Global Affairs and Finance October 10, 2009

  Six Taliban gunmen dressed as Pakistani soldiers attacked Pakistan's military headquarters on Saturday in a 45-minute shootout that resulted in the deaths of four gunmen and six soldiers. Two of the men escaped and have not been found.

President Obama sought to refocus the conversation towards health care today after his Nobel Prize victory dominated the news cycle Friday. In his weekly radio address, Obama told lawmakers to act quickly and vote on health care reform, which he said was growing in popularity. "The historic movement to bring real, meaningful health insurance reform to the American people gathered momentum this week as we approach the final days of this debate."

 A new technique, which requires less drilling that tapped previously inaccessible supplies of gas throughout the U.S., is spreading to the rest of the world, raising hopes of a huge expansion in global reserves of the cleanest fossil fuel.

 Italian and Norwegian oil engineers and geologists have arrived throughout Texas, Oklahoma and Pennsylvania to learn how to extract gas from layers of a black rock called shale. Companies are leasing huge tracts of land across Europe for exploration.

The 281-146 votes will expand the definition of violent federal hate crimes to cover those committed because of a victim's gender and sexual orientation.

 All 11 people aboard a United Nations plane that crashed today in a mountainous area of southeastern Haiti have been killed, the UN peacekeeping mission to the Caribbean country has confirmed.

 New rules by the Financial Accounting Standard Board, in the form of FAS 166 and 167, will force banks to put securitized debt back on balance sheets and retain continued exposure to the risks related to transferred financial assets, by eliminating the concept of a "qualifying special-purpose entity."

 After the Polish President Lech Kaczynski signed the European Union's reform treaty into law on Saturday, the Czech Republic as the only country still to ratify the document.

 Families fleeing northern insurgency in the Yemen War swell refugee camp

* ICRC says situation worsened sharply in recent weeks

U.N. peacekeepers died on Friday when their surveillance plane crashed into a mountainside in Haiti during a routine patrol, U.N. officials said.

 A U.N. rescue team confirmed there were no survivors among the 11 crew and military personnel on the plane, a Casa-212, when it went down near the town of Fonds-Verrettes, nears the border with the Dominican Republic.

 U.S third Quarter growth strong while the trade gap narrows.

Hidden Swiss accounts must return to Italy in a tax amnesty oversight.

Pakistan's poor public education system has been associated with the rise in extremism. Analysts say education reform is needed to stabilize Pakistan.