Tokyo - Japan's conservative Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) surged back to power in an election on Sunday just three years after a devastating defeat, giving ex-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe a chance to push his hawkish security agenda and radical economic recipe.

Exit polls by television broadcasters showed the LDP winning nearly 300 seats in parliament's powerful 480-member lower house, while its ally, the small New Komeito party, looked set to win about 30 seats.

That would give the two parties the two-thirds majority needed to over-rule parliament's upper house, where no party has a majority and which can block bills, which should help to break a deadlock that has plagued the world's third biggest economy since 2007.

An LDP win will usher in a government committed to a tough stance in a territorial row with China, a pro-nuclear energy policy despite last year's Fukushima disaster and a potentially risky prescription for hyper-easy monetary policy and big fiscal spending to beat deflation and tame a strong yen.

Syrian rebels attacked al-Yarmouk Palestinian refugee camp in Southern Damascus on Sunday and killed dozens of Palestinians and Syrian civilians.

Some 600 terrorists entered the camp after withdrawal of popular groups from al-Orouba and al-Lobiya streets and opened fire on everyone, which led to the killing and injury of many people, a source in the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine said on Sunday, adding the conflicts are still underway.

According to eyewitnesses, the terrorists killed tens of Syrian civilians and executed several people in the streets.

Many people have tried to take shelter in safer areas and the al-Basel hospital was closed due to its inability to give service to the large numbers of the people wounded during the terrorists' attack on the refugee camp.

In the last four years, the use of unmanned drones to engage in so-called "targeted killing" has escalated dramatically. In Pakistan alone, US drone strikes have increased five fold during the Obama administration, according to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, which tracks US drone strikes [11]. Drones have become the go-to weapon in the United State's "War on Terror". The drone war's apparent "successes" are celebrated by administration officials on a regular basis, often while avoiding the more disturbing details, such as the under-accounted for civilian death toll, the violation of international and humanitarian laws, the counter-productivity of drone warfare, and the lasting effects of such blatant disregard for human life.

It is a challenge to find an accurate count of civilian casualties, thanks in large part to the effort of the United States government to keep information about the drone program shielded from the public. Under the Freedom of Information Act, the American Civil Liberties Union and the New York Times both have filed requests for documents relating to the CIA's drones. The CIA replied that it can "neither confirm or deny the existence of records". This response was challenged by the ACLU in a lawsuit containing nearly 200 statements (both on- and off-the-record) made by current and former members of the CIA itself. Justice Department lawyers argue that revealing the existence of such documents relating to targeted killing or a drone program would unveil "sensitive information about the nature and scope of such a program" [1]. A federal judge in Washington D.C ruled in favor of the CIA in September, which the ACLU appealed.

Adding to the difficulty, the information that is being made made public is opaque, misleading, and contradicting. In one statement made to the public, the United States reported that there have been "no" or "single digit" civilian casualties [4]. In late June of 2011, President Obama's chief counter-terrorism adviser John Brennan stated "in the last year, 'there hasn't been a single collateral death because of the exceptional proficiency, precision of the capabilities that we've been able to develop [9]." The Bureau of Investigative Journalism cites civilian casualties as follows: From June 2004 to mid-September 2012, US drone strikes killed 2,562-3,325 people in Pakistan alone. Out of that total, 474-881 were civilian, and of those 176 were children. Additionally, 1,228-1,362 people were injured [11]. Perhaps the government's estimate of civilian deaths is due, in part, to the fact the US counts "any military-aged male" killed in a drone strike as a "militant", not a civilian [1][10].

When we first collected much of this data, it was after the Aurora, Colo. shootings, and the air was thick with calls to avoid "politicizing" the tragedy. That is code, essentially, for "don't talk about reforming our gun control laws."

Let's be clear: That is a form of politicization. When political actors construct a political argument that threatens political consequences if other political actors pursue a certain political outcome, that is, almost by definition, a politicization of the issue. It's just a form of politicization favoring those who prefer the status quo to stricter gun control laws.

Since then, there have been more horrible, high-profile shootings. Jovan Belcher, a linebacker for the Kansas City Chiefs, took his girlfriend's life and then his own. In Oregon, Jacob Tyler Roberts entered a mall holding a semi-automatic rifle and yelling "I am the shooter." And, in Connecticut, at least 27 are dead - including 18 children - after a man opened fire at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

If roads were collapsing all across the United States, killing dozens of drivers, we would surely see that as a moment to talk about what we could do to keep roads from collapsing. If terrorists were detonating bombs in port after port, you can be sure Congress would be working to upgrade the nation's security measures. If a plague was ripping through communities, public-health officials would be working feverishly to contain it.

Only with gun violence do we respond to repeated tragedies by saying that mourning is acceptable but discussing how to prevent more tragedies is not. "Too soon," howl supporters of loose gun laws. But as others have observed, talking about how to stop mass shootings in the aftermath of a string of mass shootings isn't "too soon." It's much too late.

What follows here isn't a policy agenda. It's simply a set of facts - many of which complicate a search for easy answers - that should inform the discussion that we desperately need to have.

French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian told BFMTV on Tuesday that although French Marines are onboard the vessel, it does not mean that France is preparing for a military intervention in Syria.

He, however, justified the presence of the French aircraft carrier in waters just outside Syria as part of Paris' policy to maintain military readiness in the face of any threat.

The French minister also said that the vessel is not conducting a military exercise in the region.

USS Eisenhower Carrier Strike Group and at least five British warships, which are also carrying a large marine force, are also in the region.

On 20 March 2011, the Charles de Gaulle was deployed to the Mediterranean Sea to enforce a Western-backed no-fly zone over Libya.

Le Drian also denied reports claiming that the French military has gone into a secret state of alert and that it is ready for intervention in Syria.

Indianapolis -- Gold buyers could be forced to register with the state and operate from a fixed location under legislation being proposed by a southwestern Indiana lawmaker.

Democratic Rep. Gail Riecken of Evansville says she also wants to require gold buyers to hold goods for seven days and report their purchases to law enforcement officials.

Riecken tells the Indianapolis Business Journal she is pushing the bill at the urging of pawnbrokers and gold buyers amid concerns that the gold-buying industry has become a vehicle for jewelry thieves.

Cash-for-gold stores have multiplied in the last five years as gold prices have doubled. Gold prices topped $1,800 an ounce in September 2011, but it still trading at around $1,700 an ounce.

Police say the industry provides an easy outlet for stolen goods.

Newtown school massacre reignites gun control debate as politicians call for a law 'to get weapons of war off the streets'.

Barack Obama is under intensifying pressure to take the lead in a campaign for greater gun control following the Newtown massacre of young children.

The mayor of New York and leading US senators pressed the president on Sunday to tell Congress to reinstate a ban on assault weapons which are common to almost all recent mass shootings in the US, including Friday's tragedy in Connecticut in which 20 children, aged six and seven, and seven adults were killed.

Michael Bloomberg, the New York mayor, praised the president for his tearful reaction to the deaths but called on Obama, who has faced accusations of political cowardice over his failure to tackle gun control following other massacres, to make the issue a priority.

"It's time for the president to stand up and lead and tell the country what we should do. Not go to Congress and say: what do you guys want to do? This should be his number one agenda. He's the president of the United States and if he does nothing during his second term, something like 48,000 Americans will be killed with illegal guns. That's is roughly the number of Americans killed during the whole Vietnam war," said Bloomberg, on NBC's Meet the Press.

The U.S. Government on Friday asked a federal judge to dismiss a lawsuit over the killing of three American citizens in drone strikes in Yemen earlier this year: alleged Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula leader Anwar Al-Awlaki, his son Abdulrahman, and alleged AQAP magazine editor Samir Khan.

The administration also threatened to invoke the State Secrets Privilege if the suit is not dismissed on other grounds. The privilege, which 2008 presidential candidate Barack Obama regularly blasted the Bush administration for invoking, allows the government to seek dismissal of a suit if it could expose national security secrets.

In the motion to dismiss, Justice Department lawyers argue that the necessity for the strikes and the viability of any alternatives is a question beyond the proper purview of the courts.

"Plaintiffs thus invite this Court to determine whether an individual in Yemen whom the Executive Branch had already declared a leader of an organized armed enemy group, and a foreign operative of that group, posed a sufficient threat to the United States and its citizens to warrant the alleged use of missile strikes abroad within the context of an armed conflict and the Executive's national self-defense mission," the motion says. "Moreover, they ask this Court to pass judgment on the Executive's purported battlefield and operational decisions in that conflict - namely, to determine whether lethal force was the most appropriate option available; if so, what sort of lethal force to employ; and whether appropriate measures were taken to minimize collateral damage. Each of these issues is a 'quintessential source' of political questions."

Money Laundering For Drug Cartels

In this episode, Max Keiser and Stacy Herbert look at HSBC being fined rather than criminally charged in order to avoid destabilizing the system, while JP Morgan and others are being sued for about a trillion in bad mortgages investors were duped into buying. They also look at "1001" under which bankers who lied to the federal housing authorities could be criminally tried for lying to a federal official. In the second half, Max Keiser talks to Kyra Maya Phillips of MisfitEconomy.com about democracy aboard pirate ships of the 18th century on which No Plunder, No Pay was the name of the game and innovation happened on the fringe. Max proposes banksters walk the plank in a specially built platform in Trafalgar Square.

Viewers, beware: while you're watching TV, your TV might be watching you back. A security firm discovered that Samsung's Smart TV can give hackers access to the device's built-in camera and microphones, allowing them to watch everything you do.

The Malta-based firm ReVuln posted a video showing its team of researchers hacking into one of the Samsung TVs and accessing its settings, channel lists, widgets, USB drives, and remote control configurations. The security flaw allows hackers to access any and all personal data stored on the TV.

"We can install malicious software to gain complete root access to the TV," the video writes.

With this access, hackers can use the Smart TVs built-in camera and microphones to see and hear everything in front of it. Instead of just watching TV, viewers could themselves be watched without knowing it.

But this flaw isn't present in just one specific model. The vulnerability affects all 11 Samsung televisions of the latest generation. The Smart TVs have many of the same features as a computer, but lack the same kind of protection. The devices do not have security features such as firewalls and antivirus software.

Fortunately for concerned viewers, the problem has a silver lining: hackers must first breach the network that the television is connected to, as well as know the IP address of the device. As a result, security breaches would likely only occur as a targeted attack against an individual, rather than randomly. Unlike an Internet virus, a hacker would have to exploit the network manually.