Judge rejects Apple injunction bid vs. Samsung

(Reuters) – A U.S. judge on Monday denied Apple Inc‘s request for a permanent injunction against Samsung Electronics‘ smartphones, depriving the iPhone maker of key leverage in the mobile patent wars.

Apple had been awarded $ 1.05 billion in damages in August after a U.S. jury found Samsung had copied critical features of the iPhone and iPad. The Samsung products run on the Android operating system, developed by Google.

Apple and Samsung are going toe-to-toe in a patents dispute that mirrors the struggle for industry supremacy between the two companies, which control more than half of worldwide smartphone sales.

For most of the year, Apple had been successful in its U.S. litigation campaign against Samsung. Apple convinced U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, California to impose two pretrial sales bans against Samsung — one against the Galaxy Tab 10.1, and the other against the Galaxy Nexus phone.

Apple then sought to keep up the pressure after its sweeping jury win. It asked Koh to impose a permanent sales ban against 26 mostly older Samsung phones, though any injunction could potentially have been extended to Samsung’s newer Galaxy products.

Yet the jury exonerated Samsung on the patent used to ban Galaxy Tab 10.1 sales, and Koh rescinded that injunction. Then, in October, a federal appeals court reversed Koh’s ban against the Nexus phone.

In her order late on Monday, Koh cited that appellate ruling as binding legal precedent, ruling that Apple had not presented enough evidence that its patented features drove consumer demand for the entire iPhone.

“The phones at issue in this case contain a broad range of features, only a small fraction of which are covered by Apple’s patents,” Koh wrote.

“Though Apple does have some interest in retaining certain features as exclusive to Apple,” she continued, “it does not follow that entire products must be forever banned from the market because they incorporate, among their myriad features, a few narrow protected functions.”

An Apple spokeswoman declined to comment on Koh’s ruling, and a Samsung representative could not immediately be reached.

In a separate order on Monday, Koh rejected a bid by Samsung for a new trial based on an allegation that the jury foreman was improperly biased in favor of Apple.

The case in U.S. District Court, Northern District of California is Apple Inc. vs. Samsung Electronics Co Ltd et al, 11-1846.

(Reporting by Dan Levine in Oakland, California; Editing by Ron Popeski)

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The Voice's Top Three Give Final Performances in the Competition

TV Watch

The Voice

By Julia Haskins

12/17/2012 at 10:25 PM EST

From left: Judges Adam Levine, Cee Lo Green, Christina Aguilera and Blake Shelton

Trae Patton/NBC

Monday night's episode of The Voice gave the final three contestants three chances to earn fans' votes. Each singer revisited a "breakout" song that set them apart in the competition, sang a new song and performed a duet with his or her coach.

But the night opened with a touching tribute to the victims of the Sandy Hook tragedy. Coaches and singers held up the names of each life lost while singing Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah."

Team Cee Lo's Nicholas David then kicked off the competition with Jerry Lee Lewis's "Great Balls of Fire." Not able to resist a pun, his coach chimed in on his performance: "Your fire tonight burned this house down," Green said. David later revisited his performance of Bill Withers's "Lean On Me," and joined Green for a duet of Wild Cherry's "Play That Funky Music."

Team Blake's two contestants also had the crowd cheering. Terry McDermott's sang his best song, Foreigner's "I Want to Know What Love Is," and took a stab at Mr. Mister's "Take These Broken Wings." But the crowning moment of the night for McDermott was his duet with Shelton of Aerosmith's "Dude (Looks Like a Lady)." Adam Levine played guitar alongside them, decked out in a long rocker wig.

Cassadee Pope sang "Over You," which her coach and his wife, Miranda Lambert, co-wrote. She received huge praise for singing it the first time, but the song about Shelton's late brother had special meaning in the wake of the shootings in Newtown, Conn. "America's heart is heavy, and that's about healing," Shelton said. She also moved the coaches with her take on Faith Hill's "Cry." "I don't care that you weren't on my team," Levine said. "I am so proud of you and so happy that you're here at this moment." Pope finished the night with Shelton for a duet of Sheryl Crow's "Steve McQueen."

The Voice returns Tuesday, when the season's winner will be named. Who will it be? Tell us in the comments below.

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Experts: No link between Asperger's, violence

NEW YORK (AP) — While an official has said that the 20-year-old gunman in the Connecticut school shooting had Asperger's syndrome, experts say there is no connection between the disorder and violence.

Asperger's is a mild form of autism often characterized by social awkwardness.

"There really is no clear association between Asperger's and violent behavior," said psychologist Elizabeth Laugeson, an assistant clinical professor at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Little is known about Adam Lanza, identified by police as the shooter in the Friday massacre at a Newtown, Conn., elementary school. He fatally shot his mother before going to the school and killing 20 young children, six adults and himself, authorities said.

A law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the person was not authorized to discuss the unfolding investigation, said Lanza had been diagnosed with Asperger's.

High school classmates and others have described him as bright but painfully shy, anxious and a loner. Those kinds of symptoms are consistent with Asperger's, said psychologist Eric Butter of Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, who treats autism, including Asperger's, but has no knowledge of Lanza's case.

Research suggests people with autism do have a higher rate of aggressive behavior — outbursts, shoving or pushing or angry shouting — than the general population, he said.

"But we are not talking about the kind of planned and intentional type of violence we have seen at Newtown," he said in an email.

"These types of tragedies have occurred at the hands of individuals with many different types of personalities and psychological profiles," he added.

Autism is a developmental disorder that can range from mild to severe. Asperger's generally is thought of as a mild form. Both autism and Asperger's can be characterized by poor social skills, repetitive behavior or interests and problems communicating. Unlike classic autism, Asperger's does not typically involve delays in mental development or speech.

Experts say those with autism and related disorders are sometimes diagnosed with other mental health problems, such as depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder or obsessive-compulsive disorder.

"I think it's far more likely that what happened may have more to do with some other kind of mental health condition like depression or anxiety rather than Asperger's," Laugeson said.

She said those with Asperger's tend to focus on rules and be very law-abiding.

"There's something more to this," she said. "We just don't know what that is yet."

After much debate, the term Asperger's is being dropped from the diagnostic manual used by the nation's psychiatrists. In changes approved earlier this month, Asperger's will be incorporated under the umbrella term "autism spectrum disorder" for all the ranges of autism.

__

AP Writer Matt Apuzzo contributed to this report.

___

Online:

Asperger's information: http://1.usa.gov/3tGSp5

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Asian shares inch higher on "fiscal cliff" hopes

TOKYO (Reuters) - Asian shares crept higher on Tuesday, tracking the overnight gains in U.S. stocks, as fresh signs of compromise maintained a new optimism that the U.S. "fiscal cliff" budget tussle could be settled before tax hikes and spending cuts begin to bite early next year.

Oil and copper also firmed on the prospect of progress in the U.S. budget talks, but expectations of more monetary easing in Japan kept the yen soft.

President Barack Obama is seeking higher tax revenues which include increased rates on the wealthy while he is willing to cut some spending by changing the way cost of living adjustments are made to Social Security retirement benefits and other programs.

Obama's offer shows his willingness to give way on an item that some of his supporters had sought to protect, and may help advance negotiations with top Republican John Boehner to avert the fiscal cliff before the end-year deadline.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan <.miapj0000pus> was up 0.2 percent, following a rise in global shares on Monday. The index snapped an eight-day winning streak on Monday as investors took profits from last week's rally.

Fears over the U.S. fiscal crisis have dragged on many markets, but regional equities took direction from local factors.

Australian shares <.axjo> led Asia's outperformers with a 0.7 percent gain, lifted by a rise in iron ore prices <.io62-cni> to a five-month high.

"Iron ore is a very key commodity in the Chinese industrial machine, steel usage will bounce back and that is good news for our exporters," said Baillieu Holst director Richard Morrow.

Seoul shares <.ks11> rose marginally but underperformed others in Asia, as investors were reluctant to build positions ahead of South Korea's presidential vote on Wednesday.

In Japan, the Nikkei average <.n225> surged 1.1 percent to an 8-1/2-month high and edged closer to the key 10,000-mark, with sentiment bolstered by a landslide election win for the conservative Liberal Democratic Party on Sunday. <.t/>

LDP leader Shinzo Abe, who is due to be confirmed as Japan's next premier on December 26, is calling for far more aggressive monetary stimulus and huge public works spending to rescue Japan out of decades-long deflation, pledges which are seen pressuring the yen and supporting Japanese stocks by improving earnings for Japanese exporters.

"The Nikkei is up today primarily due to the rise in U.S. stocks overnight, but the 'Abe-effect' is surprisingly longer-lasting as investors seem to be postponing the timing of unwinding their positions until they see the details and specifics in policies," said Ayako Sera, market economist at Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank.

YEN REMAINs PRESSURED

The dollar inched up 0.1 percent to 83.95 yen, off a 20-month high of 84.48 yen hit on Monday but well above its late New York levels on Friday.

Abe applied fresh pressure on the Bank of Japan on Monday, saying that the election result reflected strong public support for his views, which he hoped the BOJ would take into account at its two-day policy meeting starting on Wednesday.

"The dollar has more upside against the yen ahead of the BOJ's meeting, with expectations for some additional easing steps being strengthened after Abe's comments yesterday," said Yuji Saito, director of foreign exchange at Credit Agricole in Tokyo.

"The corrective fall in the dollar/yen after the election was small and it's crawling up because the yen weakening trend is still intact. But after the BOJ meeting, there will likely be pre-holiday profit-taking, pushing the dollar/yen down by 1 to 2 yen," he said, adding that the dollar could temporarily touch 85 yen before profit-taking sets in by the end of the year.

The benchmark 10-year Japanese government bond yield hit a one-month high of 0.750 percent on concerns that big-scale fiscal stimulus could seriously increase the country's debt burden.

U.S. Treasury yields also inched up in Asia, with the 10-year yields briefly reaching 1.796 percent, its highest level since October 26, on hopes for a deal on the U.S. fiscal cliff.

London copper was up 0.2 percent to $8,078.50 a metric ton (1.1023 tons).

U.S. crude rose 0.4 percent to $87.57 a barrel and Brent added 0.5 percent to $108.18.

(Additional reporting by Victoria Thieberger in Melbourne; Editing by Eric Meijer)

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Chávez Party Wins Vote Amid Uncertainty

CARACAS, Venezuela — With President Hugo Chávez cancer-stricken and potentially unable to continue in office, Venezuelans showed overwhelming support for his party in elections for governor on Sunday, giving it control over almost all of the nation’s 23 states.

But voters also delivered an important victory to Mr. Chávez’s main rival, re-electing Henrique Capriles Radonski as governor of one of the most populous states and cementing his position as the opposition’s standard-bearer.

Candidates loyal to Mr. Chávez won in at least 19 states. The opposition, which started the day with governors in eight states, won only two and was leading in a third. In one other state, Bolívar, results were not complete Sunday night.

“This has been an immense victory,” said Jorge Rodríguez, the campaign chief for Mr. Chávez’s United Socialist Party.

Most attention going into the election focused on Mr. Capriles’s state of Miranda, which includes part of Caracas and surrounding areas, and where he faced a difficult race for re-election against an all-out government effort to defeat him.

Mr. Capriles was the candidate of a unified opposition in the presidential race in October, when he ran a strong but losing campaign against Mr. Chávez. He received 6.5 million votes, 44 percent of the total, the best showing by an opposition candidate since Mr. Chávez was first elected in 1998. Mr. Capriles, 40, crisscrossed the nation during his campaign, energizing voters unhappy with the status quo and even finding support in areas that had long been strongholds for Mr. Chávez.

“It’s hard to come here and smile,” Mr. Capriles said on Sunday, referring to the widespread opposition losses. But he added: “This dream we have, I know that it’s around the corner. We will achieve it.”

After the election in October, Mr. Capriles took the politically risky decision to run for re-election in his home state. That made him a target for Mr. Chávez’s government, which saw a chance to weaken him as a serious contender and sow disarray within the opposition.

Mr. Chávez dispatched a former vice president, Elías Jaua, to run against Mr. Capriles, and the government and the United Socialist Party dedicated vast resources to defeat Mr. Capriles.

Mr. Chávez, 58, is in Cuba recovering from what officials have called a complex and difficult cancer operation. If he is not able to begin his new six-year term on Jan. 10, or if he is forced to leave office soon because of poor health, the Constitution says that new elections will have to be called.

If that happens, Mr. Chávez, who has been president for nearly 14 years, has said that Vice President Nicolás Maduro should lead in his place and be his party’s candidate. His blessing is likely to go a long way to shore up support for Mr. Maduro.

But the opposition has never been able to beat Mr. Chávez in a head-to-head race, and running against Mr. Maduro would give it its best chance in years, something that opposition voters had in mind on Sunday.

“This was a trial by fire for him, to show his leadership,” Rubén Colmenares, 24, a university student, said of Mr. Capriles, predicting he could go on to beat Mr. Maduro if a special election was called.

Yet the losses in many other states, especially the large state of Zulia, left the opposition reeling. Supporters of Mr. Chávez in Miranda said they did not think that Mr. Capriles would be able to defeat Mr. Maduro in a special election. “Maduro beats Capriles, the revolution continues — it’s that simple,” said Carlos Bolívar, 40, a street vendor, after voting in Petare, a sprawling Caracas slum. “If Capriles wins, the whole process goes backward 20 years if not 200 years.”

Andrew Rosati contributed reporting.

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Top 5 Apps for Kids This Week

1. PHLIP

Ages 4-up Overall rating: 4.1 out of 5 stars Why we like it: PHLIP is a spatial relations puzzle where you “flip” or turn your screen left or right, like a steering wheel, to change the orientation of the set of tiles, in order to reassemble the picture. You can use photos you take, or choose one from your photo library. Need to know: The more tiles, the harder the puzzle. You can lock any tile by tapping on it. The physical rotation of the device develops motor and cognitive skills and hand-eye coordination. It can also cause your heavy iPad to slip out of your hands. This is a game that works much better on an iPad Mini. Ease of use: 8/10 Educational: 9/10 Entertaining: 7/10 $ 0.99

Click here to view this gallery.

[More from Mashable: How to Crowdsource Your Job Hunt]

Chris Crowell is a veteran kindergarten teacher and contributing editor to Children’s Technology Review, a web-based archive of articles and reviews on apps, technology toys and video games. Download a free issue of CTR here.

In this week’s Top 5 Kids Apps, your kids can play with a spatial puzzle that lets them reassemble photographs they upload themselves. There’s also a chance to learn and have fun with geography trivia and explore Australia with an illustrated story.

[More from Mashable: 4 Benefits of a Job Search Community]

Our friends at Children’s Technology Review shared with us these 5 top apps from their comprehensive monthly database of kid-tested reviews. The site covers everything from math and counting to reading and phonics.

Check back next week for more Top Kids Apps from Children’s Technology Review

Photo via iStockPhoto, cglade

This story originally published on Mashable here.

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Drew Barrymore's Baby & Miley Cyrus's Outfit Get Readers' Top Reactions

By Julia Haskins

12/16/2012 at 09:30 PM EST

Drew Barrymore and Olive. Miley Cyrus

Michael Tran/Filmmagic

We love knowing what's on your mind when you read articles on PEOPLE.com, and as always, you gave us plenty of great feedback this week.

Your emotions ranged from "aww" at the photos of Drew Barrymore's daughter Olive, to "ugh" when it came to Miley Cyrus's questionable outfit choice. You also mourned the loss of a legend, singer Jenni Rivera.

Keep letting us know what's making you smile, frown, or LOL each week by clicking on the buttons at the bottom of every article.

You were nearly as thrilled to welcome Drew Barrymore's baby as the proud mom herself! The actress is over the moon about her new daughter Olive, and describes her feelings for her little as "like the biggest crush I've ever had in my life!"

You were highly impressed by professional builder Johan Huibers's latest creation: A full-scale replica of Noah's Ark. The wooden vessel – which is 427 feet long, 95 feet wide and 75 feet high – is a feat of, well, biblical proportions!

You were heartbroken over the news that Mexican-American singer Jenni Rivera was killed in a plane crash shortly after takeoff early Sunday. Rivera, who was known as the Diva of Banda and sold over 20 million albums worldwide, was 43. Her family is also mourning the tragic loss.

Miley Cyrus didn't leave much to the imagination with a revealing outfit worn on stage at a concert in Hollywood. Readers were angry about the young starlet's ensemble, which consisted of tight pants, knee-high snakeskin boots and a peekaboo top that showed more than just a little cleavage.

Well, this is awkward. You weren't too upset about Track Palin filing for divorce from wife Britta Hanson after a year and a half. Their parting made readers LOL. Palin, the oldest son of former Alaska governor Sarah Palin, and Hanson were former high school sweethearts.

Check back next week for another must-read roundup, and see what readers are reacting to every day here.

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Experts: No link between Asperger's, violence

NEW YORK (AP) — While an official has said that the 20-year-old gunman in the Connecticut school shooting had Asperger's syndrome, experts say there is no connection between the disorder and violence.

Asperger's is a mild form of autism often characterized by social awkwardness.

"There really is no clear association between Asperger's and violent behavior," said psychologist Elizabeth Laugeson, an assistant clinical professor at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Little is known about Adam Lanza, identified by police as the shooter in the Friday massacre at a Newtown, Conn., elementary school. He fatally shot his mother before going to the school and killing 20 young children, six adults and himself, authorities said.

A law enforcement official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the person was not authorized to discuss the unfolding investigation, said Lanza had been diagnosed with Asperger's.

High school classmates and others have described him as bright but painfully shy, anxious and a loner. Those kinds of symptoms are consistent with Asperger's, said psychologist Eric Butter of Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, who treats autism, including Asperger's, but has no knowledge of Lanza's case.

Research suggests people with autism do have a higher rate of aggressive behavior — outbursts, shoving or pushing or angry shouting — than the general population, he said.

"But we are not talking about the kind of planned and intentional type of violence we have seen at Newtown," he said in an email.

"These types of tragedies have occurred at the hands of individuals with many different types of personalities and psychological profiles," he added.

Autism is a developmental disorder that can range from mild to severe. Asperger's generally is thought of as a mild form. Both autism and Asperger's can be characterized by poor social skills, repetitive behavior or interests and problems communicating. Unlike classic autism, Asperger's does not typically involve delays in mental development or speech.

Experts say those with autism and related disorders are sometimes diagnosed with other mental health problems, such as depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder or obsessive-compulsive disorder.

"I think it's far more likely that what happened may have more to do with some other kind of mental health condition like depression or anxiety rather than Asperger's," Laugeson said.

She said those with Asperger's tend to focus on rules and be very law-abiding.

"There's something more to this," she said. "We just don't know what that is yet."

After much debate, the term Asperger's is being dropped from the diagnostic manual used by the nation's psychiatrists. In changes approved earlier this month, Asperger's will be incorporated under the umbrella term "autism spectrum disorder" for all the ranges of autism.

__

AP Writer Matt Apuzzo contributed to this report.

___

Online:

Asperger's information: http://1.usa.gov/3tGSp5

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Wall Street Week Ahead: Holiday "on standby" as clock ticks on cliff

NEW YORK (Reuters) - The last two weeks of December are traditionally quiet for stocks, but traders accustomed to a bit of time off are staying close to their mobile devices, thanks to the "fiscal cliff."

Last-minute negotiations in Washington on the so-called fiscal cliff - nearly $600 billion of tax increases and spending cuts set to take effect in January that could cause a sharp slowdown in growth or even a recession - are keeping some traders and analysts from taking Christmas holidays because any deal could have a big impact on markets.

"A lot of firms are saying to their trading desks, 'You can take days off for Christmas, but you are on standby to come in if anything happens.' This is certainly different from previous years, especially around this time of the year when things are supposed to be slowing down," said J.J. Kinahan, chief derivatives strategist at TD Ameritrade in Chicago.

"Next week is going to be a Capitol Hill-driven market."

With talks between President Barack Obama and House Speaker John Boehner at an apparent standstill, it was increasingly likely that Washington will not come up with a deal before January 1.

Gordon Charlop, managing director at Rosenblatt Securities in New York, will also be on standby for the holiday season.

"It's a 'Look guys, let's just rotate and be sensible" type of situation going on," Charlop said.

"We are hopeful there is some resolution down there, but it seems to me they continue to walk that political tightrope... rather than coming up with something."

Despite concerns that the deadline will pass without a deal, the S&P 500 has held its ground with a 12.4 percent gain for the year. For this week, though, the S&P 500 fell 0.3 percent.

BEWARE OF THE WITCH

This coming Friday will mark the last so-called "quadruple witching" day of the year, when contracts for stock options, single stock futures, stock index options and stock index futures all expire. This could make trading more volatile.

"We could see some heavy selling as there is going to be a lot of re-establishing of positions, reallocation of assets before the year-end," Kinahan said.

RETHINKING APPLE

Higher tax rates on capital gains and dividends are part of the automatic tax increases that will go into effect next year, if Congress and the White House don't come up with a solution to avert the fiscal cliff. That possibility could give investors an incentive to unload certain stocks in some tax-related selling by December 31.

Some market participants said tax-related selling may be behind the weaker trend in the stock price of market leader Apple . Apple's stock has lost a quarter of its value since it hit a lifetime high of $705.07 on September 21.

On Friday, the stock fell 3.8 percent to $509.79 after the iPhone 5 got a chilly reception at its debut in China and two analysts cut shipment forecasts. But the stock is still up nearly 26 percent for the year.

"If you owned Apple for a long time, you should be thinking about reallocation as there will be changes in taxes and other regulations next year, although we don't really know which rules to play by yet," Kinahan said.

But one indicator of the market's reduced concern about the fiscal cliff compared with a few weeks ago, is the defense sector, which will be hit hard if the spending cuts take effect. The PHLX Defense Sector Index <.dfx> is up nearly 13 percent for the year, and sits just a few points from its 2012 high.

(Reporting by Angela Moon; Additional reporting by Chuck Mikolajczak; Editing by Jan Paschal)

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As Gold Is Spirited Out of Afghanistan, Officials Wonder Why

Zalmai for The New York Times

A Kabul jewelry shop. Officials are concerned about gold being flown out of Afghanistan.

KABUL, Afghanistan — Packed into hand luggage and tucked into jacket pockets, roughly hewed bars of gold are being flown out of Kabul with increasing regularity, confounding Afghan and American officials who fear money launderers have found a new way to spirit funds from the country.

Most of the gold is being carried on commercial flights destined for Dubai, according to airport security reports and officials. The amounts carried by single couriers are often heavy enough that passengers flying from Kabul to the Persian Gulf emirate would be well advised to heed warnings about the danger of bags falling from overhead compartments. One courier, for instance, carried nearly 60 pounds of gold bars, each about the size of an iPhone, aboard an early morning flight in mid-October, according to an airport security report. The load was worth more than $1.5 million.

The gold is fully declared and legal to fly. Some, if not most, is legitimately being sent by gold dealers seeking to have old and damaged jewelry refashioned into new pieces by skilled craftsmen in the Persian Gulf, said Afghan officials and gold dealers.

But gold dealers in Kabul and current and former Kabul airport officials say there has been a surge in shipments since early summer. The talk of a growing exodus of gold from Afghanistan has been spreading among the business community here, and in recent weeks has caught the attention of Afghan and American officials. The officials are now puzzling over the origin of the gold — very little is mined in Afghanistan, although larger mines are planned — and why so much appears to be heading for Dubai.

“We are investigating it, and if we find this is a way of laundering money, we will intervene,” said Noorullah Delawari, the governor of Afghanistan’s central bank. Yet he acknowledged that there were more questions than answers at this point. “I don’t know where so much gold would come from, unless you can tell me something about it,” he said in an interview. Or, as a European official who tracks the Afghan economy put it, “new mysteries abound” as the war appears to be drawing to a close.

Figuring out what precisely is happening in the Afghan economy remains as confounding as ever. Nearly 90 percent of the financial activity takes place outside formal banks. Written contracts are the exception, receipts are rare and statistics are often unreliable. Money laundering is commonplace, say Western and Afghan officials.

As a result, with the gold, “right now you’re stuck in that situation we usually are: is there something bad going on here or is this just the Afghan way of commerce?” said a senior American official who tracks illicit financial networks.

There is reason to be suspicious: the gold shipments track with the far larger problem of cash smuggling. For years, flights have left Kabul almost every day carrying thick wads of bank notes — dollars, euros, Norwegian kroner, Saudi Arabian riyals and other currencies — stuffed into suitcases, packed into boxes and shrink-wrapped onto pallets. At one point, cash was even being hidden in food trays aboard now-defunct Pamir Airways flights to Dubai.

Last year alone, Afghanistan’s central bank says, roughly $4.5 billion in cash was spirited out through the airport. Efforts to stanch the flow have had limited impact, and concerns about money laundering persist, according to a report released last week by the United States Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction.

The unimpeded “bulk cash flows raise the risk of money laundering and bulk cash smuggling — tools often used to finance terrorist, narcotics and other illicit operations,” the report said. The cash, and now the gold, is most often taken to Dubai, where officials are known for asking few questions. Many wealthy Afghans park their money and families in the emirate, and gold dealers say more middle-class Afghans are sending money and gold — seen as a safeguard against economic ruin — to Dubai as talk of a postwar economic collapse grows louder.

But given Dubai’s reputation as a haven for laundered money, an Afghan official said that the “obvious suspicion” is that at least some of the apparent growth in gold shipments to Dubai is tied to the myriad illicit activities — opium smuggling, corruption, Taliban taxation schemes — that have come to define Afghanistan’s economy.

There are also indications that Iran could be dipping into the Afghan gold trade. It is already buying up dollars and euros here to circumvent American and European sanctions, and it may be using gold for the same purpose.

Yahya, a dealer in Kabul, said other gold traders were helping Iran buy the precious metal here. Payment was being made in oil or with Iranian rials, which readily circulate in western Afghanistan. The Afghan dealers are then taking it to Dubai, where the gold is sold for dollars. The money is then moved to China, where it was used to buy needed goods or simply funneled back to Iran, said Yahya, who like many Afghans uses a single name.

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