Facebook announces new site search feature

Facebook announced that it is launching a search engine for the social network called "graph search."

At a press event in Menlo Park, Calif., Tuesday CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the social network is launching a search engine that will run inside of Facebook.

"What is graph search? It's not web search," Zuckerberg told reporters.

During a comparison of graph search with a web search, Zuckerberg demonstrated that graph search will deliver answers to questions like, "Who are my friends that live in San Francisco?"

Graph search focuses on people, photos, places and interests. Users can type a question into the search bar on Facebook and ask questions. An option to refine searches is also provided.

Zuckerberg showed off other searched like: "Mexican restaurants in Palo Alto, Calif, my friends have been to" and "Photos of me and  Priscilla." The search is in still in its beta phase.

Facebook users can search for specific photos, like "photos of Berlin, German from 1989," "photos of my friends before 1990" or "photos I've liked."

Zuckerberg also touched on privacy concerns and pointed out to privacy shortcuts, which are located at the top right section of the website. The setting lets users see what photos have been uploaded, tagged and hidden from Timeline.

Facebook Graph Search is in the early stages of development. Because of a partnership with Bing, any results that cannot be found on Facebook will pull from Bing.com.

The social network was previously rumored to unveil a "Facebook phone," even though Zuckerberg has publically shot down speculation that Facebook was planning to build a smartphone.

"It is so clearly the wrong strategy for us," Zuckerberg said at a September technology conference in his first public interview after Facebook's May initial public offering. "It doesn't move the needle for us."

Facebook's graph search is in closed beta. Users who want to sign up for the test can join the waiting list on Facebook's website.

The Menlo Park, Calif.-based company reports 1 billion monthly active users, 240 billion photos and 1 trillion connections.

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Is China easing up on local media?

A protester calls for greater media freedom outside the headquarters of Nanfang Media Group in Guangzhou on Jan. 9.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Young: Handling of Southern Weekly row demonstrated tolerant side of new leadership


• Traditional, newer media can serve as tools for achieving goals in China's modernization


• The fight against corruption in China is at the top of the list for incoming leader, Xi Jinping


• Young: Media has also emerged as an important tool for combating other social problems

Editor's note: Doug Young teaches financial journalism at Fudan University in Shanghai and is the author of The Party Line: How the Media Dictates Public Opinion in Modern China published by John Wiley & Sons. He also writes daily on his blog, Young's China Business Blog, commenting on the latest developments in China's fast-moving corporate scene.

Shanghai, China (CNN) -- China's traditional iron-handed approach to the media has taken a surprise turn of tolerance with Beijing's soft handling of a recent dispute with local reporters, in what could well become a more open attitude toward the media under the incoming administration of presumed new President Xi Jinping.

The new openness is being driven in large part by pragmatism, as the government realizes that both traditional and newer media can serve as powerful tools for achieving many of its goals in the country's modernization.

The recent conflict between reporters at the progressive Southern Weekly and local propaganda officials over a censorship incident left many guessing how the government would respond to the first clash of its kind in China for more than 20 years. The result was a surprisingly mild approach, including mediation by a high-level government official and a vague promise for less censorship in the future.

Read: Censorship protest a test for China

The unusually tolerant tack could well reflect a new attitude by Xi and other incoming leaders set to take control of China for the next decade, all of whom have come to realize the media can serve many important functions beyond its traditional role as a propaganda machine.

At the top of Xi's list is the fight against corruption, a problem he has mentioned frequently since taking the helm of the Communist Party last year. The party has tried to tackle the problem for years using its own internal investigations, but progress was slow until recently due to protection many officials received through their own sprawling networks of internal relationships, known locally as guanxi.

Read: Corruption as China's top priority

All that began to change in the last two years with the rapid rise of social media, most notably the Twitter-like microblogs known as Weibo that are now a pervasive part of the Chinese Internet landscape and count hundreds of millions of ordinary Chinese among their users. Those social media have become an important weapon for exposing corruption, allowing thousands of ordinary citizens to pool their resources and build cases against officials they suspect of using their influence for personal gain.

This increasingly sophisticated machine was on prominent display last year in a case involving Yang Dacai, a local official in northwestern Shaanxi province who infuriated the online community by smiling at the site of a horrific accident scene. Netizens quickly turned their outrage into an online investigation, and uncovered photos of him wearing several luxury watches he could hardly afford on his government salary. As a result, the government ultimately opened an investigation into the matter and Yang was sacked from his posts.

In addition to its role in battling corruption, the media has also emerged as an important tool for combating and addressing many of the other social problems that China is facing in its rapid modernization. Barely a week goes by without a report on the latest national food safety scandal or case of illegal pollution in both traditional and social media, with such reports often followed by government investigations.

Beijing leaders have also discovered that the media can also be an important vehicle for improving communication between the government and general public -- something that was a low priority in previous eras when officials only cared about pleasing their higher-up party bosses.

Following a Beijing directive in late 2011, most local government agencies and other organizations have all established microblog accounts, which they use to keep the public informed about their latest activities and seek feedback on upcoming plans. Such input has become a valuable way to temper traditional public mistrust toward the government, which historically didn't make much effort to include the public in any of its internal discussions.

Lastly, the government has also discovered that media, especially social media, can be an effective tool in gauging public opinion on everything from broader national topics like inflation down to very local issues like land redevelopment. Such feedback was difficult to get in the past due to interference by local officials, who tried to filter out or downplay anything with negative overtones and play things up to their own advantage. As a result, central government officials often received incomplete pictures of what was happening in their own country.

With all of these valuable roles to play, the media has become an increasingly important part of Beijing's strategy in executing many of its top priorities.

The government also realizes that a certain degree of openness is critical to letting the media perform many of those roles, which may explain its relatively tolerant approach in the recent Southern Weekly conflict. Such tolerance is likely to continue under Xi's administration, helping to shift more power towards a field of increasingly emboldened reporters at both traditional and new media and away from their traditional propaganda masters.

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The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Doug Young.

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'Very happy' Bush the elder leaves hospital

WASHINGTON: Former US president George H.W. Bush was released from hospital on Monday following more than two months of treatment for bronchitis, a bacterial infection and a persistent cough.

"Mr Bush has improved to the point that he will not need any special medication when he goes home, but he will continue physical therapy," said physician Amy Mynderse.

Bush, at 88 the oldest surviving former president, was admitted to the Methodist Hospital in Houston on November 7 and released after 12 days only to be readmitted four days later when his cough flared up again.

"I am deeply grateful for the wonderful doctors and nurses at Methodist who took such good care of me," Bush said in a statement after being picked up by his wife Barbara.

"Let me add just how touched we were by the many get-well messages we received from our friends and fellow Americans. Your prayers and good wishes helped more than you know, and as I head home my only concern is that I will not be able to thank each of you for your kind words."

Bush's spokesman Jim McGrath told AFP that the former president and his wife had returned immediately to their home in west Houston where he would continue to receive "some strength training or conditioning."

Calling it a "wonderful day" for the ex-president, the spokesman said Bush had understood the need to be in hospital but was delighted to be out.

"He's not a man who is known to enjoy sitting still for too long, and as long as he didn't need to be in the hospital he wanted to get out. He's a very happy former president today," McGrath added.

No more tests were scheduled but the spokesman said they would "take these things one day at a time."

Doctors had hoped to have the elder statesman home for Christmas, but he was instead forced to spend the holiday season in the hospital, where he was joined by his wife Barbara, son Neil and grandson Pierce.

Bush, a Republican, served only one term in the White House, from 1989 to 1993, despite sending US troops to victory in the first Gulf War in which an American-led coalition expelled Saddam Hussein's invading forces from Kuwait.

Bush, a decorated World War II veteran, had earlier served in several top government posts, including as vice president to Ronald Reagan, director of the Central Intelligence Agency, and as US ambassador to the United Nations.

He was also chief of the US Liaison Office in China when Washington had official ties with Beijing's foe Taipei.

His son George W. Bush served two terms as president and also went to war with Iraq, this time sending US-led troops all the way to Baghdad to overthrow Saddam, whom he had wrongly accused of hoarding weapons of mass destruction.

- AFP/jc

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Oscar's message: Reality bites

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• A.S. Hamrah: Oscar-nominated films deal in disaster, trauma, upheaval, ruined lives


• He says filmmakers this year depict consequences of exposure to violence


• He says "Argo," "Zero Dark Thirty," "Lincoln" show grim events; "Les Mis" shows misery


• Films also long, adding to ordeal, he says. Filmmakers' message: Deal with it

Editor's note: A.S. Hamrah is film critic at n+1, a print magazine of politics, literature and culture published three times a year. He edits the magazine's film review publication, the N1FR, and lives in Brooklyn, New York.

(CNN) -- Sunday night's Golden Globes came hot on the heels of the announcement of this year's Oscar nominations, which were pushed up so they wouldn't come out during the Sundance Film Festival. Awards season is now a blur of gowns, cleavage and red carpeting. But in Hollywood, looking good is still more important than feeling good, except in the movies themselves, where the situation is often reversed. And in this year's dire crop of nominees, there is not much feel-good.

Consider "Argo," one of this year's nine nominees for the Best Picture Academy Award. The Hollywood sign that looms over Los Angeles was in reality spruced up just before the 1979 events depicted in the film, but it makes sense that we see it damaged and collapsing instead in Ben Affleck's movie about Hollywood's intervention in the Iran hostage crisis.

That's because all the Oscar-nominated films this year deal in disaster, trauma and upheaval. Whether the damage is historical or personal, familial or environmental, or some combination of the four, the films the academy singled out this year tell stories of catastrophe and its aftermath.

While CIA movies like "Argo" and Kathryn Bigelow's "Zero Dark Thirty" are "based on first-hand accounts of actual events," as a title at the beginning of Bigelow's film informs us, this year even a movie as colorful as "Life of Pi" or a musical like "Les Misérables" brought us ruined lives and devastated landscapes.

For the first time in decades, the societal and psychological consequences of constant exposure to violence were actually something big-budget filmmakers took into account. That they have been rewarded for it at awards season is ironic and necessary in a year that witnessed a mass killing in a movie theater showing the last in a dark trilogy of superhero fantasies.

Even light-hearted genres were affected. Romance, in the neo-screwball comedy of "Silver Linings Playbook," blossoms between people with serious problems recovering from violent loss. That film, set in a recognizable lower-middle-class milieu, deglamorized the rom-com, moving it into a new era. In David O. Russell's film, the characters played by Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper don't dream of having it all. Happy to score a five instead of 10, they exult in their ability just to participate in normal life.

Opinion: Despite Newtown, we crave violent movies

Lawrence and Cooper are outpatients, but many of the academy-acknowledged films this year feature bedridden performances by actors playing characters with broken or failing bodies.

Naomi Watts, nominated as Best Actress for her performance in "The Impossible," spends half the film on death's door in a Thai hospital. In "The Sessions," John Hawkes, nominated for Best Actor as a poet suffering from polio, spends the entire movie on his back. Denzel Washington, nominated for his lead performance as an alcoholic pilot in "Flight," wakes up in a hospital and suffers the physical effects of his crash through most of the film. In Michael Haneke's "Amour," we watch Emmanuelle Riva slowly dying, slipping into immobility, incoherence and unconsciousness as she suffers.

The desire for a new understanding of historical trauma accompanies this new investigation of damaged minds and bodies. Steven Spielberg and Quentin Tarantino, in "Lincoln" and "Django Unchained," both show slavery as the original disaster of American history, an inhuman institution defined by vicious abuse that ended in bloody civil war. Neither film tolerates the conciliatory old Hollywood portrait of the South as noble and romantic. As violent as Tarantino's view is, Spielberg's is just as condemnatory. When Jackie Earle Haley, known of late for playing deviants and psychopaths, shows up in "Lincoln" as a representative of the Confederacy, you can be sure his cause is as wrong as it is lost.

The post-revolutionary settings of "Argo" and "Les Misérables" are chaotic and dangerous, but the greatest danger facing the characters in this year's Oscar movies comes from nature. The scope of this danger is biblical, but it's rooted in real events linked to climate change. Great floods wash away the bonds of family, among other things, in "Beasts of the Southern Wild," "Life of Pi," "The Impossible" and "Moonrise Kingdom" (nominated for Best Original Screenplay). "Les Misérables" begins with an ark-like ship being dragged into port, a heavy symbol in a movie drowned in Anne Hathaway's tears.

Part of this sense of ordeal has to do with the epic length of the ever-lengthening Hollywood blockbuster. The average length of the Best Picture nominees this year was 135 minutes. Remove the indie "Beasts of the Southern Wild" from the list, by comparison a short subject at 93 minutes, and the average running time jumps to 141 long minutes, a length that sorely tests the ever-shortening patience of most viewers not to check their phones for texts.

For decades, disaster films were metaphors. In the 1950s, for instance, they turned the real threat of nuclear devastation into science fiction, helping viewers cope with a frightening future. In our post-collapse era, disaster is closer than ever. The new, post-metaphoric disaster movie avoids subtext by forefronting "actual events." The message here is: Deal with it. Did Hollywood finally catch up with the world, or did the world just catch up with the disaster film?

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The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of A.S. Hamrah.

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AP: Armstrong gives tearful apology to Livestrong

AUSTIN, Texas Lance Armstrong apologized to the staff at his Livestrong cancer foundation before heading to an interview with Oprah Winfrey, a person with direct knowledge of the meeting told The Associated Press.

The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the discussion was private.

Play Video

Anti-doping chief: Armstrong bullied witnesses

38 Photos

Lance Armstrong

Stripped last year of his seven Tour de France titles because of doping charges, Armstrong addressed the staff Monday and said, "I'm sorry." The person said the disgraced cyclist choked up and several employees cried during the session.

The person also said Armstrong apologized for letting the staff down and putting Livestrong at risk but he did not make a direct confession to the group about using banned drugs. He said he would try to restore the foundation's reputation, and urged the group to continue fighting for the charity's mission of helping cancer patients and their families.

After the meeting, Armstrong, his legal team and close advisers gathered at a downtown Austin hotel for the interview.

The cyclist will make a limited confession to Winfrey about his role as the head of a long-running scheme to dominate the Tour with the aid of performance-enhancing drugs, a person with knowledge of the situation has told the AP.

Winfrey and her crew had earlier said they would film the interview, to be broadcast Thursday, at his home but the location apparently changed to a hotel. Local and international news crews staked out positions in front of the cyclist's Spanish-style villa before dawn, hoping to catch a glimpse of Winfrey or Armstrong.

Armstrong still managed to slip away for a run Monday morning despite the crowds gathering outside his house. He returned home by cutting through a neighbor's yard and hopping a fence.

During a jog on Sunday, Armstrong talked to the AP for a few minutes saying, "I'm calm, I'm at ease and ready to speak candidly." He declined to go into specifics.

Armstrong lost all seven Tour titles following a voluminous U.S. Anti-Doping Agency report that portrayed him as a ruthless competitor, willing to go to any lengths to win the prestigious race. USADA chief executive Travis Tygart labeled the doping regimen allegedly carried out by the U.S. Postal Service team that Armstrong once led, "The most sophisticated, professionalized and successful doping program that sport has ever seen."

In a recent "60 Minutes Sports" interview, Tygart described Armstrong and his team of doctors, coaches and riders as similar to a "Mafia" that kept their secret for years and intimidated riders into silently following their illegal methods.

Yet Armstrong looked like just another runner getting in his roadwork when he talked to the AP, wearing a red jersey and black shorts, sunglasses and a white baseball cap pulled down to his eyes. Leaning into a reporter's car on the shoulder of a busy Austin road, he seemed unfazed by the attention and the news crews that made stops at his home. He cracked a few jokes about all the reporters vying for his attention, then added, "but now I want to finish my run," and took off down the road.

The interview with Winfrey will be Armstrong's first public response to the USADA report. Armstrong is not expected to provide a detailed account about his involvement, nor address in depth many of the specific allegations in the more than 1,000-page USADA report.

In a text to the AP on Saturday, Armstrong said: "I told her (Winfrey) to go wherever she wants and I'll answer the questions directly, honestly and candidly. That's all I can say."

After a federal investigation of the cyclist was dropped without charges being brought last year, USADA stepped in with an investigation of its own. The agency deposed 11 former teammates and accused Armstrong of masterminding a complex and brazen drug program that included steroids, blood boosters and a range of other performance-enhancers.

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Lance Armstrong offered donation to USADA during investigation

Once all the information was out and his reputation shattered, Armstrong defiantly tweeted a picture of himself on a couch at home with all seven of the yellow leader's jerseys on display in frames behind him. But the preponderance of evidence in the USADA report and pending legal challenges on several fronts apparently forced him to change tactics after more a decade of denials.

He still faces legal problems.

Former teammate Floyd Landis, who was stripped of the 2006 Tour de France title for doping, has filed a federal whistle-blower lawsuit that accused Armstrong of defrauding the U.S. Postal Service. The Justice Department has yet to decide whether it will join the suit as a plaintiff.

The London-based Sunday Times also is suing Armstrong to recover about $500,000 it paid him to settle a libel lawsuit. On Sunday, the newspaper took out a full-page ad in the Chicago Tribune, offering Winfrey suggestions for what questions to ask Armstrong. Dallas-based SCA Promotions, which tried to deny Armstrong a promised bonus for a Tour de France win, has threatened to bring yet another lawsuit seeking to recover more than $7.5 million an arbitration panel awarded the cyclist in that dispute.

The lawsuit most likely to be influenced by a confession might be the Sunday Times case. Potential perjury charges stemming from Armstrong's sworn testimony in the 2005 arbitration fight would not apply because of the statute of limitations. Armstrong was not deposed during the federal investigation that was closed last year.

Many of his sponsors dropped Armstrong after the damning USADA report — at the cost of tens of millions of dollars — and soon after, he left the board of Livestrong, which he founded in 1997. Armstrong is still said to be worth about $100 million.

Livestrong might be one reason Armstrong has decided to come forward with an apology and limited confession. The charity supports cancer patients and still faces an image problem because of its association with Armstrong. He also may be hoping a confession would allow him to return to competition in the elite triathlon or running events he participated in after his cycling career.

World Anti-Doping Code rules state his lifetime ban cannot be reduced to less than eight years. WADA and U.S. Anti-Doping officials could agree to reduce the ban further depending on what information Armstrong provides and his level of cooperation.

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Lance Armstrong Apologizes to Livestrong Staff

Lance Armstrong apologized today to the Livestrong staff ahead of his interview with Oprah Winfrey, a foundation official said.

The disgraced cyclist gathered with about 100 Livestrong Foundation staffers at their Austin, Texas, headquarters for a meeting that included social workers who deal directly with patients as part of the group's mission to support cancer victims.

Armstrong's "sincere and heartfelt apology" generated lots of tears, spokeswoman Katherine McLane said, adding that he "took responsibility" for the trouble he has caused the foundation.

McLane declined to say whether Armstrong's comments included an admission of doping, just that the cyclist wanted the staff to hear from him in person rather than rely on second-hand accounts.

Armstrong then took questions from the staff.

Armstrong's story has never changed. In front of cameras, microphones, fans, sponsors, cancer survivors -- even under oath -- Lance Armstrong hasn't just denied ever using performance enhancing drugs, he has done so in an indignant, even threatening way.

Riccardo S. Savi/Getty Images|Ray Tamarra/Getty Images

Lance Armstrong Doping Charges: Secret Tapes Watch Video

Lance Armstrong's Winfrey Interview: Expected to Admit to Doping Watch Video

Today, sources tell ABC News, will be different. Today Armstrong is expected to rewrite his own, now infamous story, to Winfrey. So what should she ask? There are enough questions to fill a book, but here's our shot at five, for starters, all based on the belief that his first words will be an admission. Feel free to comment and add your own.

1) Witnesses have told the U.S. Anti Doping Agency that after recovering from cancer, you increased your use of performance enhancing drugs, but swore off one of them—Human Growth Hormone—specifically noting your cancer as a reason to avoid it. Do you believe your cancer may have been caused by performance enhancing drug use?

2) Some people seem able to forgive or rationalize the use of performance enhancing drugs, but what troubles them is the vicious cover-up. Why did you feel it necessary to go beyond denials, to attack and even threaten and file legal claims against those who accused you of drug use, even to the point of causing serious harm to people's lives and reputations?

3) In 1996, while recovering from cancer, your former close friend Frankie Andreu and his wife Betsy say they were in the hospital room when you told doctors you'd used several different performance enhancing drugs during your career. They testified under oath about this, but you always denied it and vilified them. This caused the Andreus great harm. Did it happen?

4) What do you tell your kids?

5) Up until today, everything you've said and done—even that picture on twitter of you and your yellow jerseys—has said to the world that you're not sorry, and that you're the real winner of seven Tours. Aren't you just coming forward now to help yourself, rather than to come clean or set the record straight?

Whatever the answers, a small army of lawyers and even criminal investigators will be listening closely. Will Armstrong's interview be the start of his redemption or the beginning of even bigger problems?

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Quest: U.S. economy to dominate Davos

The United States and the sorry state of its political and budgetary process will be the center of attention at Davos, writes Quest

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Quest: Davos is a chance to see where the political and economic landmines are in 2013


• Quest: People will be speculating about how dysfunctional the U.S. political process has become


• Quest: Davos has been consumed by eurozone sovereign debt crises for three years

Editor's note: Watch Quest Means Business on CNN International, 1900pm GMT weekdays. Quest Means Business is presented by CNN's foremost international business correspondent Richard Quest. Follow him on Twitter.

(CNN) -- It is that time of the year, again. Come January no sooner have the Christmas trees been taken down, as the winter sales are in full vicious flood the world of business start thinking about going to the world economic forum, better known as Davos.

For the past three years Davos has been consumed by the eurozone sovereign debt crises.

As it worsened the speculation became ever more frantic.....Will Greece leave the euro? Will the eurozone even survive? Was this all just a big German trick to run Europe? More extreme, more dramatic, more nonsense.

Can China be the biggest engine of growth for the global economy. Round and round in circles we have gone on these subjects until frankly I did wonder if there was anything else to say short of it's a horrible mess!

This year there is a new bogey man. The US and in particular the sorry state of the country's political and budgetary process will, I have little doubt, be the center of attention.

Read more: More 'cliffs' to come in new Congress

Not just because Congress fluffed its big test on the fiscal cliff, but because in doing so it created many more deadlines, any one of which could be deeply unsettling to global markets... There is the $100 billion budget cutbacks postponed for two months by the recent agreement; postponed to the end of February.

At exactly the same time as the US Treasury's ability to rob Peter to pay Paul on the debt ceiling crises comes to a head.

Read more: Both Obama, GOP set for tough talks ahead

The Treasury's "debt suspension period" is an extraordinary piece of financial chicanery that if we tried it with our credit cards would get us locked up!! Then there is the expiration of the latest continuing resolution, the authority by which congress is spending money.

There is the terrifying prospect that all these budget woes will conflate into one big political fist fight as the US faces cutbacks, default or shutdown!!

I am being alarmist. Most rational people believe that the worst sting will be taken out of this tail....not before we have all been to the edge...and back. And that is what Davos will have on its mind.

People will be speculating about how dysfunctional the US political process has become and is it broken beyond repair (if they are not asking that then they should be...)

They will be pondering which is more serious for risk...the US budget and debt crises or the Eurozone sovereign debt debacle. A classic case of between the devil and the deep blue sea.

The official topic this year is Resilient Dynamism. I have absolutely no idea what this means. None whatsoever. It is another of WEF's ersatz themes dreamt up to stimulate debate in what Martin Sorrell has beautifully terms "davosian language" In short everyone interprets it as they will.

What I will enjoy, as I do every year, is the chance to hear the global players speak and the brightest and best thinkers give us their take on the global problems the atmosphere becomes febrile as the rock-stars of finance and economics give speeches, talk on panels and give insight.

Of course comes of these musings, it never does at Davos. That's not the point. This is a chance to take stock and see where the political and economic landmines are in 2013. I like to think of Davos as the equivalent of Control/Alt/Delete. It allows us to reboot.

We leave at least having an idea of where people stand on the big issues provided you can see through the panegyrics of self congratulatory back slapping that always takes place whenever you get like minded people in one place... And this year, I predict the big issue being discussed in coffee bars, salons and fondue houses will be the United States and its budgetary woes.

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France pounds Islamist strongholds in northern Mali

BAMAKO: French jets pounded the Islamist strongholds of Gao and Kidal in northern Mali on Sunday, forcing insurgents to flee on the third day of a game-changing intervention that has been met with relief by the population and spurred the region into action.

"Stopping the terrorists -- it's done," French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said. "Today we started taking care of the terrorists' rear bases."

Rafale fighter planes struck bases used by Al-Qaeda-linked fighters in Gao, the main city in northern Mali and the base from which ethnic-Tuareg rebels a year ago launched the offensive that touched off Mali's descent into chaos.

France also targeted a large base in the northern region of Kidal, a security source said, targeting an area where rebels had stocked munitions and fuel.

In addition to the Rafales, former colonial ruler France has used Gazelle helicopters and Mirage jets since it launched the operation on Friday to counter the rebel push south.

Algeria on Sunday granted France permission to use its airspace to reach targets in Mali.

Residents in Gao, which had been under the control of a group called Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa, said the French airstrikes had completely levelled the Islamists' position and forced them out of the town.

"We can see smoke billowing from the base. There isn't a single Islamist left in town. They have all fled," a teacher said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

French President Francois Hollande, who has been struggling on the domestic front and whose ratings have hit record lows, said the intervention had stopped the southward rebel advance seen as threatening the capital Bamako, but stressed France's mission was not over.

Some residents of Gao rejoiced at the French strikes but said they needed friendly troops to fill the void as soon as possible.

"What we need now is for the (Malian) army to come here so that the Islamists can't come back," a young student said.

Gao is 1,200 kilometres northeast of Bamako.

Residents of Timbuktu, which has seen some of the worst Islamist abuses over the past 10 months, said they were also eager for French jets to appear in the sky.

"The population is cut off from the south. We can't travel, it's become too dangerous," said Elhaj Cisse, a literature teacher in the ancient northern city.

"We are waiting for this French intervention. We have been living in a very totalitarian regime for nine to 10 months," he said.

In liberated Gao and Konna, "people are relieved. They have been in this situation for 10 months. We needed this spark.... Everyone is saying it, even in the mosques," another resident said.

Aides to Hollande described the militants as better trained and armed than they'd expected.

"What has struck us markedly is how modern their equipment is and their ability to use it," one said in a reference to the rebels' hit on a French helicopter, which resulted in the death of its pilot, France's only confirmed fatality.

Senior officers from neighbouring countries were expected in Bamako on Sunday to prepare for the arrival of the first troops of a multinational West African force.

The force has been authorised by the UN Security Council to help the Malian government reclaim control of the north of the country. It will be commanded by General Shehu Abdulkadir of Nigeria, which will provide around 600 men.

Burkina Faso, Niger, Senegal and Togo all pledged around 500 troops this weekend, while Benin has said it will send 300 soldiers.

It remained unclear when any of these forces would arrive and how quickly they could be deployed to the frontline.

Media reports have said France is deploying about 500 troops in Mali.

Regional bloc ECOWAS is due to hold an emergency summit to discuss the Mali crisis on January 19 in Abidjan.

A Malian security source said leading Islamist Abdel Krim had been killed in Konna. Krim, nicknamed "Kojak", was said to be a key lieutenant of Iyad Ag Ghaly, the leader of Ansar Dine, one of the Islamist groups which have controlled northern Mali since last April.

Colonel Paul Geze, the French mission's commander, said the French contingent would be at full strength by Monday and primarily deployed around Bamako to protect the 6,000-strong expatriate community.

Since taking advantage of a power vacuum created by a military coup in Bamako to seize control of huge swathes of Mali in April 2012, the Islamists have imposed an extreme form of Muslim law in areas they control.

They have destroyed centuries-old mausoleums they see as heretical, and perceived offenders against their moral code have been subjected to floggings, amputations and sometimes executions.

In addition to the French helicopter pilot, the last few days of fighting have claimed the lives of 11 Malian soldiers, according to an update released Saturday evening.

A Malian officer in the central town of Mopti, near the front line, said dozens, possibly as many as a hundred Islamists had been killed in Konna.

Human Rights Watch, citing reports from residents, said at least 10 civilians had died as a result of the fighting in Konna, including three children who drowned while trying to flee across the Niger river.

France's intervention has been backed by the main opposition at home, by Britain, which has offered logistical support in the form of transport planes, and by the US, which is considering offering surveillance drones for the operation.

Its closest partner Germany has also defended France's action but has ruled out sending any troops and warned that Mali's problems can only be solved by political mediation.

- AFP/jc

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Making job stress worth enduring

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta swears in reenlisting troops in Turkey. A survey found that military jobs tend to be the most stressful.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Marci Alboher: Annual list of most stressful jobs drew attention


• She says the right issue is whether job rewards compensate for stress


• People who take on stressful jobs that help others report satisfaction, she says

Editor's note: Marci Alboher, is a Vice President of Encore.org, a nonprofit making it easier for people to pursue second acts for the greater good. Her latest book is, "The Encore Career Handbook: How to Make a Difference and a Living in the Second Half of Life" (Workman: January 2013).

(CNN) -- A recent study with a catchy headline about the most stressful jobs of 2013 found its way to the soft hour of news this week.

The annual study by careercast.com created some buzz in the online water cooler and I was asked to appear on the "Today" show to talk about it. Colleagues e-mailed me and posted on my Facebook page about where their chosen professions ranked. My media friends couldn't help noticing that public relations professionals, reporters and photojournalists all made it into the top 10 for stress.

The "study," referred to in quotes in some of the commentary, considered some logical criteria to come up with these rankings. Proximity to risk of death (yours or others'), travel, deadlines, working in the public eye and physical demands all racked up points on the stress scale. And there's no arguing that military personnel, firefighters and police officers -- all high-rankers on the most-stressed list -- are exposed to higher stakes than your typical seamstress (holder of the second-least stressful job slot).

Marci Alboher

The job that snagged the "least stressful" slot, according to the survey, was "university professor," a designation that caused outrage among people who actually hold that job. One commenter conceded that most academic jobs don't put you in personal danger (though you can argue that point), but anyone who's ever been around professors knows that faculty politics, difficult students and pressure to "publish or perish" can cause even the most calm character to crack.

We could debate whether these designations make any sense. And whether every police officer, firefighter and member of the military faces the same amount of stress.

But let's make sure we are having the right conversation. How many people choose a profession based on how high the stress level is? And how can you measure stress objectively? If you're prone to stress, perhaps you're just as likely to feel stressed out whether you work as a librarian, a massage therapist or a commercial airline pilot (No. 4 on the stress list).

People choose their line of work for a lot of reasons. For those who are committed to making our communities and the world safer and healthier for the rest of us, minimizing stress is probably not so high on their list of criteria. And it shouldn't be. Folks who choose helping jobs that may have a high level of stress are fueled by other motivators, like wanting their work to have meaning.

They aren't deterred by the fact that their job will likely come with stress. And some people are simply by their own nature and personalities drawn to work that may be to others, dauntingly stressful. How many FBI agents do you think would prefer a gig as an audiologist (sixth-least stressful job)?

When I talk to men and women in their 50s and 60s who've decided to take on encore careers as teachers, they tell me that the work is often exhausting and stressful. They are on their feet all day, often with inadequate resources, with kids who are themselves highly stressed; even those who come from leadership roles in other sectors say they've never worked harder. Yet they almost always tell me that doing something that matters to others -- and that puts them in touch with young people every day -- compensates for the added stress.

The same is true of those tackling some of the world's most intractable problems. When I talk to Stephen and Elizabeth Alderman, whose foundation trains health-care professionals around the world to work with victims of trauma, or Judith Broder, who founded The Soldiers Project, which works with returning veterans, they rarely talk about stress. Instead they talk about how they are compelled to do what they do, because moving the needle even a fraction is better than doing nothing.

Rather than discouraging people to take on jobs that might have a lot of stress, let's instead encourage those who are designed for those jobs to do them. And let's make sure to support our friends and family members who go down these paths.

It's hard to grab headlines in the crowded space of morning television, but a good survey with a catchy title will always do that. So let's use these kinds of surveys to have the right kinds of conversations. Like why so many jobs that keep us safe and healthy, and that care for our children and the environment rarely show up on lists of the most highly compensated jobs. Now there's a conversation I'd most like to be having.

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The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Marci Alboher.

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McChrystal: I regret not finishing the job in Afghanistan

(CBS News) Amid news that the White House is pushing for a full withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, retired Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal said today on "Face the Nation" he regrets that he didn't get to finish the job there.

"I have regrets that some of the things I was responsible for, I didn't finish," he said, referring to his forced resignation in 2010 over a Rolling Stone article that quoted members of his team making disparaging remarks about President Obama. "I didn't finish the job in Afghanistan. I let down a lot of people that worked for me, 150,000 troops worked for me, the Afghan people, many of them believed deeply in me."

McChrystal said he doesn't believe the Rolling Stone piece "was particularly accurate in the way it represented my team but, you know, I was in command. And the simple elegance of command is, you assume responsibility." In his new book, "My Share of the Task," he said he chose not to devote time pointing fingers over the incident because "I'm not sure Washington needs another book like that."

Though he wouldn't comment on how many U.S. troops - if any - should remain in Afghanistan, McChrystal said while Afghan forces are "improving," they've "got a long way to go."

"When I got [to Afghanistan] in 2002, the country was physically devastated, and morally and mentally traumatized. The society was in tatters," he said. "There's been an awful lot of... progress, but Afghanistan is hard. It's always hard. If you study their history, it's complex and difficult. [Now] there are females in school, there are opportunities, there are places that are secure that were not secure just a few years ago.

"...My question on the future is what do we want in the region; this is not just a case of, al Qaeda was in Afghanistan, and now they largely are not," McChyrstal continued. "I believe Afghanistan can be stable. I think they must take responsibility for their security, the vast lion's share, but I think the strategic partnership that President Obama offered to President Karzai is critical. Not just physically. It's not how many troops and how much money, it's the idea in the minds of Afghans that they have a reliable partner."

As for former Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., who will face immediate decisions about troop levels in the region if he is confirmed as Defense Secretary Leon Panetta's replacement, McChyrstal said while he's only met him once, "I certainly have no problem with him."

Hagel, a Vietnam War veteran, "certainly has a great record, not just as a soldier, but as a senator," he said.

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