NPR 2011-02-08

Anyone looking for a big party? Green Bay is where it's at. Fans are heading into Lambeau Field this hour to welcome their Super Bowl champs — the Packers, who defeated the Pittsburgh Steelers yesterday. Classes were let out early. Some businesses shut down for the big celebration. It's been nonstop work for Tim Klemme though, manager of the sports bar Stadium View. But he says it's a big deal.

"Green Bay is the smallest market team, you know, town's only 102,000 people. And for them to win the Super Bowl, it's a big deal. Probably expect more than half the city to be at Lambeau Field."

NFL commissioner 1 Roger Goodell meanwhile is apologizing to the hundreds of fans who had to give up their seats at the Super Bowl because of structural 2 issues with temporary seating. He says the league ran out of time to make last-minute fixes. Goodell is inviting 3 those fans who were forced to watch Green Bay's defeat of the Steelers on monitors or some other way a free seat to the big game next year. The NFL also says it will refund 4 the affected 5 fans at three times the face value of their tickets.

The Obama administration has started the process of taking Sudan off a terrorism list. As NPR's Michele Kelemen reports, this is a diplomatic reward to Khartoum for allowing southern Sudan to secede 6.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton congratulated northern and southern Sudanese leaders for facilitating a peaceful and orderly independence vote in southern Sudan. In a written statement, she commended Khartoum for accepting the outcome. As spokesman P. J. Crowley says, the US will now keep its pledge to consider taking Sudan off a terrorism blacklist.

"We will begin the process of removing Sudan from the state sponsor of terrorism list with the obvious qualification that Sudan has to meet the criteria 7 under law before that action could be taken."

Sudan's foreign minister came to Washington recently to encourage this move, arguing that recent US reports have shown that Sudan is cooperating with the US on counterterrorism. Michele Kelemen, NPR News, Washington.

Still no ending in sight to two weeks of anti-government demonstrations 8 in the Egyptian capital despite recent concessions 9 President Hosni Mubarak's allies have offered. The thousands gathered in Cairo's Tahrir Square say the only thing that will make them leave is if Mubarak leaves as well.

And investigation 10 is underway into shootings yesterday at an Ohio fraternity house. A Youngstown State University senior was killed. Eleven other people were wounded, including a critically injured 17-year-old. Police say they have arrested two people.

At last check on Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average up 67 points at 12,159, also up more than 0.5%; NASDAQ gaining 14, it's at 2,784; S&P 500 up eight at 1,319.

This is NPR News.

The French finance minister says the euro has fallen victim to American and Chinese policies to weaken their currencies. From Paris, Eleanor Beardsley reports French President Nicolas Sarkozy has set out to reform the international monetary 11 system as France prepares to host the G20 this year.

Foreign Minister Christine Lagarde says the euro is too high because it is caught in the middle between two currencies that are deliberately 12 weak. China has been accused of keeping its yuan low to support its export markets. And world economists 13 say the US, by using tactics like quantitative 14 easing and printing money to buy its own debt, is also deflating the dollar to spur American exports. The international monetary system relies too heavily on the US dollar, says Sarkozy, which leads fast growing countries like China to amass 15 huge dollar-denominated currency reserves that cause global volatility 16. Sarkozy says he's not trying to displace the dollar but says the new global reality of emerging economies and economic powerhouses like Europe should be reflected by several reserve currencies or a basket of currencies. For NPR News, I'm Eleanor Beardsley in Paris.

Carnival 17 in Brazil is suffering a potentially major setback 18 with less than a month before that big event. Today, a large fire swept through a warehouse 19 complex that housed thousands of intricately designed costumes and floats that samba groups took as long as a year to create. The cause of the blaze is still under investigation. Authorities say there were no immediate 20 reports of injuries. However, the loss is being described as "tremendous" for a country that typically attracts hundreds of thousands of tourists for carnival in Brazil each year.