Maintenance work shuts Starbucks across country

By NBC News and msnbc.com staff

Twitter.com

Thousands of tweets flooded Twitter lamenting a Starbucks-less Wednesday.

Bleary-eyed customers who stumble into their local Starbucks every morning did so literally Wednesday. That's because hundreds of the coffee chain's stores nationwide were closed.

The forced decaffeination of America's morning commuters was due to overnight maintenance work at stores across the country that wasn't finished on time for the morning rush, Maggie Jantzen, a spokeswoman for Starbucks, told NBC station WCMH of Columbus, Ohio.?

Jantzen said she didn't know how many stores were affected, but she said about 10 percent to 20 percent of the stores that were due for the work were unable to open on time.?

The company said the work was routine maintenance on a standardized water filtration system and that no safety issues were involved.

But because of it, stores were closed across the country ? as many as 1,500, mainly in the eastern half of the U.S., a quick tabulation of local news reports and hundreds of tweets by msnbc.com indicated. Coffee drinkers were left dripless from South Dakota to Florida, New York to Texas.

"I like to start my day with Starbucks, so I don't really know what to do," Kelly Furnet told NBC station WJXT as she stood outside a shuttered shop in Jacksonville, Fla.

"It's a huge problem because, in my office, people go there multiple times in a day for their coffee fix," Rebecca Stockdale, who works near one of the closed Starbucks in Columbus, told WCMH. "You can't have them coming to work without their caffeine!"

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Leo Roth: Eli Manning is no longer 'Peyton's little brother' (Rochester Democrat and Chronicle)

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Show of NATO unity over unpopular Afghan war

US President Barack Obama and NATO allies put up a united front Sunday to persuade a war-weary public that the Afghan conflict will end in two years, as President Hamid Karzai vowed Afghanistan will no longer be a "burden."

Leaders of the 28 NATO nations stood in solemn silence as a bugler's lament recalled the heavy cost of a conflict that has killed over 3,000 coalition soldiers, maimed thousands more and left tens of thousands of Afghans dead.

As anti-war protesters clashed with police near the Chicago summit site, the two-day talks aimed to endorse a withdrawal strategy and seek firm commitments from allies to train and bankroll Afghan forces.

Before the summit Obama held talks with Karzai, three weeks after his dramatic trip to Kabul where the two leaders inked a security pact for going forward after the last 130,000 international troops withdraw in late 2014.

"We're confident that we are on the right track, and what this NATO summit reflects is that the world is behind the strategy that we've laid out," said Obama, who faces a tough re-election in November.

But in a sign of growing impatience within the alliance, new French President Francois Hollande refused to back down from his decision to pull troops out in 2012, a year earlier than planned.

"I told everyone I spoke with that this was not negotiable because it was a question of French sovereignty and everyone understood," he said, adding France would continue to train Afghan forces after 2012.

Karzai said his country no longer wanted to be a "burden," urging the international community to complete a security transition to his Afghan forces.

"Afghanistan... is looking forward to an end to this war and a transformational decade in which Afghanistan will be working further for institution building and the development of sound governance in the country," he said.

Along with reaffirming the 2014 deadline, the summit is expected to back Obama's plan to cede the lead in combat missions to Afghan troops next year, while making a commitment to securing $4 billion annually for Afghan forces.

"Once the Afghans have full responsibility by the end of 2014, our combat mission will come to an end but we will not walk away," assured NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen.

A Western official told AFP Sunday that nations with troops in Afghanistan had pledged roughly $1 billion to bankroll Afghan security forces after 2014. The bulk of the funding is expected to come from the United States.

Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari's attendance at the summit had raised hopes his government was ready to lift a blockade on NATO convoys, but talks on reopening the routes have stumbled over Islamabad's demand to charge steep fees for trucks crossing the border.

Zardari and leaders from some 30 other nations and international organizations will join the 28 NATO allies for Monday's second day of talks.

In a sign of the waning appetite for further conflict, Rasmussen said the western defense alliance "has no intention to intervene" in Syria despite concern at the bloodshed there.

"We strongly condemn the behavior of the Syrian security forces and their crackdowns on the Syrian population and we urge the Syrian leadership to accommodate the legitimate aspirations of the Syrian people," he told reporters.

The summit in Obama's hometown went ahead under a massive security operation as normally bustling Chicago streets were deserted.

Boats with machine guns patrolled a river near Obama's hotel and police enforced a wide security perimeter around the conference center.

Thousands of protestors have taken to the streets in recent days calling for an end to war. Although the rallies have been largely peaceful, scuffles broke out Sunday when some hardcore demonstrators refused police orders to disperse.

The NATO talks come against a backdrop of a changing geopolitical landscape for the 63-year-old organization also grappling with shrinking defense budgets.

Leaders on Sunday launched the first phase of a US-led missile shield for Europe and sought to appease Russian anger over the system by renewing an invitation to cooperate.

Obama and fellow leaders also agreed on a slew of some 20 joint projects to pool military hardware as part of a so-called "Smart Defense" initiative.

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Opposition groups report clashes in Syrian capital; top officials deny assassination claims

BEIRUT - A restive district of the Syrian capital that has been a hotbed of dissent against President Bashar Assad was rocked by fighting overnight between government forces and army defectors, opposition groups said Sunday.

The Local Coordination Committees and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the clashes took place in Kfar Souseh early Sunday morning but there were no immediate reports of casualties. The district is a high security area, housing the Foreign Ministry and several security and intelligence agencies. It has also been the scene of frequent anti-Assad demonstrations since the uprising began.

"Violent clashes broke out between rebel fighters and regime troops at a checkpoint in Kfar Souseh district," the Observatory said in a statement. Both the Observatory and LCC said explosions and gunfire were also heard in several other neighbourhoods of Damascus.

The revolt against Assad's regime started in March 2011 with mostly peaceful protests calling for political change. The deadly government crackdown led many opposition supporters to take up arms. Now, the regime is facing an armed insurgency targeting government installations, soldiers and security forces.

In March, the U.N. said that 9,000 people had been killed. Hundreds more have died since.

Also Sunday, Syrian rebels claimed in an Internet statement that they carried out a sophisticated attack that killed top political and security officials meeting in the capital. The posting claimed those killed included Maj. Gen. Assef Shawkat, the deputy chief of staff for security affairs; Defence Minister Dawoud Rajha; Interior Minister Mohammad al-Shaar and former defence minister, Hassan Turkmani.

Al-Shaar denied the reports in a phone call to state-run Syrian TV, saying they were "laughable."

"I am speaking to you from my office at the interior ministry," he said.

Turkmani also called the station and said the reports were proof of "media bankruptcy."

"My colleagues and I are well and carrying out our duty to serve the country ... these are blatant lies," he said. The station later interviewed Turkmani in his office, denying the claims.

Syrian officials rarely respond to claims and statements issued by the opposition and their quick denials on Sunday were unusual.

Clashes in the heart of the Syrian capital have become more common recently but are still rare compared to other opposition strongholds in Syria that witness deadly violence almost daily.

The Local Coordination Committees said "huge reinforcements" were brought in to Kfar Souseh in the wake of the overnight fighting.

A cease-fire that was supposed to start last month has never really taken hold, undermining the rest of international envoy Kofi Annan's plan, which is supposed to lead to talks to end the 15-month crisis.

World powers remain divided on how to end Syria's crisis. The U.S. and other Western and Arab nations have called for Assad to leave power, and the U.S. and European Union have placed increasingly stiff sanctions on Damascus. But with Russia and China blocking significant new U.N. punishments, U.S. officials are trying to get consensus among other allies about ways to promote Assad's ouster.

Visiting Annan deputy Jean-Marie Guehenno held talks Sunday with a three-man delegation from an opposition group inside Syria.

Abdul-Aziz al-Kheir, a spokesman for the National Coordination Body for Democratic Change in Syria, said the talks centred on implementing Annan's plan. He said his group demanded "a genuine and overall cease-fire" as the only path to a political process that could solve the crisis.

President Barack Obama said Saturday that the members of the Group of Eight industrial nations support the U.N.'s peace plan for Syria, but added that it has not taken hold fast enough.

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