LONDON (Reuters) - Seven countries in sub-Saharan Africa, the world's worst-hit region in the global AIDS epidemic, have cut the number of new HIV infections in children by 50 percent since 2009, the United Nations AIDS program said on Tuesday.

The dramatic reductions - in Botswana, Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Namibia, South Africa and Zambia - mean tens of thousands more babies are now being born free of HIV, UNAIDS said in a report on its Global Plan to tackle the disease in around 20 of the worst affected countries.

Overall, across 21 priority countries in Africa, there were 130,000 fewer new HIV infections among children in 2012 - a drop of 38 percent since 2009 - mostly due to increased drug treatment of pregnant women with the virus.

"The progress in the majority of countries is a strong signal that with focused efforts every child can be born free from HIV," said Michel Sidib, UNAIDS' executive director.

"But progress has stalled in some countries with high numbers of new HIV infections. We need to find out why and remove the bottlenecks which are preventing scale-up."

Among places causing concern, UNAIDS said, are Angola and Nigeria, where new infections in children have increased and remained unchanged respectively since 2009.

Nigeria has the largest number of children acquiring HIV in the region, with nearly 60,000 new infections in 2012.

And for those children who do become infected, access to AIDS drugs that can keep their disease in check is "unacceptably low", UNAIDS said, with only 3 in 10 children getting the AIDS medicines they need in most priority countries.

The report said much of the reduction in new HIV cases in children was thanks to more use of AIDS drug treatment for HIV-positive pregnant women. Coverage rates were above 75 percent in many of the priority countries, it said.

AIDS medicines known as antiretroviral therapy not only improve the health of mothers with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) that causes AIDS, but can also prevent HIV from being transmitted to their children.

Botswana and South Africa have reduced mother to child HIV transmission rates to 5 percent or less, according to UNAIDS.

Eric Goosby, global AIDS coordinator for the United States government, called on the international community to "continue working together to see the day when no children are born with HIV, which is within our reach".

(Editing by Alison Williams)

Mikhail Grabovski, anyone?

Otherwise, many of the available impact players were swept up in the first few hours after the NHL's free-agency opened Friday.

A total of 60 players were signed in deals involving 26 of the league's 30 teams, according to a list posted on NHL.com. They included Columbus landing Nathan Horton to a $37.1 million, seven-year contract and Daniel Alfredsson leaving Ottawa for a one-year deal in Detroit. Toronto signed David Clarkson to a $36.75 million, seven-year deal, while Jarome Iginla signed a one-year deal with Boston, the team he jilted for Pittsburgh earlier this season.

And then another nine were traded, with the biggest move involving the Senators filling the void Alfredsson left by acquiring Anaheim forward Bobby Ryan in exchange for two forwards and a first-round draft pick.

At the rate players were being signed and swapped, Flyers general manager Paul Holmgren was relieved to have addressed most of his team's needs before the market officially opened.

"I didn't think the defense market was as strong as centers. The better ones went right away," Holmgren said, while formally announcing the team had signed captain Claude Giroux to an eight-year extension worth over $64 million. "I think we were fortunate to jump in on Mark when we did."

Holmgren was referring to defenseman Mark Streit, who was acquired in a trade with the New York Islanders before Philadelphia locked him up to a four-year, $21 million contract last week. Holmgren also could have mentioned Philadelphia getting Vincent Lecavalier this summer's most prized free agent to agree to a five-year deal on Tuesday.

That didn't stop Holmgren from signing goalies Ray Emery and Yann Danis on Friday to shore up what remains an unsettled position.

Beyond that, it's a wonder anyone's still available.

Former Flyers goalie Ilya Bryzgalov's still on the market. So are two ex-Detroit teammates, Damien Brunner and Daniel Cleary. As for defense, there's Toni Lydman.

And then there's Teemu Selanne, who usually takes his time in free agency. Ducks general manager Bob Murray is scheduled to contact Selanne next week to see whether the Finn is close to making a decision on returning for one more year.

Many players came to much quicker decisions.

Alfredsson was driven to the Motor City by the opportunity to win a championship, and was joined, soon after, by center Stephen Weiss, who agreed to a five-year, $24.5 million contract.

"It's all about trying to get the Stanley Cup," Alfredsson said.

For others, it was the lure of finding the right fit.

Horton was willing to give up big-city living in Boston, for the chance to raise his family in a more collegiate environment such as Columbus.

"It's a great opportunity for me and my family to be in a house and for it to be a little more quiet," Horton said, while noting he is also eager to help transform the Blue Jackets into contenders. "I want to be in the playoffs and everybody else does (here), and we've got the team to do it. That's why I'm so excited."

The Toronto Maple Leafs, coming off their first postseason appearance since 2004, also made a statement by signing Clarkson and keeping first-line center Tyler Bozak with a $21 million, five-year deal.

Tampa Bay reached a $25 million, five-year deal with 29-year-old center Valtteri Filppula to essentially replace Lecavalier.

Ottawa wasn't expecting Alfredsson to bolt.

"It was a devastating conversation, a disappointing one, hard to swallow," Senators general manager Bryan Murray acknowledged. "But I understand a veteran player that hasn't won and wants to win and sees a better opportunity."

The Senators, though, got younger and perhaps better up front by acquiring Ryan. Ottawa sent forwards Jakob Silfverbeg, Stefan Noesen and its first-round pick in next year's draft to the Ducks for the four-time 30-goal scorer.

A lot of other teams also made moves to jockey for position in the parity-filled league:

The Phoenix Coyotes, with a new owner, signed forward Mike Ribeiro to a four-year, $22 million contract.

The New Jersey Devils signed forward Ryane Clowe to a five-year, $24.25 million contract, and forward Michael Ryder to a two-year, $7 million deal.

The Stanley Cup champion Blackhawks re-signed defenseman Michal Rozsival, forward Michal Handzus and gave 40-year goalie Nikolai Khabibulin a one-year deal to replace Emery.

The Pittsburgh Penguins reunited with defenseman Rob Scuderi by giving him a four-year $13.5 million deal.

The New York Islanders re-signed goalie Evgeni Nabokov to a one-year, $3.25 million deal and defenseman Travis Hamonic to a seven-year, $27 million contract, and signed free-agent forward Pierre-Marc Bouchard to a one-year, $2 million contract.

___

AP Sports Writers Larry Lage in Detroit, Dan Gelston in Philadelphia and Rusty Miller in Columbus, Ohio, contributed to this report.

CEO Steve Ballmer said in a memo to employees Thursday that the changes mean the company is "rallying behind a single strategy" and organizing by function. While it has been widely anticipated, it's too early to tell how well the reorganization will help Microsoft compete with more nimble rivals like Apple and Google.

"You don't make massive, sweeping changes like this unless something is wrong," said Colin Gillis, an analyst at BGC Financial, pointing to Wednesday's reports of declining PC shipments around the world.

Worldwide shipments of personal computers fell 11 percent in the April-June period, according to data from research firms Gartner and IDC. Gartner Inc. said the PC industry is now experiencing the longest decline in its history, as shipments dropped for the fifth consecutive quarter. Analysts have blamed a massive consumer migration to tablets and other mobile devices for the falloff. But many observers also believe Microsoft's Windows 8 operating system which comes installed on most new PCs has turned consumers off.

The company's new divisions include engineering, marketing and business development. Microsoft named veteran executive Julie Larson-Green head of its devices and studios engineering group, overseeing hardware development, games, music and entertainment. She had been promoted in November to lead all Windows software and hardware engineering after Steven Sinofsky, the president of its Windows and Windows Live operations, left the company shortly after the launch of Windows 8.

Terry Myerson will lead Microsoft's operating systems and engineering group, namely Windows. Qi Lu will head applications and services.

Ballmer stressed the company's focus on "one Microsoft" in his memo. He said Microsoft will move forward operating as a cohesive company rather than a "collection of divisional strategies."

"Although we will deliver multiple devices and services to execute and monetize the strategy, the single core strategy will drive us to set shared goals for everything we do. We will see our product line holistically, not as a set of islands," Ballmer wrote.

The shake-up is being driven by competitive pressures as two of Microsoft's once much-smaller rivals, Apple and Google, have emerged as the technology trendsetters. In a world that increasingly revolves around mobile devices and Internet services, Microsoft has been scrambling to adapt to the upheaval. The company wants to ensure its relevance in the future while protecting the personal computer franchise that has always generated most of its revenue.

The changing of the guard has already been noted by Wall Street. Both Apple and Google boast market values higher than Microsoft, despite a surge in Microsoft's stock price during the past three months. The new pecking order would have seemed inconceivable when Google first went public nearly nine years ago. Apple's stock price is nearly 28 times higher than it was then while Google's is 10 times higher. Microsoft's stock price is up by just 30 percent since then, largely because the company has fewer outstanding shares than it did nine years ago.

Microsoft's lackluster stock performance has amplified speculation that the company might consider replacing Steve Ballmer, who took over when co-founder Bill Gates stepped down as CEO 13 years ago.

The reorganization could be Ballmer's attempt at placating shareholders with a dramatic overhaul that appears to borrow elements of Apple's and Google's set-ups. The winnowing of Microsoft's disparate divisions and Ballmer's rallying cry for "One Microsoft" suggests the company is trying to make its products work together more seamlessly, much like Apple has been doing since the late Steve Jobs returned as that company's CEO in the late 1990s.

At the same time, Ballmer appears determined to eliminate bureaucracy in hopes of making Microsoft operate more like a nimble startup able to quickly innovate a goal that Google CEO Larry Page set out to achieve when he took over leadership of that company two years ago.

Janney Capital Markets analyst Yun Kim said the reorganization helps align Microsoft's various divisions around its devices and services strategy, but he added that he's taking a "wait and see" approach.

"We continue to look for signs on how the company can leverage its success in the Xbox business to re-energize its current efforts in the tablet and smartphone markets," Kim wrote in a note to investors.

BGC Financial's Gillis noted that major reorganizations "can serve as a negative distraction for months before potentially offering benefits."

Microsoft shares rose 67 cents to $35.37 in early afternoon trading. The Redmond, Washington-based company's stock is up 32 percent since the start of the year, compared with a 17 percent increase of the Standard & Poor's 500 index.

In a closely watched climate change speech, Obama said as part of a new national climate action plan, the Environmental Protection Agency will come up with new standards governing power plant carbon standards.

Speaking at Georgetown University, Obama said he wants to see a market-based solution to climate, but that the problem demands attention now. He said there are no federal limits to the amount of carbon emissions that power plants can pump into the atmosphere.

(Reporting by Steve Holland; editing by Jackie Frank)

"Lumen Fidei" (Light of Faith) was originally intended to form a part of a series by Benedict on the theological virtues, following earlier encyclicals on love and hope, but was not completed by the time of his shock resignation in February.

The encyclical stresses the central importance of the Christian faith as a defense against the "massive amnesia in our contemporary world" caused by excessive trust in technology and the "subjective truths of the individual".

"When faith is weakened, the foundations of humanity also risk being weakened," Francis said, in a text issued three days before he visits Lampedusa, the tiny island south of Sicily which thousands of desperate migrants from North Africa have died trying to reach.

Francis, the first Latin American pope, has struck a sharply different tone from his austere German predecessor, refusing to occupy the sumptuous papal apartments and shunning many of the ceremonial trappings in which Benedict appeared to revel.

But the 82-page encyclical, a letter to bishops and the faithful laying out a pope's views on doctrinal or other matters, made clear he sees no fundamental departure in theological terms from Benedict to whom he expressed his gratitude.

(Reporting By James Mackenzie, editing by Gareth Jones)

NEW YORK, June 26 (Reuters) - With no consensus sure-fire star as an obvious target, Thursday's NBA Draft has a sense of suspense about it with numerous candidates for the Cleveland Cavaliers, who own the number one pick.

"This draft is really unpredictable," 7-foot-1 (2.16 m) Ukrainian center Alex Len out of the University of Maryland, one of the top prospects in the draft, told reporters on Wednesday.

"You don't have any LeBron Jamses, so it's going to be interesting."

Picking behind the Cavaliers will be the Orlando Magic, followed by the Washington Wizards, Charlotte Bobcats, Phoenix Suns and New Orleans Pelicans in the two-round draft conducted by the 30 teams in the National Basketball Association.

That is, if teams maintain the pecking order rather than wheel and deal their picks in draft night swapping at the Barclays Center.

The Cavs, who finished with a 24-58 record, have many needs beyond their premiere point guard Kyrie Irving.

Besides Len or shot blocking big man Nerlens Noel of Kentucky, they could use a shooting guard to team up with Irving, raising the possibility of Ben McLemore of Kansas or Indiana's Victor Oladipo.

Small forward Otto Porto of Georgetown or Canadian Anthony Bennett of Las Vegas could also offer some scoring firepower for the young Cavaliers.

Noel, a 6-11 (2.11 m) defensive specialist, entered last season as the top-rated collegian but his freshman year at Kentucky was curtailed by a knee injury leading to some uncertainty.

Dick Weiss, a long time former college basketball analyst for the New York Daily News now of Blue Star Media (bluestarmedia.org), predicted the draft would produce many solid NBA players, but might not yield a superstar.

"There isn't a franchise number one pick in this draft," Weiss told Reuters.

"Cleveland are probably deciding between Alex Len, Nerlens Noel and Anthony Bennett, who is a very mobile, small forward who played for Las Vegas in an uptempo situation who is a freak athlete."

Oladipo, who is also an outstanding defensive player, said he was curious about who would be number one.

"There's so many different players in the draft," said Oladipo. "I know people are saying there's nobody that really stands out. We just wait and see. I'm anxious, anxious to see who it's going to be."

Besides Len and Bennett, another international player who could be taken in the first round is 6-11 (2.11 m) center Steven Adams of New Zealand out of the University of Pittsburgh.

Len, like many of the most fancied potential first-rounders at a round-table media opportunity on Wednesday, said it did not matter where he went in the draft though he acknowledged a touch of competitiveness about the process.

"Somewhere inside you want to be number one. You want to be the best," said Len, who added that he would be proud to become just the seventh player from Ukraine in the NBA.

"On your competitive side, yeah. You want to be number one."

(Editing by Peter Rutherford)

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While many of Jackson's controversial statements are unique to him — that , that Planned Parenthood is like the KKK, that evolution isn't real because monkeys can't talk — this idea is not. Republicans have long been attacked for using welfare as a code word to rally racist whites — . You can't say the n-word anymore, GOP strategist Lee Atwater famously explained, but you can say you want to cut welfare, and racist whites will know what you're talking about. Think of this slavery-wasn't-all-bad theory as having evolved to counter that: It's not cutting welfare that's racist — welfare itself is racist!

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In 2011, the Iowa evangelical group The Family Leader had Republican presidential candidates sign .

Slavery had a disastrous impact on African-American families, yet sadly a child born into slavery in 1860 was more likely to be raised by his mother and father in a two-parent household* than was an African American baby born after the election of the USA’s first African-American President.

Since it is unfortunately not obvious, let's state for the record that under slavery, human beings were bought and sold at their owners' whims with little regard for their families. Slave marriages .

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Nevertheless, some conservatives have been eager to get actual black people to make this case. During the 2012 Republican primary, Herman Cain talked about how he left "." Allen West said in 2011 that the Democratic Party is a "21st Century plantation," with some black leaders being "nothing more than the overseers." At the Conservative Political Action Conference in March, a packed audience listened to a panel titled "?," about how liberals were the true racists. This panel descended into chaos when a white supremacist and a liberal in the audience repeatedly interrupted the speaker to note that in the 1960s and 1970s, the GOP welcomed segregationists (the white supremacist and the liberal agreed on the history, but disagreed about whether this was a good move for the GOP).

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Jackson urged listeners not to depend on government for freedom, but on faith. "We are founded on the principle of truth that our rights, our freedoms do not come from a government, a king, a president, a potentate... They came from almighty God; they come from our creator. And even while slavery still existed in this nation those words resonated in the consciences of the American people." That's a nice added touch — even during slavery people weren't that racist!

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The Harvard University researchers stressed it was too early to say the men have been cured, but said it was an encouraging sign that the virus hasn't rebounded in their blood months after drug treatment ended.

The first person reported to be cured of HIV, American Timothy Ray Brown, underwent a stem cell transplant in 2007 to treat his leukemia. He was reported by his German doctors to have been cured of HIV two years later.

Brown's doctors used a donor who had a rare genetic mutation that provides resistance against HIV. So far, no one has observed similar results using ordinary donor cells such as those given to the two patients by the Harvard University researchers.

The researchers, Timothy Henrich and Daniel Kuritzkes of the Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, announced last year that blood samples taken from the men who both had blood cancers showed no traces of the HIV virus eight months after they received bone marrow transplants to replace cancerous blood cells with healthy donor cells. The men were still on anti-HIV drugs at the time.

The men have both since stopped anti-retroviral therapy one 15 weeks ago and the other seven weeks ago and show no signs of the virus, Henrich told an international AIDS conference in Malaysia on Wednesday.

"They are doing very well," Henrich said. "While these results are exciting, they do not yet indicate that the men have been cured. Only time will tell."

The HIV virus may be hiding in other organs such as the liver, spleen or brain and could return months later, he warned.

Further testing of the men's cells, plasma and tissue for at least a year will help give a clearer picture on the full impact of the transplant on HIV persistence, he said.

Kuritzkes said the patients will be put back on the drugs if there is a viral rebound.

A rebound will show that other sites are important reservoirs of infectious virus and new approaches to measuring these reservoirs will be needed in developing a cure, Henrich said.

"These findings clearly provide important new information that might well alter the current thinking about HIV and gene therapy," Kevin Robert Frost, chief executive of The Foundation of AIDS Research, said in a statement. "While stem cell transplantation is not a viable option for people with HIV on a broad scale because of its costs and complexity, these new cases could lead us to new approaches to treating, and ultimately even eradicating, HIV."

Cairo's emblematic Tahrir Square and nearby approaches to the River Nile were largely empty but left strewn with debris. Thousands of Morsi's Islamist supporters had marched to the area demanding his reinstatement but ended up fleeing under a hail of stones, fireworks and sometimes gunfire.

Enraged at his overthrow by millions of protesters backed by the country's powerful military, tens of thousands of Morsi's supporters took to the streets on Friday, holding rallies they say they will continue until the former leader is returned to office.

The chaotic scenes that played out in the capital, mostly on a bridge leading to Tahrir, ended only after the army rushed in with armored vehicles to separate the warring groups. Some of Morsi's opponents jumped on at least one vehicle to try to show that the military was on their side.

The clashes had accelerated after the supreme leader of Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood defiantly proclaimed his followers would not give up street action until the return of the country's first freely elected president. Morsi's opponents had called out the public to defend against the Brotherhood, deepening the battle lines.

"God make Morsi victorious and bring him back to the palace," Brotherhood chief Mohammed Badie proclaimed Friday before cheering supporters at a Cairo mosque in his first appearance since the overthrow. "We are his soldiers we defend him with our lives."

Badie said it was a matter of honor for the military to abide by its pledge of loyalty to the president, in what appeared to be an attempt to pull it away from its leadership.

Hours later, his deputy, Khairat el-Shater, considered the most powerful figure in the organization, was arrested in a Cairo apartment along with his brother on allegations of inciting violence, Interior Ministry spokesman Hani Abdel-Latif told The Associated Press.

After the speech, a large crowd of Islamists surged across 6th October Bridge over the Nile toward Tahrir, where a giant crowd of Morsi's opponents had been massed all day. Battles broke out there and near the neighboring state TV building. Pro-Morsi youth shielded themselves from flying stones and fireworks with sheets of metal. A car burned at the top of an exit ramp amid the sounds of automatic weapons and shotguns. At least three people were killed at the bridge.

Across the country, clashes erupted as Morsi supporters tried to storm local government buildings or military facilities, battling police or Morsi opponents. Besides the 30 killed throughout the day, some 210 were wounded, Heath Ministry official Khaled el-Khatib told The Associated Press.

Islamists descended on anti-Morsi rally, opening fire with guns in the Mediterranean coastal city of Alexandria, where at least 12 people were killed, mostly Morsi opponents, emergency services official Amr Salama said. One man was stabbed and thrown from the roof of a building by Morsi supporters after he raised an Egyptian flag and shouted insults against the ousted president, according to an Associated Press reporter at the scene.

Militants killed five policemen in shootings around the Sinai city of el-Arish, according to security officials speaking on condition of anonymity because not authorized to talk to the press.

The U.S. State Department condemned the violence and called on all Egyptian leaders to denounce the use of force and prevent further bloodshed among their supporters.

An interim president senior judge Adly Mansour was sworn in Thursday, and a Cabinet of technocrats is to be formed to run Egypt until new elections can be held, although officials have not said when that will be. Mansour dissolved the interim parliament the upper house of the legislature which was overwhelmingly dominated by Islamists and Morsi allies. He also named the head of General Intelligence, Rafaat Shehata, as his security adviser.

The Brotherhood has said it will not work with the new military-backed leadership, and Morsi's supporters say the armed forces have wrecked Egypt's democracy by carrying out a coup against an elected president.

They accuse loyalists of former leader Hosni Mubarak, ousted in 2011, and liberal and secular opposition parties of turning to the army for help because they lost the election to Islamists. Many also see it as a conspiracy against Islam.

Friday's turmoil began in the afternoon when army troops opened fire as hundreds of his supporters marched on the Republican Guard building in Cairo. That site is where Morsi was staying when he was toppled before being taken into military custody at an undisclosed location.

The crowd approached a barbed wire barrier where troops were standing guard. When one person hung a sign of Morsi on the barrier, soldiers tore it down and told the crowd to stay back. A protester put up a second sign, and the soldiers opened fire, according to an AP photographer.

A protester fell dead with a gaping, bleeding wound in the back of his head, while others were bloodied and wounded. Witnesses told AP Television News at the scene that men in plain clothes fired the lethal shots. The Health Ministry said a total of four were killed at the site, though it was not known how all died.

Badie, made his appearance three hours later on a stage in front of tens of thousands of Islamists massed at Rabia al-Adawiya Mosque, not far from the Republican Guard building.

The circumstances of his appearance were a mystery. Security officials had said he was taken into custody from a villa on the Mediterranean coast soon after Morsi's removal Wednesday night and flown to Cairo, part of a sweep that netted at least five other senior Brotherhood figures and put around 200 more on wanted lists.

Fears have been running high over an Islamist backlash to Morsi's overthrow. Extremist Islamist groups that gained considerable freedom to operate during Morsi's year in office have already vowed violence in retaliation.

___

AP correspondent Tony G. Gabriel contributed to this report.