By Caroline Valetkevitch
NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks staged an explosive rally on Wednesday, driving the Dow and the S&P 500 to all-time closing highs after the Federal Reserve announced it would start to unwind its historic stimulus.
While the Fed's move came as a surprise to many in the market, it confirmed that the U.S. economy was on firmer footing and put to rest the question of when the Fed would begin to scale back its bond-buying program, a relief to some investors, analysts said.
"This is a vote of confidence in the economy and represents the first step toward monetary policy normalization," said David Joy, chief market strategist at Ameriprise Financial, in Boston.
The central bank said it would reduce its monthly asset purchases by $10 billion to $75 billion, while it also indicated that its key interest rate would stay at rock bottom even longer than previously promised. It said it "likely will be appropriate" to keep overnight rates near zero "well past the time" that the U.S. jobless rate falls below 6.5 percent.
Yet the decision to move now rather than later pointed to better prospects for the U.S. economy and the labor market. It also marked a turning point for the largest monetary policy experiment ever.
Stocks extended losses just after the announcement, but quickly turned higher and began rallying. The day's move marked the biggest swing from the day's high to the low for the S&P 500 in two years. All 10 S&P 500 sector indexes ended higher, with all but information technology (.SPLRCT) gaining more than 1 percent, and the S&P 500 financial index (CME:^SPSY) rising 2.4 percent.
The Dow Jones industrial average (^DJI) surged 292.71 points or 1.84 percent, to end at 16,167.97, a record closing high. The S&P 500 (^GSPC) gained 29.65 points or 1.66 percent, to finish at 1,810.65, also a record closing high. The Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) climbed 46.384 points or 1.15 percent, to close at 4,070.064.
Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke began hinting at a reduction in the stimulus back in May. The issue of when the Fed would make its move had been a source of uncertainty for markets since then. The Fed surprised markets three months ago by choosing not to reduce its third round of quantitative easing.
Most surveys had forecast the move would occur after December, but recent strong economic data seemed to suggest that the timeline could be pushed up.
"Janet Yellen's imprint is on this move, and that's very good for the markets," said Quincy Krosby, market strategist at Prudential Financial, in Newark, New Jersey, in reference to the Fed's vice chair and President Barack Obama's nominee to succeed Bernanke in the Fed's top job. "It's clear from moves in bonds and equities that the markets discounted this in September."
The bus driver wanted him out. Madam Wong, 38, the bus assistant, persuaded Mr Sakthivel Kumaravelu to alight.
The bus driver then quickly closed the bus doors and started to ferry the foreign workers in the bus to Jalan Papan from Tekka Lane.
He did not get very far. He was making a left turn into Race Course Road when he heard a loud bang.
He then discovered that he had knocked down the drunk man, who was pinned under the left rear wheel of the bus.
What followed was pandemonium that ended in a riot involving about 400 people, and 320 policemen to control them.
Investigations revealed that after Sakthivel disembarked, he was walking or running after the bus in “an unsteady manner”. “He then stumbled, tripped and fell onto the path of the rear tyre of the bus and was run over, ” the police added.
13 school websites were hacked into and defaced on Wednesday afternoon sometime after 3pm.
The MOE released a statement about the incident indicating that all the affected websites were hosted on the same server. The pages continued to show the defaced webpage until just after 5pm.
They have reported the matter to the police and the affected websites are being worked on to get them back online.
The hacker responsible identified himself as Jack Rider and left the pages with a black and green background with the words "Hacked by Jack Rider" on it.
The hack comes just a week after "The Messiah" was arrested and charged in court under the Computer Misuse Act for hacking governmental websites.
Today (20 nov), Minister for Law and Foreign Affairs K Shanmuugam also said publicly that Hacking attacks are “nothing short of terrorism”, at a REACH dialogue today. He was responding to a student’s question on why the Government appeared to be taking the recent hacking threats and attacks so seriously since there appeared to be little tangible damage.
It seems like the Singapore government is trying to make all sort of excuses to push for tougher internet laws on the online community.
Meanwhile, anonymous hackers are apparentlygaining a huge amount of support from Singaporeans which causes many ministers including our Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong to panic and ask for support from Singaporeans instead of cheering for the hackers in an event of a cyber attack.
Here is a list of the 13 websites which were affected:
1. Bukit Timah Primary School
2. Canberra Primary School
3. Compassvale Primary School
4. Greendale Primary School
5. South View Primary School
6. West View Primary School
7. Woodlands Ring Primary School
8. Henderson Secondary School
9. Kent Ridge Secondary School
10. Maris Stella High School
11. Raffles Girls' School
12. St Gabriel's Secondary School
13. St Andrew's Junior College
Federal Reserve leaves low interest-rate policies unchanged
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Federal Reserve says its low interest-rate policies are still needed to invigorate a subpar U.S. economy.
In a statement Wednesday after a policy meeting, the Fed said it would keep buying $85 billion a month in bonds to keep long-term rates low and encourage borrowing and spending.
Yet the Fed seemed to signal that it thinks the economy is improving despite some recent weak data and uncertainties caused by the partial government shutdown.
The Fed no longer expresses concern, as it did in September, that higher mortgage rates could hold back hiring and economic growth. And its statement makes no reference to the 16-day shutdown, which economists say has slowed growth this quarter.
HPH Trust said earnings for the three months ended Sept fell 8.4% to HK$539.2 million ($86.2 million) from HK$588.9 million from a year ago.
Earnings per share fell to HK 6.19 cents from HK 6.76 cents.
Revenue and other income inched up 1% to HK$3.36 billion from HK$3.33 billion.
The container throughput of Hongkong International Terminals or HIT decreased by 11.6% as compared to the same quarter in 2012, in view of weaker transshipment, intra-Asia and US/EU cargoes.
The container throughput of Yantian International Container Terminals or YICT decreased by 3.5% as compared to the same quarter in 2012, primarily due to the drop in empty volume.
The average revenue per TEU for Hong Kong was higher than last year because of the favorable throughput mix of containers from liners, whereas that for China was higher than last year due to less concessions granted to some liners and a lower empty/laden container ratio.
(Personal Sharing)
I am totally disappointed with HPH trust performance. The share price is on a downtrend now. Target price seems to be at 0.74USD.
NEW YORK (AP) -- Wall Street finally got the deal it's been waiting for.
A last-minute agreement to keep the U.S. from defaulting on its debt and reopen the government sent the stock market soaring Wednesday, pushing the Standard & Poor's 500 index close to a record high.
On Wednesday, Senate leaders agreed to fund the government through Jan. 15 and extend government borrowing through Feb. 7.
This is good news for now. Come year 2014, the worries come again.
K-Green Trust's earnings rose 7.4% to $3.8 million in the third quarter, up from $3.5 million a year ago. Revenue for the three months ended September was $17.1 million, up 0.3% from a year ago.
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — U.S. stocks soared on Thursday, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average notching its best one-day point gain since December 2011, after House Republican leaders proposed a temporary extension of the nation’s debt ceiling.
It's a like a roller coaster ride with the Dow Jones.
One in five women who suffer repeated miscarriages has a medical condition that means her blood is too thick and sticky which starves the baby of oxygen and can trigger very late pregnancy loss.
Few are tested and many are labelled as infertile and embark on expensive and difficult treatment, a conference was told.
Prof Graham Hughes, of London Bridge Hospital, said a simple blood test can identify their problem and a daily lose dose aspirin costing a few pence can lead to a successful pregnancy.
Speaking at the Aspirin Foundation conference in London, he said current guidelines mean many women are not given the test for Hughes syndrome, named after Prof Hughes, until they suffer many miscarriages, if they are tested at all.
He called for awareness amongst doctors to be raised and for women to be tested after their first, or certainly, their second miscarriage.
Following treatment the successful pregnancy rate can rise from lower than 20 per cent to around 75-80 per cent, he said.
He told the Daily Telegraph: "Some women have suffered 12 or even 15 miscarriages before the problem is spotted and that is tragic because the treatment is so easy.
"Some of these pregnancy losses can occur at eight months or more.
"Hughes syndrome is now known to be the commonest cause of repeat miscarriage yet it is still an unrecognised problem. It is starting to catch on in the obstetrics world but current advice is to test women after three or more miscarriages and that is terrible.
"If it were my daughter, I'd test after the first, it costs a few pounds and is a simple blood test."
Symptoms of the condition include migraine, memory problems, balance problems and pins and needles, which can lead them to be wrongly diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.
Aspirin has been hailed as a wonder drug after it was found to significantly reduce the chances of developing cancer and in the prevention of stroke and heart attacks.
The conference at the Royal College of Physicians also heard of the role of aspirin in dementia and diabetes where early studies suggest it may be beneficial.
(Personal Sharing)
Why in Singapore, women are not tested when they suffered from multiple miscarriages? I am a victim myself. The doctors I have seen all assumed that pregnancy cases in Singapore should be smooth-sailing and when things go wrong, they would say 'sorry for your loss'. I hope the doctors can be more caring like the 'Deliver Me' doctors in Discovery Home and Health. If they know a woman has suffered from more than one miscarriages, they should give the woman tests on the first visit and monitor them closely. Don't just think of earning money from the smooth-sailing pregnancies.
By Andy Sullivan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Airports have not ground to a halt. Fresh meat has not disappeared from supermarkets and the economy has not slipped back into recession.
The U.S. government may have headed off some of the most dire predictions about the "sequester," but over seven months, the across-the-board spending cut has thrown sand into the gears of the economic recovery.
The sequester has pulled some teachers from classrooms and police from the streets. It has grounded Air Force planes and docked Navy ships. The Forest Service had 500 fewer "hot shots" to battle summer wildfires. And as many as 140,000 low-income families may not get housing assistance that was once available.
The sequester wasn't supposed to happen. Congress set up the automatic cuts in 2011, with the burden falling equally on military and domestic programs, in an effort to force negotiators to agree on more targeted budget savings.
But they failed to find common ground over the next year and a half as Democrats protected Social Security and other benefits and Republicans rejected tax hikes.
So on March 1, automatic cuts kicked in totaling $85 billion, or roughly 2 percent of the federal $3.5 trillion budget. Social Security payments and the Medicaid health program for the poor were spared, but many other programs, from military to housing, took a 5 percent hit.
Congress eased the pain somewhat by giving agencies greater budget flexibility: the Federal Aviation Administration avoided furloughing air-traffic controllers by cancelling $247 million in construction; the Agriculture Department averted a food price spike when it kept meatpacking inspectors on the job by making other cuts; and civilian Pentagon employees, originally facing 11 unpaid days, ended up taking only six.
The Justice Department was able to keep FBI agents on the job by tapping unused funds from prior years. But cuts to its community-policing fund mean that cities like Oakland, California, now have fewer police on the streets, according to Chuck Loveless of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees.
If the sequester hasn't generated many sensational headlines, some economists say it is playing out largely as they predicted by slowing economic recovery and job creation.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated in July that based on data up to that point, the cuts would cost 900,000 jobs within a year. Goldman Sachs said earlier this month that the federal furloughs had slowed personal income growth over the summer.
"People are looking around and saying, 'Gee, the economy hasn't imploded, life isn't so bad,'" said Stephen Fuller, an economist at George Mason University who has tracked the impact. "But they're clearly becoming more apparent, and I think we'll see this in much slower growth for the rest of the year."
MORE WASTE, FRAUD, ABUSE
Democrats and many Republicans say the sequester is bad policy but some conservatives say it has provided a welcome check on a federal government that has grown too large.
"This restraint is helping to heal our economy by reducing the debt - and deferred taxes - on future generations," Republican Senator Tom Coburn said on Friday.
In some parts of government, the sequester has prompted the kind of belt-tightening that budget hawks say will be needed to keep U.S. debt manageable. For example, it could spur the Pentagon to open up its satellite program to competition more quickly.
"It provides an impetus to go ahead and get you there faster because you have to save money," said Douglas Loverro, the Pentagon's point man on space policy.
In other areas, however, the sequester has increased wasteful spending.
Some federal courts now hire expensive private-sector lawyers to represent poor defendants because public defenders have been forced to take up to 20 unpaid days off this year.
Deferred repairs to Agriculture Department buildings in Washington that were damaged by a 2011 earthquake will cost more to fix in the future, the department says.
Government watchdogs say the sequester has hurt their ability to monitor fraud and abuse, according to a survey by the Association of Government Accountants.
And tax cheats may face less scrutiny. The Internal Revenue Service now employs 10,000 fewer people than it did two years ago and it shut down for three days this summer to save money.
"For every one dollar not invested in the IRS, the general treasury's losing four dollars," said Colleen Kelley, president of the National Treasury Employees Union, which represents 150,000 federal workers.
The U.S. Navy says it had to mothball the USS Miami, an arson-damaged nuclear submarine, when a manpower shortage drove up repair costs. Another 11 ships have been kept in port.
Thirty-three Air Force squadrons grounded this year to save money will need to boost their flying hours by 10 percent next year to return to fighting shape.
To find immediate savings, the Pentagon has backed off on energy efficiency efforts that could bring long-term savings, according to construction-industry officials, who say some Pentagon contracts no longer ask bidders to include energy-efficient windows and other components.
"The sequester is creating a short-term solution that is going to have long-term impacts on their energy-reduction goals," said Tom Mertz, a senior vice president at Sundt Construction in Phoenix.
BACK TO SCHOOL
For schools, the impact is just now hitting home.
The sequester means 57,000 fewer poor children will participate in the Head Start preschool program this year.
That translates into 15 fewer kids, one less teacher, and one less assistant in Fremont, Nebraska, where the program already had 40 children on a waiting list.
Program director Stephanie Knust argues that those 15 Fremont kids will start kindergarten with fewer academic and social skills than their peers.
Their older siblings might also feel the impact.
"The money that's supposed to be going to help our neediest students is slowly disappearing for us," said Jeff Bisek, school district superintendent for the White Earth Indian reservation in Minnesota, where most students qualify for subsidized lunches.
Federally funded school programs for poor communities and mentally and physically handicapped children have been disproportionately hit by the sequester. The amount of federal funds to local school budgets averages 8 percent but rises to above 50 percent in some areas.
Bisek said he plugged a $250,000 shortfall this year partly by scaling back tutoring and a program for teenage mothers. He used a rainy-day fund and state aid to cover the difference.
Other schools don't have as much of a cushion.
On the Cheyenne River Indian reservation in South Dakota, class sizes have risen and struggling students are less likely to get individual help, said superintendent Carol Viet.
DROPPING OUT OF SCIENCE
As in education, cutbacks to scientific research may take years to play out.
The National Institutes of Health canceled 700 grants, and the Agriculture Department slashed 100 research projects. The Army cut its research budget by half.
Scientists worry that, aside from thwarting potential breakthroughs, the cuts could prompt young researchers to abandon the field.
University of New England professor Ian Meng said he couldn't hire assistants this summer to help him research headaches and "dry eye" syndrome. Next year, Meng may have to lay off some lab workers.
"The people I've invested in, have mentored, they certainly are seeing that research is maybe not a priority for our government," he said.
THE RENT COMES DUE
The sequester means Tamara Caston, a Houston-area school bus driver, will face a $300 a month rent increase in July or have to move to a smaller apartment with her 17-year-old son.
Faced with a $7 million federal aid cut, Houston's public-housing authority is scaling back rent support.
The extra rent equals one week's take-home pay for Caston, who says she may need a third job to cover her bills.
Across the country, many housing authorities have frozen their client lists, though few people seem to have actually been thrown out on the street. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a liberal think tank, estimates that by next January 140,000 fewer families will receive housing help.
Housing advocates say the cuts are likely to be worse if Congress extends the sequester, as expected.
"I'm worried about the future," said Nan Roman of the National Alliance to End Homelessness. "We're getting pretty close to the bone."
(Additional reporting by Andrea Shalal-Esa; Editing by Marilyn W. Thompson and Claudia Parsons)
Some of the victims of the Nairobi mall massacre reportedly suffered terrible tortures at the hands of the terrorists who carried out the slaughter.
Among the reports are claims of hostage being dismembered and castrated, having their eyes gouged out, fingers cut off with pliers, and being left hanging from hooks.
"They removed balls, eyes, ears, nose. They get your hand and sharpen it like a pencil then they tell you to write your name with the blood. They drive knives inside a child's body," Kenyan newspaper The Star quoted a doctor working at the mall as saying.
"Actually if you look at all the bodies, unless those ones that were escaping, fingers are cut by pliers, the noses are ripped by pliers."
While the information could not be independently verified, The Star editor William Pike told Britain's Independent that reporters had also heard similar accounts from other sources.
The horrifying claims about the Somalian al-Shabaab terrorists came amid mounting public anger at the lack of information from authorities about the massacre.
It was unclear how many people died after terrorists armed with machine guns and grenades started the killing in the mall around lunchtime on Saturday.
Some reports put the number of dead, excluding terrorists, at 67, with the Red Cross saying a further 71 people were listed as still missing.
Unverified accounts in Nairobi suggested the military had been forced to blow up part of the mall both to bring the massacre to an end and to end the appalling suffering of hostages.
The Daily Mail reported accounts of children being found dead in food court fridges with knives still in their bodies.
According to some accounts, most of the defeated terrorists were discovered burnt to ashes, after being set alight by the last of their number still alive to try to protect their identities.
During the assault by government troops on Monday to retake the mall, hostages reportedly had their throats slashed from ear to ear and were thrown screaming from third-floor balconies.
Between 10 and 15 terrorists were thought to have carried out the killings, with police saying five of the extremists had been killed and at least 10 taken into custody.
It could be up to a week before the mall can be thoroughly searched because of fears of setting off explosives.
SHOCKING IMAGES
Devastating images of the Kenyan mall carnage and tales of the terror shoppers encountered therein are emerging as authorities work hard to bring to justice those responsible for planning the attack that killed at least 67 people.
The Kenyan Presidential Press Service distributed photos showing blasted-out cars dangling from the wreckage of a collapsed carpark.
In one photo two baby strollers are seen at a cafe table, perhaps a metre from a gaping pit filled with charred vehicles.
But more terrifying than any images of a demolished car park are the stories coming from survivors.
Tales of how one Muslim women huddled in a crawl space with seven strangers tried to teach them a Muslim chant, so they might be spared.
How a woman smeared her body with blood from the corpse of a teenage boy so she'd appear to be already among the dead.
How the gunmen fired indiscriminately into the crowd, and corpses piled upon corpses.
These are their stories.
___
Saturdays are crowded at the Westgate Mall, Nairobi's most elite retail destination and a crossroads of the global economy. Rich foreign businessmen go there, as do wealthy Kenyans. There are shopping diplomats, and aid workers watching movies. They stroll the Nakumatt grocery store and have sandwiches at Java House. They buy sunglasses, silk shirts and phones.
Much of Kenya lives on less than a couple of dollars a day, but these poor also come to Westgate. They work inside, carrying boxes at the supermarket, sweeping the marble floors. Or they just come to watch.
"Poor. Rich. High class. All of them are there," says Rafia Khan, whose husband is a wealthy businessman.
On this Saturday, though, they would watch children weep and watch them die. They would leave injured friends behind as they fled the attackers. They would be shot, and hit by shrapnel from grenades. At least 67 would die in what became a four-day siege by extremists from al-Shabab, the Somalia-based, Muslim militant group.
__
The Westgate Mall entrance, about 12:36 p.m.:
Kenyan authorities believe there are as few as six gunmen, although the numbers remain unclear. The first team, wearing bulletproof vests, storms Westgate's front entrance, throwing grenades and firing assault rifles as they run. They are clearly well-trained.
Few people inside the mall think of terrorism when they hear the first explosion, and many think it's an electrical box giving way under Nairobi's unreliable power grid. But as one blast gives way to another and the clatter of machine-gun fire is heard, thousands of people know they need to move. But where?
Outside at the entrance, Ben Mulwa, a community organiser driving to the mall for lunch, jumps from his car and takes shelter in a shallow flowerbed. He also thinks it's a bank robbery. An unarmed mall security guard takes cover next to him.
Then he sees four attackers in the driveway, racing in his direction. All carry rifles.
"I realised this is bigger trouble than I actually thought," he says.
Mulwa hears a bang, and the guard next to him is shot through the head. He never moves again.
"That's when I saw the second gunmen actually pointing his rifle at me," he says later. Three shots ring out. In his mind, he sees his 1-year-old daughter. "I asked God: Why would you want my daughter to go through this?"
___
Al-Shabab once controlled wide swaths of Somalia, bringing with it a harsh version of Islam that required punishments such as stoning adulterers to death. The group has been threatening revenge on Kenya since 2011, when Kenyan soldiers crossed into Somalia and helped hobble the al Qaeda-linked militants.
The group said in an emailed statement after the attack that "any part of the Kenyan territory is a legitimate target. ... Kenya should be held responsible for the loss of life."
Authorities believe the group had planned long in advance, scouting the mall carefully.
"They likely had cased the location for some time and knew very well the best place and time to attack," House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Mich., said in a statement to The Associated Press.
The gunmen, for the most part, are dressed casually. Many are in khakis and long-sleeved shirts. Some have checked scarves around their necks or flung over their heads. Only some are wearing bulletproof vests.
Most carry AK-47 or G3 assault rifles, weapons widely used in the region and easily available on the black market.
It was unclear how many people died after terrorists armed with machine guns and grenades started the killing in the mall around lunchtime on Saturday.
Some reports put the number of dead, excluding terrorists, at 67, with the Red Cross saying a further 71 people were listed as still missing.
Unverified accounts in Nairobi suggested the military had been forced to blow up part of the mall both to bring the massacre to an end and to end the appalling suffering of hostages.
The Daily Mail reported accounts of children being found dead in food court fridges with knives still in their bodies.
According to some accounts, most of the defeated terrorists were discovered burnt to ashes, after being set alight by the last of their number still alive to try to protect their identities.
During the assault by government troops on Monday to retake the mall, hostages reportedly had their throats slashed from ear to ear and were thrown screaming from third-floor balconies.
Between 10 and 15 terrorists were thought to have carried out the killings, with police saying five of the extremists had been killed and at least 10 taken into custody.
It could be up to a week before the mall can be thoroughly searched because of fears of setting off explosives.
SHOCKING IMAGES
Devastating images of the Kenyan mall carnage and tales of the terror shoppers encountered therein are emerging as authorities work hard to bring to justice those responsible for planning the attack that killed at least 67 people.
The Kenyan Presidential Press Service distributed photos showing blasted-out cars dangling from the wreckage of a collapsed carpark.
In one photo two baby strollers are seen at a cafe table, perhaps a metre from a gaping pit filled with charred vehicles.
But more terrifying than any images of a demolished car park are the stories coming from survivors.
Tales of how one Muslim women huddled in a crawl space with seven strangers tried to teach them a Muslim chant, so they might be spared.
How a woman smeared her body with blood from the corpse of a teenage boy so she'd appear to be already among the dead.
How the gunmen fired indiscriminately into the crowd, and corpses piled upon corpses.
These are their stories.
___
Saturdays are crowded at the Westgate Mall, Nairobi's most elite retail destination and a crossroads of the global economy. Rich foreign businessmen go there, as do wealthy Kenyans. There are shopping diplomats, and aid workers watching movies. They stroll the Nakumatt grocery store and have sandwiches at Java House. They buy sunglasses, silk shirts and phones.
Much of Kenya lives on less than a couple of dollars a day, but these poor also come to Westgate. They work inside, carrying boxes at the supermarket, sweeping the marble floors. Or they just come to watch.
"Poor. Rich. High class. All of them are there," says Rafia Khan, whose husband is a wealthy businessman.
On this Saturday, though, they would watch children weep and watch them die. They would leave injured friends behind as they fled the attackers. They would be shot, and hit by shrapnel from grenades. At least 67 would die in what became a four-day siege by extremists from al-Shabab, the Somalia-based, Muslim militant group.
__
The Westgate Mall entrance, about 12:36 p.m.:
Kenyan authorities believe there are as few as six gunmen, although the numbers remain unclear. The first team, wearing bulletproof vests, storms Westgate's front entrance, throwing grenades and firing assault rifles as they run. They are clearly well-trained.
Few people inside the mall think of terrorism when they hear the first explosion, and many think it's an electrical box giving way under Nairobi's unreliable power grid. But as one blast gives way to another and the clatter of machine-gun fire is heard, thousands of people know they need to move. But where?
Outside at the entrance, Ben Mulwa, a community organiser driving to the mall for lunch, jumps from his car and takes shelter in a shallow flowerbed. He also thinks it's a bank robbery. An unarmed mall security guard takes cover next to him.
Then he sees four attackers in the driveway, racing in his direction. All carry rifles.
"I realised this is bigger trouble than I actually thought," he says.
Mulwa hears a bang, and the guard next to him is shot through the head. He never moves again.
"That's when I saw the second gunmen actually pointing his rifle at me," he says later. Three shots ring out. In his mind, he sees his 1-year-old daughter. "I asked God: Why would you want my daughter to go through this?"
___
Al-Shabab once controlled wide swaths of Somalia, bringing with it a harsh version of Islam that required punishments such as stoning adulterers to death. The group has been threatening revenge on Kenya since 2011, when Kenyan soldiers crossed into Somalia and helped hobble the al Qaeda-linked militants.
The group said in an emailed statement after the attack that "any part of the Kenyan territory is a legitimate target. ... Kenya should be held responsible for the loss of life."
Authorities believe the group had planned long in advance, scouting the mall carefully.
"They likely had cased the location for some time and knew very well the best place and time to attack," House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Mich., said in a statement to The Associated Press.
The gunmen, for the most part, are dressed casually. Many are in khakis and long-sleeved shirts. Some have checked scarves around their necks or flung over their heads. Only some are wearing bulletproof vests.
Most carry AK-47 or G3 assault rifles, weapons widely used in the region and easily available on the black market.
But some of the gunmen are draped with belts of large-calibre ammunition, and witnesses hear the fast, frightening, echoing blasts of heavy machine-gun fire.
As they storm through the mall, the music system keeps playing, an undertone to the explosions and screams. The music of Adele and Ne-Yo filters through the carnage.
___
Millionaires Casino, 12:57 p.m.:
Khan is huddled in a ceiling-level crawl space with nine other people. Her daughter is texting her.
"Are you okay???"
"Mum??"
"Can u message us Mum???"
___
Millionaires Casino, 1:30 p.m.:
Word has spread that the gunmen are allowing Muslims to leave — testing them by asking about their knowledge of Islam.
Khan and her cousin are the only Muslims among the small group. They decide to teach the others to recite the Shahada, the short Arabic-language creed that proclaims there is only one God and Muhammed is his prophet.
Over and over, Khan whispers the words slowly and phonetically, as if to a child: "La il-a-ha il-Al-lah wa Mu-ham-mad ru-soul Al-lah."
___
Parking area, third-level rooftop, about 1:30 p.m.:
The young mother watches the gunman shoot. Crowds of people are stumbling, screaming, falling around her.
He is calm.
She is terrified.
Sneha Kothari-Mashru, 28 and a part-time radio DJ, watches through a tangle of her long brown hair, which she has thrown across her face to appear as if she is already among the dead. She has smeared blood onto her arm and her clothes, taking it from the corpse of a teenage boy. She has kicked off her blue high heels.
The gunman doesn't scream, she recalls days later. He rarely speaks. There is no obvious anger in his expression. He seems confident, she says. "He was normal."
About 15 minutes later, Kothari-Mashru watches as the gunman speaks quietly to one family. She can't hear what is said, but the wife is dressed in the billowing robes worn by highly observant Muslim women. Slowly, the family members stand, raise their hands above their heads, and walk away.
Other witnesses described similar scenes. Elijah Kamau, who was at the mall at the time of the midday attack, said he listened as militants told one group of their plans.
"The gunmen told Muslims to stand up and leave. They were safe," he said.
In the email statement, al-Shabab said their fighters "carried out a meticulous vetting process at the mall and have taken every possible precaution to separate the Muslims from the Kuffar (disbelievers) before carrying out their attack".
___
This is not the rule, however, in the attack.
Dozens of Muslims are shot, and many are killed. Most often, the gunmen fire wildly, spraying bullets into crowds and not bothering to ask about religion.
Some of the bloodiest scenes occur just a few feet from where Kothari-Mashru pretends to be dead.
A Junior Super Chef cooking competition was being held in the parking area and dozens of people — many from Kenya's community of Ismaili Muslims — were at long tables set up beneath car advertisements.
Gunmen had already fired through the crowds at the competition when Kothari-Mashru hides nearby. Afterward, the tables are still arranged in many places, complete with upholstered chairs and red tablecloths. But puddles of blood are everywhere, with corpses one on top of another.
___
Parking area, third-level rooftop, about 3 p.m.:
Word goes out that someone has found a place to hide.
Kothari-Mashru decides to run. As she leaves, though, she sees a friend she had met that day, lying down, obviously wounded.
"Can you get up?" Kothari-Mashru asks.
Her friend has been shot three times. She smiles at Kothari-Mashru, but says she cannot move.
As the crowds swarm toward what seems to be safety, Kothari-Mashru leaves.
"It was heartbreaking," she says later.
She swallows.
"I don't know. I don't know," she says. "She couldn't get up. She couldn't move. She just lay there."
Soon, Kothari-Mashru is among dozens of people on a back staircase heading to safety. As she races down, she runs into her husband, who had convinced two plain-clothed policemen to help find her. Later, Kothari-Mashru's friend was rescued and treated at a hospital.
___
Millionaires Casino, about 4 p.m.:
Police bang on the door of the casino. The 10 people hiding in the crawl space are escorted out by security forces. They were never forced to recite the creed.
___
Westgate Mall, about 6:30 p.m.:
Dozens, perhaps more than 100 people, remain scattered thorugh the mall as the sun sets. Bodies are carried out as security forces push the gunmen into ever smaller areas.
Mulwa, who had taken cover in the flowerbed and was shot in the leg, has already been taken to safety by police and hospitalized. After surgery, he is released from the hospital.
The siege does not end until Tuesday night, at the end of fierce gunbattles, a fire and the collapse of part of the structure.
Among the dead is Kofi Awoonor of Ghana, a beloved 78-year-old poet who was in Nairobi for a literary festival. His body was flown Wednesday to Accra, the capital of his homeland, where hundreds gathered at the airport to remember him as a man of peace.
In one verse, he was clearly conscious of his own mortality.
"When the final night falls on us
"As it fell upon our parents,
"We shall retire to our modest home
"Earth-sure, secure
"That we have done our duty
"By our people;
"We met the challenge of history
"And were not afraid."
- AP
