NEWS

ELLE Macpherson isn't the only star spending Easter in Sydney. A slew of celebrities, both native and foreign, are planning to open their chocolate eggs in Australia this weekend.

While Hugh Jackman was back on the campaign trail yesterday en route to Korea to further spruik X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Rachel Griffiths, Eric Bana and Matthew McConaughey were already settling in for the break, with Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban still expected.

Having wrapped up work on family TV drama Brothers And Sisters earlier this year, Griffiths has been enjoying some downtime with her family before the August release of new flick Beautiful Kate, her first Aussie movie since Ned Kelly in 2003.

Quietly slipping into town almost two weeks ago with husband Andrew Taylor and children Banjo, 5, and Adelaide, 3, Griffiths, who is six months pregnant, has been enjoying lazy days by the water at their Palm Beach pile.

L'AQUILA, Italy – The death toll in Italy's quake has risen to 250, officials said Wednesday, as strong aftershocks cause further fear among residents sheltered in tent camps.

As rescue teams continued searching through the debris for survivors, the homeless emerged from their tents after spending a second night in chilly mountain temperatures.

"I slept so badly because I kept feeling the aftershocks," said Daniela Nunut, speaking at one of the tent camps set up across L'Aquila. The 46-year Romanian-born woman said she and her companion plan to stay in the tent for now. "What can you do? You can't go into the building."

The magnitude-6.3 quake hit L'Aquila and several towns in central Italy early Monday, leveling buildings and reducing entire blocks to a pile of rubble and dust.

The Civil Protection said that 250 people have died, including 11 who remained to be identified.

Fifteen people remain missing, Civil Protection officials said.

The dead included four students trapped in the rubble of a dormitory of the University of L'Aquila, the ANSA news agency reported.

By Tuesday evening, rescue crews gave up gingerly removing debris by hand and brought in huge pincers that pulled off parts of the dorm roof, balconies and walls, showering debris down.

"Unless there is a miracle, I've been told (by rescuers) that they probably are dead," university rector Ferdinando Di Orio said.

Since the quake Monday, there have been some 430 aftershocks, including some strong ones, said Marco Olivieri of the National Institute of Geophysics and Vulcanology in Rome.

A strong aftershock at 7:47 p.m. Tuesday rained debris on screaming residents and rescue crews, who ran from the site.

Many survivors at the camp said they had been cold during the night as heaters in some of the tents were not working. Some read a newspaper as they lined up for hot coffee or tea and a croissant.

To shelter the homeless against the chilly nights in the mountains, some 20 tent cities have sprouted in open spaces around L'Aquila and surrounding towns. Field kitchens, medical supplies and clowns with bubbles — to entertain traumatized children — were brought in.

NEW YORK – A solution to the world's urban transportation problems could lie in two wheels not four, according to executives for General Motors Corp. and Segway Inc.

The companies announced Tuesday that they are working together to develop a two-wheeled, two-seat electric vehicle designed to be a fast, safe, inexpensive and clean alternative to traditional cars and trucks for cities across the world.

The Personal Urban Mobility and Accessibility, or PUMA, project also would involve a vast communications network that would allow vehicles to interact with each other, regulate the flow of traffic and prevent crashes from happening.

"We're excited about doing more with less," said Jim Norrod, chief executive of Segway, the Bedford, N.H.-based maker of electric scooters. "Less emissions, less dependability on foreign oil and less space."

The 300-pound prototype runs on a lithium-ion battery and uses Segway's characteristic two-wheel balancing technology, along with dual electric motors. It's designed to reach speeds of up to 35 miles-per-hour and can run 35 miles on a single charge.

The companies did not release a projected cost for the vehicle, but said ideally its total operating cost — including purchase price, insurance, maintenance and fuel — would total between one-fourth and one-third of that of the average traditional vehicle.

Larry Burns, GM's vice president of research and development, and strategic planning, said the project is part of Detroit-based GM's effort to remake itself as a purveyor of fuel-efficient vehicles. If Hummer took GM to the large-vehicle extreme, Burns said, the PUMA takes GM to the other.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. securities regulators will consider about 4 proposals to restrict short selling, a type of investing blamed for accelerating the severe downturn in financial services stocks.

Proposals the SEC will consider at its Wednesday meeting include the restoration of the "uptick rule," which allowed short sales -- a bet that a stock's price will fall -- only when the last sale price was higher than the previous price, the chief of the Securities and Exchange Commission said on Monday.

"We are going to put forward about four different proposals, and one of them does include the original (uptick rule)," SEC Chairwoman Mary Schapiro told reporters on the sidelines of the Council of Institutional Investors conference. "There are different modified versions because the markets have changed a lot, even since 2007."