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President Pratibha Patil has extended an invitation to her Nepalese counterpart Ram Baran Yadav to visit India. A letter in this regard was handed over to Yadav by External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee when he called on Nepal’s first President at his office ‘Sheetal Niwas’ at Maharajgunj last evening.

Yadav is yet to undertake a foreign trip since assuming office in July. The President was invited to the inaugural ceremony of the Beijing Olympics but could not attend due to political developments in the country.

Shoppers who crave electronics goodies, but are increasingly short on cash, may sacrifice a gym membership or movie popcorn just to get a new gadget like the “Google phone” this holiday season.

Tightened U.S. household budgets in the face of a recession means holiday spending plans for electronics are at their lowest level since the industry’s Consumer Electronics Association began its annual shopper survey 15 years ago.

But when they do choose to spend on gifts, consumers have such a soft spot for electronics they will give up items like sporting goods and trips to pay for gadgets, said Tim Herbert, senior director of market research for the CEA, which represents the $160 billion industry.

“These are no longer just luxury items or products that are fun to own. They really are used in a variety of ways to enhance communications, increase productivity, or for education,” Herbert said. “Also, from a gift-giving standpoint, there is still a tremendous ‘wow’ factor with electronics.”

Consumers plan to cut overall holiday spending by about 14 percent this year, but their budget allocation for electronics has increased, according to CEA.

That should help keep the momentum behind hot-ticket items like the “Google phone” distributed by T-Mobile USA, Apple Inc’s iconic iPod and newer iPhone, or even a sleek 2-pound Dell mini-computer

Advanced video game consoles, 40-inch flat-panel televisions, and smartphones are also expected to move off retail shelves, as well as humbler technology products that simply improve communications and organization.

They include SanDisk’s $80, postage-stamp-sized 16-gigabyte memory card, DVD box sets, compact external hard drives that can hold entire music and video collections, and webcams by the likes of Microsoft Corp and Logitech International SA.

But in hard times, traditional electronics retailers like Best Buy Co and Circuit City Stores will be pressed to offer bigger deals on these items to consumers to stand out against the discounts at Wal-Mart Stores Inc.

“The product cycle is commoditizing, so as price points become cheaper you get into the sweet spot of the Wal-Mart customer,” said JP Morgan analyst Christopher Horvers.

“Circuit City right now is in a capital-constrained situation and really fighting for their life,” Horvers said. “You’re likely to see them be more aggressive this year to try to drive traffic.”

NO NEW “MUST-HAVES”

So far, no new “must-have” gadget has appeared, unlike previous years when devices like Sony Corp’s PlayStation 3, Nintendo’s Wii, or Sirius satellite radios and myriad digital cameras were launched shortly before the season to woo shoppers.

Mukul Krishna, global director of digital media for Frost & Sullivan, is betting that advanced high-definition TVs, video game software and smartphones will be consumers’ top picks in electronics.

But he agreed that consumers who have scaled back their lifestyles “are going to be looking for some aggressive discounting and couponing by the major electronics leaders,” potentially pressuring profit margins of major manufacturers.

Any shopping, even on Black Friday immediately after U.S. Thanksgiving, may be bittersweet as fallout from the global financial crisis hobbles the U.S. economy.

NPD Group found 26 percent of its survey participants planned to spend less this year, versus 18 percent last year.

Consumer electronics sales are expected to rise 3.5 percent in the fourth quarter, down from 7 percent a year ago, according to an industry study.

But even as shoppers sweat over the shrinking value of their retirement accounts, they may snap up deals for devices they have been eyeing all year.

Some of the most desired items are also pretty pricey. At, say, $750, a semi-professional digital camera, portable computer or flat panel TV costs as much as rent for some, or two car payments for others.

“You will see more bargain hunting and lower pricing, and more advertising for Black Friday. However … pricing probably won’t be what drives people into the stores,” said analyst Stephen Baker of research firm NPD.

“If people still feel the way that they do now, (stores are) going to have to keep reminding them that these things have never been more affordable,” he added.

TVs POTENTIAL BRIGHT SPOT

Next year’s shift to digital broadcast signals is also expected to spur sales of better TVs.

Television broadcasters must begin airing only in digital starting February 17, 2009, ceasing their analog signals. That requires customers with “rabbit-ear” antennas who don’t subscribe to cable, phone or satellite television services to replace their TV or get an analog-to-digital converter.

Lower-priced TV brands such as the Vizio sold at Wal-Mart Stores may have an advantage as consumers look for values. “Consumers might be going for some of the cheaper alternatives out there,” Frost & Sullivan’s Krishna said.

Regardless of the gloomy outlook, CEA’s Herbert said emotions may drive shoppers to the store as the holidays draw closer.

“Historically, for a lot of Americans, shopping is therapy. People want to give gifts to their loved ones,” he said. “If these products can enhance family time or serve as a substitute for that trip to Disney World for a vacation … consumers view that as a way to keep their spirits up.”

“I don’t think anyone wants to outright cancel Christmas,” Herbert added.

North Korea has threatened to end all relations with South Korea, a major supplier of aid and cash to the impoverished state, Yonhap news agency reported on Thursday, quoting official North Korean media..

The move comes days after North Korea said it would resume taking apart its nuclear plant that makes bomb-grade plutonium and return to a disarmament-for-aid deal.

Barack Obama would like to offer John McCain a job if he becomes president, in what his allies says is an attempt to end the bitter partisan rancour that engulfed the White House race last week.

Both presidential rivals are working behind the scenes to calm the increasingly incendiary atmosphere on the campaign trail.

Two Democratic sources with knowledge of the thinking in the Obama camp say that forming a partnership with McCain would prove that Obama will reach across the aisle and also help rehabilitate McCain, who many Democrats believe has been pushed by hardline advisers into making increasingly desperate attacks on his rival.

One well-connected Democrat, who spoke to Obama last week, told The Sunday Telegraph: “John McCain is a good man. There’s no question about it. I think we’ll see Barack Obama reach out to him and say: let’s work together.”

He pointed out that Bill Clinton and the first President Bush “work together on common issues” despite their testy exchanges “in the heat of battle”.

“Obama has said all along that he will work with the best people, regardless of party affiliation. John McCain has experience and he used to have a record of bipartisanship. We’re all going to need to pull together when this is over.”

McCain, however, will not be offered a cabinet job. Obama may ask him to spearhead a bipartisan overhaul of veteran’s affairs, an issue close to McCain’s heart.

Obama’s events was much more laid back, but there was still a sense of tense expectation among his supporters, many of whom still cannot quite believe that he stands on the cusp of making history.

There is fear among Democrats that the imminent prospect of an Obama presidency has unleashed the primal motives of racism, prevalent in the Appalachian region of Southern Ohio.

The United States may soon remove North Korea from a terrorism blacklist to try to salvage nuclear talks with Pyongyang but faces resistance from Japan, a source close to the negotiations on said Friday.

“It’s probably going to happen,” the source said when asked whether Washington was weighing the removal of North Korea from the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism, which imposes a range of sanctions.

An announcement had been expected on Friday but U.S. officials said a decision had not been made. They pointed to a need to get “consensus” among the other four nations involved in the talks with Pyongyang.

Japan, in particular, has reservations.

Asked whether President George W. Bush had signed off on removing North Korea from the State Department’s terrorism list, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said: “No.”

“We’re continuing to work with our six-party partners but I don’t expect anything else today on that,” Perino added.

The Bush administration has been scrambling in its final months to save the aid-for-disarmament agreement with secretive and impoverished North Korea that it hoped to claim as a rare foreign policy success.

The drive to revive the deal also comes as North Korea has stepped up efforts to rebuild its nuclear facility at Yongbyon and banned U.N. monitors from the Soviet-era plant — moves Washington and others say must be reversed.

Under a broad accord struck in 2005 between North Korea, South Korea, China, Japan, Russia and the United States, Pyongyang agreed to abandon all nuclear programs in exchange for potential economic and diplomatic benefits.

Under a subsequent pact, the United States suggested it would remove North Korea from the terrorism list in exchange for Pyongyang providing a “complete and correct” declaration of all of its nuclear programs.

That deal has become snagged by North Korea’s reluctance to accept a mechanism allowing the United States or other members of the talks to verify its declaration.

It is also held up by Tokyo’s objections to delisting North Korea until the issue of the abduction of Japanese nationals decades ago by North Korean agents is settled.

TALKS WITH JAPAN, OTHERS

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice discussed North Korea on Friday with Japan’s foreign minister, as well as those from China and South Korea, said her spokesman Sean McCormack, who expected Rice to talk to her Russian counterpart soon.

McCormack refused to be drawn on whether Japan was holding up the delisting, except to repeat the Bush administration’s view that the abductions issue must be quickly resolved.

“We’ll see if we get to the point where we have a verification protocol and regime that all the six parties can agree upon,” he told reporters.

But the source close to the talks said Japanese Foreign Minister Hirofumi Nakasone had voiced misgivings about the U.S. plans and that Bush might speak to new Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso to discuss the matter.

Analysts say one way to break the logjam could be for the United States to agree to less specificity in a verification protocol, making it more palatable to Pyongyang, which has said earlier proposals amounted to house-to-house searches.

The United States could then put forward a more specific set of verification procedures to be blessed by the six-party talks, possibly providing a face-saving out for Pyongyang.

But softening the verification language is likely to attract fierce criticism, particularly from conservative Republicans who believe the Bush administration would be giving in to North Korea and putting off any reckoning on suspected nuclear proliferation or uranium enrichment programs.

“This is still in play, but if the final result is a watered-down verification agreement backed by a unilateral U.S. statement of its understanding of verification procedures, the administration risks heavy criticism,” said Michael Green, a former National Security Council Asia expert now at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) think tank.

North Korea tested a nuclear device in 2006 using plutonium and it is suspected of pursuing a uranium enrichment program, which would provide a second path to make fissile material for nuclear weapons.

Jon Wolfsthal, also from CSIS, said his understanding of the U.S. proposal was that North Korea would give China a set of verification steps it is prepared to take. Washington would then quietly accept the terms and drop Pyongyang from the terrorism list.

“We are obviously dancing to the North Koreans’ tune at this point,” Wolfsthal said.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez made his second whirlwind visit to Cuba in less than a week and met behind closed doors for two and a half hours with ailing former leader Fidel Castro, state media reported Sunday.

Chavez’s stopover had not been previously announced, but the Communist Youth newspaper Juventud Rebelde said he landed in Havana Saturday evening and left hours later. He was greeted at the airport by 77-year-old Raul Castro, who succeeded his brother as president in February.

The newspaper published a photo of Chavez shaking hands with a serious-faced Raul Castro. There were no images of the ailing, 82-year-old Fidel, who has not been seen in public since undergoing emergency intestinal surgery in July 2006.

Juventud Rebelde said Chavez discussed his recent tour of China, Russia and Europe with the Castro brothers, but did not give specific details on what it described as a “fraternal” encounter.

Chavez also stopped in Havana at the start of the tour for a face-to-face with Fidel Castro. Days later in Moscow, he told the Cuban government news agency Prensa Latina that Fidel was “stronger and more impetuous than a Hurricane Ike” — referring to the storm that killed seven people and damaged hundreds of thousands of homes in Cuba this month.

“We talked a lot and when I said goodbye, I was surprised by his strength,” Chavez was quoted as saying in an article published Sunday.

Chavez is a close friend and ally of the older Castro, and oil-rich Venezuela sends nearly 100,000 barrels of crude a day to Cuba at favorable prices, helping to keep the island’s communist economy afloat.

Holed up in an undisclosed location, Fidel Castro is suffering from an unknown illness but continues to sign essays that appear several times a week in state-controlled newspapers. He has not been seen in photographs or video images since June.

Iraqi police on Thursday raised the death toll in an ambush against Iraqi forces raiding a Sunni village northeast of Baghdad to 35, most of them commandos sent to the area as part of a U.S.-backed military crackdown.

The attackers in the suspected insurgent stronghold of Othmaniyah in the volatile Diyala province apparently had been tipped off about Wednesday’s raid and were waiting for the Iraqi forces to arrive, officials said.

The U.S. military had said those killed included 14 national policemen and eight members of a Sunni group allied with the Americans to fight against al-Qaida in Iraq. The military later referred questions about updates to Iraqi officials.

A police officer in the provincial military operation center said 27 policemen were killed, raising the total to 35. The officer spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release the information.

The rural territory around Diyala’s provincial capital of Baqouba has been one of the hardest areas to control despite numerous U.S.-Iraqi military operations aimed at routing insurgents from their safehavens there.

The national police unit that was struck had been sent to the region over the summer as part of the latest offensive.

The brazen attack occurred the same day the Iraqi parliament approved a law paving the way for the first provincial elections in four years.

The breakthrough came after lawmakers decided to postpone a decision on how to resolve a power-sharing dispute over the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, which has stoked ethnic tensions in northern Iraq.

U.S. commanders have warned that failure by the central government to make progress in promoting unity among Iraq’s divided ethnic and religious parties was threatening recent security gains.

Separately, Iraq’s Health Ministry reported Thursday that a total of 327 cholera cases had been confirmed in central and southern Iraq since an outbreak of the disease last month. The death toll from the outbreak stood at five, it said.

Cholera is a gastrointestinal disease that can be spread by a lack of clean drinking water. The problem has been worsened by the poor state of Iraq’s infrastructure after years of neglect and war.

The United Nations stressed Thursday that the current outbreak appeared less severe than one that occurred last year.

The World Health Organization has confirmed 306 cases so far this year, well below the 4,700 reported in 2007, according to a statement. It said Iraq has an average of 600 cholera cases reported each year.

U.N. officials who recently discussed the issue with government and health officials in Babil province also praised the government response, saying hospitals were prepared and an information drive was under way.

On Wednesday, a suicide bomber killed a U.S. soldier in Diyala, the military said Thursday. At least 4,171 members of the U.S. military have died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

The coalition of the willing that went to war in Iraq is becoming the coalition of the disappearing.

President Bush and Iraqi President Jalal Talabani formally thanked the diminishing band of allies at a meeting Tuesday night on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly. The low-key, low-profile gathering stood in stark contrast to the early days of Bush’s administration, when hot debates over the war formed the centerpiece of the annual global forum.

“It’s a pleasure to be with nations that have helped your democracy grow,” Bush told Talabani in a room packed with representatives of more than two dozen countries that have contributed in Iraq. “A lot of people around the world have made sacrifices along with the Iraqi people to enable a country to emerge from the shadows of tyranny — become a hopeful example for nations around the world.”

At its height, the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq included 50,000 troops from more than three dozen countries other than the United States. But by the next 90 days or so, that global coalition will shrink to just a handful of nations, according to White House advisers.

The White House says that isn’t because international support is dwindling, but because security gains and the increased capability of Iraqi forces allow outside forces to do more with less.

“Many of the troops of the countries represented here have returned home, but they have done so on success,” Bush said at the reception.

Iraq is drafting bilateral agreements with the U.S. and other countries to replace a U.N. mandate that authorizes their presence now but which expires at year’s end. The White House has not disclosed the names of countries likely to remain in Iraq after the expiration of the U.N. mandate, saying it’s up to the Iraqi government to seal each agreement on its own.

The president was careful not to imply that all is well in Iraq.

Bush’s military buildup last year — along with several key local factors as well — did help to quell violence. But security gains were meant to provide breathing room for political reconciliation, and progress there has been spotty.

On Wednesday, Iraq’s parliament overwhelmingly approved a provincial elections law, setting the stage for local elections believed to be an essential step to building a long-term peace among the country’s rival religious and ethnic communities. Lasting power-sharing agreements have been elusive in Iraq so far. The law still needs approval by the country’s three-member presidential panel

“Mr. President, we’ve still got work to do,” Bush told Talabani. “But there is no doubt that the situation in Iraq has changed substantially.”

According to a list provided by the White House, representatives of the following nations were recognized at the meeting for past or ongoing contributions: Albania, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, El Salvador, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, South Korea, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, Tonga, Turkey and the United Kingdom.

“I’m here on behalf of the Iraqi people to express my deepest appreciation for all countries who participated in the breaking Iraq from worst kind of dictatorship,” Talabani said. “I want to express my deepest condolences for your brave soldiers and civilians who have lost their lives while standing up for our shared values of freedom and democracy.”

In the fall of 2002, Bush went to the United Nations and got a strong U.N. Security Council resolution demanding that former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein give up all unconventional weapons and open his country to new arms inspections. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell’s congressional testimony in early 2003 documenting Saddam’s weapons programs was based, as it turned out later, on faulty U.S. intelligence.

But when Bush went to war in Iraq in spring 2003, he did so without U.N. backing — amassing the coalition on his own instead, with often tiny contributions from other countries. The United States has always contributed the vast majority of troops — 250,000 out of 300,000 at its height.

Bush ends his three-day stay in New York on Wednesday with a meeting on free trade with leaders of nations in the Western Hemisphere. The United States has signed free trade agreements with 12 nations in the hemisphere that represent two-thirds of the region’s gross domestic product and one-third of the U.S. global bilateral trade.

The president is pushing Congress to approve free trade deals with Colombia, Panama and South Korea.

“It’s important for the American people to understand that exports benefit workers,” he said Wednesday, standing next to Mexican President Felipe Calderon at the Council of the Americas in New York. “Half of our growth last year is the result of trade. Therefore, it’s in our interest to continue to open up markets, particularly in our own neighborhood.”

Many people have been killed after an armed student started shooting at a school for adults in southwestern Finland on Tuesday. Several others were injured in the attack.

“There are dead people. We have not counted them. It’s a big school,” local fire chief Ahti Yli-Mannila said.

The Mayor of the town of Kauhajoki, where the shooting took place at around 11:00 hrs local time, said that the gunman – a student of the same school – has killed himself.

“Several are dead,” Kauhajoki Mayor Antti Rantakokko said, adding he did not know the exact number. “The situation is over now. He is no longer free. He has killed himself.”

According to a police official, the shooting took place at the Kauhajoki Home Economics and Catering School.

State media reports too said several of those injured in the shooting incident have died.

Finnish national broadcaster, YLE, said the police soon surrounded the school after the student with a ski mask opened firing at the school. The school is attended by around 200 students, most in their late teens or early 20s.

Kauhajoki has a population of about 15,000 people and is located some 180 miles (290 km) from the capital, Helsinki.

The incident comes almost a year after another school shooting left nine people, including the gunman, dead in the Finnish town of Tuusala.