| NASCAR suspends Kurt Busch before Daytona 500 Posted: 20 Feb 2015 04:32 PM PST  The suspension comes hours after a judge said he committed an act of domestic violence.
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| Police: Suspect bragged about Las Vegas road-rage killing Posted: 20 Feb 2015 03:37 PM PST  LAS VEGAS (AP) — The teenage neighbor arrested in what has been described as the road-rage slaying of a Las Vegas mother boasted about the shooting and told friends that he emptied several clips from his semi-automatic handgun during the gunbattle, according to a police report released Friday.
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| Greece wins eurozone bailout deal with strict conditions Posted: 20 Feb 2015 02:58 PM PST  The 19 eurozone finance ministers reached the hard-won deal at tense talks pitting Greece against an angry Germany, suspicious that the new radical leftist government in Athens was looking to ditch its austerity obligations. "The meeting was intense because it was about building trust between us," said Eurogroup head Jeroen Dijsselbloem, after the talks ended with a two-page statement setting out the tough conditions Athens will have to fulfil. Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis said the deal marked a new era for Athens and its relationship with the European Union, after two painful bailouts put together at the height of the debt crisis to save the euro. Athens claimed the rescues and the austerity measures it had to follow since its first 2010 bailout had wrecked the Greek economy, making it impossible to manage its mountain of debt.
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| Suspect in blast near NAACP office: Target was accountant Posted: 20 Feb 2015 04:42 PM PST  COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) — The man accused of setting off a small explosion last month that rattled nerves because of its proximity to a Colorado NAACP office says he was in a rage over his financial problems and was actually targeting his accountant, according to court documents filed Friday.
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| Ex-Virginia first lady Maureen McDonnell sentenced Posted: 20 Feb 2015 03:49 PM PST  McDonnell receives her punishment for a role in a bribery scheme that destroyed her husband's career.
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| Germany, France demand Ukraine ceasefire be 'fully respected' Posted: 20 Feb 2015 12:12 PM PST  Germany and France demanded Friday that a crumbling Ukraine truce be "fully respected" even as pro-Russian rebels celebrated a battlefield victory in a strategic town and exchanged artillery fire elsewhere with government troops. "The ceasefire has been violated several times," French President Francois Hollande said in a joint Paris media conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. French officials said the foreign ministers of Ukraine, Russia, Germany and France would meet in Paris next Tuesday to discuss the conflict.
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| Rand Paul: Presidential announcement likely in March, April Posted: 20 Feb 2015 10:15 AM PST  The senator from Kentucky dropped a big hint about his 2016 ambitions.
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| Greek PM 'certain' euro zone will accept loan deal Posted: 20 Feb 2015 02:06 PM PST  By Jan Strupczewski and Renee Maltezou BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Euro zone finance ministers agreed in principle on Friday to extend Greece's financial rescue by four months, averting a potential cash crunch in March that could have forced the country out of the currency area. The deal, to be ratified once Greece's creditors are satisfied with a list of reforms it will submit next week, ends weeks of uncertainty since the election of a leftist-led government in Athens which pledged to reverse austerity. "Tonight was a first step in this process of rebuilding trust," Jeroen Dijsselbloem, chairman of the 19-nation Eurogroup, told a news conference. "We have established common ground again to reach agreement on this statement." The agreement, clinched after the third ministerial meeting in two weeks of acrimonious public exchanges, offers a breathing space for the new Greek government to try to negotiate longer-term debt relief with its official creditors.
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| Finger-pointing, lawsuits likely to follow 'superbug' scare Posted: 20 Feb 2015 04:19 PM PST  LOS ANGELES (AP) — With an antibiotic-resistant "superbug" outbreak connected to its facility, Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center stopped short of pointing a finger at the manufacturer of a medical instrument believed to have spread the deadly germs. The maker of the product was careful not to blame the hospital as it issued new cleaning instructions emphasizing meticulous manual sterilization.
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| Refugees in Niger live under shadow of Boko Haram Posted: 20 Feb 2015 03:50 AM PST  Aboubacar, usually a worker for a non-governmental organisation, has now taken on another, more ominous role: watching out for suicide bombers. "We watch everyone," he said in Niger's second-largest city of Zinder. His fears reflect the shifting threat of Islamist extremist group Boko Haram, which has in recent weeks carried out attacks across the border from its base in northeastern Nigeria as regional forces pursue them. In the southern city of Zinder, the hot, dusty streets have seen a trail of refugees from Niger's Diffa, about 400 kilometres (250 miles) to the east.
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| Warnings after blizzards sweep across Middle East Posted: 20 Feb 2015 03:12 AM PST  Snow blanketed much of Israel, Jordan and Lebanon early on Friday, with many residents urged to stay in their homes because of blocked or icy roads. People in Jerusalem woke up to around 25 centimetres of snow after the second major blizzard of winter swept across the hilltop Holy City. The two main highways into Jerusalem, which climb to around 795 metres (2,600 feet) above sea level, were closed in both directions for several hours but reopened at around midday, police said. "There's heavy snow falling in Jerusalem, about 25 centimetres (10 inches) so far and it will continue to fall throughout the day," Israel Meteorological Service forecaster Rinat Rehamim told public radio.
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| 'Parks and Recreation' producer Harris Wittels found dead Posted: 19 Feb 2015 10:25 PM PST  LOS ANGELES (AP) — Harris Wittels, who worked as a writer and executive producer on the NBC comedy "Parks and Recreation," was found dead Thursday of a possible drug overdose at his Los Angeles home, police said. He was 30.
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| Eastern U.S. bitter cold snap brings pain, grimaces and wonder Posted: 20 Feb 2015 10:13 AM PST  By Jonathan Allen NEW YORK (Reuters) - Millions of people awoke to painfully cold weather in the eastern United States on Friday, with temperatures frigid enough in New York City and Washington to break decades-old record lows for Feb. 20. At his small grocery store in Brooklyn's Fort Greene neighborhood, Mohammad Islam, 30, anticipated selling a lot of hot coffee as the temperature outside hovered around 4 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 15.6 degrees Celsius), beating the record low of 7 degrees set in 1950 according to National Weather Service records. "I've never seen cold like this," he said unhappily, noting he had moved to New York from Bangladesh in 2003. "All I got to do is dress warm," Ludlow Chamberlain, a 76-year-old custodian at a nearby concert hall, said before counting off his layers on two hands.
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| Pennsylvania college aims to end insurance coverage of abortions in rape cases Posted: 20 Feb 2015 02:59 PM PST By David DeKok HARRISBURG, Pa. (Reuters) - University of Scranton employee insurance plans will no longer cover abortions in cases of rape, incest or life-threatening pregnancies under a plan that the Jesuit school says is consistent with Catholic doctrine. The union negotiated away coverage for elective abortions nine years ago in return for adoption coverage, but its current contract pays for abortions in cases of rape, incest, or to save the live of the mother. In a letter to faculty released by the university on Friday, its president, Rev. Kevin Quinn, said that even limited abortion coverage is "inconsistent with the moral teachings of the church." The move comes as Pope Francis, the first Catholic pontiff who is a member of the Jesuit order, prepares to visit Pennsylvania in September. Michael Friedman, an English professor who serves as union president, insisted that Quinn could not impose the change unilaterally. |
| Amid controversy, oil trains quietly rerouted through Virginia towns Posted: 20 Feb 2015 11:49 AM PST  Hundreds of communities across the United States have become accustomed to the sight of mile-long oil trains rumbling by in recent years. Pembroke, Virginia, was not one of them, until now. CSX Corp is temporarily rerouting up to five oil trains through this small riverside town to bypass the site of an explosive oil train derailment that occurred 90 miles north in Mount Carbon, West Virginia, on Monday. In line with a federal protocol established last year following a string of fiery derailments across North America, the Virginia Department of Emergency Management on Tuesday informed 16 counties and cities that oil trains could be coming through their towns, local officials and fire departments said, one day after the Mount Carbon derailment.
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