By Gopal Sharma

KATHMANDU (Reuters) - Ringed by an endless stream of pilgrims at an ancient temple in Kathmandu, Hindu holy man Mahant Ramnaresh Giri sat naked and puffed on a pipe filled with cannabis, his body smeared with ash as he took part in Nepal's biggest annual religious event.

Giri was one of more than a hundred such naked ascetics at the ancient Shivaratri festival, which brings an estimated one million devout Hindus flocking to Kathmandu's Pashupatinath temple each year for rituals to cleanse them of sin and earn a place in heaven.

Holy men such as Giri, 35, bless them and smoke cone-shaped pipes of cannabis as part of the annual festival dedicated to Shiva, the god of destruction.

"After I smoke I get a feeling that I have overcome worldly pleasure and dissolved myself in the universe," said Giri, smoke billowing around his head.

After Shiva's consort died, legend has it, he came to the forests near the temple, his body smeared with ash. Smoking cannabis, which grows wild in the forests of Nepal, he wore a serpent and draped his waist with a tiger skin as he wandered.

Cannabis is illegal in Nepal, but permitted as a religious ritual for ascetics during the festival, which took place at the weekend. The only explanation for this is that the ascetics are imitating Shiva.

The ban is ignored during the festival for the ascetics, who are allowed to smoke inside the temple complex but not sell or distribute it to pilgrims.

Authorities supplied the drug to holy men in the past but the practice was discontinued in the 1990s after critics said it amounted to promoting its consumption.

For pilgrims, the rituals are more mundane and involve pouring milk on a stone phallus and making offerings of fruit, sandalwood paste and incense sticks. Holy men such as Giri press ash-covered thumbs onto their foreheads and bless them.

"I became an ascetic for the protection of our religion, the welfare of the world and myself," said Giri, his dreadlocked hair and beard not combed or cut for 17 years.

This year's festival included modern touches such as 65 CCTV cameras to help guard crowds estimated to have topped one million devotees. Some of the holy men also played music on their mobile phones.

But for most, the festival remains deeply spiritual.

Krishna Nanda, a Romanian holy man wrapped in white cloth who came to India to study Sanskrit, said his desire to know more about life was behind his renunciation of physical and worldly pleasure two years ago.

"I love everything in society and god ... I am always happy," said the 23-year-old.

(Reporting by Gopal Sharma, editing by Elaine Lies)

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JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Former South African president Nelson Mandela was admitted to hospital on Saturday for a "routine test", his second period of hospital treatment in less than three months, the government said.

A spokesman for President Jacob Zuma said there was "no need for panic" and that doctors were treating Mandela for a pre-existing condition consistent with his age.

It did not reveal any more details about the condition of the 94-year-old anti-apartheid leader, other than to say he was in a hospital in the capital, Pretoria.

The tone of the government's announcement was in keeping with previous announcements about Mandela's health.

Mandela, South Africa's first black president, spent nearly three weeks in hospital in December with a lung infection and after surgery to remove gallstones. It was his longest stay in hospital since his release from prison in 1990.

Since his release on December 26 he had been receiving treatment at his Johannesburg home.

The Nobel Peace Prize laureate has a history of lung problems dating back to when he contracted tuberculosis as a political prisoner. He spent 27 years in prison, including 18 years on the windswept Robben Island off Cape Town.

He became president of Africa's biggest economy in 1994 after the first all-race elections brought an end to white-minority apartheid rule.

Although he is deeply revered by nearly all of South Africa's 50 million people, he has played no part in public life for the last decade.

(Reporting by Peroshni Govender; Writing by Ed Cropley; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

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MIAMI (Reuters) - New York media mogul Robert F.X. Sillerman is the new entertainment king of Miami Beach after taking over almost all of the famous South Florida island-city's glitzy, over-the-top nightclubs in a push to consolidate the fast-growing electronic dance music (EDM) industry.

Two Miami companies, The Opium Group and Miami Marketing Group, which own eight nightclubs, including LIV inside the historic, art deco Fontainebleau Hotel, were recently purchased by Sillerman, according to a spokesman.

The deals, in which terms were not disclosed, are the latest move by Sillerman to corner the EDM market, after saying in June last year that he was willing to spend more than $1 billion buying up EDM promoters and event organizers.

EDM is rapidly growing in popularity in the U.S. and abroad, popularized by nightclub DJs featuring acts by Lady Gaga, Katy Perry and Pitbull.

Sillerman's stake in the Miami club scene gives him a presence in a major EDM market and home of the Ultra Music Festival, one of the biggest in the world, with eight stages and more than 230,000 attendees last year.

This year's Ultra event in Miami promises to be even bigger, and has expanded to two consecutive 3-day weekends later this month. Sillerman has no ties to the event.

Sillerman's quest echoes his business strategy from the late 1990s when his company, SFX Entertainment, consolidated a large number of concert promoters, producers and venues and was bought by Clear Channel in 2000 for $4.4 billion.

In January, Sillerman's revived SFX Entertainment purchased the North American division of Holland-based ID&T Entertainment, the world's largest dance music concert promoter. ID&T runs a three-day festival in Belgium called Tomorrowland and Sensation White, an EDM concert series held across Europe that made its U.S. debut at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn last October.

Tomorrowland producers plan to hold their first festival outside of Belgium, called Tomorrow World, somewhere in North America in late September.

SFX has also acquired several other EDM assets in recent weeks, including New Orleans-based EDM promoter Donnie Disco Presents and Life in Color, which puts on day-glow-paint-soaked EDM concerts across the U.S. Last week, SFX took over the Denver-based music site Beatport, a major download store for EDM with a catalog of more than one million tracks, the New York Times reported.

"He's the entrepreneurial type, looking for different avenues to bring in his management aggregation strategy," said Mark Fratrik, vice president and chief economist for media consultancy BIA/Kelsey. "I imagine he could do the same thing [now]... it seems like this is another combining of the events with the music."

SFX, LIVE NATION EXPAND EDM REACH

Sillerman first began buying radio stations in the late 1970s and sold a block of 10 stations to Westinghouse Broadcasting for $400 million in 1989. He later launched SFX Broadcasting which went public in 1993 and grew even larger when the Telecommunications Act of 1996 lifted the cap on the number of stations a company could own in a single market. In 1997, the company was sold for $2.1 billion to Capstar Broadcasting Corp, a company formed by the Hicks brothers.

Sillerman then started a new public company called Marquee Group Inc, which bought up agencies that represented professional sports and music stars, and SFX Entertainment through which he acquired concert venues and promoters.

SFX Entertainment was sold to Clear Channel in 2000 for $4.4 billion and was widely recognized as the precursor to the now massive concert promoter and producer Live Nation.

Sillerman went on to form CKX Inc, which bought 85 percent of Elvis Presley Enterprises, including the rock-and-roll legend's Graceland mansion, and 100 percent of Simon Fuller's 19 Entertainment, producer of American Idol.

"He's been extremely successful in consolidating fragmented industries which have untapped growth potential that generally have excellent marketing opportunities attached to them," said Mike Principe, a former SFX attorney who is now CEO of The Legacy Agency. "He goes in, acquires en masse, and enjoys a leading position."

Sillerman isn't the only one trying to bring the booming slice of the music industry under one flag. In May 2012, Live Nation purchased Cream Holdings Limited, which produces EDM events in the U.K. and Australia.

Cream Founder and CEO James Barton became head of Live Nation Electronic Music tasked with expanding the company's reach in EDM around the world. Both SFX and Live Nation have been reportedly courting Los Angeles-based Insomniac.

The company's signature event, Electric Daisy Carnival, drew more than 230,000 revelers to the Las Vegas Motor Speedway in the summer of 2012 and has spawned satellite festivals in cities around the U.S.

(Editing by David Adams, Bernard Orr)

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SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A 24-year-old intern killed by an African lion at a California wildlife sanctuary died almost instantly after the big cat broke her neck, a coroner said on Thursday, amid media reports that the animal may have escaped from its pen to attack her.

The Cat Haven, a private sanctuary east of Fresno, remained closed on Thursday, a day after Dianna Hanson was killed by a 350-lb (160-kg) male Barbary lion named Cous Cous that attacked her inside an enclosure. Hanson was from the Seattle area.

"The young lady did not suffer because she died almost instantly from a fractured neck," Fresno County Coroner Dr. David Hadden told Reuters.

An autopsy conducted on Thursday showed bite and claw marks on Hanson from "the lion playing with the body like a cat would play with a mouse," Hadden said.

Hadden told several news organizations, including CNN and the Fresno Bee newspaper, that the lion may have used its paw to pry open a gate separating its pen from the larger enclosure to attack Hanson while she was cleaning it. But that could not be immediately confirmed by Reuters.

Hanson's death was the latest in a handful of high-profile incidents involving big cats in captivity in the United States in recent years, and comes less than six months after a man leapt into a tiger's den at the Bronx Zoo, sustaining multiple injuries.

Hanson's Facebook page showed pictures of her standing or sitting next to big cats, apparently in enclosures, and she had worked on a wild feline reserve in Africa. Her father has told a television station she liked to get close to big cats.

"I've always had a premonition this would happen," Paul Hanson told Seattle television station KING 5. "She really loved getting up close and personal with the animals."

The California Division of Occupational Safety and Health sent two inspectors with questions such as whether the sanctuary allowed the woman to enter the enclosure, agency spokesman Peter Melton said.

"We'll find out exactly what she was doing and what her job duties were and whether she was following the procedures as they were supposed to be done," Melton said.

Cat Haven is a 100-acre (16-hectare) sanctuary in Dunlap, California, run by the group Project Survival. It was founded "to exhibit a variety of wild cats and engage public support for their conservation in the wild via specific projects," according to the park's website.

'IT'S DEVASTATING'

Dale Anderson, founder of the facility, told reporters outside the gates of his facility that he could not comment on the circumstances of Hanson's death or the safety protocols at Cat Haven. "Our whole staff is just ... it's devastating," he said as he broke down in tears.

Hanson, who graduated in 2011 from Western Washington University with a degree in biology, had spent six months in Kenya last year working on a wild feline reserve.

In 2011 and 2012, Hanson also volunteered in Seattle for the Snow Leopard Trust, which seeks ways to protect the endangered species, the organization said.

The 4-year-old Barbary lion that killed Hanson was of a species that is extinct in the wild, said Janice Mackey, a spokeswoman for the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, which oversaw the permit that allows the sanctuary to operate.

The lion had been handled by humans since it was weeks old, and was one of two Barbary lions at the facility. Several years ago, when it was a cub, Cous Cous also made an appearance on the talk show "Ellen," Mackey said.

The lion was shot and killed by sheriff's deputies as they tried to reach Hanson, authorities said. On Thursday, a necropsy was performed on the lion to determine if it suffered from any health problems that could have led to the attack, Mackey said.

Anderson, Cat Haven's founder, said the facility has been "incident free" since it opened in 1998, and California officials confirmed they had never responded to any emergency at the facility similar to Wednesday's death.

In 2010, a lion attacked a trainer at a glass-encased enclosure at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. The trainer survived.

In another high-profile incident involving captive cats in 2011, the owner of a private menagerie released dozens of tigers, lions and other animals in Ohio, and then killed himself. The case led some animal welfare groups to call for a ban on private ownership of exotic animals.

The California Department of Fish and Game permits private animal sanctuaries only if their goal is scientific research or public education, Mackey said.

(Additional reporting by Stephen Keleher in Dunlap, California; Laura L. Myers in Seattle and Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; Writing by Alex Dobuzinskis; Editing by Cynthia Johnston, David Gregorio and Lisa Shumaker)

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SAN FRANCISCO (AP) A television consultant claims that former Vice President Al Gore and others at Current TV stole his idea to sell the struggling network to Al-Jazeera.

Los Angeles resident John Terenzio is demanding more than $5 million in a lawsuit quietly filed in San Francisco Superior Court Tuesday.

Al-Jazerra announced Jan. 3 that it would pay $500 million for San Francisco-based Current TV.

Terenzio alleges he first brought the idea of the Qatar-owned Al-Jazeera's purchase of Current TV to board member Richard Blum in July, and he expected to be paid if his plan was used. The lawsuit claims Blum was open to the plan, which Terenzio laid out with a detailed PowerPoint presentation but feared Gore would find such a deal with the oil-rich government of Qatar "politically unappealing."

Neither Gore or Blum, nor their representatives, could be reached for comment late Wednesday.

Gore co-founded Current TV in 2005 with Joel Hyatt, with each receiving a 20 percent stakes in Current, a politically left leaning news and talk network. Comcast Corp. had less than a 10 percent stake. Another major investor in Current TV was supermarket magnate and entertainment industry investor Ron Burkle, according to information service Capital IQ.

Blum, a venture capitalist and husband of California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, is also an investor in Current TV.

Terenzio claims he presented to Blum "a step-by-step approach for making the sale of the liberal media outlet to Al-Jazeera palatable to U.S. lawmakers, pro-Israel factions, cable operators and, most importantly, the American public."

Terenzio claims he created the English version of China Central Television and reprogrammed it for American audiences. He said he planned to use the same strategies in rebranding Current TV into Al-Jazeera America.

"Blum greeted Terenzio's proposal with enthusiasm, indicating that he and other investors were eager to salvage their multi-million investment in the floundering cable network," Terenzio claims in his lawsuit.

Terenzio said he believes Gore did turn down the deal in July and was "adamant" in rejecting it.

Terenzio's attorney, Ellyn Garofalo, said an "insider" told her client of Gore's rejection but refused to identify that person in a brief email interview Wednesday night. Garofalo represented Dr. Sandeep Kapoor when a jury acquitted him of illegally funneling prescription drugs to Anna Nicole Smith.

Terenzio said Al-Jazeera's January announcement of the sale was the first he heard of it.

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MOSCOW (AP) A Russian ballet star who has danced the roles of violent and powerful historical figures at the Bolshoi Theater has confessed to organizing the acid attack on the theater's ballet chief, Moscow police said Wednesday.

A masked man threw a jar of sulfuric acid in the face of artistic director Sergei Filin as he returned home late on Jan. 17, severely burning his eyes. The 42-year-old former dancer is undergoing treatment in Germany.

Bolshoi soloist Pavel Dmitrichenko, 29, confessed to masterminding the attack, and two other men confessed to being the perpetrator and the driver of the getaway car, police said in a statement. All three were to appear in court on Thursday, when prosecutors were to move for criminal charges to be filed against them.

"I organized that attack but not to the extent that it occurred," a bleary-eyed Dmitrichenko said in footage released by Russian police.

Moscow police said in a statement that investigators believe that Dmitrichenko harbored "personal enmity" against Filin.

The attack threw light on a culture of deep intrigue and infighting at the famed Moscow theater. Within hours of the attack, Bolshoi managers were speculating that the attack could have been in retaliation for Filin's selection of certain dancers over others for prized roles.

Dmitrichenko, who joined the Bolshoi in 2002, has not suffered for starring roles. Most recently, he danced the title role in "Ivan the Terrible," a ballet based on the life of the ruthless 16th-century czar who killed his son in a rage. He also has danced Spartacus in the ballet of the same name. Dmitrichenko's page on the social networking site VKontakte includes a photograph of him as the leader of the slave uprising dancing with a dagger in each hand.

Dmitrichenko's girlfriend, who also is a Bolshoi soloist, is reported to have had a troubled relationship with Filin and felt she was unfairly denied major parts, an angle to the case that has been played up by Russian state television.

Filin's lawyer and wife, however, both cautioned that the ballerina is unlikely to have been the only cause of the conflict.

"Sergei thinks the motives of the crime are somewhat different," Filin's wife, Maria Prorvich, was quoted as saying in an interview to the newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda. "The girl is only a pretext, but certainly not the main cause of the crime."

She said Filin had suspected Dmitrichenko's involvement in the attack, but is certain that the circle goes beyond the three men arrested on Tuesday.

Filin's lawyer agreed. "We believe that investigators still have a lot of work to do to establish all of the facts," Tatyana Stukalova said in an interview on Rossiya state television.

Investigators became suspicious of Dmitrichenko when they found out that he had recently been in a close contact with an unemployed man with a prison record. The suspects were making inquiries about Filin's schedule and whereabouts, and bought SIM cards for mobile phones registered under fake names, police said.

Police determined that the acid that the alleged attacker, 35-year-old Yuri Zarutsky, splashed on Filin's face had been purchased at an auto shop. Police said Zarutsky is believed to have heated it to evaporate the water to make the acid stronger. On the night of the attack Dmitrichenko tipped off Zarutsky when Filin left the theater, police said.

Bolshoi spokeswoman Katerina Novikova told The Associated Press that Filin had been informed about Dmitrichenko's detention, but said the theater would not comment until after the trial.

The Bolshoi's general director, Anatoly Iksanov, has accused veteran principal dancer Nikolai Tsiskaridze of inspiring the attack. Tsiskaridze, a long-time critic of the theater's management, has denied the allegation.

Dmitrichenko's girlfriend, Anzhelina Vorontsova, was coached by Tsiskaridze.

When contacted Wednesday by the AP, Tsiskaridze texted back: "I have nothing to say..."

Izvestia, a Kremlin-friendly daily, on Wednesday quoted ballet teacher Marina Kondratyeva as saying that Vorontsova had not been given leading parts lately but for a good reason: "How could Filin 'elbow her out'? Tsiskaridze is mentoring and coaching her but she was just plain fat."

Filin was instrumental in bringing Vorontsova to Moscow to study and had hoped she would stay to dance for him at the Stanislavsky and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theater, Moscow's second ballet company, where he was artistic director before taking up the Bolshoi post in March 2011. Instead she joined the Bolshoi.

Russian newspapers quoted unidentified ballet dancers as saying that Dmitrichenko had a fiery temper.

In a rare public outburst, Dmitrichenko posted an angry comment in November responding to a newspaper review that said his "artistic scope is limited not to mention his physical potential."

On the website of the Kommersant daily, Dmitrichenko accused the ballet critic of bias, calling the writer "a failed performer." Kommersant later took down his comment. One of the screenshots of the detailed remarks read: "I'm happy, I'm accomplished, I work with the genius of a teacher, I work with a genius, Grigorovich himself!!! What about you??"

Yuri Grigorovich led the dance company for three decades, resigning in 1995, after losing a protracted dispute with theater management, but he remains on the Bolshoi staff. Dancers and teachers still loyal to Grigorovich have resisted efforts by a series of successive artistic directors to bring a more modern repertoire to the theater, still celebrated mainly for the classical ballets that grace its stage. Filin, who danced for the Bolshoi from 1989 until 2007, was seen as capable of bridging that gap.

Both of Dmitrichenko's main starring roles were in ballets choreographed by Grigorovich. He was next due to appear at the Bolshoi on March 16, in "Sleeping Beauty, dancing the part of Bluebird.

____

AP writers Lynn Berry, Varya Kudryavtseva, Sasha Merkushev and Yelena Yegorova contributed to this report.

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HANOI (Reuters) - Pot-bellied, short, or abusive traffic policemen will be barred from working on the streets of Vietnam's capital and assigned desk jobs instead as Hanoi police try to clean up their unsavoury image, a newspaper reported on Wednesday.

The city's traffic police are following the worst offenders closely and compiling lists of those to be reassigned. All police on traffic duty will be made to carry a book on the code of conduct to remind them how to behave, the official Tien Phong (Vanguard) newspaper said.

"Little officers, or those with too big a belly will be moved to work in offices instead of guiding traffic and settling violations," Colonel Dao Vinh Thang, head of the Hanoi Traffic Police Department, was quoted by Tien Phong as saying.

He said five teams of inspectors had been sent to monitor the behaviour of police on the street. Thang could not be reached for additional comment.

Tempers often flare in the city of 7 million famous for constant streams of motorcycles and sometimes haphazard driving. Complaints have mounted about the conduct of traffic police, including allegations of corruption and abusive behaviour.

The latest initiative follows the deployment in January of female traffic police, all part of a campaign to improve the image of the security forces.

Crackdowns on overweight policemen have taken place in Thailand, Pakistan, Britain, Indonesia and the Philippines in recent years. Several of those countries ordered officers to get fit and lose weight before they could return to work.

(Reporting by Hanoi Newsroom; Editing by Martin Petty and Ron Popeski)

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SHANGHAI (Reuters) - At Shanghai's Zhabei District marriage registration center, officials divorced a record 53 couples in a single day this week - that's about one every five minutes - as couples rushed to untie the knot to avoid tougher tax laws on home sales.

There were similar scenes in Wuhan, Nanjing and Ningbo as married couples opted for 'quickie', uncontested divorces - costing just a few yuan - that would allow them to split ownership of their properties and sell without having to pay capital gains tax of as much as 20 percent.

Beijing last week signaled it wanted local governments to be tougher in implementing rules to curb property speculation - the tax on gains from selling second homes has been in place for almost two decades but never strictly enforced. Chinese tend to park much of their wealth in real estate as they have few other alternative investment options, and home prices in the biggest cities have risen for 9 straight months.

Reckoning that primary residences owned for more than five years will remain tax exempt, some couples hope that divorcing and dividing up real estate assets will allow them to sell properties as individuals, and not pay tax. Once the sale is complete, they can remarry.

"It's a practical attitude," said Li Li, managing director of International Strategic Group, a real estate consultancy in Shanghai. "It's strange, but policy forces people to do it."

While homeowners and prospective buyers await details on how the tightened property rules will be implemented, the official Shanghai Daily quoted one unnamed official at the Yangpu District registration office as saying the rise in divorces was driven by unapologetic tax evaders, including a pregnant woman.

"I told all of them to come here again for remarriage registration as soon as their transaction is finished," the official told the newspaper.

Requests for city-wide data from the Shanghai civil affairs bureau were not immediately answered. The Shanghai Daily quoted Lin Kewu, deputy director of the bureau's marriage administration, saying the government did not want to release statistics for fear of encouraging the tactic.

The phenomenon is not new. In 2010 and 2011, state media reported that couples resorted to forging divorce certificates so they could skirt restrictions and buy more property.

"I know people who have divorced to evade taxes," said one man who asked not to be named as he waited outside a real estate trade center in Pudong on Wednesday. "But I think marriage is more important than property."

(Additional reporting by Anita Li and Reuters Shanghai bureau; Editing by Ian Geoghegan)

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(Reuters) - Cellphone users should be allowed to switch their devices to any mobile carrier, the White House said on Monday in response to an online petition against the recent banning of the practice.

More than 100,000 people signed the petition protesting the ban on switching imposed by the Library of Congress, which took effect in January. At issue is whether cellphone buyers, who get new devices at a heavily subsidized price in return for committing to long-term contracts, should be able to take their gadgets with them when they change carriers.

Many in the telecoms industry argue that cellphones should be "locked" - or prevented from moving freely across networks - because of the massive subsidies that carriers provide, effectively putting the devices in the hands of more people.

The petition argued that preventing "unlocking" reduces consumer choice and resale value of phones, which can cost hundreds of dollars without subsidies from carriers like AT&T Inc, Verizon Wireless and Sprint.

"The White House agrees with the 114,000+ of you who believe that consumers should be able to unlock their cell phones without risking criminal or other penalties," R. David Edelman, a senior advisor for Internet, Innovation, & Privacy to the Obama administration, wrote in the White House's response.

"This is particularly important for secondhand or other mobile devices that you might buy or receive as a gift, and want to activate on the wireless network that meets your needs - even if it isn't the one on which the device was first activated. All consumers deserve that flexibility."

The Library of Congress, which among other things is responsible for setting rules and deciding on exemptions related to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, said on Monday the issue would benefit from further debate and that its intention was not to supplant public policy discussion.

The Library of Congress got involved late last year during a rulemaking session conducted by the Register of Copyrights, which advises the organization. Unidentified participants in the rulemaking process, a technical, legal proceeding that allows members of the public to request exemptions to the copyright act, raised the issue then.

The Library of Congress subsequently decided that cellphones should no longer be exempted from the relevant section of copyright law, triggering the January ban on "unlocking."

(Reporting by Edwin Chan in San Francisco; Editing by Tim Dobbyn)

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AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Dutch police arrested a 19-year-old Romanian woman on Monday in connection with the audacious theft last October of paintings including a Picasso and a Monet from an art gallery in Rotterdam, police said.

The woman was the girlfriend of one of two Romanian men arrested in Romania in January in connection with the heist, one of the most dramatic in years, in which seven paintings were stolen.

"Given the speed with which it was carried out it was clear it must have been well prepared," the police said in the statement in which they unveiled new details about the progress of their investigation, which has yet to locate the paintings.

Police were put on the trail by combing through security camera footage from the period leading up to the robbery, looking for visitors whose behavior suggested they might be making preparations for a robbery.

Security camera footage released at the time showed thieves entering through a back door and disappearing from the camera's field of view. Seconds later they reappeared carrying bulky objects and left the building by the same entrance.

Police singled out two men, Romanians aged 25 and 28, on the basis of their behavior and the frequency of their visits.

Police believe the unnamed woman, the girlfriend of the 28-year-old, was living in the flat where the canvases were stored until they had been removed from their frames and transported to Romania.

The other artworks stolen were by Henri Matisse, Lucian Freud and Meyer de Haan.

The investigation, which is being carried out in coordination with Romanian police, is ongoing.

(Reporting by Thomas Escritt; Editing by Jon Hemming)

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BEIJING (Reuters) - Former NBA basketball star Dennis Rodman emerged from four days in North Korea on Friday, calling the leader of the reclusive country "an awesome kid".

Rodman, known for his tattoos, body piercings and flamboyance, was in North Korea to film a sports documentary, and watched a basketball game alongside the country's leader, Kim Jong-un.

Kim "is like his grandfather and his father, who are great leaders, he is an awesome kid, very honest and loves his wife so much", Rodman told the Chinese government news agency Xinhua before leaving the North Korean capital, Pyongyang, on Friday.

Kim, 30, is the grandson of Kim Il-sung, who founded North Korea, and the son of Kim Jong-il. Both ruled the country with an iron fist.

Kim has maintained his father's drive to secure nuclear arms for his impoverished country, with North Korea last month conducting its third nuclear test, drawing the condemnation of world powers and the United Nations.

At Thursday's basketball game, Rodman and Kim laughed and conversed in English, and later had an "amicable" dinner, Xinhua quoted the former Chicago Bulls player as saying. Kim attended secondary school in Switzerland, but his language abilities remain a mystery.

North Korea routinely denounces U.S. "hostility" and no peace treaty was signed after a truce ended the 1950-53 Korean War. But Xinhua said Kim told Rodman over dinner that he hoped further sports exchanges would promote "mutual understanding between peoples of the two countries".

Asked how his visit might help, Rodman told the agency: "About the relationship, no one man can do anything. His country and his people love him. I love him, he is an awesome guy."

Before meeting Kim, Rodman appeared to have mixed up the two Koreas, suggesting he might meet South Korean rapper Psy during his trip to the North.

Rodman came to North Korea to shoot footage for a show to air on the U.S. television network HBO, a producer travelling with the group said.

Arriving at Beijing airport, Rodman brushed past reporters without speaking.

(Reporting by Terril Yue Jones; Editing by Ron Popeski)

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NEW YORK (AP) There is something Donald Trump says he doesn't know.

Trump has welcomed a reporter to his 26th-floor corner office in Trump Tower to talk about "All-Star Celebrity Apprentice." And here in person, this one-of-a-kind TV star, billionaire businessman, ubiquitous brand mogul and media maestro strikes a softer pose than he has typically practiced in his decades on public display.

Relaxed behind a broad desk whose mirror sheen is mostly hidden by stacks of paper that suggest work is actually done there, Trump is pleasant, even chummy, with a my-time-is-your-time easiness greeting his guest.

He even contradicts his status as a legendary know-it-all with this surprising admission: There's a corner of the universe he doesn't understand.

The ratings woes of NBC, which airs his show, are on Trump's mind at the moment, and as he hastens to voice confidence in the network's powers-that-be ("They will absolutely get it right"), he marvels at the mysteries of the entertainment world.

"If I buy a great piece of real estate and do the right building, I'm really gonna have a success," he says. "It may be MORE successful or LESS successful, but you can sort of predict how it's gonna do. But show business is like trial and error! It's amazing!"

He loves to recall the iffy prospects for "The Apprentice" when it debuted in January 2004. With show biz, he declares, "You NEVER know what's gonna happen."

Except, of course, when you do.

"I do have an instinct," he confides. "Oftentimes, I'll see shows go on and I'll say, 'That show will never make it,' and I'm always right. And I understand talent. Does anybody ask me? No. But if they did, I would be doing them a big service. I know what people want."

So maybe he does know it all. In any case, lots of people wanted "The Apprentice." In its first season, it averaged nearly 21 million viewers each week.

And it gave Trump a signature TV platform that clinched his image as corporate royalty. He presided in a mood-lit stagecraft boardroom where celebrity subjects addressed him as "Mr. Trump" and shrank at that dismissive flick of his wrist and dreaded catchphrase, "You're fired."

The two-hour premiere of "All-Star Celebrity Apprentice" (Sunday at 9 p.m. EST) starts by rallying its 14 veteran contenders in the even more evocative setting of the 2,000-year-old Egyptian Temple of Dendur at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

There, grandly, Trump receives such returning players as Gary Busey, Stephen Baldwin, LaToya Jackson and reality mean queen Omarosa.

Soon, teammates are chosen by team leaders Bret Michaels and Trace Adkins. Their first assignment: concoct a winning recipe for meatballs, then sell more of them than the rival team.

This is the 13th edition of the "Apprentice" franchise, which has now slipped to less than one-third its original viewership, according to Nielsen Co. figures. But even an audience matching last season's 6.26 million viewers would be pleasant news for NBC, which has recently fallen to fifth place in prime time, behind even Spanish-language Univision.

"I could probably do another show when I don't enjoy 'The Apprentice' anymore," says the 66-year-old Trump, mulling his TV future. "I have been asked by virtually every network on television to do a show for them. But there's something to sticking with what you have: This is a good formula. It works."

Years before "The Apprentice," Trump had hit on a winning formula for himself: Supercharge his business success with relentless self-promotion, putting a human face his! on the capitalist system, and embedding his persona in a feedback loop of performance and fame.

Since then, he has ruled as America's larger-than-life tycoon and its patron saint of material success. Which raises the question: Does he play a souped-up version of himself for his audience as Donald Trump, a character bigger and broader than its real-life inspiration?

He laughs, flashing something like a you-got-me smile.

"Perhaps," he replies. "Not consciously. But perhaps I do. Perhaps I do."

It began as early as 1987, when his first book, "Trump: The Art of the Deal," became a huge best-seller.

And even without a regular showcase, he was no stranger to TV. For instance, in the span of just 10 days in May 1997, Trump not only was seen on his "Miss Universe Pageant" telecast on CBS, but also made sitcom cameo appearances as himself on NBC's "Suddenly Susan" and ABC's "Drew Carey Show."

Meanwhile, as a frequent talk-show guest then (as now), he publicized his projects and pushed his brand.

"I'll be on that show for 20 or 30 or 60 minutes, and it costs me nothing," he notes. "When you have an opportunity for promotion, take it! It's free."

No one has ever accused Trump of hiding his light under a bushel. But his promotional drive (or naked craving for attention) has taken him to extremes that conventional wisdom warns against: saying and doing things that might hurt your bottom line.

Item: Trump's noisy, even race-baiting challenge to President Barack Obama to prove his American citizenship. This crusade has earned Trump the title from one editorialist as "birther blowhard."

For an industrialist and entertainer, where's the profit in voicing political views that could tick off a segment of your market or your audience?

"It's a great question, and a hard question to answer, because you happen to be right," Trump begins. "The fact is, some people love me, and some people the-opposite-of-love me, because of what I do and because of what I say. But I'm a very truthful person. By speaking out, it's probably not a good thing for me personally, but I feel I have an obligation to do it."

But isn't he being divisive with some of his pronouncements?

"I think 'divisive' would be a fair word in some cases, not in all cases," he replies. "But I think 'truthful' is another word."

The publicity he got from his political activism reached a fever pitch during his months-long, media-blitzed flirtation with running for president that seemed conveniently to dovetail with the Spring 2011 season of his TV show.

That May, he announced he would not run. For some, it was the final scene of nothing more than political theatrics.

"They weren't," Trump says quietly. "I was very seriously considering running. It was a race that the Republicans should have won. I made a mistake in not running, because I think I would have won."

He says he has no designs on this year's race for mayor of New York. But his politicizing continues apace. In his Twitter feed, with 2 million followers, he continues to bash China and rant about Washington. He phones in to Fox News Channel's "Fox & Friends" each Monday morning to vent his spleen.

"I believe in speaking my mind," he says, "and I don't mind controversy, as you probably noticed. I think sometimes controversy is a good thing, not a bad thing."

Last summer saw the opening in Aberdeen, Scotland, of Trump International Golf Links after a bitter, yearslong fight waged by environmentalists and local residents against government leaders and, of course, Trump.

A man for whom it seems no publicity is bad publicity, Trump insists the controversy helped the project.

"If there wasn't controversy surrounding it, I don't think anybody would even know it exists," he says, laying out the alternative: "I could take an ad: 'Golf course opening.'"

Trump even seems to profit from the harsh attention focused on his hair.

"I get killed on my hair!" he says, with no trace of remorse. But he wants everyone to know, "It's not a wig!" Nor is it an elaborately engineered coif to hide a hairline in retreat, as many Trump-watchers imagine.

To prove it, Trump does a remarkable thing: He lifts the flaxen locks that flop above his forehead to reveal, plain as day, a normal hairline.

"I wash my hair, I comb it, I set it and I spray it," he says. "That's it. I could comb it back and I'd look OK. But I've combed it this way for my whole life. It's become almost a trademark. And I think NBC would be very unhappy if I combed it back, 'cause you know what? maybe I wouldn't get as high a rating."

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Online:

www.nbc.com

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Frazier Moore is a national television columnist for The Associated Press. He can be reached at fmoore(at)ap.org and at http://www.twitter.com/tvfrazier

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SEOUL (Reuters) - Former NBA star Dennis Rodman appears to have mixed up his Koreas on a visit to Pyongyang, tweeting that he expected to run into South Korean rapper Psy on his trip to the North.

Rodman, famed for his tattoos, piercings and radical hair colours from his time on court, arrived in North Korea on Tuesday to shoot some hoops and a documentary to be aired on HBO in April.

"Maybe I'll run into the Gangnam Style dude while I'm here," the 51-year old tweeted (@dennisrodman) after his arrival.

Psy, a 35-year old roly-poly rapper, shot to global fame with his Gangnam Style song last year, garnering more than a billion YouTube hits for his portrayal of the ritzy and shallow Gangnam enclave in the southern part of the South Korean capital of Seoul.

While Pyongyang is by far the richest part of North Korea, Rodman is unlikely to see the kind of wealth and designer chic on display in Gangnam.

The North's economy is 1/40th the size of South Korea's, according to most independent estimates, and is smaller than it was 20 years ago according to the United Nations.

The only bling that Rodman may encounter in North Korea appears to come from third generation of the country's ruling family.

Jowly 30-year old dictator Kim Jong-un has a penchant for Disney shows and fun-fairs, while his young wife - rumoured to have given birth recently - has been seen sporting a Dior bag.

Many North Koreans struggle to put adequate amounts of food on the table each day and recent reports suggested there had been a famine in the country's food-basket area in 2012.

(Reporting by David Chance, editing by Elaine Lies)

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TEHRAN, Iran (AP) Iranian state media has run altered images of first lady Michelle Obama's Oscars appearance, making her gown look less revealing.

The first lady wore a sleeveless, scoop neck gown. The semi-official Fars news agency ran an altered photo that covered her shoulders and neckline with added material. State TV showed images that blurred the parts of her body that were exposed.

Under Iran's Islamic dress code, women are required to cover their bodies in public. Films showing foreign women without a headscarf are considered acceptable, but revealing clothes are forbidden.

For the Oscars ceremony, Michelle Obama at the White House joined Jack Nicholson via video link to help present the best picture prize for "Argo," a film based on the escape of six American hostages from the besieged U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979.

Fars said the first lady's announcement suggested that the film was made with U.S. government support. Iranian officials have dismissed "Argo" as a CIA commercial.

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PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) Flamboyant former NBA star Dennis Rodman is heading to North Korea with the VICE media company tattoos, piercings, bad-boy reputation and all.

The American known as "The Worm" is set to arrive Tuesday in Pyongyang, becoming an unlikely ambassador for sports diplomacy at a time of heightened tensions between the U.S. and North Korea.

Rodman, three members of the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team, a VICE correspondent and a production crew from the company are visiting North Korea to shoot footage for a new TV show set to air on HBO in early April, VICE told The Associated Press in an exclusive interview before the group's departure from Beijing.

It's the second high-profile American visit this year to North Korea, a country that remains in a state of war with the U.S. It also comes two weeks after North Korea conducted an underground nuclear test in defiance of U.N. bans against atomic and missile activity.

Google's executive chairman, Eric Schmidt, made a surprise four-day trip to Pyongyang, where he met with officials and toured computer labs in January, just weeks after North Korea launched a satellite into space on the back of a long-range rocket.

Washington, Tokyo, Seoul and others consider both the rocket launch and the nuclear test provocative acts that threaten regional security.

North Korea characterizes the satellite launch as a peaceful bid to explore space, but says the nuclear test was meant as a deliberate warning to Washington. Pyongyang says it needs to build nuclear weapons to defend itself against the U.S., and is believed to be trying to build an atomic bomb small enough to mount on a missile capable of reaching the mainland U.S.

VICE said the Americans hope to engage in a little "basketball diplomacy" in North Korea by running a basketball camp for children and playing pickup games with locals and by competing alongside North Korea's top athletes for a game Rodman said he hopes leader Kim Jong Un will attend.

"Is sending the Harlem Globetrotters and Dennis Rodman to the DPRK strange? In a word, yes," said Shane Smith, the VICE founder who is host of the upcoming series. "But finding common ground on the basketball court is a beautiful thing.

"These channels of cultural communication might appear untraditional, and perhaps they are, but we think it's important just to keep the lines open," he said. "And if Washington isn't going to send their Generals then we'll send our Globetrotters."

The Washington Generals were the Globetrotters' regular, long-suffering opponents in a long-running series of comic exhibition games. DPRK is an acronym of North Korea's formal name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

VICE, known for its sometimes irreverent journalism, has made two previous visits to North Korea, coming out with the "VICE Guide to North Korea." The HBO series, which will air weekly starting April 5, features documentary-style news reports from around the world.

The Americans also will visit North Korea's national monuments, the SEK animation studio and a new skate park in Pyongyang.

The U.S. State Department hasn't been contacted about travel to North Korea by this group, a senior administration official said, requesting anonymity to comment before any trip had been made public. The official said the department does not vet U.S. citizens' private travel to North Korea and urges US citizens contemplating travel there to review a travel warning on its website.

In a now-defunct U.S.-North Korean agreement in which Washington had planned last year to give food aid to Pyongyang in exchange for nuclear concessions, Washington had said it was prepared to increase people-to-people exchanges with the North, including in the areas of culture, education and sports.

Promoting technology and sports are two major policy priorities of Kim Jong Un, who took power in December 2011 following the death of his father, Kim Jong Il.

But the often over-the-top Rodman, with his maze of tattoos, nose studs and neon-bleached hair, seems like an unlikely diplomat to a country where male fashion rarely ventures beyond military khaki and growing facial hair is forbidden.

During his heyday in the 1990s, Rodman was a poster boy for excess. He called his 1996 autobiography "Bad as I Wanna Be" and showed up wearing a wedding dress to promote it.

Shown a photo of a snarling Rodman, piercings dangling from his lower lip and two massive tattoos emblazoned on his chest, one North Korean in Pyongyang recoiled and said: "He looks like a monster!"

But Rodman is also a Hall of Fame basketball player and one of the best defenders and rebounders to ever play the game. During a storied, often controversial career, he won five NBA championships a feat that quickly overshadowed his antics for at least one small North Korean group of basketball fans.

Along with soccer, basketball is enormously popular in North Korea, where it's not uncommon to see basketball hoops set up in hotel parking lots or in schoolyards. It's a game that doesn't require much equipment or upkeep.

The U.S. remains Enemy No. 1 in North Korea, and North Koreans have limited exposure to American pop culture. But they know Michael Jordan, a former teammate of Rodman's when they both played for the Chicago Bulls in the 1990s.

During a historic visit to North Korea in 2000, then-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright presented Kim Jong Il, famously an NBA fan, with a basketball signed by Jordan that later went on display in the huge cave at Mount Myohyang that holds gifts to the leaders.

North Korea even had its own Jordan wannabe: Ri Myong Hun, a 7-foot-9 star player who is said to have renamed himself "Michael" after his favorite player and moved to Canada for a few years in the 1990s in hopes of making it into the NBA.

Even today, Jordan remains well-loved here. At the Mansudae Art Studio, which produces the country's top art, a portrait of Jordan spotted last week, complete with a replica of his signature and "NBA" painted in one corner, seemed an odd inclusion among the propaganda posters and celadon vases on display.

An informal poll of North Koreans revealed that "The Worm" isn't quite as much a household name in Pyongyang.

But Kim Jong Un, also said to be a basketball fanatic, would have been an adolescent when Rodman, now 51, was with the Bulls, and when the Harlem Globetrotters, an exhibition basketball team, kept up a frenetic travel schedule worldwide.

In a memoir about his decade serving as Kim Jong Il's personal sushi chef, a man who goes by the pen name Kenji Fujimoto recalled that basketball was the young Kim Jong Un's biggest passion, and that the Chicago Bulls were his favorite.

The notoriously unpredictable and irrepressible Rodman said he has no special antics up his sleeve for making his mark on one of the world's most regimented and militarized societies, a place where order and conformity are enforced with Stalinist fervor.

But he said he isn't leaving any of his piercings behind.

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Associated Press writer Matthew Pennington contributed to this report from Washington. Follow AP's bureau chief for Pyongyang and Seoul at www.twitter.com/newsjean.

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WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) A royal penguin found stranded on a New Zealand beach has died.

The penguin was found Sunday by hikers. It was emaciated and suffering kidney failure and was taken to the Wellington Zoo.

It was just the fourth time over the past 100 years that a royal penguin has been found on the North Island of New Zealand. They generally live more than 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) away around Macquarie Island, about halfway between New Zealand and Antarctica.

Lisa Argilla, the veterinary science manager at the zoo, said Friday that they suspect the penguin suffered multiple organ failure. It was severely underweight, she said, and had no reserves.

She said the zoo did the best it could.

The penguin's arrival has revived memories of another penguin, an emperor nicknamed Happy Feet, that arrived in 2011 and whose recovery at the zoo captured the hearts of many before he was released.

Royal penguins have a yellow crest, eat krill and squid and generally live on and around Macquarie Island, about halfway between New Zealand and Antarctica.

Jenny Boyne, who lives near Tora Beach where the penguin was found, said she drove it to the zoo in a fish crate after staff suggested she bring it in.

"It sat down like a little quiet lamb," she said.

The bird stood up briefly a couple of times and honked but generally lay still for the two-hour journey, she said. She blasted the air conditioning and spritzed the bird with water after zoo staff instructed her to keep it cool. She said she was surprised it had no significant smell.

Argilla said the penguin weighed about 2.7 kilograms (6 pounds) when it arrived.

The penguin was about 1 year old, 50 centimeters (20 inches) long and its sex had not been determined, Argilla said.

Royal penguins can grow to about 75 centimeters (30 inches) and 5.5 kilograms (12 pounds). They are considered a threatened species but not endangered. They shed all their feathers during an annual molt, which the New Zealand penguin had been doing when found.

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CANBERRA (Reuters) - A suspected Mossad agent who died in an Israeli jail in 2010 was arrested by his spymasters who believed he may have told Australian intelligence about his work with the Israeli spy agency, Australian media reported on Monday.

The Australian Broadcasting Corp said dual Australian-Israeli citizen Ben Zygier, 34, had met officers from Australia's domestic spy agency ASIO and had given details of a number of Mossad operations.

Quoting undefined sources, the ABC, which broke the initial story about Zygier's secret arrest and death in prison, said on one of his four trips to Australia, Zygier had also applied for a work visa to Italy.

But Mossad became concerned when it discovered Zygier had contact with the Australian spy agency, the ABC reported, adding it was worried he might pass on information about a major operation planned for Italy.

It said Zygier was one of three Australians who changed their names several times and took out new Australian passports for travel in the Middle East and Europe for their work with Mossad.

The closely guarded case has raised questions in Australia and Israel about the suspected use by Mossad of dual Australian-Israeli nationals.

Israeli lawmakers on Sunday announced plans to investigate Zygier's death, which a judge has ruled was suicide. Australia's Foreign Minister, Bob Carr, has initiated an inquiry into his department's handling of the case.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday sought to reduce media attention on the case and said he "absolutely trusts" Israel's security services and what he described as the independent legal monitoring system under which they operated.

Australia's Attorney-General, Mark Dreyfus, who is in charge of ASIO, on Monday said he would not comment on intelligence matters or suggestions ASIO had exposed Zygier's identity.

He also said he saw no need for a review of how the intelligence agencies handled the case.

"I haven't seen any need either, for any such review to take place within the Attorney General's Department," he told reporters.

(Reporting by James Grubel; Editing by Ron Popeski)

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SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korea unveiled a cruise missile on Thursday that it said can hit the office of North Korea's leaders, trying to address concerns that it is technologically behind its unpredictable rival which this week conducted its third nuclear test.

South Korean officials declined to say the exact range of the missile but said it could hit targets anywhere in North Korea.

The Defence Ministry released video footage of the missiles being launched from destroyers and submarines striking mock targets. The weapon was previewed in April last year and officials said deployment was now complete.

"The cruise missile being unveiled today is a precision-guided weapon that can identify and strike the window of the office of North Korea's leadership," ministry spokesman Kim Min-seok said told reporters.

North Korea has forged ahead with long-range missile development, successfully launching a rocket in December that put a satellite into orbit.

The North's ultimate aim, Washington believes, is to design an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead that could hit the United States.

North Korea, which accuses the United States and its "puppet", South Korea, of war-mongering on an almost daily basis, is likely to respond angrily to South Korea flexing its muscles.

North Korea, technically still at war with the South after their 1950-53 conflict ended in a truce, not a peace treaty, carried out its third nuclear test on Tuesday, drawing condemnation from around the world including its only major ally China.

The test and the threat of more unspecified actions from Pyongyang have raised tensions on the Korean peninsula as the South prepares to inaugurate a new president on February 25.

"The situation prevailing on the Korean peninsula at present is so serious that even a slight accidental case may lead to an all-out war which can disturb the whole region," North Korea's official KCNA news agency said.

(Reporting by Ju-min Park; Editing by Nick Macfie)

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MANILA, Philippines (AP) A southern Philippine town plans to hold funeral rites for the world's largest saltwater crocodile and then preserve its remains in a museum to keep tourists coming and prevent their community from slipping back into obscurity, the town's mayor said Monday.

The 1-ton crocodile was declared dead Sunday a few hours after flipping over with a bloated stomach in a pond in an eco-tourism park in Bunawan town, which had started to draw tourists, revenue and development because of the immense reptile, Mayor Edwin Cox Elorde said.

"The whole town, in fact the whole province, is mourning," Elorde said from Bunawan in Agusan del Sur province. "My phones kept ringing because people wanted to say how affected they are."

Guinness World Records had proclaimed it the largest saltwater crocodile in captivity last year, measuring the giant at 6.17 meters (20.24 feet). The reptile took the top spot from an Australian crocodile that measured more than 5 meters (17 feet) and weighed nearly a ton.

The crocodile was named Lolong, after a government environmental officer who died from a heart attack after traveling to Bunawan to help capture the beast. The crocodile, estimated to be more than 50 years old, was blamed for a few brutal deaths of villagers before Bunawan folk came to love it.

The giant reptile has come to symbolize the rich bio-diversity of Agusan marsh, where it was captured. The vast complex of swamp forests, shallow lakes, lily-covered ponds and wetlands is home to wild ducks, herons, egrets and threatened species like the Philippine Hawk Eagle.

Wildlife experts were to perform an autopsy as early as Monday to determine the cause of its death, Elorde said.

Bunawan villagers planned to perform a tribal ritual, which involves butchering chicken and pigs as funeral offerings to thank forest spirits for the fame and other blessings the crocodile has brought, Elordie said. A group of Christians would separately offer prayers before the autopsy.

The rites would be held at the eco-tourism park, where the reptile had emerged as a star attraction, drawing foreign tourists, scientists and wildlife reporting outfits like the National Geographic to Bunawan, a far-flung town of 37,000 people about 515 miles (830 kilometers) southeast of Manila.

The crocodile's capture in September 2011 sparked celebrations in Bunawan, but it also raised concerns that more giant crocodiles might lurk in a marshland and creek where villagers fish. The crocodile was captured with steel cable traps during a hunt prompted by the death of a child in 2009 and the later disappearance of a fisherman. Water buffalos have also been attacked by crocodiles in the area.

About 100 people led by Elorde pulled the crocodile from a creek using a rope and then hoisted it by crane onto a truck.

Philippine officials had planned to construct a road to the park to accommodate the growing number of tourists, Elorde said, adding that he planned to have the crocodile preserved and placed in a museum so Bunawan villagers and tourists could still marvel at it.

"I'd like them to see the crocodile that broke a world record and put our town on the map," he said.

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CAIRO (AP) President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad arrived in Egypt on Tuesday for the first visit by an Iranian leader in more than three decades, marking a historic departure from years of frigid ties between the two regional heavyweights.

Egypt's Islamist President Mohammed Morsi gave Ahmadinejad a red-carpet welcome on the tarmac at Cairo airport, shaking the Iranian's hand and exchanging a kiss on each cheek as a military honor guard stood at attention.

Ahmadinejad's three-day visit, which is centered around an Islamic summit, is the latest sign of improved relations between the countries since the 2011 uprising ousted Egypt's longtime ruler President Hosni Mubarak and brought an Islamist government to power in Cairo. Such a visit would have been unthinkable under Mubarak, who was a close ally of the U.S. and shared Washington's deep suspicions of Tehran.

Shortly after his arrival, Ahmadinejad and Morsi held a 20-minute talk that focused on the civil war in Syria, security officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media. Iran is Damascus' closes regional ally, while Egypt is among those that have called on Syrian President Bashar Assad to step down.

In September, Morsi offered a package of incentives to Tehran to end its support for Assad. The proposal included the restoration of full diplomatic ties, which would be a significant prize for Iran given that Egypt is the most populous Arab nation and a regional Sunni powerhouse.

Such diplomatic overtures have raised concerns among Sunni Gulf nations, who are keeping a close eye on the Iranian leader's visit. The Gulf states, who are opposed to Iran's regional policies and wary of the Shiite nation, accuse Iran of supporting Shiite minorities in the Gulf, and harbor concerns about Tehran's disputed nuclear program.

Morsi and the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood group from which he hails have sought to ease Gulf concerns about its improved ties with Iran, and have stressed that the security of the Gulf nations which Egypt has relied upon for financial aid to help prop up its faltering economy is directly linked to Cairo's own.

Foreign Minister Mohammed Amr Kamel reiterated Tuesday that "Egypt's relationship with Iran will never come at the expense of Gulf nations."

During his visit to Egypt, Ahmadinejad is scheduled to meet with Grand Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, the head of Al-Azhar, the Sunni Muslim world's premier Islamic institution. He is also scheduled to attend the summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation in Cairo, which starts Wednesday.

Security officials said Ahmadinejad is also going to tour the Pyramids in Giza.

Once close, Egypt and Iran severed their relations after the 1979 Islamic Revolution when Cairo offered exile to Iran's deposed shah. Relations further deteriorated after Egypt's peace treaty with Israel.

Morsi's rise to power out of Egypt's own revolution complicates his ability to pursue better ties with Iran when it is seen as suppressing a revolution in Syria. Cairo is home to the offices of the main Syrian opposition council, which has a strong presence of members of the Brotherhood's Syrian chapter.

The Egyptian president also faces pressure on the home front not to cozy up to Tehran.

On Tuesday, Egypt's hardline Daawa Salafiya, which is the foundation of the main Salafi political Al-Nour Party, released a statement calling on Morsi to confront Ahmadinejad on Tehran's support for the Syrian regime and make clear that "Egypt is committed to the protection of all Sunni nations."

Mohammed Abbas Nagi, an Egyptian expert on Iran, said Morsi may be trying to restore some level of diplomatic ties with Tehran in order to show that Cairo is pursuing a more independent foreign policy than that of his predecessor and to keep the door open to the Islamic Republic in case the Gulf states' support dwindles.

"Despite the fact that restoring relations is a sovereign decision fully belonging to Egypt, I don't see that Egypt will make a decision separate from the course of its relationship with the U.S. and Israel, for whom Iran is now the main issue," Nagi said.

Morsi visited Tehran last year to attend an international summit in the first visit by an Egyptian leader to Iran in years. He held a brief one-on-one talk with Ahmadinejad then and discussed Syria's civil war. But Morsi also used the opportunity in Tehran to lash out at Iran's ally, calling the Damascus regime "oppressive."

Egypt's leader has spearheaded an "Islamic quartet" of nations to try and resolve the Syrian crisis that includes Iran, as well as Turkey and Saudi Arabia, which are two of the most vocal critics of the Syrian president.

While Saudi Arabia has largely abstained from the group's meetings in an apparent snub to Iran's Syria policies, Egyptian officials say they will try to revive those talks on the sidelines of this week's OIC summit.

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Associated Press writer Amir Makar contributed to this report.

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