[Lu Stout:] Coming to you live from Hong Kong, you're back watching NEWS STREAM. Now, only hours from now, football's governing body, FIFA, is set to announce the 2011 Player of the Year. Among the nominees, Portugal's Christiano Ronaldo and Spanish star Xavi. But neither is expected to beat this man to the honor, Lionel Messi of Argentina. He's shooting for a third straight award, and CNN's Pedro Pinto has more.
[Pedro Pinto, Cnn International Sports Correspondent:] It's the one party this year no player wants to miss. On Monday evening, the great and the good from the world of football will gather in Zurich to crown the best performers of the past year. The top prize on offer is the 2011 FIFA Ballon d'Or. Lionel Messi of Argentina, Christiano Ronaldo of Portugal, and Xavi of Spain are the nominees. Few are betting against Messi taking home the award for a third straight year. The 24-year-old Barcelona star scored 54 goals in 62 games in all competitions for club and country, while the inspired
[Dwight Yorke, Fmr. Manchester United Forward:] Right now, because of what Barcelona is doing, the way Barcelona is playing, I think Messi certainly was thinking he has the edge over it. But when you look at Ronaldo, what he's doing there single-handedly at Real Madrid is just phenomenal.
[Edgar Davids, Fmr. Juventus Midfielder:] They're great guys, absolutely great personalities. And, you know, as a fan, you just want to see them flourish both, and may the best guy win.
[Pinto:] How tough is it to face a guy like Messi?
[Wojciech Sczesny, Arsenal Goalkeeper:] It's tough. It's tough. But, you know, everyone knows Messi is the best player in the world. I personally think that in a few years, we'll be talking about the best player in history of football.
[Edwin Van Der Sar, Fmr. Manchester United Goalkeeper:] The thing with Ronaldo is, when I met him six years ago, he said, "I want to be the best player in the world." And probably a lot of people say that, a lot of players say that, but he's someone who really worked on it.
[Pinto:] Brazilian superstar Marta is aiming to win the FIFA's Women's World Player of the Year Award for an unprecedented six times. The other nominees are World Cup winner Homare Sawa of Japan and team USA's forward, Abby Wambach. There are other prizes that will be given out in Zurich. Alex Ferguson, Pep Guardiola and Jose Mourinho will battle it out for the Coach of the Year Award.
[Gabrielle Marcotti, Italian Journalist:] I'll sound boring and I will say Pep Guardiola. And it's not just the football played in winning the champions league so seemingly effortlessly last year. It was also the philosophy that he brought and also that willingness to renew yourself. You know, this year we've seen them move to a 3-4-3 at times, we've seen them use players in different positions. It's almost as if he's not content to sit with what he has, but he's always looking to go to the next level. And he's delivering results as well.
[Lu Stout:] And we will have more sports a little later in the hour. Can Tim Tebow continue his incredible run against the Pittsburgh Steelers? We've got the highlights coming up. And we look at the heady process of the U.S. caucuses and primaries and tell you why some people think the system needs to be changed. I'm Kristie Lu Stout in Hong Kong. You're watching News Stream. And these are your world headlines. Now police in Nigeria have reportedly shot and killed a protester in the city of Legos. Heated demonstrations like this have been ongoing since the start of January when the government stopped subsidizing the cost of fuel. The Reuters news agency says three other people were also injured in the altercation. Malaysia's high court has acquitted opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim of sodomy. Anwar said that the charges were an attempt to end his political career. And the verdict has concluded a two year trial means that he is now able to run in this year's election. Iran state run media say an Iranian-American has been sentenced to death for spying. Former U.S. marine Amir Hakmati was found guilty of working for the CIA. His family doesn't believe his confession was voluntary. Hakmati was arrested in Iran while visiting relatives in August. And more talks between France and Germany about Europe's debt crisis. German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy are meeting in Berlin with the emphasis on getting the EuroZone economy growing again. A key part of that is getting EuroZone countries to accept greater supervision of their budgets. And U.S. Republicans still hoping to win their party's nomination have one last day to campaign before the primary in New Hampshire. And the race is now down to six major candidates. Opinion polls suggest that former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney will win tomorrow's vote. And critics charge that the U.S. voting process flawed. And tradition aside, they say the system as it stands today shows statistical bias. Jonathan Mann has more.
[Jonathan Mann, Cnn Correspondent:] The United States is one of the world's oldest democracies, but many critics say this is no way to elect a president and here is why. The first two nominating contests are in Iowa and New Hampshire. A win in either state can give a candidate momentum. But there's a problem with giving those two states so much power, they're tiny. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Iowa is the 30th biggest state in the U.S. by population, New Hampshire the 40th. Together, they make up less than 1.5 percent of the population and yet they could decide the Republican nominee for president. Another criticism is the state's racial make-up. 94 percent of Iowa residents white, New Hampshire is even whiter, more than 95 percent white. Those states don't reflect a country where fewer than two-thirds are citizens, but they still play a huge role in the process and give the winners a boost they can use in fundraising. Which is the next issue: money. That's Mitt Romney's opinion, and the U.S. Supreme Court agrees. The court has ruled that corporations and unions have the right to free speech, including the right to run ads that address issues without endorsing a particular candidate. That allowed groups known as Super PACs, or political action comimttees, to raise and spend limitless amounts of money. Romney has been a big beneficiary.
[Announcer:] Haven't we had enough mistakes?
[Mann:] Restore Our Future is a Super PAC created to support Romney. It spent $3 million in Iowa to bash Romney's rivals and President Barack Obama too. But it isn't just a Republican tactic. Priorities USA, a pro Obama Super PAC, raked in more than $3 million in the same period. Both groups, by law, aren't controlled by the actual campaigns, but they are led by former aids and supporters. That means a potential third party would need a huge bank roll to even think about running against the Democrats and Republicans. Including congressional races, one analyst believes $8 billion could be spent in the 2012 election, $8 billion. That's $26 for every man, woman, and child in the country. After all is said and done, an American candidate can win more votes than his or her opponent and still lose. It happened most recently in 2000 where Al Gore lost to George W. Bush despite winning half a million more votes. Gore can blame the electoral college, the system designed by the founding fathers creates a winner take all race in each of the 50 states. Then those states cast votes for president regardless of the overall result. States that fell heavily to one party or the other where a candidate knows they'll win or lose can be safely ignored during the campaign. A handful of swing states like Ohio or Florida will decide the election. Carry those two and a candidate can start picking out the drapes for the Oval Office. Jonathan Mann, CNN, Atlanta.
[Lu Stout:] Now this is the fate of a cargo ship that ran aground on a reef off the coast of New Zealand in October last year. The Rena has split in two, spewing containers and other debris and triggering fears of a fresh oil spill. Now hundreds of tons of oil have already leaked form the ship. And New Zealand's environment minister has called the Rena's grounding the country's worst maritime environmental disaster. And this is where the Rena is stuck, it's about 12 nautical miles, or 22 kilometers off the coast of New Zealand's North Island near the resort city of Tauranga. Now this is the Rena this Monday as seen from an observation flyby by the Maritime New Zealand Agency. And the sections of the ship are now about 30 meters apart, but they are still lodged on the Astrolabe reef. And this is the kind of damage that, compounded by the bad weather, saw the vessel split up. And even in this photograph from back in October it shows an already wide fracture on the starboard side of the stranded ship. And then the ship, it was listing badly leading to dramatic images like this showing containers starting to spill over the side. Now Maritime New Zealand now says that 150 containers have since been lost to the sea. And 12 containers, like this one in this image, have washed ashore. Now 40 more are floating in the water, but it could have been worse. Salvage crews have been working for months to remove containers safely from the Rena's holds. And take a look at this, now on the left you can see the Rena as she was in October, piled high with containers. And on the right, just half of the ship is seen today, almost empty. Now, bad weather is still forecasted in the area. Let's get the forecast now with Mari Ramos. She joins us live from the world weather center Mari.
[Mari Ramos, Cnn Weather Correspondent:] Hey, Kristie, those pictures are really amazing when you think about how large that ship was, how many containers were on board, how big each one of those containers is and to have so many of them lost at sea, that is a concern, because some of them could break up and some of that debris could float into those beaches. They say Maritime New Zealand said that 12 container ships have actually rested on the shore already like you mentioned. So that is definitely a big deal. Now we've had worse weather. And of course over the weekend it was worse when ship was breaking up, but we're in between systems, so to speak. We have an area of low pressure that will be coming along. You can see a little bit of a circulation right there over the North Island of New Zealand. If that comes through, we are expecting some more rain across the area. So there's going to be a lot of different things that they're going to have to deal with over the next 24 hours at least. Now the salvage crews can not get on board to actually remove containers off the ship or do any kind of work on any of the salvage operations, because the weather has been bad. Not only do they have to deal with those two meter swells minimum as we head through the next day or so, but also the winds will be quite strong. Anything over 20 kilometer per hour winds, those rescue personnel will not go onboard, because it would be too dangerous. Now there's also going to be rain at times and poor visibility is still a huge concern. They have to make sure that everything is OK before they can actually continue their work not just on the ship itself, but remember on shore as well. The crews are standing by waiting for breaks in the weather. We should see an improvement as we head to tomorrow night. So at least a little bit of a hope here so they can get their work going again. And that's just so painful for people to watch and have to wait. And they wonder why they're not doing more, because the weather is so bad. They just have to wait until it gets a little better. And the weather will be improving across Madagascar here. Here you see the island of Madagascar, there's Mozambique. Here's the rest of Africa. And we had a tropical cyclone that made landfall in the last 24 hours. I did want to show you, though, that we're still expecting some heavy rain with this weather system. So that's still going to be a concern. The threat for flooding and mudslides even as the storm continues to dissipate over the high terrain there. Let's go ahead and move on and talk a little bit about the weather in Asia. I want to start you in South Asia first of all. And let's head to Pakistan over here. Across the north Pakistan, Islamabad, of course a large city, over a million people in population. Well, the city kind of spills over a little bit over into the mountainous areas. And in the mountains, they've had their first snowfall since 2005. This is actually pretty cool. For most people, a welcome sight. But it has caused some problems. Kids overall appeared to be enjoying it, but there have been some problems with transportation, with power outages, and of course it is still so cold over this region. Let's go ahead and check out your forecast next. It's 11 in Islamabad right now. That's not too bad, right? It's of course much colder as we head into areas to the north. This is a picture from Srinagar in India. Talk about breaking the ice there, Kristie. They are trying to get moving through some of these lakes and river systems, but it has been very difficult. A lot of power outages in those areas as well. As we head to east Asia, temperatures remain fairly cold, especially in the north. Bad air quality again, a problem for you in Beijing. And some rain showers expected as we head across through the Philippines, nothing to be too concerned about, but just some scattered rain showers in your forecast. And in Europe, what a flip-flop of temperatures we've had. Still very warm here across the west. And the snowfall will continue in areas to the east. Watch for some heavy snowfall as we head back over into eastern Europe, Turkey, and also through the Alps. Some welcome snowfall again over these areas, but it remained warm here across much of the west. Above average temperatures. It's 11 in London right now, Kristie. Talk about a January thaw. 11 will be the high over the next three days in the city. Back to you.
[Lu Stout:] Well, folks they better enjoy it. Mari Ramos, thank you and take here. Now ahead on News Stream, peace on the peninsula, a new generation of South Koreans tries to break down barriers with the north. We'll get how that is affecting the country's relationship with China. Stay with us.