Man charged in university
student killings arrives in Idaho
The man accused in the November slayings of four University of Idaho students is has arrived in Idaho, where he is charged with four counts of first-degree murder and felony burglary. Bryan Kohberger was flown by Pennsylvania State Police to a small airport near the Idaho border and handed over to local authorities Wednesday evening. Kohberger is a 28-year-old criminology doctorate student at Washington State University, which is just 10 miles from the University of Idaho. He was arrested at his parents’ Pennsylvania home last week on a warrant out of Idaho. Kohberger told a judge Tuesday that he wouldn’t fight extradition to Idaho.
Supply chain woes
caused US auto sales
to fall 8% last year
Shortages of computer chips and other parts continued to hobble the U.S. auto industry last year. That led to sales dropping 8% from 2021 to the lowest level in more than a decade. But there’s good news for consumers in the gloomy numbers: Vehicle supplies on dealer lots are growing, albeit slowly, and automakers expect at least a small easing in prices this year. Automakers reported Wednesday that they sold 13.9 million cars, trucks, SUVs and vans last year as the parts shortage limited factory output amid high demand for new vehicles. It was the lowest sales number since 2011 when the economy was recovering from the Great Recession.
Amazon, Salesforce jettison jobs in latest tech worker purge
E-commerce giant Amazon and business software maker Salesforce are the latest U.S. tech companies to announce major job cuts. Amazon said Wednesday that it will be cutting about 18,000 positions. It’s the largest set of layoffs in the Seattle-based company’s history, although just a fraction of its 1.5 million global workforce. Salesforce is laying off about 8,000 employees, or 10% of its workforce. Major technology companies are pruning their payrolls that they rapidly expanded during a two-year boom spurred by pandemic lockdown. Meta Platforms announced in November that the Facebook and Instagram owner would by laying off 11,000 employees, or 13% of its workforce.
Ukraine claims heavy Russian
losses in waves of missile strikes
Ukraine has claimed a string of successful artillery attacks on Russian barracks in the first days of the year, asserting that it hit newly drafted men and other soldiers where they were sleeping or congregating, killing or wounding more than 1,000. The Russian military has confirmed one of the three waves of claimed strikes, though it gave a much lower death toll than the Ukrainians estimate. Military analysts say the Ukrainians’ use of long-range artillery, including American-provided HIMARS precision rockets, to target barracks marks a shift for the artillery forces, which for months had concentrated on materiel like ammunition depots.
By wire sources
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