The Ivory Coast army told President Laurent Gbagbo that it would not accept the incorporation of rebel factions into a coalition government as had been agreed in Paris last weekend. Protests in Abidjan also lead to violence between Christian supporters of Gbagbo and a Muslim group from the northern part of the country. (Reuters, BBC)

Television projections following exit polls in Israel's national elections today predicted a decisive victory for Ariel Sharon's right-wing Likud party. Likud's victory reflects Israelis' concerns about national security, which the results indicate outweigh concerns about Israel's faltering economy. (Ha'aretz)

Pakistan said it had shot down an unmanned Indian spy plane flying over a Pakistani-controlled area of Kashmir. India uses the spy planes to monitor the activities of militants who India says make incursions into the region of Kashmir controlled by India. India denied that a plane had been shot down. (BBC)

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il didn't meet with a South Korean envoy in Pyongyang. North Korea has alternated between promises to work with South Korea to resolve the crisis surrounding its nuclear program and complete rejections of any option other than direct talks with the U.S. (Reuters)

U.S. and Afghan forces killed 18 Afghan rebels in the mountains near the Pakistani border after encountering a force of as many as 80. United Nations officials believe increasing numbers of rebels have been traveling to Afghanistan from Pakistan and that new attacks on Afghan forces are likely. (NYT)

U.S. officials told the Washington Post they would declassify intelligence that proves that Iraq has been concealing banned weapons and equipment from U.N. weapons inspectors. The officials have said they are reluctant to make the intelligence public because doing so could jeapordize intelligence sources. (WaPost)

President Bush delivered the president's annual State of the Union address. He proposed that the U.S. accelerate tax cuts to address economic concerns; spend $400 billion over 10 years to reform Medicare; spend $15 billion over five years for AIDS relief in Africa; and offer $1.2 billion for research in hydrogen-powered automobiles. He also said that Saddam Hussein was a threat to the world. (WhiteHouse.gov)

The Los Angeles Times reported that the U.S. Forest Service had proposed to allow extensive logging in the Giant Sequoia National Monument in California. The Forest Service proposal argues that the more trees it allows to be cut down the better a job it does managing fire risk. Logging is otherwise forbidden in U.S. national monuments. (LAT)

U.S. officials told the Washington Post they would declassify intelligence that proves that Iraq has been concealing banned weapons and equipment from U.N. weapons inspectors. The officials have said they are reluctant to make the intelligence public because doing so could jeapordize intelligence sources. (WaPost)

Promising corporate outlooks and consumer confidence reports pushed U.S. stocks higher. The Dow rose 1.25 percent, to 8,089.05; the Nasdaq climbed 1.29 percent to close at 1,342.32; and the S&P 500 finished at 858.56, up 1.31 percent. (Reuters)

A malevolent computer program that overloaded hundreds of thousands of computers on the Internet last weekend by exploiting a known security hole in Microsoft software also affected computers run by Microsoft Corp. itself, the New York Times reported. Microsoft has defended its software by saying that users who properly maintained their software would not have been susceptible to the attack. (NYT)

A malevolent computer program that overloaded hundreds of thousands of computers on the Internet last weekend by exploiting a known security hole in Microsoft software also affected computers run by Microsoft Corp. itself, the New York Times reported. Microsoft has defended its software by saying that users who properly maintained their software would not have been susceptible to the attack. (NYT)

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il didn't meet with a South Korean envoy in Pyongyang. North Korea has alternated between promises to work with South Korea to resolve the crisis surrounding its nuclear program and complete rejections of any option other than direct talks with the U.S. (Reuters)