Israeli vote doesn't nail shut door to peace: Clinton

WASHINGTON: The outcome of Israel's elections did not torpedo hopes for peace with the Palestinians, but instead opened up a new chance for dialogue, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton argued Tuesday.

"I actually think this election opens doors, not nails them shut," she said, during a so-called "global townhall" meeting, in which she took questions from Internet-users and broadcasters around the world.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud-Beitenu list emerged from last week's vote with the biggest single share of seats in the Knesset, but was weakened by a surge in support for Yair Lapid's centrist Yesh Atid party.

Party leaders are negotiating a new coalition, which is expected to have a centre-right bent, and the talks are being watched for signs as to whether it will be able to revive the Middle East peace process.

According to Israeli reports, Netanyahu has offered Lapid the post of foreign minister or finance minister in a new government. And while Lapid has rarely spoken about foreign policy challenges or the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, he has said he favours negotiations.

Clinton, in one of her final public engagements before she steps down from US President Barack Obama's administration, chose to strike an optimistic note.

She said: "A significant percentage of the Israeli electorate chose to express themselves by saying, 'We need a different path than the one we have been pursuing internally and with respect to the Middle East peace process.'

"So I know President Obama and my successor soon-to-be secretary of state John Kerry will pursue this, will look for every possible opening."

As Clinton was speaking, the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee gave its backing to Kerry's appointment, clearing the way for the full Senate to confirm him as her successor later in the day.

Last week, in his confirmation hearings, Kerry appeared to hint he may have new proposals up his sleeve to restart direct peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians which have stalled for more than two years.

"We need to try to find a way forward, and I happen to believe that there is a way forward," he said.

"But I also believe that if we can't be successful that the door, or window, or whatever you want to call it, to the possibility of a two-state solution could shut on everybody and that would be disastrous in my judgment."

Both Israel and the Palestinian Authority have theoretically committed themselves to the goal of a "two-state solution" with both living side-by-side within agreed borders.

But direct talks have foundered, with Palestinians decrying ongoing Israeli settlement building on occupied territory and Israel denouncing rocket attacks on its civilians from Gaza, which is controlled by the Hamas militia.

Clinton told the Washingon townhall meeting that she believed "Hamas is not interested in democracy... is still largely a military resistance group."

But she added: "We've made it very clear that if Hamas renounces violence, if they morph themselves into a political entity the way that Fatah and the Palestinian Authority have from the origins in the PLO, if they accept the previous commitments... there's a place for them at the table. And it would be my great hope that they would do that."

- AFP/jc

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Newegg wins in key 'shopping cart' lawsuit

Newegg last week won an important ruling that could have a profound impact on e-commerce.

A U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit last week ruled (PDF) that Newegg has not violated patents held by Soverain related to the function of shopping carts and other e-commerce technologies. The court found that Soverain's claims -- that Newegg was violating its patents through its online shopping cart -- were "invalid for obviousness."

Ars Technica was first to report on the judgement.

Soverain does not actually operate an e-commerce business. Instead, the company has acquired a wide array of patents across e-commerce that it has used to win judgement against several online retailers, including Victoria's Secret and Avon. In 2007, the company also won a verdict against Newegg on the claims that have now been overturned by the higher court.

What Soverain has been seeking (and receiving) from online retailers is nothing to scoff at. The company wins damages against the online retailers that it defeats, plus a "running" royalty of 1 percent of sales for the right to use its patents.

As Ars Technica points out, however, the Federal court's ruling could effectively alter Soverain's future. The company's patents, which in some cases, date all the way back to the 1990s, are now being called invalid because they're "obvious." It might not take long, therefore, for companies that it defeated in court to appeal judgements based on that ruling. The company has also brought lawsuits against a slew of other companies that are still pending and might be scuttled by this deal.

Here's what Newegg's chief legal officer, Lee Cheng, had to say to Ars Technica about Soverain:

Lo and behold, I unveil to you the world of--shopping cart! And this shopping cart--unlike all the shopping carts used for hundreds, if not thousands of years--should be paid for based on the total dollars of transactions in the shopping cart.

It's very common in troll cases for them to say, "Our widget is so critical, we deserve a penny on every dollar." But what they have is a completely commodity functionality that could be coded any one of dozens of different ways. I mean, come on. Let's not stretch credibility.

CNET has contacted Soverain for comment. We will update this story when we have more information.

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Istanbul police start search for missing NYC mom

ANKARA, Turkey Police in Istanbul were scanning security camera footage Monday to try to trace a New York City woman who went missing while vacationing alone in the city, an official said.

Sarai Sierra, 33, was last in touch with her family on Jan. 21, the day she was supposed to fly home after two weeks in Turkey.

A police official said authorities were reviewing footage from around Istanbul's Taksim neighborhood — the city's main hub where she was staying at a hostel.

Several police teams have also been dispatched to surrounding neighborhoods to find possible clues and witnesses, the official said. He spoke on condition of anonymity, in line with government rules that bar civil servants from speaking to reporters without prior authorization.

Turkey's private Dogan news agency meanwhile, reported that police had established that Sierra had traveled to Amsterdam, Netherlands, from Istanbul on Jan. 15 and then journeyed on to Munich, Germany, on Jan. 16, before returning to Istanbul on Jan. 19. Police were trying to determine the reason for her visit to the European cities, the report said.

Police were also trying to find the identity of a person she had been chatting with on the Internet, Dogan reported.

Another police official, contacted by The Associated Press, confirmed that Sierra had made a brief trip to Europe, but refused to provide further details. He also spoke on condition of anonymity saying he was not authorized to speak publicly about the investigation.

Before she went missing, the mother-of-two told family members that she planned to take some photographs at Galata Bridge, a well-known tourist destination about 1.2 miles away from Taksim that spans the Golden Horn waterway. She was then supposed to begin traveling home and was scheduled to arrive in New York City on Tuesday afternoon.

Her belongings, including her passport and phone, were found in her room. The first police official said authorities were therefore not able to track her by her cell phone.

Sierra's husband and brother were traveling to Istanbul to follow the search. Her two children, aged 11 and 9, do not know their mother is missing, her brother David Jimenez told the AP Sunday.

Sierra had planned to go on the trip with a friend but ended up going by herself when the friend couldn't make it. She was looking forward to exploring her hobby of photography, her family said.

Crime in Turkey is generally low and Istanbul is a relatively safe city for travelers, though there are areas where women would be advised to avoid going alone at night. The Galata and the nearby Galata Bridge areas have been gentrified and are home to fish restaurants, chic cafes and boutiques.

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Grand Jury Wanted to Indict JonBenet's Parents

A grand jury believed there was enough evidence in 1999 to indict John and Patsy Ramsey on charges relating to the still-unsolved killing of their beauty queen daughter JonBenet Ramsey, ABC News sources say.

Six-year-old JonBenet was found dead in the basement of her family's upscale Boulder, Colo., home Christmas Day 1996. Suspicion fell on her parents, John and Patsy Ramsey, but they insisted an intruder was to blame and they were never prosecuted.

In an interview with ABC News' Barbara Walters after her death, both of the girl's parents denied that they had killed her. They were eventually cleared by prosecutors.

JonBenet Ramsey Case: New Grand Jury Report Watch Video

After meeting for more than a year, a grand jury found sufficient evidence to indict the couple on charges of child abuse resulting in death, as first reported Sunday by the Boulder Daily Camera newspaper and confirmed by two separate sources by ABC News.

"This grand jury, in effect, came up with a compromise finding, 'No, it's not murder,' but, 'Yes, we think they were responsible' for the death based on abuse," ABC News legal analyst Dan Abrams said.

PHOTOS: JonBenet Ramsey: Never-Before-Seen Photos

But District Attorney Alex Hunter refused to sign off on the grand jury's decision, saying there was too little proof.

"I and my prosecution task force believe we do not have sufficient evidence to warrant the filing of charges against anyone who has been investigated at this time," Hunter said then.

Hunter believed a conviction would be impossible. Abrams said that he agrees with the decision.

"I've seen the majority of the case files and I think Alex Hunter made the right call," he said. "I think there simply was not enough evidence to move forward."

Patsy Ramsey died in 2006 after a battle with ovarian cancer. John Ramsey remarried. His attorney told ABC News that Hunter is "a hero who wisely avoided a miscarriage of justice."

The case is still officially open but, as in 1996, investigators seem no closer to solving the crime this year, when JonBenet would have turned 23.

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Violence flares in Egypt after emergency law imposed

CAIRO (Reuters) - A man was shot dead on Monday in a fifth day of violence that has killed 50 Egyptians and prompted the Islamist president to declare a state of emergency in an attempt to end a wave of unrest sweeping the biggest Arab nation.

Emergency rule announced by President Mohamed Mursi on Sunday covers the cities of Port Said, Ismailia and Suez. The army has already been deployed in two of those cities and ministers agreed a measure to let soldiers arrest civilians.

A cabinet source told Reuters any trials would be in civilian courts, but the step is likely to anger protesters who accuse Mursi of using high-handed tactics of the kind they fought against to oust his military predecessor Hosni Mubarak.

Egypt's politics have become deeply polarized since those heady days two years ago, when protesters were making the running in the Arab Spring revolutions that sent shockwaves through the region and Islamists and liberals lined up together.

Although Islamists have won parliamentary and presidential elections, the disparate opposition has since united against Mursi. Late last year he moved to expand his powers and pushed a constitution with a perceived Islamist bias through a referendum. The moves were punctuated by street violence.

Mursi's national dialogue meeting on Monday to help end the crisis was spurned by his main opponents.

They say Mursi hijacked the revolution, listens only to his Islamist allies and broke a promise to be a president for all Egyptians. Islamists say their rivals want to overthrow by undemocratic means Egypt's first freely elected leader.

Thousands of anti-Mursi protesters were out on the streets again in Cairo and elsewhere on Monday, the second anniversary of one of the bloodiest days in the revolution which erupted on January 25, 2011 and ended Mubarak's iron rule 18 days later.

"The people want to bring down the regime," they chanted Alexandria. "Leave means go, and don't say no!" they shouted.

VOLLEYS OF TEARGAS

Propelled to the presidency in a June election by the Muslim Brotherhood, Mursi has lurched through a series of political crises and violent demonstrations, complicating his task of shoring up the economy and of preparing for a parliamentary election to cement the new democracy in a few months.

Instability in Egypt has raised concerns in Western capitals, where officials worry about the direction of a key regional player that has a peace deal with Israel.

In Cairo on Monday, police fired volleys of teargas at stone-throwing protesters near Tahrir Square, cauldron of the anti-Mubarak uprising. A car was torched on a nearby bridge.

A 46-year-old bystander was killed by a gunshot early on Monday, a security source said. It was not clear who fired.

"We want to bring down the regime and end the state that is run by the Muslim Brotherhood," said Ibrahim Eissa, a 26-year-old cook, protecting his face from teargas wafting towards him.

The political unrest has been exacerbated by street violence linked to death penalties imposed on soccer supporters convicted of involvement in stadium rioting in Port Said a year ago.

As part of emergency measures, a daily curfew will be imposed on the three canal cities from 9 p.m. (1900 GMT) to 6 a.m. (0400 GMT). Residents have said they will defy it.

The president announced the measures on television on Sunday: "The protection of the nation is the responsibility of everyone. We will confront any threat to its security with force and firmness within the remit of the law," Mursi said, angering many of his opponents when he wagged his finger at the camera.

He offered condolences to families of victims. But his invitation to Islamist allies and their opponents to hold a national dialogue was spurned by the main opposition National Salvation Front coalition. Those who accepted were mostly Mursi's supporters or sympathizers.

SENDING A MESSAGE

The Front rejected the offer as "cosmetic and not substantive" and set conditions for any future meeting that have not been met in the past, such as forming a government of national unity. They also demanded that Mursi declare himself responsible for the bloodshed.

"We will send a message to the Egyptian people and the president of the republic about what we think are the essentials for dialogue. If he agrees to them, we are ready for dialogue," opposition politician Mohamed ElBaradei told a news conference.

The opposition Front has distanced itself from the latest flare-ups but said Mursi should have acted far sooner to impose security measures that would have ended the violence.

"Of course we feel the president is missing the real problem on the ground, which is his own policies," Front spokesman Khaled Dawoud said after Mursi made his declaration.

Other activists said Mursi's measures to try to impose control on the turbulent streets could backfire.

"Martial law, state of emergency and army arrests of civilians are not a solution to the crisis," said Ahmed Maher of the April 6 movement that helped galvanize the 2011 uprising. "All this will do is further provoke the youth. The solution has to be a political one that addresses the roots of the problem."

Rights activists said Mursi's declaration was a backward step for Egypt, which was under emergency law for Mubarak's entire 30-year rule. His police used the sweeping arrest provisions to muzzle dissent and round up opponents, including members of the Brotherhood and even Mursi himself.

Heba Morayef of Human Rights Watch in Cairo said the police, still hated by many Egyptians for their heavy-handed tactics under Mubarak, would once again have the right to arrest people "purely because they look suspicious", undermining efforts to create a more efficient and respected police force.

"It is a classic knee-jerk reaction to think the emergency law will help bring security," she said. "It gives so much discretion to the Ministry of Interior that it ends up causing more abuse, which in turn causes more anger."

(Additional reporting by Yasmine Saleh in Cairo, Yusri Mohamed in Ismailia and Abdelrahman Youssef in Alexandria; Editing by Giles Elgood, Peter Millership and Alastair Macdonald)

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Iran sends monkey into space

TEHRAN: Iran on Monday successfully sent a monkey into orbit, paving the way for a manned space flight, Defence Minister Ahmad Vahidi told state television.

Arabic-language channel Al-Alam and other Iranian news agencies said the monkey returned alive after travelling in a capsule to an altitude of 120 kilometres (75 miles) for a sub-orbital flight.

"This success is the first step towards man conquering the space and it paves the way for other moves," General Vahidi said, but added that the process of putting a human into space would be a lengthy one.

"Today's successful launch follows previous successes we had in launching (space) probes with other living creatures (on board)," he added.

"The monkey which was sent in this launch landed safely and alive and this is a big step for our experts and scientists."

Iranian state television showed still pictures of the capsule and of a monkey being fitted with a vest and then placed in a device similar to a child's car-seat.

A previous attempt in 2011 by the Islamic republic to put a monkey into space failed. No official explanation was ever given.

A defence ministry statement quoted by Iranian media said earlier Iran had "successfully launched a capsule, codenamed Pishgam (Pioneer), containing a monkey and recovered the shipment on the ground intact".

Iran announced in mid-January its intention to launch a monkey into orbit as part of "preparations for sending a man into space," which is scheduled for 2020.

Iran's space programme deeply unsettles Western nations, which fear it could be used to develop ballistic missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads they suspect are being developed in secret.

The same technology used in space launch rockets can also be used in ballistic missiles.

The Security Council has imposed on Iran an almost total embargo on nuclear and space technologies since 2007.

Tehran has repeatedly denied that its nuclear and scientific programmes mask military ambitions.

Iran's previous satellite launches were met by condemnation from the West who accused Tehran of "provocation."

The Islamic republic has previously sent a rat, turtles and worms into space. It has also successfully launched three satellites -- Omid in February 2009, Rassad in June 2011 and Navid in February 2012.

In mid-May last year, Tehran announced plans to launch an experimental observation satellite Fajr (Dawn) within a week but it did not happen and Iran gave no explanation for the delay.

The Fajr satellite was presented by Iranian officials as "an observation and measurement" satellite weighing 50 kilos (110 pounds), built by Sa-Iran, a company affiliated to the defence ministry.

- AFP/ir

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Kutcher went on Jobs' fruitarian diet, landed in the hospital

Did the fruit help?

(Credit:
JBeylovesyou/YouTube Screenshot by Chris Matyszczyk/CNET)

Actors are lovely people.

Until they take themselves seriously, that is.

Then, eccentricities are magnified, intentions are doubted and sanity is questioned.

What to make, you see, of Ashton Kutcher's revelation that, in some actorial attempt to be as much like Steve Jobs as he could, he became a fruitcake?

This is the technical term for someone who decides to go on a fruitarian diet, which involves only allowing fruits, nuts, and seeds inside you -- something that Jobs himself tried.

As the entirely unseedy US Weekly digests it, Kutcher was so dedicated to pursuing his craft that pursuing this diet put him in hospital.

I am sure the producers of "jOBS" were delighted with his dedication, as he was sent to ER just two days before shooting started.

More Technically Incorrect

"I was like doubled over in pain and my pancreas levels were completely out of whack, which was completely terrifying, considering everything, Kutcher told US Weekly.

Terrifying, indeed. And, perhaps, not wholly unsurprising.

Still, it doesn't seem to have been as terrifying as playing Jobs.

Kutcher emoted: "It's portraying a guy who just passed away that is really fresh in people's minds, that people are really passionate about, and care about, and have an opinion about -- that's really scary. Especially portraying a guy that I really admire . . . it's terrifying, it's terrifying!"

My colleague Casey Newton, who witnessed the movie on Friday, seems to have been less terrified and more numbed at the experience, although he seemed reasonably enamored of Kutcher's performance.

I'm sure it was the fruit that got him closer to the man.

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Gingrich: Republicans "clearly have to change"

(CBS News) If the GOP had focused more on ideas in the 2012 presidential election, "maybe we could have won," former House Speaker Newt Gingrich suggested today on "Face the Nation."

Reacting to Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal's speech last week to the Republican National Committee in Charlotte, Gingrich recommended "to every Republican" Irving Kristol's 1976 essay, "The Stupid Party." Then "Ronald Reagan came along with Jack Kemp," Gingrich continued, "and they basically moved us back to being an idea-oriented party. I think we clearly have to change.

"I mean, maybe we could have won or not won this year," continued Gingrich, who ultimately lost out in the GOP primaries to former nominee Mitt Romney. "I was certainly wrong - I thought [Romney] would win up until about 5:30 on Election Day."

Jindal was "right on track," Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., said during the discussion with Gingrich. "What we need to do is get rid of 'Grand Old Party.' We are the 'great opportunity party.' We're the 'growth and opportunity party.' We are the 'government of the people' party. And that needs to be upon point of view and the perspective we come from and we carry our message forth."

One thing Republicans didn't do well with Romney's campaign, Blackburn argued, "was to penetrate the market place with our message - we didn't have a broad enough basis using social media, using all the different media formats that are there." Gingrich, though, pointed to overly conservative policies as the GOP's 2012 curse.

"When I said as a candidate we're not going to deport a grandmother if she's been here 25 years, we had a nominee who said yes, we would, that she would self-deport," Gingrich said. "I think at that point we lost Asians, we lost Latinos. You can't lose Asians, Latinos, African Americans and young people, and think you're going to be competitive.

"I think we have to come to grips with the reality," he continued. "We have to learn to communicate in the world of young people on their terms but we also have to understand that we need to be a country of immigrants where Republicans are seen as welcoming, hard-working, competent people, not prepared to kick grandmother out."

Appearing later in the program, former Romney adviser Kevin Madden agreed that as the American electorate evolves, "we have to do a better job as Republicans of reaching out.

"It really comes down to this fundamental idea, this principle: Are we going to talk about what we're for or are we going to talk about what we're against? We lulled ourselves into a belief that in the 2010 elections, because we had very good results in the midterms, that we could be a party of 'no' and run against spending, run against deficits. But in order to prosper and become a majority party we have to talk about what we're for.

"Immigration is an example," Madden continued. "What does a modernized immigration system look like and how is it part a larger economic argument, part of the argument of values and families? That is our challenge as part of the rebuilding process going forward."

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Brazil Nightclub Fire: 232 Dead, Hundreds Injured

A blaze raced through a crowded nightclub in southern Brazil early Sunday, killing 232 people as the air filled with deadly smoke and panicked party-goers stampeded toward the exits, police and witnesses said. It appeared to be the world's deadliest nightclub fire in more than a decade.

Witnesses said that a flare or firework lit by band members may have started the fire.

Police Maj. Cleberson Braida Bastianello said by telephone that officials counted 232 bodies that had been brought for identification to a gymnasium in the city of Santa Maria, at the southern tip of Brazil near the borders with Argentina and Uruguay.

Another 117 people were being treated at hospitals, he said, and President Dilma Roussef arrived to visit victims after cutting short participation at a Latin American-European summit in Chile.

Bastianello said the recount lowered the toll from 245 earlier believed killed.

Television images showed smoke pouring out of the Kiss nightclub as shirtless, young male partygoers joined firefighters in wielding axes and sledgehammers, pounding at windows and walls to break through to those trapped inside. Teenagers sprinted from the scene desperately trying to find help. Others carried injured and burned friends away in their arms.

"There was so much smoke and fire, it was complete panic and it took a long time for people to get out, there were so many dead," survivor Luana Santos Silva told the Globo TV network.

Germano Roratto/AFP/Getty Images

Silva added that firefighters and ambulances responded quickly after the fire broke out, but that it spread too fast inside the packed club for them to help.

Michele Pereira, another survivor, told the Folha de S. Paulo newspaper that she was near the stage and that the fire broke out after members of the band lit flares.

"The band that was onstage began to use flares and, suddenly, they stopped the show and pointed them upward. At that point the ceiling caught fire. It was really weak but in a matter of seconds it spread," Pereira said.

Most of the dead apparently suffocated, according to Dr. Paulo Afonso Beltrame, a professor at the medical school of the Federal University of Santa Maria who raced the city's Caridade Hospital to help victims.

He said survivors, police and firefighters told him a flare set off by a band member set the ceiling's soundproofing ablaze. "Large amounts of toxic smoke quickly filled the room and I would say that at least 90 percent of the victims died of asphyxiation," Beltrame told The Associated Press by telephone.

"The toxic smoke made people lose their sense of direction so they were unable to find their way to the exit. At least 50 bodies were found inside a bathroom. Apparently they confused the bathroom door with the exit door."

"In the hospital I saw desperate friends and relatives walking and running down the corridors looking for information. It was one of the saddest scenes I have ever witnessed," he added.

Rodrigo Moura, identified by the newspaper Diario de Santa Maria as a security guard at the club, said it was at its maximum capacity of between 1,000 and 2,000, and partygoers were pushing and shoving to escape.

Beltrame also said he was told the club was filled far past its capacity during a party for students at the university's department of agronomy. The event featured a group called Gurizada Fandangueira, which plays a driving mixture of local Brazilian country music styles. It was not immediately clear if the band members were among the victims.

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Nightclub fire kills at least 232 in Brazil

SANTA MARIA, Brazil (Reuters) - A fire in a nightclub killed at least 232 people in southern Brazil on Sunday when a band's pyrotechnics show set the building ablaze and fleeing partygoers stampeded toward blocked and overcrowded exits in the ensuing panic, officials said.

The blaze in the university town of Santa Maria was started by a band member or someone from its production team igniting a flare, which then set fire to the ceiling, said Luiza Sousa, a civil police official. The fire spread "in seconds," she said.

Local fire officials said at least one exit was locked and that bouncers, who at first thought those fleeing were trying to skip out on bar tabs, initially blocked patrons from leaving. The security staff relented only when they saw flames engulfing the ceiling.

The vast majority of the victims, most of them university students, died from asphyxiation, officials said. Others were crushed in the stampede.

"We ran into a barrier of the dead at the building's exit," Colonel Guido Pedroso de Melo, commander of the Santa Maria fire squad, said of the scene firefighters found on arrival. "We had to clear a path to get to the rest of those that were inside."

An estimated 500 people were in the Boate Kiss nightclub when the fire broke out at around 2:30 a.m., police said. Witnesses said the club, which has a 2,000-person capacity, was always busy on weekends but wasn't any more crowded than usual.

The death tally was lowered slightly, with police saying at midafternoon that 232 people had been killed, down from an initial figure of 245.

When the fire began, many revelers were unable to find their way out amid the chaos, confusing restroom doors for exits and finding resistance from bouncers when they did find an exit door.

"It all happened so fast," survivor Taynne Vendrusculo told GloboNews TV. "Both the panic and the fire spread rapidly, in seconds."

Once security guards realized the building was on fire, they tried in vain to control the blaze with a fire extinguisher, according to a televised interview with one of the guards, Rodrigo Moura. He said patrons were getting trampled as they rushed for the doors, describing it as "a horror film."

Television footage showed people sobbing outside the club before dawn, while shirtless firefighters used sledge hammers and axes to knock down an exterior wall to open up an exit.

SAFETY STANDARDS IN SPOTLIGHT

Rescue officials moved the bodies to a local gymnasium, where the deceased were segregated by gender. Male victims were easier to identify, they said, because most of them, unlike the women, whose purses were left scattered in the devastated nightclub, had identification on them.

One of the club's owners had already surrendered to police for questioning, GloboNews reported.

President Dilma Rousseff, who started her political career in the Rio Grande do Sul state where the fire happened, cut short a visit to Chile to return to visit the scene. Before leaving Chile, she broke out in tears as she pledged government help for the victims and their families.

"We are trying to mobilize all possible resources to help in the rescue efforts," Rousseff said. "All I can say at the moment is that my feelings are of deep sorrow."

The disaster recalls other incidents including a 2003 fire at a nightclub in West Warwick, Rhode Island, that killed 100, and a Buenos Aires nightclub blaze in 2004 that killed nearly 200. In both incidents, a band or members of the audience ignited fires that set the establishment ablaze.

Brazil's safety standards and emergency response capabilities are under particular scrutiny as it prepares to host the 2014 World Cup soccer tournament and the 2016 Olympics.

Santa Maria, with a population of more than 275,000, is about 186 miles west of the state capital of Porto Alegre.

Rio Grande do Sul state's health secretary, Ciro Simoni, said emergency medical supplies from all over the state were being sent to the scene.

(Additional reporting by Guillermo Parra-Bernal, Gustavo Bonato, Jeferson Ribeiro, Eduardo Simões and Brian Winter; Writing by Paulo Prada; Editing by Todd Benson, Kieran Murray and Eric Beech)

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