STOCKHOLM (Reuters) - France scored one of the biggest ice hockey upsets ever when they defeated defending champions Russia 2-1 at the world championships in Helsinki on Thursday.

"When I'm 60 I'll tell my grandchildren that I was captain of the team that beat Russia at the world championships," a beaming Vincent Bachet told reporters.

All the scoring came in a see-saw second period, with Damien Fleury and Antoine Roussel notching the vital goals for France after Alexander Perezhogin gave Russia the lead. Alexander Radulov also missed a penalty for the Russians.

The defending champions turned up the heat in the final period but, even with a frenzied offensive effort in the final minutes, the Russians could not find a way through the massed ranks of the French defense.

Despite taking 29 shots to France's 19, Russia came off second best and their unbeaten streak at the world championships ended at 13 games.

In the late game in Helsinki, Martins Cipulis scored after just 15 seconds to put Latvia on the road to a 5-3 win over Slovakia, their first victory of the tournament.

Canadian goalkeeper Mike Smith was the hero in Stockholm, stopping 33 shots to shut out co-hosts Sweden as his side cruised to a 3-0 victory.

The Czech Republic defeated Denmark 2-1 in a shootout after a goal for each side from Zbynek Michalek and Morten Poulsen in the third period forced overtime in the early game in Sweden.

Switzerland remain top of the Stockholm group on 11 points from four matches, ahead of Canada (10), Sweden (9) and Norway (6).

Despite their defeat, Russia maintain their position as leaders of the Helsinki group on goal difference, level on nine points with the United States. Hosts Finland are third with eight with Slovakia in fourth place on six points.

The top four teams in each eight-team group go through to the quarter-finals.

(Editing by John Mehaffey)

I will keep his secret, but there is a young woman he is living with and planning to marry, and I do not believe this is fair to her or her child. He is not happy being a gay man, and that's why he's choosing to live a lie. He was raised in church and feels like he is betraying God by being gay.

How can I support him and lie to this young woman he is with? My son is so confused. How do I help him and keep his secret at the same time? -- ANONYMOUS

DEAR ANONYMOUS: Your son may not be "happy" being a gay man, but that is who he is. For him to keep a secret like this from his fiancee, who plans to share the rest of her life with him, will be more hurtful to her if he goes through with the wedding than telling her now.

Help him by encouraging him to seek counseling through an LGBT community center. It will be strictly confidential, and there is nothing he can tell them they haven't heard before. He has already cracked open his closet door by disclosing his sexual orientation to you. This tells me that on some level he wants to open it all the way.

He is fortunate that he has a parent who is as accepting and wise about life as you. Continue talking to him and encourage him to talk more with you. It may help him to become more comfortable opening up and to accept reality.

DEAR ABBY: I live in a small town where traffic isn't much of a problem. Recently, though, a young man was killed in a car wreck. He ran into a semi because he was texting while driving. His final text was to a friend who had asked if they could get together for a night of fun.

As a rule, we look down on people who drink and drive, as this is unacceptable in today's world. But we do nothing to drivers who text and drive. Please advise your readers that no message is worth dying over. Last night there was another traffic accident caused by the same thing! -- ROBERT IN KILGORE, TEXAS

DEAR ROBERT: Sadly, that "night of fun" will have to be postponed indefinitely. Sometimes it takes a tragedy (or two) to wake people up because they're operating under the delusion that they are the exception to the rules of the road or are invincible.

DEAR ABBY: My mother is in her mid-90s and in good health. She has no intention of dying soon, but asked me an interesting question. She has mileage points with a major airline and was wondering if she can use them for the "final trip" back to her home state for burial when the time comes. Do you know the answer? -- ONE-WAY TICKET

DEAR ONE-WAY: Your question is not only an interesting one, but it's a first. I contacted a spokesperson for a major airline who responded that his company does not accept mileage points as a form of payment for any type of "shipment." For her last flight, your mother would no longer be considered a passenger; she would be cargo, which is why her points idea won't fly.

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.)

The Pentagon this week said China appeared to be cyberspying against the U.S. government, the first time it has made such an assertion in its annual report on Chinese military power. A bill introduced in the Senate on Tuesday would require the president to block imports of products using stolen U.S. technology or made by companies implicated in computer theft.

Washington's sudden focus on Chinese hacking comes after rising complaints from U.S. businesses about theft of trade secrets. Amid growing evidence that the People's Liberation Army and other state-backed groups are behind the infiltrations, Beijing's statements that the cyberhacking allegations are groundless repeated anew Wednesday by the Chinese Defense Ministry are being broadly dismissed.

"Hacking has become a significant sore spot in the U.S.-China relationship," said Abe Denmark, senior director of the National Bureau of Asian Research, an independent U.S.-based think tank. "It encompasses security, trade and intellectual property rights, and has become an issue of strategic significance to Washington."

Thus far, President Barack Obama's administration has mostly sought to apply pressure and avoid a confrontation that could set off a Chinese backlash at a time when Washington wants to keep the economy afloat. The issue was raised on recent visits by U.S. officials, including Secretary of State John Kerry and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey, although Dempsey said that no specific measures to discourage such activity were discussed.

The sides also agreed to form a joint working group to address the matter, adding it to the other disputes that bedevil ties, including trade, North Korea, Iran, Chinese territorial claims and human rights.

There are scant signs of progress so far, with State Department spokesman Patrick Ventrell saying only that "we look forward to engaging in that dialogue."

Chinese hacking and cyberspying are described by experts to be so widespread and persistent that it has caused billions of dollars in economic losses and become an issue of U.S. national security by possibly placing critical infrastructure at risk. Washington is trying to beef up defenses by working with Internet companies and security firms.

The Pentagon report released Monday said China is using its cyber capabilities to collect intelligence against U.S. diplomatic, economic and defense programs. And the report warned that the skills needed for such espionage are similar to those needed to conduct more aggressive cyberattacks.

Though the Pentagon did not pinpoint sources of the hacking, U.S.-based Internet security firm Mandiant said in a February report that it traced years of cyberattacks against 140 mostly American companies to a People's Liberation Army unit in Shanghai. Mandiant executives say attacks originating in China have continued since then, with the exception of those from Shanghai-based Unit 61398 that had been highlighted in its earlier report.

China has called the accusations groundless, saying it's impossible to tell the origin of cyber-intrusions, and complained that it too is a target of hacking, with many attacks coming from the U.S.

"As everyone knows, it's America that is the real 'hackers empire,' People's Daily, the Communist Party's flagship newspaper, wrote in a commentary.

Though China has provided scant specifics, the National Security Agency was tasked in 1997 with developing ways to attack foreign computer networks, according to recently declassified information released last month by the National Security Archive of George Washington University. One of the most successful acts of cyber-sabotage the insertion of the Stuxnet virus into computer systems for Iran's nuclear program in 2010 is believed to have been the work of the U.S. and Israel.

China's Defense Ministry dismissed the Pentagon report, calling it an attempt to "turn black into white and mislead international public opinion," in a statement that did not directly address the assertions about cyberspying and the overall rising capabilities of the PLA.

"In recent years, the United States vigorously developed advanced weapons and equipment and formed an offensive cyberwarfare unit. This is obvious to the international community. The United States has no right to make irresponsible remarks on China's legitimate building of its defense and military," the ministry said.

James Mulvenon, a specialist on the Chinese military and cyberwarfare at Washington, D.C.-based consultancy Defense Group Inc. scoffed at the dismissal. He tweeted: "'Groundless accusations,' eh? Wasted 100s of hours fighting in my networks."

With Beijing so far not forthcoming, often partisan forces in Washington are coalescing around the need for tougher action.

The Senate bill was introduced by a bipartisan group of senators, including Democrat Carl Levin of Michigan and Republican John McCain of Arizona. While it doesn't mention China as a specific target of sanctions, a news release on the legislation notes that "recent reports indicate that China is by far the largest source of theft attempts against U.S. companies."

"We need to call out those who are responsible for cyber theft and empower the president to hit the thieves where it hurts most in their wallets, by blocking imports of products from companies that benefit from this theft," Levin was quoted as saying in the release.

The Senate's bipartisan approach, rising attention from the administration and public expressions of concern from the normally pro-Beijing business community illustrate how the issue has already reached critical mass, said Yu Maochun, a China scholar at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland.

"The Chinese hacking is so staggering and so significantly un-American that it has actually united major bickering and partisan sections of American society, the same way Pearl Harbor or Sept. 11 did," Yu said.

___

Associated Press writers Matthew Lee and Matthew Pennington contributed to this report from Washington.

LOS ANGELES (TheWrap.com) - It's retro week at the box office.

"Evil Dead," a remake of Sam Raimi's gleefully gory 1981 horror classic, and Universal's 3D re-release of Stephen Spielberg's 1993 sci-fi smash "Jurassic Park" are the only two movies opening nationwide this weekend.

That means the overall box office, which is running about 13 percent behind 2012, won't do much catching up this weekend. Last year at this time, "The Hunger Games" was about to cross $300 million with a $33 million third weekend.

On the specialty front, Fox Searchlight is debuting Danny Boyle's crime drama "Trance" on four screens. James McAvoy, Rosario Dawson and Vincent Cassell star in the R-rated tale of an art auctioneer who gets mixed up with a group of criminals partners and a hypnotherapist in order to recover a lost painting.

Sony Classics is opening the R-rated thriller "The Company You Keep." It's directed by Robert Redford, who stars with Shia LaBouf in the story of a former Weather Underground activist who goes on the run from a journalist who has discovered his identity.

Advance ticket sales have been strong for Shane Carruth's "Upstream Color," which indie distributor ERBP is opening at the IFC Center in New York. It's Caruth's second film. His first was the 2004's time-travel thriller "Primer,," which won the Grand Jury Prize for drama at the Sundance Film Festival. Caruth wrote the screenplay, diected, stars and composed the score.

The Weinsstein Company has its horror thriller "6 Souls" in 30 theaters.

As for "Evil Dead," Social-media activity has surged for "Evil Dead" over the past few days, and analysts say it should wind up No. 1 with around $22 million. That will be a win for Sony's TriStar, Film District and Ghost House Pictures, since its production budget is an estimated $17 million.

That's not a lot by Hollywood standards, but it is compared to the budget on Raimi's original "The Evil Dead," which was $375,000. That one made less than $3 million at the box office, with most people seeing it on VHS. Its over-the-top style and gruesome effects made it a cult favorite and set off waves of imitators.

The buzz around the remake took off after it premiered at the South by Southwest Film Festival last month. Good, and gory, was the takeaway. "It makes the 'Saw' movies look like 'The Care Bears," said one fan.

The timing looks right for "Evil Dead."

"Its pedigree and cult appeal give this film a built-in following," BoxOffice.com editor-in-chief Phil Contrino told TheWrap. "Add in the fact there hasn't been a horror film in the market for more than a month, and you've looking at a strong opening."

It's the top selling movie at online ticket seller Fandango.

What's more, "Evil Dead" already has more than 629,000 "likes" on Facebook, compared to the 69,000 that last April's homage/send-up of the genre, "Cabin in the Woods," had three days prior to its release. On Twitter, it's more than 55,000 to 17,000.

Raimi, who has gone on to direct three "Spider-Man" movies and "Oz the Great and Powerful," is a producer, along with Robert Tapert, who produced the original film, and Bruce Campbell, who played the heroic Ash in the original.

Director Alvarez will be making his feature film debut, after catching Raimi's eye with his short film "Panic Attack." He and Rodo Sayagues co-wrote the script, which got a polish by Diablo Cody.

Jane Levy (TV's "Suburgatory") plays the lead, who is taken by a group of her 20-something friends to a remote cabin to get off drugs cold turkey. There, the discovery of a Book of the Dead leads them to unwittingly summon up demons living in the nearby woods, and the blood-letting - and there's plenty of it - begins. Shiloh Fernandez, Lou Taylor Pucci, Jessica Lucas and Elizabeth Blackmore co-star.

"Evil Dead' is rated R, which in theory puts a ceiling on its box-office prospects. But there was really no other choice, if the filmmakers wanted to remain true to the spirit of the original, which was NC-17 for violence and gore. It makes sense to cater to hardcore fans, since the chances that "Evil Dead" will play beyond its genre base are slim. That's why even horror films that open well rarely show staying power at the box office.

"Evil Dead" will be on more than 3,000 screens in North America, and is opening in 20 foreign countries as well.

"Jurassic Park" - for which Universal spent $10 million on the conversion by Stereo D, the same outfit that worked on James Cameron's "Titanic" - will be on roughly 2,600 screens, about 300 of them Imax. T - and that's in line with the recent re-releases of of a couple of other blockbusters.

Last February, "Star Wars Episode 1: The Phantom Menace" was given a 3D re-release in 2,655 theaters. It opened with $22 million and went on to take in $43.4 million domestically.

A couple of weeks later, on this weekend last year, the 3D version of "Titanic" was able to bring in $17.3 million from 2,674 theaters before grossing $58 million total in North America. The 3D "Titanic' was a huge hit in China, however, where it took in an eye-popping $145 million.

Analysts see the 3D "Jurassic Park" landing in the mid-teen millions this weekend and taking in around $40 million over the course of its domestic run Universal is also opening it this weekend in Australia, Hong Kong, Lebanon, Russia, Ukraine and India, with the rest of the foreign rollout starting next week.

During this week's, which begins late Thursday (May 9) Eastern time due to time zone differences, the moon's disk will appear to be about 4.5 percent smaller than the disk of the sun, so the effect is like placing a penny atop a nickel. A ring of sunlight remains visible surrounding , resulting in a ring of fire, or annular, solar eclipse.

The shadow path from which the ring will be visible runs for thousands of miles, but will get no wider than 107 miles (172 kilometers) at the point of greatest eclipse. Much of the path falls over the Pacific Ocean, but at or soon after local sunrise Friday (when it will actually be Thursday in North America), it will slice across a part of northern Australia. []

And in Queensland, amazingly, the eclipse track passes over the very same area that experienced a ! Places that fortuitously find themselves within the path of both eclipses include Kowanyama, Maramie, and Dixie. The center lines of the two eclipses end up crossing just to the northeast of Mitchell-Alice Rivers National Park.

A rare event

Just how often does the same region get twoin less than six months? Certainly it would seem to be an exceptionally rare occurrence.

The mean frequency of a total solar eclipse for any given spot on Earth is once every 375 years, and it's once every 224 years for annular eclipses, according to the famous Belgian eclipse calculator Jean Meeus, By combination, this yields an annular or a total eclipse every 140 years.

But the paths of total and annular solar eclipses, while narrow, can also run for thousands of miles across the surface of the Earth. And sometimes, the paths of two different eclipses cross each other after a short time interval, as happens with the eclipses of November 2012 and May 2013.

When the moon passes squarely in front ofand either completely obscures it or allows a ring of sunlight to remain, we call that a "central" eclipse. A little less than six months is the shortest time interval you can have between two central eclipses.

WARNING:Never look directly at the sun during an eclipse with a telescope or your unaided eye; severe eye damage can result. Scientists and serious eclipse-watchers use special filters to safely view these events. []

Coming attractions

Interestingly, during the 20th century such back-to-back solar eclipses occurred 12 times. But during the 21st century, it happens 23 times.

Prior to 2012-2013, the last time this happened was in 2009-2010 over China. A very long (almost seven-minute) total eclipse occurred on July 22, 2009, followed on Jan. 15 by an.

Chongqing, the largest and most populous of China's four provincial-level municipalities (pop. 31.4 million) was in the totality path in July 2009. Six months later, it ended up on the central line of annularity, with the ring phase lasting 7 minutes and 50 seconds.

The next time this will happen after this week involves two annular eclipses, on Dec. 26, 2019 and June 21, 2020. In fact, the two eclipse tracks will cross each other not once but twice first over Arabia and later over the Pacific Ocean.

And if you live in south-central Texas, the track of an annular eclipse on Oct. 14, 2023 will cross with the track of a total eclipse on April 8, 2024. The middle of each track (roughly 120 miles, or 200 km, wide) will intersect 10 miles (16 km) north of Utopia, Texas which is located to the west of San Antonio.

The annular eclipse will last five minutes, while the total eclipse will run an unusually long 4 minutes 26 seconds. Amazing!

Eclipse drought will soon end

While were on the subject of successive central solar eclipses in certain places, it's worth pointing out that there are other parts of the globe suffering a solar eclipse drought.

Take for example, northern New York State and much of central and northern New England. The last time an eclipse of the sun was visible from these places was on Christmas Day, 2000.

But the wait will finally come to an end later this year when, on Nov. 3, the latter stages of a partial solar eclipse will be visible at sunrise for the Eastern Seaboard, including upstate New York and New England.

Editor's note:If you live in the observing area of this week's solar eclipse and safely snap an amazing picture of the sun that you'd like to sharefor a possible story or image gallery, send photos, comments and your name and location to managing editor Tariq Malik at .

Joe Rao serves as an instructor and guest lecturer at New York's Hayden Planetarium. He writes about astronomy for Natural History magazine, the Farmer's Almanac and other publications, and he is also an on-camera meteorologist for News 12 Westchester, New York.Follow us,and. Original article on.

What matters more here are the dusty rows of government-subsidized, two-story apartment buildings on the outskirts of the once-neglected outpost testament to an effective populist outreach that has won the president millions of loyal backers in the provinces.

That support could give him influence beyond next month's election to pick his successor, underscoring how public opinion is relevant in Iran despite the heavy hand of clerical rule.

At first glance, Ahmadinejad may appear as a mostly spent political force. Damaging internal battles with the Islamic establishment over power and policies have left him so politically toxic in ruling circles that the possible leading candidates to replace him have all joined to ridicule his presidency.

But counting Ahmadinejad out grossly underestimates his most critical asset: A deep well of grateful and loyal supporters in hardscrabble places such as Birjand, a city of nearly 300,000 in wind-swept hills near the border with Afghanistan.

"May God bless Ahmadinejad," said Birjand taxi driver Ali Reza Farsi. "He is my hero."

___

EDITOR'S NOTE: This is the second story in an occasional series examining the June 14 Iranian election and the wider global and internal Iranian consequences at the end of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's era.

___

While Iran's theocracy holds many levers in the election, including vetting all candidates and deciding who appears on the final ballot, public opinion remains a legitimate force in Iran. It gave pro-reform President Mohammad Khatami a landslide re-election in 2001 and unleashed its fury after claims that vote fraud brought Ahmadinejad back for a second term four years ago.

Now, it's Ahmadinejad's backers who could rattle the system. No previous Iranian president has left office on such bad terms with the ruling clerics. A cozy landing for the 56-year-old leader in the inner circle or as an elder statesman is highly unlikely. This leaves Ahmadinejad with his big political ego and his still-significant political base.

"There is no doubt that an Ahmadinejad loyalist is a tough challenger no matter what," said prominent political analyst Saeed Leilaz. "Conservatives and reformists would have to fight an Ahmadinejad loyalist, who has strong supporters in small towns and rural areas."

His main goal has been to get his chief adviser, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, on the June 14 ballot. But the chances that his protege, whose daughter is married to Ahmadinejad's son, would be approved are sharply dimmed because of his messy power struggles with the clerics.

The relationship worsened in 2011 with a dispute over the choice of intelligence minister. The atmosphere became so divisive that Ahmadinejad boycotted government meetings for 11 days to protest being overruled by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the final say in all critical affairs.

Even without Mashaei on the ballot, Ahmadinejad has clout in other ways stemming from his policies funneling money and public works to long-neglected areas.

He could suddenly be transformed from scorned to courted by the front-runners, including a former nuclear negotiator, a top adviser for Khamenei and the mayor of Tehran, if they decide an endorsement from Ahmadinejad could bring in a potential voter windfall in the provinces

Or he could break away and start his own political movement, which could quickly become a serious force. Ahmadinejad cannot run this year because of term limits, but a comeback bid is possible as early as 2017.

The five-day registration period for candidates closes Saturday. The election overseers, known as the Guardian Council, will announce the handful of candidates on the ballot later this month. The list is expected to be weighted heavily toward establishment-friendly hopefuls. Reformists and liberal-leaning groups have been widely crushed and left leaderless after massive street protests following Ahmadinejad's disputed 2009 victory.

Ahmadinejad was the surprise winner in 2005 by portraying himself as a champion of the poor. In many ways, he has remained true to this identity even as he morphed from loyal foot soldier for the theocracy to an agitator who broke taboos and challenged the authority of Khamenei.

Those failed battles left Ahmadinejad politically humbled and openly derided by the presumed front-runners in the June election. But Ahmadinejad has weathered the storms in the hinterlands. For eight years, his political roadshow traveled to small towns and villages across Iran where many people say even local authorities had never visited.

His government redirected oil revenue into development projects and cash handouts in impoverished areas. His critics called it demagoguery and evidence of gross fiscal mismanagement, which is blamed for soaring prices and worsening the blows from international sanctions over Iran's nuclear program. Yet it also earned Ahmadinejad the devotion of millions outside Tehran and other major cities.

In a rare message to his eventual successor, Ahmadinejad said last week that government "subsidies belong to the people" and they should continue despite the shrinking resources under sanctions.

Ahmadinejad has offered no clear signals on his next moves. Any kind of political future, though, would almost certainly tap into the support built in rural areas and small cities such as Birjand, which had some of the highest reported turnout for Ahmadinejad in the past two elections.

"My husband would have never been able to buy a place to live in his lifetime without Ahmadinejad's support. God may prolong his life," said Razieh Esmaeili, 41, whose husband works in a bakery. Last year, they received an apartment in Birjand's Mehr housing development, part of a nationwide low-income project initiated under Ahmadinejad.

"I'll vote only for the candidate Ahmadinejad supports," she added.

In 2005, Ahmadinejad, then mayor of Tehran, reportedly took 88 percent of the votes in Birjand, his highest percentage in the country. In his re-election, Ahmadinejad still took about 70 percent of the votes, according to official results that have been dismissed by opposition groups as tainted with fraud.

The low-income housing project, however, also is an example of the shortcuts taken by Ahmadinejad's government in its populist outreach.

The streets are still dusty. Electricity and natural gas have been hooked up gradually, but some of the houses still don't have water, which is supplied by a tanker truck. Some of the houses were given to residents half-complete.

Still, few in Birjand complain about the president a major contrast to Tehran where even Khamenei in February described Ahmadinejad's combative political style as "bad, wrong, inappropriate."

The taxi driver Farsi likes to recount a story about a 2005 letter he wrote to Ahmadinejad asking for help to expand his small house.

"Two months later," he said, "I got a call from the governor's office" offering a loan of about $3,400.

"My family and I will vote for anyone who will be supported by Ahmadinejad, no matter if is Mashaei or somebody else," said Farsi, who is also an active member of the Basij, a paramilitary force allied with the Revolutionary Guard in the South Khorasan province around Birjand.

But Abdollah Hadinia, conservative editor of Khorasan daily in Birjand, has dropped his support for Ahmadinejad after the feud with Khamenei.

"I was proud of Ahmadinejad's statements. But some of his decisions in the past two years have shamed us," he said. "He deviated from his path, and this has harmed has popularity."

Still, there is little sign of reformist activity in Birjand, which reflects the significant gulf between the pockets of liberal-leaning politics in some of Iran's urban areas and the deep traditionalism in the provinces. Voters in Birjand will likely look to Ahmadinejad for cues on how to vote.

"A pro-Ahmadinejad candidate will have a good number of votes. There are 2,000 villages in South Khorasan province and most people in those villages have benefited from Ahmadinejad's government," said Abolfazl Zahei, a pro-reform activist. "People here care about making their ends meet and welfare, not politics."

___

Murphy reported from Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

TACOMA, Washington (Reuters) - A U.S. soldier who pleaded guilty to killing five fellow servicemen in a shooting spree at a combat stress center in Iraq acted with the tactical precision of a trained soldier as he moved through the clinic, an Army crime scene expert testified on Thursday.

U.S. Army Sergeant John Russell pleaded guilty last month to killing two medical staff officers and three soldiers at Camp Liberty, adjacent to the Baghdad airport, in a 2009 shooting the military has said could have been triggered by combat stress.

Russell faces an abbreviated court-martial at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington state where a military judge will determine the level of his guilt. Russell's sentence, determined by the judge, will hinge greatly on whether he acted with premeditation, as prosecutors say, or on impulse, as the defense argues.

On the fourth day of court-martial proceedings, an Army forensic science officer on scene after the attack testified that Russell had acted with the tactical precision of a trained soldier as he moved through the clinic.

In one instance, the expert said, Russell avoided a splotch of blood next to a victim that his boots would have tracked about the room. In another, after taking two wayward head shots at a fleeing clinic worker, Russell dropped to his knee, bringing his "sight picture down to center mass like a good soldier" and fired again upon the worker, who survived.

"(This was) a deliberate, methodical, complex hunt throughout the building, sir," said Phillip Curran, an Operations Officer in the 11th Military Police Battalion, also known as the Criminal Investigation Command.

"There was nothing disorganized about it," Curran said.

Russell's state of mind during the attacks, which marked one of the worst episodes of soldier-on-soldier violence in the Iraq war, has been central to legal proceedings over the past year at the Pacific Northwest military base, one of the Army's largest.

Defense attorneys, who had not yet made an opening statement, have said Russell suffered a host of mental ailments after several combat tours and was suicidal before the attack. With his mind damaged and unable to get the help he needed, they say, he cracked.

"My plan was to kill myself," Russell said during his plea-hearing. "I wanted the pain to stop."

An independent forensic psychiatrist, Dr. Robert Sadoff of the University of Pennsylvania, concluded that Russell suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and psychosis at the time of the shootings.

Army prosecutors said Russell tried to gain a quick exit from the Army and sought revenge on a mental health worker who would not help him achieve that goal.

Prosecutors have called witnesses who described the more than 40 minutes Russell had to consider his actions as he drove to the clinic with a stolen Ford SUV and M16-A2, how he removed identification tags and the gun's optic, and have described him as having a stone-faced demeanor.

Defense lawyers could make an opening statement and call a first witnesses on Thursday. Sentencing is likely next week.

Russell, who agreed to plead guilty in a deal that will spare him the death penalty, faces up to life in confinement without the possibility of parole, forfeiture of pay and a dishonorable discharge.

(Editing by Cynthia Johnston)

ABUJA/LONDON (Reuters) - Nigeria, they say, has almost as many Manchester United fans as there are Canadians on the planet - 33 million.

Such a figure is hard to verify, but a big contingent of the English soccer team's huge global following undoubtedly lives in the West African nation.

So many Nigerians, like fellow Manchester United supporters from Europe to Asia, were stunned by Wednesday's announcement that veteran manager Alex Ferguson will retire.

"Club football will never be the same again. There are star coaches, there are superstar coaches, there are megastar coaches, and then there is Alex Ferguson," said Sadiq Abdullateef, 38, a lifelong fan in Nigeria's capital, Abuja.

Ferguson, a 71-year-old Scotsman, steps down later this month after 26 years in charge at the club, during which time he became the most successful manager in English soccer history.

Under Ferguson, the club has become a "global brand", and in a survey published last year it claimed to have 659 million followers worldwide, including the 33 million in Nigeria.

Emotions were high on Wednesday in China, where United says it has a following of 108 million. "I never imagined that he would disappear from my world of football. That kind of feeling of not knowing what to do is really awful, and I am not alone," wrote "Hupu Tristan" on Weibo, China's version of Twitter - who admitted to not even being a Manchester United supporter.

In India, fans hailed Ferguson's showmanship. "Standing on the touchline, chewing gum and yelling at players and referees, he was an added entertainment," Dyutiman Basu, a 19-year-old student in Delhi, told Reuters.

THE ONLY SPORT THAT COUNTS

To many Nigerians, soccer is the only sport that counts, and the English Premiership is the only league they follow, at the expense even of the domestic game.

Passions about the fortunes of Manchester United and its rivals Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool run every bit as high in Nigeria as they do back in Britain. Possibly more so.

Nigerians choose their premiership team for all sorts of reasons. Many flocked to Arsenal a decade ago when Nigerian international Nwankwo Kanu played for the north London team. Some even decided to support Bolton Wanderers, a northern team with conspicuously less success in modern times, when compatriot Jay-Jay Okchoa played there from 2002-2006.

But most are Manchester United fans out of respect for Ferguson and his success in the English and European games. "He has made the impossible possible during his reign as the coach of Man U," said Samson Belimote, a 20-year-old student living in the southern Nigerian oil region.

Top Premier League matches are great social occasions. Nigerians watch on anything from tiny TVs to giant screens erected in open "Bush Gardens" in the country's cities and villages. Beer flows freely, raising passions and provoking the odd scuffle between rival fans.

Supporters wear their teams' shirts, some authorized by the clubs but most produced by an energetic counterfeiting industry. Such is the following that Nigerian billionaire Mike Adenuga sponsors United through his mobile phone company Globacom.

IN FERGIE WONDERLAND

"Gutted is the word. I'm still in shock," said Dhruv Dua, a fan in Delhi. "All of us knew the day was coming, but nobody, I mean nobody, expected it to be today. I'm still in Fergie wonderland ... out of words, out of tears."

Speculation raged over who will succeed Ferguson from bar rooms to the Internet. Paul Bassey, General Commissioner of the Confederation of African Football, said the new manager should follow Ferguson's example of winning on a relatively tight budget - unlike rivals such as Chelsea and Manchester City, whose billionaire backers lavish huge sums on star players.

"We hope his replacement will follow the United tradition, not someone who will come and start throwing his money around," said Bassey, a Nigerian living in Abuja.

(Additional reporting by James Jukwey in London, Hui Li in Shanghai, Amlan Chakraborty and Krishna Das in Delhi, Mike Oboh in Abuja, Tife Owolabi in Yenagoa and Isaac Abrak in Kaduna)

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Stephen Hawking toured a stem cell laboratory Tuesday where scientists are studying ways to slow the progression of Lou Gehrig's disease, a neurological disorder that has left the British cosmologist almost completely paralyzed.

After the visit, the 71-year-old Hawking urged doctors, nurses and staff at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center to support the research.

Hawking recalled how he became depressed when he was diagnosed with the disease 50 years ago and initially didn't see a point in finishing his doctorate. But his attitude changed when his condition didn't progress quickly and he was able to concentrate on his studies.

"Every new day became a bonus," he told a packed room.

Cedars-Sinai received nearly $18 million last year from California's taxpayer-funded stem cell institute to study the debilitating disease also known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. ALS attacks nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord that control the muscles. People gradually have more and more trouble breathing and moving as muscles weaken and waste away.

There's no cure and no way to reverse the disease's progression. Few people with ALS live longer than a decade.

Diagnosed at age 21 while a student at Cambridge University, Hawking has survived longer than most. He receives around-the-clock care, can only communicate by twitching his cheek, and relies on a computer mounted to his wheelchair to convey his thoughts in a distinctive robotic monotone.

A Cedars-Sinai patient who was Hawking's former student spurred doctors to invite the physicist to glimpse their stem cell work.

"We decided it was a great opportunity for him to see the labs and for us to speak to one of the preeminent scientists in the world," said Dr. Robert Baloh, who heads the hospital's ALS program.

During the tour, Hawking viewed microscopic stem cells through a projector screen and asked questions about the research, Baloh said.

Cedar-Sinai scientists have focused on engineering stem cells to make a protein in hopes of preventing nerve cells from dying. The experiment so far has been done in rats. Baloh said he hopes to get governmental approval to test it in humans, which would be needed before any therapy can be approved.

Renowned for his work on black holes and the origins of the universe, Hawking is famous for bringing esoteric physics concepts to the masses through his best-selling books including "A Brief History of Time," which sold more than 10 million copies worldwide. Hawking titled his speech to Cedars-Sinai employees "A Brief History of Mine."

Despite his diagnosis, Hawking has remained active. In 2007, he floated like an astronaut on an aircraft that creates weightlessness by making parabolic dives.

Space exploration is important "for the future of humanity," he told the audience.

Hawking said he did not think Earthlings would survive "without escaping beyond your fragile planet."

And he gave some advice: Look up at the stars. Stay curious.

"However difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at," he said.

Doctors don't know why some people with Lou Gehrig's disease fare better than others. Baloh said he has treated patients who lived for 10 years or more.

"But 50 years is unusual, to say the least," he said.

___

Follow Alicia Chang at http://twitter.com/SciWriAlicia

Stanton underwent an MRI exam Tuesday and said the diagnosis was a grade-two strain on the one-to-three scale for the injury. He was hurt trying to beat out a grounder in Monday's 15-inning victory over the New York Mets, and was placed on the 15-day disabled list.

The injury occurred just as last year's NL slugging leader showed signs of emerging from a prolonged slump to start the season. He hit his first home run Saturday and two more Sunday.

"Awesome timing," Stanton said facetiously. "It's a tough break. Pretty frustrating. It's just one of those freak things. There's never a good time, but this was probably one of the worst times to do it."

Last year Stanton hit 37 home runs despite missing 39 games because of injuries. Now the Marlins, already saddled with the worst record in the majors, will be without their best hitter for several weeks.

"If we could just erase all of April, that would be lovely," Stanton said.

He'll be replaced in right field by 22-year-old Marcell Ozuna, who was recalled from Double-A Jacksonville to make his major-league debut.

"When I received the call, I felt very excited," Ozuna said. "I didn't sleep last night."

With Stanton due to become eligible for arbitration after the season, there's already speculation the thrifty Marlins will trade him, and Ozuna would be the leading replacement candidate.

The Dominican was hitting .333 with five homers and 15 RBIs in 10 games with Jacksonville. He's a career .274 hitter in the minors who hit at least 22 home runs each of the past three seasons.