Philippines' top judge testifies at Senate trial

The Philippines' top judge was due to testify at his impeachment trial on Tuesday in a last-ditch bid to save his job, with President Benigno Aquino saying his ouster is key to an anti-corruption drive.

Supreme Court Chief Justice Renato Corona is accused of protecting graft-tainted former president Gloria Arroyo from prosecution, and of allegedly amassing a personal fortune above the limits of his salary.

President Aquino, who won a landslide election victory in 2010 on a platform to end corruption, has said that if Corona is acquitted, it would virtually destroy his efforts to rid the poverty-plagued country of pervasive graft.

But as the Senate trial nears its climax, Corona lawyers say the 63-year-old is expected to refute allegations he failed to declare up to $12 million in bank accounts and blocked Aquino's efforts to prosecute Arroyo for corruption.

"I am not worried," Corona told reporters on Monday.

Corona was impeached by the House of Representatives, parliament's lower chamber, in December, sending him for trial in the Senate, which began hearings in January.

The proceedings have gripped the nation for four months, with millions watching the drama live on TV.

Prosecutors allege Corona lacked integrity, failed to declare his assets properly, and blocked Arroyo's prosecution. They said his actions amounted to "culpable violation" of the constitution and betrayal of public trust.

A guilty verdict on any of the three charges would lead to his removal from office. There is no appeal process and the government would then be able to pursue criminal charges against him over the alleged hidden wealth.

The chief justice's lawyers had said he did not need to take the stand, but changed their minds after Ombudsman Conchita Morales disclosed documents on Corona's alleged bank accounts that prosecutors described as the "smoking gun".

"I expect the chief justice to answer practically all issues being hurled against him, for as long as his rights under the constitution will not be violated," Corona's lawyer Tranquil Salvador said.

Prosecutors, led by members of the House of Representatives, expect to finish quizzing Corona by Thursday, after which the 23 senators sitting as judges will adjourn before delivering a verdict.

Senate president Juan Ponce Enrile has said he wants a decision no later than June 7.

Though by no means the only target, Aquino has said driving Corona from office would be a crucial step in ridding the Philippines of corruption.

Aquino's predecessor Arroyo, who ruled for nearly 10 years, was arrested last year and charged with vote-rigging.

Aquino's allies have said she planted Corona in the Supreme Court just before leaving office in 2010 as a rearguard action to protect herself from future criminal prosecutions.

For his part Corona sees his impeachment as a personal vendetta by Aquino following a landmark Supreme Court verdict that would break up Hacienda Luisita, a giant sugar estate owned by the president's clan.

Shortly before the Aquino-controlled House of Representatives voted to impeach Corona last year, the Supreme Court ruled 4,300 hectares (10,600 acres), or most of the estate, must be subjected to land reform.

The 15-member court last month threw out an appeal by the clan to overturn the ruling and stop the farm being parcelled out to its workers, leaving the Aquino government no option but to enforce the decision.

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News On Computer Home-Study Certification Training Courses In ...

If you think Cisco training might be for you, but you?ve not yet worked with routers, initially you should go for the CCNA training. This will provide you with skills for setting up and maintaining routers. The internet is constructed from huge numbers of routers, and large commercial ventures with many locations also utilise routers to allow their networks of computers to communicate.

Jobs that need this type of qualification mean it?s likely you?ll end up working for national or international corporations that have multiple departments and sites but need to keep in touch. Or, you may move on to working for an internet service provider. These jobs are well paid and in demand.

It?s a good idea to find a specially designed course that will take you through a specific training path in advance of commencing your Cisco training.

Typically, a new trainee will not know to ask about a vitally important element ? how their training provider segments the courseware sections, and into how many separate packages. Training companies will normally offer a 2 or 3 year study programme, and drop-ship the materials to you piecemeal as you get to the end of each exam. If you think this sound logical, then consider this: It?s not unusual for trainees to realise that the company?s usual training route isn?t the easiest way for them. It?s often the case that varying the order of study will be far more suitable. Could it cause problems if you don?t get everything done at the pace they expect?

In an ideal situation, you want everything at the start ? meaning you?ll have all of them for the future to come back to ? irrespective of any schedule. This also allows you to vary the order in which you complete each objective as and when something more intuitive seems right for you.

Many training companies have a handy Job Placement Assistance facility, to help you into your first commercial role. Sometimes, people are too impressed with this facility, because it?s really not that difficult for any motivated and trained individual to secure work in the IT industry ? because there?s a great need for qualified personnel.

Work on polishing up your CV right away however ? you should get plenty of help from your training provider on this. Don?t delay till the exams have actually been passed. Getting your CV considered is more than not being known. A surprising amount of junior positions are offered to students in the early stages of their course. Most often, a specialist independent regional recruitment consultant or service ? who make their money when they?ve found you a job ? is going to give you a better service than a division of a training company. Also of course they should know local industry and the area better.

Do make sure you don?t invest a great deal of time on your training course, just to give up and expect somebody else to secure your first position. Stop procrastinating and start looking for yourself. Invest as much time and energy into landing your new role as you did to get trained.

It would be wonderful to believe that our jobs will remain secure and the future is protected, but the growing likelihood for the majority of jobs throughout Great Britain today appears to be that security may be a thing of the past. In actuality, security now only emerges via a fast increasing market, driven by a shortfall of trained staff. It?s this alone that creates the correct background for a higher level of market-security ? a more attractive situation all round.

Investigating the Information Technology (IT) business, a key e-Skills investigation brought to light a more than 26 percent skills deficit. To explain it in a different way, this highlights that the country can only locate three properly accredited workers for every four jobs available today. This disquieting fact clearly demonstrates the requirement for more properly qualified computing professionals across the country. Without a doubt, this really is a fabulous time for retraining into IT.

Commencing with the idea that it?s necessary to home-in on the area of most interest first, before we can contemplate which training course ticks the right boxes, how do we know the right path? Since in the absence of any commercial background in Information Technology, how can most of us be expected to understand what someone in a particular job does? Ultimately, a well-informed conclusion can only grow through a detailed study of many varying criteria:

* Personality factors and what you?re interested in ? what work-centred jobs you enjoy or dislike.

* What time-frame are you looking at for the retraining?

* What priority do you place on travelling time and locality vs salary?

* Because there are so many markets to choose from in Information Technology ? you will have to pick up some background information on what sets them apart.

* Having a cold, hard look at what commitment and time that you can put aside.

In all honesty, it?s obvious that the only real way to investigate these areas is via a conversation with an experienced advisor who understands IT (and chiefly it?s commercial requirements.)

Pop over to our website for quality ideas? www.CareerChangeJob.co.uk or www.electricianqualification.co.uk.

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Tipperary Town ? The Best Place to Live in Ireland

Exquisitely couourful from dawn to dusk, nestled against the magnificent backdrop of the Galtee Mountains, filled with music and song and some of the most beautiful people in Ireland who are dynamic,, positive and fun. That?s Tipperary Town. We have everything here: theatre, cinema, swimming pool, athletics arena, several tennis clubs, brass band, musical society, allotments, community radio and 64 different social clubs. We have a wonderful Youth Orchestra which travels extensively showcasing the talent of our young musicians.
We have superb golf clubs with very reasonable green fees.
We have a railway station in the town with connections to Dublin and Limerick Junction. Our schools, including our Gaelscoil, are excellent and the friendships forged there last for ever.
Fro those who are fond of the Sport of Kings, we have a racecourse which is well attended for every meet.
In Tipperary Town, everyone is equal and we are all on first name terms with each other.
The history of Tipperary Town is rich and varied. We were once a garrison town and the old English Army Barricks is being renovated as a hostel.
The Tipperary Hills, a public park which incorporates our Famine Graveyard, is the second largest public park in Ireland, the Phoenix Park being the largest.
Tipperary Town is a peaceful, welcoming place where I am very happy to have landed., I am not from here, but I have felt at home here from the first moment I arrived

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Obama: NATO shifting to help peace in Afghanistan

CHICAGO (AP) ? The NATO alliance that has fought for a decade in Afghanistan is helping that nation shift toward stability and peace, but there will be "hard days ahead," President Barack Obama said Sunday as alliance leaders insisted the fighting coalition will remain effective despite France's plans to yank combat troops out early.

With a global economic crisis and waning public support for the war as a backdrop, world leaders opened a NATO summit confronted by questions about Afghanistan's post-conflict future: money for security forces, coming elections and more. Some cautioned against following France's example while others played down stresses in the fighting alliance.

"We still have a lot of work to do and there will be great challenges ahead," Obama said. "The loss of life continues in Afghanistan and there will be hard days ahead."

The NATO summit opened Sunday afternoon, with leaders holding a moment of silence to pay tribute to force killed or injured while serving the alliance.

"Just as we've sacrificed together for our common security, we will stand united in our determination to complete this mission," Obama said.

The end of the war is in sight, Obama said following a lengthy discussion with Afghan President Hamid Karzai on the sidelines of the NATO summit. The military alliance is pledged to remain in Afghanistan into 2014, but will seal plans Sunday and Monday to shift foreign forces off the front lines a year faster than once planned.

Afghan forces will take the lead throughout the nation next year, instead of in 2014, despite uneven performance under U.S. and other outside tutelage so far. The shift is in large part a response to plummeting public support for the war in Europe and the United States, contributors of most of the 130,000 foreign troops now fighting the Taliban-led insurgency. A majority of Americans now say the war is unwinnable or not worth continuing.

Karzai said his nation is looking forward to the end of war, "so that Afghanistan is no longer a burden on the shoulder of our friends in the international community, on the shoulders of the United States and our other allies."

Obama said NATO partners would discuss "a vision for post-2014 in which we have ended our combat role, the Afghan war as we understand it is over, but our commitment to friendship and partnership to Afghanistan continues."

Newly elected French President Francois Hollande has said he will withdraw all French combat troops from Afghanistan by year's end ? a full two years before the timeline agreed to by nations in the U.S.-led NATO coalition.

Hollande's stance was facing some resistance.

German foreign minister Guido Westerwelle cautioned Sunday in Chicago that "withdrawal competition" among countries with troops in Afghanistan could strengthen the terrorist threat. And German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germany stood "very firmly" behind the principle of "in together, out together."

Hollande, speaking briefly to French reporters outside a Chicago hotel, insisted he was being "pragmatic" in his new leadership. "I am pragmatic in my effort to let the alliance continue to work for our defense and security, and at the same time make sure that our soldiers can come home from Afghanistan by the end of 2012."

NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen denied there were fresh cracks in the alliance. He suggested a deal will emerge for France to move into a noncombat role but continue to support the international mission.

"There will be no rush for the exits," Rasmussen said. "Our goal, our strategy, our timetable remain unchanged."

Before the one-hour meeting with Karzai, a senior U.S. official said the prime topic was planning for Afghanistan's 2014 elections, as well as the prospect of a political settlement with the Taliban.

Karzai has said repeatedly he will step down from power when his term ends in 2014, opening the way for new elections. NATO's scheduled end of the war was built around those plans, with foreign forces staying until the 2014 election but exiting the country by 2015.

The U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomacy, said before the meeting that Obama and Karzai also were to discuss prospects for a political settlement or peace pact between Karzai's government and the Taliban-led insurgency. The Taliban pulled out of U.S.-led talks in March, but separate talks among Afghan and other contacts continue, the U.S. official said.

The Taliban is urging nations fighting in Afghanistan to follow France's lead and pull their international forces from the war this year.

"We call upon all the other NATO member countries to avoid working for the political interests of American officials and answer the call of your own people by immediately removing all your troops from Afghanistan," the group said in a statement before the meeting.

The national security-focused NATO summit caps an extraordinary weekend of international summitry. Obama and the leaders of the world's leading industrial nations convened at Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland, for two days of talks focused in large part on Europe's economic crisis.

Joining Obama and many of the G-8 leaders in Chicago are the heads of NATO alliance nations and other countries with a stake in the Afghan war.

Prominent among those nations is Pakistan. Tensions between the U.S. and Pakistan have been running high following several incidents, including the U.S. raid in Pakistan that led to the death of Osama bin Laden and a U.S. airstrike that killed two dozen Pakistani soldiers.

Both countries have been seeking to restore normal relations. Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari's acceptance of an invitation to attend the NATO summit was seen as an indication that his country would reopen major roads used to supply NATO fighting forces in Afghanistan, a key U.S. demand.

White House officials said that while they believe an agreement on reopening the supply routes will be reached, they do not expect that to happen during the NATO meetings. The two nations are haggling over how much Pakistan will be paid to allow the heavy transport truck to pass through. A senior U.S. official said the two sides are far apart. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomacy.

Officials have indicated that Obama and Zardari will not meet one on one until the matter is resolved. Although miffed, Zardari did meet with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in Chicago.

"I do hope that we will see a reopening of the transit routes in the very near future," Rasmussen said. "These negotiations will continue, but I am hopeful that they will be concluded in a positive manner."

___

AP writers Ben Feller and Desmond Butler contributed to this report.

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Sector Free dating online Internet site ? The Means To New ...

Meet women online\ An urbane shot to pick up a graceful girlfriend is to cause them to beckon to you

dating services

When net dating first came online around the delayed nineties and also in early 2000, signing up dating services used to stink of uncomfortable anti-social ?nes of those that couldn?t locate connections in the genuine dating world. At minimal online dating purchased to mind those older singles that could certainly watch their dating years slipping as the biological clock is tapping.

But in the current few years, using an online dating internet site has actually switched, to turning into the destination of certainly not the previous however the first hotel for those searching for personals web pages. Not a refuge for those that just can?t hack typical dating, personals websites are certainly not just taken a convenient time putting by means to satisfy additional singles however additional entertaining and also sociable task additionally.

Bars, spiritual establishments, singles clubs and also matchmaker products are rapidly being changed by where the cutting-edge generation of singles is to be identified, at a dating internet site on the internet. The net has actually permitted additional folks to come collectively on a scale that has actually never been seen before.

New specialized niche dating internet site memberships offer customized dating products to certain teams of folks such as gay dating, black dating and also senior dating websites to call a few. You are able to additionally locate horoscope dating, dating websites for golfers, motor-cyclists, health and fitness and also nearly virtually any team you are able to contemplate.

These specialized niche singles websites have protected and also protected memberships that are consistently kept track of for fake profiles and also can adequately weed out those undesirables that are just out to mess with individuals lives.

Discovering the singles internet site team that matches you is the site to build when trying to find dating sites a brand-new relationship. Why waste time the dating personals internet site that shows off tons of associates and also have hunt cartons like ?I Am A Male? searching for a, ?Female? Grown old xx. Plainly going direct to your target team is the means to go. And if that doesn?t obtain results you are able to proceed to a broader occupation.

Don?t obtain discouraged if you first don?t obtain results on your decided on dating internet site, Those that have actually succeeded at online dating record that they dated many folks before finding ?the one?, some make things in 1 or 2, others need 15 or 20. The varieties are in your favor, there concern 16 million folks using net dating websites, nearly 1 in 4 Americans that are trying to find a charming partner are performing so via singles dating websites.

Courting online additionally permits you to satisfy and also develop connections effortlessly by having those exterior your city or state. Commuter couples in these times are raising. Regular folks, certainly not just civil servants or military personalized, are increasingly living apart from their spouses. Mainly these are dual-career couples that just can?t, or don?t prefer to, uproot their qualified lives.

Is commuting risky for a relationship? According to the Club for the Study of long Distance Relationships (LDRs) commuters are not any a lot more probably than those couples living together to separate.

Analysis shows that just about fifty percent of those that married over a singles dating internet site occupy metropolitan areas. This means that there are hundreds of thousands of achievable match-ups for you out there that you don?t know of.

Using an online dating sites is vibrant and also expanding technique of how folks seek companions for companionships, life companions and also matrimony. There are untold wealths of male and also female friendship expecting you via an online dating internet site.

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Orly Nail Polish ? The Preferred Brand For Nail ... - Health and Fitness

Posted by Diana on May 19th, 2012 09:42 PM | Beauty??

Motivated as well as driven by a wish to bring about innovation in nail care products, Jeff Rose-color set about creating nail care products that speedily found acceptance in salons as well as through individual consumers.

So who is Jeff Pink, you may ask?

Well, he is the man abaft Orly nail polish and many other like nail care products. He is somebody who has been the driving strength behind Orly nail polish and claw fashion products being present in greater degree of the 66 countries and the fact that this fire-~ has been going strong even subsequent to 35 years, speaks volumes around its appeal. Orly is indeed one of the most preferred brands used by manicurists athwart the world. They trust if for the consistent and undeviating results they get out of its usage and consumers who hold used the brand are very reluctant to vary to any other brand.

That is a natural come up, you will agree. If you become comfortable and are joyous with the results you are able to achieve using a especial brand for any of your beauty or skin care purposes, you would definitely not deficiency to experiment with other brands and originate problems for yourself. Orly nail burnish is one such product that has found accepting amongst its many loyal consumers who hold found it to be great in providing that vigorous adhesion, enduring shine and easy to carry attributes they always wanted in a claw polish product.

Just for your intelligence about the evolution of this brand, it is worthwhile to memorandum that Jeff Pink came up through the initial French manicure, which is straight now a favourite fingernail appearance for many women worldwide. Jeff Rose-color wished to develop a versatile appearance in method to complement the wardrobe of some of the most form-savvy celebrities of Hollywood and that is how the French manicure was born. It became an proximate craze and was the rage in most fashion shows in Paris and other lofty profile fashion events. The elegance and chic direct the eye of this product has made it one of the top selling claw products.

Jeff Pink has been prosperous in creating a product line that has been compatible in coming out with stunning new colours and products that are in sync through what consumers expect from a global fire-~. Orly has the distinction of being well known for its claw lacquers, not only for its high quality but likewise for its wide range of shades. The introduction of metallic hades in particular was a milestone that led to immediate gains for the fire-~ as consumers now had something new and trendy that they could try out.

As mentioned higher than, cosmetic value is not the only impressive lineament about Orly nail polish and the fire-~. You can get a whole range of nail care products that includes topcoats, epidermis care, nail hardeners, creams, and burnish removers and so on. Using all of these products in tandem power of determination give you the results you always sought and Orly claw polish certainly ranks very lofty amongst all of them.

Charlotte Wilson is an practised beauty columnist who specialises in article chirography within the subject of beauty, skin care and cosmetics. Effortless Nails stores top nail care products including treatments and polishes from governing nail care brands. To view the row of Orly nail polish please go to see the Effortless Nails website at http://www.effortlessnails.com/.

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Prosecutors: Trio planned to attack Obama's HQ

This undated photo provided Saturday, May 19, 2012 by the Chicago Police Department shows Brent Vincent Betterly, 24, of Oakland Park, Fla. Betterly was one of three men arrested Wednesday, May 16, 2012, in Chicago, accused of making Molotov cocktails with plans to attack President Barack Obama's campaign headquarters, Mayor Rahm Emanuel's home and other targets during this weekend's NATO summit, according to prosecutors at a court hearing Saturday. The three were arrested in a nighttime raid of an apartment in the city's South Side Bridgeport neighborhood ahead of the two-day meeting. (AP Photo/Chicago Police Department)

This undated photo provided Saturday, May 19, 2012 by the Chicago Police Department shows Brent Vincent Betterly, 24, of Oakland Park, Fla. Betterly was one of three men arrested Wednesday, May 16, 2012, in Chicago, accused of making Molotov cocktails with plans to attack President Barack Obama's campaign headquarters, Mayor Rahm Emanuel's home and other targets during this weekend's NATO summit, according to prosecutors at a court hearing Saturday. The three were arrested in a nighttime raid of an apartment in the city's South Side Bridgeport neighborhood ahead of the two-day meeting. (AP Photo/Chicago Police Department)

This undated photo provided Saturday, May 19, 2012 by the Chicago Police Department shows Jared Chase, 24, of Keene, N.H. Chase was one of three men arrested Wednesday, May 16, 2012, in Chicago, accused of making Molotov cocktails with plans to attack President Barack Obama's campaign headquarters, Mayor Rahm Emanuel's home and other targets during this weekend's NATO summit, according to prosecutors at a court hearing Saturday. The three were arrested in a nighttime raid of an apartment in the city's South Side Bridgeport neighborhood ahead of the two-day meeting. (AP Photo/Chicago Police Department)

This undated photo provided Saturday, May 19, 2012 by the Chicago Police Department shows Brian Church, 20, of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. Church was one of three men arrested Wednesday, May 16, 2012, in Chicago, accused of making Molotov cocktails with plans to attack President Barack Obama's campaign headquarters, Mayor Rahm Emanuel's home and other targets during this weekend's NATO summit, according to prosecutors at a court hearing Saturday. The three were arrested in a nighttime raid of an apartment in the city's South Side Bridgeport neighborhood ahead of the two-day meeting. (AP Photo/Chicago Police Department)

Protesters walk past Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel's house Saturday, May 19, 2012, in Chicago, ahead of this weekends' NATO summit in Chicago. On Sunday, the start of the two-day NATO summit, thousands of protesters are expected to march to the McCormick Place convention center, where NATO delegates will be meeting. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast)

Protesters walk in front of Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel's house as part of a NATO summit demonstration in Chicago, Saturday, May 19, 2012. (AP Photo/ Nam Y. Huh)

CHICAGO (AP) ? Three men accused of making Molotov cocktails had been planning to attack President Barack Obama's campaign headquarters, Mayor Rahm Emanuel's home and other targets during this weekend's NATO summit, prosecutors said Saturday.

The three were arrested Wednesday when police raided an apartment on the city's South Side ahead of the two-day meeting.

Defense attorneys alleged that the arrests were an effort to scare the thousands of people expected to protest at the gathering of world leaders. They told a judge that undercover police were the ones who brought the Molotov cocktails.

"This is just propaganda to create a climate of fear," defense attorney Michael Duetsch said.

Later, outside the courtroom, Duetsch said two undercover police officers or informants who called themselves "Mo" and "Gloves" were also arrested during the Wednesday raid, and defense attorneys said they later lost track of the two.

"We believe this is all a setup and entrapment to the highest degree," Duetsch said.

The trio was charged with providing material support for terrorism, conspiracy to commit terrorism and possession of explosives.

The suspects were each being held on $1.5 million bond. They apparently came to Chicago late last month to take part in May Day protests. Six others arrested Wednesday in the raid were released Friday without being charged.

Chicago police Lt. Kenneth Stoppa declined to elaborate on the case beyond confirming the charges against the three who were still in custody.

Police identified the suspects as Brian Church, 20, of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.; Jared Chase, 24, of Keene, N.H.; and Brent Vincent Betterly, 24. A police spokesman gave Betterly's hometown as Oakland Park, Mass., but no such town exists. There is an Oakland Park, Fla., that is near Fort Lauderdale.

Activist Bill Vassilakis, who said he let the men stay in his apartment, described Betterly as an industrial electrician who had volunteered to help with wiring at The Plant, a former meatpacking facility that has been turned into a food incubator with the city's backing.

Vassilakis said he thought the charges were unwarranted.

"All I can say about that is, if you knew Brent, you would find that to be the most ridiculous thing you've ever heard. He was the most stand-up guy that was staying with me. He and the other guys had done nothing but volunteer their time and energy," he said.

Betterly appears to have a history of minor run-ins with law enforcement.

He was cited for disorderly intoxication in February in Miami-Dade County, Fla., earlier this year , but the case has been dismissed, according to online court records.

Authorities in Oakland Park, Fla., said Betterly and two other young men walked into a public high school last fall after a night of tequila drinking and took a swim in the pool, according to a report in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.

They stole fire extinguishers from three school buses, discharged one and smashed a cafeteria window with another. The vandalism caused about $2,000 in damage. Betterly was charged with burglary, theft and criminal mischief, the newspaper said.

Chase grew up in Keene, N.H., and moved to Boston a few years ago before becoming active in the Occupy movement, said his aunt, Barbara Chase of Westmoreland, N.H.

She said she was stunned to learn of the charges against her nephew.

"That surprised me because he's not that dumb, at least I wouldn't have thought so anyway," said Barbara Chase, a factory worker. "He always seemed harmless, but who knows? Outside influences sometimes can sway people to do things that they normally wouldn't do."

Jared Chase's father, Steve Chase, died about five weeks ago after a long struggle with a disease that left him disabled, Barbara Chase said. The family had been waiting for him to come home before having a funeral.

The arrests came as authorities tightened security throughout the city in preparation for the summit, where delegations from about 60 countries will discuss the war in Afghanistan and European missile defense.

Downtown streets were largely empty Saturday, though that is not unusual for a weekend. Security guards stood watch outside many downtown buildings and in some places almost outnumbered pedestrians.

By mid-afternoon, hundreds of protesters marched from a park to the mayor's house, stopping traffic along the way. Police with bicycles stood guard in front of the Northwest Side home, wearing helmets with face shields.

Some of the protesters sat for a time in the middle of the street. Others climbed trees. One woman carried a sign calling Emanuel a bully for closing mental health clinics and libraries in poor neighborhoods. Others chanted that health care should be a human right.

"We are exercising our power to go and tell him what we want," said N'Dana Carter, who was wearing a hospital gown for the demonstration. "He will hear our message."

A city representative said Emanuel respects the demonstrators' First Amendment right to expression.

The bigger show will be on Sunday, the start of the summit, when thousands of protesters are expected to march 2? miles from a band shell on Lake Michigan to the McCormick Place convention center, where delegates will be meeting.

___

Associated Press writers Ryan Foley, Jason Keyser, Jim Suhr and Jeffrey McMurray contributed to this report.

Associated Press

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