Water recycling at Japan nuclear plant stops again (AP)

TOKYO – A water recycling system at Japan's damaged nuclear power plant was halted for repairs Monday after a brief run that had been hailed as major progress in restoring control and improving conditions at the crippled plant.

Tons of fresh water has been pumped to the plant to cool its reactors, a process that taints the water with radiation. About 110,000 tons of tainted water has accumulated and could overflow by early July if the recycling system fails or other storage options are not enough.

Workers have struggled for weeks to use a new system to clean the tainted water and reuse it in the cooling process. The water treatment components fully operated for five hours earlier this month, and test-runs were conducted before it went fully operational Monday. It also pumped treated water into the reactors — a long-awaited new phase that lasted only briefly.

Plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. said the recycling system was halted about an hour and a half after it began operating. Workers spotted water leaking from a hose that was sending the processed water into the reactors, TEPCO spokesman Junichi Matsumoto said.

The leak shut down the recycling segment of the system, while the cleaning segment is continuing to operate. Workers switched back to fresh water injection into the reactors, Matsumoto said.

No new leakage outside the plant has been reported. TEPCO plans to start repair work early Tuesday to restore the recycling segment as soon as possible, hopefully by the end of the day.

The multinational system has reprocessed 1,850 tons of contaminated water as coolant to be pumped back into the reactors. In full capacity, the system can treat up to 1,200 tons of contaminated water per day, more than twice as much as needed to cool the three reactors.

The March earthquake and tsunami destroyed power and cooling systems at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant, melting reactor cores and leaking massive amount of radiation. Some contaminated water seeped into the ocean in April and May, causing criticism and concerns in and outside of Japan.

Some of the tainted water is stored in temporary tanks, but the rest has still pooled inside reactor and turbine basements and utility pits, hampering workers and risking radiation exposure.

TEPCO has sealed cracks, set up oil fences around the coastal plant, and acquired more storage tanks in case of emergency. But as long as the cleaning segment of the recycling system is functioning, the volume of tainted water will not grow.

Announcing the launch of the recycling system earlier Monday, Goshi Hosono, newly appointed nuclear crisis minister, called the system "a major step forward" toward stable cooling of the reactors. But he said he was not fully confident about the system.

"It's a problem if the system continues to be unreliable," he said. "We must turn it into something that can feed water stably."

TEPCO and the government have said they hope to achieve a cold shutdown of the reactors by January by bringing the core temperatures to below 100 Celsius (212 Fahrenheit).

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Powerful quakes again hit New Zealand's Christchurch (Reuters)

WELLINGTON (Reuters) – A series of powerful tremors rattled the quake-prone New Zealand city of Christchurch on Monday, destroying buildings and sending boulders tumbling down hillsides nearly four months after a quake killed 181 people.

There were no reported fatalities. New Zealand's Civil Defense said 10 people suffered minor injuries in the quakes, with the strongest put at a magnitude of 6.0 at 2.20 p.m. (10:20 p.m. ET on Sunday) local time.

Buildings were evacuated and infrastructure damaged across the city, still trying to recover from the February 22 6.3 magnitude earthquake.

Monday's quake knocked the New Zealand dollar lower and was seen as another hurdle to rebuilding New Zealand's second largest city, likely encouraging the Reserve Bank of New Zealand to keep interest rates on hold for longer.

"You can draw a picture already of a significant earthquake," Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker told Radio New Zealand. A cloud of dust had enveloped the city after the quakes, he said.

Civil Defense said two people had been rescued from a damaged church. There were no further reports of trapped people.

As with the initial quake, Monday's aftershock sent boulders on the city's Port Hills tumbling toward houses. Parts of the eastern city which suffered the most damage in February's tremor suffered from flooding and liquefaction - where solid ground is turned into liquid by the force of the quake.

New Zealand's GNS Institute said the earthquakes were within the expected pattern after February's tremor and could well trigger fresh seismic activity.

"We would expect a number of aftershocks in the magnitude 4.0 to 5.0 range on the coming days and weeks," said Kelvin Berryman, GNS's Manager of Natural Hazards Research.

Prime Minister John Key said the new tremor would probably affect recovery efforts. "I acknowledge that this is a setback for Christchurch, but it does not lessen our resolve to rebuild," he told reporters in parliament.

POWER CUTS, INFRASTRUCTURE DAMAGED

Power was cut to about 50,000 houses and there were reports of damage to roads, buildings and water supplies.

A number of homes were likely to remain without power overnight, with the temperature likely to dip close to freezing.

Christchurch has experienced a number of strong earthquakes since a magnitude 7.1 quake struck the city on Sept 4 last year.

On Monday, five tremors of magnitude 4.3 or greater were recorded from 0029 GMT. A 5.5 tremor at 0100 GMT was believed to have caused most of the damage 10 km (6 miles) south-east of the city center at a depth of 11 km.

Parts of the city center have been closed since the Feb 22 quake. One of the city's tallest buildings, the Grand Chancellor Hotel, has been declared unstable and is being prepared for demolition.

The cost to rebuild Christchurch after the quakes has been estimated at around NZ$15 billion ($12.2 billion).

The Reserve Bank of New Zealand cut rates after the February tremor to a record-equaling low of 2.50 percent. But signs of recovery and an upbeat assessment from the bank at its review last week have led markets to price in rate rises from December.

However, markets would start to ease back on expectations of a rate hike, said Tim Kelleher, CBA's vice president of institutional banking and markets.

"It puts things like the rebuild of Christchurch further on delay," he said.

($1=NZ$1.23)

(Reporting by Adrian Bathgate; Editing by Ron Popeski)

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Strong quakes again rock shaken New Zealand city (AP)

WELLINGTON, New Zealand – Strong aftershocks rattled New Zealand's quake-devastated city of Christchurch again Monday, toppling one of the few buildings still standing downtown and sinking thousands of homes into darkness.

Bricks crashed down in the cordoned-off city center, where only workers have tread since it was devastated in February's major earthquake. About 200 people were there when the quakes struck Monday, and two were briefly trapped in a church. More than 40 people have been taken to hospitals with minor injuries from falling debris, the city council said.

"We are being enveloped with dust," Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker told New Zealand's National Radio. "It is very, very scary."

All across the city, people fled buildings in panic when a 5.2-magnitude quake struck during lunchtime; just over an hour later, a 6.0 hit, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Smaller quakes were also recorded.

Several buildings were damaged in the central city and suburbs.

"All the shops have fallen down," said Renee Murray, who works at a Domino's Pizza in a suburb. "Half of the roof has fallen in (but) they have not fully collapsed."

Thousands of aftershocks have followed the 6.3-magnitude quake that killed 181 people on Feb. 22. That tremor and its aftershocks have been very shallow, which along with proximity to the city, have made them very destructive. Monday's temblors were six miles (10 kilometers) deep, according to the USGS.

About 47,000 homes in the city's eastern suburbs were without power Monday night, when temperatures were expected to approach freezing. Rocks tumbled down hills in the area, which was among the hardest hit in February, and silt bubbled from the earth — a process known as liquefaction that sometimes happens during a quake.

After the February quake, 300,000 tons of silt had to be scraped away, and the silt alone made thousands of homes uninhabitable.

On one road Monday, an SUV tipped front-first into a sinkhole that opened in the asphalt. A police car sank into another.

Roger Sutton, chief executive of the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority, said the extra damage to the city center means some buildings that had been salvageable "are now seriously damaged and will have to be brought down."

The group's demolition manager "was driving (during the 6.0 quake), and there were buildings coming down in front of him, coming down behind him," Sutton said. "He's very lucky to be alive."

Two people who were injured were salvaging windows from St. John's Church when the facade, the last wall standing after February's quake, collapsed. Police said they were rescued and taken to a hospital with cuts and bruises.

Another building nearby fell, according to police, and the dean of Christchurch Cathedral said the collapsed building suffered new damage.

"This has been a setback for Christchurch and its people, but it does not lessen our resolve to rebuild," Prime Minister John Key told reporters. "The people of Christchurch should know all New Zealanders are thinking of them and will continue to support and stand by them in this very difficult time."

New Zealand's earthquake monitoring service GNS Science said Monday's quakes were within a predicted range but are likely to trigger new aftershocks themselves.

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Sony Hacked Again, Group Claims (PC Magazine)

Sony has been hacked again, according to a group that recently infiltrated the servers at PBS.

A group that identifies itself as Lulzsec claims to have hacked into SonyPictures.com and compromised the personal information of more than 1 million users.

"Among other things, we also compromised all admin details of Sony Pictures (including passwords) along with 75,000 'music codes' and 3.5 million 'music coupons,'" Lulzsec wrote in a note posted to Pastebin.com.

Lulzsec is the same group that infiltrated PBS servers to post fake news and password dumps.

The news comes the same day that Sony brought the Sony PlayStation store back online and appeared on Capitol Hill to say there was no "clear evidence" that hackers accessed credit card information on its PlayStation Network. The company, however, said it and other tech companies are vulnerable to future attacks absent any action from Congress.

Sony has been conducting an "intensive investigation" into the hack that took down its PlayStation Network for almost a month and in looking "deeply" at the logs related to the hacked databases, "we have found no clear evidence that there was any access made to the credit card information, and we found plenty of evidence that that data was not accessed," Tim Schaaff, president of Sony Network Entertainment International, told a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee.

Almost a week after the PSN went down, Sony confirmed that hackers had obtained personal information from the network, which possibly included credit cards. The company later said that credit card information was encrypted, but it could not rule out the possibility that it was obtained by the hackers.

Schaaff said Thursday that as its investigation continued, the information it recovered about credit card data "has changed." In speaking with credit card companies, there are "no signs of unusual activity related to this breach," Schaaff said.

Still, despite pointing fingers at clandestine cyber-group Anonymous, Sony still does not know who hacked into its system. "We're working with law enforcement to try and figure that out," Schaaff said.

Last month, Sony said one of its SOE servers included mention of Anonymous. Though a group spokesman has denied involvement, it has launched distributed denial of service attacks against Sony for suing PS3 hackers.

When asked if Sony regrets pursuing PS3 hackers given that those lawsuits possibly prompted the PSN hack, Schaaff said it points to a larger problem of how companies protect their content. But if Sony hadn't gone after those hackers, it "would've played out" at another company, he said. "We are all under attack."

Furthermore, without comprehensive privacy legislation from Congress coupled with industry-wide best practices, the tech industry is vulnerable to future attacks, Schaaff speculated. In written testimony, he said Sony supports federal data breach legislation that would require companies to inform customers about any breaches in a timely and consistent manner, regardless of the state in which they reside.

"Without further assistance, we're all going to have a world of hurt in this Internet economy and we would appreciate your assistance," Schaaff told the subcommittee.

Jeanette Fitzgerald, general counsel with Epsilon Data Management, which recently had a data breach of its own, said it also supports federal legislation that would replace the patchwork of state laws governing data protection with one, federal law.

Rep. Mary Bono Mack, chair of the subcommittee on commerce, manufacturing, and trade, said "Americans need additional safeguards to prevent identity theft, and I will soon introduce legislation designed to accomplish this goal."

Her bill will focus on three guiding principles: companies and entities that hold personal information must establish and maintain security policies to prevent the unauthorized acquisition of that data; information considered especially sensitive, such as credit card numbers, should have even more robust security safeguards; and consumers should be promptly informed when their personal information has been jeopardized.

In the Senate, John Kerry and John McCain have teamed up to introduce a bill that would provide Internet users with a commercial privacy bill of rights.

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RIM shares tumble again after Nokia warning (Reuters)

TORONTO (Reuters) – Shares of Research In Motion extended a two-day slide on Wednesday on concerns that a profit warning from Finland's Nokia could presage more difficulties for the Canadian maker of the BlackBerry smartphone.

As with Nokia, RIM is losing market share as consumers line up to buy Apple's iPhone and devices based on Google's Android technology.

"Nokia cited Android pressures in Europe at all price points. This is impacting RIM as well," said Avian Securities analyst Matthew Thornton.

Shares of RIM, which fell 4.4 percent on Tuesday, dropped a similar percentage to a fresh five-year low on the Toronto Stock Exchange on Wednesday, after Jefferies analyst Peter Misek wrote that the Nokia warning was a bearish signal for RIM.

RIM issued its own warning in late April, exacerbating fears raised a month earlier after revealing lackluster forecasts. RIM is due to release its earnings for the three months to late May on June 16.

The stock lost 16 percent of its value on April 29, the day after RIM warned it was not shipping as many devices in the United States and Latin America as it had expected.

"We have reviewed RIM's margins and believe that the handset business could be much lower margin this quarter and going forward as average selling prices collapse," Misek said in a note to clients.

"What is happening to Nokia could be a precursor to what could happen to RIM," said Misek, noting that both were embarking on difficult software transitions.

RIM's PlayBook tablet computer runs on its new QNX system that the company will begin using its smartphones next year. Nokia recently abandoned its Symbian software in favor of Microsoft software.

CLOUD THREAT

Speculation that Nokia is in talks to sell its core business to Microsoft for $19 billion may have added to nervousness about RIM. [ID:nLDE7500RE] The Finnish company denied as "baseless" a Boy Genius Report article that relied on unnamed sources.

Sterne Agee analyst Shaw Wu said that investors were also likely weighing the threat posed to RIM by Apple's announcement of its iCloud service, which will offer computing and data over the Internet and would pressure RIM's push network.

He said Apple's push services -- the ability to send information to a device without it being requested -- would "become more seamless and powerful" and RIM's advantage in that space would be "narrowed if not eliminated."

RIM shares fell 4.5 percent at C$39.51 on Wednesday on the Toronto Stock Exchange. The company's shares also fell to a two-year low on the Nasdaq, down 5.4 percent at $40.53.

RIM played the third-biggest role of any single stock in leading the Toronto Stock Exchange's S&P/TSX composite index lower on Wednesday.

Investors also dumped Nokia shares on Wednesday, taking them to their lowest in more than 13 years after a profit warning a day earlier raised fears the handset maker may never regain its shrinking market share.

Nokia said on Tuesday mobile phone sales in the second quarter would be substantially below a previous forecast and abandoned its full-year outlook, blaming difficult conditions in China and Europe.

(Reporting by Alastair Sharp and Euan Rocha; Editing by Frank McGurty)

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Nokia dips again after heavy fall (AFP)

HELSINKI (AFP) – The world's top mobile phone maker Nokia saw its share price drop again Wednesday, a day after closing 17.5 percent lower following a dramatic downgrade of its second quarter outlook.

The mobile phone giant's share price dropped more than 10 percent around midday to 4.27 euros a share, but regained most of that loss by closing, when its stock was down just 0.76 percent at 4.70 euros a share.

It appeared the haemorrhaging was over as some investors "are looking for a near-term bottom in the stock and buying upside calls," Pipeline Trading Systems explained to the Dow Jones Newswires.

The flattening out of Nokia's share price came amid a rumour that Microsoft had agreed to purchase the Finnish company's mobile business for $19 billion (13 billion euros).

The unconfirmed report on the website Boy Genius, which cited industry insider Eldar Murtazin as the source, pushed Microsoft's shares lower but may have helped the stock in Nokia, which denied the claim.

Nokia's two days of losses nonetheless left its share price at the lowest level since early 1998, right before it became the industry leader.

Analysts said the drop was due to a sense of betrayal among investors over the company's announcement Tuesday that its second quarter sales would be far worse than previously expected and that it could no longer give a full-year forecast.

"It was quite a shock. Nokia just had an annual general meeting and they didn't give any hint of this, in fact, they gave the impression that everything was just fine," the chairman of Finland's Shareholders' Association, Timo Rothovius, told AFP.

Nokia chief executive Stephen Elop, who joined the company from Microsoft last year, said Tuesday the Finnish company's sharp outlook downgrade was part of a rocky transition period as it phases out its Symbian smartphone platform in favour of a tie-in with Microsoft Phone.

The mobile phone maker said it hopes to regain lost ground when it starts shipping its first Microsoft handsets at the end of this year.

"The problem is that they are losing market share at such a pace that there's a risk that consumers won't be interested in buying Nokia phones anymore," said Rothovius.

While it remains the world leader, Nokia has in recent years seen its global market share dwindle amid harsher competition in the high-end smartphone sector.

The company said earlier this year its market share in the first quarter had fallen to 29 percent from 33 percent a year earlier, and compared with 40 percent in the first half of 2008.

Investors were not the only ones who were disappointed.

Ratings agency Moody's said Wednesday it had placed Nokia's long term debt rating under review for a possible downgrade, saying the Finnish company's revised outlook "indicates a faster than anticipated erosion in market share."

That in turn would increase pricing pressure, Moody's said, adding that "as a result, Nokia may enter into a phase of cash consumption and will start the Windows Phone period ... from a substantially weaker market position."

A number of investment banks, including Goldman Sachs, Bernstein Research, RBS and Credit Suisse, also downgraded their Nokia ratings Wednesday.

Pohjola Bank analyst Hannu Rauhala told AFP it was impossible to predict how the Microsoft tie-in would affect Nokia's performance after this turbulent year.

"There is nothing more than a preliminary schedule for the new products. We don't know what kind of cost structure there is, what kind of ecosystem it will be, or how consumers will accept them," he said, adding that there was "a great temptation to be pessimistic" about the fourth quarter.

He also pointed to the unpredictability of a global mobile market in upheaval, with markets, devices, companies and usage changing so fast that it is creating a great deal of opportunity "but lots of uncertainty too."

Rothovius meanwhile said he believed the falling share price could be a short-term adjustment.

Finland's financial media meanwhile seemed more pessimistic, with respected business webzine Taloussanomat pointing out that Danske Bank has warned Nokia's share price could drop as low as 2.20 euros.

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Unpronounceable Icelandic Volcano Once Again Causes Travel Delays (Time.com)

Travel chaos caused by an entirely unpronounceable Icelandic volcano has returned to Europe.

A little more than a year after Eyjafjallajokull's eruption grounded more than 100,000 flights across the continent, an ash cloud from the nearby Grimsvotn volcano closed various airports in northern Europe - although officials say that the disruption would not reach the scale of a year ago.

(PHOTOS: Iceland's Grimsvotn Volcano Erupts.)

On Wednesday, Germany's Bremen and Hamburg airports closed down because of ash in the air overhead, with traffic at Berlin's airports due to stop later. Air traffic in Norway, Denmark and the UK was disrupted on Tuesday, but had returned to normal by Wednesday. Eurocontrol, Europe's air traffic management agency, said about 500 of 29,000 flights scheduled across Europe had been cancelled on Tuesday.

Officials say that last year's experience - which inconvenienced millions of passengers - resulted in amended flight rules in the case of volcanic ash that should prevent similarly large-scale air closures this year. What's more, particles from Grimsvotn are larger than those emitted by Eyjafjallajokull, meaning that they will fall to the ground more rapidly. European Union transport commissioner Siim Kallas told the BBC: "We do not at this stage anticipate widespread airspace closure and prolonged disruption like we saw last year."

But with Grimsvotn's activity - and weather patterns around Iceland - impossible to predict, some airlines complained Wednesday that air traffic officials should relax restrictions even further. Michael O'Leary, the combative chief executive of budget airline Ryanair, announced on Tuesday that he had ordered one of his pilots to fly straight into the teeth of a giant volcanic ash cloud in an attempt to force regulators into lifting the ban by proving that air travel was safe. He called the ash cloud "'non existent and mythical and misguided invention by the UK Met Office and the Civil Aviation Authority.'

UK officials, however, said that Ryanair's aircraft - and the craft of another British Airways test flight which similarly encountered little particulant matter - had only gone through a zone already redesignated as safe. (via The Guardian)

LIST: Top 10 Famous Volcanoes.

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Trial of U.S. hikers in Iran delayed again, diplomat says

Shane Bauer (left) and Josh Fattal have been detained in Iran since their arrest during a 2009 hiking trip near the Iranian border.The trial is postponed after the suspects are not brought from prison to court "There were no reasons given why they were not brought in," a diplomat says The defense attorney says he doesn't know when the trial will resumeThe hikers' families say the development is "extremely troubling"

(CNN) -- The scheduled trial of two Americans accused of espionage in Iran was delayed again Wednesday after the suspects were not brought from prison to the courthouse, a Swiss diplomat and their defense attorney told CNN.

"I have been able to verify that the session has actually been postponed due to the absence of the two prisoners. They were not brought in from prison," said an official with the Swiss Embassy in Tehran, who, according to protocol, asked not to be identified. Switzerland represents U.S. interests in Iran.

Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer were set to stand trial on Wednesday. The two were charged with espionage after being arrested nearly 22 months ago while hiking along an unmarked border between Iran and Iraqi Kurdistan. The two Americans were expected to appear in Branch 15 of Tehran's Revolutionary court Wednesday morning.

"There were no reasons given why they were not brought in," the diplomat said. Iranian authorities once again barred Swiss diplomats from monitoring the proceedings.

"Shane and Josh were not brought up from the jail to the courtroom today," said defense attorney Masoud Shafii. He said he also does not know the reason for the postponement, but does not believe it was because a third hiker released on bail, Sarah Shourd, did not return to Iran for proceedings.

The families of Bauer and Fattal issued a statement saying they also do not know why the two were not brought to court, "but we are even more deeply concerned for their health and welfare as a result of their non-appearance.

"Their unexplained absence from the hearing, and the fact that their lawyer, Mr. Masoud Shafii, continues to be denied access to Shane and Josh, is extremely troubling," the statement said.

The hikers' trial began in February, but was delayed until Wednesday.

Shafii told CNN Tuesday he had yet to be granted a private meeting with his clients.

"What I hope is that the court comes to a decision," Shafii said. "This case must be closed. It has gone on long enough."

On Wednesday, Shafii said he will continue to request a meeting with his clients.

"I am not sure when the next court date will be set," he said. "I now must wait for a letter from the court with the new date. I am hoping it will be soon. They (Bauer and Fattal) have already served time that was not warranted."

He said the judiciary, not prison authorities, is responsible for getting the defendants to court, and he has filed a formal complaint.

Human rights organizations have launched direct appeals to Iranian officials calling for the Americans' release.

"The endless prosecution of the two hikers appears to be little more than a political jab at the United States," said Sarah Leah Whitson of the New York-based organization Human Rights Watch. "This case highlights the cruel and arbitrary nature of the Iranian justice system."

In a separate statement, Amnesty International's Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui said the Iranian justice system "has systematically failed to observe international fair trial standards in this case, including giving the men adequate contact with their lawyer, families or consular assistance."

The third U.S. citizen who was arrested with the men on the border in 2009 and accused of spying has refused to attend Wednesday's scheduled court hearing after being released on bail last year.

Iranian authorities allowed Sarah Shourd, Bauer's fiancee, to leave the country on "humanitarian grounds" after she paid a $500,000 bail.

Shourd said she would not return because she suffers from severe post-traumatic stress disorder after spending 14 months in Tehran's notorious Evin prison.

In an essay published this week in The New York Times, Shourd wrote that Fattal and Bauer's cell "contains two beds, a sink, a toilet, a shower and an empty space about the size of a large beach towel. With fluorescent lights continuously kept on, Josh and Shane never enjoy the luxury of darkness; in order to sleep at night they have to tie a shirt around their eyes."

An Iranian prosecutor said investigators found "compelling evidence" that all three Americans were spies.

Suspects convicted on espionage charges can face the death penalty in Iran. All three have maintained their innocence.

"They were strictly travelers who were near an unmarked border that no one would be able to know whether it was Iraq or Iran," defense lawyer Shafii has said.

"Today's development appears to be yet another example of the arbitrary treatment Shane and Josh have been subjected to for more than 21 months," their families said in their statement. "The Iranian authorities continue to play games with their lives and the constant uncertainty and fear for Shane and Josh is ruining our lives as well. The charges against Shane and Josh are baseless. As we have said all along, there is no reason to put Shane and Josh on trial."

The picturesque mountain border region where the Americans were detained is a popular picnic and camping destination for Iraqi Kurds. The border is also porous. Smugglers regularly cross the frontier on donkeys and horseback, bringing fuel to Iraq and alcohol into the Islamic Republic of Iran.

CNN's Shirzad Bozorgmehr contributed to this report.

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NASA: Endeavour launch postponed again, to after May 10

When Endeavour does launch, it will be the space shuttle's final mission.The space shuttle Endeavour had a short circuit on its April 29 launch dateNASA technicians are looking at what caused the circuit to short outThe flight will be Endeavour's final one

(CNN) -- The rescheduled launch date of the space shuttle Endeavour, whose mission was scrubbed last week due to an electrical problem, remained uncertain Wednesday, but sources told CNN the next liftoff could be as late as May 13.

The launch, which will be the final flight for the Endeavour, won't be any earlier than May 10, NASA said.

Technicians continue to test the electrical system to determine what caused a circuit to short out, causing the cancellation of Endeavour's April 29 launch, officials said. The liftoff was delayed until this past Monday and then to no earlier than May 10 at 11:21 a.m., officials said.

NASA repair crews have already replaced the power distribution box that shorted out a circuit supplying power to heaters for the orbiter's hydraulics system.

The scrubbed April 29 launch postponed what promised to be an emotional moment for the shuttle's commander, Mark Kelly.

Kelly's wife, U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Arizona, traveled to Florida to watch the shuttle's ascent. Giffords was shot in the head during a January 8 assassination attempt at a public event in Tucson, Arizona. She has been recovering at a Houston rehabilitation hospital.

Giffords returned Sunday to Houston and TIRR Memorial Hermann hospital, according to a post on her Facebook page.

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Haiti again feels pinch of rising food prices

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — Marie Bolivar, a gray-haired woman with a raspy voice, crushes peanuts into paste for sandwiches which she sells by the roadside for 12 cents apiece. These days the paste is thinner, because the price of peanuts has jumped by 80 percent.

var data = blocks.columnist;if (data != undefined){document.getElementById('columnistmug').innerHTML=data;} By Ramon Espinosa, AP

A man carries five sacks of rice at the La Saline Market in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on April 21.

By Ramon Espinosa, AP

A man carries five sacks of rice at the La Saline Market in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on April 21.

But Bolivar, 60, says she still has trouble feeding her four children and paying the rent. "I can't survive like this," she said on a recent afternoon as she piled freshly crushed peanuts on a small plastic tray.

Soaring food prices aren't new in Haiti, the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere and heavily dependent on imports. Now those prices are rising again, mirroring global trends, while the cost of gasoline has doubled to $5 a gallon. Haitians are paying more for basic staples than much of Latin America and the Caribbean, an Associated Press survey finds.

More than half of Haiti's 10 million people get by on less than $2 a day and hundreds of thousands are dependent on handouts. Undernourished children are easy to spot by the orange tinge in their hair. "Haitians have less room to increase their expenditures on their food," said Myrta Kaulard, Haiti's country director for the U.N. World Food Program. "This is a serious concern."

Bolivar is one of many who cope as roadside vendors. They are getting squeezed from both ends ? rising prices and customers with less to spend.

It's ironic to hear Bolivar say "Everything was much easier a year ago," when a year ago Haiti had just endured a quake that killed 300,000 people and laid waste to large parts of the capital, Port-au-Prince. What she means is that food was much cheaper then because of the emergency supplies being rushed in.

But as the aid operation scales back and the market reasserts itself, prices are soaring again. Last month a cab strike was called to protest rising gasoline prices, but it fizzled because drivers were so desperate for fares.

One bit of good news has been the price of rice, Haiti's staple food. Pushed down by the free food being shipped in after the earthquake, it fell to $0.92 a kilogram in September, climbed to $1.38 in January and then began to fall, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization.

But corn, which cost $0.68 a kilogram just before the quake, was almost double the price in March.

Incomes haven't risen, however. The minimum wage is $5 a day but most Haitians don't have a job that would pay them that minimum. So, like Bolivar, they cope through "degaje," a Creole term that means "making do."

It also depends where they shop. In a high-end grocery, a kilogram of white rice can cost as much as $3.03. But the street markets close after dusk, leaving customers dependent on supermarkets.

Nature and the outside world have all taken their toll. Erosion, deforestation, flooding and tropical storms make farming difficult. American imports are stiff competition for farmers. Haiti imports nearly all of its food, including more than 80 percent of its rice, known here as "Miami Rice." A whole chicken costs $8 in Haiti ? double the price in Peru. Argentines earn much more than Haitians, but pay less for a kilogram of rice.

The rise of garment factories in the cities since the 1970s has denuded the countryside of working hands. Bolivar is among those who moved here. She lives in a small cinderblock home in a slum in the relatively affluent city of Petionville.

"There was nothing for me in the countryside," she said.

The winding down of quake aid is meant in part to encourage quake survivors to leave their camps and to stabilize market prices. Groups such as the WFP have launched cash-for-work programs, school meals to ensure attendance, and efforts to get aid workers to purchase goods locally.

But for Bolivar, it's the cost of living that overshadows everything. She says she usually eats just once a day. One of her sons had to drop out of school because she owed $69 for two months of his tuition.

A daughter helps out from her earnings as a waitress at a Lebanese restaurant popular among Haiti's moneyed class and foreign aid workers.

Bolivar said she hopes things will get better under Michel Martelly, the musician elected as president on March 20. "We're waiting for all the promises he made," Bolivar said. "People want commercial activity. People want jobs. People want to eat."

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Police to search New York beach again for clues in deaths of 8

Bone science identifies crime victimsSTORY HIGHLIGHTSPolice say they are searching for more human remains FridayEarlier police divers returned to the bay near a section of Long Island, New York They searched for evidence in the deaths of at least eight peopleThe area is also where 23-year-old Shannan Gilbert was last seen in May 2010RELATED TOPICSMurder and HomicideLong IslandNew York City New York (CNN) -- Police will conduct a "limited" land search Friday near the Long Island bay, part of their continued search for clues in the mysterious deaths of at least eight people.

Investigators will be searching in an area of the Town of Oyster Bay for more human remains, said Lt. Kevin Smith, of the Nassau County Police Department.

Investigators, earlier this week, scraped the sea floor with metal detectors and long poles with mesh baskets during an underwater search for evidence in the possible serial killer case.

"It could be a piece of jewelry, it could be a piece of apparel, anything of interest," said Suffolk County Marine Deputy Inspector Harold Jantzen.

Thursday's search was in the same area where the bodies of four women were uncovered in December 2010.

The area, near private docks in the upscale Oak Beach area, is also where 23-year-old Shannan Gilbert -- the missing New Jersey woman whose disappearance prompted the initial search -- was last seen in May, 2010.

Police said Gilbert, like the other four women, was a prostitute who advertised on Internet sites such as Craigslist.

She was first reported missing after attending a private party at a home in the Oak Beach community.

A man who lives a few miles from where the remains were found said that a young woman who matched Gilbert's description and "looked like she was partying all night" came to his door at about 5 a.m. on May 1.

"She was screaming 'Help me, help me!' and said somebody was chasing her," said Oak Beach resident Gustav Coletti.

She then ran away when Coletti called 911, he said.

Gilbert has not been found, but it was her case that led to the grisly discovery of the bodies of four women, at least some of whom were wrapped in burlap and discarded in tangled bushes next to an oceanside Long Island highway.

At least four other bodies were later found nearby in March and April, though medical examiners have yet to identify them.

Two additional sets of remains -- including a human skull -- were discovered last week in bordering Nassau County, police said.

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GOP Senators Try Again to Restrict 'Birthright Citizenship'

AP

Shown here are Sen. David Vitter, left, and Sen. Rand Paul.

Several Republican senators are taking another crack at preventing the children of illegal immigrants from gaining automatic U.S. citizenship. 

Sen. David Vitter, R-La., and three colleagues on Tuesday announced a bill that would restrict so-called "birthright citizenship" by amending the Immigration and Nationality Act. U.S. law provides that anyone born on U.S. soil is a citizen, but the proposal would change that, to require at least one parent to be a U.S. citizen, legal resident or member of the U.S. military. 

In announcing the bill, Vitter referenced recent reports about a cluster of condos in California that were allegedly converted into maternity centers for Chinese women who want to give birth to children inside the U.S. 

"'Birth tourism' is certainly a reprehensible practice, but it is not an illegal one yet," Vitter said in a statement. "It is astounding that the U.S. government allows individuals to exploit the loopholes of our immigration system in this manner, and Congress has the authority and the obligation to put a stop to it once and for all." 

Vitter and Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., previously introduced the proposal as a constitutional amendment meant to change the 14th Amendment, which outlines citizenship rights. 

Vitter claims the 14th Amendment has been misinterpreted. 

But while the latest proposal might find some supporters, the constitutional amendment stands a slim chance of passing, as it would have to be approved by a two-thirds majority in both chambers of Congress and ratified by three-quarters of the state legislatures. And critics of the push say it won't address the problem of illegal immigration. 

Sens. Mike Lee, R-Utah, and Jerry Moran, R-Kansas, also co-authored the latest GOP proposal.

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