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Republicans on the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee will soon release a report asserting the CIA's use of harsh interrogation techniques helped bring down Osama bin Laden and disrupt terrorist plots, the panel's top Republican said on Sunday. "Information gleaned from these interrogations was in fact used to interrupt and disrupt terrorist plots, including some information that took down bin Laden," Senator Saxby Chambliss of Georgia said on CBS's "Face the Nation." Democrats who control the Senate Intelligence Committee are expected to issue their own report that alleges the CIA techniques, such as "waterboarding," did not help yield valuable intelligence and were not necessary. The two reports will come five years after the committee authorized a probe into the CIA's possible use of torture after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. It is unclear when the Democrats' report will be released because Senator Dianne Feinstein, who chairs

President Barack Obama said corporate America has done well under his economic policies, telling the Economist magazine that chief executive officers should stop complaining about regulations and show greater social responsibility. "If you look at what's happened over the last four or five years, the folks who don't have a right to complain are the folks at the top," Obama said in an interview conducted last week and posted on the magazine's website late on Saturday. Republicans have sought to portray Obama as anti-business, and businesses have complained that Obama's signature healthcare law and the Dodd-Frank financial reforms have raised costs. Business groups are lobbying against his new plan to curb climate-changing carbon emissions from power plants. "I would take the complaints of the corporate community with a grain of salt," Obama said, arguing that his policies have been friendly to business. "They always complain about regulatio

President Barack Obama dismissed Russia as a nation that "doesn't make anything" and said in an interview with the Economist magazine that the West needs to be "pretty firm" with China as Beijing pushes to expand its role in the world economy. _0"> Obama has tried to focus U.S. foreign policy on Asia, a response to China's economic and military might. But for months, that "pivot" has been overshadowed by a flurry of international crises, including Russia's support for separatists in eastern Ukraine. Russia is the world's third-largest oil producer and second-largest natural gas producer. Europe relies heavily on Russian energy exports, complicating the West's response to the Ukraine crisis. Obama downplayed Moscow's role in the world, dismissing President Vladimir Putin as a leader causing short-term trouble for political gain that will hurt Russia in the long term. "I do think it's important to keep perspecti

German magazine Der Spiegel reported on Sunday that Israel and at least one other intelligence agency were listening in on U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry's unsecured phone calls last year when he was holding nearly daily negotiations for peace with various leaders in the Middle East. _0"> The magazine cited "several sources from intelligence circles" as saying that although Kerry has a secure phone at his mansion in Georgetown, while he was traveling and needed to make a quick phone call, he sometimes used an ordinary telephone that the intelligence agencies listened in on. "A large number of these conversations, which went via satellite, were listened to by at least two intelligence agencies, including the Israelis," the magazine wrote. "It is probable that the Russians and Chinese were also listening in." The magazine said that Israel thus often knew precisely what Kerry was talking to the other sides about. Kerry, the magazine said,

The body of radio personality Casey Kasem, who even before his June death was at the center of a tug-of-war between his wife and his children from a prior marriage, has been flown to Canada from a Washington state funeral home, his longtime former agent said on Wednesday. _0"> Kasem, the former host of the syndicated program "American Top 40," was moved to Canada by his wife, his agent Don Pitts said, after being kept at the Gaffney Funeral Home in Tacoma, Washington. He died on June 15 at age 82. Candace Corkum, administrative manager for the funeral home, confirmed on Friday that Kasem's body was no longer at the facility. When reached by phone on Wednesday, someone speaking for the home declined further comment. Kasem had been the focus of a dispute between his three children from his first marriage - Kerri, Julie and Mike - and his second wife, Jean Kasem. The children said she prevented them from visiting him as he suffered from Lewy body dementia, an i

CBS' "Late Show" will stay in New York when comedian Stephen Colbert takes over from the late-night talk show's host David Letterman in a deal that will award the network tax credits for jobs commitments, CBS Corp. and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo said on Wednesday. _0"> CBS did not immediately commit to keeping the show at its only home, Manhattan's Ed Sullivan Theater, when the network announced in April that Colbert would succeed Letterman. Politicians in California had lobbied for the "Late Show" to move to Los Angeles after NBC's "The Tonight Show" moved to New York from its longtime home in Burbank, California, when Jay Leno stepped aside for Jimmy Fallon in February. CBS said it will be eligible for at least $11 million in state tax credits over five years by keeping the "Late Show" in New York, another example of how states have lured television and film production away from its traditional Los Angeles home

Former Washington Redskins tight end Fred Davis is being sought by police on a domestic assault charge, Washington police said on Wednesday. _0"> Davis, 28, is alleged to have approached an ex-girlfriend while she was eating at a Washington restaurant early on June 2 with a man. Davis grabbed her by the shoulders and spun her around, police said. When the woman walked outside, Davis followed and threw a handful of dirt and flowers from a plant box at her, police said. The two argued at length, then Davis got in a car and drove off. The woman, 28, was not hurt. She reported the incident to police the following day, police said. Davis, a second-round draft choice from the University of Southern California, played for the Redskins for six years. He was suspended indefinitely in February by the National Football League for violating the league's substance abuse policy. (Reporting by Ian Simpson ; Editing by Eric Beech )

"Weird Al" Yankovic, the parody singer and cult figure, on Wednesday earned his first No. 1 album on the weekly U.S. Billboard 200 album chart on the strength of several viral videos released online. _0"> Parodying pop hits such as Pharrell's "Happy" ("Tacky") and Lorde's "Royals" ("Foil"), Yankovic's "Mandatory Fun" album sold 104,000 copies in its debut week, according to figures compiled by Nielsen SoundScan. Billboard said it is the first comedy album to top the chart since 1963, adding that "Mandatory Fun" had the most weekly sales for a comedy album since 1994. Yankovic, who has scored hits over the past 30 years with parodies such as "Like a Surgeon"(Madonna's "Like a Virgin") and "Amish Paradise" (Coolio's "Gangsta's Paradise") launched a promotional campaign releasing eight new music videos in as many days. The next three spots on

Former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, the 2008 Republican nominee for vice president, was issued a speeding citation in her hometown of Wasilla, court records showed on Wednesday. The July 16 citation carries a potential fine of $154, and Palin has 30 days from the date of receiving the citation to respond to it, the records showed. Police pulled Palin over while she was driving her black Toyota Tundra pickup bearing the license plate LOVUSA, the Alaska Dispatch News reported on Wednesday. It said the former governor was driving 63 miles per hour in a 45-mph speed zone while returning from a bikram hot yoga workout. “I was thinking, I wasn’t speeding, I was qualifying,” Palin told the Dispatch News. Wasilla Police spokesman Officer Rick Manrique declined to comment on the case, and an attorney for Palin could not be reached for comment. Palin, since stepping down as governor of Alaska in 2009, has endorsed and campaigned for a number of conservative candidates for Congress. Last

Actor James Shigeta, best known for his roles in "Die Hard," and "Flower Drum Song," has died, a representative for the actor said on Tuesday. He was 81. _0"> Shigeta, who was born in Hawaii and has Japanese ancestry according film database IMDB, died peacefully in his sleep in Los Angeles on Monday, his agent Jeffrey Leavitt said. The actor rose to prominence in the 1960s with a series of film and television roles, and won a Golden Globe for most promising male newcomer. He played the leads in 1961's musical film "Flower Drum Song" and "Bridge to the Sun," and a vice admiral in 1976's World War II film "Midway." In 1988, the actor was a key supporting cast member in "Die Hard" alongside Bruce Willis. The actor is survived by three brothers and one sister, Leavitt said. (Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy ; Editing by Mary Milliken )

Award-winning American filmmaker Robert L. Drew, a pioneer of the cinema vérité documentary style, died on Wednesday in Sharon, Connecticut at the age of 90, his family said. _0"> Drew, who made more than 100 films on social issues, politics and the arts during a career that spanned more than five decades, died peacefully surrounded by children and friends. "He had been declining for some time and it was not completely unexpected," his son, Thatcher Drew, said. Drew, a former correspondent and editor at Life Magazine and a fighter pilot during World War Two, helped to develop cinema vérité, a direct type of observational or fly on the wall filming to capture reality. He also founded the documentary film company Drew Associates in the early 1960s. Many of his films were shown on television and screened at international film festivals. "He believed in the pure form of cinema vérité. It was a strict code that allowed no directing of subjects, no set up shots

Rock guitarist Dick Wagner, whose prolific session work graced the albums of such acts as Alice Cooper, Lou Reed, Kiss and Aerosmith during the 1970s, has died at age 71 in Arizona, his manager said on Thursday. The Michigan-bred musician, featured on scores of albums and hailed by fans as "the Maestro of Rock," suffered from a number of health problems in his later years, including two heart attacks and a stroke. He died on Wednesday at a hospital in Scottsdale, Arizona, succumbing to respiratory failure about two weeks after undergoing a cardiac procedure, his manager and business partner, Susan Michelson, told Reuters. Wagner began his rock career in the 1960s with the formation of an early Detroit-area band called the Bossmen. He gained wider notice after establishing the Frost, recording his first three Billboard-charted albums with that group. After moving to New York he formed another band, Ursa Major, whose original but short-lived lineup included Billy Joel on

The news and entertainment website BuzzFeed has fired the writer Benny Johnson after its editors said they found he plagiarized others' work 41 times. _0"> BuzzFeed editor Ben Smith in a note late on Friday called writer Benny Johnson "a creative force" at his best, but said a review of more than 500 posts revealed dozens of instances where he copied sentences and phrases verbatim from other websites. Smith said the plagiarism on the seven-year-old site was brought to light this week by Twitter users. "Plagiarism, much less copying unchecked facts from Wikipedia or other sources, is an act of disrespect to the reader," Smith wrote. "We are deeply embarrassed and sorry to have misled you." Johnson, whose eclectic range of posts with attribution issues cited by BuzzFeed included items on miracle babies, things that are definitely bigger in Texas, and how to avoid eating horse meat, apologized via Twitter on Saturday. "To the writers w

The gloves that boxing great Muhammad Ali wore in his legendary 1971 fight against Joe Frazier in what became known as the Fight of the Century sold at auction on Thursday for almost $400,000. An anonymous bidder bought the gloves for $388,375 at the auction run by Texas-based Heritage Auctions at the National Sports Collectors Convention in Cleveland. Heritage previously auctioned a set of gloves Ali wore to claim his first World Championship in 1964 for $836,500. The Fight of the Century, in New York's Madison Square Garden, was the first of three fights between Ali and Frazier during the 1970s. In 1971, Frazier officially held the title of Heavyweight Champion of the World. Ali had been stripped of the title he had held since the 1964 bout against Sonny Liston because of his refusal to participate in the Vietnam War-era draft. The March 8 fight against Frazier was Ali's second after returning to the ring following a 3-1/2 year absence. Ali's conviction had just bee

Invesco Ltd, which oversees the PowerShares line of exchange-traded funds, said on Thursday that second-quarter profit jumped 35.5 percent as strong markets boosted assets under management. Net profit rose to $274.5 million, or 63 cents per share, from $202.6 million, or 45 cents per share, a year earlier. Excluding discontinued operations from the sale of its Atlantic Trust business and other one-time items, Atlanta-based Invesco earned 65 cents per share. Analysts, on average, expected profit of 59 cents, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S. Invesco ended the quarter in June with $802.4 billion in assets under management, up $15.1 billion from the end of March. Net long-term outflows at Invesco were $6.9 billion for the quarter, pressured by a single client withdrawal of $13.1 billion, after the company lost a contract to manage funds for wealth manager St. James's Place. Much of the money that left with St. James's Place is following Neil Woodford, a longtime Invesco

The Pimco Total Return Fund, the world's largest bond fund run by Bill Gross, is ending the month on a rough note, lagging 93 percent of its peers so far in July. According to preliminary Morningstar data on Thursday, the Pimco Total Return is posting returns of negative 0.49 percent, while its peer-fund category is putting up returns of 0.26 percent on the month as of July 30. Gross's fund performance is widely followed as it serves as an industry benchmark, though this year has been one of Gross's roughest patches. Gross saw his successor, Mohamed El-Erian, resign earlier this year while his Pimco Total Return has seen over $64 billion of net outflows since May 2013. "The Pimco Total Return Fund (PTTRX) has a lot of duration exposure to the 1-5 year point of the yield curve, the exact spot where yields rose during July," said David Schawel, vice president and portfolio manager of Square 1 Financial. "Meanwhile, they show to have just 11 percent of mat

Billionaire investor William Ackman called himself his "own worst enemy" in reviewing why last week's much hyped presentation on Herbalife Ltd.'s nutrition clubs failed to deliver the "death blow" he had originally promised. _0"> "It was a PR failure," Ackman told Bloomberg News on Thursday, explaining that he had raised expectations about the presentation. "People were looking for the dead body and the smoking gun and instead what they got was a three-hour detailed regulatory presentation," he said in the interview. "I'm my own worst enemy," Ackman said when asked whether he had been advised on how to present the data. Ackman was not available for comment but a spokesman confirmed his comments. Herbalife's stock price climbed higher during the July 22 presentation, extending the fund manager's losses on his $1 billion short bet against the company that he unveiled 19 months ago when he first accused the

Famed oil trader Andy Hall's more than $3 billion hedge fund was up nearly 20 percent at the half-year mark, sharply outpacing its rivals in one of the best performances of its seven-year history, data obtained by Reuters showed on Thursday. The feat came as Occidental Petroleum Corp, which owns 20 percent of Hall's Westport, Connecticut-based hedge fund Astenbeck Capital Management and trading firm Phibro, reported a strong second quarter on Thursday, citing "improved marketing and trading" activity. Occidental did not say if it was still open to selling its stakes in Astenbeck and Phibro, which it was considering early this year to reduce proprietary trading after a patch of weak returns at Hall's fund. Hall's Astenbeck returned the most this year from among nine commodity funds that Maryland's $44 billion state pension system was invested in, data obtained by Reuters showed. The Astenbeck Commodities Fund III, which Maryland had about $137 million

A former broker who masterminded an annuity scheme to profit from the deaths of terminally ill patients has agreed to an $850,000 fine and to be banned from the securities industry, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said on Thursday. The broker, Michael Horowitz of Los Angeles, also admitted to wrongdoing as part of the settlement, the SEC said. The agency filed a civil action against Horowitz in March. Variable annuities are investment vehicles designed to help retirees maintain a source of income. Typically, insurance companies who sell the annuities will agree to make periodic payments to people who purchase the product. But another common feature offered is a death benefit, in which the insurer pays the policyholder's beneficiary under certain conditions. Horowitz, the SEC said, recruited people to help him steal personal health information from hospice and nursing home patients so he could designate them as annuitants and sell the products to wealthy investors

(James Saft is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own) The taper tantrum was brutal, but rising rates do not have to mean lousy performance for emerging markets. As investors look to the possibility of rising official interest rates in the U.S. and Britain in the coming year their expectations are colored by nasty memories of 2013’s taper tantrum, when bumbled communications by the Federal Reserve caused Treasury yields to spike and emerging markets to suffer. Asset performance was both volatile and very poor, particularly among emerging market countries like India and South Africa which need to attract capital flows from abroad. But much depends on why rates are rising, rather than just the direction. “Higher interest rates and exit from monetary stimulus in major advanced economies when led by stronger growth prospects produce good spillovers,” according to International Monetary Fund economist Hamid Faruqee, one of the authors of a report this week on the po

Consumers who opt in for bank overdraft protection end up paying more than double for small purchases, a U.S. consumer watchdog warned on Thursday, giving banks a fee bonanza when checking accounts are short of funds. A study by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau showed that debit card overdraft fees average about $34, and are mostly incurred on transactions of $24 or less. Consumers therefore end up paying the equivalent of more than 17,000 percent in annual interest rate for a loan, the CFPB said. Overdraft fees, which are usually paid within three days, are giving U.S. banks and credit unions more than half of their consumer checking income, the agency said. About one in five consumers who opt in will likely overdraw an account more than 10 times a year, and pay about $260 per year in overdraft and non-sufficient funds fees, CFPB Director Richard Cordray told reporters on a conference call. "Despite recent regulatory and industry changes, overdrafts continue to impo

Hedge fund managers Barry Rosenstein and David Einhorn, like many other investors, were hurt by last month's late but sharp stock market selloff and are reporting losses for July, investors who saw their performance numbers said. _0"> Rosenstein's Jana Partners funds lost 1.3 percent in July while his Jana Nirvana fund lost 1.7 percent. Meanwhile, David Einhorn's Greenlight Capital fell 2.9 percent last month. For the year, however, all those funds are still in the black. Rosenstein's Nirvana fund is up 6.2 percent, beating the S&P 500's 5.7 percent rise while his Partners fund is up 4.0 percent. Einhorn's Greenlight Capital is up 3.6 percent. Rosenstein and Einhorn rank among the world's biggest and most successful hedge fund managers, so their monthly numbers are closely followed by investors, keen to gauge the health of the broader hedge fund industry. On the last day of July, the U.S. Dow Jones industrial average lost 317 points to regi

Mom and pop investors hoping to emulate the investment savvy of Wall Street's wealthiest like Warren Buffett and Carl Icahn will have a new way into markets on Friday when the latest low-cost exchange-traded fund tracking the stock picks of big name investors begins trading. The Direxion iBillionaire ETF, set to trade under the ticker "IBLN," is the latest in a handful of similar ETFs that have come to market in recent years, all packaging the holdings disclosed quarterly by top managers into instruments that are more accessible to Main Street investors. "It democratizes a lot of the information that very wealthy institutional investors have had for a long time," said Brian Jacobs, president of Direxion Investments, the ETF provider that has partnered with index creator iBillionaire. At $65 for every $10,000 invested, fees for the new iBillionaire ETF are far lower than the $200 that would be charged by the typical billionaire-run hedge fund, which would al

Financial advisers at Morgan Stanley, one of the world's largest securities brokerages, do not typically arrange clients' European vacations. But when an ultra-high-net-worth client was planning a family meeting in Tuscany, Deanna Rodriguez, Morgan Stanley's director of lifestyle advisory, did everything from reserving a villa that sleeps 20 to planning the family's sightseeing agenda. Rodriguez, one of two registered brokers at Morgan Stanley employed to provide full-time concierge services, is part of a broader trend of wealth managers offering luxury travel arrangements for select clients. "I'm not your Cunard Cruise girl. You can get that from your American Express Platinum," Rodriguez said. "We get called in because there are a lot of moving parts and it really needs to go off like a corporate event." Travel services are unusual at the large U.S. brokerages known as wirehouses, but several independent broker-dealers like HighTower Adv

Investors worldwide pulled $4.4 billion out of high-yield junk bond funds in the week ended July 30, marking a third straight week of big withdrawals from the funds, data from a Bank of America Merrill Lynch Global Research report showed on Friday. The latest outflows from funds that hold the riskier, lower-rated debt brought withdrawals in the past three weeks to $12 billion, according to the report, which also cited data from fund-tracker EPFR Global. The high-yield market, which typically moves in sympathy with equities, has been on investors' radar after its multi-year rally. High-profile investors have warned repeatedly this year that junk securities were trading at lofty prices. Dan Fuss, vice chairman of Loomis Sayles, said on Friday: "The market's for sale - finally. In general, we aren't buying the market as a whole. The things we like, I am afraid, are what others like too." Fuss said he expects junk bonds to come under pressure as financial market

It should have been a routine delivery of vegetable oil to Iran for making margarine; instead the tanker spent months in the Gulf as banks held up payment for the cargo, fearing they would run foul of international sanctions. The sanctions regime, imposed by the United States and European Union over Tehran's nuclear program, permits trade in humanitarian goods such as food and pharmaceuticals. Yet many banks are steering clear of financing any deals with Iran due to a series of fines handed out by U.S. authorities for dealing with sanctioned countries, including a recent $8.97 billion penalty for BNP Paribas of France. So from January to March this year the Greek-run tanker lay at anchor before it was forced to head to Fujairah in the United Arab Emirates to refuel - this also being difficult in Iran due to the sanctions. Eventually, a sale of goods bill for the transaction came through and the tanker discharged its cargo in Iran, but only after months of wasted time and mount

Summer jobs: The very mention brings up memories of low pay, long hours and sweaty, clueless teenagers who don't really know what they're doing. Memories like that are still vivid for some of the nation's greatest achievers. Since last August, Reuters has been gathering the first-job stories of successful Americans, including sports legends, business titans and media superstars. This month, to coincide with the nation's monthly jobs report, we spoke to a few of them about those memorable summer jobs that got them started. JASON MRAZ, SINGER AND SONGWRITER First summer job: Fence builder "My dad was a fence contractor in Mechanicsville, Virginia, so my first paying gig was building fences. It involved a lot of digging holes, cleaning up construction sites and distributing lumber. It was for $5 an hour, which, at the time, was more than minimum wage." "It was hard manual labor, and I certainly would rather have been at the pool with my friends r

After helping a girlfriend through the messy, tangled finances left in the wake of a parent's death, John Kerecz had a message for his own mom and dad: Get your paperwork in order. A few years later, Kerecz's father passed away unexpectedly. The 52-year-old environmental engineer from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania went to the house and looked where his father and mother used to keep their important documents, but nothing was there. It was pure luck that he went to the computer to look up a phone number and saw a folder on the desktop labeled "DEATH." "Sure enough, everything was there in that folder," Kerecz says. Armed with a copy of the will, lists of the financial accounts and insurance policies and other paperwork, Kerecz was quickly able to settle his father's estate and use the funds to take care of his ailing mother, making him extremely grateful. The difference between having your files organized or not is about more than just stress; leave behi

Jeffrey Gundlach's DoubleLine Funds had net inflows of $603 million in July, with its flagship DoubleLine Total Return Bond Fund attracting net inflows of $375 million. DoubleLine Capital, based in Los Angeles, said on Friday its DoubleLine Total Return Bond Fund ended July with net inflows totaling $1.9 billion so far this year, and more than $2.7 billion of net inflows into DoubleLine open-end funds. The DoubleLine Total Return Bond Fund is posting returns of 4.46 percent year-to-date, surpassing the benchmark Barclays U.S. Aggregate Bond Index which is returning 3.66 percent. The DoubleLine fund is surpassing 77 percent of its peer category so far this year, according to Morningstar data. The sixth straight month of net inflows into DoubleLine open-end funds and the DoubleLine Total Return Bond Fund "are a product of two things - the general move by investors back into fixed-income funds and good risk-adjusted returns provided by our managers," said Loren Fleckens

Harvard University has hired a former hedge fund manager as head of public equity to help oversee how its $32 billion endowment invests in stock markets around the world, the Ivy League school said on Friday. _0"> Michael Ryan, a Yale graduate and former Goldman Sachs partner who recently helped run hedge fund JAI Capital Management, will step into the newly created position at Harvard Management Company (HMC), the school's money management arm, in September. "Public markets are an important driver of HMC's returns and we are confident Mike will contribute significantly to our investment strategy and our ability to outperform our equity market benchmarks," Stephen Blyth, managing director, head of public markets said in a statement. Harvard invests a bigger chunk of its portfolio in private equity than in U.S. stocks and that has caused the school to miss out on strong stock market gains over the last five years, outside analysts have said. Jane Mendillo

U.S. job growth slowed a bit in July and the unemployment rate unexpectedly rose, pointing to slack in the labor market that could give the Federal Reserve room to keep interest rates low for a while. Nonfarm payrolls increased 209,000 last month after surging by 298,000 in June, the Labor Department said on Friday. Economists had expected a 233,000 job gain. Although job growth was below expectations, July marked the sixth straight month employment expanded by more than 200,000, a signal of strength last seen in 1997. In addition, data for May and June was revised to show 15,000 more jobs created than previously reported. The one tenth of a percentage point increase in the unemployment rate to 6.2 percent came as more people entered the labor market, an indication of confidence in job prospects. "It's a goldilocks report for an economy that is steadily expanding but not lifting off. It will reinforce for now the Federal Reserve's commitment to a gradualist policy

Two thousand people took to the streets of Benghazi on Friday to protest against Islamist militants and former rebel militias who have been fighting armed forces and taken over an important military base in the eastern Libyan city. The heavy clashes in Benghazi and the capital Tripoli over the past two weeks have been the worst since the 2011 fall of Muammar Gaddafi, killing more than 200 people and forcing most Western governments to pull their diplomats out of the North African state. Fierce fighting among rival factions in the country's two major cities also underscores Libya's fragile control over the heavily armed brigades of former anti-Gaddafi rebel fighters and militias who refuse to disband. The Benghazi Revolutionaries Shura Council, an alliance formed by former rebels and Islamist militants from Ansar al-Sharia, which Washington classifies as a terrorist organization, have forced the army to pull out of Benghazi. Chanting slogans praising Libya's army and c

Argentina cannot turn its back on negotiations with holdout creditors after defaulting on its sovereign debt, a U.S. judge instructed on Friday, just as the country's failure to service a June interest payment was declared a "credit event." In a stern tone, U.S. District Judge Thomas Griesa in New York slammed the decision by Latin America's third-biggest economy to defy his order to pay holdout investors in full and instead default on $29 billion in debt. As Griesa was speaking, a 15-member committee facilitated by the International Swaps and Derivatives Association (ISDA) voted unanimously to call the missed coupon payment a "credit event." The move triggers a payout process for holders of insurance on Argentine debt, which analysts estimate could amount to roughly $1 billion. Argentina's economy ministry said later in a combative statement that Griesa's attitude sought to favor "vulture funds". It has asked Argentina's securitie