Opposition beats Merkel team in knife-edge state poll: TV

BERLIN: Germany's centre-left opposition beat Chancellor Angela Merkel's ruling alliance Sunday in a cliffhanger state poll eight months ahead of a national vote, estimates on public television showed.

In one of the tightest German state races in recent memory, the Social Democrats together with the Greens eked out a one-seat lead in Lower Saxony, just ahead of the incumbent coalition of Merkel's Christian Democrats with the Free Democrats, broadcasters ARD and ZDF said.

After a suspense-packed night with broad implications for the September general election and Merkel's bid for a third four-year term, the centre-left camp said it aimed to use its victory to create fresh momentum.

"It shows the race until September is far from over," the Social Democrats' embattled challenger to Merkel, Peer Steinbrueck, told reporters as the results came in.

Merkel enjoys a robust lead in national polls thanks to her fierce defence of German interests in the eurozone crisis.

But pundits said the state poll could help shore up the battered campaign of her gaffe-prone challenger Steinbrueck.

Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU) were the strongest party with around 36 percent of the vote, according to the estimates, which were still pending official confirmation.

Their candidate, state premier David McAllister, a half-Scot widely seen as a potential Merkel successor, had held out hope down to the last, calling it a "heart-stopping night".

Their coalition partners for the last decade in Lower Saxony, the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP), drew nearly 10 percent -- more than doubling many pollsters' expectations and tallying their best result in the state in post-war history.

But their cumulative result fell just short of the Social Democrats' (SPD) around 33 percent and the Greens' 14 percent, meaning the opposition can build a governing majority in Germany's fourth most populous state.

Polls had indicated the FDP risked slipping below the five-percent hurdle required for seats in the state parliament, but it got a lift from conservative voters splitting their ballots under Germany's two-vote system in a bid to rescue the coalition.

ARD television said around 101,000 voters who cast ballots for the conservatives in 2008 had plumped for the FDP this time.

If the FDP failed to win representation, its embattled leader Philipp Roesler, who is also Merkel's vice-chancellor and who hails from Lower Saxony, was seen as likely to step down -- possibly as soon as Sunday night.

The outcome seemed to give him a reprieve, if perhaps only brief.

"It is a great day for the FDP in Lower Saxony but it is also a great day for the FDP and liberals in Germany as a whole," a beaming Roesler told reporters in Berlin.

Around 6.2 million people were called to the polls in Lower Saxony, a northwestern state home to European auto giant Volkswagen.

Steinbrueck, a former finance minister from Merkel's 2005-09 "grand coalition" government, was anointed by the SPD as its chancellor candidate late last year.

But he has run into trouble of late with revelations that he made around 1.25 million euros ($1.66 million) over the last three years in speaking fees, and with comments that Merkel owed much of her popularity to her gender.

The SPD's candidate in Lower Saxony, Stephan Weil, hinted that he had been forced to campaign in the face of headwinds out of Berlin.

"The SPD made gains, which is remarkable considering the not exactly easy conditions under which we fought for voters' support in recent weeks," he said.

After Lower Saxony, only the southern state of Bavaria is expected to vote before the September general election.

-AFP/ac

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Schmidt, daughter open up about trip to North Korea

Google's Eric Schmidt (right) arrives in North Korea on January 7, 2013, with former N.M. Gov. Bill Richardson.

(Credit:
CBS News/Screenshot by CNET)

Google's Eric Schmidt is back from his much-publicized trip to North Korea, and he's got a few details to share about his humanitarian mission.

The search giant's executive chairman had already revealed some of the reasoning behind his trip to reporters during a briefing a week and a half ago at the Beijing airport, saying that his private delegation urged North Korean officials to open up global Internet access if they wanted to further their economy. The delegation was led by former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, who is also a former ambassador to the U.N.

In a post last night on his Google+ page, Schmidt opened up more about his thoughts on Internet access in the country, explaining that North Korea's decision to essentially isolate itself from the global Net is going to "make it harder for them to catch up economically."

He noted that while Internet access is possible for government officials and the military and while there is a private intranet set up for universities, the general public does not have access to the Internet unless someone is watching them.

Furthermore, he said that it was obvious that the country's technology is limited. "There is a 3G network that is a joint venture with an Egyptian company called Orascom. It is a 2100 Megahertz SMS-based technology network, that does not, for example, allow users to have a data connection and use smart phones," he wrote.

A separate blog post written by Schmidt's daughter Sophie, who accompanied him on the trip, included even more details of their visit, along with a series of photos. She described the country as "very, very cold" and "very, very strange."

"Nothing I'd read or heard beforehand really prepared me for what we saw," she wrote.

The delegation apparently visited the Palace of the Sun, Kim Il Sung's former office and now the national mausoleum where Kim Il Sung's and Kim Jong Il's bodies lie in state, as well as the Kim II Sung University e-Library, which she described eerily as a room of 90 desks, all manned, with just one problem: "No one was actually doing anything. A few scrolled or clicked, but the rest just stared."

Some other interesting tidbits from her post:

• We left our phones and laptops behind in China, since we were warned they'd be confiscated in NK, and probably infected with lord knows what malware.
• Our trip was a mixture of highly staged encounters, tightly-orchestrated viewings and what seemed like genuine human moments. We had zero interactions with non-state-approved North Koreans and were never far from our two minders (2, so one can mind the other).
• Ordinary North Koreans live in a near-total information bubble, without any true frame of reference.
• We were told well ahead of time to assume that everything was bugged: phones,
  cars, rooms, meetings, restaurants and who knows what else.
• This is a country in a permanent revolutionary state, and everything you see reflects that dug-in, determined, fiercely independent quality.
• Their mobile network, Koryolink, has between 1-2 million subscribers. No data service, but international calls were possible on the phones we rented. Realistically, even basic service is prohibitively expensive, much like every other consumption good (fuel, cars, etc.).
• North Korea has a national intranet, a walled garden of scrubbed content taken from the real Internet. Our understanding is that some university students have access to this.
  

The State Department had frowned upon the group's visit to the country, saying that the timing wasn't right. A department spokeswoman cited recent missile launches by North Korea as a reason for discouraging the mission.

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Algeria hostage describes 4-day ordeal

A freed British hostage has told Sky News that he feared he had fallen "into the hands of the terrorists" after fleeing the Algerian gas complex where he had been holed up for four days.

Alan Wright spent days hidden in a pitch-black room with colleagues at the Ain Amenas plant after hearing gunfire.

He told Sky that the militants tried to entice them out of their hiding place with a friendly voice.

"We heard the doors opening again and someone came in, and a very friendly national voice said 'good morning', but not in English, in Arabic, Arabic for good morning, and we're certain that that was the terrorists coming in and just trying to lull people into coming out."

Eventually, the 30 or so workers in the building decided to cut through a perimeter fence and make a break for it, Sky News reported.

"When you don't know what's out there, and we know that the terrorists are dressed the same as the security forces, it was a huge decision, do you stay or do you go?"

Once outside the complex, Wright said he and his colleagues headed into the unknown of the Sahara desert.

But he told Sky News he thought he'd made the "biggest mistake" of his life when the troops who intercepted them separated the expats from the local workers.

"I thought there's only one way they're separating us and it's 'cause they're going to be freed and we're going to go," he said.

"So that was a horrible, horrible thing: you've escaped, but you've escaped into the hands of the terrorists, or so we thought."

Fortunately for them Alan Wright and his group had encountered Algerian security forces who helped them reach safety.

The exact number of people who died in the four-day siege is still not clear.

Algerian bomb squads on Sunday found 25 more bodies as they scoured the gas plant, a security official said.

The state of some of the bodies is making it difficult to tell whether the dead were hostages or the attackers, the official said.

Algerian authorities said on Saturday that 23 hostages and 32 captors were known to have died but that those figures were expected to rise.

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President Obama Sworn In for Second Term

President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden today officially embarked on their second term, taking the Constitutionally mandated oath of office in two separate private ceremonies inside their homes.

Shortly before noon in the Blue Room of the White House, Obama raised his right hand, with his left on a family Bible, reciting the oath administrated by Chief Justice John Roberts. He was surrounded by immediate family members, including first lady Michelle Obama and daughters, Malia and Sasha.

"I did it," he said to his daughters after taking the oath.

Biden was sworn in earlier today by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the first Hispanic to administer a presidential oath, in a ceremony at his official residence at the U.S. Naval Observatory. He was joined by more than 120 guests, including cabinet members, extended family and his wife, Dr. Jill Biden.

Because Jan. 20 -- the official date for a new presidential term -- falls on a Sunday this year, organizers delayed by one day the traditional public inauguration ceremony and parade down Pennsylvania Avenue.

Michael Reynolds-Pool/Getty Images

Vice President Joe Biden Sworn in for 2nd Term Watch Video

President Obama's 2nd Inauguration: Hundreds of Thousands to Attend Watch Video

Obama and Biden will each repeat the oath on Monday on the west front of the Capitol, surrounded by hundreds of dignitaries and members of Congress. An estimated 800,000 people are expected to gather on the National Mall to witness the moment and inaugural parade to follow.

The dual ceremonies in 2013 means Obama will become the second president in U.S. history to take the presidential oath four times. He was sworn in twice in 2008 out of an abundance of caution after Roberts flubbed the oath of office during the public administration. This year Roberts read from a script.

Franklin Roosevelt was also sworn in four times but, unlike Obama, he was elected four times.

This year will mark the seventh time a president has taken the oath on a Sunday and then again on Monday for ceremonial purposes. Reagan last took the oath on a Sunday in 1985.

Both Obama and Biden took the oath using a special family Bible. Obama used a text that belonged to Michelle Obama's grandmother LaVaughn Delores Robinson. Biden placed his hand on a 120-year-old book with a Celtic cross on the cover that has been passed down through Biden clan.

The official inaugural activities today also included moments of prayer and remembrance that marked the solemnity of the day.

Obama and Biden met at Arlington National Cemetery for a brief morning ceremony to place a wreath on the Tomb of the Unknowns, honoring military service members who served and sacrificed. The men stood shoulder to shoulder, bowing their heads as a bugler played "Taps."

Biden, who is Catholic, began the day with a private family mass at his residence. The president and first family attended church services at Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church, a historically black church and site of two pre-inaugural prayer services for former President Bill Clinton and Vice President Al Gore and their families.

The Obamas and Bidens plan to participate in a church service on Monday morning at St. John's Episcopal, across Lafayette Park from the White House. They will also attend a National Prayer Service on Tuesday at the National Cathedral.

Later on Sunday evening, the newly-inaugurated leaders will attend a candlelight reception at the National Building Museum. The president and vice president are expected to deliver brief remarks to their supporters.

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Veteran jihadist claims bloody Algeria siege for al Qaeda

ALGIERS/IN AMENAS, Algeria (Reuters) - A veteran Islamist fighter claimed responsibility on behalf of al Qaeda for the Algerian hostage crisis, a regional website reported on Sunday, tying the bloody desert siege to France's intervention across the Sahara in Mali.

Algeria said it expected to raise its preliminary death tolls of 23 hostages and 32 militants killed in the four-day siege at a gas plant deep in the Sahara. It said on Sunday it had captured five militants alive.

Western governments whose citizens died or are missing have held back from criticizing tactics used by their ally in the struggle with Islamists across the vast desert.

"We in al Qaeda announce this blessed operation," one-eyed guerrilla Mokhtar Belmokhtar said in a video, according to the Sahara Media website, which quoted from the recording but did not immediately show it.

"We are ready to negotiate with the West and the Algerian government provided they stop their bombing of Mali's Muslims," said Belmokhtar, a veteran of two decades of war in Afghanistan and the Sahara.

Belmokhtar's fighters launched their attack on the In Amenas gas plant before dawn on Wednesday, just five days after French warplanes unexpectedly began strikes to halt advances by Islamists in neighboring northern Mali.

European and U.S. officials say the raid was almost certainly too elaborate to have been planned since the start of the French campaign, although the military action by Paris could have provided a trigger for an assault prepared in advance.

"We had around 40 jihadists, most of them from Muslim countries and some even from the West," Sahara Media quoted Belmokhtar as saying. Algerian officials say Belmokhtar's group was behind the attack but he was not present himself.

Some Western governments have expressed frustration at not being informed in advance of the Algerian authorities' decision to storm the complex on Thursday.

Survivors have said many hostages were killed when Algerian government forces blasted a convoy of trucks on Thursday morning. Algerian officials said they stormed the compound because the militants were trying to escape with their captives.

Britain and France both defended the Algerian action.

"It's easy to say that this or that should have been done. The Algerian authorities took a decision and the toll is very high but I am a bit bothered ... when the impression is given that the Algerians are open to question. They had to deal with terrorists," French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said.

British Prime Minister David Cameron said in a televised statement: "Of course people will ask questions about the Algerian response to these events, but I would just say that the responsibility for these deaths lies squarely with the terrorists who launched this vicious and cowardly attack.

"We should recognize all that the Algerians have done to work with us and to help and coordinate with us. I'd like to thank them for that. We should also recognize that the Algerians too have seen lives lost among their soldiers."

With so much still unknown about the fates of foreigners held at the site, some countries that have faced casualties have yet to issue full counts of their dead.

Scores of foreigners lived alongside the hundreds of Algerians at the plant, which was run by Britain's BP and Norway's Statoil and also housed workers from a Japanese engineering firm and a French catering company.

Cameron said three British nationals were confirmed killed and another three plus a British resident were also feared dead. One American has been confirmed killed. Statoil said it was searching for five missing Norwegians. Japanese and French citizens are also among those missing or presumed dead.

Algeria's Interior Ministry, which gave the figure on Saturday of 23 hostages killed, said 107 foreign hostages and 685 Algerians had been freed.

"I am afraid unfortunately to say that the death toll will go up," Minister of Communication Mohamed Said was quoted as saying on Sunday by the official APS news agency. Private Algerian television station Ennahar said on Sunday 25 bodies had been discovered. Clearing the base would take 48 hours, it said.

Survivors have given harrowing accounts. Alan Wright, now safe at home in Scotland, told Sky News he had escaped with a group of Algerian and foreign workers who hid for a day and a night and then cut their way through a fence to run to freedom.

While hiding inside the compound the first night, he managed briefly to call his wife who was at home with their two daughters desperately waiting for news.

"She asked if I wanted to speak to Imogen and Esme, and I couldn't because I thought, I don't want my last ever words to be in a crackly satellite phone, telling a lie, saying you're OK when you're far from OK," he recalled.

Algeria's oil minister, Youcef Yousfi, visited the site and said the physical damage was minor, state news service APS reported. The plant, which produces 10 percent of Algeria's natural gas, would start back up in two days, he said.

OIL VULNERABILITIES EXPOSED

The Islamists' assault has tested Algeria's relations with the outside world and exposed the vulnerability of multinational oil operations in the Sahara.

Algeria, scarred by the civil war with Islamist insurgents in the 1990s which claimed 200,000 lives, has insisted there would be no negotiation in the face of terrorism.

France especially needs close cooperation from Algeria to have a chance of crushing Islamist rebels in northern Mali. Algiers has promised to shut its porous 1,000-km border with Mali to prevent al Qaeda-linked insurgents simply melting away into its empty desert expanses and rugged mountains.

Algeria's permission for France to use its airspace, confirmed by Fabius last week, also makes it much easier to establish direct supply lines for its troops which are trying to stop the Islamist rebels from taking the whole of Mali.

French troops in Mali advanced slowly on Sunday towards the town of Diably, a militant stronghold the fighters abandoned on Saturday after punishing French attacks.

According to Communications Minister Said, the militants were of six different nationalities. Believed to be among the dead was their leader, Abdul Rahman al-Nigeri, a fighter from Niger who is seen as close to Belmokhtar.

The apparent ease with which guerrillas swooped in from the desert to take control of an important energy facility has raised questions over the country's outwardly tough security measures. Yousfi said Algeria would not allow foreign security firms to guard its oil facilities.

Algerian officials said the attackers may have had inside help from among the hundreds of Algerians employed at the site.

Security in the half-dozen countries around the Sahara desert has long been a preoccupation of the West. Smugglers and militants have earned millions in ransom from kidnappings.

The most powerful Islamist groups operating in the Sahara were severely weakened by Algeria's secularist military in the civil war in the 1990s. But in the past two years the regional wing of al Qaeda has gained fighters and arms as a result of the civil war in Libya, when arsenals were looted from Muammar Gaddafi's army.

(Additional reporting by Balazs Koranyi in Oslo, Estelle Shirbon and David Alexander in London, Brian Love in Paris, Daniel Flynn in Dakar; Writing by David Stamp and Peter Graff; Editing by Sonya Hepinstall)

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Football: Pogba at double for Juve as Palermo hold Lazio

MILAN: French teenager Paul Pogba scored a sensational brace to inspire depleted Juventus to a 4-0 rout of Udinese which helped the Serie A champions extend their lead over Lazio on Saturday.

Juve started their 21st match of the campaign with a three-point lead on both Napoli and Lazio but missing key midfielders Andrea Pirlo, Claudio Marchisio and Arturo Vidal due to recent injuries.

After Lazio had to settle for a share of the points in a 2-2 draw at strugglers Palermo, Juve took full advantage.

The champions now have a five-point lead over Lazio, who sit second on 43 points, and will be hoping Napoli, third on 42, find similar trouble Sunday in their away game against Fiorentina.

Pogba, signed in the off-season on a free transfer from Manchester United, had already scored two sensational goals earlier this season.

And the 19-year-old broke the deadlock near the end of a frustrating first half for the hosts by unleashing a 30-metre screamer which hit the crossbar before beating Daniele Padelli in the Udinese goal.

Juventus were struggling to build on their lead in the early stages of the second half when Udinese were unlucky not to score on the counter.

But again Pogba came to the rescue, this time with a long-range daisy-cutter which slotted into Padelli's bottom corner to give Juve a 2-0 lead.

Six minutes later Juve striker Mirko Vucinic made it 3-0 when Padelli parried the Montenegrin's close-range effort over his own body and into the net.

Udinese threatened through top striker Antonio Di Natale, who saw a snapshot shave the top of the crossbar.

However the former Italy striker appeared to be showing the effects of recent flu-like symptoms, which meant he only appeared early in the second half.

With 10 minutes to play, second half substitute Alessandro Matri made it 4-0 for the hosts when he latched on to a Vucinic through ball to nutmeg Padelli.

Despite missing Miroslav Klose, Abdoullay Konko and Ederson, Lazio had hoped to secure a win that would have kept them three points behind Antonio Conte's league leaders.

But after Vladimir Petkovic's side were stunned by two goals in less than two minutes the visitors were forced to launch a late fighback to grab a share of the points

Sergio Floccari gave Lazio a 10th minute lead when he headed Cristian Ledesma's cross over the static Samir Ujkani in the Palermo goal, only for Arevalo Rios (70) and Paulo Dybala (71) to give the hosts a shock lead.

It took a penalty from Brazilian Hernanes, after Floccari had been fouled in the box, for Lazio to draw level with six minutes left to play.

- AFP/de

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Microsoft blazes trail to next PC

Microsoft Surface Pro: the design isn't perfect, but the fact that it can function as a standalone tablet and is thin and light puts it ahead of the convertible-laptop pack.

(Credit:
CNET)

PC makers take note. Microsoft is pioneering the next PC.

Here are two simple reasons why the Surface Pro makes a good case as the template for the new PC. One, Microsoft realized that the device's electronics should go behind the glass, not under the keyboard. Two, the device uses a real processor.

Let's address the electronics first. Most of the newfangled laptops I saw at
CES were convertibles. That is, the displays are not detachable because the core electronics are under the keyboard, just like your father's laptop.

And most of them were unimpressive. The mechanics necessary to flip and/or slide the screen and convert the laptop to
tablet mode were more often than not kludgy and some seemed destined for mechanical problems down the pike.

And the more problematic designs weren't thin or light, either. At least not when compared with popular tablets like Apple's
iPad or Google's Nexus.

One of the few exceptions -- as I noted before -- was the HP EliteBook Revolve. That 11.6-inch design was about as well conceived as a convertible can be.

But there's a reason for that: HP has been building Windows convertibles for ages. The EliteBook 2700 series has been around since the dawn of Windows XP. So, HP has this down to a science.

But, again, that's a rare exception at present. The future leans more toward a PC with the electronics behind the glass. And there's no better example right now than the Surface Pro.

Microsoft was bold enough to go with a mainstream third-generation Core Intel "Ivy Bridge" chip, not the slower Atom processor that most Windows 8 tablet and detachable makers have opted for.

Yeah, the battery life won't be great, but Microsoft, I think, knew (rightly so) that it would be crucified if it opted for the performance-challenged Atom chip, which isn't up to the task of running serious desktop applications on Windows 8.

Remember the netbook? That's one way to look at the first crop of Atom-based Windows 8 tablets: a netbook in tablet clothing. Microsoft didn't want to go there.

And give Lenovo some credit too. It showed off the ThinkPad Helix detachable at CES that separates from the base to become a full-fledged Ivy Bridge-based tablet, not unlike the Microsoft Surface Pro.

And Intel, I think, in its heart of hearts knows Atom isn't really up to the task. Thus, the revelation at CES of the most power-efficient Ivy Bridge yet. One of Intel's goals is to get these new Ivy Bridge chips -- as well as upcoming "Haswell" chips -- behind the glass, as Intel's Adam King told me at CES.

So, I would expect to see an increasing number of Windows 8 tablets and/or detachables sporting Intel's mainstream Haswell Core processors later this year.

And battery life will improve with Haswell. I would be fine with a Windows 8 tablet packing a real Intel chip that gets six hours of battery life. And a Haswell-based Surface tablet should meet or exceed this.

Sony Vaio Duo 11 convertible: The apparatus to support the display in tablet mode isn't exactly elegant.

(Credit:
CNET)

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Hundreds join pro-gun rallies in state capitals

Last Updated 4:02 p.m. ET

Hundreds of people gathered in state capitals nationwide Saturday to rally against stricter gun control measures.

An estimated 600 people turned out so far for Saturday speeches in Austin, Texas. Many carried signs with messages such as, "An Armed Society is a Polite Society," and "The Second Amendment Comes from God."

Meanwhile, police say hundreds more joined rallies in New England, while organizers also have plans to gather in capital cites to the west.

Organized by the Washington D.C.-based group Political Media, the "Guns Across America" rallies have been promoted by activists via social media, and come days after President Barack Obama unveiled a sweeping package of gun-control proposals.

Larry Ward, president of Political Media, says the "Gun Appreciation Day" is modeled after last summer's "Chick-Fil-A Appreciation Day." That's when supporters of the fast food chain were asked to rally outside restaurants after the company came under fire for its stance on gay marriage.

Ward says the rallies are a chance for the public to see that gun owners aren't scary people.

First-term Texas state Rep. Steve Toth was among attendees in Austin. He's one of several state officials nationwide who have proposed trying to curb federal gun restrictions in states.

In Hartford, Conn. -- less than 50 miles from the site of the December 14 mass school shooting in Newtown -- police say about 1,000 people showed up on the Capitol grounds Saturday, urging state and federal authorities not to introduce new restrictions on gun ownership, saying such moves would erode their Second Amendment rights.

Task forces created by the legislature and Gov. Dannel Malloy are considering changes to state gun laws.

In Maryland, where Gov. Martin O'Malley is backing a comprehensive measure that includes a ban on assault weapons and new licensing requirements for handguns, a demonstration in Annapolis drew a large crowd to Lawyer's Mall in front the state capitol, where demonstrators carried signs reading, "Guns Save Lives," and "It's not about Guns, It's about Control."

A demonstration was also held in Albany, N.Y., where the nation's toughest assault weapon and magazine restrictions were passed and signed into law last week.

Demonstrators rally outside the Capitol in Albany, N.Y., Saturday, Jan. 19, 2013, to assert their right to own firearms and to denounce recent gun-control efforts.

/

AP Photo/Tim Roske

Republican Assemblyman Steven McLaughlin told the crowd in Albany that New York's new law was an "abuse of power" by the governor.

"This is an outrage against humanity, what we're seeing," said protester Robert Candea, of Warwick.

In Frankfort, Ky., tea party leader David Adams spoke to the crowd, saying that the "government is out of control."

In Augusta, Me., dozens of gun-rights advocates gathered in front of the Maine State House, many standing in the snow and some holding flags and placards during Saturday's mid-day rally.

One demonstrator, Joe Getchell of Pittsfield, said every law-abiding citizen has a right to bear arms, and it's a constitutional right no one can take away.

Another demonstrator held a sign that said, "Educate Not Legislate."

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Ex-Teammate: Armstrong Showed 'Genuine Emotion'

While critics railed against Lance Armstrong for coming off as detached in the two-part interview with Oprah Winfrey that aired Thursday and Friday nights, former teammate and friend, Tyler Hamilton, told "Good Morning America" today that he felt Armstrong was displaying "genuine emotion."

"I've never seen Lance shed a tear until last night. Before I even heard one word from him Thursday night, I could tell he was a broken man," Hamilton said.

Armstrong's contrition turned tearful Friday when he revealed to Oprah Winfrey how difficult it was to betray his family -- particularly his 13 year old son -- who stood up for the fallen cycling star as rumors swirled that he was taking banned drugs.

Armstrong, 41, choked up when he recounted what he told his son, Luke, in the wake of the scandal.

"When this all really started, I saw my son defending me and saying that's not true…" Armstrong told Winfrey, "I told Luke. I said, 'Don't defend me anymore.'"

Armstrong's interview with Winfrey drew millions of viewers.

It was the first time Armstrong admitted using performance-enhancing drugs and oxygen-boosting blood transfusions to help him win the Tour de France.

"I view this situation as one big lie that I repeated a lot of times," Armstrong said. "I know the truth. The truth isn't what was out there. The truth isn't what I said.

George Burns/Courtesy of Harpo Studios, Inc./AP Photo

Lance Armstrong Confession: 'I Could Not Believe Lance Apologized' Watch Video

Lance Armstrong-Winfrey Interview: How Honest Was He? Watch Video

Lance Armstrong-Winfrey Interview: Doping Confession Watch Video

"I'm a flawed character, as I well know," Armstrong added. "All the fault and all the blame here falls on me."

However, Hamilton said any hope for Armstrong's redemption would come if he came clean about others who were part of the doping scandal.

"The question now is where he goes from this, his actions moving forward. He needs to name names," Hamilton said.

READ MORE: Armstrong Admits to Doping

Armstrong was stripped of his seven Tour de France titles in October 2012, after a report by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency found that he and 11 of his teammates orchestrated "the most sophisticated, professionalized and successful doping program that sport has ever seen."

Despite the admissions of his teammates that they had doped with Armstrong and seen him complete blood transfusions for races, Armstrong condemned the report and denied that he had ever cheated.

As sponsors including Nike began to pull support of Armstrong following the report, Armstrong's carefully-built image began to crumble. He stepped down from Livestrong, the charity he started to help cancer patients after he survived testicular cancer.

"It was a mythic perfect story and it wasn't true," Armstrong said of his fairytale story of overcoming testicular cancer to become the most celebrated cyclist in history.

In the interview, Armstrong explained his competition "cocktail" of EPO, blood transfusions and testosterone that he used throughout his career. He also said he had previously used cortisone.

Armstrong refused to give Winfrey the details of when, where and with whom he doped during seven winning Tours de France between 1999 and 2005, which was the last year he said he doped. Armstrong specifically denied using banned substances when he placed third in 2009 and entered the tour again in 2010.

Investigators familiar with Armstrong's case, however, told ABC News that Armstrong did not come completely clean to Winfrey, and say they believe he doped in 2009.

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Algerian army stages "final assault" on gas plant

ALGIERS/IN AMENAS, Algeria (Reuters) - The Algerian army carried out a dramatic final assault to end a siege by Islamic militants at a desert gas plant on Saturday, killing 11 al Qaeda-linked gunmen after they took the lives of seven more foreign hostages, the state news agency said.

The state oil and gas company, Sonatrach, said the militants who attacked the plant on Wednesday and took a large number of hostages had booby-trapped the complex with explosives, which the army was removing.

"It is over now, the assault is over, and the military are inside the plant clearing it of mines," a source familiar with the operation told Reuters.

British Defence Secretary Philip Hammond said the hostage situation had been "brought to an end" by the Algerian army assault on the militants.

The exact death toll among the gunmen and the foreign and Algerian workers at the plant near the town of In Amenas remained unclear, although a tally of reports from various sources indicated that several dozen people had been killed.

The Islamists' attack on the gas plant has tested Algeria's relations with the outside world, exposed the vulnerability of multinational oil operations in the Sahara and pushed Islamic radicalism in northern Africa to centre stage.

Some Western governments expressed frustration at not being informed of the Algerian authorities' plans to storm the complex. Algeria's response to the raid will have been conditioned by the legacy of a civil war against Islamist insurgents in the 1990s which claimed 200,000 lives.

HOSTAGES FREED

As the army closed in, 16 foreign hostages were freed, a source close to the crisis said. They included two Americans and one Portuguese. Britain said fewer than 10 of its nationals at the plant were unaccounted for and it was urgently seeking to establish the status of all Britions caught up in the crisis.

The base was home to foreign workers from Britain's BP, Norway's Statoil, Japanese engineering firm JGC Corp and others.

BP's chief executive Bob Dudley said on Saturday four of its 18 workers at the site were missing. The remaining 14 were safe.

The crisis at the gas plant marked a serious escalation of unrest in northwestern Africa, where French forces have been in Mali since last week fighting an Islamist takeover of Timbuktu and other towns.

The captors said their attack on the Algerian gas plant was a response to the French offensive in Mali. However, some U.S. and European officials say the elaborate raid probably required too much planning to have been organized from scratch in the week since France launched its strikes.

Scores of Westerners and hundreds of Algerian workers were inside the heavily fortified gas compound when it was seized before dawn on Wednesday by Islamist fighters who said they wanted a halt to the French intervention in neighboring Mali.

Hundreds escaped on Thursday when the army launched a rescue operation, but many hostages were killed.

Before the final assault, different sources had put the number of hostages killed at between 12 and 30, with many foreigners still unaccounted for, among them Norwegians, Japanese, Britons and Americans.

The figure of 30 came from an Algerian security source, who said eight Algerians and at least seven foreigners were among the victims, including two Japanese, two Britons and a French national. One British citizen was killed when the gunmen seized the hostages on Wednesday.

The U.S. State Department said on Friday one American, Frederick Buttaccio, had died but gave no further details.

U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said nobody was going to attack the United States and get away with it.

"We have made a commitment that we're going to go after al Qaeda wherever they are and wherever they try to hide," he said during a visit to London. "We have done that obviously in Afghanistan, Pakistan, we've done it in Somalia, in Yemen and we will do it in North Africa as well."

BURNED BODIES

Earlier on Saturday, Algerian special forces found 15 unidentified burned bodies at the plant, a source told Reuters.

The field commander of the group that attacked the plant is a fighter from Niger called Abdul Rahman al-Nigeri, according to Mauritanian news agencies. His boss, Mokhtar Belmokhtar, a veteran of fighting in Afghanistan in the 1980s and Algeria's civil war of the 1990s, appears not to have joined the raid.

Britain, Japan and other countries have expressed irritation that the army assault was ordered without consultation and officials grumbled at the lack of information.

But French President Francois Hollande said the Algerian military's response seemed to have been the best option given that negotiation was not possible.

"When you have people taken hostage in such large number by terrorists with such cold determination and ready to kill those hostages - as they did - Algeria has an approach which to me, as I see it, is the most appropriate because there could be no negotiation," Hollande said.

The apparent ease with which the fighters swooped in from the dunes to take control of an important energy facility, which produces some 10 percent of the natural gas on which Algeria depends for its export income, has raised questions over the value of outwardly tough Algerian security measures.

Algerian officials said the attackers may have had inside help from among the hundreds of Algerians employed at the site.

Security in the half-dozen countries around the Sahara desert has long been a preoccupation of the West. Smugglers and militants have earned millions in ransom from kidnappings.

The most powerful Islamist groups operating in the Sahara were severely weakened by Algeria's secularist military in the civil war in the 1990s. But in the past two years the regional wing of al Qaeda gained fighters and arms as a result of the civil war in Libya, when arsenals were looted from Muammar Gaddafi's army.

France says the hostage incident proves its decision to fight Islamists in neighboring Mali was necessary. Al Qaeda-linked fighters, many with roots in Algeria and Libya, took control of northern Mali last year.

(Additional reporting by Balazs Koranyi in Oslo, Estelle Shirbon and David Alexander in London, Brian Love in Paris; Writing by Giles Elgood; Editing by Mark Trevelyan and Rosalind Russell)

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