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TOKYO –  For one night, millions of eyes look up to the ‘Ring of Fire.’

Millions around the world are set to watch the annular solar eclipse, in which the moon passes in front of the sun leaving only a golden ring around its edges, which will be visible to wide areas across Asia Monday morning, parts of the western United States and even some parts of Mexico will catch a glimpse.

Parts of eastern Asia were being treated to a solar spectacle as the moon slid across the sun, creating a “ring of fire.” Sky-watchers in the western U.S. awaited their turns as the rare phenomenon was due to move over the Pacific and toward them later Sunday.

Scientists cautioned would-be viewers everywhere to be very careful because the sun’s damaging rays will remain powerful even during the annular solar eclipse. The advice: Either wear specially designed protective eyewear or attend a viewing event — at a planetarium or amateur astronomy club, for example — to avoid risk of serious eye injury.

Local weather permitting, the solar spectacle was first visible in parts of eastern Asia around dawn Monday, local time. If skies were clear enough, early risers there were able to catch the ring eclipse.

Later, the late day sun (on Sunday in the U.S.) will transform into a glowing ring in southwest Oregon, Northern California, central Nevada, southern Utah, northern Arizona and New Mexico and finally the Texas Panhandle.

For 3 ½ hours, the eclipse follows an 8,500-mile path with the ring-of-fire phenomenon lasting as long as 5 minutes, depending on location.

Outside this narrow band, other parts of the U.S. and portions of Canada and Mexico will be treated to a partial eclipse. The Eastern Seaboard will be shut out, but people can find online sites that plan to broadcast the event live.

It’s impossible to know how many people plan to make an event of the ring-of-fire spectacle, the likes of which hasn’t been seen in the continental U.S. for nearly two decades.

One clue to demand might be found at the planetarium at the University of Nevada, Reno, which had to order another 10,000 solar viewing glasses after it sold out of them — 17,000 pairs at $2 each — last week.

In Japan, “eclipse tours” were arranged at schools and parks, on pleasure boats and even private airplanes. Similar events were held in China and Taiwan as well.

Early risers in southern China, northern Taiwan and southeastern Japan will get the best view, weather permitting, around dawn Monday. 

In Japan, cable cars will begin running early to give tourists an unobstructed view from the mountains, and ocean ferries will make special trips to allow viewing from offshore. Children will gather early at schools to view the eclipse with teachers. Stores are promoting special eclipse-viewing eyewear as well as ring-shaped goods of all sorts — from wedding rings to doughnuts.

In Tokyo, where a ring eclipse was last seen in 1839, the event dominated Sunday’s TV talk shows, with hosts providing viewing tips and information about special activities.

In Taiwan, the Taipei Astronomical Museum will open its doors at dawn, while Hong Kong’s Space Museum will set up solar-filtered telescopes outside its building on the Kowloon waterfront.

The eclipse will follow a narrow 13,700-kilometer (8,500-mile) path for 3 1/2 hours. The ring phenomenon will last about five minutes, depending on location. People outside the narrow band will see a partial eclipse.

An annular solar eclipse is not as dramatic as a total eclipse, when the disk of the sun is entirely blocked by the moon. As in a total solar eclipse, the moon crosses in front of the sun, but the moon is too far from Earth and appears too small in the sky to blot out the sun completely.

The rare astronomical event will give a 16.4 billion yen ($208 million) boost to Japan’s economy from the sale of eyewear, tours, planetarium visits and other items, according to an estimate by Kansai University economist Katsuhiro Miyamoto.

A city-run zoo in Yokohama, near Tokyo, will open early to show visitors how animals may react. The zoo has also set up live cameras to capture the movement of elephants, monkeys, kangaroos and penguins. Yokohama is inside the narrow band where the ring eclipse will be visible, weather permitting.

“This is a chance that comes only once in hundreds of years. The data we collect will be extremely valuable for animal research,” zoo official Yoshinori Kubo said.

In the western prefecture of Wakayama, another major viewing area, enthusiasts are organizing viewing parties at several locations.

Doctors and education officials warned of eye injuries from improper viewing. Education Minister Hirofumi Hirano demonstrated the use of eclipse glasses in a televised news conference.

Police also cautioned against traffic accidents caused by distraction during the eclipse and advised drivers to concentrate while on the road.

Japan’s Meteorological Agency is predicting mostly cloudy weather in the country’s eclipse viewing areas.

The last time this type of eclipse was seen in the U.S. was in 1994. This year’s solar show offers ringside seats at 33 national parks along the eclipse path, including the Grand Canyon and Bryce Canyon. A partial eclipse can be viewed from another 125 national parks.

Reporting by the Associated Press.

By NOMAAN MERCHANT, Associated Press
–
26 minutes ago 

CHICAGO (AP) — Thousands of protesters marched through downtown Chicago on Sunday in one of the city’s largest demonstrations in years, airing grievances about war, climate change and a wide range of other complaints as world leaders assembled for a NATO summit.

The protest, which for months had stirred worries about violence in the streets, drew together a broad assortment of participants, including peace activists joining with war veterans and people more focused on economic inequality. But the diversity of opinions also sowed doubts about whether there were too many messages to be effective.

And some of the most enduring images of the event were likely to be from the end — when a small group of demonstrators clashed with a line of police who tried to keep them from the lakeside convention center where President Barack Obama was hosting the gathering.

The protesters tried to move east toward McCormick Place, with some hurling sticks and bottles at police. Officers responded by swinging their batons. The two sides were locked in a standoff for nearly two hours, with police blocking the protesters’ path and the crowd refusing to leave. Some protesters had blood streaming down their faces.

Authorities were seen making arrests one by one and leading individual demonstrators away in handcuffs.

Esther Westlake, a recent graduate of Northeastern Illinois University, marveled at the size of the crowd. She said she had been involved in marches protesting the Iraq War in Chicago but never one this big.

“It’s crazy. There’s so many people here,” she said. “Having NATO in town is kind of exciting.”

But she wondered whether the political agendas of the protesters were too unfocused to get diplomats’ attention.

“It seems like there’s so many messages and people aren’t really sure what they want to get accomplished,” Westlake said. “People just need to figure out what their argument is going to be.”

She worried that some protesters participated simply “to do stupid things” and cause trouble.

Some participants called for the dissolution of NATO, the 63-year-old military alliance that is holding its 25th formal meeting in Chicago. It is the first time the summit has been held in a U.S. city other than Washington.

Diplomats at the meeting planned to discuss the war in Afghanistan, European missile defense and other international security matters.

“Basically NATO is used to keep the poor poor and the rich rich,” said John Schraufnagel, who traveled from Minneapolis to Chicago for the march. Since the end of the Cold War, he said, the alliance has become “the enforcement arm of the ruling 1 percent, of the capitalist 1 percent.”

The march lacked the size and single message that shaped the last major protest moment in Chicago, when nearly half a million people filled the city’s downtown in 2006 to protest making it a felony to be an illegal immigrant.

At one point, dozens of protesters in black clothing surged toward a much smaller group of police, throwing objects at them. The badly outnumbered officers fought back with truncheons, and people on both sides threw punches. As police reinforcements moved in, the pack of violent protesters fled.

Authorities had planned to provide heightened security along the march route to protect people and property.

But unseasonably warm temperatures raised concerns about the safety of the marchers themselves. The city provided water, rest stations and cooling buses along the 2½-mile protest route.

The heat offered an unexpected benefit for police: making it easier to spot potential troublemakers.

Before the summit, officers were told to keep an eye out for people wearing bulky clothing that could hide weapons or big pieces of cardboard that protesters could use to shield themselves against rubber bullets. But anyone wearing overcoats or sweatshirts was conspicuous on a 90-degree day, when many people wore T-shirts and shorts.

Organizers of Sunday’s rally had initially predicted tens of thousands of protesters this weekend. But that was when the G-8 summit of leading industrial nations was also scheduled to be in Chicago. Earlier this year, President Barack Obama moved the Group of Eight economic meeting to Camp David, the secluded retreat in rural Maryland.

Chicago kept the NATO summit, which is not addressing the economy specifically. That left activists with the challenge of persuading groups as diverse as teachers, nurses and union laborers to show up for the Chicago protests even though the summit’s main focus doesn’t align with their most heart-felt issues.

At the end of the march, police appeared to be using precisely the tactics Superintendent Garry McCarthy said they would — extracting individuals from the crowd and quickly getting them away from the rest of the demonstrators.

Several times they could be seen pulling protesters into a line of officers, which parted briefly before quickly closing ranks again.

Police also used “sound cannons” to give orders to demonstrators and tried to relieve officers who had become fatigued to help prevent any escalation in violence.

The demonstrations unfolded just a day after three activists who traveled to Chicago for the summit were accused of manufacturing Molotov cocktails in a plot to attack Obama’s campaign headquarters, Emanuel’s home and other targets.

Defense lawyers argued that the police had trumped up the charges to frighten away peaceful protesters. They told a judge it was undercover officers who brought the firebombs to an apartment on Chicago’s South Side where the men were arrested.

On Sunday, police said two other men were also in custody on charges they discussed making bombs prior to the summit. Authorities said the pair was not connected to the earlier arrests, although defense attorneys said all five were targeted by authorities to scare protesters away from the meeting.

Associated Press writers Michael Tarm, Robert Ray, Carla K. Johnson, Sophia Tareen and Don Babwin contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

By NOMAAN MERCHANT, Associated Press
–
26 minutes ago 

CHICAGO (AP) — Thousands of protesters marched through downtown Chicago on Sunday in one of the city’s largest demonstrations in years, airing grievances about war, climate change and a wide range of other complaints as world leaders assembled for a NATO summit.

The protest, which for months had stirred worries about violence in the streets, drew together a broad assortment of participants, including peace activists joining with war veterans and people more focused on economic inequality. But the diversity of opinions also sowed doubts about whether there were too many messages to be effective.

And some of the most enduring images of the event were likely to be from the end — when a small group of demonstrators clashed with a line of police who tried to keep them from the lakeside convention center where President Barack Obama was hosting the gathering.

The protesters tried to move east toward McCormick Place, with some hurling sticks and bottles at police. Officers responded by swinging their batons. The two sides were locked in a standoff for nearly two hours, with police blocking the protesters’ path and the crowd refusing to leave. Some protesters had blood streaming down their faces.

Authorities were seen making arrests one by one and leading individual demonstrators away in handcuffs.

Esther Westlake, a recent graduate of Northeastern Illinois University, marveled at the size of the crowd. She said she had been involved in marches protesting the Iraq War in Chicago but never one this big.

“It’s crazy. There’s so many people here,” she said. “Having NATO in town is kind of exciting.”

But she wondered whether the political agendas of the protesters were too unfocused to get diplomats’ attention.

“It seems like there’s so many messages and people aren’t really sure what they want to get accomplished,” Westlake said. “People just need to figure out what their argument is going to be.”

She worried that some protesters participated simply “to do stupid things” and cause trouble.

Some participants called for the dissolution of NATO, the 63-year-old military alliance that is holding its 25th formal meeting in Chicago. It is the first time the summit has been held in a U.S. city other than Washington.

Diplomats at the meeting planned to discuss the war in Afghanistan, European missile defense and other international security matters.

“Basically NATO is used to keep the poor poor and the rich rich,” said John Schraufnagel, who traveled from Minneapolis to Chicago for the march. Since the end of the Cold War, he said, the alliance has become “the enforcement arm of the ruling 1 percent, of the capitalist 1 percent.”

The march lacked the size and single message that shaped the last major protest moment in Chicago, when nearly half a million people filled the city’s downtown in 2006 to protest making it a felony to be an illegal immigrant.

At one point, dozens of protesters in black clothing surged toward a much smaller group of police, throwing objects at them. The badly outnumbered officers fought back with truncheons, and people on both sides threw punches. As police reinforcements moved in, the pack of violent protesters fled.

Authorities had planned to provide heightened security along the march route to protect people and property.

But unseasonably warm temperatures raised concerns about the safety of the marchers themselves. The city provided water, rest stations and cooling buses along the 2½-mile protest route.

The heat offered an unexpected benefit for police: making it easier to spot potential troublemakers.

Before the summit, officers were told to keep an eye out for people wearing bulky clothing that could hide weapons or big pieces of cardboard that protesters could use to shield themselves against rubber bullets. But anyone wearing overcoats or sweatshirts was conspicuous on a 90-degree day, when many people wore T-shirts and shorts.

Organizers of Sunday’s rally had initially predicted tens of thousands of protesters this weekend. But that was when the G-8 summit of leading industrial nations was also scheduled to be in Chicago. Earlier this year, President Barack Obama moved the Group of Eight economic meeting to Camp David, the secluded retreat in rural Maryland.

Chicago kept the NATO summit, which is not addressing the economy specifically. That left activists with the challenge of persuading groups as diverse as teachers, nurses and union laborers to show up for the Chicago protests even though the summit’s main focus doesn’t align with their most heart-felt issues.

At the end of the march, police appeared to be using precisely the tactics Superintendent Garry McCarthy said they would — extracting individuals from the crowd and quickly getting them away from the rest of the demonstrators.

Several times they could be seen pulling protesters into a line of officers, which parted briefly before quickly closing ranks again.

Police also used “sound cannons” to give orders to demonstrators and tried to relieve officers who had become fatigued to help prevent any escalation in violence.

The demonstrations unfolded just a day after three activists who traveled to Chicago for the summit were accused of manufacturing Molotov cocktails in a plot to attack Obama’s campaign headquarters, Emanuel’s home and other targets.

Defense lawyers argued that the police had trumped up the charges to frighten away peaceful protesters. They told a judge it was undercover officers who brought the firebombs to an apartment on Chicago’s South Side where the men were arrested.

On Sunday, police said two other men were also in custody on charges they discussed making bombs prior to the summit. Authorities said the pair was not connected to the earlier arrests, although defense attorneys said all five were targeted by authorities to scare protesters away from the meeting.

Associated Press writers Michael Tarm, Robert Ray, Carla K. Johnson, Sophia Tareen and Don Babwin contributed to this report.

Copyright © 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

“We have people watching them do it,” one law enforcement source told the Chicago Sun-Times.

The trio includes Brian Church, 22, of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.; Jared Chase, 27, of Keene, N.H.; and Brent Vincent Betterly, 24, of Oakland Park, Fla. Each was ordered held on a $1.5 million bond Saturday.

They’re charged with possession of an explosive or incendiary device, conspiracy to commit terrorism and providing material support to terrorism. Federal charges are possible, but unlikely, sources said.

County prosecutors said they were using an anti-terrorism law passed by the state Legislature in the wake of the 9/11 terrorism attacks.

“We believe it’s the first time it’s been used in the state of Illinois,” said Alvarez’s spokeswoman, Sally Dally.

Prosecutors alleged the three men “traveled to Chicago to commit acts of domestic terrorism during the NATO Summit.”

But outside court, defense attorney Michael Deutsch told reporters the case was “a Chicago Police set-up … entrapment to the highest degree.”

Deutsch said three undercover police nicknamed “Nadia,” “Mo” and “Gloves” befriended his clients on May 1.

Deutsch said two of the people arrested in the operation were actually undercover Chicago cops.

The undercover officers “egged on” the protesters, Deutsch said.

“From our information the so-called incendiary devices and the plans to attack police stations … that’s all coming from the minds of the police informants and not coming from our clients, who are non-violent protesters,” he said.

The defendants are already being referred to as the “NATO 3” by supporters. The term #NATO3 is trending on Twitter.

They were described by prosecutors as anarchists who considered themselves part of the “Black Bloc” movement that’s wreaked havoc at past global gatherings.

“They are domestic terrorists,” said Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez. “These men were here to hurt people.”

On Wednesday, members of the Chicago Police Department’s Organized Crime Division raided a Bridgeport apartment at 1013 W. 32nd Street where the protesters were staying, seizing four Molotov cocktails and arresting nine people.

They executed a “no knock” search warrant that allows officers in extraordinary circumstances to enter a home without first knocking and identifying themselves as police, authorities said.

The officers seized a mortar gun, swords, a crossbow, a throwing star, ninja knives, knives with brass-knuckle handles and written plans for the assembly of pipe bombs, prosecutors said.

The alleged anarchists planned to use torn bandanas jammed into gasoline-filled beer bottle bombs as wicks, prosecutors said.

They allegedly planned to attack four police stations with the Molotov cocktails in hopes of slowing down the police response to the higher-profile attacks.

Asked if the planned actions on the Obama headquarters in the Prudential Building and Emanuel’s North Side home were intended to be violent, Chicago Police Supt. Garry McCarthy said: “They weren’t going to go trick or treating.”

“This represents a victory — not a failure — in preventing something from happening.”

Prosecutors cast Church as the ringleader. He allegedly said he wanted to recruit 16 people — split into four cells — to conduct the attacks.

Church allegedly said he wanted to buy several assault rifles so that if a police officer pointed a gun at him he could “point one back.”

The conspirators bought gasoline for the firebombs at the BP station at 31st and Halsted — across the street from the Deering District police station, prosecutors said.

Church asked fellow protesters if they had ever seen “a cop on fire” and suggested throwing a firebomb at the station at 3120 S. Halsted in the Bridgeport neighborhood, prosecutors said.

Police conducted court-authorized electronic surveillance of the apartment, sources said. The FBI and Secret Service helped analyze computers and cell phones seized from the apartment, prosecutors said.

Deutsch, the attorney for the trio, told Judge Edward Harmening the undercover officers were the ones trying to draw the others into illegal activity.

“We believe it is a set-up, an entrapment to the highest degree … to discredit the protesters that have come here to non-violently protest,” Deutsch said.

“They’re not anarchists,” he said of his clients. “They are not members of the Black Bloc organization. . . . This is a way to stir up prejudice against the people who are exercising their First Amendment rights,” he said.

Another defense attorney, Sarah Gelsomino of the National Lawyers Guild, claimed “police broke down doors with guns drawn and searched residences without a warrant or consent” at 11:30 p.m. Wednesday. But prosecutors insisted that the officers were executing a legal search warrant signed by a judge.

Gelsomino also said there was a pattern of harassment against the men. They were previously pulled over by Chicago cops while in a car near a CVS pharmacy and questioned about their protest plans, she said.

“All three of these guys, interestingly, were in the car about a week ago that was stopped and harassed by the Chicago Police Department,” Gelsomino said. “They then posted video online in an attempt to expose that police misconduct. Each of those three are now being charged with these crimes.”

A police source said the traffic stop was conducted by beat officers unconnected to the terrorism investigation.

The three men were among nine people collared Wednesday night in the raid on the Bridgeport apartment building, Gelsomino said. At least two other people were arrested later in connection with the case, she said.

Six of the original nine arrested were released without charges Friday, Gelsomino said.

Betterly and Chase were involved in other scrapes with the law in recent months, Florida court records show.

Betterly is facing felony charges in Broward County, Fla., for allegedly breaking into a high school with two other men and having a tequila-fueled pool party. They allegedly damaged the property with stolen fire extinguishers.

Chase was convicted of theft in Dade County, Fla., in January, records show.

“He told me he was going to be protesting,” said an uncle, Michael Chase, of New Hampshire. “He gets a little carried away and does a little elbow bumping with police but certainly nothing like you’re describing. “… I’m quite shocked. He’s not above doing dumb things but nothing like this.”

Contributing: Natasha Korecki

ASSOCIATED PRESS

May 19, 2012 1:24AM

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