Feds probing Connecticut train crash

Sat, 18 May 2013 19:02:32 GMT

Train service in the busy New York-to-New Haven corridor may be restricted for days as officials investigate Friday's rush-hour collision of two trains in Connecticut -- an incident that sent dozens to hospitals -- officials said Saturday.

Officials from the federal National Transportation Safety Board arrived at the site Saturday morning to begin their investigation of the Metro-North train crash in Bridgeport, Connecticut. The wreckage won't be removed until investigators finish examining it on site -- possibly Sunday, NTSB member Earl Weener said -- and then two tracks will have to be repaired before they can be reopened.

While that happens, a long stretch of rail that tens of thousands of passengers take daily will be shut down. That includes Metro North service for a 30-mile stretch between New Haven and South Norwalk, Connecticut, and Amtrak service between New York and New Haven -- both closed indefinitely.

"I think this is going to be with us for a number of days," Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy told reporters Saturday morning.

The two Metro-North passenger trains, heading in opposite directions, collided Friday evening in southwestern Connecticut, damaging both trains and leaving some people critically injured.

The accident occurred when a train heading from New York City to New Haven derailed around 6:10 p.m. That train struck the other train in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Weener said Saturday.

Three people still were in critical condition Saturday morning, according to Andrew Doba, spokesman for Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy. The governor had said Friday night that five people were seriously injured.

Of the 70 people taken to hospitals Friday, nine remained in the facilities Saturday morning, hospital representatives told CNN.

The damage to the tracks and several train cars is "absolutely staggering," said U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Connecticut, who visited the site with other officials Saturday. Wreckage littered an area of about 200 yards, officials said.

"Ribbons of the sides of cars are torn away like ribbons of cloth," Blumnethal said. "Tons of metal tossed around like toy things. The insides of cars are shattered."

The cause of the derailment wasn't immediately known. Investigators will look at a number of things, including the trains' braking performance, wheel and track conditions, and speed and other information from data recorders, NTSB member Earl Weener said Saturday.

A passenger in a middle car of the New York-bound train, Chris Martin, said his car went dark after the crash.

He then heard someone yell over the intercom for "all the doctors up front."

Martin said his crowded train was evacuated. Everybody on his train was physically fine, he said, but many were shaken emotionally. He said he saw injured people outside the train.

Brian Alvarez said he saw the wreckage.

"I saw this one car and it was completely destroyed, and they were pulling people out of the car," Alvarez said. "... They were all bloody."

Bridgeport Mayor Bill Finch said Friday that travel headaches could persist for weeks because the two tracks affected by the derailment -- which are both "shot right now" -- may take weeks to repair. Cranes will have to remove the wreckage from the tracks once the NTSB has finished its on-site probe.

Because of a bridge replacement project, those two tracks are the only way in and out of New York City by train from that part of Connecticut.

Malloy said the state would set up a system taking rail Metro North patrons from Bridgeport to the closest operable station, in South Norwalk, during the shutdown.

France signs same-sex marriage bill into law

Sat, 18 May 2013 18:39:16 GMT

French President Francois Hollande signed into law Saturday a bill allowing same-sex couples to marry and adopt.

It came a day after the nation's top court, the Constitutional Council, ruled that the bill adheres to the constitution.

"The most historic part is that future generations will no longer have to ask themselves if they have the right to marry and if they are recognized by their country because now they are," Vincent Autin told CNN affiliate BFMTV.

He and his companion said they plan to become the first same-sex couple to tie the knot in France when they do so on May 29 in Montpellier.

The city in southern France issued a statement inviting people to attend.

Autin, who had campaigned for the change, said the new law represents "the vision of modernity, the vision of equality, the vision of respect for all and for all couples, all the children."

In a last-ditch attempt to stop the bill from becoming law, conservative opponents filed a legal challenge after lawmakers approved it.

Passing legislation to allow same-sex marriage was one of Hollande's election pledges in campaigning last year.

In a statement Friday, he recognized the controversial nature of the bill, but said France was able to listen to and respect different points of view.

"I'm convinced that with the passage of time this law will be seen for what it is: progress for equality and for freedom," he said.

The move was opposed by many conservatives and the Catholic Church in France, prompting hundreds of thousands of people to turn out for protest marches in Paris as politicians debated the bill.

Many conservatives and the Catholic Church opposed the move, prompting hundreds of thousands of protesters to march in Paris as politicians debated the bill.

The new law, published Saturday morning after Hollande's signature, admits France to a small but growing club.

It is the ninth country in Europe to allow same sex marriage.

Lawmakers in New Zealand this year made it the first country in the Asia-Pacific region to legalize same-sex marriage. The law is set to be enacted later this year.

Uruguayan lawmakers have also approved a measure allowing same-sex marriage. It awaits the signature of Uruguay's president, who has indicated he supports it.

If the laws in New Zealand and Uruguay are enacted as expected, the count of nations allowing same-sex marriage will rise to 14.

The first same-sex couples walked down the aisle in the Netherlands in 2001, with others following suit in Canada, South Africa, Belgium and Spain. Argentina was the first Latin American nation to legalize such marriages, in 2010. Other countries on the list are Denmark, Iceland, Norway, Portugal and Sweden.

Many countries remain split over the issue. A Brazilian court this week issued a directive removing a barrier that had limited same-sex marriage, but no bill has made it through Congress.

Legislators in the United Kingdom are also weighing proposals to legalize same-sex marriage. Lawmakers in Australia voted against a bill to legalize same-sex marriage last September. A poll for the advocacy group Australian Marriage Equality indicated that 64% of those surveyed "support marriage equality."

In the United States, the question went before the Supreme Court and justices are deliberating over the matter.

Twelve U.S. states and the District of Columbia have legalized same-sex marriages. On the other side, many states have specific laws blocking same-sex couples from legally marrying.

GOP: IRS scandal one more strike against health care law

Sat, 18 May 2013 18:23:44 GMT

Republicans capped the week with another attack against President Obama's health care reform, criticizing the law and its relationship with the Internal Revenue Service.

"It's the IRS that will be responsible for enforcing many of these regulations. If we've learned anything this week, it's that the IRS needs less power, not more," Rep. Andy Harris of Maryland, an anesthesiologist of nearly 30 years' experience, said Saturday in the Republican weekly address.

The Republican-controlled House passed for the third time a repeal of Obamacare this week, a measure that has little chance of going anywhere in the Senate. The vote marked the 37th time Republicans have attempted to eliminate the 2010 law.

Adding fuel to their fire this week was the controversy in which the IRS admitted to targeting conservative groups applying for tax exempt status during the past three years. Two top officials stepped down over the ordeal, a scandal that drew scorn from President Obama and Treasury Secretary Jack Lew.

While the outgoing IRS commissioner, Steven Miller, said the over-scrutinizing of the groups amounted to "foolish mistakes," he maintained in a congressional hearing Friday that they were not conducted out of political bias.

Republicans, however, used the controversy to further criticize health care reform, as the IRS is tasked with implementing many of the law's provisions. Lawmakers also highlighted the fact that the current director of the Affordable Care Act office in the IRS used to head up the agency's tax exempt/government entities office, the same department taking heat over the recent dust-up with conservative groups.

"You can't make this stuff up," Harris said in the address.

With several of the health care reforms taking effect next year, Republicans are drumming up more opposition to the law. Harris argued the law's mandate to purchase health insurance would "turn lives upside down" and fears of rising costs are discouraging small business owners from hiring new workers.

"Obamacare is knocking Americans off the ladder of opportunity, and the sooner we repeal it, the sooner we can start fixing health care for working families," said the congressman, who was elected in 2010.

Americans remain divided over Obamacare. Forty-six percent disapprove of the law, while 41% approve of the 2010 health care reform act, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released last month.

Forty-one percent said the law will not affect them, while 37% say it will hurt rather than help, the poll showed.

U.N.: Syria refugee count past 1.5 million

Sat, 18 May 2013 18:00:16 GMT

The number of Syrian civilians who have fled their country to escape the civil war has passed 1.5 million, the U.N. refugee agency said Friday.

"The Syrian conflict continues to have a devastating impact on the lives of those who are forced to flee," said Dan McNorton, a spokesman for the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, in Geneva, Switzerland.

"Refugees tell us the increased fighting and changing of control of towns and villages, in particular in conflict areas, results in more and more civilians deciding to leave. Over the past four months, we have seen a rapid deterioration when compared to the previous 20 months of this conflict," he said.

The real number of refugees is probably much higher, McNorton said, adding that "this is due to concerns that some Syrians have regarding registration."

Since the start of 2013 alone, UNHCR has registered close to 1 million refugees -- which amounts to about 250,000 people each month.

Along with the refugees, more than 4 million people have been internally displaced, according to U.N. General Assembly President Vuk Jeremic.

Syria has a population of just more than 22 million, according to the CIA World Factbook. That means nearly 30% of Syrian people have left their homes amid the violence.

The war has left at least 80,000 dead, Jeremic said, since the start of the hostilities in Syria more than two years ago.

That death toll continues to climb. On Friday, the opposition Local Coordination Committees of Syria reported 113 dead -- 39 of them in and around Damascus, 17 in Idlib province, 15 in Homs, 14 in Deir Ezzor and others elsewhere.

U.S. official: Russian missiles will 'prolong the suffering'

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov reiterated Moscow's position Friday that it will fulfill a deal to supply air defense missiles to the Syrian government.

At a news conference with U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon in Russia's Black Sea resort city of Sochi, Lavrov said he did not understand the furor over the sale of the S-300 anti-aircraft missiles.

Delivery of the weapons will fulfill a signed agreement and will not give the Syrian government any advantage in its fight with the opposition, he said.

Moscow says international concerns voiced over the move by Russia, a longtime friend of Syria that has supported the regime of President Bashar al-Assad during the conflict, are unfounded.

"All who are not planning aggressive acts on a sovereign country, should not be worried, because air defense missiles are exclusively for defense (hence their name) and they are needed to fight an air attack," Lavrov said last week, according to the Foreign Ministry website.

"We are not breaking any laws and don't want to jeopardize our reputation of a trusted supplier."

Among those expressing concern about the missiles Friday was U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, who said the sale "does not help" the situation in Syria. "It makes it more dangerous," he said.

U.S. Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, elaborated further, calling Russia's move "at the very least a very unfortunate decision that will embolden the regime and prolong the suffering."

"What I really worry about is that Assad will decide that since he's got these systems, he's somehow safer or more prone to a miscalculation," Dempsey added.

Hagel noted U.S. efforts, led by Secretary of State John Kerry, to work with Russia to find common ground and help prevent the eruption of a regional war.

Lavrov and Ban said they were keen to see an international meeting held soon involving the Syrian government opposition.

The aim would be to implement last summer's Geneva communique brokered by Russia and the United States outlining how a transitional government could be formed.

Lavrov and Kerry said this month that they had agreed to try to organize a meeting "as soon as is practicable, possibly and hopefully, by the end of this month."

France: Iran shouldn't be part of Syria conference

Even though it's viewed as a civil war, the conflict in Syria has had a significant impact on its region.

Violence has spilled over into Turkey, Lebanon and Israel. And the conflict has become entangled in issues involving another hot-button nation in the Middle East: Iran.

On Friday, France's foreign ministry issued a statement opposing Iran's participation in an international peace conference on Syria.

Iran has been a strong ally of al-Assad and his government, as well as a focus of international condemnation over its nuclear program.

"The stability of the whole region is in question," the French ministry said. "We can't see a country, representing a threat to stability, taking part in this conference."

The French government said that Tehran should provide a "certain number of answers" and meet "international obligations" before it takes part in talks regarding Syria.

Gruesome footage shows man cutting out soldier's organs

Inside Syria itself, opposition groups responded Friday to widespread outrage this week over a horrific video showing a man said to be a Syrian rebel carving into the body of a government soldier, cutting out his heart and liver, and taking a bite of the heart.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a London-based activist group, questioned in a statement why the world had not paid the same attention to the many videos it has published showing atrocities allegedly carried out by forces loyal to al-Assad.

A new video purported to be of the Syrian rebel who carried out the atrocity, Khaled al-Hamad, known as Abu Sakkar, was also posted online Friday.

He is asked, "Abu Sakkar, do you regret what you have done? After the killing of the Assad militiaman and the mutilation of his body?"

He replies: "I am ready to face justice and be brought to trial for my actions on the condition that they need to bring Bashar and his thugs to stand trial as well, for the atrocities that they have committed against our women and children."

He warns that "if the bloodshed doesn't stop in Syria, all of the Syrian people will be Abu Sakkar. Everyone will be Abu Sakkar."

Although CNN cannot independently verify the authenticity of the videos, it interviewed a local rebel spokesman this week who confirmed the heart-eating incident and said he had spoken to the man involved.

Also Friday, Human Rights Watch urged the rebel groups now in control of Raqqa city, in northern Syria, to ensure that evidence of torture chambers in government security facilities seen by HRW researchers last month is preserved.

"The documents, prison cells, interrogation rooms, and torture devices we saw in the government's security facilities are consistent with the torture former detainees have described to us since the beginning of the uprising in Syria," said Nadim Houry, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch.

"Those in control of Raqqa need to safeguard the materials in these facilities so the truth can be told and those responsible held accountable."

Sectarian violence erupts anew in Iraq

Sat, 18 May 2013 17:59:05 GMT

At least 15 people were killed Saturday in Baghdad and Anbar provinces, police said, in what appeared to be a continuation of sectarian violence.

Another 14 people, six of them police officers, most of whom are Shia, were kidnapped Saturday in Anbar province, police said.

The incidents occurred a day after dozens of people were killed when bombs struck as worshipers were leaving a Sunni mosque and attending a funeral.

At least 40 people were killed and 46 others wounded Friday in the two roadside explosions outside a Sunni mosque in the city of Baquba, police and health officials told CNN.

Baquba, the largest city in Diyala province, is about 60 kilometers (37 miles) north of Baghdad.

That bombing, one of several attacks Friday, came on the heels of a spate of sectarian violence in the Middle Eastern nation.

Tensions have grown in recent months between Iraq's Sunnis and Shiites, especially after an incident last month in Hawija, in Kirkuk province, where Iraqi security forces raided a site used by Sunni protesters to demonstrate against the Shiite-led government. At least 50 people were killed and more than 85 others wounded in a clash between security forces and gunmen.

Sunnis, who represent a minority of Iraqis, have been politically marginalized since the overthrow in 2003 of Saddam Hussein. Shiites, who make up a majority of Iraqis, now dominate the government.

Since December, tens of thousands of demonstrators have taken to the streets of predominantly Sunni provinces -- including Anbar, Nineveh, Salaheddin and Diyala -- demanding that the Shiite-led government stop what they call second-class treatment of Iraq's Sunni community.

The incidence of such attacks has dropped significantly since the peak of sectarian violence, between 2005 and 2007. But tensions, stirred in part by enmity between Shiites and Sunnis, have persisted since the U.S.-led invasion.

Martin Kobler, the U.N. special representative for Iraq, called this week on leaders to protect civilians as another wave of bombings erupted this week, warning that the country "will slide backwards into a dangerous unknown if they do not take action."

"It is the responsibility of all leaders to stop the bloodshed in this country and to protect their citizens," he said.

Romney weighs in on Washington controversies

Sat, 18 May 2013 15:58:26 GMT

Former Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney appeared on "The Tonight Show" with Jay Leno on Friday and weighed in on the barrage of controversies plaguing the White House in recent weeks.

The former Massachusetts governor said he's "over" the election but is "not a fan of the president." He said a special counsel should be appointed to investigate the Obama administration and the IRS' targeting of conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status.

"There are really two concerns with regards to the IRS story. One is they have admitted now that they did target conservative groups for extra scrutiny as those groups were looking to find a tax-except status," Romney said. "That obviously is a violation of the very fundamental trust that we have that the IRS does not pursue a political agenda.

"The buck stops at the president's desk," he said, and he questioned whether individuals who donated to Republicans or his campaign during the election were targeted specifically by the IRS.

Regarding the Justice Department's subpoena of Associated Press phone records, Romney said it was premature to draw conclusions.

"I think a lot of people are concerned that the First Amendment is being challenged in some way when the Justice Department subpoenas phone records of some 20 different reporters over some period of time. And they're looking for leaks of classified information. And clearly that's something which is alarming to some folks."

Romney repeated attack lines he used on the campaign trail last year over the administration's handling of the September 11, 2012, attack on the U.S. diplomatic post in Benghazi, Libya, which resulted in the deaths of four Americans, including Ambassador Christopher Stevens.

"American people were misled as to what happened," Romney said, referring to discredited talking points UN Ambassador Susan Rice conveyed on television news programs saying that the attack was a spontaneous reaction to an anti-Islam film rather than a premeditated assault.

"That's a real concern," Romney said, "and the fact is that it's been very difficult to pull out over the ensuing months."

Romney said another concern was that no effort was made to rescue the Americans caught in the attack last year.

Asked if this would hurt a hypothetical presidential campaign in 2016 for former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Romney said there would be "careful" scrutiny into her record working for the Obama administration.

Pivoting to the White House, Romney said Obama's "largest legacy of concern or failure" is the ongoing issues in places like North Korea and Iran.

Losing the election was tough, Romney said, but it's nothing compared to other challenges in life. He pointed to the benefits of spending time with his sons, 22 grandchildren, and his wife Ann, who has been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.

"This is something you get over pretty quickly," he said of losing the election.

As far as advice for future Republican presidential candidates, Romney said "get used to eating Iowa corndogs" and later added, "sell the horse."

Police: Cannes 'shooting' suspect faces court

Sat, 18 May 2013 15:43:01 GMT

A man arrested at Cannes Film Festival after firing a gun loaded with blanks during a live TV interview is due to appear in court Sunday, Cannes police said.

Canal+ was interviewing Christoph Waltz, who won the Academy Award for best supporting actor in "Django Unchained," and actor Daniel Auteuil when a man fired two shots from a starter pistol on Friday, according to authorities and the French television station.

The man allegedly had a dummy grenade in one hand, and footage and images of the incident showed Waltz and Auteuil being taken offstage and attendees scrambling for cover.

The 43-year-old suspect, who fired twice into the air, told police he believed in God and wanted to change the world, a Cannes police spokesman said Saturday.

He has been examined by a psychiatrist who concluded that he "is not mentally ill," the spokesman said.

Many police officers were present at the time of the shooting and the suspect was caught immediately, he said.

The court is expected to consider the case against the man, who remains in custody but whose name has not been made public, on Sunday, he said.

'Fake grenade'

The incident, which occurred on the Canal+ set along the popular Promenade de la Croisette -- the main boulevard in Cannes -- briefly interrupted the show.

But Canal+ anchor Michel Denisot came back on the air a short time later and told viewers: "The shots fired were blanks and the grenade was fake. That's what we know."

No injuries were reported.

Pictures of the arrest obtained by The Hollywood Reporter showed police wrestling the man to the ground.

The man said to a woman next to him, 'If I were you, I wouldn't stick around here'," Denisot later told France 24.

It was far from the typical scripted fare of the Cannes Film Festival, where chaos plays out on screen and not among the audience.

The annual festival brings together the rich and famous from around the world for movie screenings and glittering parties.

Stolen jewels

Earlier the same day, police in Nice said that more than $1 million in jewels belonging to the Swiss firm Chopard had been stolen from a hotel room in Cannes.

Chopard later said in a statement that the value of the stolen pieces was "far lower than those in the figures circulating in the media."

The theft of the jewels occurred Thursday night, on the second day of the festival, which opened Wednesday and runs through May 26.

Commandant Bernard Mascarelli, of the Nice police, said the jewelry was stolen from a room in the Suite Novotel hotel on Boulevard Carnot in Cannes.

A Chopard employee who was staying in the room left it for several hours to go to dinner, he said. She returned to discover the whole safe containing the jewels had been unscrewed and taken away.

No detailed description has yet been given of the stolen jewels, but a Chopard spokeswoman said they were not part of the firm's "Red Carpet Collection 2013" and were not due to be worn by any actresses in Cannes.

Chopard, which is an official sponsor of the festival, has provided the Palme d'Or trophy awarded to the director of the best feature film for the past 15 years. The trophy features a 24-carat gold palm attached to a piece of cut crystal.

'I thought that lady was gonna die'

Sat, 18 May 2013 14:51:58 GMT

Tina and Billy Clark saw the funnel cloud approaching and did what many of their neighbors did.

"We just ran and hid in the closet," Tina Clark told CNN after one of a swarm of tornadoes descended Wednesday night into their neighborhood in Hood County, 30 miles southwest of Fort Worth, Texas.

"I was holding the door shut," Billy Clark told CNN. "You could feel the pressure from inside the house. It was like pulling on the door a little bit. The whole house was shaking really bad. It felt like the house was getting ripped apart, but we couldn't see anything from inside the closet, so we didn't know what exactly was going on."

"You could just hear stuff hitting the house," his wife said.

Once the storm had passed, they emerged from the closet and noted that their house, perhaps because of its location on a slope, had escaped the brunt of the storm.

It was only after they got into their truck and began driving to get out of the impact zone that they began to realize that others had not fared so well.

"Once we turned the corner and got up the street a little bit, I mean, just everything was destroyed," said Billy Clark.

They came upon neighbors who asked them for a ride to a hospital. "So we started loading them up," Tina Clark said.

Among their passengers were two girls. "They couldn't even walk, they were just covered in blood," she said.

The couple then came upon a woman and her son. "They said that the wall got ripped off from the tornado and they got sucked out of the house," Billy Clark said. "The mom, it threw her into a tree head first and busted her head open."

"I thought that lady was gonna die in my truck," Tina Clark said.

"The son, he went outside to go get her during the tornado, and then it pulled him out of the house. He said it threw him through a field and he cut his head on a piece of sheet metal."

They picked up several other children, too. "The one little girl, all her teeth were knocked out," Billy Clark said. "And then the other girl, she had bones sticking out of her legs, she had a big gash in her arm."

The couple soon found the road blocked by downed trees and power lines. "There was no way out, so we took them back to the house and called the ambulance, and they just told us to wait," Tina Clark said.

Instead, they got back into the truck and drove their injured passengers as far as they could, then continued on foot. "We just had to carry them to the paramedics because they couldn't get to us," Tina Clark said.

Three people were taken to a nearby hospital, and 13 others were taken to hospitals in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, authorities have said.

Some of the patients underwent amputations, said Dr. Kerri Sistrunk, head of the trauma unit at Lake Granbury Medical Center.

By Friday afternoon, all seven people who had been reported missing had been found, police said.

But many more were homeless; 31 people slept in a shelter Thursday night.

"What always amazes me on visits like this is how fast lives can totally change," Gov. Rick Perry said Friday after touring Granbury.

Neighborhood hit hard

The devastation from what the National Weather Service said were at least 16 tornadoes that killed six people was centered in the Clarks' neighborhood of Rancho Brazos.

Of the 110 houses that had stood there Wednesday afternoon, "there's very few left untouched," said Mario Flores, director of disaster-response field operations for Habitat for Humanity, which built 61 homes in the neighborhood.

"Fifty-eight had damage, from minor to total destruction," Flores said. "It's a scene of total devastation."

"When you look down to where all the rest of the houses normally are, there's nothing there," Daniel Layne told CNN affiliate KTRK. "Piled-up cars, cars in trees, there's a car in our water tower."

He and his wife, Amanda, had waited two years to move into one of the Habitat homes.

"There literally is no Rancho Brazos anymore," Amanda Layne said.

Hood County Sheriff Roger Deeds is no stranger to destruction. "I've seen bad," he said. "But this is about as bad as it gets."

A survey team for the National Weather Service concluded that the tornado that descended on this neighborhood was an EF4 -- the second-most severe classification on a scale of zero to five.

For some, the extent of their loss remains unclear.

Families have not been able to return to their homes in Rancho Brazos since the storms rolled through. Deeds said Friday that "hopefully" they'll be able to go in at 8 a.m. Saturday, adding that authorities plan only to "open things back up on a limited basis." A curfew applies from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m.

Ronna Cotten is one of those who haven't been gone back, having been warned it would be days before she couldn't re-enter her subdivision to "check to see if we have any belongings left."

She has stayed in the home of a woman who picked her up from a rescue center Wednesday night.

The mother of four said she survived by clutching to a doorknob as winds tore through her home.

"I feel very lucky, because we are alive," she said.

Plane lands without landing gear at Newark

Sat, 18 May 2013 14:37:50 GMT

A US Airways plane touched down without landing gear at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey early Saturday morning.

The plane was carrying 31 passengers and three crew members. U.S. Airways spokesman Davien Anderson told CNN that no injuries were reported.

US Express Flight 4560, operated by Piedmont Airlines, took off from Philadelphia around 11 p.m. Friday night. The plane reported a landing gear issue upon approach to Newark and stuck with a holding pattern before landing on its belly around 1 a.m. Saturday morning, an hour after it was scheduled to arrive. Upon landing, passengers and crew members were evacuated. They were transported to the terminal where they gathered their luggage and departed the airport, Anderson said.

An investigation into the matter is ongoing. US Airways is fully cooperating with the National Transportation Safety Board, Anderson said.

Turkish protesters clash with police

Sat, 18 May 2013 14:11:25 GMT

Protesters in a Turkish border town hit by a twin car-bombing a week ago clashed with police Saturday, as they voiced anger over the government's response to the attack.

About 50 people were killed and about 100 injured when the blasts went off in the southern town of Reyhanli, in across the border from Syria's Idlib province, on May 11. One was at the community's city hall and the other in front of a post office.

The protest Saturday began relatively peacefully but descended into chaos as running street clashes broke out with police.

Protesters threw rocks and bottles at the police, who responded by firing tear gas canisters and high-pressure paintballs. Officers also brought out a water cannon.

Women and children ran from the scene as thick clouds of tear gas spread through the streets at the heart of the confrontation.

Police prevented the protesters from reaching the site of the blasts in the center of the town, which lies in Turkey's southern Hatay province.

The police have not yet commented on the clashes, which quieted down after less than an hour.

The protest -- which started with several thousand people but dwindled to a hard core of several hundred as trouble broke out -- was intended to show support and solidarity for the people of Reyhanli in the wake of the deadly bombings.

Many people in the town are angry at the government's response and say its decision to take in Syrian refugees fleeing the conflict in their country has made Turkey a target for attacks.

The crowd chanted calls for Erdogan and the government to resign.

One family of demonstrators was mourning the death of Ayten Calim, a 20-year-old secretary from Reyhanli who was killed in the bombings last Saturday.

Her brother, Halim Calim, said, "We are here to voice our pain." He and another brother carried Turkish flags and a banner with Ayten's photo on it that read, "We will not forget."

Some have criticized Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan for traveling to the United States this week instead of coming to Reyhanli to show support.

Erdogan has held talks with U.S. President Barack Obama and other U.S. officials in Washington.

Turkish President Abdullah Gul visited Reyhanli Thursday, when he vowed that those responsible for the car bombs would be held accountable.

Celalettin Lekesiz, governor of Hatay province, said Saturday that security forces had detained 17 people so far in connection with the bomb attacks and are hunting for four others, the semi-official Anadolu news agency reported.

All 21 suspects are Turkish nationals, he said.

Lekesiz said the security forces now had detailed information about how the suspects allegedly acquired the explosives and staged the bomb attacks, the news agency reported.

Interior Minister Muammer Guler and other Turkish officials have accused a former Marxist terror group that they say maintains relations with Al Muhabarat, Syria's intelligence services, according to Anadolu.

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