New Lumia phones seen winning Nokia more time

HELSINKI (Reuters) – Nokia‘s new Lumia smartphones are trickling into the market and early signs suggest they may sell well enough to give the handset maker more time in its fight against industry leaders Samsung and Apple.

But investors shouldn’t expect a quick turnaround for the struggling Finnish cellphone maker, with rival gadgets like mini tablet computers vying for consumers’ attention, analysts said.

“Positive reviews are a great start but as we have seen many times before these won’t deliver strong sales volumes on their own,” said Pete Cunningham, an analyst at research firm Canalys.

Successful sales of the latest Lumia 920 and 820 models are crucial for Nokia’s survival. The former market leader is burning through cash while it loses share in both high-end smartphones and cheaper handsets.

FIM Securities analyst Michael Schroder forecast Nokia will sell 1-3 million of the new models this quarter. It sold 2.9 million older Lumia models in the third quarter, compared to Apple’s sales of around 26.6 million iPhones in the same period.

“In any case the uptake will not be massive,” he predicted.

Lumia’s sales could serve a verdict on Chief Executive Stephen Elop‘s decision in February 2011 to partner with Microsoft instead of using Google‘s Android or continuing to develop Nokia’s own operating system.

Investors had feared poor reviews and weak sales could bring an end to the company’s smartphone business early next year.

So far, consumer reviews seem to favor the feel and look of the new models, which include high-definition cameras and the latest Microsoft Windows Phone 8 software.

“It (the Lumia 920) is very similar in appearance to the Lumia 900, but has curved glass, rounded edges, and curved back so it feels great in your hand. It is a dense device, but if you look at all the pros and cons the heft is worth it,” said a reviewer for tech website ZDNet.

That’s an improvement from the market’s reaction when the new model was first unveiled. The shares slumped 13 percent that day with investors citing a lack of a “wow” factor.

MAKE OR BREAK

Nokia is taking a gradual approach to launching the phones, and availability is expected to vary by market for the next few weeks, compared with Apple’s iPhone models which usually go on sale on the same day to global fanfare.

“While we are very impressed with the hardware features of the Lumia 920 and the improved software functionality of Windows Phone 8, we believe a focused launch to drive steady sales growth is necessary,” said Canaccord Genuity analyst Michael Walkley.

In Canada, one of the earliest launch markets, carrier Rogers Communications has trained its sales staff more to sell the latest Lumias than the previous models, said John Boynton, Rogers’ executive vice president of marketing.

He predicted the phones would be popular with first-time smartphone users, thanks to homescreens with tile-like icons designed to help users navigate applications and functions.

“They’re a little nervous at some of the more complex smartphones that are out there,” he said. “The tile format is a really, really simplified way for people to get comfortable using smartphones.”

In France, retail staff have become more confident in explaining Windows Phones to their customers, according to Laurent Lame, devices marketing chief at SFR which is the country’s second-biggest mobile operator.

“They know the product better after six months of good sales of the Lumia 610,” Lame said, adding he was now more optimistic about the Nokia-Microsoft partnership. “For once, with Windows 8, we are not starting from zero.”

Telefonica Deutschland Chief Executive Rene Schuster said he was “very, very pleased” with the early progress of Lumia sales.

Some retailers were more cautious, however, and in some cities there were no demonstration models for customers to test.

A salesman in an O2 store at the Zeil, Frankfurt’s busiest shopping area, said the store could take orders for the phone but could not show it. Demand was “okay, but not huge,” he said.

Analysts also expect tough competition during the pre-Christmas shopping season from the likes of Samsung’s Galaxy S III and Apple’s iPhone 5. Taiwan’s HTC has also introduced smartphones running Windows Phone 8 software.

Other rival gadgets include Apple’s iPad mini as well as cheaper tablets from Google and Amazon.

The stakes could not be higher for Nokia’s Elop, who said in February 2011 the company’s transition would take two years.

“This is absolutely a make-or-break phone for the Windows Phone strategy,” FIM Securities’ Schroder said. “If it fails, they have to take a whole new course.” (Additional reporting by Allison Martell in Toronto, Leila Abboud in Paris, Harro Ten Wolde in Frankfurt and Tarmo Virki in Helsinki; Editing by Mark Potter)

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Day-Lewis heeded inner ear to find Lincoln's voice

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A towering figure such as Abraham Lincoln, who stood 6 feet 4 and was one of history's master orators, must have had a booming voice to match, right? Not in Daniel Day-Lewis' interpretation.

Day-Lewis, who plays the 16th president in Steven Spielberg's epic film biography "Lincoln," which goes into wide release this weekend, settled on a higher, softer voice, saying it's more true to descriptions of how the man actually spoke.

"There are numerous accounts, contemporary accounts, of his speaking voice. They tend to imply that it was fairly high, in a high register, which I believe allowed him to reach greater numbers of people when he was speaking publicly," Day-Lewis said in an interview. "Because the higher registers tend to reach farther than the lower tones, so that would have been useful to him."

"Lincoln" is just the fifth film in the last 15 years for Day-Lewis, a two-time Academy Award winner for best actor ("My Left Foot" and "There Will Be Blood"). Much of his pickiness stems from a need to understand characters intimately enough to feel that he's actually living out their experiences.

The soft, reedy voice of his Lincoln grew out of that preparation.

"I don't separate vocal work, and I don't dismember a character into its component parts and then kind of bolt it all together, and off you go," Day-Lewis said. "I tend to try and allow things to happen slowly, over a long period of time. As I feel I'm growing into a sense of that life, if I'm lucky, I begin to hear a voice.

"And I don't mean in a supernatural sense. I begin to hear the sound of a voice, and if I like the sound of that, I live with that for a while in my mind's ear, whatever one might call it, my inner ear, and then I set about trying to reproduce that."

Lincoln himself likely learned to use his voice to his advantage depending on the situation, Day-Lewis said.

"He was a supreme politician. I've no doubt in my mind that when you think of all the influences in his life, from his childhood in Kentucky and Indiana and a good part of his younger life in southern Illinois, that the sounds of all those regions would have come together in him somehow.

"And I feel that he probably learned how to play with his voice in public and use it in certain ways in certain places and in certain other ways in other places. Especially in the manner in which he expressed himself. I think, I've no doubt that he was conscious enough of his image."

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British medical journal slams Roche on Tamiflu

LONDON (AP) — A leading British medical journal is asking the drug maker Roche to release all its data on Tamiflu, claiming there is no evidence the drug can actually stop the flu.

The drug has been stockpiled by dozens of governments worldwide in case of a global flu outbreak and was widely used during the 2009 swine flu pandemic.

On Monday, one of the researchers linked to the BMJ journal called for European governments to sue Roche.

"I suggest we boycott Roche's products until they publish missing Tamiflu data," wrote Peter Gotzsche, leader of the Nordic Cochrane Centre in Copenhagen. He said governments should take legal action against Roche to get the money back that was "needlessly" spent on stockpiling Tamiflu.

Last year, Tamiflu was included in a list of "essential medicines" by the World Health Organization, a list that often prompts governments or donor agencies to buy the drug.

Tamiflu is used to treat both seasonal flu and new flu viruses like bird flu or swine flu. WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl said the agency had enough proof to warrant its use for unusual influenza viruses, like bird flu.

"We do have substantive evidence it can stop or hinder progression to severe disease like pneumonia," he said.

In the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends Tamiflu as one of two medications for treating regular flu. The other is GlaxoSmithKline's Relenza. The CDC says such antivirals can shorten the duration of symptoms and reduce the risk of complications and hospitalization.

In 2009, the BMJ and researchers at the Nordic Cochrane Centre asked Roche to make all its Tamiflu data available. At the time, Cochrane Centre scientists were commissioned by Britain to evaluate flu drugs. They found no proof that Tamiflu reduced the number of complications in people with influenza.

"Despite a public promise to release (internal company reports) for each (Tamiflu) trial...Roche has stonewalled," BMJ editor Fiona Godlee wrote in an editorial last month.

In a statement, Roche said it had complied with all legal requirements on publishing data and provided Gotzsche and his colleagues with 3,200 pages of information to answer their questions.

"Roche has made full clinical study data ... available to national health authorities according to their various requirements, so they can conduct their own analyses," the company said.

Roche says it doesn't usually release patient-level data available due to legal or confidentiality constraints. It said it did not provide the requested data to the scientists because they refused to sign a confidentiality agreement.

Roche is also being investigated by the European Medicines Agency for not properly reporting side effects, including possible deaths, for 19 drugs including Tamiflu that were used in about 80,000 patients in the U.S.

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Online:

www.bmj.com.tamiflu/

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'Inappropriate’ emails, ‘shirtless’ photos

Paula Broadwell and Gen. David Petraeus in July of 2011. (Photo by ISAF via Getty Images)It seemed the story behind Gen. David Petraeus' resignation as director of the CIA  couldn't get stranger. New reports, however, now indicate that Marine Gen. John Allen, another well-respected, high-ranking general, might be involved in the growing scandal.

On the surface, the case so far involves: the FBI; a slew of allegedly inappropriate emails (between  Petraeus and his biographer, Paula Broadwell, Allen and socialite Jill Kelley, and allegedly threatening ones Broadwell sent to Kelley); the FBI agent who started the probe, who's now being investigated for sending "shirtless" photos to Kelley; and, as reported by the New York Post Tuesday morning, a child custody battle involving Kelley's twin sister that somehow allegedly concerns both Petraeus and Allen.

To help sort things out, here's a rundown of events, and where things currently stand.

Jill Kelley, a 37-year-old from Tampa, Fla., who organized local social events for the military as a volunteer, became friends with Petraeus and his family when he was stationed in Florida. Last spring, she began receiving harassing emails from an anonymous account, and alerted a friend who worked for the FBI.

The FBI began an investigation, which eventually uncovered an affair between Petraeus and Broadwell, both of who are married. The FBI believes Broadwell sent the harassing emails to Kelley because she perceived her to be a rival for Petraeus' affections.

The FBI found something else during the inquiry: 20,000 to 30,000 pages of emails and other communications between Kelley and Allen, the top commander in Afghanistan and a nominee to become the new NATO supreme allied commander for Europe.

A senior defense official has told the Washington Post that the emails were "potentially inappropriate." Other sources strongly denied to the Post that anything inappropriate ever happened between Allen and Kelley, but said that Allen may have used terms of endearment like "sweetheart" to refer to Kelley in his emails to her. The source said Allen, who is married, is "embarrassed" by this, but did not have an affair with her. Allen also received an email from the same account that was harassing Kelley, though it's unclear what the email said.

The Tampa party planner, who is married and has three children, is also at the center of another bizarre twist in the case. The Wall Street Journal reported Monday night that Kelley's FBI agent friend was taken off the Petraeus case and is currently being investigated because his superiors discovered that he sent "shirtless" photos to Kelley before the probe started. After the agent was removed from the case, the agent contacted Washington Rep. David Reichert to warn him that he thought FBI leaders would sweep the investigation under the rug.

Meanwhile, the Daily Beast, citing an anonymous source, reports that the harassing emails allegedly sent from Broadwell to Kelley did not say "stay away from my guy" as previously reported, and did not even directly reference Petraeus. The source described the tone of the emails as "more like, 'Who do you think you are? You parade around the base. You need to take it down a notch.'" The Wall Street Journal reported that one email, without elaborating, asked Kelley if her husband knew what she was doing. Another said the sender knew Kelley had touched "him," without specifying who the "him" was.

And, the AP has uncovered the trick Broadwell and Petraeus used to email each other without creating an online trail. The pair set up anonymous email accounts and drafted emails to each other without ever pushing "send." Each one could log on to the other account and click the "drafts" folder to see if a message had been left for them. This avoids creating an easily traceable email trail, the AP reported.

One question  the Daily Beast raised is why the FBI investigated the harassing emails sent to Kelley in the first place. There were no overt threats, such as "I'll kill you," in the emails, and some wonder if  Kelley's friendship with the FBI agent may be why the agency  investigated what seemed like a humdrum case better suited to local authorities.

Broadwell's father, for one, told the New York Daily News that he thinks the scandal is a smokescreen for a bigger story. "This is about something else entirely, and the truth will come out," Broadwell's father, Paul Krantz, told the Daily News. "There is a lot more that is going to come out."

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Pakistan accuses Afghans of killing civilians

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan on Monday accused Afghan forces of killing at least four civilians in a cross-border shelling attack, increasing tension just as a senior Afghan official visited Islamabad to discuss peace talks with the Taliban.

Pakistan is seen as critical to reaching a peace deal with the Taliban because of its historical ties to the group. The process has been complicated by significant levels of distrust among the major players — Afghanistan, Pakistan, the United States and the Taliban.

Pakistani Foreign Secretary Jalil Abbas Jilani condemned Sunday evening's cross-border attack in a conversation with the Afghan ambassador to Pakistan, Mohammad Umar Daudzai.

Jilani called the attacks "unhelpful and unproductive" and said they would undermine "the conducive environment that Pakistan is trying to create for promotion of peace and stability in the region," according to a statement from the Pakistani Foreign Ministry.

The Pakistani government said the attack killed four civilians, but Pakistani intelligence officials and a local resident, Habib Wazir, put the death toll at five — four men and a child. They said mortars exploded outside a house in the border village of Neiznarai in the South Waziristan tribal area.

The intelligence officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to reporters.

There was no immediate response from the Afghan government, which has repeatedly accused Pakistani forces of killing Afghan civilians with cross-border shelling in the other direction.

The latest accusations surfaced as the head of the Afghan government's council for peace talks with the Taliban, Salahuddin Rabbani, started three days of talks in Islamabad with Pakistani political and military leaders. Kabul set up the council in 2010 to negotiate an end to the decade-long war in Afghanistan.

Rabbani was named the council chief after his predecessor and father, Burhanuddin Rabbani, was assassinated in Sept. 2011. The killing stalled peace efforts and exacerbated tensions between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Some Afghan officials accused Pakistani intelligence agents of involvement in the assassination, allegations denied by Islamabad.

Rabbani met Monday with Pakistani Prime Minister Raja Pervaiz Ashraf, who expressed hope that the visit would improve relations between the two countries.

Significant disagreements remain. Afghanistan has long accused Pakistan of not doing enough to prevent Taliban militants from using its territory to launch cross-border attacks against Afghan and U.S.-led forces.

Kabul has also demanded that Islamabad release the former deputy leader of the Taliban, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, who was captured in Pakistan in 2010. His arrest reportedly angered Afghan President Hamid Karzai because Baradar was conducting secret talks with the Afghan government.

Pakistan has refused to release Baradar, who is seen by some as a potentially important player in striking a peace deal in Afghanistan. Islamabad has also struck back by accusing Kabul of not doing enough to stop militants based in Afghanistan from launching cross-border attacks against Pakistan.

Despite these disagreements, there is hope among some analysts that Pakistan may step up its cooperation with the peace process, because Islamabad is concerned that instability in Afghanistan after most foreign forces withdraw in 2014 could negatively impact Pakistan.

Many of the Taliban's top leaders are thought to be based in Pakistan, and Islamabad and Washington recently set up a group to determine which militants would be open to reconciliation and ensure they could travel out of the country for talks.

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Associated Press writer Ishtiaq Mahsud contributed to this report from Dera Ismail Khan, Pakistan.

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Microsoft’s Surface tablet has “modest” start: Ballmer

PARIS (Reuters) – Microsoft Corp‘s new Surface tablet – its challenger to Apple‘s iPad – had a “modest” start to sales because of limited availability, Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer told French daily Le Parisien.

The world’s largest software company put the Surface tablet center stage at its Windows 8 launch event last month in its fightback against Apple and Google in the exploding mobile computing market.

“We’ve had a modest start because Surface is only available on our online retail sites and a few Microsoft stores in the United States,” Ballmer was quoted as saying.

Meanwhile, 4 million upgrades to Windows 8 were sold in the three days following the system’s launch, Ballmer added. (Reporting by Lionel Laurent; Editing by David Cowell)

Tech News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Elmo puppeteer accused of underage relationship

NEW YORK (AP) — The puppeteer who performs as Elmo on "Sesame Street" is taking a leave of absence from the popular kids' show in the wake of allegations that he had a relationship with a 16-year-old boy.

Sesame Workshop said puppeteer Kevin Clash denies the charges, which were first made in June by the alleged partner, who by then was 23.

"We took the allegation very seriously and took immediate action," Sesame Workshop said in a statement issued Monday. "We met with the accuser twice and had repeated communications with him. We met with Kevin, who denied the accusation."

The organization described the relationship as personal and "unrelated to the workplace." Its investigation found the allegation of underage conduct to be unsubstantiated. But it said Clash exercised "poor judgment" and was disciplined for violating company policy regarding Internet usage. It offered no details.

"I had a relationship with (the accuser)," Clash told TMZ. "It was between two consenting adults and I am deeply saddened that he is trying to make it into something it was not."

At his request, Clash has been granted a leave of absence in order to "protect his reputation," Sesame Workshop said.

No further explanation was provided, nor was the duration of his leave specified.

"Elmo is bigger than any one person and will continue to be an integral part of 'Sesame Street' to engage, educate and inspire children around the world, as it has for 40 years," Sesame Workshop said in its statement.

"Sesame Street" is currently in production, but other puppeteers are prepared to fill in for Clash during his absence, according to a person close to the show who spoke on condition of anonymity because that person was not authorized to publicly discuss details about the show's production.

"Elmo will still be a part of the shows being produced," that person said.

The 52-year-old Clash, the divorced father of a grown daughter, has been a puppeteer for "Sesame Street" since 1984. It was then that he was handed the fuzzy red puppet named Elmo and asked to come up with a voice for him. Clash transformed the character, which had been a marginal member of the Muppets troupe for a number of years, into a major star rivaling Big Bird as the face of "Sesame Street."

In 2006, Clash published an autobiography, "My Life as a Furry Red Monster," and was the subject of the 2011 documentary "Being Elmo: A Puppeteer's Journey."

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British medical journal slams Roche on Tamiflu

LONDON (AP) — A leading British medical journal is asking the drug maker Roche to release all its data on Tamiflu, claiming there is no evidence the drug can actually stop the flu.

The drug has been stockpiled by dozens of governments worldwide in case of a global flu outbreak and was widely used during the 2009 swine flu pandemic.

On Monday, one of the researchers linked to the BMJ journal called for European governments to sue Roche.

"I suggest we boycott Roche's products until they publish missing Tamiflu data," wrote Peter Gotzsche, leader of the Nordic Cochrane Centre in Copenhagen. He said governments should take legal action against Roche to get the money back that was "needlessly" spent on stockpiling Tamiflu.

Last year, Tamiflu was included in a list of "essential medicines" by the World Health Organization, a list that often prompts governments or donor agencies to buy the drug.

Tamiflu is used to treat both seasonal flu and new flu viruses like bird flu or swine flu. WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl said the agency had enough proof to warrant its use for unusual influenza viruses, like bird flu.

"We do have substantive evidence it can stop or hinder progression to severe disease like pneumonia," he said.

In the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends Tamiflu as one of two medications for treating regular flu. The other is GlaxoSmithKline's Relenza. The CDC says such antivirals can shorten the duration of symptoms and reduce the risk of complications and hospitalization.

In 2009, the BMJ and researchers at the Nordic Cochrane Centre asked Roche to make all its Tamiflu data available. At the time, Cochrane Centre scientists were commissioned by Britain to evaluate flu drugs. They found no proof that Tamiflu reduced the number of complications in people with influenza.

"Despite a public promise to release (internal company reports) for each (Tamiflu) trial...Roche has stonewalled," BMJ editor Fiona Godlee wrote in an editorial last month.

In a statement, Roche said it had complied with all legal requirements on publishing data and provided Gotzsche and his colleagues with 3,200 pages of information to answer their questions.

"Roche has made full clinical study data ... available to national health authorities according to their various requirements, so they can conduct their own analyses," the company said.

Roche says it doesn't usually release patient-level data available due to legal or confidentiality constraints. It said it did not provide the requested data to the scientists because they refused to sign a confidentiality agreement.

Roche is also being investigated by the European Medicines Agency for not properly reporting side effects, including possible deaths, for 19 drugs including Tamiflu that were used in about 80,000 patients in the U.S.

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Online:

www.bmj.com.tamiflu/

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Petraeus' aide wondered about Broadwell's behavior, qualifications

Retired Gen. David Petraeus, who resigned as CIA director last week after admitting an extramarital relationship, could possibly face military prosecution for adultery if officials turn up any evidence to counter his apparent claims that the affair began after he left the military.

The affair between Petraeus and his biographer, Paula Broadwell, both of whom are married, began several months after his retirement from the Army in August 2011 and ended four months ago, retired U.S. Army Col. Steve Boylan, a former Petraeus spokesman, told ABC News.

Broadwell, 40, had extraordinary access to the 60-year-old general during six trips she took to Afghanistan as his official biographer, a plum assignment for a novice writer.

"For him to allow the very first biography to be written about him, to be written by someone who had never written a book before, seemed very odd to me," former Petraeus aide Peter Mansoor told ABC News.

The timeline of the relationship, according to Patraeus, would mean that he was carrying on the affair for the majority of his tenure at the CIA, where he began as director Sept. 6, 2011. If he carried on the affair while serving in the Army, however, Patraeus could face charges, according to Article 134 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which reprimands conduct "of a nature to bring discredit upon the armed forces."

Whether the military would pursue such action, whatever evidence it accumulates, is unclear.

As the details of the investigation launched by the FBI unraveled this weekend, it became clear that the woman at the heart of the inquiry that led to Petraeus' downfall had been identified as Jill Kelley, a Florida woman who volunteers to help the military. She is a family friend of Petraeus, who Broadwell apparently felt threatened by.

Kelley and her husband are longtime supporters of the military, and six months ago she was named "Honorary Ambassador to Central Command" for her volunteer work with the military. Officials say Kelley is not romantically linked to Petraeus, but befriended the general and his wife when he was stationed in Florida. The Kelleys spent Christmases in group settings with the Petraeuses and visited them in Washington D.C., where Kelley's sister and her son live.

"We and our family have been friends with Gen. Petraeus and his family for over five years." Kelley said in a statement Sunday. "We respect his and his family's privacy and want the same for us and our three children."

Earlier this year, around the time that Petraeus and Broadwell were breaking off their affair, Kelly began receiving anonymous emails, which she found so threatening she went to authorities. The FBI traced the messages to Broadwell's computer, where they found other salacious and explicit emails between Broadwell and Petraeus that made it clear to officials that the two were carrying on an affair.

Investigators uncovered no compromising of classified information or criminal activity, sources familiar with the probe said, adding that all that was found was a lot of "human drama."

Broadwell, a married mother of two, had access to Petraeus while she was with him in Afghanistan as his official biographer. People close to the general had previously suspected Broadwell's feelings for him had crossed a professional line.

They found Broadwell, who spent a year embedded with Petraeus in Afghanistan, to be embarrassing and far too "gushy" about him. They said to one another they thought Broadwell "was in love with him," sources told ABC News.

Petraeus is said to have been the one to have broken off the extramarital affair.

His storied career, first as the public face of two wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and later as director of the CIA, came crashing down Friday when he announced his resignation from the intelligence agency, citing the indiscretion.

"After being married for over 37 years, I showed extremely poor judgment by engaging in an extramarital affair. Such behavior is unacceptable, both as a husband and as the leader of an organization such as ours," Petraeus said in a statement Friday.

Director of National Intelligence James Clapper was made aware of the Petraeus situation Tuesday evening around 5 p.m. by the FBI, according to a senior intelligence source.

After having several conversations with Petraeus that evening and the next day, Clapper advised Petraeus that the best thing to do would be for him to resign, the source said.

Clapper notified the White House the next afternoon that Petraeus was considering resigning, according to the source. Petraeus then went to the White House Thursday and told the president he thought he should resign, and Obama accepted his resignation the next day, the source said.

Despite the lengthy investigation into Broadwell by the FBI, the White House says it was not made aware of it until Wednesday, the day after the election, a revelation that surprised many.

"It just doesn't add up. That the FBI would be carrying on this type of investigation without, again, bringing it to the president or the highest levels of the White House," Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., said.

Petraeus and his wife, Holly, who have been married for 38 years, are said to be staying in their Arlington Home and are doing "OK."

"Knowing the family, I suspect it will be hard work, but given the effort, they will get through it," Boylan, the former Petraeus spokesman, said.

Numerous questions still remain about the investigation, and some on Capitol Hill are also frustrated because Petraeus was schedule to testify to the House and Senate intelligence committees about the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya, in September.

The timing of Petraeus' resignation "was what it was," an official told ABC News, adding that the time had come to tie up any loose ends in the investigation and confront the general.

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Man in Afghan uniform kills foreign service member

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — A gunman wearing an Afghan army uniform on Sunday shot and killed a member of the U.S.-led coalition forces fighting in Afghanistan — the latest in a spate of insider attacks that are fracturing the trust between NATO and Afghan forces.

Separately, officials said 11 Afghan civilians were killed by land mines on Sunday in explosions in the east and south.

U.S. Army Maj. Martyn Crighton, a spokesman for the coalition, said the service member was killed in the south. His identity and nationality were not disclosed.

Mohammad Zarak, spokesman for the governor of Helmand province, said the shooting took place in Nad Ali district after an argument between an Afghan soldier and coalition service members.

Coalition figures show at least 60 coalition service members have been killed so far this year and others have been wounded in about 45 insider attacks, where members of the Afghan security forces or insurgents dressed in their uniforms turn their guns on U.S. and allied troops.

The insider attacks have raised questions about how effectively the allied forces can train the Afghans to take over security of their own country in 2014 and beyond. Foreign forces are due to turn over security responsibility to the local military by the end of 2014.

A roadside bomb killed three men, two women and a baby in Khost province of eastern Afghanistan, deputy provincial police chief Youqib Khan said. He said their vehicle hit the bomb as they were returning from a hospital.

Three other civilians were killed when their vehicle detonated a land mine on the road between Helmand and Kandahar provinces, a government statement said.

Also in the south, two civilians who were walking were killed by a land mine in Khakrez district of Kandahar province, said Ahmad Jawed Faisal, a spokesman for the provincial governor.

The United Nations says homemade bombs continue to be the weapons that kill the most civilians in the war.

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Associated Press Writers Rahim Faiez and Mirwais Khan contributed to this report.

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