Acer will beat Google to market with its own $99 tablet

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Taylor Swift keeps Bruno Mars out of Billboard 200 top spot

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Country pop star Taylor Swift held her reign at the top of the Billboard 200 album chart on Wednesday, keeping retro-inspired R&B singer Bruno Mars‘ new album at bay.

Swift’s latest album, “Red,” released in October, held the No. 1 slot for a fifth non-consecutive week with sales of 208,000, according to figures from Nielsen SoundScan.

Mars’ second album, “Unorthodox Jukebox,” sold 192,000 copies in its opening week to take the No. 2 slot.

The album’s lead single, “Locked Out of Heaven,” stayed at the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100 chart for a second week, and is the singer’s fourth chart-topping single. It also tops the Digital Songs chart this week.

Hip hop artist The Game entered the chart at No. 6 with his fifth studio album, “Jesus Piece,” selling 86,000 copies.

Four festive albums sat in the top ten this week, with Michael Buble‘s “Christmas” at No. 3, Rod Stewart‘s “Merry Christmas Baby” at No. 5, Blake Shelton‘s “Cheers, It’s Christmas” at No. 8, and Lady Antebellum‘s “On This Winter’s Night” at No. 10.

(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy Editing by Jill Serjeant, Gary Hill)

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The Benghazi Report and Parents of Children With Mental Illness: Today’s Qs for O’s WH, 12/20/12

TAPPER: Has the president read the Accountability Review Board report?

CARNEY: I don’t know. I haven’t – I know he has been briefed on it. I don’t know if he’s read it word for word, but he’s a voracious reader, so he may have.

TAPPPER: The – I believe one person has resigned and three have been – stepped down from their current duties but are still State Department employees. There might – there might have been an update for that since I last read about that. Is that sufficient for the president? Is that – is that enough accountability from the Accountability Review Board?

CARNEY: I think by every measure, the report has been assessed to be – to have been sharply critical and very blunt and clear-eyed about both problems that exist, problems that need to be fixed and the need for accountability, and actions are – already have been taken, as you just – as you just noted.

TAPPER: I’m not questioning the report. I’m -

CARNEY: Well, again, I think -

TAPPER: I’m wondering: is that enough?

CARNEY: I think independent experts here, Admiral Mullen and Ambassador Pickering, oversaw a – Accountability Review Board which I think everyone is judging to have been quite – and the recommendations that they have made are being adopted in full, and there has already been, in this very short period of time, actions that demonstrate accountability is being upheld.

I don’t – I mean I haven’t had a discussion with the president, but I think he is both appreciative of Ambassador Pickering and Admiral Mullen for the service they provided to the nation here, for the depth that they delved into in this report and the seriousness of the recommendations, the speed with which they acted; and, you know, he intends to make sure that the administration, as the secretary of state has said, begins implementation of all of these recommendations before the next secretary of state takes office.

Some of this has to do – some of it will have to do with working with Congress to ensure that Congress provides the necessary funds to allow for enhanced security at our diplomatic missions around the world. So there is obviously more action that needs to be taken, but this is a very serious report and the president has indicated that he expects it to be implemented fully.

TAPPER: Again, I’m not disparaging the report. I’m just wondering if -

(Cross talk.)

CARNEY: Again, I think – I don’t have another answer for you. Four people have already, in one way or another, been held accountable, fairly senior people, so -

TAPPER: Is that sufficient for the president? That’s the only question.

CARNEY: I believe the president believes that the recommendations and the actions taken have been the right ones.

TAPPER: O.K., one other thing I wanted to ask about the mental health ramifications following Sandy Hook, and that is there have been some interesting personal stories in the media about parents – a lot of them single parents, but not exclusively – struggling with children who are mentally ill, some of them violently so, most of them not, who do not have enough help from society. They fall through some holes, some cracks in the system. I’m just wondering if the president has seen any of these, have read any of the – of the essays that have been written, and caught any of them on television, because it’s been – it’s actually been – it’s been remarkable to hear, because normally you don’t hear stories like this.

CARNEY: Well, I haven’t had that discussion with him. He is someone who reads widely, and it would surprise me if he hasn’t read or seen some of the reports that you’re talking about, probably more likely to have read rather than seen, with all due respect to the broadcast media.

But the fact is that he believes very strongly that mental health is one of the major areas that needs to be addressed as we take a kind of comprehensive approach to this problem. It’s why – setting aside the issue of gun violence – but the issue of mental health in general is extremely important to – in the president’s view, to our – what our overall approach to health care in this country ought to be, which is why, as you know, he made sure that the health care law that he passed with Congress will ensure 30 million more Americans have access to mental health services, and that will also – makes recommended mental health services available without a co-pay or a deductible – again, part of the effort here to make it clear that issues of mental health are as important, both for the individual and for the society, as issues of physical health.

So – but as it relates to the gun violence there is no question that this is something that needs more exploration and likely more action, which is why the president has taken the action that he has.

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IntercontinentalExchange buys NYSE Euronext for $8 billion

NEW YORK/LONDON (Reuters) – IntercontinentalExchange struck an $ 8.2 billion deal to buy NYSE Euronext, a combination that will propel the commodities market powerhouse into European financial futures but threaten to further reduce the clout of the New York Stock Exchange.

The deal will create a new player in global derivatives trading and clearing that would take on CME Group Inc. While the New York Stock Exchange has stood for 200 years as an iconic symbol of U.S. capitalism, it is almost an afterthought in this deal.

Atlanta-based ICE said it will try to spin off the Euronext European stock market businesses in a public offering, generating speculation it may eventually shutter the NYSE‘s trading floor, as well. Profits from stock trading have been significantly eroded by new technology and the rise of private venues run by Wall Street banks and brokers.

Analysts said the deal will give ICE a strategic boost with control of Liffe, Europe’s second-largest derivatives market, helping it compete against U.S.-based CME Group, owner of the Chicago Board of Trade. Derivatives trading remains quite profitable for the exchanges and new rules coming into play next year will dramatically expand the demand for clearing over-the-counter contracts.

Regulatory concerns sank two deals to buy NYSE Euronext last year, including a joint bid by ICE and Nasdaq OMX Group and a separate bid from German exchange Deutsche Bourse. But ICE alone has far less overlapping business and should face easy approvals, antitrust attorneys said.

The deal values each NYSE Euronext share at $ 33.12, a 28 percent premium to the stock’s closing price on Wednesday. Shareholders will have the option of accepting $ 33.12 in cash per NYSE Euronext share or 0.2581 ICE share or a mix of $ 11.27 in cash and 0.1703 ICE share, subject to a maximum cash consideration of $ 2.7 billion..

NYSE Euronext stock rose 33 percent, to $ 31.88, after the deal was announced. ICE’s shares fell as much as 4 percent before clawing back some of the losses to trade down 0.6 percent, at $ 127.60, at 01:10 p.m. ET.

ICE said it would pay an annual dividend of $ 300 million once the deal closes.

NYSE Chief Executive Duncan Niederauer called the deal a “no brainer” on a call with analysts on Thursday. Further consolidation of exchanges was “inevitable” and ICE was a “great partner,” he said, so continuing on alone did not make sense.

“We can sit here and keep slugging away and keep working hard, but the bottom line is we had not delivered, in my mind, sufficient returns to shareholders,” Niederauer said.

Before the latest ICE offer emerged, NYSE Euronext‘s shares had fallen by nearly a third since ICE and Nasdaq launched their thwarted joint bid.

The newest offer first took shape in October when ICE Chairman and Chief Executive Jeff Sprecher, a consummate deal maker, called Niederauer to consider reviving their talks without the Nasdaq involved, said one person familiar with the situation who was not authorized to speak to the press.

ICE started out as an online marketplace for energy trading before Sprecher initiated a string of acquisitions from the London-based International Petroleum Exchange in 2001, to the New York Board of Trade and, most recently, a handful of smaller deals, including a climate exchange and a stake in a Brazilian clearing house.

A tie-up with Liffe would give Sprecher a boost to trade in to interest rates, one of the world’s biggest asset classes and a particular specialty of CME. Liffe and CME have a long-time rivalry in trading of short-term interest-rate contracts, with each launching – to little effect – look-alike versions of the other’s contracts. The CME declined to comment on the proposed deal.

“ICE is after Liffe, that is the crown jewel of NYSE Euronext,” said Peter Lenardos, analyst at RBC Capital Markets. NYSE bought Euronext, including Liffe, for 8 billion euros in 2007. “Strategically it makes sense for ICE to enter the European derivatives space in a meaningful way.”

ICE’s current main operations are in energy futures trading and, it has steered clear of stocks and stock-options trading, key businesses for NYSE Euronext. So there is not much business overlap between the two groups compared with last year’s proposed takeovers.

“This deal is probably not going to generate a lot of concern from an antitrust perspective,” said Warren Rosborough, a veteran of the U.S. Justice Department’s antitrust division who is now with the law firm McDermott Will & Emery.

A small amount of competing derivatives business could be addressed with straightforward divestitures, he said. “It’s an open question about whether it will generate questions,” he said. “If there is a fix, it will be relatively easy fix.”

Sprecher, who will be chairman and CEO of the combined company, said the deal had been “well received” by regulators after he and Niederauer completed a “whirlwind tour” in the United States and Europe ahead of Thursday’s announcement. Officials at the European Commission and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission declined to comment.

Last year, the Justice Department blocked a $ 11 billion joint hostile bid by ICE and Nasdaq OMX on concerns the tie-up would dominate U.S. stock listings. A rival $ 9.3 billion bid by Deutsche Boerse fell afoul of European regulators.

A combined ICE-NYSE Euronext would leap-frog Deutsche Boerse to become the world’s third-largest exchange group with a combined market value of $ 15.2 billion. CME Group has a market value of $ 17.5 billion, Thomson Reuters data shows.

Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing is the world’s largest exchange group with a market cap of $ 19.5 billion.

ICE said it expected to achieve $ 450 million in cost savings from the takeover. In the first year after the deal closes, additional earnings of 15 percent are expected.

Long-time Wall Street traders saw the potential takeover of the venerable stock exchange by a 12-year-old derivatives upstart as weighted with symbolism.

“It’s the end of an era,” said a director on the board of a rival exchange who did not have clearance to speak to the press and asked not to be named. “I think ultimately the floor will be closed, because Jeff (Sprecher) has shut every floor he’s ever had,” the person said.

The exchange was prepared to shut down the floor temporarily during superstorm Sandy and trade completely electronically, Wall Street executives said.

But one former New York Stock Exchange executive was doubtful that ICE would completely shut down the NYSE floor. “It has too strong a marketing brand associated with it to close it,” said the executive, who declined to be identified because he is not permitted to speak to the press.

Morgan Stanley was the lead financial adviser to ICE, with assistance from BMO Capital Markets Corp, Broadhaven Capital Partners, JPMorgan Chase & Co, Lazard Group LLC, Societe Generale Corporate & Investment Banking, and Wells Fargo Securities LLC. ICE legal advisers are Sullivan & Cromwell LLP and Shearman & Sterling LLP.

The principal financial advisers to NYSE Euronext are Perella Weinberg Partners and BNP Paribas. Further financial advice to NYSE Euronext is being provided by Blackstone Advisory Partners, Citigroup, Goldman Sachs & Co. and Moelis & Co. Legal advisers to NYSE Euronext are Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, Slaughter & May, and Stibbe NV.

(Additional reporting by Luke Jeffs and David Brough in London, Jessica Toonkel, Diane Bartz and Karen Brettell in New York, Sarah N. Lynch in Washington and Ann Saphir in Chicago; writing by Carmel Crimmins and Aaron Pressman; editing by Philippa Fletcher)

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Worries grow in east Congo with fighter buildup

DAKAR, Senegal (AP) — Aid workers warned Wednesday that armed groups are setting up new front lines in and around the city of Goma in eastern Congo, where the U.N. said it now has documented at least 126 rape cases last month.

Thousands of fighters from the M23 rebel group withdrew several weeks ago from Goma, and the fighters have since taken steps toward negotiating with the Congolese government.

However, residents in Goma say M23 and other armed fighters are now positioning themselves in an around the city — including inside camps for people displaced by the violence.

The arrival of several thousand fighters within the last week is prompting fear among civilians, who already have experienced years of fighting and rebellions, said Tariq Riebl, Oxfam’s humanitarian coordinator there.

“They are very concerned — people are seeing this and they don’t know what it means,” he said. “I think what everyone is scared about is that it seems like people are ramping up, ramping up but for what purpose?”

Oxfam warns that more than 1 million people could come under attack if violence again flares in Goma, where more than 100,000 people already have fled from elsewhere in the region.

“Goma is typically the last refuge safe haven and now it’s being directly called into question. If Goma falls in a big battle, where are people going to go?” Riebl said.

“This is very, very disconcerting because you have a population of over 1 million people and if war were to break out, we’re looking at a horrific situation.”

The M23 rebel group, which is believed to be backed by neighboring Rwanda, is made up of hundreds of soldiers who deserted the Congolese army in April.

They took control of many villages and towns in the mineral-rich east over the last seven months, culminating in the seizure of Goma on Nov. 20. It took days of negotiations and intense international pressure, including from the U.N., for the thousands of fighters from M23 to finally withdraw from the regional capital.

The U.N. mission says it’s received allegations of serious rights violations, including killings and wounding of civilians, rape, looting, and forced recruitment of children, by elements of the M23 rebels in Goma and neighboring areas.

Congo’s armed forces are also blamed for a series of attacks as they fled Goma in retreat in late November.

The U.N. said Tuesday it now has been able to document at least 126 rapes during that period in the Minova area, about 60 kilometers (40 miles) south of Goma.

U.N. spokesman Martin Nesirky said that two Congolese soldiers so far have been arrested in connection with the rapes, while seven others had been implicated in looting in the area.

“The Congolese Armed Forces have started investigating those human rights violations,” he said. “The U.N. Mission is supporting the military justice procedure in conducting thorough investigations into these allegations to ensure that the perpetrators are identified and held accountable.”

Rape has long been used as a brutal weapon of war in eastern Congo, where both soldiers and various armed groups use sexual violence to intimidate, punish and control the population.

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Wii U finally gets Nintendo’s TVii service on December 20th

After a month-long delay, Nintendo (NTDOY) will launch its Nintendo TVii service for the Wii U on December 20th in the U.S. and Canada. Nintendo TVii is the company’s take on organizing all of the various video streaming and DVR services a user might subscribe to and then displaying them in an easy-to-navigate touchscreen-based interface on the Wii U GamePad. With Nintendo TVii, Nintendo hopes to make content discovery an easier task, rather than a chore. At the same time, Nintendo TVii will offer new “second-screen” experiences (similar to Xbox SmartGlass) with built-in social sharing options to Facebook (FB), Twitter and the Wii U console’s Miiverse.

[More from BGR: BlackBerry 10 browser smokes iOS 6 and Windows Phone 8 in comparison test [video]]

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Nintendo TVii will support Amazon (AMZN) Instant Video, Hulu Plus and cable and satellite providers on Thursday, but Netflix (NFLX) and TiVo (TIVO) support won’t hit the U.S. until “early 2013.” Nintendo didn’t state when TVii support for the latter two will hit Canada.

For the consumer’s sake, we hope the download for Nintendo TVii doesn’t take as long as past system updates.

Nintendo’s press release follows below.

Nintendo Makes TV Smart and Social – Nintendo TVii Launches Dec. 20

New Wii U Service Gives Every Member of the Family His or Her Own Personalized, Easy-to-Use Second-Screen Viewing Experience

REDMOND, Wash.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–The company that changed how we play is about to change how we watch. On Dec. 20, Nintendo will introduce Nintendo TVii, a free, integrated service for the recently launched Wii U console that combines what you watch and how you watch into one seamless, second-screen experience on the revolutionary new Wii U GamePad controller.

The rapid increase in both the quality and availability of video entertainment content – hundreds of satellite and cable channels, a seemingly endless amount of video-on-demand options – has made finding something to watch a complex and occasionally frustrating process. The solution to this problem is coming from perhaps an unexpected place: a video game console.

“After Dec. 20, you’ll never look at your TV the same way again,” said Nintendo of America President and COO Reggie Fils-Aime. “Wii U owners have already experienced the transformative effect that the GamePad has on game play and social interaction. Nintendo TVii shows how the integrated second screen of the GamePad can also transform and enhance the TV viewing experience. Welcome to the new world of TVii.”

Nintendo TVii maximizes Wii U owners’ current cable, satellite and video-on-demand services by pulling all of their available content sources – such as a Comcast cable package or Hulu Plus subscription – into one place. This empowers Wii U owners to focus on whatthey want to watch and not how they want to watch. And once users find the show, sporting event or movie they want, they press an icon and Nintendo TVii does the rest.

In addition to greatly simplifying finding and watching video content, Nintendo TVii also includes a series of social features that enable Wii U owners to share experiences and exciting moments with friends as they are happening on live TV. People can engage with others by commenting and sharing on Miiverse, Facebook and Twitter. Or they can comment, post or tweet about an incredible touchdown, a remarkable performance or a shocking plot twist, all using the personal screen of the Wii U GamePad.

Nintendo TVii requires no additional equipment and can be enjoyed with very little setup, demonstrating what’s possible when the second screen is truly integrated with the TV. Wii U owners can also discover more information about what they’re watching by easily accessing information on the GamePad via an Internet connection, including cast details, movie reviews from Rotten Tomatoes and sports data such as live stats and scores.

Nintendo TVii launches in the United States and Canada on Dec. 20. At launch, the service will support cable and satellite providers in both regions, as well as direct integration with Amazon Instant Video and Hulu Plus subscriptions in the United States. Further integration with Netflix subscriptions and TiVo are expected in early 2013 in the United States. Wii U owners with a Netflix subscription can still access the Netflix application from the Wii U system’s main menu and enjoy their favorite content accordingly.

All elements of the Nintendo TVii service are included in the purchase price of the Wii U system. Users will define which services they currently subscribe to – including the channel lineup in their cable package and video-on-demand service subscriptions – as part of the setup process.

Nintendo TVii observes the Wii U system parental controls, and additional options specific to the Nintendo TVii features can be chosen in the Nintendo TVii settings. Every member of the family can create a different viewing profile. For more information about this and other features, visit http://www.nintendo.com/wiiu.

This article was originally published by BGR

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Madonna leads Billboard’s top-grossing tours

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – While this year’s pop charts have been dominated by young singers, it is veteran music stars, led by Madonna, who are commanding big money in tour ticket sales, according to a new Billboard list released on Tuesday.

Madonna, 54, topped Billboard‘s list of highest-grossing live tours, earning an estimated $ 228.4 million in ticket sales from her sold-out ninth worldwide tour in support of her 12th studio album “MDNA.” The singer will wrap her tour in South America this weekend, after performing more than 80 shows across the world starting in Israel in May.

Madonna came ahead of pop star Lady Gaga, who landed at No. 6, with ticket sales of $ 124.9 million from her worldwide “Born This Way Ball” tour. Gaga, 26, is currently midway through her tour, which kicked off in South Korea in April, and will wrap in Oklahoma in March 2013.

Music publication Billboard compiled its list through estimated gross ticket sales figures from Billboard box scores, which tracks concert tours, ticket prices and sales.

The top five highest-grossing tour acts of 2012 included Bruce Springsteen, 63, and the E Street band at No. 2 with $ 199 million from 72 shows and Pink Floyd’s Roger Waters, 69, at No. 3 with $ 186 million.

Cirque Du Soleil‘s homage to late singer Michael Jackson in “The Immortal World Tour” ranked No. 4 with $ 147.3 million over 183 shows, and British rock band Coldplay was fifth with $ 147.2 million over 67 shows.

The only other young stars in the list of 25 top-grossing tours was Canadian pop star Justin Bieber, 18, at No. 20 with $ 30 million from 29 shows as part of his ongoing “Believe” tour, and country-pop darling Taylor Swift, 23, who raked in $ 26 million from 21 shows from her “Speak Now World Tour.”

Last year, Swift ranked No. 5 on Billboard‘s list with an estimated $ 97 million in ticket sales from her “Speak Now World Tour,” while Bieber came in at No. 15 with $ 44 million.

Swift will embark on her third worldwide concert tour in support of her studio album “Red” in March 2013.

(Reporting By Piya Sinha-Roy; Editing by Patricia Reaney and Eric Walsh)

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Amgen pagará 762 millones por vender un medicamento para usos no autorizados

Nueva York, 19 dic (EFE).- El gigante estadounidense de la biotecnología Amgen pagará una sanción de 762 millones de dólares tras declararse culpable de introducir en el mercado un medicamento para usos no permitidos por las autoridades federales.

La compañía aceptó hoy en un tribunal federal de Brooklyn (Nueva York) un acuerdo para declararse culpable, clausurar el caso y pagar 150 millones en sanciones criminales y 612 millones para cubrir las solicitudes de compensación a programas públicos de seguro médico, como Medicare o Medicaid.

El caso se refiere al “Aranesp”, un medicamento aprobado por la Administración de Fármacos y Alimentos (FDA, por sus siglas en inglés) para favorecer la formación de glóbulos rojos en los tratamientos de anemias.

“A fin de incrementar las ventas de Aranesp y lograr más beneficios, Amgen ilegalmente vendió el medicamento con la intención de que se usara con dosis que la FDA había estudiado y rechazado, y para tratamientos que la FDA nunca aprobó”, señaló el tribunal federal en un comunicado.

El acuerdo supone la mayor sanción por fraude a una compañía de biotecnología en la historia de Estados Unidos.

El fiscal federal Marshall Miller señaló que “en lugar de trabajar para alargar y mejorar la vida humana, Amgen buscó ilegalmente los beneficios empresariales mientras ponía en peligro la seguridad de consumidores vulnerables que sufrían enfermedades”. EFE

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Bank chief house costs to be paid

19 December 2012 Last updated at 08:39 ET

Mark Carney, the next head of the Bank of England, will be paid £250,000 in housing costs in addition to his salary and pension costs.

He will receive the money on top of his annual £480,000 salary and a yearly pension allowance of £144,000.

The housing allowance will be taxed at the new top rate of tax of 45%, which will be in place by the time he takes up his post next July,

Mr Carney is currently the head of the Bank of Canada.

A housing allowance was agreed as part of the package to tempt Mr Carney, who lives with his wife and four children, from his current post in Canada, but has only just been signed off by the non-executive directors of the Bank of England.

The allowance is designed to help him maintain a similar lifestyle to his current one in Ottawa, where he has a spacious family house near the Bank of Canada’s headquarters.

Continue reading the main story

What may stir controversy is that Mr Carney’s package protects him from the kind of gyrations in the economy that it will be his role to temper”

End Quote

Mr Carney’s salary itself is well above the £305,000 paid to the current governor of the Bank of England, Sir Mervyn King.

The Bank says this reflects in part the increased role the next governor will be faced with, as the Bank is taking over most of the UK’s bank regulation from the Financial Services Authority next year.

The Chancellor, George Osborne, spent months trying to court Mr Carney to take the post as Bank chief.

Mr Carney had gone on record as saying he was not interested in the post, but was persuaded to change his mind by Mr Osborne.

Part of the deal included allowing Mr Carney to serve just five years as Bank governor, rather than the eight-year term normally served in that position.

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NBC’s Engel, TV crew escape abduction in Syria

BEIRUT (AP) — NBC‘s chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel said Tuesday he and members of his network crew escaped unharmed after five days of captivity in Syria, where more than a dozen pro-regime gunmen dragged them from their car, killed one of their rebel escorts and subjected them to mock executions.

Appearing on NBC’s “Today” show, an unshaven Engel said he and his team escaped during a firefight Monday night between their captors and rebels at a checkpoint. They crossed into Turkey on Tuesday.

NBC did not say how many people were kidnapped with Engel, although two other men, producer Ghazi Balkiz and photographer John Kooistra, appeared with him on the “Today” show. It was not confirmed whether everyone was accounted for.

Engel said he believes the kidnappers were a Shiite militia group loyal to the Syrian government, which has lost control over swaths of the country’s north and is increasingly on the defensive in a civil war that has killed 40,000 people since March 2011.

“They kept us blindfolded, bound,” said the 39-year-old Engel, who speaks and reads Arabic. “We weren’t physically beaten or tortured. A lot of psychological torture, threats of being killed. They made us choose which one of us would be shot first and when we refused, there were mock shootings,” he added.

“They were talking openly about their loyalty to the government,” Engel said. He said the captors were trained by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and allied with Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite militant group, but he did not elaborate.

There was no mention of the kidnapping by Syria’s state-run news agency.

Both Iran and Hezbollah are close allies of the embattled Syrian government of President Bashar Assad, who used military force to crush mostly peaceful protests against his regime. The crackdown on protests led many in Syria to take up arms against the government, and the conflict has become a civil war.

Engel said he was told the kidnappers wanted to exchange him and his crew for four Iranian and two Lebanese prisoners being held by the rebels.

“They captured us in order to carry out this exchange,” he said.

Engel and his crew entered Syria on Thursday and were driving through what they thought was rebel-controlled territory when “a group of gunmen just literally jumped out of the trees and bushes on the side of the road.”

“There were probably 15 gunmen. They were wearing ski masks. They were heavily armed. They dragged us out of the car,” he said.

He said the gunmen shot and killed at least one of their rebel escorts on the spot and took the hostages into a waiting truck nearby.

Around 11 p.m. Monday, Engel said he and the others were being moved to another location in northern Idlib province.

“And as we were moving along the road, the kidnappers came across a rebel checkpoint, something they hadn’t expected. We were in the back of what you would think of as a minivan,” he said. “The kidnappers saw this checkpoint and started a gunfight with it. Two of the kidnappers were killed. We climbed out of the vehicle and the rebels took us. We spent the night with them.”

Engel and his crew crossed back into neighboring Turkey on Tuesday.

The network said there was no claim of responsibility, no contact with the captors and no request for ransom during the time the crew was missing.

NBC sought to keep the disappearance of Engel and the crew secret for several days while it investigated what happened to them. Major media organizations, including The Associated Press, adhered to a request from the network to refrain from reporting on the issue out of concern it could make the dangers to the captives worse. News of the disappearance did begin to leak out in Turkish media and on some websites on Monday.

Syria has become a danger zone for reporters since the conflict began.

According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, Syria is by far the deadliest country for the press in 2012, with 28 journalists killed in combat or targeted for murder by government or opposition forces.

Among the journalists killed while covering Syria are award-winning French TV reporter Gilles Jacquier, photographer Remi Ochlik and Britain’s Sunday Times correspondent Marie Colvin. Also, Anthony Shadid, a correspondent for The New York Times, died after an apparent asthma attack while on assignment in Syria.

The Syrian government has barred most foreign media coverage of the civil war in Syria. Those journalists whom the regime has allowed in are tightly controlled in their movements by Information Ministry minders. Many foreign journalists sneak into Syria illegally with the help of smugglers and travel with rebel escorts or drivers.

Engel joined NBC in 2003 and was named chief foreign correspondent in 2008. He previously worked as a freelance journalist for ABC News, including during the U.S. invasion of Iraq. He has lived in the Middle East since graduating from Stanford University in 1996.

Middle East News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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