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"COPENHAGEN (AP) - The police foiled an attempt to kill an artist who drew a cartoon depicting the Prophet Muhammad that sparked outrage in the Muslim world, the head of Denmark's intelligence service said Saturday. Jakob Scharf, who heads PET, the Danish intelligence service, said a 28-year-old Somalia man was armed with an ax and a knife when he tried to enter the home of the artist, Kurt Westergaard, in Aarhus on Friday evening. The attack on Mr. Westergaard, whose rendering was among 12 that led to the burning of Danish diplomatic offices in predominantly Muslim countries in 2006, was "terror related," Mr. Scharf said in a statement. "The arrested man has according to PET's information close relations to the Somali terrorist group, Al Shabab, and Al Qaeda leaders in eastern Africa," he said. The man was suspected of having been involved in terror-related activities during a stay in East Africa and had been under PET's surveillance, but not in connection with Mr. Westergaard, Mr. Scharf said. The police shot the Somali man in a knee and a hand, authorities said. The police in Aarhus said that the suspect was seriously wounded, but that his life was not in danger."

"DES MOINES, Iowa - Snow was piled so high in Iowa that drivers couldn't see across intersections and a North Dakota snowblower repair shop was overwhelmed with business as heavy snow and wind chills as low as 52 below zero blasted much of the Midwest on Thursday. Frigid weather also gripped the South, where a rare cold snap was expected to bring snow and ice Thursday to states from South Carolina to Louisiana. Forecasters said wind chills could drop to near zero at night in some areas. In Bowbells, in northwestern North Dakota, the wind chill hit 52-below zero Thursday morning. "The air freezes your nostrils, your eyes water and your chest burns from breathing - and that's just going from the house to your vehicle," said Jane Tetrault, the Burke County deputy auditor. Her vehicle started, but the tires were frozen. "It was bump, bump, bump all the way to work with the flat spots on my tires," Tetrault said. "It was a pretty rough ride." Other parts of the Midwest also had dangerously cold wind chills, including negative 40 in parts of South Dakota and minus 27 in northeast Nebraska, according to the National Weather Service. Equally disturbing chills were expected overnight Friday."

"PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti - Prayers of thanksgiving and cries for help rose from a roofless cathedral and the huddled homeless Sunday, the sixth day of an epic humanitarian crisis that was straining the world's ability to respond and igniting flare-ups of violence amid the rubble. A leading aid group echoed complaints about the supply bottleneck and skewed priorities at the U.S.-controlled airport. The general in charge said the U.S. military was "working aggressively" to speed up deliveries. In the ruins of the Port-Au-Prince cathedral, gathered beneath shattered stained glass for their first Sunday Mass since Tuesday's earthquake, survivors were told by their priest, "We are in the hands of God now." But anger mounted hourly that other helping hands were slow in getting food and water to millions in need. "The government is a joke. The U.N. is a joke," Jacqueline Thermiti, 71, said as she lay in the dust with dozens of dying elderly outside their collapsed nursing home near the airport. "We're a kilometer (half a mile) from the airport and we're going to die of hunger." Water was delivered to more people around the capital, where an estimated 300,000 were living in the streets, but food and medicine were still scarce. Pregnant women gave birth in the streets. The injured arrived in wheelbarrows and on people's backs at hurriedly erected field hospitals. Authorities warned of looting and violence. In downtown Port-au-Prince, where people set bonfires to burn uncollected bodies, gunfire rang out and bands of machete-wielding young men, their faces covered with bandanas, roamed the streets."

"PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti - Troops, doctors and aid workers flowed into Haiti on Monday even while victims of the quake that killed an estimated 200,000 people still struggled to find a cup of water or a handful of food. European nations pledged more than a half-billion dollars in emergency and long-term aid, on top of at least $100 million promised earlier by the U.S. But help was still not reaching many victims of Tuesday's quake - choked back by transportation bottlenecks, bureaucratic confusion, fear of attacks on aid convoys, the collapse of local authority and the sheer scale of the need. Looting spread to more parts of downtown Port-au-Prince as hundreds of young men and boys clambered up broken walls to break into shops and take whatever they can find. Especially prized was toothpaste, which people smear under their noses to fend off the stench of decaying bodies. At a collapsed and burning shop in the market area, youths used broken bottles, machetes and razors to battle for bottles of rum and police fired shots to break up the crowd. "I am drinking as much as I can. It gives courage," said Jean-Pierre Junior, wielding a broken wooden plank with nails to protect his bottle of rum. Even so, the U.S. Army's on-the-ground commander, Lt. Gen. Ken Keen, said the city is seeing less violence than before the earthquake. "Is there gang violence? Yes. Was there gang violence before the earthquake? Absolutely."' Keen said some 2,000 Marines were set to join 1,000 U.S. troops on the ground and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon announced Monday he wants 1,500 more U.N. police and 2,000 more troops to join the existing 7,000 military peacekeepers and 2,100 international police in Haiti."

"WASHINGTON - For the past year, China has struck an increasingly muscular position with the United States, berating American officials for the global economic crisis, stage-managing President Obama's visit to China last November, refusing to back a tougher climate change agreement in Copenhagen and standing fast against American demands for tough new Security Council sanctions against Iran. Now, the Obama administration has started to push back. In announcing an arms sales package to Taiwan worth $6 billion on Friday, the United States leveled a direct strike at the heart of the most sensitive diplomatic issue that has existed between the two countries since America affirmed the one-China policy in 1972. The arms package was doubly infuriating to Beijing, coming so soon after President Bush announced a similar arms package to Taiwan in 2008, and right as Beijing and Taipei are in the middle of a détente of sorts in their own relations. China's immediate, and outraged, reaction-canceling some military-to-military exchanges and announcing punitive sanctions against American companies - demonstrates, China experts said, that Beijing is feeling a little burned, particularly because the Taiwan arms announcement came on the same day that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton publicly berated China for not taking a stronger position on holding Iran accountable for its nuclear program."

"Malaysia: Churches Firebombed print story download (PDF) email story share Share on Facebook Share on MySpace! no media Eight churches have been attacked in Malaysia following a court decision that allows Christians to use "Allah" in their prayers and publications when referring to God, according to The Associated Press (AP). On Sunday, Jan. 10, three churches were firebombed. "On Sunday, a Molotov cocktail was hurled at the All Saints Church in Taiping town in central Perak state early in the morning before it opened," state police chief Zulkifli Abdullah told AP. "Police found burn marks on the wall but there was no damage to the building," he added. Despite the attacks, thousands of Christians attended services and prayed for unity and an end to the attacks. The attacks on churches began on Jan. 8 and 9, when four churches were hit with firebombs. "No one was hurt and all suffered little damage, except the Metro Tabernacle Church," AP said. "Parishioners there moved services after fire gutted the first floor." The attacks followed a Dec. 31 High Court decision overturning a government ban prohibiting non-Muslims from using the word "Allah" in prayers and literature. The court had ruled on a petition by Malaysia's Roman Catholic Church, whose main publication, the Herald, uses the word "Allah" in its Malay-language edition. The government has appealed the verdict."

"KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia - Three Christian churches were attacked with firebombs Friday as tensions rose in a dispute over whether Christians could use the word "Allah" in this largely Muslim nation. Skip to next paragraph Enlarge This Image Mark Baker/Associated Press Muslims gathered outside a mosque in Kuala Lumpur, Friday to protest a recent court ruling allowing Christians to use the word Allah. Later in the day, small crowds rallied outside two major mosques in the capital, in a growing protest over a court ruling that overturned a government ban on the use of "Allah" by Roman Catholics as a translation for God. The government has appealed that ruling, insisting that the ban should remain in force, and made no move to bar the unsanctioned rallies, as it commonly does."