welcome to nhk world "newsline." riot police in bahrain have stormed the capital's main square to drive out protesters. two demonstrators have reportedly been killed. majority shia muslims in the gulf kingdom have been protesting against the ruling sunni minority since monday when activists began calling for rallies through the internet. the demonstrators want constitutional change and the resignation of the country's long serving prime minister. thousands of protesters occupied

pearl square in the capital mana ma. they set up tents to prepare for a long battle. they say several hundred police and troops began operations to remove the crowd before dawn thursday. all roads to the square have been blocked off. opposition members say two demonstrators were killed and hundreds of others, including women and children, were injured. anti-government protests are also growing in libya which has been under authoritarian rule for decades. the demonstrations this week are the first in the north african country since moammar al gadhafi took power more than 40 years ago. hundreds of demonstrators rallied in the northeastern city of benghazi, the country's second largest city, on tuesday and wednesday. the protesters called for the end of gadhafi's rule and the release of human rights activists from detention. hospital officials say at least 38 people were injured in a

clash between protesters, security troops and government supporters. similar demonstrations were staged in other cities. in an effort to defuse tensions the government has freed 110 people accused of belonging to anti-government groups but protesters are using social networking sites to call for another rally on thursday. tensions are mounting in yemen after two people were killed between clashes between protesters and security forces. the demonstrators want president ali abdullah saleh to step down after more than two decades in power. they also say the government should do more to tack the poverty. afp reports troops fired on hundreds of protesters in the southern city of andin wednesday killing two men. riot police fired warning shots at the student demonstrators in sanaa. the protests spread across yemen even after president saleh

announced earlier this month he will step down after his term expires and will not run in the presidential election in 2013. in iran, clashes are escalating between government supporters and opponents following a wave of pro-democracy movements across the middle east. iran state media says pro and anti-government groups clashed in central tehran wednesday at a funeral for a university student killed in fighting. one other person was killed monday when supporters of iran's reformists protested around the country. the funeral was organized by conservatives who said the student backed the government but reformists also came claiming he belonged to their side. no reports are available on the latest of the size of the clashes or casualties. an online newspaper reports an iranian worker in the japanese embassy was arrested on monday during a protest rally.

looking at biz news, upbeat u.s. corporate earnings have lifted new york stocks to the highest closing level in over two and a half years. overnight the dow jones industrial average rose 61 points or half a percent to finish the session at 12,288. that's the highest closing level since june 2008. investors bought a wide range of stocks as the solid performance of major computer and farming equipment makers raised the outlook for america's economic recovery. better than expected housing starts in january added to the buying momentum. u.s. housing starts in january jumped 14.6% from the previous month. that was the highest rate of increase since september last year. the u.s. commerce department said on wednesday that january starts rose sharply to a

seasonally adjusted annual rate of 596,000 units, just 540,000 units had been forecast, but the report says permits for future home construction dropped 10.4% in january from december last year. construction permits are an indicator of the outlook for the housing market. housing starts are a major factor in the u.s. economy but stable recovery still seems elusive. china says it will further tighten control of rare earth metals on indispensable element in high-tech products, the move by one of the world's major suppliers is alarming japan, the u.s. and europe. china announced a new policy on wednesday saying illegal and excessive mining of rare earth metals has caused severe environmental damage and added exports are not controlled properly and rare minerals should be treated as important strategic resources. the policy says china will strengthen the competitiveness of rare earth mining and export

by promoting industry mergers and realignments over the next five years. the policies were worked out recently. last week china's government put the country's first mining drpt under its direct control. japan and india have agreed to cooperate to promote a regional economic partnership covering asia and oceania. japanese trade and industry minute tear bandikayeda and his indian counterpart met on tokyo wednesday. earlier they signed an economic partnership agreement. he asked india to help implement japan's proposal to conclude an economic partnership of 16 economies t would involve the ten members of asean, ajapan, india, china, south korea, australia and new zealand. sha charma hopes to promote regional integration through a broad

economic partnership. the two ministers confirmed their countries will cooperate to build logistic facilities in india. japan's business lobby leader and the thai prime minister plan to advance trade among the asian nations. japan business federation chairman hiromase yonekura met with abhisit vejjajiva on wednesday in bangkok. thailand is yonekura's second stop on his three-nation southeast asian tour which includes indonesia and singapore. yonekura says he'll work to promote trade and investment liberalization through the economic integration of japan and asean or the association of southeast asian nations. abhisit says he has high expectations of japan's efforts to facilitate a transpacific partnership aimed at creating a free trade bloc in the asia-pacific nation. tokyo stocks added their gains on thursday morning, following an overnight rise in new york. the nikkei average ended the morning session at 10,849, up 41 points, gaining 0.4%.

export related issues led the advance as investors took their cues from a positive outlook for the u.s. economy. this came after the federal reserve released minutes for last month's policy meeting on wednesday. the document says the u.s. central bank upgraded its growth forecast for the nation's gross domestic product for this year. the dollar moving in a narrow range in mixed trading in tokyo changing hands at 83.60-65 yen, euro buying 1.3588-91. market sources say investors are buying the dollar on expectations of an improfld u.s. economy but selling pressure is also strong due to worries about the middle east situation. exporters, too, are selling their dollars before fiscal 2010 ends in march.

cyberspace c dangerous place or land of opportunity intending on who is looking and when. it's been a powerful force in the recent uprising in arab countries. the wikileaks disclosures and online attacks against governments and corporations have exposed the lack of any uniform standards of conduct. yuko auto tan aotani spoke with an expert in washington about how we can secure and police the web. >> cyberspace has become so ubiquitous that we almost don't even notice it until something goes wrong. then the consequences can be devastating, and like the lure of the sea and the skies, regulation of the internet is a vast and largely uncharted area. the united states military has appointed a task force to defend critical infrastructure, but any new internet rules that are too strict could choke the free expression that has given voice to millions of people around the world. julian sanchez joins us now,

research fellow at the cato institute. thank you very much for joining us today. >> thank you. >> the united states set up the cyber command last year. is it really going to come up with a longstanding solution to cyber threats do you think? >> well, it depends what they see their mission as being. if they limit themselves to attempting to secure government networks, i think they have a good chance of at least reducing the risk, minimizing the threat of serious security breaches. if they see themselves as tasked with protecting the united states digital infrastructure generally, i think they're very unlikely to make a lot of headway because it's just too big a target >> there could be many of these attackers, because it's difficult to identify their attack and it doesn't cost very much to be one. >> yes, that's right, and the

classic problem, of course, in cyber security is attribution. you know, when a missile falls on your country, you have a pretty good idea usually where it came from. in a case of a cyber attack, even if you can figure out that it came from, say china, it's very difficult to know whether this is an attack that is a case of, a bored teenager or some kind of more official, organized entity that is being used to mount an assault. >> right. u.s. defense secretary robert gates recently made note of chinese military advances in cyber and anti-satellite warfare. is this really a threat and if so, how big a threat is it? >> i think it is not a threat that should be dismissed. it is a real threat, but so far, most serious kinds of dangers are, again, to this point largely hypothetical.

>> but on the other hand, there was a case where china said to have hijacked the internet traffic and forced it through their own service. >> right, and i think that is one of the dangers inherent in the open internet, which is if someone is, has control over the backbone traffic or any kind of trusted entity that's supposed to be signaling where traffic should go, the open nature of the internet itself makes it susceptible to that kind of rerouting. on the other hand, in the past we've always seen that, again, even informal groups of security professionals and geeks basically have been very adaptive in responding to that kind of thing. >> so do you think -- you're

saying all this is exaggerated, people are fearing too much over trivial things? >> i don't want to trivialize it. there are definitely real dangers. i think it is important to distinguish between genuine military attacks and really conventional online criminal or, you know, prank attacks, which have always been around, which are a problem to deal with, but which, again, unless you're a contractor hoping to get pentagon money thrown your way are not necessarily a threat at the national level. >> the iranian nuclear power plant has apparently been the target of a computer virus and they suspect u.s. or israeli interests were responsible. looking at this incident, who gets to decide what's right and wrong in this situation, if it's a defense or offense? >> i mean, that is actually an underexplored question here. most observers say that probably

the u.s. or israel is one of a very small number of countries with the technical capability and know-how to have developed something this sophisticated, but it's almost impossible to say with any kind of certainty, and one effect of that is that it has been less necessary to develop rules because the attacks are, in fact, unattributable, so this is still a process that is in the very early stages of coming to some kind of international consensus about how to respond, not with a technical response but what the appropriate political response to efforts like this is, and that's just work that hasn't really gotten very far yet. >> okay, well thank you very much. that was julian sanchez, research fellow at the cato institute in washington.

lawmakers in south korea have sent a birthday present to north korean leader kim jong-il. they released balloons across the country's shared border carrying 100,000 leaflets denouncing his dictatorship. six lawmakers from south korea ruling grand national party carried out the protest on wednesday at imjin gak, near the demilitarized zone, coinciding with kim's 69th birthday. the balloons were equipped with timers so they would drop the leaflets over north korean territory three hours after their release. the literatu rerature criticizes north korea's hereditary rule and features photos of kim jong-il drinking wine alongside starving north korean citizens. >> translator: i believe it's our responsibility to let north koreans know just what's going on outside their country and also to pave the way for them so they can decide their own future.

>> this is the first time south korean lawmakers have taken part in this kind of protest against north korea. they were apparently motivated by the country's shelling of a south korean island and its alleged sinking of one of the south's warships last year. japan and south korea have again said the north must discuss scrapping its nuclear program ahead of the resumption of six-party talks.seiji maehara met with his counterpart kim sung hwan in tokyo on tuesday. they agreed that north korea should present a concrete plan of denuclearization at interkorea talks. maehara said japan would not hold dialogue with the north for the sake of just talks. kim also said that the north should arrange appropriate international conditions for the resumption of the six-party talks proposlesed by china. kim said as a news conference afterwards that the south, japan and u.s. have agreed that the north should move first.

he added that china understands this well. working level military talks between the two koreas broke off last week with the north showing no signs of moving toward denuclearization. japanese ast out in koichi wakata has been named commander of the international space station to serve for six months from 2013. he's the first to be chosen from outside europe and the united states. wakata is scheduled to fly to the iss on a soyuz spacecraft at the end of 2013. he leads a multinational crew from 15 countries and plays a significant role in the operation of the space station. wakata has been to space three times. he also completed a long-term mission on the station in 2009. he now heads a division at nasa

in charge of astronauts. it's believed japan's two successful unmanned space launches could have contributed to wakata's appointment. wa ta ta says he will put all his efforts to prepare and train for his new task, based on his previous experience. a group of japanese novelists has asked the chinese portal site to remove novels by its members that have been posted without permission. the japan p.e.n. column made the request in a letter sent to baidu on wednesday. the club says novels and essays by at least 16 writers, including the late makoto oda, have been posted on a site offered by the japanese arm of baidu. the novels and essays are sold in the form of digital files for electronic books.

they have been reposted on baidu's site without permission. a similar copyright violation on the site was reported recently. the p.e.n. club also asked baidu to set up an in-house section to deal with copyright-related complaints from novelists and publishers. baidu says it will respond to the requests as soon as it confirms the facts about the alleged irregularities. baidu says it will also try to educate its users on the proper use of the site. a top researcher in japan says an outbreak of avian influenza could spread across the entire country. bird flu has just been reported in two prefectures along the pacific coast. there are now 18 confirmed cases of the disease. the new outbreaks were reported between tuesday and early wednesday in the western prefectures of wakayama and mie. this season a total of 18 cases have been reported in seven prefectures, mainly in the western part of the country. more than 1 million chickens have been culled so far.

>> translator: at the end of last year, it owed a lot along the japan seacoast. e migratory birds have escaped erfimoved to rc maashehe farmerlingazaki

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> look at our lead stories this hour -- riot police stormed the capital's main square tdrive t otesters. reportedly been killed. majority shia muslims in the av protesting against the ruling sunni minority since monday when activists began calling for rallies through the internet. the demonstrators want

constitutional change and the o long serving prime minister. thousands of protesters occupie manama. they set up tents to prepare for a long battle. they say several hundred police and troops began operations to remove the crowd before dawn thursday, firing tear gas and rubber bullets. all roads to the square have been blocked off. opposition memrs t hundreds of others, including women and children, were injured. anti-government protests are also growing in libya which has been under authoritarian rule the demonstrations this week are the first in the north african country since moammar al gadhafi ok me hundreds of demonstrators rallied in the northeastern city of benghazi, the country's second largest city, on tuesday anwey. the protesters called for the end of gadhafi's rule and the release of human rights activists from detention. hospital officials sayas 38 people were injured i

clash between protesters, security troops and government supporters. similar demonstrations were staged in other cities. in an effort to defuse tensions the government has fre 1 op aused of belonging to anti-government groups but protesters are using social networking sites to call for another rally on thursday. tensions are mounting in yemen after two people were killed in clashes between protesters and security forces. the demonstrators want president ali abdullah salo step after more than two decades in power. they also say the government should do more to tackle poverty. afp reports troops fired on hundreds of protesters in the southern city of addan wednesday killing two men. riot police fired warning shots at the student demonstrators in sanaa, where anti-government rallies have continued for six days in a row. we'll be back with more news in 30 minutes.

i'm gene otani in tokyo.