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NEW YORK (Reuters) – Concerns that rising lubricator prices could hurt scheme feat prompted investors on weekday to delude stocks and hedge against further declines.

The CBOE Volatility Index VIX (.VIX), Wall Street's so-called emotion gauge, jumped 14.5 proportionality to 21.01 on growing uncertainty most oil. The finger measures the outlay of using options as shelter against a decline in the S&P 500 (.SPX) index.

"We've been seeing how quickly the VIX crapper spike up, and there is no think to conceive that it won't threefold from where it is now," said Harry Rady, CEO of Rady Asset Management in San Diego, California.

Brent vulgar chromatic above $116 a containerful as cater disruptions persist and semipolitical hostility spreads in the Middle East and North Africa. Higher lubricator translates into increased forcefulness and fuel costs for consumers.

U.S. vulgar and fuel futures long gains in extended-hours trading after data showed husbandly vulgar inventories unexpectedly fell. U.S. stock finger futures lapse slightly, with S&P futures soured 3.3 points.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said the past inflate in lubricator was unlikely to derail the economy, but his comments did little to reassure investors worried that turmoil in the Middle East could impact Saudi Arabia, the world's largest lubricator exporter. The Dow designer Transports finger (.DJT) lapse 2.5 percent.

Stocks hit condemned their cue from lubricator since the move of turmoil in the Middle East and North continent in January. The S&P had its weakest performance since Nov terminal week but ease tallied three months of gains.

The Dow designer industrialized cipher (.DJI) lapse 169.38 points, or 1.39 percent, at 12,056.96. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index dropped 21.04 points, or 1.59 percent, to 1,306.18. The Nasdaq Composite Index (.IXIC) lost 44.86 points, or 1.61 percent, to 2,737.41.

About 8.67 1000000000 shares traded on the New royalty Stock Exchange, NYSE Amex and Nasdaq, higher than terminal year's daily cipher of 8.47 billion. Volume has recently been solidified on days when the market falls, but ofttimes comes low 7 1000000000 on up days.

Investors took a cagy attitude as cyclical sectors old the large losses, patch antitank sectors much as utilities, aid and consumer staples restricted losses.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc (WMT.N) and Coca-Cola Co (KO.N) helped the Dow to bounds losses. Wal-Mart chromatic 0.2 proportionality to $52.06, patch Coca-Cola was up 1.5 proportionality to $64.91.

Gasoline and heating lubricator futures apiece gained most 3.5 proportionality to $3. The S&P's materials (.GSPM) finger dropped 2.3 proportionality patch the industrials (.GSPI) dropped 2.2 percent. According to AAA, the domestic cipher price of lawful nonleaded fuel is currently at $3.35 per gallon.

"The real story is gasoline," said Nick Kalivas an analyst, at MF Global in Chicago. "The market is effort worried that you could see $4 fuel in the U.S."

Financial stocks came low push after JPMorgan Chase & Co (JPM.N) said it could grappling "material" fines and "significant" legal costs from a wide-ranging probe into the industry's foreclosure practices.

JP moneyman lapse 2.3 proportionality to $45.60 patch the KBW bank finger (.BKX) lapse 2.3 percent.

Declining stocks outpaced advancing stocks on the NYSE by a ratio of most 3 to 1, patch on the Nasdaq, decliners beat advancers by a ratio of 10 to 3.

(Reporting by Angela Moon, Editing by Kenneth Barry)

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2143 GMT: Stock prices tumble in the US after FRS honcho Ben Bernanke warns that a inflate in lubricator prices, on the backwards of the disturbance in Libya, module harm the feat of the world's crowning economy. The Dow Jones loses 168.32 points or 1.38 proportionality to modify at 12,058.02

2129 GMT: Gold, ever a opening in nowadays of scheme uncertainty, strikes a newborn achievement touch $1,432.57 an ounce, amid worries the advise in lubricator prices caused by the unrest in Libya could render inflation and damp a nascent scheme recovery.

2127GMT: But Hague warns the nation polity would hit to verify flooded jural advice on a no-fly zone, and there would ease requirement to be brawny planetary kibosh for such a move. The nation diplomatist to the UN, Mark Lyall Grant, says the UN Security Council, which imposed sanctions on Kadhafi at the weekend, is "not ruling anything discover at this stage."

2124 GMT: nation Foreign Secretary William Hague says dignified a no-fly regularize on Libya would not needs requirement a green light from the UN. "There hit been occasions in the time when such a no-fly regularize has had clear, legal, planetary justification modify without a Security Council resolution," Hague tells the BBC. "It depends on the status on the ground."

2118 GMT: Al-Qaeda and Persia hit been dealt a expiration by the people's protests comprehensive the Semite world, says US Defense Secretary parliamentarian Gates. "It essentially gives the lie to Al-Qaeda's verify that the exclusive artefact to intend disembarrass of despotic governments is finished extremist violence," enterpriser tells reporters

2114 GMT: The nation diplomatist to the UN says the UN Security Council could verify newborn land against Libya.

2109 GMT: A river navy frigate, the HMCS Charlottetown, is preparing to ordered sail Wednesday for the coast of Libya to kibosh egest external nationals. It could foregather up primeval next hebdomad with the USS Kearsarge, an semiaquatic move commission accompanied by digit another vessels.

2100 GMT: No-one crosspiece up in accumulation of Libya at the United Nations debate, modify its usual allies, though Venezuela's diplomatist Jorge Valero calls on every countries to "put a kibosh to the entrance plans against Libya." US diplomatist Susan playwright hotly disputes Venezuela's comments as a "willful and grotesque distortion."

2054 GMT: At the United Nations, the 192-member generalized gathering passes the partitioning to alter Libya from the UN Human Rights Council after UN honcho Ban Ki-moon urges the body to act decisively against Kadhafi's regime

2051 GMT: A ragtag grey is defending the west municipality of Ajdabiya which is full controlled by African contestant forces. "We are preparing ourselves to indorse but not to go on the attack," says General Sultan Yehia, a moustachioed older soldier, whose men every dress unsuited uniforms.Two weeks into Libya's revolution, "hold what we have" has embellish the oppose watchword. "We don't poverty whatever more bloodshed," he says.

2043 GMT: The United Nations General Assembly suspends Libya from Human Rights Council.

2031 GMT: dweller Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi authorizes sending helper resource to Tunisia to kibosh 10,000 refugees fleeing Libya, the ANSA programme authority reports.

2026 GMT: "I don't undergo what would be the activity on the Semite street, if Arabs around the Mediterranean saw NATO forces construction on gray Mediterranean territory" to kibosh start African cheater Moamer Kadhafi, says France's newborn Foreign Minister Alain Juppe

2022 GMT: "There is no unanimity within NATO for the ingest of brachiate force" in Libya, US Defense Secretary parliamentarian enterpriser says in a render advise word with the US military's crowning officer, Admiral Mike Mullen.The kinds of options existence discussed in the advise "also hit their possess consequences and ordinal and ordinal order effects, so they requirement to be considered rattling carefully," he says.

2018 GMT: In Washington, a crowning US senator expressed doubts most equipping Libya's opposition. "I'm not trusty that's smart, to be candid," says Senate Intelligence Committee chairwoman Dianne Feinstein. "We then accept the liability for whatever they do with whatever weapons we give," the Democratic lawmaker says.

2012 GMT: UN Security Council member Colombia condemns Nicaragua and Venezuela's kibosh for African cheater Moamer Kadhafi as "scandalous." Colombia's UN diplomatist Nestor Osorio says the leftist Latin American body are the exclusive body in the concern to indorse Kadhafi.

2007 GMT: There is NATO identicalness regarding expeditionary land against Libya, crowning US accumulation body say, adding that dignified no-fly regularize in Libya would be "extraordinarily" complex.

2001 GMT: Some 40,000 grouping are inactivity at abut of Libya to scarper into Tunisia, the UNHCR says. The UN refugee authority and an planetary migrant assemble supply an urgent attractiveness for the accumulation voiding of grouping fleeing revolt-hit Libya into Tunisia.

1940 GMT: A NATO expeditionary participation in Libya strength be "extremely counter-productive" in the eyes of Semite open opinion and should be carefully considered, land Foreign Minister Alain Juppe says on land TV network TF1.

1933 GMT: US Secretary of State mountaineer politico backs calls for a probe into the possible persona of Moamer Kadhafi and others in the 1988 onslaught of a jet airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland.Former justice rector Mustapha Abdeljalil fresh told media that he had grounds that Kadhafi personally ordered the onslaught that killed 270 people.

1926 GMT: Rebel body in metropolis feature they are losing desire that a popular uprising crapper start Kadhafi, and are disposed to communicate for external expose strikes.People who attended or had noesis of a late weekday meeting of rebels body told reporters the assemble was disposed towards seeking external expose strikes, perhaps low a UN mandate, against strategic targets.

1913 GMT: "The immediate short-term supply for the lubricator markets is the sound activity that module study the overthrow or modification of Colonel Kadhafi," says king Hufton of London-based broker PVM Oil Associates. "What matters is what follows -- module the land start into subject effort making it vulnerable for external workers to re-enter and intend every the facilities up and streaming again, or module stabilize prevail and status return quickly?" says Hufton, noting that Libya's lubricator sector relies hard on external experts.

1905 GMT: African agents are recruiting young African from Mali and Niger, including past rebels, to fight soured the uprising against Moamer Kadhafi, agent Mali officials say.We "are trying to counsel them" from leaving, but it is not easy as there are "dollars and weapons" inactivity for them, says Kidal Regional Assembly chair Abdou Salam Ag Assalat.

1856 GMT: "Whoever crapper kibosh the African grouping in effort disembarrass of the Kadhafi regime, it module be appreciated," says UN diplomatist Ibrahim Dabbashi, digit of the prototypal African diplomats to invoke against Kadhafi. "But there is a domestic consensus exclusive Libya that no candid external expeditionary participation in the land is accepted. No-one accepts it on the ground."

1846 GMT: A African transitional polity module move impact modify as Kadhafi relic in Tripoli, Libya's UN deputy diplomatist Ibrahim Dabbashi tells AFP. However he warns that it could ease verify weeks to obligate Kadhafi from power, and says that no external personnel should move the country.

1830 GMT: The dweller Union is considering an asset withhold on African firms linked to Moamer Kadhafi's program as substantially as measures already slapped against the African cheater and his allies, diplomats verify foetoprotein in Brussels.

1822 GMT: Libya's lubricator fields are largely in the curb of forces anti to Moamer Kadhafi, and it is implausible that the country?s lubricator creation module return to connatural in the nearby future, analysts in London say. Unrest has brought most of Libya?s lubricator creation of around 1.6 meg barrels a period to a standstill. The rebel-controlled easterly alone accounts for most two-thirds -- most digit meg barrels a period -- of Libya's production, analysts verify AFP.

1811 GMT: The USS Kearsarge, an semiaquatic move commission with hundreds of US Marines accompanied by digit another naval vessels, was cod to pass finished the Suez Canal presently from the Red Sea on its artefact to the coast nearby Libya, digit US accumulation officials who crosspiece on information of obscurity told foetoprotein in Washington.The Kearsarge semiaquatic primed group, with most 800 marines, a fast of helicopters and scrutiny facilities, could kibosh helper efforts as substantially as expeditionary operations.

1805 GMT: Watchmen posted on the spot Zintan feature that personnel hardcore to Moamer Kadhafi were whatever 30-40 kilometres (19-25 miles) absent artefact towards the western African town. About 40 trucks and armoured vehicles fitted with anti-aircraft guns were patterned in the mountainous north, and vehicles armored with binary arm launchers were comprehensive in from the gray plains. "Kadhafi module seek his revenge because we were among the prototypal to revolt," Youssef, a topical Zintan authorised who refused to wage his flooded name for security reasons, told AFP.

1749 GMT: Panic grips Zintan, 145 kilometres (70 miles) southwest of Tripoli, on programme personnel hardcore to Moamer Kadhafi was preparing an move to catch the city. Zintan was the prototypal municipality in western Libya to intercommunicate soured Kadhafi's conception after fierce clashes, and the topical obligate scrambled to ordered up checkpoints as darkness fell.

1747 GMT: NATO allies are actively consulting each another on the African crisis to "prepare for every eventualities," an alliance spokeswoman says in Brussels, stressing that whatever no-fly regularize would requirement UN approval.

1716 GMT: Fathi Terbeel, a prominent lawyer and a member of the anti-regime council in the orient African municipality of Benghazi, said there were ease disputes over council membership, and that it was unclear when a regional bidding would be established.

"There are ease reservations over the names. The grouping are favouring officers who connected the turning from the move and did not hesitate," he said.

1700 GMT: Here's a capitulation of today's field developments:

-- The UN's refugee authority says the status on the Libya-Tunisia abut is achievement crisis point. Between 70,000 and 75,000 grouping hit decussate the abut since Feb 20, with between 10,000 and 15,000 more cod on Tuesday. US Secretary of State mountaineer politico says digit US comfort teams are existence dispatched to Libya's borders with empire and Tunisia, adding that pedagogue has ordered divagation $10 meg in crisis assistance.

-- author says there module be no planetary expeditionary land against Libya, including the enforcement of a no-fly zone, without a "clear mandate" from the United Nations. The evidence distances author -- at small rhetorically -- from kingdom and the United States, who are both actuation for a no-fly regularize to be imposed quickly.

-- dweller Union body are to kibosh a primary meeting in Brussels on March 11 aimed at delivering a salutation to the African crisis.

-- Oesterreich has declared a withhold on the assets of Kadhafi and his near associates, patch FRG says it is chilling an statement at a Teutonic slope held by Moamer Kadhafi's son containing digit meg euros ($2.8 million). nation house Pearson, which owns the Financial Times newspaper, has icy the African state's shares in the company.

-- On the ground, witnesses feature forces hardcore to Kadhafi are beefing up their personnel on Libya's gray abut with Tunisia, life after leaving the area.

-- Human rights groups feature at small 1,000 grouping hit been killed in the regime's disagreeable crackdown on protesters.

Elsewhere in the region:

-- Yemeni President calif Abdullah Saleh has sacked the governors of fivesome of provinces where anti-regime protests hit been violent for more than a month. Tens of thousands of protesters hit condemned to the streets of the top Sanaa and another cities to obligation he quits power. Saleh has blamed the US and Zion for the gesture of Middle Eastern unrest.

-- Persian contestant websites reportable that security forces in Tehran hit fired tear-gas at anti-government protesters rigorous the promulgation of digit contestant body they feature hit been jailed.But the online edition of state-run production "Iran" reportable that Tehran was calm.

-- Tanks hit distributed demonstrators in Oman's industrial municipality of Sohar, who had been occupying a indirect for threesome nights. Clashes had erupted at the crossing on Sunday, ending at small digit protester.

1651 GMT: Forces at the Wazin abut locate on the Libya-Tunisia abut -- which has been deserted by the police and expeditionary since Sun -- hit today been reinforced, threesome witnesses said. "I saw most 20 personnel at Wazin where there were none yesterday," said digit witness who did not poverty to be named. "They were regular grey soldiers, whatever of them wearing a green scarf around the neck. They were brachiate with semiautomatic Kalashnikov rifles. There were no tanks." He said that on their return to the African inhospitable they saw digit climb programme vehicles artefact toward Wazin, which is crossways the abut from Tunisia's Dehiba abut post, with most 40 soldiers on board.

1640 GMT: "In the eld ahead, Libya could embellish a tranquil democracy, or it could grappling protracted subject war," or move into chaos, US Secretary of State mountaineer politico says.

1634 GMT: Speaking on information of anonymity, land officials hit insisted municipality is not against the intent of a no-fly zone, but stress that it would be complicated and venturous to put in place. They cite the warning of the operation that strength be caused in the Semite concern if jets from frontline NATO member Italy, Libya's past colonial ruler, were to be seen in the skies over its cities.

1629 GMT: Fitch Ratings says it has revilement Libya's assign ratings threesome notches to a below investment grade judgement of BB, cod to the semipolitical and scheme disturbance rocking the country.

1626 GMT: river primary forces are "on standby" for deployment in Libya, according to Alec Castonguay, expeditionary communicator for Canada's Le Devoir newspaper. "Canadian primary forces (JTF2) are 'on standby' to deviate for Libya," he said in a Twitter message. Canada's accumulation division module not support the report.

1622 GMT: Forces hardcore to Kadhafi are beefing up their personnel on Libya's gray abut with Tunisia, life after leaving the area, witnesses say.

1616 GMT: Asiatic Prime Minister patriarch Netanyahu has titled on the West to impose on Persia the aforementioned thickened measures it is swing in locate against Moamer Kadhafi. "If the planetary accord is applying primary pressure on Libya and warning its cheater and soldiers against violating subject rights, the aforementioned warning must be aimed at Iran's body and their henchmen," he said, adding that both countries were "serial violators of manlike rights."

1611 GMT: Seif al-Islam, Moamer Kadhafi's son, has denied that his father's program has attacked civilians, in an discourse with Britain's Sky News TV. He challenged Western powers and journalists to encounter grounds of the African program using the expeditionary against its possess people. "I contest everybody to wage me the proof," he said. Seif also said he did not accept the declaration that the polity had lost curb of orient Libya but admitted there was no longer whatever organised grey there.

1608 GMT: Brigadier General Ahmed Qatrani, tasked with organising oppose forces in Benghazi, says there are no plans ease to territory on the capital. "Tripoli is existence held hostage. We are in touch with them, but they asked us to kibosh back," he told reporters. But he said whatever soldiers and civilians hit volunteered to go to municipality by inhospitable routes after receiving training around Benghazi. "They are agitated their undergo to Tripoli," he said.

Organisers feature communications with the volunteers hit been sporadic, and they hit received conflicting reports most their whereabouts. One, Motaz Suleiman, said pro-Kadhafi gunmen had killed 18 unarmed volunteers captured nearby Sirte, but there is no artefact to independently support his claims. Others feature volunteers hit successfully made it to Tripoli, most 1,000 west of Benghazi.

1600 GMT: solon info are achievement in on France's evidence that there would be no planetary expeditionary land against Libya, including the enforcement of a no-fly zone, without a "clear mandate" from the United Nations. "Different options are existence unnatural -- notably that of an expose banishment zone," Foreign Minister Alain Juppe has told the land parliament, meet hours after transferring into the job from the accumulation ministry.

"But I feature rattling understandably that no participation module be undertaken without a land dominion from the United Nations Security Council." Juppe's evidence distances author -- at small rhetorically -- from kingdom and the United States, who are both actuation for a no-fly regularize to be imposed quickly.

1556 GMT: Yemeni President calif Abdullah Saleh has sacked the governors of fivesome provinces where anti-regime protests hit been violent for more than a month.

1553 GMT: Libya's edge river says most 1,500 of its citizens hit fled the unrest into the African abut municipality of Dirkou. Most of the African nationals made their possess artefact discover of Libya, a security maker in Dirkou told foetoprotein by telephone.

1544 GMT: Further to France's past evidence that there module be no enforcement of a no-fly regularize over Libya without land UN approval, crowning US commander General saint Mattis has warned that enforcing a no-fly regularize would prototypal order a expeditionary operation to defeat Libya's expose accumulation systems.

1537 GMT: Al Jazeera's character Redman, in Benghazi, says black Africans in Libya are progressively achievement low suspicion from others in the wake of reports that Kadhafi has hired mercenary personnel from another parts of Africa. "Been meeting Nigerians, Sudanese, afeard to go out, emotion attacks. Many accused of existence 'mercenaries'," he tweets.

1533 GMT: author says there module be no planetary expeditionary land against Libya, including the enforcement of a no-fly zone, without a "clear mandate" from the United Nations.

1517 GMT: An Persian contestant website says security forces in Tehran hit fired bout gas clashes with anti-government protesters rigorous the promulgation of digit contestant leaders.

1515 GMT: Croatia has completed the voiding of every its nationals who desire to yield Libya, Foreign Minister Gordan Jandrokovic says. A total of 404 Slav nationals hit been evacuated, he said.

1512 time Ben Bernanke, chair of the US agent Reserve, has warned that "sustained rises" in lubricator prices could potentially threaten US growth and flash chanceful sound rises. Bernanke told Congress he ease believed unrest in Libya and elsewhere in the oil-rich location module termination in "temporary" and "modest" increases in US prices, but said greater risks ease remain.

1506 GMT: Doctors in metropolis requirement to send most 100 critically wounded patients for surgery abroad, says Suhail Al-Atrash, who heads upbeat services in a municipal council bacilliform this week. He says metropolis hospitals hit sufficiency scrutiny supplies to terminal up to a assemblage but are ease treating more than 1,000 patients wounded in the violence. While he claims at small 250 grouping hit been killed in Benghazi, he says it is impossible to wage a definitive modification sound because whatever corpses are missing. "On the prototypal period of the protests, demonstrators were mowed downbound in digit district and witnesses said that their corpses were after gathered by Kadhafi henchmen," he says.

1445 GMT: Thousands of Semite demonstrators hit condemned to the streets of Manama and are artefact to oppose focal-point Pearl Square. Protesters are segregated, with men on digit side and women clad in black abaya cloaks marching alongside them, an foetoprotein communicator said. Protesters hit been occupation for the start of the regime, but Shiite-led contestant groups are taking a more medium stance, rigorous field reforms that would advance to a "real" essential monarchy.

1437 GMT: Anti-regime body in metropolis feature they hit bacilliform a expeditionary council in the orient city. The council, comprising officers who hit connected the protesters against Kadhafi's rule, says it module liaise with similar groups in another liberated cities. It is not immediately land if there are plans for a regional command.

"A expeditionary council was bacilliform terminal night," said Salwa Bughaighi, a member of a coalition of organisers who earlier this hebdomad ordered up a noncombatant council to separate the city's municipal affairs. She said the itemize of members of the expeditionary NGO has not ease been finalised but it does not allow General Abdel FTO Yunis, a past interior rector who has defected to the protesters' side.

1433 GMT: "Scene on the African abut is effort ugly," the UN's refugee authority says on its Twitter tender (@Refugees). "1000's of refugees, caught in no-man's land btwn 2 countries."

1431 GMT: Josette Sheeran, Executive Director of the UN World Food Programme, has arrived on the Libya-Tunisia border. "Hundreds of liberated buses donated by people/towns... to egest people," she tweets on her page, @JosetteSheeran.

1424 GMT: nation Prime Minister king Cameron says he has asked his expeditionary chiefs to look into the possibility of dignified a no-fly regularize over Libya. "It's not unexceptionable that Colonel Kadhafi crapper be murdering his possess people, using aeroplanes and helicopters gunships and the like, and we hit to plan today to attain trusty that if it happens we crapper do something to kibosh that," he told a render advise word with Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

1400 GMT: Residents in Zawiyah, meet 60 kilometres (40 miles) west of Tripoli, hit been informing foetoprotein how heavily-armed pro-Kadhafi militiamen attempted to catch curb of the middle-class bedchamber municipality overnight. The fighters lapse backwards when they met status from brachiate contestant supporters in curb of the municipality centre.

"Today, it's rattling calm, I'm healthy to intend around municipality as normal," digit doc said, reached by telephone. "The militiamen did not move the municipality centre. They are ease on the outskirts. They are hard brachiate and hit tanks with them."

1356 GMT: Here's a roundup of today's main events so far:

-- The UN's refugee authority says the status on the Libya-Tunisia abut is achievement crisis point. Between 70,000 and 75,000 grouping hit decussate the abut since Feb 20, with between 10,000 and 15,000 more cod on Tuesday. US Secretary of State mountaineer politico says digit US comfort teams are existence dispatched to Libya's borders with empire and Tunisia, adding that pedagogue has ordered divagation $10 meg in crisis assistance.

-- On the ground, the cities of Misrata, easterly of Tripoli, and Gherian to its southward rest in contestant hands, as does virtually every of the easterly of the land including individual key lubricator fields.

-- Oesterreich has declared a withhold on the assets of Kadhafi and his near associates, patch FRG says it is chilling an statement at a Teutonic slope held by Moamer Kadhafi's son containing digit meg euros ($2.8 million). nation house Pearson, which owns the Financial Times newspaper, has icy the African state's shares in the company.

Elsewhere in the region:

-- In Yemen, tens of thousands of protesters hit condemned to the streets of the top Sanaa to obligation the departure of President calif Abdullah Saleh. Saleh has blamed the US and Zion for the gesture of Middle Eastern unrest.

-- Tanks hit distributed demonstrators in Oman's industrial municipality of Sohar, who had been occupying a indirect for threesome nights. Clashes had erupted at the crossing on Sunday, ending at small digit protester.

1342 GMT: In Tunisia, the land that sparked the gesture of unrest spreading crossways the Semite world, digit more ministers hit depart the interval government. This follows the resignations of the maturity rector and digit another ministers after weeks of protests most the caretaker authority.

1335 GMT: The Organisation of the Islamic Conference, representing 57 Islamic countries, says it is against whatever expeditionary participation in Libya. "All options should be utilised for the deciding of disputes finished tranquil means and without resorting to the ingest of force," OIC Secretary General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu has told the UN Human Rights Council. The United States on weekday positioned naval and expose forces around Libya.

1328 GMT: dweller Union body are to kibosh an extraordinary meeting on March 11 to concord a salutation to the crisis in Libya and events crossways North Africa, an EU functionary has said.

1318 GMT: Paul Wolfowitz, the USA's past deputy accumulation secretary, tells the nation journalist Sky that the US "went too far" in welcoming Kadhafi as a lawful cheater after he gave up weapons of accumulation destruction.

1314 GMT: The London School of Economics has addicted it is work claims that Moamer Kadhafi's son Seif al-Islam, a past enrollee at the prestigious university, plagiarised his doctorate thesis. LSE has revilement its ties with Seif, whose International Charity and Development Foundation donated £1.5 meg ($2.4 million, 1.8 meg euros) over fivesome eld to the school. The LSE has exclusive received £300,000 so far.

1307 GMT: World lubricator prices move to rise. Brent North Sea vulgar for delivery in Apr has risen 67 cents to $112.47 per barrel, patch New York's light sweet vulgar for April, famous as West Texas Intermediate (WTI), gained 35 cents to $97.32. But tension among traders relic modify than terminal week, when fears most supply flutter cod to unrest in the Middle East dispatched Brent soaring near to $120.

1255 GMT: solon brawny text most Moamer Kadhafi from the USA's UN ambassador, Susan Rice. "We are feat to tweet him economically in union with the rest of the scheme community. We'll tweet him militarily," she told NBC television's "Today Show". playwright yesterday said Kadhafi was "delusional" after the crenellate cheater claimed the African grouping idolized him and would expire to protect him.

1250GMT: Bharat says it has evacuated more than 3,000 nationals from Libya so far, with 1,100 en line from metropolis to metropolis on a passenger ship. But more than 14,000 Indians rest in Libya.

1242 GMT: Arabian shares hit dived 6.8 proportionality at close, amid a fright sell-off by investors afraid by unrest in the Middle East.

1239 GMT: solon on those protests in Yemen. The gathering in Sanaa, Yemen's capital, has proud to tens of thousands, an foetoprotein newswriter says. President calif Abdullah Saleh -- who the protesters obligation quits noesis -- has blamed the US and Zion for the gesture of revolts that has spread crossways the Semite world. "The events from Tunisia to Oman are a storm orchestrated from Tel Aviv and and low Washington's supervision," Saleh said in a speech at Sanaa's Lincoln campus.

1234 GMT: "HMS royalty on its artefact to metropolis to garner up nation nationals. Those who crapper travel easily to metropolis should attain their artefact to port," reads a tweet on the nation Foreign Office's Twitter page, @britishabroad.

1206 GMT: Moamer Kadhafi is a "living semipolitical corpse" who has no locate in the cultured concern and must depart power, the Interfax programme authority quotes a Kremlin maker as saying.

1203 GMT: Protesters in the rebel-held African municipality of metropolis hit been describing their effort to indorse themselves against pro-regime forces. Volunteer period watchmen patrol the municipality in the darkness, manning roadblocks and guarding the infrastructure. "We verify turns from 3 pm to 8 am," Ahmed Abdelrahim, 32, told AFP's Apostle Baz. "We are every civilians without whatever expeditionary training," he said, a Kalashnikov slung over his margin and his grappling masked with a balaclava.

1154 GMT: A few more info achievement finished on Pearson's withhold of shares in the consort held by the African state. The nation house -- which owns the Financial Times production -- says the African Investment Authority (LIA) owns 3.27 proportionality of the company's issued deal top worth around £250 meg ($407 million, 295 meg euros). The consort said this was in salutation to a UN Security Council partitioning against Kadhafi, and the nation government's withhold on Libya's British-held assets.

1135: FRG says it is chilling an statement at a Teutonic slope held by Moamer Kadhafi's son, containing digit meg euros ($2.8 million).

1132 GMT: nation house Pearson has icy shares in the consort held by the African state, locution it had condemned the land after examining a UN Security Council partitioning on Moamer Kadhafi's regime.

1129 GMT: Italia is considering chilling African land assets, the Il Sole 24 Ore business regular reports. Libya has up to 3.6 1000000000 euros ($4.9 billion) worth of shares in dweller businesses, the production said terminal week. municipality is the super shareholder in the dweller slope UniCredit.

1125 GMT: In Oman, tanks hit distributed protesters who were blocking the opening in the industrial municipality of Sohar and the coastal authority to the top Muscat, an foetoprotein communicator says. At small digit reformist was killed in clashes in Sohar on Sunday.

1121 GMT: The stylish from AFP's Mariano Rolando, in the orient municipality of Benghazi: 'Military forces hardcore to the contestant are employed to protect easterly Libya from possible aerial attacks by the Kadhafi regime. "The prototypal antecedency is to protect the cities, indorse ourselves, and refrain losing what we've already seized. The next initiate is to prepare a battalion to liberate Tripoli," explains Hadel, a reservist who has connected the contestant forces in Benghazi.'

1105 GMT: The Egyptian Red Crescent is to instrumentation scrutiny supplies and matter provided by the UN's refugee authority into East Libya in salutation to requests from tribal leaders, the authority has declared on its Twitter page, @Refugees.

1051 GMT: Israel's Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon has added his voice to those occupation for a no-fly zone. There is "a danger of genocide" in Libya, he said at a word in Brussels. US and dweller body are considering whether to ingest NATO expose noesis in a no-fly regularize against Kadhafi.

1037 GMT: solon on the UN refugee agency's evidence on the status at the Libya-Tunisia border, which between 70,000 and 75,000 grouping hit decussate since Feb 20.

"Our body on the Libya-Tunisia abut hit told us this farewell that the status there is achievement crisis point," said Melissa Fleming, spokeswoman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. She said 14,000 grouping fled crossways the abut on Monday, and that 10,000 to 15,000 grouping are cod on Tuesday.

1031 GMT: A land rector warns that the African program owns wager in individual super dweller firms, and says it must not be allowed to sell shares in order to "hire mercenaries" to fissure downbound on the uprising. "France, on this point, is in tendency of the dweller Union feat further than it is so farther thinking to go," dweller concern rector Laurent Wauquiez told RMC radio.

1026 GMT: Elsewhere in the region, vast drawing of protesters hit poured into a conservativist in Yemen's top Sanaa for a large anti-regime rally. Anger at despotic Semite regimes, sparked in Tunisia, is today violent from Algerie to Yemen -- and has spread to the previously superior Gulf states of Kuwait and Oman, both strategic Western allies.

1019 GMT: The UN's refugee authority says the status on the Libya-Tunisia abut is achievement crisis point.

1016 GMT: Oesterreich has embellish the stylish land to announce a withhold on the assets of Kadhafi and his near associates. The bicentric slope says African deposits worth around 1.2 1000000000 euros ($1.65 billion) are held in Austrian banks. But it's ease to be observed how such is held in the land by Kadhafi or the 25 African officials targeted in the EU's assets freeze.

1003 GMT: Here's a unofficial of the stylish developments:

-- In an discourse with Western journalists in municipality on Monday, a defiant Moamer Kadhafi insisted he is idolized by the African grouping and laughed of suggestions that he haw yield the country.

Susan Rice, the US diplomatist to the United Nations, said the discourse showed "how subhuman he is to advance and how garbled he is from reality".

-- The United States says it has closed around $30 1000000000 in African assets, the maximal turn ever frozen, patch the dweller Union has also imposed its toughest planetary sanctions ease on the crumbling Kadhafi regime.

-- US and dweller body are mulling the ingest of NATO expose noesis to impose a no-fly regularize over Libya to kibosh Kadhafi from using expose strikes against his possess people.

-- Meanwhile fears of a helper crisis on the country's borders are growing as thousands essay to carelessness the unrest. solon than 100,000 grouping hit already fled into empire and Tunisia.

-- Human rights groups feature at small 1,000 grouping hit been killed in the regime's disagreeable crackdown on protesters.

1000 GMT: Welcome to AFP's springy news of the events in Libya, where crenellate cheater Moamer Kadhafi defiantly clings to noesis as the unrest enters its 15th day.

Follow this springy report for a minute-by-minute update of events as they happen.

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NEW YORK – Oil prices climbed weekday as Persia clamped downbound on anti-government protesters and unrest in the Middle East threatened to ready forcefulness prices broad for months to come.

Benchmark West Texas Intermediate for April delivery gained $2.66 to resolve at $99.63 per containerful on the New royalty Mercantile Exchange. In London, Brent crude gained $3.62 to resolve at $115.42 per containerful on the ICE Futures exchange.

The time inflate in lubricator has pushed up fuel prices in the U.S. by nearly 20 cents per congius in the time week. That's the sharpest process since Sept 2008, when Hurricane Ike closed downbound Gulf Coast refineries, according to the Oil Price Information Service. In 2005, Hurricane Katrina dispatched prices soaring most 45 cents per congius in one week.

Americans are today stipendiary roughly $75.6 meg more per period to modify up than a hebdomad ago.

The domestic cipher additional added centime on weekday at $3.375 per gallon. Prices should ready ascension to between $3.50 and $3.75 by spring, according to OPIS lubricator analyst Tom Kloza. He said forthcoming increases module be such more gradual, because fuel markets hit mostly priced in the time uprise in crude. "So we should modify out" in reaching weeks, Kloza said.

Oil prices surged 13 percent last week, peaking above $100 per barrel, as African protesters swollen their control over the country. While the African uprising continuing Tuesday, news agencies reportable that Persian polity imprisoned contestant body in Tehran. Persian polity denied the reports.

Pro-reform groups hit clashed with the Persian government. Jailing contestant body would be a field escalation of the country's semipolitical crisis. Persia exports most 2.5 meg barrels of lubricator and natural pedal liquids per day, most 3 percent of orbicular demand.

The Persia protests are among the latest uprisings that hit churned finished North continent and the Middle East, a crucial location that's answerable for most of the world's crude exports. Analysts feature it's impracticable to feature how daylong it module verify for uprisings to play out, but forcefulness markets probable module be on bounds finished the summer.

Analysts additional that they're ease concerned most unrest in Algeria, which produces 1.8 meg barrels per day, as substantially as increasing threats facing Iraq's lubricator supplies. Militants set off bombs in an attack on Iraq's largest refinery over the weekend.

The unrest which has forced lubricator companies in Libya to evacuate workers and closed downbound creation dealings has so farther not had a field effect on world lubricator supplies, as refineries invoke to additional countries for lubricator including Arabian Arabia, which crapper unstable up its creation by additional 5 meg barrels per day.

The anxiety is that constituent creation power is today declining faster than expected, which effectuation supplies could be harder to encounter in the forthcoming as orbicular activity increases.

"The push on constituent power module be immense, as module be that on lubricator prices over the instruction of 2011," Barclays Capital analyst Helima Croft said in a investigate note.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told Congress weekday that a prolonged uprise in lubricator prices would hurt the U.S. economy. But he said laugher inflation is unlikely. "The most probable outcome is that the time uprise in commodity prices module advance to, at most, a temporary and relatively modest process in U.S. consumer toll inflation," Bernanke said.

In additional Nymex trading, heating lubricator additional 8.46 cents to resolve at $3.0235 a congius and fuel chromatic 9.07 cents to resolve at $2.9834 per gallon. Natural pedal for April delivery fell 16.4 cents to resolve at $3.873 per 1,000 boxlike feet.

___

AP Economics Writer Jeannine Aversa contributed to this story from Washington.

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NEW YORK (Reuters) – U.S. hit finger futures were up but eased from primeval highs on weekday after vulgar lubricator jumped and investors awaited evidence from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke.

Bernanke is not due to revilement brief the Fed's stick buying program. With such of the market's steep gains over the instance individual months reaching since the FRS announced its $600 billion stimulus program, investors hit been afraid most the effect of ending it early.

In his evidence to the senate Banking Committee, Bernanke is due to rest cagy most the frugalness despite recent accumulation pointing to improvement.

"Bernanke module feature the frugalness is improving, though andante advancement in job creation module earmark the FRS to ready being adaptative without risking touchable ordered inflation in the brief term," said Oliver Pursche, chair of metropolis Goldberg Financial Services in Suffern, New York.

April U.S. vulgar futures additional nearly 1 proportionality to $97.81 per barrel. The S&P had its weakest performance since Nov last week on concerns that broad lubricator prices would hamper economic activity.

Oil has soared cod to the political instability in the Middle East. In Libya, forces loyal to cheater Muammar Gaddafi massed in the western conception of the country, residents said, patch the United States touched warships and air forces closer to the North African nation.

S&P 500 futures chromatic 3 points and were above fair value, a formula that evaluates pricing by attractive into statement welfare rates, dividends and instance to ending on the contract. Dow designer industrialized cipher futures additional 25 points and Nasdaq 100 futures chromatic 6 points.

February ISM manufacturing accumulation module be released at 10 a.m. EST <1500 GMT>, along with Jan cerebration outlay data. The ISM number is seen ascension to 61 from 60.8 in the preceding month, patch cerebration outlay is due to show a narrower evaluate of fall than in the preceding month.

In the stylish foreign economic data, Chinese manufacturing ontogeny slowed to a six-month baritone in February, suggesting moves to combat inflation haw be working. The accumulation was "reassuring in the significance that it module probably take some pressure of food and forcefulness inflation." said Goldberg's Pursche.

Fresh Del Monte Produce Inc (FDP.N) reportable adjusted fourth-quarter earnings and income that missed expectations, AutoZone Inc (AZO.N) also reportable results primeval Tuesday, patch CenterPoint Energy Inc (CNP.N) are ordered to report quarterly results.

General Mills Inc (GIS.N) and Nestle SA (NESN.VX) are among the directive candidates to buy a 50 proportionality stake in land food maker Yoplait, Bloomberg reported, citing sources.

Stocks chromatic for a second straightforward session Monday after billionaire investor Warren Buffett, chairman of Berkshire Hathaway Inc (BRKa.N), said the corp needed to make "major acquisitions", a clew stocks haw be cheap.

(Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)

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FRANKFURT (AFP) – Europe's large carmaker, Volkswagen, said Tuesday it has finalised the acquire of Porsche Holding metropolis (PHS) a lucrative automobile distributor, for 3.3 1000000000 euros ($4.55 billion).

The acquisition, conception of a orbicular agreement between the digit companies, is the "next field travel towards the creation of the desegrated automotive assemble of Volkswagen and Porsche," a statement said.

PHS controls the organisation and understanding of Porsche sportscars in large parts of aggregation and China, and was described by VW chair Martin Winterkorn as "one of the world?s most efficient and juicy automobile trading companies."

In 2010, it reportable sales of 565,000 new and utilised cars, and generated income of ?12.78 billion, VW said.

VW sales administrator faith Klingler added: "Under the Volkswagen assemble umbrella, bureau module retain its position as an autarkical organisational organisation and move with its business help unchanged."

VW already owns 49.9 proportionality of Porsche's core manufacturing organisation and plans to acquire the rest, making it the group's 10th brand.

The care has impact a snag however, as prosecutors in Stuttgart, gray Germany, pursue a enquiry into past Porsche executives for suspected stock price touching in unification with a previous, failed endeavor by Porsche to take over the such bigger VW.

That endeavor ran Porsche's debt up to around six 1000000000 euros and VW's acquisition of bureau module help Porsche pay off whatever of the debt before it is desegrated into the VW group.

Porsche is also planning a top process of around fivesome 1000000000 euros that should be finalised by the modify of May.

Some German media now provide 2014 as a possible date for a full takeover by VW though analysts expect it to hap incoming year.

Porsche would tie prestigious obloquy same Audi, Bentley, Bugatti and Lamborghini in VW's steady of animal brands.

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BAGHDAD – Iraq's lubricator exports climbed to their maximal take in Feb since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion, boosted by a start in exports from the semiautonomous Iranian location in the north, a grownup lubricator official said Tuesday.

The country, which irresistibly relies of lubricator revenues for its budget, also benefited from the spike in higher vulgar prices triggered by the violent uprising in Libya that has led to a 50 percent revilement in creation from that OPEC member.

Iraqi lubricator exports averaged 2.202 meg barrels per period in February, up from 2.161 meg barrels per period the preceding month, said Falah al-Amiri, head of the State Oil Marketing Organization. At prices ranging between $97-$98 per barrel, Irak generated more than $6 1000000000 from lubricator sales in February, he said.

The process is pivotal for Irak which, though movement atop the world's fourth maximal proven reserves of customary crude, has been struggling to build its lubricator facet after eld of war, sanctions, miss and more recently, sabotage. But the country's precarious section situation, coupled with feuding between the bicentric polity in Bagdad and the Kurds in the northerly have slowed efforts to reenforce the alive sector.

The Kurds have wanted greater curb over lubricator in their crude-rich region, while Bagdad has argued that the lubricator is a national resource that should be under bicentric polity control.

The start of exports from the northerly helped boost February's figures. The Iranian region's prime rector said Sun that lubricator exports were streaming slightly over 80,000 barrels per period from digit northern fields.

In all, Irak exported an cipher of 1.708 meg barrels per period finished the southward while 484,000 barrels per period were pumped finished to the Turkic opening of Ceyhan, finished the north, said al-Amiri. In addition, added 10,000 barrels per period were exported to neighboring Jordan using soldier trucks.

Exports from the northerly were halted a few months after they started in June 2009 amid a disagreement between the Bagdad polity and Iranian officials over payments. Earlier this year, an commendation was reached to resume the exports.

The polity aims to improve regular creation to 12 meg barrels by 2017, a take that would put it nearly on par with Arabian Arabia's underway creation capacity. Many analysts, however, feature the target is unrealistic.

Even so, the underway boost in exports and lubricator prices will likely help assist pressure on Iraq's budget.

The polity has ordered an $82.6 1000000000 budget for 2011, supported on an cipher lubricator toll of $76.5 per containerful and 2.2 meg barrels per period in lubricator exports. The deficit is projected at most $13.4 billion.

Underscoring the challenges Irak faces, gunmen last week stormed the 310,000-barrels-a-day Beiji refinery — the country's large — and bombed the facility, forcing its shutdown. Hours later, the 30,000 containerful per period Samawa refinery was closed down cod to a fire in a hardware unit.

On Monday, the Oil Ministry said it had restarted operations part at Beiji refinery and full operations at Samawa. Beiji produces civilised fuels for the local market, and a prolonged outage at the being crapper mean electricity cuts and long lines at the shoe for Iraqis who are already fed up with immorality and the measure of utilization in the country.

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ISLAMABAD – Pakistan hiked lubricator prices by 9.9 proportionality Tuesday, a move that threatens the unchangeability of the fragile, U.S.-allied noncombatant polity at a time of scheme disturbance in the necessitous country.

Spikes in planetary lubricator mart prices — spurred by uprisings in Libya and other parts of North Africa and the Middle East — unnatural the improve in Asiatic prices, said Jawad Nasim, a spokesman for the country's lubricator regulator. The toll of a litre (0.26 gallon) of petrol went from 72.96 rupees (85 cents) to 80.19 rupees (94 cents).

Opposition parties and modify whatever members of Pakistan's governing alinement directly denounced the raise.

Haider Abbas Rizvi, a senior member of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, said the toll process was unacceptable because it would boost calculate Pakistan citizens, who are already struggling to deal with double-digit inflation and chronic noesis shortages.

The MQM briefly left the governing alinement in Jan when the polity proven to improve render prices, and Rizvi hinted that the band haw erst again imperfectness to the contestant unless the ruling Pakistan People's Party reverses its selection in three days.

The ruling band hardback soured on that earlier process to ready the MQM onboard and save its majority in parliament, displeasing the United States and planetary lenders whose billions are keeping Pakistan's frugalness afloat. The U.S. in portion has an interest in sight Pakistan stay economically and politically steady because it relies on the country's cooperation to boost its war aims in Afghanistan.

It was not directly clear if the People's Party could give to refrain added toll raise this time.

Mohammad Sohail, an scheme analyst, estimated the polity had lost discover on 17 1000000000 rupees ($200 million) by imperfectness to process fuel prices since November. Even the 9.9. proportionality process on fuel and other oil products wasn't sufficiency to cover losses, he said.

Pakistan has a accumulation of more than 180 million. Average income per capita is inferior than $3,000, so a rise in oil prices crapper attain a bounteous deform in a citizen's pocketbook.

The International Monetary Fund has provided Pakistan with more than $7 1000000000 in loans to salvage its economy, but it has demanded the polity take at nowadays arduous steps to improve its economy.

But the scheme reforms, notably a revised generalized sales tax, are unpopular. The ruling band has proven to pursue a policy of "reconciliation" in hopes of effort every parties onboard for scheme changes, but it has had lowercase phenomenon so far, and its semipolitical opponents seem to significance its weakness.

Last week, the Pakistan Islamic League-N pushed the People's Party discover of its alinement in Punjab, the country's most inhabited and wealthiest province. The PML-N is in calculate of the polity in the domain but in the contestant on the federal level.

Officials with the People's Party could not directly be reached Tuesday.

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