.

The Cook County charges had actually been dropped in 2007, but Robbins was still required to appear in court in Illinois to answer for the warrant on those charges, court records show.

jmeisner@tribune.com
ehirst@tribune.com
lford@tribune.com

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Suicide bomber kills guard at U.S. embassy in Turkey

ANKARA (Reuters) - A far-leftist suicide bomber killed a Turkish security guard at the U.S. embassy in Ankara on Friday, officials said, blowing open an entrance and sending debris flying through the air.

The attacker detonated explosives strapped to his body after entering an embassy gatehouse. The blast could be heard a mile away. A lower leg and other human remains lay on the street.

Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said the bomber was a member of the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), a far-left group which is virulently anti-U.S. and anti-NATO and is listed as a terrorist organization by Washington.

The White House said the suicide attack was an "act of terror" but that the motivation was unclear. U.S. officials said the DHKP-C were the main suspects but did not exclude other possibilities.

Islamist radicals, extreme left-wing groups, ultra-nationalists and Kurdish militants have all carried out attacks in Turkey in the past. There was no claim of responsibility.

"The suicide bomber was ripped apart and one or two citizens from the special security team passed away," said Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan.

"This event shows that we need to fight together everywhere in the world against these terrorist elements," he said.

Turkish media reports identified the bomber as DHKP-C member Ecevit Sanli, who was involved in attacks on a police station and a military staff college in Istanbul in 1997.

KEY ALLY

Turkey is a key U.S. ally in the Middle East with common interests ranging from energy security to counter-terrorism and has been one of the leading advocates of foreign intervention to end the conflict in neighboring Syria.

Around 400 U.S. soldiers have arrived in Turkey over the past few weeks to operate Patriot anti-missile batteries meant to defend against any spillover of Syria's civil war, part of a NATO deployment due to be fully operational in the coming days.

The DHKP-C was responsible for the assassination of two U.S. military contractors in the early 1990s in protest against the first Gulf War and launched rockets at the U.S. consulate in Istanbul in 1992, according to the U.S. State Department.

Deemed a terrorist organization by both the United States and Turkey, the DHKP-C has been blamed for suicide attacks in the past, including one in 2001 that killed two police officers and a tourist in Istanbul's central Taksim Square.

The group, formed in 1978, has carried out a series of deadly attacks on police stations in the last six months.

The attack may have come in retaliation for an operation against the DHKP-C last month in which Turkish police detained 85 people. A court subsequently remanded 38 of them in custody over links to the group.

"HUGE EXPLOSION"

U.S. Ambassador Francis Ricciardone emerged through the main gate of the embassy shortly after the explosion to address reporters, flanked by a security detail as a Turkish police helicopter hovered overhead.

"We're very sad of course that we lost one of our Turkish guards at the gate," Ricciardone said, describing the victim as a "hero" and thanking Turkish authorities for a prompt response.

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland condemned the attack on the checkpoint on the perimeter of the embassy and said several U.S. and Turkish staff were injured by debris.

"The level of security protection at our facility in Ankara ensured that there were not significantly more deaths and injuries than there could have been," she told reporters.

It was the second attack on a U.S. mission in four months. On September 11, 2012, U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three American personnel were killed in an attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya.

The attack in Benghazi, blamed on al Qaeda-affiliated militants, sparked a political furor in Washington over accusations that U.S. missions were not adequately safeguarded.

A well-known Turkish journalist, Didem Tuncay, who was on her way in to the embassy to meet Ricciardone when the attack took place, was in a critical condition in hospital.

"It was a huge explosion. I was sitting in my shop when it happened. I saw what looked like a body part on the ground," said travel agent Kamiyar Barnos, whose shop window was shattered around 100 meters away from the blast.

CALL FOR VIGILANCE

The U.S. consulate in Istanbul warned its citizens to be vigilant and to avoid large gatherings, while the British mission in Istanbul called on British businesses to tighten security after what it called a "suspected terrorist attack".

In 2008, Turkish gunmen with suspected links to al Qaeda, opened fire on the U.S. consulate in Istanbul, killing three Turkish policemen. The gunmen died in the subsequent firefight.

The most serious bombings in Turkey occurred in November 2003, when car bombs shattered two synagogues, killing 30 people and wounding 146. Part of the HSBC Bank headquarters was destroyed and the British consulate was damaged in two more explosions that killed 32 people less than a week later. Authorities said those attacks bore the hallmarks of al Qaeda.

(Additional reporting by Daren Butler and Ayla Jean Yackley in Istanbul, Mohammed Arshad and Mark Hosenball in Washington; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Stephen Powell)

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S&P 500 posts biggest monthly gain since October 2011

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks edged lower on Thursday on caution ahead of Friday's all-important jobs report, but the S&P 500 still posted its best monthly gain since October 2011.

The benchmark S&P 500 advanced 5.1 percent in January as investors cheered a compromise that temporarily postponed the impact of the "fiscal cliff" and fourth-quarter earnings were better than expected.

The S&P 500 registered its largest monthly advance since a rise of more than 6 percent in October 2011 and the best January showing since a 6.1 percent jump in 1997. For the month, the Dow gained 5.8 percent and the Nasdaq rose 4.1 percent.

Investors expect a pullback in equities after the recent gains, though they have bought on dips over the past four weeks. The largest daily decline on the S&P 500 so far in 2013 was Wednesday's 0.39 percent drop after data showed the economy contracted in the fourth quarter of 2012.

On Friday, the government is due to release January's employment figures at 8:30 a.m. (1330 GMT). Economists polled by Reuters expect non-farm payrolls to show employers added 160,000 jobs compared with a rise of 155,000 in December. The unemployment rate is likely to hold steady at 7.8 percent.

A survey by payroll processing company ADP on Wednesday showed private sector employment rose higher than expected last month, but the government's measure of jobless benefits claims increased last week.

"It's the calm before the potential storm. The uncertainty about tomorrow's numbers comes from that fact that we had a decent ADP report but the weekly claims were not so great," said Randy Frederick, managing director of active trading and derivatives for Charles Schwab in Austin, Texas.

In a separate report, the Commerce Department said American incomes rose 2.6 percent last month, the biggest increase since December 2004.

"We could see an overly sensitive market to a bad number tomorrow, given that we've been up without a major correction, and that makes the market sensitive to the downside."

Friday will also bring reports on consumer confidence, U.S. manufacturing, construction spending and car sales.

Limiting losses on the Nasdaq composite index, Qualcomm gained 3.9 percent to $66.02 after the world's leading supplier of chips for cellphones beat analysts' expectations for quarterly profit and revenue and raised its targets for the year.

Facebook shares fell 0.8 percent to $30.98 after falling as low as $28.74 a day after the social network company said it doubled its mobile advertising revenue in the fourth quarter. However, growth trailed some of Wall Street's most aggressive estimates.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was down 49.84 points, or 0.36 percent, at 13,860.58. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was down 3.85 points, or 0.26 percent, at 1,498.11. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was down 0.18 points, or 0.01 percent, at 3,142.13.

UPS shares lost 2.4 percent to $79.29 after reporting fourth-quarter earnings that were below analysts' estimates on Thursday and forecasting weaker-than-expected profit for 2013.

Constellation Brands shares tumbled 17.4 percent to $32.36 after the U.S. Justice Department moved to stop Anheuser-Busch InBev from buying the half of Mexican brewer Grupo Modelo that it does not already own. Constellation would have distributed Corona beer in the United States if the transaction had been approved.

Thomson Reuters data through Thursday morning shows that of the 231 companies in the S&P 500 that have reported earnings this season, 69.3 percent have exceeded expectations, a higher proportion than over the past four quarters and above the average since 1994.

Overall, S&P 500 fourth-quarter earnings rose 3.7 percent, according to Thomson Reuters data. That's above a 1.9 percent forecast at the start of the earnings season but well below a 9.9 percent profit growth forecast on October 1.

(Reporting By Angela Moon; Editing by Nick Zieminski and Kenneth Barry)

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5 Super Bowl ads that enlist viewer help

Advertisers are finding new ways to get viewers into the game during Super Bowl XLVII, which airs on CBS on Sunday. Here are 5 campaigns that enlist viewer help in one form or another.

1. Coca-Cola created an online game that pits a troupe of showgirls, biker-style "badlanders" and cowboys against each other in a race to find a Coke in the desert. Viewers are encouraged to vote for their favorite group and set up obstacles that delay other groups on CokeChase.com. Obstacles include a traffic light or getting a pizza delivered, which both waste time. Coca-Cola's online game is alluded to in a Super Bowl ad and the winning group — which has the most "for" votes and the least "obstacle" votes will be announced after the Big Game. Coke will also give the first 50,000 people who vote a free Coke.

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Online:

www.cokechase.com

2. For its halftime intro spot, Pepsi, the sponsor of the Super Bowl halftime show, created a collage of 1,000 user-submitted photos that are stitched together to create a 30-second video that looks like one person jumping to the tune of Beyonce's "Countdown." The spot introduces the pop star's halftime show.

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Online:

www.halftime.pepsi.com

3. Toyota invited people to submit photos of themselves on Instagram or Twitter between Jan. 2 to Jan. 12 with the hashtag (hash)wishgranted. The photos were entered into a contest to win a spot on Toyota's Super Bowl ad. The ad stars Kaley Cuoco from CBS's "The Big Bang Theory" granting wishes. A photo of the winner, Ryan Koch of Fitchburg, Wis., will be featured in the ad.

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Online:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iymBRSUfz9U&feature=youtu.be&noredirect=1

4. Ford Motor Co. enlisted late-night talk show host Jimmy Fallon to choose road trip stories submitted via Twitter with the hashtag (hash)steerthescript for its Lincoln Super Bowl ad. The story line of the Lincoln ad was developed from 6,117 Tweets and stars rapper Joseph "Rev Run" Simmons and Wil Wheaton, who acted in "Star Trek: The Next Generation."

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Online:

www.steerthescript.com

5. Audi let viewers choose one of three possible endings for its Game Day spot by voting online on Jan. 25 for 24 hours. The ad shows a boy who gets enough confidence from driving his father's Audi to the prom to kiss his dream girl, even though he is then decked by her boyfriend. Audi allowed people to vote for one of three potential endings for the ad.

In one possible ending, the boy drives home alone in triumphant. Another ending shows him palling around with friends. The third shows the boy going home and finding a prom picture of his parents in which his dad has a similar black eye.

The first ending, called "Worth it," won. Audi, which declined to say how many people voted, said "Worth It," was by far the most popular, getting more than half of the total views and the most "thumbs up" out of all three versions.

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Online:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANhmS6QLd5Q

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Despite court ruling, EPA raises biofuel estimate

WASHINGTON (AP) — Days after a federal appeals court said the Obama administration is setting overly optimistic production quotas for the struggling biofuels industry, the government issued new standards Thursday that raise production estimates for 2013.

New standards announced by the Environmental Protection Agency require production of 14 million gallons of so-called cellulosic biofuels made from grasses and woody material. That’s up from an 8.7 million-gallon requirement in 2012 — when actual production was near zero.

An oil industry representative said the Obama administration was thumbing its nose at a ruling last week by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. The court threw out the 2012 mandate for cellulosic biofuels, saying it was based on wishful thinking rather than accurate estimates for an industry the Obama administration wants to encourage. Administration officials have said that increased use of biofuels could lower greenhouse gas emissions that contribute to global warming, as well as lower U.S. dependence on foreign fuel.

“The court recognized the absurdity of fining companies for failing to use a nonexistent biofuel,” said Bob Greco, director of downstream operations for the American Petroleum Institute, the principal lobbying group for the oil and gas industry.

Greco said he was astonished that EPA would nearly double the mandate for biofuel in 2013. “EPA needs a serious reality check,” he said, calling the mandate a “stealth tax on gasoline” and an “egregious example of bad public policy.”

EPA spokeswoman Julia Valentine said the agency believes the proposed standards “are a reasonable representation of expected production” of biofuels this year.

“This projection reflects EPA’s current estimate of what will actually happen in 2013,” she said, adding that EPA will consider public comments before setting the final cellulosic standard.

The biofuels mandate is part of a 2007 renewable fuels law that requires a certain amount of ethanol and other renewable fuels to be mixed in with gasoline each year. Despite annual EPA projections for millions of gallon of biofuels made from switchgrass, corn husks or wood pulp, little production has materialized.

According to final EPA estimates, no cellulosic fuel was produced in 2010 or 2011. Only about 25,000 gallons was produced last year.

Despite that track record, a spokesman for the renewable fuel industry called the 2013 mandate realistic, citing recent breakthroughs in which several long-delayed biofuel projects have come online.

Two companies, in Mississippi and Florida, have recently begun production of cellulosic biofuel, and dozens more are moving forward, including plants under construction in Iowa, Kansas and Michigan, said Bob Dineen, president of the Renewable Fuels Association.

Dineen said he understands skepticism from those who have seen promised production of biofuels fail to materialize but that after years of setbacks caused by the financial downturn and other issues, the industry is poised for a major breakthrough in 2013.

“The skeptics should go take a look at the plants” in Mississippi and Florida, he said. “They are in operation.”

Dineen called the EPA’s 14-gallon estimate “conservative.” If anything, production should exceed that level, he said, especially if a major project by Abengoa Bioengergy to convert crop residues into ethanol in southwest Kansas goes into operation this year as expected. The $ 550 million plant is expected to generate 75 megawatts of electricity and 15 million gallons of ethanol per year.

Dineen said the API and others in the oil industry were “desperately afraid” that biofuels will succeed and threaten the oil industry’s dominance.

“They are trying to sow the seeds of doubt so people don’t make investment in these future technologies and they can maintain their grip on the fuel pump,” he said.

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Follow Matthew Daly on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MatthewDalyWDC

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Fear and loathing in Egypt's Port Said

Behind the mask

Scales of justice

Moment of truth

Fans celebrate

Armed and ready

Rally at the club

Portrait of the dead

ACAB

Down with Morsi

Army in control

Port Said women protest

Al Masry ultras

The sound of machine guns

Aftermath

Protest

Shots fired

Empty stands

Harrowing reminder

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STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Chaos erupted in Egypt after 21 people were sentenced to death following a football riot


• More than 70 people died after match in Port Said between local club Al Masry and Al Ahly


• Egyptian league was suspended and has yet to restart due to threats of further violence


• Verdicts for 52 other defendants who were arrested after riot is expected March 9

(CNN) -- The faces of more than 70 young men and boys bore down on the crowd of thousands outside Al Ahly's training complex in Cairo.

As many as 15,000 members of the Ahlawy, the organized ultras fan group of Egypt's most popular soccer club, had gathered here early for the news they, and the country, had been waiting almost a year to hear.

At 10 a.m. a judge was to deliver a verdict on one of the darkest moments in the history of the game.

It happened on February 1, 2012, when more than 70 -- those young men and boys whose faces now appear on a billboard high above the entrance of the club -- lost their lives after a match in the Mediterranean city of Port Said, against local club Al Masry.

Most of the dead were crushed when the Al Masry fans stormed the pitch.

The players sprinted for their lives, finding sanctuary in the dressing room. And then the floodlights went out.

When the lights came back on 10 minutes later, the dead lay piled in a tunnel, in front of a locked, metal gate that had prevented escape before it collapsed under the weight of bodies.

Direct action

Seventy-three people were arrested, many accused of murder. They were mostly Al Masry fans, but included several members of the security forces.

The man allegedly responsible for cutting the power to the lights was also arrested. The Ahlawy suspected that a hidden hand was at work.

There were conspiracy theories, many asked questions: was this just a football rivalry gone very wrong? Or did police allow the violence as payback against the ultras for their part in the revolution?

Read: Clashes erupt after Egypt court sentences

The Ahlawy had played a crucial role in the revolution. They were an organized group of tens of the thousands of young men willing to fight the police -- as they had both inside and out of Egypt's soccer stadiums for the previous four years -- to make their voices heard.

The authorities denied any collusion. It was a tragic accident, they said. Hooliganism and ineptitude, no more, no less, no hidden hand.

But many of the Ahlawy fans were not convinced. The Egyptian soccer league was canceled and the Ahlawy waged a successful direct action campaign to prevent its restart until justice had been served.

The young men waited for the verdict on Saturday. Several had come armed, in anticipation of a further postponement or, worst still, a not guilty verdict. Some carried clubs, others homemade pistols and double-barreled sawn-off shotguns.

Tear gas

At 10 a.m. the judge rose on national television and delivered his verdict. Twenty-one of the accused were sentenced to death. The verdicts for the remaining defendants are expected March 9.

The news swept through the crowd, reducing those in its path to tears of joy; teenagers who had lost friends, mothers who had lost sons, wives who had lost husbands.

Scores dead in Egypt soccer riot

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"It's a very good decision by the court," said Mihai, a member of the Ahlawy who had come to hear the verdict. As with all the ultras, he declined to give his last name.

The guns that had been brought in anticipation of violence were fired into the sky in celebration.

One fan fired an automatic pistol until it jammed. He inspected the piece of failing, unfamiliar equipment. Unable to fix it, he tucked it into his belt and jumped into the sea of celebrating men.

"We hope it will be a perfect ending for this story. We have been waiting for this for so long. For 21 to get executed is a very good decision. So now we wait for the police decision. For sure it wasn't just them that made this," Mihai said.

Back in February, with the raw memories of Port Said just a few weeks old, the Ahlawy had demanded that those responsible should be put to death.

With the court verdict, they received their wish. Justice, they believed, had been served. At least partially.

"The police will be (put to) trial on March 9," said Mohamed, a founding member of the Ahlawy.

The previous night -- on the Egyptian revolution's anniversary -- Cairo was blanketed in tear gas as protesters roamed the streets surrounding Tahrir Square, venting their anger at President Mohamed Morsy and what they see as a lack of any real reforms.

Many, including the Ahlawy, expected further confrontations after the verdict.

But as the crowd moved inside the complex, holding a rally on the club's main soccer pitch, it became clear that no fighting would take place that day.

"I feel satisfied that some of those who committed what we suffered a year ago are going to face what they deserve," said Ahmed, another founding member of the Ahlawy who believed that the right decision had been made.

"It's a strong verdict but they don't deserve less than a strong verdict. Nobody ever wants to see someone dying but when someone kills he deserves a death sentence. He deserves that his life is taken. I don't see a way the police can get away with this."

Port Said ignited

Not everyone was happy, especially those who saw the verdict as a potential springboard to challenge Morsy, whom many of the Ahlawy view as no different from Hosni Mubarak, the former dictator who ruled Egypt for almost 30 years.

"They are giving us something of a painkiller to take out the anger from the young lads -- for me it is not enough," said Hassan, an Ahly fan standing on the training ground pitch.

Egypt unstable after days of protest

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"All the other political movements and parties were looking at what was going to happen today. Everyone had their hopes for the ultras and now they have given us this painkiller and it has lost its momentum of something really happening against the new regime," he added.

But what had -- if only temporarily -- calmed the Ahlawy, it ignited Port Said.

The verdicts were greeted with astonishment, disbelief, and anger by Al Masry's fans and the families of the 73 accused who had gathered outside the prison in Port Said where the suspects were held.

Like the Ahlawy supporters in Cairo, they too had come prepared. Two policemen were shot dead as the relatives tried to storm the prison. The police fired back. At least 30 people were killed in clashes. Among them was a former Al Masry player.

President Morsy addressed the nation and announced a 30-day curfew, from 9 p.m. until 6 a.m. in the cities worst effected by the violence.

A few hours before the first curfew was due to fall, a storm rolled into Port Said. The streets were empty, the skies dark and pregnant with rain as 9 p.m. approached.

The only sound was the faint, periodic burst of gunfire. It emanated from near the Al Arab police station by the sea.

Smoldering barricades

On approaching it, the dead streets suddenly came alive, as if the entire energy of the city had been focused on one point. Barricades made from burning tires separated the police from groups of young men, exchanging rocks for gunfire.

The clashes had followed the funeral of more protesters, killed the day after the violence outside the prison.

"There are some injuries here," a member of the Red Crescent said as he sheltered from the gunfire in a side street. Ambulances flew by, their sirens blaring.

"We've seen gun bullets from the government. In four days we have seen more than 450 (injured)."

The prospects of a hastily arranged march to defy Morsy's curfew, looked bleak.

But at 8.30 p.m. a crowd of thousands gathered near the same spot the Red Crescent had been waiting to ferry the injured to hospital. They marched through the smoldering barricades towards where the gunfire had previously come from.

Now the army, not the police, was in charge.

Armored personnel carriers and armed troops were stationed on street corners and outside important military and civilian buildings.

At its core were the fans of Al Masry ultras group the Green Eagles. But they were by no means alone. The marchers had come from all sections of Port Said. Several hundred women marched together, denouncing Morsy and Cairo.

The curfew came and went, the crowd mocking its passing. "It's 9 o'clock!" they chanted as they passed the stationed troops.

But there was no animosity towards the army. The police was the enemy. Protesters took it in turns to hug and kiss the young soldiers.

Few would readily admit to being Al Masry fans, nor say whether they were there on that fateful night almost a year ago that set in motion this chain of deadly events.

Vendetta

What they would say is that they believed a miscarriage of justice had taken place, that Morsy had sacrificed Port Said to prevent chaos in Cairo, that traditional antipathy towards Port Said was at play.

"People are truly sure that these people (the 21 sentenced to death) didn't kill anyone. We didn't do it and they (the Ahlawy) don't believe we didn't do this," said Tariq Youssef, a 32-year-old accountant who was on the march with a friend.

"Al Masry will not be back for five years. I'm a big Masry fan. But I can't go anywhere. All the supporters for the big teams in Cairo or anywhere believe that Al Masry supporters did this."

For Tariq, admitting to being an Al Masry supporter outside of Port Said was impossible.

"They say, 'You killed them the Ahly supporters. You are like a terrorist.' Nobody believes us we didn't do anything here. There will be no football in the next five years."

As the march moved back towards the place it had started, machine gun fire rang out once again.

This time it was all around the march, front and back. The crowd scattered. A protester had been shot dead at the back of the march, next to the Al Arab police station.

"In three days we have lost 21 people, judged to be executed, and also about 39 murdered and many injured so there is no family which have not lost a friend, a colleague, a neighbor.

"You can consider this a sort of vendetta between the people and the police," said Muhammad el Agiery, an English tutor who had stayed until the end.

"People are going to stay out all of the night, every day for a month. They reject and refuse the curfew imposed by Morsy," he added.

The next morning the storm was gone and the sun was shining. But the cycle of violence continues. Another funeral march will begin, another barricade will likely be set on fire, and another curfew broken.

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Hadiya Pendleton: Slain girl made anti-gang video

Four years ago Hadiya Pendleton, then in sixth grade at Carter G. Woodson Elementary School, made an anti-gang video with fellow students. She was fatally shot this week.

The sixth-grader can barely keep from smiling, self-conscious in front of the camera as she delivers a very serious message.

"Hi, my name is Hadiya. This commercial is informational for you and your future children," she begins. "So many children out there are in gangs and it's your job as students to say no to gangs and yes to a great future."

The video then shows shots of a boy slumped in a stairwell, another boy sprawled against a locker, a girl lying on the floor against a wall as a classmate next to Hadiya says, "So many children in the world have died from gang violence. More than 500 children have died from being in the wrong place at the wrong time."

Four years after Hadiya Pendleton made that public service video at Carter G. Woodson Elementary School, police are saying the same thing about her.

Hadiya had just finished her final exams at King Prep High School, where she was a sophomore, and was hanging out with friends from the school's volleyball team when she was gunned down in a park in the 4400 block of South Oakenwald Avenue. Thursday afternoon, police announced the reward for information leading to an arrest in the shooting had increased to $24,000, up from $11,000 announced Wednesday.

Hadiya and the others had sought shelter from a rainstorm under a canopy at the park around 2:20 p.m. Tuesday when a gunman jumped a fence, ran toward them and opened fire, police said.

As the teens scattered, Hadiya and two teenage boys were shot. Hadiya was hit in the back and pronounced dead at Comer Children's Hospital less than an hour after the shooting. The wounds suffered by the boys were not life-threatening.

Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy stressed that neither Hadiya nor anyone in the group she was with were involved with gangs. But it appears the gunman mistook the students for members of a rival gang, he said. The shooter was last seen fleeing in a white Nissan.

“These were good kids by everything that I learned," McCarthy said at a Wednesday news conference, where a reward of $11,000 was announced. "Wrong place at the wrong time.”

Hadiya was shot a little more than a week after performing with the King College Prep band in Washington during President Barack Obama's inauguration festivities. The shooting occurred in a park about a mile north of Obama's Kenwood home.

The shooting has drawn the attention of both the White House, which is pushing for national gun control, and City Hall as Chicago closes on a violent January. Hadiya was the 42nd homicide victim this year in the city, where killings last year climbed above 500.

Hadiya's father, Nathaniel Pendleton, pleaded for someone to step forward and bring the 15-year-old's killer to justice.

"She was destined for great things," he said.

Hadiya was a majorette with the band at King, one of the city's elite selective-enrollment schools. She dreamed of going to Northwestern University and talked about becoming a pharmacist or a journalist, maybe a lawyer.

Police have reported no arrests.

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Syria protests over Israel attack, warns of "surprise"

BEIRUT/AMMAN (Reuters) - Syria protested to the United Nations on Thursday over an Israeli air strike on its territory and warned of a possible "surprise" response.

The foreign ministry summoned the head of the U.N. force in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights to deliver the protest a day after Israel hit what Syria said was a military research centre and diplomats said was a weapons convoy heading for Lebanon.

"Syria holds Israel and those who protect it in the Security Council fully responsible for the results of this aggression and affirms its right to defend itself, its land and sovereignty," Syrian television quoted it as saying.

The ministry said it considered Wednesday's Israeli attack to be a violation of a 1974 military disengagement agreement which followed their last major war, and demanded the U.N. Security Council condemn it unequivocally.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed "grave concern". "The Secretary-General calls on all concerned to prevent tensions or their escalation," his office said, adding that international law and sovereignty should be respected.

Israel has maintained total silence over the attack, as it did in 2007 when it bombed a suspected Syrian nuclear site - an attack which passed without Syrian military retaliation.

In Beirut on Thursday Syria's ambassador said Damascus could take "a surprise decision to respond to the aggression of the Israeli warplanes". He gave no details but said Syria was "defending its sovereignty and its land".

Diplomats, Syrian rebels and security sources said Israeli jets bombed a convoy near the Lebanese border on Wednesday, apparently hitting weapons destined for Hezbollah. Syria denied the reports, saying the target was a military research centre northwest of Damascus and 8 miles from the border.

Hezbollah, which has supported Assad as he battles an armed uprising in which 60,000 people have been killed, said Israel was trying to thwart Arab military power and vowed to stand by its ally.

"Hezbollah expresses its full solidarity with Syria's leadership, army and people," said the group which fought an inconclusive 34-day war with Israel in 2006.

Russia, which has blocked Western efforts to put pressure on Syria at the United Nations, said any Israeli air strike would amount to unacceptable military interference.

"If this information is confirmed, we are dealing with unprovoked attacks on targets on the territory of a sovereign country, which blatantly violates the U.N. Charter and is unacceptable, no matter the motives," Russia's foreign ministry said.

Iranian deputy foreign minister Hossein Amir Abdullahian said the attack "demonstrates the shared goals of terrorists and the Zionist regime", Fars news agency reported. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad portrays the rebels fighting him as foreign-backed, Islamist terrorists, with the same agenda as Israel.

An aide to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Saturday Iran would consider any attack on Syria as an attack on itself.

In battle-torn Damascus, residents doubted Syria would fight back. One mother of five said she had heard retaliation would come later. "They always say that. They'll retaliate, but later, not now. Always later," she said, and laughed.

"The last thing we need now is Israeli fighter jets to add to our daily routine. As if we don't have enough noise and firing keeping us awake at night."

BLASTS SHOOK DISTRICT

Details of Wednesday's strike remain sketchy and, in parts, contradictory. Syria said Israeli warplanes, flying low to avoid detection by radar, crossed into its airspace from Lebanon and struck the Jamraya military research centre.

But the diplomats and rebels said the jets hit a weapons convoy heading from Syria to Lebanon and the rebels said they - not Israel - attacked Jamraya with mortars.

One former Western envoy to Damascus said the discrepancy between the accounts might be explained by Jamraya's proximity to the border and the fact that Israeli jets hit vehicles inside the complex as well as a building.

The force of the dawn attack shook the ground, waking nearby residents from their slumber with up to a dozen blasts, two sources in the area said.

"We were sleeping. Then we started hearing rockets hitting the complex and the ground started shaking and we ran into the basement," said a woman who lives adjacent to the Jamraya site.

The resident, who declined to be named because of the sensitivity over the strike, said she could not tell whether the explosions which woke her were the result of an aerial attack.

Another source who has a relative working inside Jamraya said a building inside the complex had been cordoned off and flames were seen rising from the area after the attack.

"It appears that there were about a dozen rockets that appeared to hit one building in the complex," the source, who also asked not to be identified, told Reuters. "The facility is closed today."

Israeli newspapers quoted foreign media on Thursday for reports on the attack. Journalists in Israel are required to submit articles on security and military issues to the censor, which has the power to block any publication of material it deems could compromise state security.

Syrian state television said two people were killed in the raid on Jamraya, which lies in the 25-km (15-mile) strip between Damascus and the Lebanese border. It described it as a scientific research centre "aimed at raising the level of resistance and self-defense".

Diplomatic sources from three countries told Reuters that chemical weapons were believed to be stored at Jamraya, and that it was possible that the convoy was near the large site when it came under attack. However, there was no suggestion that the vehicles themselves had been carrying chemical weapons.

"The target was a truck loaded with weapons, heading from Syria to Lebanon," said one Western diplomat, echoing others who said the convoy's load may have included anti-aircraft missiles or long-range rockets.

The raid followed warnings from Israel that it was ready to act to prevent the revolt against Assad leading to Syria's chemical weapons and modern rockets reaching either his Hezbollah allies or his Islamist enemies.

A regional security source said Israel's target was weaponry given by Assad's military to fellow Iranian ally Hezbollah.

Such a strike or strikes would fit Israel's policy of pre-emptive covert and overt action to curb Hezbollah and does not necessarily indicate a major escalation of the war in Syria. It does, however, indicate how the erosion of the Assad family's rule after 42 years is seen by Israel as posing a threat.

Israel this week echoed concerns in the United States about Syrian chemical weapons, but its officials say a more immediate worry is that the civil war could see weapons that are capable of denting its massive superiority in airpower and tanks reaching Hezbollah; the group fought Israel in 2006 and remains a more pressing threat than its Syrian and Iranian sponsors.

(Additional reporting by Mariam Karouny and Oliver Holmes in Beirut, Gabriela Baczynska in Moscow and Marcus George in Dubai; editing by David Stamp and Philippa Fletcher)

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Wall Street ends lower after Fed statement

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Stocks fell on Wednesday after the Federal Reserve said in its latest statement that economic growth had stalled but indicated the pullback was likely temporary.

Stocks were flat for most of the session prior to the Fed statement at the end of a two-day policy meeting. The Fed repeated its pledge to keep purchasing securities until employment improves substantially.

The statement followed data that showed the economy, as measured by gross domestic product, unexpectedly contracted in the fourth quarter. Economists stressed that the 0.1 percent contraction, caused partly by a plunge in government spending and lower business inventories, is not an indicator of recession.

"The unemployment rate is likely to fall below 6.5 percent next year, so the Fed may be raising interest rates as soon as mid-2014. The fiscal drag from the tax increases will be offset this quarter by rebuilding post-Sandy, so real GDP growth should still come in at 2 percent," said Kurt Karl, chief economist at Swiss Re.

The S&P 500 held above 1,500, seen by technical analysts as an inflection point that will determine the overall direction in the near term. The index is on track to post its best month since October 2011 and its best January since 1997.

"This is a very modest pullback after a steep run," said Paul Zemsky, head of asset allocation at ING Investment Management in New York.

"It is too soon for the Fed to start talking about the end of (their bond buying program). The economy needs stimulus to sustain this recovery."

Chesapeake Energy rose 6 percent to $20.11 a day after it said Aubrey McClendon would step down as chief executive. The company has had a tumultuous year in which a series of Reuters investigations triggered civil and criminal probes of the second-largest U.S. natural gas producer.

After the bell, shares of Facebook Inc fell 5.9 percent to $29.40 following the company's earnings announcement. Facebook said its revenue in the fourth quarter grew 40 percent year-on-year to $1.585 billion.

Both Boeing Co and Amazon.com shares gained after earnings beat expectations, continuing a trend this quarter of high-profile names advancing after results.

Amazon rose 4.8 percent to $272.76 and Boeing rose 1.3 percent to $74.59.

The Dow Jones industrial average <.dji> was down 44.00 points, or 0.32 percent, at 13,910.42. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index <.spx> was down 5.88 points, or 0.39 percent, at 1,501.96. The Nasdaq Composite Index <.ixic> was down 11.35 points, or 0.36 percent, at 3,142.31.

Thomson Reuters data showed that of the 192 companies in the S&P 500 that have reported earnings this season, 68.8 percent have been above analyst expectations, which is a higher proportion than over the past four quarters and above the average since 1994.

Research In Motion shares fell 12 percent to $13.78 after the company, which is changing its name to BlackBerry, unveiled a long-delayed line of smartphones in hopes of a comeback into a market it once dominated.

Giving the market extra support, private sector employment topped forecasts with the ADP National Employment report showing 192,000 jobs were added in January, higher than the 165,000 expectation.

(Reporting by Angela Moon; Editing by Kenneth Barry)

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