The sentence, handed down by U.S. District Judge Harry Leinenweber, was the maximum sought by federal prosecutors.

The attacks killed more than 160 people, including six Americans. Headley, a 52-year-old U.S. citizen of Pakistani descent, admitted videotaping sites that were targeted by the Mumbai attackers.

He was arrested in 2009 and pleaded guilty to 12 charges, including conspiracy to bomb places of public use and commit murder and plotting an attack on a Danish newspaper.

After entering his plea in 2010, Headley cooperated with U.S. investigators and foreign intelligence agencies to avoid the death penalty and extradition to India, Pakistan or Denmark, agreeing to testify in foreign judicial proceedings, the government said.

In a memorandum filed with Judge Leinenweber earlier this week, the government said "there is little question that life imprisonment would be an appropriate punishment for Headley's incredibly serious crimes but for the significant value provided by his immediate and extensive cooperation."

Last week, Judge Leinenweber sentenced Pakistani-born businessman Tahawwur Rana to 14 years in federal prison for providing support to the Lashkar-e-Taiba, the group blamed for the Mumbai attacks.

(Reporting by James B. Kelleher; Editing by Cynthia Johnston)

IOWA CITY, Iowa (AP) -- Disgraced businessman Russ Wasendorf Sr. should receive the maximum 50-year prison sentence for a $215 million fraud that victimized more than 10,000 customers and bankrupted his Iowa-based brokerage, federal prosecutors argued Tuesday.

The U.S. Attorney's Office said in a filing that federal guidelines call for Wasendorf to be sentenced to life in prison, which means the founder and CEO of Peregrine Financial Group should get the maximum sentence his charges carry.

U.S. District Judge Linda Reade should make the terms on separate counts run one after another for a full 50-year sentence "to achieve the total punishment called for under the guidelines," prosecutors argued. Wasendorf, 64, would likely spend the rest of his life behind bars if Reade agrees at the Jan. 31 sentencing hearing in Cedar Rapids.

Wasendorf pleaded guilty in September to mail fraud, embezzling customer funds and making false statements to two regulatory agencies. He admitted he used customer money that was supposed to be held separately to prop up his company, known as PFGBest, and hid the theft from colleagues and regulators by making phony financial statements over a 20-year period.

Defense attorney Jane Kelly had no comment Tuesday, but she has argued the loss was less than $200 million and Wasendorf's scheme was not sophisticated two factors that could reduce the length of his recommended sentence.

Prosecutors disputed both claims, saying Wasendorf carried out "an exceedingly complex scheme" that inflated his business and personal wealth through the theft of customer funds.

Wasendorf tightly controlled the company's bank accounts, and used computers and copiers to create phony bank statements, deposit slips, and checks to cover up the theft, prosecutors said. His system fooled colleagues, who submitted false financial statements to regulators.

Prosecutors said the National Futures Association nearly discovered the fraud during a 2011 audit, but Wasendorf went to great lengths to conceal it. He convinced a PFG employee that a clerk pulled the wrong account balance, told US Bank personnel they mistakenly received the confirmation form, and then submitted a fabricated form from his home fax machine, they wrote.

Prosecutors said the $215 million loss could be "calculated with remarkable precision," unlike many other frauds. That figure represents the difference between the $376 million customers unwittingly entrusted with PFGBest, and the amount the company had in the bank.

Wasendorf used customer funds to expand PFG, even though it was never profitable and lost "tens of millions of dollars," prosecutors wrote. He told investigators that if he could make himself appear rich and successful, regulators "would not discover it was all a fraud," they added.

PFGBest collapsed in July after Wasendorf was found unconscious in his car in the company's parking lot with a tube hooked up to the exhaust pipe. Investigators say he attempted suicide after learning his company would be forced to give regulators electronic access to its bank accounts and he would no longer be able to hide his fraud. Regulators seized the company after learning $200 million was missing.

The bankruptcy left investors who had 24,000 accounts unable to access their money. Customers who invested in commodities have received 30 percent of their money back and expected are to eventually get back between 50 and 60 percent, said John Roe, co-founder of the Commodity Customer Coalition, which is helping customers.

Thousands of others who opened accounts to trade foreign currency or invest in coins or bullion have not received any funds, and it's not clear how they will fare since those investments had fewer protections, he said.

Prosecutors said they would respond in court to any defense request for a sentence of less than 50 years for Wasendorf.

Reade has a reputation for handing out tough sentences. She signaled in October one is on the way for Wasendorf when she overruled a magistrate's recommendation that he be released pending sentencing, saying he had an incentive to flee.

"Defendant faces a long sentence, and, in combination with his advanced age, there is a high likelihood that he will spend the remainder of his life in prison," Reade wrote.

[More from BGR: ]

and in Japan, it is clearly working in that regard. Nikkei notes thatthe Nexus 7 costs 19,800 yen in Japan, compared to entry-level prices of 42,800 yen and 28,800 yen for the iPad and iPad mini, respectively.

[More from BGR: ]

The Japanese arm of market research firm IDC notes that Japan is a relatively small market, though according to its estimates, a total of 3.6 million tablets were sold in Japan during 2012.

This article was

Few athletes have inspired so many backhanded compliments as Australia's Bernard Tomic, who has alienated the country's entire tennis establishment while keeping his fans in the palm of his hand.

The lanky 20-year-old has packed a lot into a year, going from the toast of the nation with a fourth-round run at his home grand slam in 2012, to a pantomime villain booted out of the Davis Cup team for a perceived lack of commitment.

In the space of a week, the pendulum of public opinion has swung back in Tomic's favor at Melbourne Park.

The Australian number one will head into Saturday's third-round clash against Roger Federer willed on by 15,000 of his compatriots at Rod Laver Arena.

The 43rd-ranked Tomic brings a lone ATP title on his resume, won at the Sydney International in the leadup, versus Federer's 17 grand slam titles.

He has not let the gulf in achievement quell his bluster, however, declaring himself full of the belief to win.

The Federer clash will be a re-match of their fourth-round encounter at Melbourne Park last year, when a marginally more humble Tomic was spanked in straight sets.

Tomic's performance against Federer after another year's development will be under the microscope, according to Mats Wilander, who says the player's unorthodox style - and his willingness to trust - are his greatest assets.

"When you're trying to play like everyone else, running around and hitting forehands as often as possible...then you can see there's a limit to it," he told Reuters.

"But with Bernard he gets into a zone and he doesn't see Djokovic the other side, he sees the opportunities.

"We don't know how good he can be. No one should ever think that they could put a limit on someone who plays that unorthodox with so much feel," added Wilander.

PLAYBOY IMAGE

"For me there's really only physically that he can be stopped. Mentally and feel-wise he's as good as the best players in the world."

Wilander's analysis jars with the enduring image of Tomic on Australian television, a sports car driving playboy in Queensland's Gold Coast getting into trouble for thumbing his nose at traffic police.

Tomic, who is still coached by his father and cosseted by his team, has been accused of being lazy by Davis Cup captain Pat Rafter, who expressed concerns he would never fulfill his potential.

The criticisms appeared justified as the player appeared to stop trying in a series of matches last year, earning the nickname "Tomic the Tank Engine".

Other Australian tennis identities have queued up to lay the boot in, with his former coach declaring him a 'lost soul' and former U.S. Open champion Sam Stosur suggesting he needed to "knuckle down" in his career.

Tomic's success leading into his match against Federer has seen olive branches offered by Rafter, however, with Australia desperate for an heir to ageing former world number one Lleyton Hewitt.

But only hard work and time will tell if Tomic can make it, Swede Wilander said.

"Physically, I have no idea whether he can do two, three or four hours against Novak. That remains to be seen," he added.

"To have the physical stuff that it takes, that they have, you're talking about 1,000 hours of work and two hours in the gym every day for the next two years.

"You have to be willing to go to the gym and do pushups and thousands of hours and it hurts every second.

"Somebody needs to get that message across (to him) very clearly. This is what it takes. Why would you be in the game if you don't want to be your best? And with his talent, that could probably mean being number one in the world.

"But he needs somebody to explain it to him."

(Editing by John Mehaffey)

Police found Swartz's body in his apartment in the New York City borough of Brooklyn on Friday, according to a spokeswoman for the city's chief medical examiner, which ruled the death a suicide by hanging.

Swartz is widely credited with being a co-author of the specifications for the Web feed format RSS 1.0, which he worked on at age 14, according to a blog post on Saturday from his friend, science fiction author Cory Doctorow.

RSS, which stands for Rich Site Summary, is a format for delivering to users content from sites that change constantly, such as news pages and blogs.

Over the years, he became an online icon for helping to make a virtual mountain of information freely available to the public, including an estimated 19 million pages of federal court documents from the PACER case-law system.

"Information is power. But like all power, there are those who want to keep it for themselves," Swartz wrote in an online "manifesto" dated 2008.

"The world's entire scientific and cultural heritage, published over centuries in books and journals, is increasingly being digitized and locked up by a handful of private corporations. ... sharing isn't immoral it's a moral imperative. Only those blinded by greed would refuse to let a friend make a copy," he wrote.

That belief - that information should be shared and available for the good of society - prompted Swartz to found the nonprofit group DemandProgress.

The group led a successful campaign to block a bill introduced in 2011 in the U.S. House of Representatives called the Stop Online Piracy Act.

The bill, which was withdrawn amid public pressure, would have allowed court orders to curb access to certain websites deemed to be engaging in illegal sharing of intellectual property.

Swartz and other activists objected on the grounds it would give the government too many broad powers to censor and squelch legitimate Web communication.

But Swartz faced trouble in July 2011, when he was indicted by a federal grand jury of wire fraud, computer fraud and other charges related to allegedly stealing millions of academic articles and journals from a digital archive at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

According to the federal indictment, Swartz - who was a fellow at Harvard University's Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics - used MIT's computer networks to steal more than 4 million articles from JSTOR, an online archive and journal distribution service.

JSTOR did not press charges against Swartz after the digitized copies of the articles were returned, according to media reports at the time.

Swartz, who pleaded not guilty to all counts, faced 35 years in prison and a $1 million fine if convicted. He was released on bond. His trial was scheduled to start later this year.

'HARSH ARRAY OF CHARGES'

In a statement released Saturday, the family and partner of Swartz praised his "brilliance" and "profound" commitment to social justice, and struck out at what they said were decisions made at MIT and by prosecutors that contributed to his death.

"Aaron's death is not simply a personal tragedy. It is the product of a criminal justice system rife with intimidation and prosecutorial overreach," the statement said.

"The U.S. Attorney's office pursued an exceptionally harsh array of charges, carrying potentially over 30 years in prison, to punish an alleged crime that had no victims," it added.

A spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's office said they wanted to respect the family's privacy and did "not feel it is appropriate to comment on the case at this time." MIT could not be reached for comment

Swartz's funeral is scheduled for Tuesday in Highland Park, Illinois. On Saturday, online tributes to Swartz flooded across cyberspace.

"Aaron had an unbeatable combination of political insight, technical skill and intelligence about people and issues," Doctorow, co-editor of the weblog Boing Boing, wrote on the site.

Doctorow wrote that Swartz had "problems with depression for many years."

Swartz also played a role in building the news-sharing website Reddit, but left the company after it was acquired by Wired magazine owner Conde Nast. Recalling that time of his life, Swartz described his struggles with dark feelings.

In an online account of his life and work, Swartz said he became "miserable" after going to work at the San Francisco offices of Wired after Reddit was acquired.

"I took a long Christmas vacation," he wrote. "I got sick. I thought of suicide. I ran from the police. And when I got back on Monday morning, I was asked to resign."

Tim Berners-Lee, who is credited as the most important figure in the creation of the World Wide Web, commemorated Swartz in a Twitter post on Saturday.

"Aaron dead," he wrote. "World wanderers, we have lost a wise elder. Hackers for right, we are one down. Parents all, we have lost a child. Let us weep."

(Reporting by Alex Dobuzinskis in Los Angeles and P.J. Huffstutter in Chicago; Editing by Colleen Jenkins, Doina Chiacu and Philip Barbara)

Paychecks across the country have shrunk over the last week due to higher federal tax rates, and workers are already cutting back on spending, which will drag on the economy this year.

In Warren, Rhode Island, Ben DeCastro got his first paycheck on Friday in which taxes on his wages rose by 2 percentage points. That works out to about $30 a week.

"You sit back and do the calculation, and that's $30 I'm not going to spend at a restaurant," said DeCastro.

He said he worries that people hit by higher taxes will spend less at the chain of furniture stores where he works as a marketing manager.

Politicians in Washington made much hubbub last week about a bipartisan deal to soften or postpone some $600 billion in scheduled tax hikes and government spending cuts. President Barack Obama said the deal would shield 98 percent of Americans from a middle-class tax hike.

Nevertheless, for most workers, rich and poor alike, taxes went up on December 31 as a temporary payroll tax cut expired. That cut - a 2 percentage point reduction in a levy that funds Social Security - was put in place two years ago to help the economy, which was still smarting from the 2007-09 recession.

About 160 million workers pay this tax, and the increase will cost the average worker about $700 a year, according to the Tax Policy Center, a Washington think tank.

"It stinks," said Beverly Renfroe, an accountant for a realty firm in Jackson, Mississippi. "I definitely noticed a decrease."

The pain will trickle through the economy over the next few weeks. Already, the new rate of 6.2 percent has trimmed paychecks for about half of the 200,000 employees whose paychecks are processed by Advantage Payroll Services, a payroll firm based in Auburn, Maine.

"HEADWIND TO GROWTH"

Economists estimate the payroll tax hike will reduce household incomes by a collective $125 billion this year. Some households could reduce contributions to retirement accounts or other savings, but most are also expected to cut back on spending.

That alone could reduce economic growth this year by about 0.6 percentage point, said Michael Feroli, an economist at JPMorgan in New York City.

"The headwind to growth should be noticeable," he said.

Most mainstream economists say the government should still be trying to stimulate the economy by lowering taxes or raising spending to help bring down the 7.8 percent jobless rate.

Even Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has said Congress could consider short-term stimulus measures if they can be coupled with a plan to tame the deficit over the long run.

But a consensus has emerged between Congress and the White House that the federal government should step up the pace at which it cuts the deficit, which ballooned during the recession.

That decision is having repercussions across the country.

In Bergenfield, New Jersey, Evelyn Weiss Francisco has put off plans to upgrade her cell phone and thinks she might go to fewer music concerts. A director at a public relations firm, she thinks the higher payroll taxes will cost her about $1,000 this year.

Some Americans will also pay higher income taxes this year. Congress and Obama let income tax rates rise for households making more than $450,000 a year, a partial repeal of tax cuts put in place under President George W. Bush. The wealthy will also pay a new tax to help fund a health insurance reform passed in 2010.

These will have a smaller impact on the wider economy because they affect fewer people. But taken together, this year's tax hikes could subtract a full percentage point from growth, Feroli said.

Most economists see economic growth of roughly 2 percent this year, a lackluster pace held back by the government's austerity measures that is likely to do little to reduce unemployment.

Failure to postpone government spending cuts due to begin around March would slow growth more, further frustrating the economic recovery.

DROP THAT BAGEL

The blow to the economy from the tax hikes will hurt the most during the first half of the year as people adapt to their smaller paychecks.

Consumer spending, which drives more than two thirds of the economy, will likely grow at a mere 1 percent annual rate in the first quarter, and 1.5 percent in the second, said Sven Jari Stehn, an economist at Goldman Sachs in New York.

Nicki Hagen, who received her first reduced paycheck on January 4 and then another on Friday, estimates the higher taxes will shrink her paychecks by about $10 a week.

She has already started holding back from coffee-and-bagel runs made by coworkers at the home improvement company where she works as an office administrator in New York City.

She expects a much bigger hit to her family's income when her husband gets his first paycheck for 2013 on Tuesday.

The two will then sit down and figure out how to budget their money. They might cut cable channels, or take vacation days when their daughter is out of school to save on babysitter expenses.

"This is going to affect our lives," she said.

(Additional reporting by Emily Le Coz in Jackson, Mississippi, and Jessica Toonkel in New York; Editing by Xavier Briand)

"The rejected measures represent 300 to 500 million euros. Our deficit-cutting path will not be affected," Moscovici told BFM television.

He added that the Socialist government would resubmit a proposal to raise taxes on high incomes in 2013 and 2014.

(Reporting by Julien Ponthus and Catherine Bremer; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Rolling out a wide-ranging plan for executive and legislative action to curb gun violence, Obama set up a fierce clash with the powerful U.S. gun lobby and its supporters in Congress, who will resist what they see as an encroachment on constitutionally protected gun rights.

Obama presented his agenda at a White House event in front of an audience that included relatives of some of the 20 first graders who were killed along with six adults by a gunman on December 14 at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.

"We can't put this off any longer," Obama said, vowing to use "whatever weight this office holds" to make his proposals reality. "Congress must act soon," he said, flanked by schoolchildren.

In a sign of how bitter the fight over gun control could get, the National Rifle Association released an advertisement hours before Obama spoke that accused him of hypocrisy for accepting armed Secret Service protection for his daughters. The White House condemned the ad as "repugnant.

Until now, Obama had done little to change America's gun culture. But just days before his second inauguration, he appears determined to champion gun control in his next term, which also will be dominated by debt and spending fights with Congress and a likely debate over immigration reform.

His plan calls on Congress to renew a prohibition on assault weapons sales that expired in 2004, require criminal background checks on all gun purchases, including closing a loophole for gun show sales, and pass a new federal gun trafficking law - long sought by big-city mayors to keep out-of-state guns off their streets.

He also announced 23 steps he intends to take immediately without congressional approval. These include improving the existing system for background checks, lifting the ban on federal research on gun violence, putting more counselors and "resource officers" in schools and better access to mental health services.

ASSAULT WEAPONS BATTLE

Obama, who has called the day of the Newtown massacre the worst of his presidency, looked down into the audience and addressed the parents of one of the Sandy Hook victims, Grace McDonald, 7, saying he had hung one of her paintings in his private study.

"Every time I look at that painting, I think about Grace, and I think about the life that she lived and the life that lay ahead of her, and most of all I think about how when it comes to protecting the most vulnerable among us, we must act now," he said.

As he announced the gun measures, Obama was accompanied by four children chosen from among those who sent letters to him about gun violence and school safety. "We should learn from what happened at Sandy Hook. I feel really bad," 8-year-old Grant Fritz wrote, in a portion Obama read from the podium.

The most contentious piece of the package is Obama's call for a renewed ban on military-style assault weapons, a move that is unlikely to win approval because Republicans who control the House of Representatives are expected to oppose it.

The Newtown gunman, 20-year-old Adam Lanza, used a Bushmaster AR-15 type assault rifle to shoot his victims, most of them 6- and 7-year-olds, before killing himself.

Law enforcement experts have noted, however, that the tighter background checks that Obama is proposing would not have prevented the Connecticut school massacre because the gunman's weapon was purchased legally by his mother.

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a staunch gun control advocate, said tighter controls were needed no matter what.

"No piece of legislation is perfect and no piece of legislation is 100 percent effective. Think of it like a speeding limit. You may every once in a while violate the speeding limit, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't have speeding limits - they protect people's lives," he told reporters.

At the firearm industry's largest trade show in Las Vegas, Gary Svecko - adding a Glock 17 pistol to his gun collection - dismissed Obama's bid to ban assault weapons purchases and blamed video games for inciting violence.

"You know the old saying, 'Guns don't kill people. People kill people'," Svecko, 58, said, citing a common argument of gun enthusiasts. "I think they should ban those stupid video games."

Shares of gun manufacturers, including Smith & Wesson and Sturm Ruger, rose more than 5 percent after Obama unveiled his proposals. Since Newtown, FBI background checks required for gun purchases have soared, indicating more people are trying to buy weapons, likely out of concern that new restrictions may be imposed.

CONTROVERSIAL NRA AD CAMPAIGN

Underscoring the tough political battle ahead, the NRA launched an advertising campaign against Obama's gun control effort and deployed its lobbyists in force on Capitol Hill.

The NRA, in a TV and Internet spot, accused Obama of being "just another elitist hypocrite" for accepting Secret Service protection for his young daughters but turning down the lobby group's proposal to put armed guards in all schools.

"Only honest, law-abiding gun owners will be affected and our children will remain vulnerable to the inevitability of more tragedy," the group said in response to Obama's proposals.

Administration officials sketched out legislative goals in a conference call with reporters but offered no draft legislation or any clear explanation of how they would overcome the hurdles. They said the list of executive actions would cost $500 million in the federal budget for the 2014 fiscal year.

With gun ownership rights enshrined in the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, gun restrictions have long been a divisive - and risky - issue in American politics.

But polls show public sentiment shifted in favor of tighter gun control fueled by outrage after Newtown, and Obama hopes to take advantage while there is a mood for action in Washington. The pattern after shooting tragedies is that memories of the events soon fade, making it hard to sustain a push for policy changes.

Obama acknowledged the political challenges but made clear he is prepared to take on the NRA, despite its support among Republicans and significant backing among Democrats.

He warned that opponents of his effort would try to "gin up fear" and urged lawmakers to put children's safety above getting an 'A' grade from the gun lobby that supports their campaign."

Michael Steel, a spokesman for Republican House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner, was noncommittal. "House committees of jurisdiction will review these recommendations. And if the Senate passes a bill, we will also take a look at that," he said.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a pro-gun-rights Democrat from Nevada, also responded cautiously, saying "all options should be on the table" to reduce gun violence.

Obama's initiative treads carefully on whether violent movies and video games contribute to gun violence. An administration official said, however, that Obama would seek $10 million to fund studies of the causes of gun violence, including any relationship to video games and media images.

Wednesday's proposals stem from a month-long review led by Vice President Joe Biden, who met advocates on both sides, including officials from the arms and entertainment industries.

(Additional reporting by Jeff Mason, Steve Holland, Roberta Rampton, Thomas Ferraro in Washington and Timothy Pratt in Las Vegas; editing by Alistair Bell and Philip Barbara)

Boeing's shares fell 3.3 percent as analysts began to lose some of their conviction in the stock, which had held up relatively well despite the dozen or so issues with the plane over the last six weeks.

All Nippon Airways Cosaid instruments aboard a domestic flight indicated a battery error, triggering emergency warnings. Shigeru Takano, a senior safety official at the Civil Aviation Bureau, said a second warning light indicated smoke.

Wednesday's incident, described by a transport ministry official as "highly serious" - language used in international safety circles as indicating there could have been an accident - is the latest mishap to hit the world's first mainly carbon-composite airliner in recent days.

"I think you're nearing the tipping point where they need to regard this as a serious crisis," said Richard Aboulafia, a senior analyst with the Teal Group in Fairfax, Virginia. "This is going to change people's perception of the aircraft if they don't act quickly."

ANA, which said the battery in the forward cargo hold was the same lithium-ion type as one involved in a fire on another Dreamliner at a U.S. airport last week, grounded all 17 of its 787s, and Japan Airlines Cosuspended its 787 flights scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday.

The two airlines, which operate about half of the 50 Dreamliners delivered to date, said they would decide on Thursday whether to resume Dreamliner flights the following day.

COMPREHENSIVE REVIEW

The 787, which has a list price of $207 million, represents a leap in the way planes are designed and built, but the project has been plagued by cost overruns and years of delays. Some have suggested Boeing's rush to get planes built after those delays resulted in the recent problems, a charge the company denies.

Both the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said they were monitoring the latest incident as part of a comprehensive review of the Dreamliner announced late last week. Financial analysts warned of the impact on a wider universe of companies.

"This is another major negative for the B787 and its supplier(s) ... as this heightens the risk of a forced slowdown of the production ramp-up," Kepler analyst Christophe Menard said, adding the latest incident was "extremely disturbing."

It was not just analysts, however, passengers were also nervous about boarding the plane after the latest upset.

At Warsaw's Chopin Airport, the LOT national carrier was announcing over the public address system that one of its Dreamliner aircraft was making its maiden trans-Atlantic flight on Wednesday. Some of the passengers checking in for the flight to Chicago expressed misgivings.

"We have decided to fly on the Dreamliner, but we are a bit worried since we've heard information that this plane is full of defects, albeit they are not really major," said Daniel Rekret, 34, who was traveling with his wife and children.

ALARM TRIGGERED

A spokesman for Osaka Airport Authority said ANA flight 692 landed at Takamatsu at 8:45 a.m. local time. All 129 passengers and eight crew evacuated via the plane's inflatable chutes. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said five people were slightly injured.

At a news conference - where ANA's Vice President Osamu Shinobe bowed deeply in apology - the carrier said a battery in the forward cargo hold triggered emergency warnings to the pilots, who decided on the emergency action. "There was a battery alert in the cockpit and there was an odd smell detected in the cockpit and cabin, and (the pilot) decided to make an emergency landing," Shinobe said.

In a statement later, ANA said the main battery in the forward electrical equipment bay was discolored and there were signs of leakage.

Passengers leaving the flight told local TV there was an odor like burning plastic on the plane as soon as it took off. Marc Birtel, a Boeing spokesman, said: "We've seen the reports, we're aware of the events and are working with our customer."

Robert Stallard, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, said lost revenue at the Japanese airlines could prompt compensation from Boeing. "What started as a series of relatively minor, isolated incidents now threatens to overhang Boeing until it can return confidence, and this looks to be a near-term challenge given the media's draw to all things 787," he said.

UNDER REVIEW

In Asia, only the Japanese and Air India have the Dreamliner in service, but other airlines are among those globally to have ordered around 850 of the new aircraft.

Australia's Qantas Airwayssaid its order for 15 Dreamliners was on track, with its Jetstar subsidiary due to take delivery of the first planes later this year.

India's regulator said it would wait for a safety report from Boeing, expected later Wednesday, before deciding whether to ground the six Dreamliners operated by state-owned Air India.

United Airlines, the only U.S. carrier now flying the 787, said it was not taking any immediate action in response to the latest incident.

The Dreamliner's problems echo those of rival Airbus , which a year ago survived a crisis of confidence after a series of incidents with wing cracks on its A380, the world's largest passenger jet. Those problems tested the manufacturer's relations with airlines, but no plane orders were canceled.

COST BURDENS

Shares in GS Yuasa Corp , a Japanese company that makes batteries for the Dreamliner, fell 4.5 percent. The Kyoto-based company said it was too early to comment on the situation.

The use of new battery technology is among the cost-saving features of the 787, which Boeing says burns 20 percent less fuel than rival jets using older technology.

Lithium-ion batteries can catch fire if they are overcharged, and once alight, they are difficult to put out as the chemicals produce oxygen, Boeing's chief engineer for the 787, Mike Sinnett, told reporters last week. He said lithium-ion was not the only battery choice, but "it was the right choice".

The 787 is Boeing's first new jet in more than a decade, and the company's financial fortunes are largely tied to its success. The plane offers airlines unprecedented fuel economy, but the huge investment to develop it coupled with years of delay in delivery has caused headaches for customers, hurt Boeing financially, and created a delivery bottleneck.

Boeing has said it will at least break even on the cost of building the 1,100 new 787s it expects to deliver over the next decade. Some analysts, however, say Boeing may never make money from the plane, given its enormous development cost.

Any additional cost from fixing problems discovered by the string of recent incidents would affect those forecasts, and could hit Boeing's bottom line more quickly if it has to stop delivering planes, analysts said.

(Addtional reporting by Olivier Fabre, Kentaro Sugiyama, Mari Saito, Yoshiyuki Osada, Deborah Charles, Alwyn Scott, Tim Hepher, Anurag Kotoky, Jaroslaw Kowalski, Danilo Masoni and James Topham; Writing by Ian Geoghegan and Ben Berkowitz; Editing by Paul Tait, Alex Richardson and Maureen Bavdek)

Premier League bottom club Queens Park Rangers secured a last-gasp 1-0 victory at West Bromwich Albion after Jay Bothroyd's late header.

Bolton squandered a 2-0 lead in the initial tie at home but there was no escape for Sunderland this time as Marvin Sordell scored twice after the break to earn his side a 2-0 victory at the Stadium of Light.

Bolton's reward is a home clash with Everton while fellow Championship side Leeds United can also look forward to hosting top flight opposition after El-Hadji Diouf sealed a 2-1 victory at Birmingham City to set up a clash with Tottenham Hotspur.

Premier League strugglers Wigan Athletic fielded a shadow squad at third tier Bournemouth but avoided a shock as Mauro Boselli's goal sealed a 1-0 win on the south coast.

Third tier Brentford secured a money-spinning west London Cup derby against holders Chelsea after beating Southend United 2-1 while MK Dons knocked out Sheffield Wednesday. (Reporting by Martyn Herman; editing by Toby Davis)