NBA players holding firm after owners' ultimatum

Derek Fisher, left, president of the National Basketball Players Association, speaks next to Maurice Evans on Tuesday.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• "There isn't any player that wants us to take a bad deal," NBA players president Derek Fisher says
• Tuesday's meeting was to explain the owners' latest offer to player representatives
• The owners have given players a Wednesday deadline to accept the offer

(CNN) -- There has been no change in NBA players' position in the face of an ultimatum from the owners as the two sides try to reach a collective bargaining agreement, the president of the players' association said Tuesday.

"There isn't any player that wants us to take a bad deal," Derek Fisher said.

The league on Sunday gave the players' association until Wednesday afternoon to accept a deal after eight hours of meetings over the weekend.

Fisher said Sunday that the offer was not acceptable, and he reiterated Tuesday that the players' association is holding firm.

"That doesn't mean we won't continue to negotiate," Fisher said at a news conference after a meeting of players representing all but one of the NBA's teams.

NBA Commissioner David Stern has said the newest proposal gives players between 49% and 51% of revenues. If the players' association does not change its mind by Wednesday, the NBA will offer up another proposal -- one that offers players 47% of basketball revenues.

The current proposal says that if the league exceeds certain revenue forecasts, the players would receive 51%. If it didn't, the share would fall to 49%.

But Fisher said Sunday that "there'd be no way in the world we'd ever get to 51%" under the provisions.

The players' association's executive director, Billy Hunter, told CNN sister network TBS that Tuesday's meeting was intended to spell out the details of the owners' proposal, which they were "misunderstanding" based on media reports that focused on the revenue sharing offer.

Once they heard the details of the proposal, he said, "they were all horrified by it." He said it would "decimate" gains made by players in recent years.

Hunter said he is likely to meet with Stern before the owners' deadline Wednesday to see if there was any movement in their position.

Fisher, during the news conference, said the players are confident an agreement giving players a better deal would still be possible despite the owners' ultimatum.

Africa's aviation industry set to soar, says Boeing

Boeing says its a very exciting time to be in Africa

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Africa is one of the fastest growing regions for commercial aviation.
• Boeing's Vice President for Commercial Sales says the continent's potential is huge.
• African airlines face political and technological challenges in fulfilling their full potential.

Cape Town, South Africa (CNN) -- Africa's passenger airline industry may still be awaiting full take off but Boeing has identified the continent as a market ripe with potential.

The U.S. company -- one of the world's biggest airplane manufacturers -- has found its order book filled with an increasing number of African clients in recent years.

But with airlines based on the continent still only accounting for a fraction of overall air traffic between Africa and the rest of the world, the company's Vice President of Sales for Africa, Van Rex Gallard believes there remains plenty of room for further expansion.

"Right now the African market for the airlines is quite small," he says.

"African airlines only have around 2% of the total of revenues of the traffic between Africa and the rest of the world, so to me the potential is huge," he adds.

We have a lot of customers in Africa and this is actually a very exciting period.
Van Rex Gallard, Boeing

The latent "potential" that Gallard refers to is confirmed by industry statistics and future passenger projections.

According to research conducted by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) in February 2011, Africa is now the second fastest growing region in the world in terms of commercial aviation, behind China.

The Airbus Global Market Forecast published earlier this month meanwhile reported that sub-Saharan Africa alone will require at least 542 new aircraft by 2020 to meet rising passenger numbers.

By providing the technology and expertise to meet these increased capacity requirements, Gallard believes that Boeing and the African airlines they provide for can jointly reap the benefits.

"We have a lot of customers in Africa and this is actually a very exciting period," he says.

"The numbers, if everything stays the way it is right now ... without the African airlines growing faster and the way they should, it would be around 800 airplanes for the next 20 years (and) worth around 100 billion dollars," he adds.

Liberians vote in runoff election

Liberian riot police surge a main thoroughfare during a rally in Monrovia on Monday.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Ellen Johnson Sirleaf faced challenger Winston Tubman
• There had been calls to boycott the election
• The United Nations called on Liberians to refrain from violence
• It is the second presidential election since the end of a 14-year civil war

(CNN) -- Liberia went to the polls Tuesday for a runoff election after incumbent President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf failed to win the votes needed for an outright victory last month.

Johnson Sirleaf, who won the Nobel Peace Prize this year, needed 50% to avoid a runoff in the October 11 election, but did not reach it. Polls were scheduled to close at 1 p.m. EST.

She faces challenger Winston Tubman, who came second.

While the U.S.-based Carter Center said the October balloting was "peaceful, orderly, and remarkably transparent," opposition parties have protested the results, and claimed voting irregularities.

Tubman has reportedly refused to participate in the runoff, alleging it won't be fair, and there have been calls to boycott the election, the United Nations has said.

On Monday, members of the Tubman's Congress for Democratic Change clashed with police in what authorities called an unauthorized protest, state-owned radio network Liberia Broadcasting System reported.

At least one person was killed and several others wounded in the clashes in the capital city of Monrovia, the network reported.

Both U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and the Security Council have called on Liberians to refrain from violence.

"Regardless of your political views, I appeal to all Liberians to say no to violence on Election Day," said Ellen Margrethe Loj, the U.N.Secretary-General's special representative and head of the U.N. Mission in Liberia (UNMIL).

Report: Iran developing nuclear bombs

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad slammed the IAEA and said the agency has no jurisdiction in Iran.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• NEW: GOP members of Congress urge White House to ratchet up economic sanctions
• NEW: Sanctions should target refined fuel supply, Iran's central bank, Rep. Mike Rogers says
• A nuclear watchdog report expresses serious concern over Iran's nuclear program
• Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad dismisses the report as fabrication

(CNN) -- The International Atomic Energy Agency issued a critical report Tuesday saying that it has "serious concerns" about Iran's nuclear program and has obtained "credible" information that the Islamic republic may be developing nuclear weapons.

The IAEA report, the most detailed to date on the Iranian program's military scope, found no evidence that Iran has made a strategic decision to actually build a bomb. But its nuclear program is more ambitious and structured, and more progress has been made than previously known.

"The agency has serious concerns regarding possible military dimensions to Iran's nuclear program," the report said. "After assessing carefully and critically the extensive information available to it, the agency finds the information to be, overall, credible. The information indicates that Iran has carried out activities relevant to the development of a nuclear explosive device."

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said the report had just arrived and refrained from commenting on details at an afternoon briefing. But a senior U.S. official called the report "a big deal."

Ahmadinejad: look at U.S. nuclear arms

Report: Iran pursuing nuclear weapons

"The report is very comprehensive, credible, quite damning, and alarming," the official said.

Read the IAEA report here

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad slammed the report as a fabrication of facts aimed at satisfying U.S. allegations about Iran's nuclear program.

Ahmadinejad essentially called Yukiya Amano, the director general of the IAEA, a U.S. puppet and said the United Nations agency has no jurisdiction in Iran.

"The Americans have fabricated a stack of papers and he keeps speaking about them," he said on state-run Press TV. "Why don't you do a report on the U.S. nuclear program and its allies? Present a report on the thousands of U.S. military bases where Washington has nuclear arms that threaten global security."

Elephant-poo power electrifies zoo

Munich Zoo's elephant energy

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Zoo in Germany partially powered by electricity produced from animal dung
• Animal waste fermented for 30 days generates "biogas"
• Energy produced enough to heat 25 homes and power 100

Munich, Germany (CNN) -- At Munich Zoo you can watch the courtship rituals of the banded mongoose, hear the morning song of the scarlet ibis or visit the Indian elephants, who help keep the lights on with electricity generated from their dung.

They can do this because Munich Zoo has harnessed "poo power," energy stored in animal waste, which can be converted into a fuel known as "biogas."

It works like this: The zoo has built three large containers, each capable of holding about 100 cubic meters of animal waste -- that's around a week's worth of dung collected from all the vegetarian animals in the zoo.

Once inside the containers, it's mixed with warm water and the bacteria in the dung is left to decompose in an oxygen-free environment for 30 days.

The resulting biogas, mainly comprised of methane and carbon dioxide, rises naturally through vents in the ceiling to a corrugated hut on the roof where it's collected in a "big balloon," says park supervisor Dominik Forster.

The biogas is then fed into a gas-powered engine that's used to generate electricity. Forster says that the balloon -- which more closely resembles a small Zeppelin -- can store enough biogas to meet 5% of the zoo's energy needs.

Could 'Earthscraper' really turn architecture on its head?

If built, the 65-story "Earthscraper" would plunge 300 meters into the ground beneath Mexico City.

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The 'Earthscraper'

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STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Mexican architects believe they have solution to capital's overcrowding
• If built 'Earthscraper' concept would plunge 300 meters into the earth
• Designed as an inverted pyramid with a central void for light and ventilation
• Pipe-dream or genuine innovation? You tell us.

(CNN) -- A team of Mexican architects have designed a 65-story glass and steel pyramid to sit in the middle of Mexico City's most historic plaza. But, if it ever gets built, you won't see it anywhere on the skyline.

That's because it would be the world's first ever "earthscraper" -- a 300-meter deep office and living space with ambitions to turn the modern high-rise, quite literally, on its head.

"There is very little room for any more buildings in Mexico City, and the law says we cannot go above eight stories, so the only way is down" explains Esteban Suarez, co-founder of BNKR Arquitectura, the firm behind the proposals.

"This would be a practical way of conserving the built environment while creating much-needed new space for commerce and living," he added.

But would it really be that practical? The design, which would cost an estimated $800 million to build, is the shape of an inverted pyramid with a central void to allow for some much-needed natural light and ventilation.

Suarez says the first 10 stories would hold a museum dedicated to the city's history and its artifacts. "We'd almost certainly find plenty of interesting relics during the dig -- dating right back to the Aztecs who built their own pyramids here," he says.

The following 10 floors are assigned to retail and housing, with the remaining 35 intended for commercial office space, says Suarez.

Suarez concedes that getting natural light and fresh air down to the lower floors will be a problem and he is investigating a "system of fiber optics" that could deliver sunlight from the surface.