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New Jersey's lieutenant governor on Monday denied a claim by the mayor of Hoboken that Governor Chris Christie's administration linked release of Superstorm Sandy relief funds to approval of a Hoboken development project. Hoboken Mayor Dawn Zimmer says Lieutenant Governor Kim Guadagno warned her that Christie would withhold disaster recovery funding if Zimmer did not support a bid by the New York-based Rockefeller Group to build on several blocks in he New Jersey city. The Democratic mayor's claim has added to political woes for Christie, who is widely seen as a Republican contender for the White House in 2016. Christie already is grappling with a scandal tied to his top aides who seemingly punished the mayor of Fort Lee, New Jersey, by orchestrating chaotic traffic jams at the George Washington Bridge. Christie has been on a fundraising trip in Florida over the weekend. His spokesman has dismissed the Hoboken mayor's claims as false, as did Guadagno on Monday at a

Tickets to the National Football League's first cold-weather Super Bowl are a hot item, with some climate-controlled suites in New Jersey's MetLife Stadium priced at $1 million. _0"> Following Sunday's conference championships that set up a Denver-Seattle Super Bowl on February 2, the average resale price of tickets on secondary markets was $3,721, the highest figure in five years of tracking, according to SeatGeek (seatgeek.com). No single ticket on the secondary market had sold for under $2,000, a price that was 33 percent more than what the cheapest ticket sold for on conference championship Sunday during each of the past three NFL playoffs, the website said. Face value of individual Super Bowl tickets ranges from $1,000-$2,600. For high-rollers, one suite on the Commissioner's Level of MetLife Stadium, the shared home of the New York Giants and New York Jets, is listed for $1.019 million. The same luxury suite for an entire Giants or Jets regular seaso

A U.S. missionary imprisoned in North Korea for more than a year appeared in front of journalists on Monday, in prison clothes and under guard, asking Washington to help him get home, foreign media there reported. Kenneth Bae, a 45-year-old ethnic Korean, was arrested as he led a tour group in North Korea in 2012 and sentenced to 15 years of hard labor on charges of state subversion. Bae met "a limited number of media outlets" in the North Korean capital Pyongyang and expressed hope of the United States securing his release, Japan's Kyodo news agency reported. Bae's son Jonathan urged Washington to respond to the statement. His father's words "obviously mean that Washington has not done enough. We need to send someone over and bring him home. That's what it's going to take. He needs to come home," Bae told Reuters by phone. Awakened to learn of his father's televised statement, the younger Bae described his emotions as "mixed,&qu

Visions of what Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. would do to promote civil rights in 2014, had he not been slain decades ago, marked speeches and commemorations held across the country to honor his memory on Monday. _0"> Recalling King's famous "I Have a Dream," speech, Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed said the late civil rights leader would want school children to hear it as a call to stay in school and become educated to better the world. "We need to swap the lesson plan for a dream plan," Reed told a crowd at Ebenezer Baptist Church gathered for the Martin Luther King Jr. Day federal holiday. He said King would want children to hear: "You are not going to school just to study math, you're going to school to be somebody." In New York City, newly elected Mayor Bill de Blasio, who swept into office promising broader opportunities for poorer residents, said at a tribute: "Dr. King would tell us we can't wait" to bring income equal

An explosion and fire at a feed plant in Omaha, Nebraska, on Monday injured at least 10 people and caused several deaths, authorities said, but did not provide an exact number of fatalities. _0"> About 38 employees were working at the International Nutrition plant at midmorning when there was an explosion and the building collapsed, authorities said. A specialized search-and-rescue team is searching the site. Interim Fire Chief Bernard Kanger told a news conference there had been fatalities but did not give a number. At least 10 people were taken to hospitals in Omaha and Lincoln, Nebraska, and four were in critical condition, Kanger said. The cause of the blast has not been disclosed. Kanger said the incident was an industrial accident. Kari Cook told the World-Herald newspaper she was waiting for news of her boyfriend, John Broderick, a shift supervisor at the plant, according to the paper's website. She told the newspaper he sent her a text at 10:09 a.m. reading:

Protesters clashed with riot police in the Ukrainian capital on Sunday after tough anti-protest legislation, which the political opposition says paves the way for a police state, was rushed through parliament last week. A group of young masked demonstrators attacked a cordon of police with sticks and tried to overturn a bus blocking their way to the parliament building after opposition politicians called on people to disregard the new legislation. Despite appeals from opposition leaders not to resort to violence, and a personal intervention from boxer-turned-politician Vitaly Klitschko, protesters continued to throw smoke bombs and hurl fireworks and other objects at police. The police appeared to show restraint during that fracas. The Interior Ministry said 30 police were hurt, including more than 10 admitted to hospital and four in serious condition. A spokeswoman for Klitschko tweeted that President Viktor Yanukovich had agreed to meet Klitschko immediately at the presidential

The Denver Broncos and the Seattle Seahawks won their National Football League conference championships in brilliant style on Sunday to set up a historic Super Bowl between the top two ranked teams in the United States. The Broncos, led by their unflappable quarterback Peyton Manning, beat the New England Patriots 26-16 in Colorado to make it to their first Super Bowl in 15 years. The Seahawks overturned a 10-0 deficit to defeat the San Francisco 49ers 23-17 in Washington state and advance to the NFL's title game for just the second time in the franchise's history. "This feels even sweeter," said Seattle owner and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen. "What an amazing job in a super tough game." The two teams will meet in the 48th Super Bowl at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey on February 2 in a game that has all the makings of a classic with the Broncos boasting the best offense in the league and the Seahawks the best defense. The Broncos will be appearing i

China's central bank has provided emergency funding support to commercial banks and will add more cash on Tuesday, as authorities respond to a spike in cash rates ahead of a major holiday, the bank announced on Monday. The move by the People's Bank of China (PBOC) comes after the interest rate that banks charge each other for short-term loans spiked in recent days. Bankers and analysts say the PBOC is attempting to strike a balance by guiding interbank interest rates steadily higher to reduce excess credit growth, while avoiding an acute credit crunch that could spark panic and choke off financing to the real economy. The central bank also appears to be responding to criticism that it failed to communicate effectively with the market during a severe cash crunch that roiled markets in June. Bankers and analysts criticized the PBOC for remaining largely silent as panic gripped the market and rumors swirled about interbank defaults. "The central bank's operations a

Intellectual Ventures is set to square off this week against Google Inc's Motorola Mobility unit in the first trial that the multibillion-dollar patent-buying firm has undertaken since it was founded. Privately-held Intellectual Ventures sued Motorola in 2011, claiming the mobile phone maker infringed patents covering a variety of smartphone-related technologies, including Google Play. Motorola has denied the allegations and will now go to trial over three of those patents. Barring any last-minute settlements, jury selection is scheduled to begin on Tuesday at a federal court in Wilmington, Delaware. The trial takes place amid an unfolding debate in Congress over patent reform, in which Intellectual Ventures and Google are on opposite sides. Google is backing attempts to curb software patents and make it easier to fight lawsuits, while IV has warned that Congress should not act too rashly to weaken patent owners' rights. IV and other patent aggregators have faced criticis

Anheuser-Busch InBev SA, the world's biggest brewer, agreed to buy back South Korea's Oriental Brewery Co Ltd (OB) for $5.8 billion including debt, returning to a large Asian market at a time of strong industry growth across the region. The sale by KKR & Co and Affinity Equity Partners will be Asia's biggest ever for private equity, excluding flotations, and rewards them with returns of more than five times their investment. However AB InBev can claim with Monday's deal to be paying a reasonable price for a business that has grown in value in the five years since it was sold for $1.8 billion. That sale was one of the aggressive divestments forced on InBev after its $52 billion purchase of U.S. brewer Anheuser-Busch in 2008. AB InBev shares rose 1.0 percent by 1050 GMT on Monday, making them the strongest performers in a STOXX 600 European food and beverage index, which was up 0.3 percent. Andrew Holland, analyst at Societe Generale, said the price was pretty f

A Taliban suicide bomber killed 13 people in a crowded market near the Pakistani army headquarters on Monday, a day after the Taliban killed 20 soldiers near the largely lawless, tribal region of North Waziristan, police said. The market, a short walk from the army headquarters in Rawalpindi, near the capital, Islamabad, was in one of the most secure areas of the city. The area was cordoned off by the military immediately after the blast. Two college students wearing blue uniforms were among the dead, their bodies lying near wreckage of a bicycle and pools of blood. Rescue workers struggled to help the wounded. Windows were shattered several hundred meters away. The attacks come after a couple of months of relative calm as the Taliban regrouped following the death of leader Hakimullah Mehsud in a drone strike in November. A drone had killed his deputy earlier in the year. After protracted negotiations, Mehsud was replaced by Mullah Fazlullah, a ruthless commander who has made lar

Two men said by Islamist militants to have carried out suicide attacks in south Russia appeared in a video donning explosive belts and warning Vladimir Putin to expect a "present" at the Sochi Winter Olympics from fighters following after them. The video was posted by a group identifying itself as Vilayat Dagestan and appeared on a website often used by militants from Russia's northern Caucasus region where Moscow has been battling insurgency for over a decade. It could not be independently corroborated. The video said the two men, named only as Suleiman and Abdulrakhman and posing also with assault rifles in front of a banner with Arabic writing, were the suicide bombers who attacked the city of Volgograd last month killing at least 34. One, who is bearded, reads a statement in Russian to the wailing of a song in Arabic. The video shows them having what appear to be explosive devices attached to them and one pushing a button that nestles in his hand and appears to

Thai authorities are "very seriously" considering a state of emergency after a weekend of violence in the capital where protesters have been trying for more than two months to bring down the government, the security chief said on Monday. The violence is the latest episode in an eight-year conflict that pits Bangkok's middle class and royalist establishment against poorer, mainly rural supporters of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra and her brother, ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra, who was toppled by the military in 2006. "We're prepared to use the emergency decree ... Everyone involved including the police, the military and the government is considering this option very seriously, but has not yet come to an agreement," National Security Council chief Paradorn Pattantabutr told Reuters after meeting Yingluck. "The protesters have said they will close various government offices. So far, their closures have been symbolic, they go to government offices

For Detroit, the road in and out of U.S. bankruptcy court is paved with casino money. An economic lifeline, wagering tax revenue from the city's three casinos is at the heart of the bankruptcy plan submitted by Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr, and it is behind the surprise rejection of a deal with banks last week that has thrown a wrench into Detroit's route and timing to recovery. Moreover, some $330 million in assistance pledged by a coalition of philanthropic groups, including the Ford Foundation and the Kresge Foundation, will not begin flowing to Detroit until it exits bankruptcy, the head of one group told Reuters. Michigan voters in 1996 approved casino gambling in Detroit, hoping to revitalize the ghost town. Three glitzy resorts eventually opened, helping to spark a burst of energy and bringing as much as $180 million in annual taxes. But the funds have been tied up since 2009 by a separate, disastrous deal that Detroit is trying to reverse. In an effort to reduce i

Seven bomb explosions killed 26 people and wounded 67 in the Iraqi capital on Monday, police and medics said, as security forces battled Sunni Muslim militants around the western cities of Falluja and Ramadi. _0"> The bloodiest attack occurred in the mainly Shi'ite Muslim Abu Dsheer district in southern Baghdad, where a car bomb near a crowded market killed seven people and wounded 18. No group claimed responsibility for the blasts. But Sunni insurgents, some of them linked to al Qaeda, are widely blamed for a surge in violence in the past year apparently aimed at undermining the Shi'ite-led government and provoking a return to all-out sectarian strife. Al Qaeda militants and their local allies seized control of Falluja and parts of Ramadi on January 1, exploiting resentment among minority Sunnis against the government for policies perceived as unfairly penalizing their once-dominant community. Five of Monday's bombs targeted mainly Shi'ite districts of th

French carmaker PSA Peugeot Citroen ( id="symbol_PEUP.PA_0"> PEUP.PA ) has taken a decisive step towards a tie-up with China's Dongfeng Motor Co. ( id="symbol_0489.HK 0489.HK ) as the board approved the outlines of a contentious survival plan that divided the founding Peugeot family. _1"> In a blow to Chairman Thierry Peugeot, who had championed an alternative plan, the board agreed in principle to a capital increase that would see the Chinese state-owned carmaker and French government acquire minority stakes and the family cede control, sources familiar with the matter said on Monday. Peugeot confirmed in a statement that it was looking to raise 3 billion euros ($4.1 billion) in a deal with Dongfeng, after unveiling a further 4.9 percent decline in global vehicle deliveries for 2013 earlier on Monday. The French government would subscribe to the share issue "on the same terms and conditions as Dongfeng", Peugeot said, an assertation later c

President Viktor Yanukovich, reeling from the worst violence for decades in the Ukrainian capital, appealed for compromise on Monday as police and demonstrators clashed again in the streets. Yanukovich is battling to reassert his authority after scores of people were injured in Kiev on Sunday in pitched battles between protesters and police that could seriously hurt his chances of re-election next year. With tension still high, about 1,000 protesters confronted police on Monday near Kiev's main government headquarters. Scores of mainly young people hurled projectiles at police throughout the day and ignored appeals to disperse. After weeks of mass protests over Yanukovich's decision to shun a trade pact with the European Union and turn instead towards Russia , demonstrators have been further enraged by sweeping laws rammed through parliament to curb public protest, "I ask you not to join those who seek violence, who are trying to create a division between the state a

Representatives from Germany's financial watchdog Bafin will visit the London offices of Deutsche Bank, the country's biggest lender, as it steps up investigations into alleged currency market manipulation, a source familiar with the process said on Monday. _0"> This follows Deutsche's suspension last week of traders in New York and mirrors the arrival of U.S. regulators in London last week at Citigroup's London headquarters, marking an escalation in the global probe. German magazine Der Spiegel reported on Sunday that Bafin was setting up a so-called special investigation, putting the case at the top of its priority list. Bafin was not available for immediate comment. Deutsche Bank declined to comment, and referred Reuters to a previous statement that it is cooperating with those investigations, and will take disciplinary action with regards to individuals if merited. The source could not say when the visit would take place, or whether Bafin officials al

Islamist militants stormed a village in remote northeast Nigeria on Monday, torching houses and spraying them with bullets in an attack that killed 18 people, witnesses said. The latest Boko Haram assault, on Sunday night, came hours before Nigeria's four top military chiefs handed over to fresh commanders in a ceremony on Monday. President Goodluck Jonathan announced the reshuffle of his entire military leadership last week in a bid to reinvigorate the fight against the insurgents. "Most of those who survived the attack have fled the village as they do not know if they will be attacked again," said Bulama Ibrahim, the chief of Alau Ngawo village, which was attacked sometime after 10 p.m. on Sunday. He said he had counted 18 bodies after the shooting and many houses burned. A former local councilor, Mustapha Galtimare, who was on the scene after the attack, concurred with the numbers of dead. The village lies in remote northeastern Borno state, the epicenter of the

A group linked to al Qaeda, emboldened by its recent victory over rival rebels in Syria , has imposed sweeping restrictions on personal freedoms in the northern province of Raqqa as it seeks to consolidate control over the region. Reuters obtained copies of four statements issued on Sunday by the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) prohibiting music from being played in public and photographs of people being posted in shop windows. The sale of cigarettes and shisha water pipes are banned, women must wear the niqab, or full face veil, in public and men are obliged to attend Friday prayers at a mosque. The directives, which cite Koranic verses and Islamic teaching, are the latest evidence of ISIL's ambition to establish a Syrian state founded on radical Islamist principles. ISIL is widely considered the most radical of the rebel groups fighting forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad, and increasingly each other, in Syria's civil war. The first and only city to h

A U.S. missionary imprisoned in North Korea for more than a year appeared in front of journalists on Monday, in prison clothes and under guard, asking Washington to help him get home, foreign media there reported. Kenneth Bae, a 45-year-old ethnic Korean, was arrested as he led a tour group in North Korea in 2012 and sentenced to 15 years of hard labor on charges of state subversion. Bae met "a limited number of media outlets" in the North Korean capital Pyongyang and expressed hope of the United States securing his release, Japan's Kyodo news agency reported. Bae's son Jonathan urged Washington to respond to the statement. His father's words "obviously mean that Washington has not done enough. We need to send someone over and bring him home. That's what it's going to take. He needs to come home," Bae told Reuters by phone. Awakened to learn of his father's televised statement, the younger Bae described his emotions as "mixed,&qu

Comet-chasing spacecraft Rosetta woke from nearly three years of hibernation on Monday to complete a decade-long deep space mission that scientists hope will help unlock some of the secrets of the solar system. Rosetta, which was launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) in 2004, is due to rendezvous with comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko and land a probe on it this year in an unprecedented maneuver. Scientists hope data the probe gathers will allow them to peek into a kind of astronomical time capsule that has preserved for millions of years clues as to what the world looked like when our solar system was born. "Since comets are so primitive, they can give scientists a chance to understand how the solar system formed, where it came from," Rosetta spacecraft operations manager Andrea Accomazzo told Reuters ahead of the wake-up call. On its way to the comet, a roughly 3 by 5 km-large rock discovered in 1969, Rosetta has been circling the sun on a widening spiral course,

Visions of what Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. would do to promote civil rights in 2014, had he not been slain decades ago, marked speeches and commemorations held across the country to honor his memory on Monday. _0"> Recalling King's famous "I Have a Dream," speech, Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed said the late civil rights leader would want school children to hear it as a call to stay in school and become educated to better the world. "We need to swap the lesson plan for a dream plan," Reed told a crowd at Ebenezer Baptist Church gathered for the Martin Luther King Jr. Day federal holiday. He said King would want children to hear: "You are not going to school just to study math, you're going to school to be somebody." In New York City, newly elected Mayor Bill de Blasio, who swept into office promising broader opportunities for poorer residents, said at a tribute: "Dr. King would tell us we can't wait" to bring income equal

Iran has halted its most sensitive nuclear operations under a preliminary deal with world powers, winning some relief from economic sanctions on Monday in a ground-breaking exchange that could ease a threat of war. The United States and European Union both suspended some trade and other restrictions against the OPEC oil producer after the United Nations' nuclear watchdog confirmed that Iran had fulfilled its side of an agreement made on November 24. The announcements, which coincided with a diplomatic row over Iran's role at peace talks on Syria [ID:nL5N0KU1X2], will allow six months of negotiation on a definitive accord that the West hopes can end fears of Tehran developing nuclear weapons and Iran wants to end sanctions that are crippling its economy. Iranian officials hailed a warming of ties that will also see their new president make a pitch to international business leaders at Davos later this week: "The iceberg of sanctions against Iran is melting," the

Central African Republic lawmakers chose their capital's mayor to become interim president on Monday and lead the country out of months of sectarian killings, as the European Union agreed to send in 500 troops to help restore order. The change in leadership and deepening international involvement in the former French colony follow waves of killing and looting that have forced 1 million people - nearly a quarter of the population - to flee. The landlocked nation, impoverished for all its mineral reserves, descended into chaos when mainly Muslim rebels, known as Seleka, seized power in March. Abuses by Seleka fighters triggered revenge attacks by Christian militia known as 'anti-balaka', fuelling unprecedented violence between communities that had lived side-by-side. "I am the president of all Central Africans, without exception," said Mayor Catherine Samba-Panza, succeeding Seleka leader Michel Djotodia who stepped down as interim president this month under i