Two U.S. officials said Shabazz was killed Thursday morning in Mexico City. They did not provide additional details and they spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to speak publicly about the case.

Shabazz family publicist Terrie Williams confirmed the death to The Associated Press and said the family would issue a statement later.

Labor activist Miguel Suarez said he was with Shabazz when his friend was beaten up during a dispute over a bill at a Mexico City bar.

Suarez, who was recently deported from the United States to Mexico, told the AP that they and several other people had gone to a bar near the downtown plaza that is home to Mexico City's mariachis.

He said Friday the owner demanded they pay a $1,200 bill and a fight ensued. Suarez says he later found Shabazz injured outside the bar and took him to a hospital where he died on Thursday.

Shabazz was born in 1984 to Qubilah Shabazz, one of six daughters of Malcolm X and his wife Betty Shabazz. Qubilah was 4 years old when she saw her father shot to death as he delivered a speech in a Harlem ballroom in 1965.

In June 1997, Malcolm Shabazz, then 12, set a fire at his grandmother Betty Shabazz's home. She died from severe burns, and he served four years in juvenile detention.

He later expressed regret for his actions, telling The New York Times in 2003 that he would sit on his jail cot and ask for a sign of forgiveness from his dead grandmother.

"I just wanted her to know I was sorry and I wanted to know she accepted my apology, that I didn't mean it," he said. "But I would get no response, and I really wanted that response."

Shabazz also served time on a 2002 attempted robbery conviction, and was released in 2005. In 2006, he pleaded guilty to criminal mischief for smashing the window of a Yonkers doughnut shop.

In recent years, Shabazz said he was writing a memoir and traveling the United States to speak out against youth violence. On his Facebook profile, he said he was attending John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York.

He proudly embraced his grandfather's legacy, describing himself on his Twitter page as "Grandson, name-sake and first male heir of the greatest revolutionary leader of the 20th century."

____

Associated Press writer Bradley Klapper contributed to this report from Washington.

In a speech delivered on Thursday, Gove lashed out against an online resource for history teachers that promotes using the "Mr Men" figures for revision on Nazi Germany.

British media reports on Gove's speech were accompanied by a picture of Mr Fussy, a figure with a Hitler-style moustache and hair-do, one of a panoply of characters such as Mr Happy and Mr Cool created by author Roger Hargreaves.

"I may be unfamiliar with all of Roger Hargreaves's work but I am not sure he ever got round to producing Mr Anti-Semitic Dictator, Mr Junker General or Mr Dutch Communist Scapegoat," Gove told an education conference in Brighton.

"What makes the setting of higher expectations more difficult is the culture of excuses and low aspirations which some in the education establishment still defend," Gove added.

The website ActiveHistory, which offers the Mr Men lesson plan, stresses that the Mr Men exercise is a revision tool, and students should have finished studying the rise of Hitler before embarking on the cartoon exercise.

Gove came under pressure about his own plans to revise the history curriculum earlier this year when historians criticised him in an open letter, saying the scope of his proposed teaching programme was too narrowly focused on Britain.

(Reporting By Shadia Nasralla, editing by Mohammed Abbas and Paul Casciato)

(Reuters) - Retail spending continued to grow modestly in April as bad weather delayed spring shopping in much of the country and frugal consumers gravitated toward discount chains.

Twelve major U.S. retailers reported a 3.7 percent increase in April sales at stores open at least a year, according to Thomson Reuters same-store sales index. That was less than the 4.3 percent increase Wall Street expected.

Wall Street got ahead of itself with upbeat expectations, said AlixPartners' Managing Director Steve Nevill, noting that unemployment remained high and consumers were still worried about their prospects.

"I still don't see us breaking out of this average performance until something big happens to lift consumer confidence," Nevill said.

L Brands Inc , which operates Victoria's Secret, said sales at stores open at least a year, were up 2 percent last month, but missed analysts' estimates at all of its major brands, including Bath & Body Works. The stock was down 1.1 percent.

Costco Wholesale Corpreported a 4 percent gain, slightly less than expected, in part because of sharply lower gas prices. Still, the warehouse club operator said sales of food and consumer electronics were good. Cost shares fell 0.5 percent

In contrast, so-called off-price chains TJX Cos Inc , which operates T.J. Maxx and Marshalls, and Ross Stores Incboth easily beat Wall Street targets, the latest proof that shoppers remained price conscious despite gradual improvements in the job market.

Ross raised its first-quarter profit forecast after reporting a 7 percent gain in same-store sales. Larger rival TJX Cos said same-stores sales rose 8 percent last month. TJX Cos shares added 0.6 percent, while Ross was up 0.2 percent.

Because of the timing of Easter, March sales numbers were artificially low, while April got a boost. Taken together, retail spending grew about 2 percent, roughly in line with trends in the last two years, said International Council of Shopping Centers Chief Economist Michael Niemira.

Spending is not expected to rise much faster than that in the coming months as consumers wrestle with a variety of worries, including the U.S. economy, Europe's economic problems, the debt debate in Washington and employment.

The ICSC expects same-store sales to increase 2 percent to 3 percent this month.

Gap Inc , the last company in the Thomson Reuters Same-Store Sales Index to report, will release its numbers after the stock market closes.

The S&P Retail Indexwas up 0.1 percent at midday.

LOTS OF DISCOUNTING

With the weather cool in much of the country in April, many shoppers' delayed purchases of spring clothing.

Janney Capital Markets analyst Adrienne Tennant said in a note this week that retailers were more aggressive in offering discounts in April, but things eased at the end of the month, suggesting stores had not over-ordered and making it likely they would avoid panicked markdowns.

Fred's Incand Cato Corpeach reported slim sales gains last month.

Retailers that don't report monthly sales posted disappointing numbers. Ann Inc , the parent of the Ann Taylor chain, and Wet Seal Inceach recorded declines in same-store sales for the first quarter.

Last week, drugstore chain Rite Aid Corpsaid same-store sales fell 4 percent in April, largely as many lower-cost generic drugs came to market in the last year. Larger rival Walgreen Coreported a modest 1.2 percent rise, hurt by a drop in sales of general merchandise.

Others did manage to buck the trend. Teen retailers The Buckle Incand Zumiez Increported much better-than-expected April sales on Thursday, and American Apparel Inchad a 3 percent gain. Zumiez shares jumped nearly 4 percent, while Buckle added 1.3 percent.

As previously announced, TJX and Ross will no longer report monthly sales after April. That will leave 11 U.S. chains reporting monthly sales, down from a peak of 68 in 2006. In the years since, big names such as Macy's Inc , Wal-Mart Stores Incand Best Buy Co Inchave dropped out of the same-store sales index.

(Additional reporting by Jessica Wohl in Chicago; Editing by Maureen Bavdek and Jeffrey Benkoe)

Lt. Col. Souleymane Maiga refused to give a timeline, saying only that preparations for the deployment are "in an advanced stage."

Kidal is currently controlled by Tuareg separatists from the NMLA rebel group. The NMLA swept into northern Mali last year. They were soon ousted by al-Qaida-linked Islamic extremists. In January, France launched an operation to help Mali take back the north. Though they purged the main towns of the al-Qaida groups, they failed to stop the NMLA from returning to Kidal, which they now control.

The NMLA has vowed to fight the Malian military should its troops try to enter Kidal.

The Onion makes a living by blurring the lines between the real and the fictional, so much so that the site's satire is often . 

On Monday, that line became even murkier as Syrian hackers apparently took control of The Onion's social media accounts, parodying the site's satirical tone with puzzling statements about the Syrian civil war and the international response it has engendered.

"UN retracts report of Syrian chemical weapon use: 'Lab tests confirm it is Jihadi body odor,'" read one , since deleted. "Syrian Electronic Army was here," read another message, which was posted to several of The Onion's Twitter accounts. 

The SAE — a nebulous group of hackers that backs Syrian President Bashar al-Assad — has claimed responsibility for hacking a number of Western media groups in recent weeks, including NPR, the BBC, and the Associated Press. In the most extreme case, the SAEwith a fake tweet from the AP's account that claimed President Obama had been wounded in an attack on the White House. 

[You can read more about the Syrian Electronic Army and its motives ]

Yet while the Syrian Electronic Army undoubtedlythose accounts, it was at first unclear if The Onion was the group's latest target, or if the site was just playing an elaborate prank. Given that satire is The Onion's bread and butter, there was initially some suspicion that the "hack" was really an inside joke. As Stefan Becket at New York wrote:

— Stefan Becket (@stefanjbecket)

So in this game of satire and cyber-warfare, who can we believe?

In addition to the tweets claiming responsibility for the hacks — which, as the , went out on at least one account that had been dormant for months — the SAE appeared to take credit elsewhere on the web. According to E Hacking News, one of the alleged hackers posted athat showed him/her in control of an Onion Twitter feed.

The tweets in question have all since been deleted, too, indicating that The Onion removed them after regaining control of its accounts. And the site, known for its quick turnarounds on major news items, was even making light of the hack — or, perhaps, perpetuating the joke — in a couple of articles and tweets Monday afternoon.

"After hacking into The Onion’s Twitter account earlier today, members of the Syrian Electronic Army confirmed that the organization simply wanted to have a little fun before soon dying at the hands of rebel forces," anposted Monday night read. "Onion Password Changed To OnionMan77," read theof another post.

— The Onion (@TheOnion)

— The Onion (@TheOnion)

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"I think that we do need to finalize a concept release that we've been working on for many moons here at the CFTC," Commodity Futures Trading Commission Chairman Gary Gensler told a public meeting of the agency on Tuesday.

Hackers took control of the AP's Twitter account on April 23 and sent a false tweet about explosions in the White House that briefly wiped out $136.5 billion of the S&P 500 index's value before markets recovered.

People in the market blamed automated trading for the wild swings.

The CFTC first announced it would come out with a concept release on high-frequency trading and other market structure issues last year.

But last week's events had reminded Gensler of the urgency of the report, he said.

Gensler said he hoped to put the concept release out in the next month or two, adding that the CFTC would seek public comments on it. A concept release constitutes the first tentative step toward possible rulemaking.

(Reporting by Douwe Miedema; Editing by Jan Paschal)

I have a history of alcoholism and she's a hoarder. A week ago, I had an "epiphany": I am desperately trying to quit drinking for my own sake.

Abby, I am a clean freak living with a hoarder. I come home from work and get depressed and stressed from looking at all the clutter. It is driving me insane. I feel like it is triggering me to stay drunk every night.

I don't want to lose this woman and her family, but I can't co-exist in this house. I have left several times, only to miss her and go back. I'm trying to kick the booze, but I know I won't be able to achieve sobriety while living in this house. -- TRULY TORN IN TEXAS

DEAR TRULY TORN: If you quit drinking only a week ago, it is important that you find an AA group to help you hang onto your sobriety. That's step one.

Next, realize that you and the lady you're living with may share a similar problem. You say you are a "clean freak." This can be a symptom of an obsessive-compulsive disorder. Hoarding can be a symptom of the same disorder.

The International OCD Foundation is a reliable resource that may be able to help you both. It offers individuals with this disorder the support they need to manage their symptoms, and has many local chapters. You can locate it online at www.ocfoundation.org or reach it by calling 617-973-5801.

DEAR ABBY: Maybe you would like to pass this on to the parents of teenage boys. It worked for me when I had the sex talk with my sons. I knew their brains had not yet fully developed. They thought they were invincible and had an "it could never happen to me" attitude.

Because money seems to be the one thing at that age they can relate to, I decided to turn it into a mathematical problem: I told them that if they got a girl pregnant, they could figure on a minimum of $300 a month child support, multiplied by 12 months for 18 years. (That totals $65,000 -- unless the girl has twins, which would double the amount.)

Then I told them if they were tempted to have unprotected sex, they should look at the girl and ask themselves if they would pay her $65,000 to have sex with them. If they couldn't answer yes, then they needed to walk away.

Abby, it worked! No grandchildren appeared until after they were married. Feel free to share this with other parents who would appreciate a "non-traditional" approach that is effective. -- TONY IN SAN DIEGO

DEAR TONY: Gladly. I'm passing your technique along because money is a great motivator, and your idea makes "cents."

DEAR ABBY: My roommate insists that undershirts should be washed right-side-out. I say as long as you're using detergent and bleach, it doesn't matter. Who is right? -- MR. CLEAN IN OCEANSIDE, CALIF.

DEAR MR. CLEAN: I don't claim to be a domestic goddess, but I don't think there is a right or wrong way to wash undershirts. I have heard, however, that washing garments inside out will prevent lint buildup on the outside, and in the case of denim, less fading.

Dear Abby is written by Abigail Van Buren, also known as Jeanne Phillips, and was founded by her mother, Pauline Phillips. Write Dear Abby ator P.O. Box 69440, Los Angeles, CA 90069.

Good advice for everyone -- teens to seniors -- is in "The Anger in All of Us and How to Deal With It." To order, send your name and mailing address, plus check or money order for $7 (U.S. funds) to: Dear Abby, Anger Booklet, P.O. Box 447, Mount Morris, IL 61054-0447. (Shipping and handling are included in the price.)

LONDON (Reuters) - Five years after the onset of the global financial crisis, the world economy is in such a chronic condition that the European Central Bank might cut interest rates this week and the Federal Reserve is likely to indicate no let-up in the stimulus it is providing the U.S. economy.

With the euro zone economy in recession, momentum is building for the ECB to lower interest rates for the first time since July 2012, according to senior sources involved in the deliberations.

If the bank does not act on Thursday, a quarter-point cut in June is considered a racing certainty.

The ECB is the most conservative of the world's main central banks. Its main short-term rate, now at 0.75 percent, is higher than the equivalent rate of the Fed, the Bank of England and the Bank of Japan. And unlike its peers the ECB has not engaged in quantitative easing - printing new money to buy bonds.

But the ECB seems to be softening. "I would argue that the ECB should be thinking of easing policy; whether they are currently is more debatable," said Stephen King, global chief economist for HSBC in London.

Only a small majority of 76 economists polled by Reuters expected a cut as early as this week.

The swing factor for King is what is happening to Germany, the euro zone's largest economy. Until recently, Germany had been showing resilience thanks to its export sector. But April's survey of purchasing managers and the Munich IFO institute's monthly poll were distinctly soft.

"Germany is becoming more like everybody else. It is being dragged down, whether it likes it or not, through weakness in southern Europe, slowing growth in China and the depreciation of the Japanese yen," he said.

"None of these things are good for Germany. So the weaker Germany becomes, the easier it is to agree on a common monetary policy," he added.

China's official purchasing managers' survey for April, to be released on Wednesday, is likely to provide more evidence that the world's second-largest economy is shifting down to a lower trend rate of growth after three decades of averaging around 10 percent a year.

Economists polled by Reuters expect the index derived from the survey to have edged up to 51.0 from 50.9 in March, holding above the threshold of 50 that demarcates month-on-month expansion from contraction.

Jian Chang, who tracks the Chinese economy for Barclays in Hong Kong, prefers to describe the economy as being in a stabilisation rather than a recovery phase.

"As long as the PMI comes in above 50 it will show that modest, slow growth is continuing," she said.

Global markets have become addicted to the drug of super-fast Chinese growth and tend to react badly to signs of softness. But Chang said the authorities in Beijing, intent on guiding the economy to a more sustainable growth rate, are not panicking.

There has been no big investment package, for example, to support the government's urbanization drive.

Policymakers will be comfortable as long as growth for the year as a whole comes in above their target of 7.5 percent, she said. Barclays is forecasting an outcome of 7.9 percent.

Whether that target is met will depend in part on an improvement in exports to the European Union and to the United States, which on Friday reported a disappointingly soft first-quarter gross domestic product growth rate of 2.5 percent.

The pace of expansion has averaged just 1.4 percent over the last two quarters and 1.8 percent over the past year, noted Jay Feldman, director of U.S. economic research at Credit Suisse in New York.

"All in all, growth is persistent, but decidedly underwhelming. At this trajectory, achieving a labor market recovery beyond the fits-and-starts progress of the last few years will be a challenge," he told clients.

Figures this week are likely to fit into the same pattern.

The Institute of Supply Management's April manufacturing survey is forecast to dip to 51.0 from 51.3 in March, while the economy is likely to have generated 150,000 jobs in April, up from just 88,000 in March but not enough to reduce the jobless rate from 7.6 percent.

Because the Fed has pledged to stick to its super-loose policy until unemployment falls to 6.5 percent, the central bank is expected to confirm at this week's policy meeting that it will keep buying $85 billion in bonds every month to keep bond yields low and encourage investment.

Talk had started to grow that the Fed might start to wind down, or taper its quantitative easing program. But after the latest economic data, the central bank's tone is likely to change, according to Steve Ricchiuto, chief U.S. economist for Mizuho Securities in New York.

"They're going to come out of this meeting with a more balanced view on tapering and say, we could increase or we could taper'," he said.

Indeed, price pressures are so muted because of slack in the economy that some Fed policymakers have raised the prospect of injecting even more stimulus.

The core personal consumption expenditure deflator, the Fed's favorite inflation gauge, rose just 1.3 percent in the year to March, Friday's GDP report showed.

"Low inflation leaves that much more leeway for the Fed to focus on growth and jobs. If the core PCE index falls much farther, look for inflation being too low' to show up in more Fed communications," Feldman said.

(Editing by Greg Mahlich)

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - After the failure of "Rise of the Guardians," DreamWorks Animation desperately needs a hit, so the studio has a lot riding on "The Croods."

The prehistoric animated film features the voices of Nicolas Cage and Emma Stone and lands in theaters on Friday. Most critics enjoyed the film, although a few reviewers groused that it failed to achieve the emotional highpoints of classic children's movies like "Toy Story" and "Up."

"The Croods" received a respectable 61 percent "fresh" rating on critics aggregator Rotten Tomatoes. It may not be as revolutionary as the discovery of fire, but from the sound of most reviews it makes for a perfectly diverting, family friendly hour and a half at the multiplex.

TheWrap's Alonso Duralde hailed the film for applying a light touch to the Stone Age antics and for playfully sending up teenage angst by setting its central father-daughter conflict against an early man backdrop.

"After the dreary 'Ice Age' movies made Pangaea tedious and stridently unfunny, it's a thrill to get a movie that gives tectonic shift a good name," Duralde wrote. "This new effort from writer-directors Chris Sanders (co-director of 'How to Train Your Dragon' and 'Lilo & Stitch') and Kirk De Micco ('Space Chimps') offers genuine comedy and compelling characters with dazzling visuals that feature both imaginary beasts (carnivorous birds, a candy-colored saber-toothed cat) and moments that approach photo-realism."

Neil Genzlinger complained in the New York Times that the film's plot is burdened with cliches, though he enjoyed the animation and the voice cast's work.

"The movie is at its most interesting and amusing when riffing on how cavemen might have reacted to new experiences and ideas, like fire and shoes," Genzlinger wrote. "Whether the kiddies will appreciate that is unclear, but they'll certainly like the voice work done by Emma Stone as Eep. She puts refreshing spunk into a character who otherwise is, alas, doomed to follow the same old story line."

Kyle Smith in the New York Post hated Cage's vocalization almost as much as Genzlinger adored Stone's performance. Though to be fair, that was hardly his only gripe.

"I'd like to take back all those times I said Nicolas Cage was one of the most annoying actors on film. It turns out he's equally terrible when he's only on the soundtrack," Smith wrote in a one-star review. "And yet Cage is the least of the problems with 'The Croods,' an animated comedy about cavemen whose writers took things a little too literally when they were told to write Cro-Magnon humor."

The Associated Press' Christy Lemire found delight in many of the same elements where Smith found disdain. She praised the film as brisk even if the plot is overly familiar. In particular, Lemire was dazzled by the animated picture's use of 3D imagery.

"Much of the lush landscape and vivid details feel as if they were taken directly from 'Avatar,' and a similar sense of wonder propels these stronger segments," Lemire wrote. "The lighting can indeed be magical, so it's no surprise that we are urged over and over again to step into it."

For Keith Staskiewicz of Entertainment Weekly, "The Croods" falls pretty far down the animated film evolutionary ladder.

"A handful of adrenalizing sequences of animated anarchy can't save this story from feeling overly primitive," he wrote.

The economy grew at a 2.5 percent annual rate in the first three months of the year, the government said. That was below the 3.1 percent forecast by economists.

The shortfall reinforced the perception that the economy is grinding, rather than charging, ahead. Investors have also been troubled by reports in the last month of weaker hiring, slower manufacturing and a drop in factory orders. Many economists see growth slowing to an annual rate of around 2 percent a year for the rest of the year.

U.S. government bonds, where investors seek safety, rose after the report.

"There are some concerns as we head into the summer," said JJ Kinahan, chief derivatives strategist for TD Ameritrade. "In the last three weeks, we've seen numbers that weren't exactly what you'd love to see."

Corporate earnings this week have also contained worrisome signs. Many companies missed revenue forecasts from financial analysts, even as they reported higher quarterly profits. For example, Goodyear Tire slipped 3.3 percent to $12.51 Friday after revenue fell short of analysts' estimates, hurt by lower global tire sales.

Of the companies that have reported earnings so far, 70 percent have exceeded Wall Street's expectations, compared with a 10-year average of 62 percent, according to S&P Capital IQ. But 43 percent have missed revenue estimates. Just over half of the companies in the S&P 500 have reported quarterly results.

The S&P 500 index dropped 2.92 points, or 0.2 percent, to close at 1,582.24.

The Dow rose 11.75 points, or 0.1 percent, to 14,712.55. The index got a big lift from Chevron. Profit for the U.S. oil company beat expectations of financial analysts in the first quarter, pushing shares up 1.3 percent to $120.04.

Three stocks fell for every two that rose on the New York Stock Exchange.

Both indexes were up for the week and remain slightly below their all-time highs reached April 11. The Dow index rose 1.1 percent this week while the S&P gained 1.7 percent.

The market has been bolstered by the Federal Reserve's easy money policy. The disappointing growth figure for the economy will ensure that the Fed sticks with its stimulus policy, providing support for stocks, said Peter Cardillo, chief market economist at Rockwell Global Capital.

"The economic data that we've been getting points to no early exit for the Fed's stimulus," Cardillo said.

The Nasdaq composite fell 10.72 points to 3,279.26, a decline of 0.3 percent. The index is 2.3 percent higher this week.

The tech-heavy index has lagged the Dow and the S&P 500 this year, but it led the way higher this week, boosted by Microsoft. The software giant, which makes up 5.3 percent of the Nasdaq, recorded its biggest weekly gain since January of last year up 6.8 percent. It reported earnings April 19 that beat Wall Street expectations. The company also began an aggressive push into the computer tablet market.

Apple, the largest stock in the Nasdaq, also had a good week. The stock rose 6.8 percent to $417.20, its best weekly gain since November, despite posting a decline in quarterly profit Tuesday. Apple accounts for 7.6 percent of the Nasdaq composite.

Among other big names investors focused on:

Amazon.com fell 7 percent to $254.81 after the company warned of a possible loss in the current quarter. The online retailer also reported lower income for the first quarter as it continued to spend heavily on rights to digital content.

Expedia fell 10 percent to $58.56 after the online travel company reported a quarterly loss.

Homebuilder D.R. Horton surged 8.7 percent to $26.66 after its income nearly tripled thanks to a continuing recovery the housing market. The results handily beat the forecasts of financial analysts who follow the company.

J.C. Penney jumped 12 percent to $17 after the billionaire financier George Soros disclosed that he had taken a 7.9 percent stake in the struggling company.

In government bond trading, the yield on the 10-year Treasury note slipped to its lowest rate of the year, 1.67 percent, from 1.71 percent the day before. The yield has fallen from 2.06 percent six weeks ago as traders move money into lower-risk investments.

The dollar weakened against the euro.

The European currency bought $1.3029 at the end of day, compared with $1.3002 the day before. The ISE dollar index, which measures the U.S. currency against a group of other world currencies including the Japanese yen and the euro, dropped 0.3 percent, to 82.48.