Karzai’s office says US, Afghans hammering out agreement on raids
Karzai’s office says US, Afghans hammering out agreement on raids
KABUL, Afghanistan — In a phone call Tuesday, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry acknowledged “mistakes” and asked Afghan President Hamid Karzai to allow American forces to enter Afghan homes in “exceptional circumstances” as the two sides rushed to finalize the wording of a draft security agreement ahead of a meeting of tribal elders who must approve the deal.
Deep divisions in Afghanistan over legal immunity for American soldiers and contractors as well as night raids have threatened to derail diplomatic efforts to keep thousands of American soldiers in the country beyond next year’s withdrawal deadline. The issue has taken on added urgency amid a spike in violence that has raised fears the Afghan forces aren’t ready to take over the battle against the Taliban and al-Qaida linked militants without more training.
Night raids by American forces have been one of the touchiest issues in the 12-year-old war and an agreement to allow them to continue, even on a conditional basis, would clear a major obstacle that has held up the pact.
Double suicide bombings in Beirut kill 23, including Iranian diplomat
BEIRUT — Suicide bombers struck the Iranian Embassy on Tuesday, killing 23 people, including a diplomat, and wounding more than 140 others in a “message of blood and death” to Tehran and Hezbollah — both supporters of Syrian President Bashar Assad.
The double bombing in a Shiite district of Beirut pulled Lebanon further into a conflict that has torn apart the deeply divided country, and came as Assad’s troops, aided by Hezbollah militants, captured a key town near the Lebanese border from rebels.
The bombing was one of the deadliest in a series of attacks targeting Hezbollah and Shiite strongholds in Lebanon in recent months.
State senator apparently stabbed by son, who is found dead of suicide
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — Virginia state Sen. Creigh Deeds, a Democrat who rose to be gubernatorial nominee in 2009 despite his reserved demeanor and humble farmland roots, was stabbed early Tuesday, apparently by his son, police said.
Gus Deeds, 24, was found at his father’s house in rural western Virginia, dead from what appeared to be a self-inflicted gunshot wound, authorities said.
Authorities were still piecing together a motive and the circumstances that led up to the stabbing, but “we’re leaning towards it being an attempted murder/suicide,” Virginia State Police spokeswoman Corrine Geller said at an afternoon news conference. She said that finding wasn’t yet definitive.
Creigh (pronounced kree) Deeds, 55, and his son were the only people at the home Tuesday morning. Police were not looking for a suspect.
Deeds was able to walk about 75 yards away from his home in Millboro, despite stab wounds in his head and chest, police said. He was in fair condition at a hospital.
Colo. teen who killed, dismembered girl to spend life behind bars
GOLDEN, Colo. — A judge on Tuesday ordered a Colorado teenager who killed and dismembered a 10-year-old Denver-area girl to spend the rest of his days behind bars, describing his crime as “evil” and saying the case that rocked the community “cries out for a life sentence.”
District Judge Stephen Munsinger gave Austin Sigg, 18, life in prison for Jessica Ridgeway’s death and an additional 86 years for other crimes, including sexual assault and kidnapping.
“Evil is apparently real,” Munsinger said after handing down the sentence. “It was present in our community on Oct. 5, 2012. Its name was Austin Sigg.”
Sigg eventually would’ve been eligible for parole on the murder charge because he was a juvenile at the time of the killing, but the extra sentences eliminated that possibility. He chose not to address Munsinger and showed no emotion as the judge issued his decision.
Sigg did not face the death penalty because he was 17 at the time of Jessica’s death.
By wire sources