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Quazi Mohammad Rezwanul Ahsan Nafis, 21, was arrested in Manhattan after he tried to detonate what he thought was a live bomb, but was actually a dummy provided in a sting operation, federal prosecutors in Brooklyn said.

NEW YORK — A Bangladeshi man arrested in a sting operation denied on Tuesday charges that he attempted to blow up the Federal Reserve Bank in New York last month with what authorities say he believed was a 1,000-pound bomb.

During a brief hearing in Brooklyn federal court, Quazi Mohammad Rezwanul Ahsan Nafis, 21, pleaded not guilty to a two-count indictment charging him with attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction and attempting to provide material support to a U.S.-designated foreign terrorist organization, al-Qaida. He faces life in prison if convicted.

Nafis appeared in court wearing a tan, prison jumpsuit and did not speak during the hearing. His lawyer and a lawyer for the government, James Loonam, said discussions were being held about a possible plea negotiation.

His lawyer and a spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office in Brooklyn declined to comment to reporters.

From Bangladesh, the suspect's father has denied his son was involved and said he was the victim of a "racist conspiracy."

Nafis was arrested on Oct. 17 after pulling up to the Federal Reserve near Wall Street and attempting to detonate what he believed to be a van packed with explosives.

The inert explosives had been provided to Nafis by an undercover agent as part of a sting operation, federal authorities said.

A criminal complaint unsealed last month against Nafis said he traveled to the United States in 2012, and eventually moved to Queens, New York.

The complaint alleged he scouted out targets for a potential attack, considering the New York Stock Exchange and a high-ranking government official identified as U.S. President Barack Obama. He eventually settled on the Federal Reserve Bank, the complaint said.

Federal Reserve plot suspect thought he had 1,000-pound bomb

Nafis attempted to recruit others to his plan, claiming he was in contact with al-Qaida operatives, the complaint said.

One of the individuals he brought onboard was an undercover agent working for the FBI, who monitored Nafis' activities and helped arm him with the inoperable explosives, federal authorities said.

Nafis is scheduled to appear next in court on Jan. 9.

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WASHINGTON — All nations will suffer the effects of a warmer world, but it is the world's poorest countries that will be hit hardest by food shortages, rising sea levels, cyclones and drought, the World Bank said in a report on climate change. 

Under new World Bank President Jim Yong Kim, the global development lender has launched a more aggressive stance to integrate climate change into development. 

"We will never end poverty if we don't tackle climate change. It is one of the single biggest challenges to social justice today," Kim told reporters on a conference call on Friday. 

The report, called "Turn Down the Heat," highlights the devastating impact of a world hotter by 4 degrees Celsius (7.2 Fahrenheit) by the end of the century, a likely scenario under current policies, according to the report. 

Climate change is already having an effect: Arctic sea ice reached a record minimum in September, and extreme heat waves and drought in the last decade have hit places like the United States and Russia more often than would be expected from historical records, the report said. 

Such extreme weather is likely to become the "new normal" if the temperature rises by 4 degrees, according to the World Bank report. This is likely to happen if not all countries comply with pledges they have made to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Even assuming full compliance, the world will warm by more than 3 degrees by 2100. 

In this hotter climate, the level of the sea would rise by up to 3 feet, flooding cities in places like Vietnam and Bangladesh. Water scarcity and falling crop yields would exacerbate hunger and poverty. 

Extreme heat waves would devastate broad swaths of the earth's land, from the Middle East to the United States, the report says. The warmest July in the Mediterranean could be 9 degrees hotter than it is today -- akin to temperatures seen in the Libyan desert. 

The combined effect of all these changes could be even worse, with unpredictable effects that people may not be able to adapt to, said John Schellnhuber, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, which along with Climate Analytics prepared the report for the World Bank. 

"If you look at all these things together, like organs cooperating in a human body, you can think about acceleration of this dilemma," said Schellnhuber, who studied chaos theory as a physicist. "The picture reads that this is not where we want the world to go.

Shocked into action
As the first scientist to head the World Bank, Kim has pointed to "unequivocal" scientific evidence for man-made climate change to urge countries to do more. 

Kim said 97 percent of scientists agree on the reality of climate change. 

"It is my hope that this report shocks us into action," Kim, writes in the report. 

Scientists are convinced that global warming in the past century is caused by increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases produced by human activities such as the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation. These findings by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change were recognized by the national science academies of all major industrialized nations in a joint statement in 2010.

Kim said the World Bank plans to further meld climate change with development in its programs.

Last year, the Bank doubled its funding for countries seeking to adapt to climate change, and now operates $7.2 billion in climate investment funds in 48 countries. 

The World Bank study comes as almost 200 nations will meet in Doha, Qatar, from Nov. 26 to Dec. 7 to try to extend the Kyoto Protocol, the existing plan for curbing greenhouse gas emissions by developed nations that runs to the end of the year. 

They have been trying off and on since Kyoto was agreed in 1997 to widen limits on emissions but have been unable to find a formula acceptable to both rich and poor nations. 

Emerging countries like China, the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, have said the main responsibility to cut emissions lies with developed nations, which had a headstart in sparking global warming. 

Combating climate change also poses a challenge for the poverty-fighting World Bank: how to balance global warming with immediate energy needs in poor countries.

In 2010, the World Bank approved a $3.75 billion loan to develop a coal-fired power plant in South Africa despite lack of support from the United States, Netherlands and Britain due to environmental concerns. 

"There really is no alternative to urgent action given the devastating consequences of climate change," global development group Oxfam said in a statement. "Now the question for the World Bank is how it will ensure that all of its investments respond to the imperatives of the report." 

Kim said the World Bank tries to avoid investing in coal unless there are no other options. 

"But at the same time, we are the group of last resort in finding needed energy in countries that are desperately in search of it," he said. 

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Jill Kelley and Paula Broadwell, the two women at the center of the David Petraeus scandal, both visited the White House multiple times during the last four years. 

Kelley  has visited three times since September of this year, and Broadwell’s two visits were in 2009 and 2011,  a White House official told NBC News on Friday, speaking on condition of anonymity. 

Kelley’s trips were set up by a White House staffer she met at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Fla., where she served as an unpaid social coordinator.

The staffer hosted Kelley and her twin sister, Natalie Khawam, for breakfast in the White House cafeteria, known as the mess, on Sept. 28 and again, for lunch, on Oct. 24. 

The third visit, on Sunday, Nov. 4, occurred just three days before Gen. Petraeus resigned as CIA director, citing an extramarital affair.  Kelley also took a tour of the White House that day with her husband, Scott, and their three children, as well as Khawam and her child. 

Broadwell visited the White House twice -- in June 2009, when she met with a National Security Staff member who handled Afghanistan and Pakistan policy, and in June 2011 when she attended a broad briefing on Afghanistan-Pakistan for approximately 20 guests, according to the White House official. 

The women have emerged as key figures in the scandal that cost Petraeus his job.

Numerous government and law enforcement officials have told NBC News that Kelley inadvertently triggered the investigation that revealed Petraeus' extramarital affair with Broadwell, his biographer, by complaining to an FBI agent she knew about a series of harassing emails she had received. Agents investigating the cyber-harassment case first determined that Broadwell was the author of the emails, then found evidence of her affair with Petraeus, the officials said.

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One of the veterans killed when a train crashed into a parade float in Texas on Thursday is being hailed as a “hero” for saving his wife just moments before he lost his own life.

Joshua Michael, a 34-year-old Army staff sergeant and recipient of two Purple Heart decorations, pushed his wife, Daylyn, off the trailer just before the train hit, according to a family friend. At least 17 people were injured, one critically, and four were killed as a result of the accident, Midland city officials said. 

Twenty-four veterans and their spouses were on the tractor-trailer, according to the Midland Reporter-Telegram.  

“I think it was just pandemonium more than anything else,” Corey Rogers, a close friend of the Michael family, said on TODAY. “Obviously, Joshua had the reaction of a real man.”

Daylyn survived and was not one of the 17 injured. Her husband was transported to Midland Memorial Hospital where he was later pronounced dead. Rogers said Daylyn flew back to her home shortly after to be with her family. Rogers did the interview with TODAY on her behalf.

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“I think everybody’s still in shock just trying to take the news in,” Rogers said. “That’s not easy news to share with anyone, let alone kids who’ve seen their dad go to war and come back and have just now kind of gotten him back, really, in their lives.”

Rogers described Michael as a family man and an “all-around American hero” who liked to hunt and play the guitar and drums.

On Friday, police confirmed the identities of the other three victims of the accident.

Army Sgt. Maj. Gary Stouffer, 37, and Army Sgt. Maj. Lawrence Boivin, 47, were pronounced dead at the scene. Army Sgt. Maj. William Lubbers was pronounced dead at Midland hospital.

NBC station KWES of Midland said the tractor-trailer was part of the Show of Support / Hunt for Heroes parade carrying veterans and their spouses to a banquet in their honor. The benefit dinner was being put on by Show of Support, Military Hunt Inc. in Midland on Thursday night, according to the organization's website.

The parade and banquet were leading up to a whitetail deer-hunting trip for the veterans, according to the Midland Reporter-Telegram. Show of Support president and founder Terry Johnson told KEWS that the events were canceled.

According to the website, the organization demonstrates support for members of the military and seeks to bring public awareness of hunting and fishing.

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Midland Police spokesman Ryan Stout said the crash occurred at 4:36 p.m. local time when an eastbound train hit the flatbed trailer. He said the flatbed was the last of two in the parade attempting to cross the tracks.

The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the crash. At a news conference in Midland on Friday, NTSB spokesman Mark Rosekind said the crossing had flashing lights as well as gate arms, but board had not determined if those were functioning at the time of the accident.

Rosekind said the locomotive had a forward-facing video camera and a sheriff's vehicle directly behind the float had a dashboard camera, and the images would be analyzed in Washington. 

He said there had been 10 train-vehicle collisions at that intersection between 1979 and 1997, but nothing there since then. None of the 10 collisions involved fatalities, he said.

There have been 477 railway-related fatalities between January and August of this year, according to federal railroad safety data. Of those, 93 were related to Union Pacific Railroad, which covers 23 states across the western United States.

In a statement, Union Pacific spokesman Tom Lange said the crossing in Midland has a gate and lights.

“Our preliminary investigation indicates that the lights and gates were operating at the time. Additionally our two person crew sounded the locomotive horn,” Lange said.

Lange said the two-person Union Pacific crew was uninjured.

The National Transportation Safety Board told NBC News that a team has been sent to investigate the accident.

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In his first substantive comments about climate change in months, President Barack Obama on Wednesday vowed to do more in his second term -- just not at the expense of jobs and economic growth.

The president got support from mainstream environmentalists, but criticism from activists wanting climate at the top of the policy pile. 

"We haven't done as much as we need to," Obama said in response to a reporter's question about climate policy that was asked at a wide-ranging White House news conference.

Obama did not provide specifics, but said he would talk with "scientists, engineers and elected officials" in the next few months to make more short-term progress on reducing carbon emissions.

Longer term, he said, a national conversation is needed "to make sure that this is not something we're passing on to future generations."

Obama emphasized, however, that Americans "have been so focused on, and will continue to be focused on, our economy, jobs and growth."

"If the message is somehow we're going to ignore jobs and growth simply to address climate change," he added, "I don't think anybody's going to go for that. I won't go for that."

But if the plan is to "create jobs, advance growth and make a serious dent in climate change ... I think that's something the American people would support," Obama said.

The president didn't spell out how, but his first-term climate policies focused on stimulating jobs in industries reducing carbon emissions.

The balancing act did not go over well with Forecast the Facts, a climate activist group.

"The president’s assertion that addressing climate change should be secondary to concerns about the economy is a gross disappointment," Brad Johnson, the group's campaign manager, said in a statement. "While conventional D.C. wisdom is focused on the manufactured crisis of the 'fiscal cliff,' the truth is that the most urgent threat to our national safety and economic well-being is the climate cliff that we are already beginning to tumble over."

At the Sierra Club, blogger Paul Rauber gave Obama the benefit of his doubt about long-term action, but added: "I hope we don't wait too long."

The Natural Resources Defense Council was more generous. 

"President Obama already has done more to combat climate change than his 43 predecessors combined," NRDC President Frances Beinecke said in a statement. "He’s determined to do more, and we’re ready to help him finish the job."

But she also was quick to offer policy advice. "The next step," she urged, "is to go after the biggest sources of carbon pollution -- power plants."

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The climate issue was largely absent from the presidential campaign.

Republican nominee Mitt Romney mocked Obama's stance, telling his party's convention in August that "President Obama promised to begin to slow the rise of the oceans and to heal the planet. My promise is to help you and your family." 

Obama did pick up a late endorsement from New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, whose city was battered by Hurricane Sandy on Oct. 29.

Bloomberg said he favored Obama, in part, because he "sees climate change as an urgent problem that threatens our planet."

While climate scientists decline to attribute individual weather events to global warming, many believe extreme storms like Sandy, along with more intense droughts, wildfires and floods, will become more common if temperatures continue to warm.  

After Obama's comments Wednesday, Bloomberg welcomed the national conversation proposed by the president. "I look forward to supporting that new effort in any way I can," he said in a statement.

U.S. lawmakers in 2009 did debate so-called cap-and-trade legislation meant to limit carbon emissions, but that attempt died and has not been re-introduced.

California on Wednesday did launch its own statewide cap-and-trade system. 

Reuters contributed to this report.

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The chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee says she will seek testimony from former CIA Director David Petraeus, who resigned Friday as CIA director after acknowledging an extramarital affair, about the September attack on the consulate in Benghazi, Libya, that left four Americans dead.

“I have no doubt now that we will need to talk with David Petraeus and we will likely do that in closed session. But it will be done one way or another,” Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., told NBC News’ Andrea Mitchell on Monday.

Feinstein also she also may subpoena reports on a trip Petraeus took to Libya in the last year.

“I believe that Director Petraeus made a trip to the region shortly before this (Petraeus affair) became public,” Feinstein said on "Andrea Mitchell Reports." “We have asked to see the trip report. One person tells me he’s read it, and then we try to get it and they tell me it hasn’t been done. That’s unacceptable.” 

“It may have some very relevant information to what happened in Benghazi,” Feinstein said.

A week and a half ago, Petraeus went to Tripoli and conducted a personal inquiry into the Benghazi attack, NBC News has confirmed.

Petraeus has not commented on his trip to Benghazi last month.

Petraeus revelation began as cyber-harassment probe

Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, information management officer Sean Smith and security personnel Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty were killed in the Benghazi attack on Sept. 11-12.

Petraeus, a decorated four-star general who received widespread praise for the surge strategy that helped stabilize the insurgency in Iraq, resigned as CIA director on Friday, citing an extramarital affair.

Numerous federal government officials have told NBC News that the married general had a relationship with his biographer, Paula Broadwell, 40, who authored “All In,” a book about Petraeus’ education.

Feinstein said she received no advance notice of Petraeus’ resignation or the affair.

The affair came to light after an FBI investigation into harassing emails sent to a family friend of Petraeus, Jill Kelley, sources have told NBC News. The investigation traced the emails to Broadwell, who revealed the affair. Petraeus also admitted the affair.

The FBI determined that no criminal charges would be filed as a result of the investigation.

Lawmakers question timing of Petraeus resignation

But now, Feinstein has linked the Petraeus affair with another controversy within the Obama administration – the attack on the Benghazi diplomatic mission in Libya.

The Senate Intelligence committee planned to start closed-door hearings on the Benghazi attack on Thursday with further proceedings expected to follow. Petraeus had been expected to testify at the hearings before he resigned as CIA director.

Republican lawmakers and Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney have criticized the administration’s evolving explanation of what triggered the Benghazi attack. Officials early on said it was a spontaneous reaction during a protest about an anti-Islamic film. Later, it was termed a planned terrorist attack.

Questions have also been raised about whether the consulate had adequate security and whether the State Department responded appropriately to requests for more protection.

Feinstein also questioned Broadwell's role as Petraeus' biographer. 

“It’s a rather confused situation because  at one point she was an Army reservist doing intelligence-related work, at the same time she was doing a journalist’s work, a biography on David Petraeus,” Feinstein said. “It seems to me these two things don’t go together, it seems to me someone who becomes active military should not be writing a book.”

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