February 18, 2016

On Top Of The News Email:news@arubatoday.com website: www.arubatoday.com Tel:+297 582-7800 Thursday, February 18, 2016

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SC Gov. Haley Endorses Rubio Ahead of Primary Republican presidential candidate, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla. meets with attendees during a campaign stop in Summerville, S.C. South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley campaigned alongside Marco Rubio for the first time since endorsing his presidential bid on Wednesday, February 17, 2016.

(AP Photo/Matt Rourke) Page 3

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Thursday 18 February 2016

FRONT

US accuses China of missiles on disputed island M. PENNINGTON R. BURNS Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States warned Wednesday of rising tensions in the South China Sea after China appeared to

mercial satellite imagery appeared to indicate China has deployed a surface-to-air missile system.

Another U.S. official gave a more direct confirmation of the deployment on Woody Island. The official, who was

efforts to claim virtually the entire disputed sea and its resources, which has prompted some of its wary neighbors to draw closer to the U.S. In Beijing, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi accused

This image shows Woody Island, the largest of the Paracel Islands, in the South China Sea. A U.S. official confirmed that China has placed a surface-to-air missile system on Woody Island in the Paracel chain, but it is unclear whether this is a short-term deployment or something intended to be more long-lasting.

(ImageSat International N.V. via AP)

have placed a surface-toair missile system on a disputed island.

Taiwan’s defense ministry said that China had positioned anti-aircraft missiles on Woody Island in the Paracel chain, which is occupied by China but also claimed by Taiwan and Vietnam.

State Department spokesman Mark Toner said com-

not authorized to discuss the information publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity, said it is unclear whether the deployment is intended for the long-term.

The deployment follows China’s building of new islands by piling sand atop reefs and then adding airstrips and military installations. The buildup is seen as part of Beijing’s

the media of hyping the issue and saying more attention should be paid to the “public goods and services” provided by China’s development of its maritime claims.

China’s actions in the South China Sea have becoming a source of tension not just with other Asian governments that claim territory there, but with

Washington. Secretary of State John Kerry said the signs of increasing militarization contradicted a public assurance from Chinese President Xi Jinping when he visited the White House last September.

“When President Xi was here in Washington, he stood in the Rose Garden with President Obama and said China will not militarize the South China Sea. But there is every evidence every day that there has been an increase in militarization,” Kerry said before meeting with Poland’s foreign minister in Washington.

“It’s a serious concern,” he said, adding that he expected the U.S. would have a “very serious conversation” with China on the issue in the next few days.

U.S. network Fox News reported that China had moved two batteries of the HQ-9 surface-to-air missile system, along with radar targeting arrays on Woody island. HIS Jane’s Intelligence Review agreed with that conclusion in its assessment of commercial satellite imagery of the island.

The review’s deputy editor Neil Ashdown said that depending on the version of the HQ-9 deployed, the system has a range of between 125 kilometers (78 miles) and 230 kilometers (143 miles), and would be the most advanced surface-to-air missile system currently deployed on land in the South China Sea. He described that as a significant military escalation.q

Iran snubs Doha proposal, won’t freeze oil output ALI AKBAR DAREINI Associated Press TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran appeared Wednesday to back a plan laid out by four influential oil producers to cap their crude output if others do the same, though it offered no indication that it has any plans to follow suit itself.

The agreement reached in Doha the day before by Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Russia and Venezuela is aimed at stabilizing global oil prices, which recently plunged to

less than $30 a barrel, a 13year low. But Iran is keen to ramp up exports to regain market share now that sanctions related to its nuclear program have been lifted under a landmark agreement.

“Iran supports any measure to boost oil prices,” Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh said after talks with his counterparts from Iraq, Venezuela and Qatar.

“The decision taken to freeze the production ceiling of OPEC and non-OPEC

members to stabilize and boost prices is also supported by us,” he added, in comments posted on the ministry’s website late Wednesday.

Iran’s envoy to OPEC, Mahdi Asali, had earlier blamed the fall in prices on oversupply, and said it was up to Saudi Arabia and others to cut production. He said the four nations that participated at the Doha gathering could stabilize oil prices on their own -- if they cut their production by 2 million

barrels a day.

“These countries increased their production by 4 million barrels when Iran was under sanctions,” Asali was quoted as saying by the Shargh daily. “Now it’s primarily their responsibility to help restore balance on the market. There is no reason for Iran to do so.”

The four countries made their announcement following an unexpected meeting in the Qatari capital that pointedly did not include Iran. q

Caribbean reports tourism surge; Zika impact not yet felt DANICA COTO Associated Press SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — The Caribbean on Tuesday reported a surge in tourism for 2015 that easily surpassed the global growth rate as it set new arrival and spending records , though there are concerns the mosquitoborne Zika virus could put a dent in those numbers this year.

Nearly 29 million people visited the region last year, a 7 percent jump that surpassed the 4 percent global tourism growth rate, said Hugh Riley, secretary general of the Caribbean Tourism Organization. Visitors to the Caribbean spent $30 billion last year, a $1 billion increase from 2014, he said.

He credited a stronger U.S. economy, new flights, lower oil prices and persistent marketing.

U.S. travelers accounted for 14.3 million visits, representing roughly 50 percent of all arrivals. Barbados, Curacao and Trinidad and Tobago reported the highest growth rates in U.S. arrivals. Meanwhile, there were more than 5 million arrivals from Europe for the first time in seven years, more than 1 million from Britain alone.

Hotel occupancies and average daily rates also increased last year for most hotels, although one-third of hotels reported a net loss as they struggled with high operating and air travel costs, said Frank Comito, CEO of the Florida-based Caribbean Hotel & Tourism Association.

“While most destinations have done well and most hotels did well, that’s not been the case across the board,” he said. “There have been some areas of slow growth and even no growth.”

The news comes as the Caribbean and Latin America struggle with an increase in Zika cases, with Puerto Rico already reporting several wedding and business conference cancellations. q

U.S. NEWS A3

Thursday 18 February 2016

Three-way feud swells among GOP White House contenders SCOTT BAUER STEVE PEOPLES Associated Press CHAPIN, South Carolina (AP) — A three-way feud among the Republicans’ leading White House contenders escalated Wednesday, with Republican Ted Cruz daring Donald Trump to sue him and dismissing Marco Rubio’s charges of dishonesty just days before South Carolina’s highstakes primary.

Yet it was Rubio who may have scored the day’s biggest win as he secured the coveted endorsement of South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley. The popular governor said she was tasked with identifying the best candidate as she surveyed the crowded Republican field.

“If we elect Marco Rubio, every day will be a great day in America,” she said alongside the Florida senator during an evening rally in suburban Columbia.

Haley’s endorsement did little to quiet the intensifying clash between Cruz, Trump and Rubio over alleged ethical violations in the days leading up to Saturday’s South Carolina contest.

On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton, the former secretary of state, and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders

Republican presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, speaks at a rally in Anderson, S.C. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)

face off during the Nevada caucuses on Saturday. The South Carolina primary for them is on Feb. 27.

Cruz has been trying to beat back charges of dishonesty from Trump and Rubio for weeks. He shifted his defense to the next level during an afternoon news conference that highlighted his extensive legal training.

“You have been threatening frivolous lawsuits for your entire adult life,” said Cruz, a Harvard Law School graduate who served as Texas’ top lawyer, speaking

directly to Trump. “Even in the annals of frivolous lawsuits, this takes the cake.”

Trump threatened earlier in the week to bring a defamation lawsuit against Cruz over a television ad that attacks the Republican front-runner’s conservative bona fides. Specifically, the ad features footage of the billionaire businessman in a 1999 interview supporting abortion rights. Trump now says he opposes abortion.

Trump’s attorney sent Cruz a letter Tuesday charging the ad was “replete with outright lies, false, defama-

tory and destructive statements” and saying Cruz could be held liable for damages if it’s not taken down.

Cruz on Wednesday said a lawsuit against the ad has no chance, and said he would like to take Trump’s deposition himself. He also announced plans to run the contested ad more frequently.

The prospective legal battle marks another extraordinary step in the turbulent 2016 Republican primary season.

Polls suggest Trump con-

tinues to hold a big lead in South Carolina and in upcoming states, as Cruz works to rally the Republican Party’s most conservative wing and Rubio tries to consolidate mainstream Republicans behind his candidacy. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Ohio Gov. John Kasich continue to battle for a spot at the table, while retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson struggles for relevancy.

Haley’s endorsement was a major setback for Bush in particular, who told NBC News on Monday that “she is the probably the most meaningful endorsement if there is” one in the state.

Suddenly backed by Haley, Rubio continued his assault against Cruz’s campaign tactics. He accused Cruz supporters of using “push polls” and creating a fake Facebook page wrongly claiming that South Carolina Rep. Trey Gowdy had switched his endorsement from the Florida senator to Cruz.

“It’s just a pattern of people around his campaign that have continuously done things like that,” Rubio said as he campaigned in Mount Pleasant.

Cruz denied being involved with anything untoward and called for anyone with evidence to come forward.

‘Torture works,’ Trump says as South Carolina primary looms CHARLESTON, South Carolina (AP) — “Torture works,” Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump declared Wednesday, repeating his vow to bring back waterboarding and approve other, tougher interrogation techniques.

“Don’t tell me it doesn’t work. Torture works, OK folks?” the brash billionaire told a crowd in South Carolina, site of the next Republican primary on Saturday.

Trump has repeatedly advocated enhanced interrogation techniques for foreign prisoners, and he said again Wednesday he would “absolutely” allow

waterboarding, which simulates the feeling of drowning.

“But we should go much stronger than waterboarding,” he said. “That’s the way I feel. They’re chopping off heads. Believe me, we should go much stronger because our country’s in trouble, we’re in danger.

We have people that want to do really bad things.”

“Waterboarding is fine, but it’s not nearly tough enough,” he added.

Waterboarding was practiced until late in the George W. Bush administration but was disavowed by President Barack Obama.

A 2014 Senate Intelligence Committee report concluded that harsh interrogation techniques failed to produce information the CIA couldn’t have obtained elsewhere or didn’t already have.

Trump’s comments could further alarm some Republican leaders, who fear Trump or Texas Sen. Ted Cruz will collect the delegates needed to secure the party’s nomination before a more mainstream candidate can consolidate voters’ support. Socalled establishment Republicans worry that Trump or Cruz could jeopardize

the party’s chances of winning in November’s general election.

Candidates Jeb Bush, John Kasich and Sen. Marco Rubio are jostling to be that more mainstream candidate, or at least keep their campaigns afloat if they don’t.

On Wednesday, Bush suffered a setback after news leaked South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley would endorse Rubio, three days before the state primary.

The Democratic field is already down to two candidates — Hillary Clinton, the former secretary of state, and Vermont Sen. Bernie

Sanders. Saturday’s Nevada caucuses are next for them, with a South Carolina primary on Feb. 27.

Both Clinton and Sanders are appealing to black voters, as blacks make up more than half of the Democratic primary electorate in South Carolina and several other southern states.

For the Republicans, the only thing that is clear heading into the South Carolina primary appears to be Trump’s grip on the lead following his victory in the New Hampshire primary. Cruz, the winner of the Iowa caucuses, is also in the mix for a strong finish.

A4 U.S.

Thursday 18 February 2016

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Muslim man sues US gun range for refusing him service

Raja’ee Fatihah speaks to members of the media at the state Capitol in Oklahoma City, Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2016. Fatihah, a U.S. Army reservist, who was asked to leave a gun range in Oklahoma after identifying himself as a Muslim is suing the owners in federal court, pushing back against what he says is a rise in anti-Islamic sentiment across the country.

(Steve Gooch/The Oklahoman via AP)

SEAN MURPHY Associated Press OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) — A U.S. Army reservist asked to leave a gun range after identifying himself as a Muslim sued the owners Wednesday, the latest in a series of cases across

the U.S. alleging anti-Islamic discrimination.

The lawsuit on behalf of 29-year-old Raja’ee Fatihah, an employee with the Oklahoma Department of Human Services, was filed in U.S. District Court against the owners of Save Yourself

Survival and Tactical Gun Range in the small town of Oktaha, Oklahoma.

A sign posted on the business declared the range a “Muslim-free” establishment, and is similar to signs that have been placed at businesses in several states,

said Brady Henderson, legal director for the Oklahoma chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, which filed the suit.

“Whether the sign in question says ‘no Muslims’ or whether it says ‘no coloreds’ or whether it says ‘no women’ or ‘no Christians’ or ‘no Buddhists’ ... it is just as un-American and fundamentally it is just as wrong,” Henderson said.

Fatihah, who is a board member with the Muslim advocacy group Council on American-Islamic Relations’ Oklahoma chapter, said he went to the gun range after learning about the sign. He said the owners of the store were pleasant and welcoming until he told them he was Muslim.

“At that point, they started treating me with suspicion,” Fatihah said.

A similar lawsuit was filed

by CAIR last year against a gun shop in Florida, but that case was dismissed by a federal judge who determined CAIR could not prove its members were

harmed by the store’s Muslim-free policy, Henderson said. Robert Muise, with the American Freedom Law Center, represented the Florida gun shop owner and now is working for Chad Neal, the owner of the Oklahoma gun range.

Muise said Fatihah was denied service because he was belligerent, not because of his religion, and that the sign declaring the shop a “Muslim-free” business is protected free speech.

“The only thing the law prohibits is if somebody denies services strictly on the basis of religion, and that didn’t happen here,” Muise said.

Fatihah denies that he acted belligerently.

Claims of discrimination by business owners against Muslims have been reported in numerous states, and formal complaints have been filed with the U.S. Department of Justice regarding incidents in Arkansas, Florida and New Hampshire, said CAIR’s national director Ibrahim Hooper.q

Man pleads guilty, faces death penalty in Vegas girl slaying KEN RITTER Associated Press LAS VEGAS (AP) — A man jailed for four years awaiting a death penalty trial has taken the unusual step of pleading guilty to capital murder in a case that shocked Las Vegas for its brutality: the rape, torture, killing and mutilation of a 15-year-old girl on her way home from school.

Javier Righetti was 19 when he killed Arbor View High School sophomore Alyssa Otremba. She disappeared Sept. 2, 2011, after texting her mom that she was walking home from school. Her burned body was found in a vacant lot the next day.

This booking photo of Sept. 6, 2011, shows Javier Righetti of Las Vegas.

(Clark County via AP)

Now 23, Righetti pleaded guilty Feb. 11 to all charges against him, including kidnapping, robbing and trying to rape another teen-

age girl in Las Vegas in March 2011.

He got no promise that he won’t be put to death.

It’s “extraordinarily unusual” to plead guilty before a capital murder trial with no deal from prosecutors to seek life in prison without parole instead of the death penalty, Righetti’s courtappointed defense attorney said Tuesday.

“He didn’t deny that he did it,” Christy Craig said.

“He was aware of what this meant. He just didn’t want to put anybody, including the family of the victim and his family, through a long trial.”

A Clark County District

Court jury is due to begin March 15 to consider whether Righetti should be executed.

Righetti last week told Judge Michelle Leavitt he kidnapped, sexually assaulted and stabbed Otremba dozens of times before burning her corpse in northwest Las Vegas.

A prosecutor told a judge in October 2011 that Righetti provided a detailed confession following his arrest.

“It made him feel powerful,” prosecutor Christopher Lalli said at the time. “He said he did it because it made him seem more like a gangster or a thug.”

Righetti also was suspected

of sexually assaulting a female cousin in Mazatlan, Mexico, Lalli said at the time, and served time in a Nevada Youth Training Center in Elko for a sexually motivated kidnapping.

Craig said Righetti knew his plea and penalty trial would get attention, and he wanted to retain his ability to appeal the jury decision.

“There’s very little he has control over,” the defense attorney said. “This will get intense scrutiny as it winds through appeals — even more so because he’s pleading guilty to all counts.” q

U.S. NEWS A5

Thursday 18 February 2016

Fight over gunman’s locked iPhone could have big impact ERIC TUCKER TAMI ABDOLLAH Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — An extraordinary legal fight is brewing with major privacy implications for millions of cellphone users after a federal magistrate ordered Apple Inc. to help the FBI hack into an iPhone used by the gunman in the San Bernardino mass shootings.

The clash brings to a head a long-simmering debate between technology companies insistent on protecting digital privacy and law enforcement agencies concerned about losing their ability to recover evidence or eavesdrop on the communications of terrorists or criminals.

On Wednesday, the White House quickly disputed the contention by Apple’s chief executive officer, Tim Cook, that the Obama administration is seeking to force the software company to build a “backdoor” to bypass digital locks protecting consumer information on Apple’s popular iPhones.

The early arguments set the stage for what will likely be a protracted policy and public relations fight in the courts, on Capitol Hill, on the Internet and elsewhere.

“They are not asking Apple to redesign its product or to create a new backdoor to one of their products,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said. “They’re simply asking for something that would have an impact on this one device.”

Within hours of the judge’s order on Tuesday telling Apple to aid the FBI with special software in the case, Cook promised a court challenge. He said the software the FBI would need to unlock the gun-

man’s work-issued iPhone 5C would be “too dangerous to create” and “undeniably” a backdoor.

Cook compared it to a master key, capable of opening hundreds of millions of locks, and said there was no way to keep the technique secret once it was developed.

“Once the information is known, or a way to bypass the code is revealed, the encryption can be defeated by anyone with that knowledge,” Cook said.

At the center of the debate is the private information carried on nearly 900 million iPhones sold worldwide: Photographs, videos, chat messages, health records and more.

There also was swift reaction on the presidential campaign trail, where Donald Trump told Fox News that he agreed “100 percent with the courts,” and on Capitol Hill, where the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Richard Burr, R-N.C.,

An iPhone is seen in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2016. A U.S. magistrate judge has ordered Apple to help the FBI break into a work-issued iPhone used by one of the two gunmen in the mass shooting in San Bernardino, California, a significant legal victory for the Justice Department in an ongoing policy battle between digital privacy and national security. Apple CEO Tim Cook immediately objected, setting the stage for a high-stakes legal fight between Silicon Valley and the federal government.

(AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

said, “Court orders are not optional and Apple should comply.”Democratic Sen.

Dianne Feinstein of California, who fought encryption in the 1990s, said she

thought the government should be able to access the phone. q

SPLC notes uptick in hate, extremist groups in 2015 PHILLIP LUCAS Associated Press BIRMINGHAM, Alabama (AP) — The number of hate groups and anti-government organizations in the United States jumped sharply in 2015 as political speech became more divisive, violent encounters between police and black men were increasingly publicized, and attacks in Paris and California spurred widespread fears of terrorism, a civil rights advocacy group said Wednesday.

In its annual Year In Hate and Extremism report, the Southern Poverty Law Center said the number of U.S. hate groups increased to

892 last year, up from 784 in 2014. SPLC officials said the number of anti-government groups increased from 874 in 2014 to 998 in 2015.The nonprofit also noted an uptick in antiMuslim behavior, which it linked to terrorist attacks in Paris and California, and talking points from Republican presidential candidates. Some candidates have suggested that Muslim Syrian war refugees be blocked from entering the country to ensure that Muslim extremists don’t get in.

The group also noted that the number of black separatist groups, which it categorizes as hate groups,

has risen from 113 in 2014 to 180 in 2015. “We think that the growth of these groups is due almost entirely to the very dramatic attention that has been paid over the past year to police violence against black men,” said SPLC Senior Fellow Mark Potok. The group simultaneously notes the number of active Ku Klux Klan groups increased to 190 in 2015 after falling between 2013 and 2014.

In general, Potok said, he would describe 2015 “as a year that very nearly approaches the political upheavals of 1968 — a time of real trial for this country.”

The SPLC was founded in

Montgomery, Alabama, in 1971. The center says its mission is to fight hate and bigotry by monitoring extremist groups, launching public education campaigns that promote tolerance, and representing clients in civil rights cases in court.

The SPLC defines hate groups as organizations that attack people based on central characteristics such as race, sexual orientation and religion. The listings focus on ideology and not violence or criminal acts. Some targets of the center say the SPLC’s main mission has become to silence conservative viewpoints.q

A6 U.S.

Thursday 18 February 2016

NEWS

Minutes show Federal Reserve worried by global turmoil

M. CRUTSINGER AP Economics Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal Reserve policymakers expressed growing concerns at their meeting last month about potential threats to the U.S. econo-

Minutes of their discussions released Wednesday showed Fed officials acknowledging that the developments made it difficult to forecast growth and inflation.

The officials said their out-

nomic data. The Fed raised rates from record lows in December, the first hike in nearly a decade.

While Fed officials continued to express confidence in the strengthening labor market, they were less bull-

Federal Reserve Board Chair Janet Yellen testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington. Fed policymakers expressed growing concerns at their meeting last month about potential threats to the U.S. economy, including turbulence in financial markets, plunging oil prices and slowing growth in China and other emerging markets.

(AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

my, including turbulence in financial markets, plunging oil prices and slowing growth in China and other emerging markets.

look had grown more uncertain, and they stressed that the pace of any interest-rate increases would hinge on the latest eco-

ish on other parts of the economy such as manufacturing.

“Most participants indicated that it was difficult to

judge at this point whether the outlook for inflation and economic growth had changed materially, but they thought that uncertainty surrounding the outlook had increased as a result of recent financial and economic developments,” the minutes said.

Its brief policy statement removed language it had been using that officials judged the risks facing the economy as “balanced.”

Most Fed officials felt there was not yet enough evidence to say the balance of risks had “changed materially,” though some officials did believe the downside risks had increased, according to the minutes.

Among the threats to U.S. growth, the minutes cited the slowdown in China and falling commodity prices that could hurt growth prospects in emerging market nations that produce those commodities.

The Fed officials also discussed the steep declines in stock prices that had occurred since the beginning of the year.

Since the Fed’s January meeting, some economic indicators have flashed more encouraging signals.

US producer prices up 0.1 percent in January AP Economics Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. producer prices edged up slightly in January as the biggest rise in food costs in eight months offset a further decline in energy prices. The tiny overall increase indicated that inflation pressures remain modest.

The Labor Department said Wednesday that its Producer Price Index rose 0.1 percent in January after having fallen 0.2 percent in December. Over the past year, the PPI, which mea-

sures inflation pressures before they reach the consumer, is down 0.2 percent.

Core inflation, which excludes energy and food, rose 0.4 percent in January, the biggest one-month jump in 15 months. Over the past 12 months, core inflation is up 0.6 percent.

A big drop in energy prices in the past two years and a strong dollar have combined to keep inflation low.

Jennifer Lee, senior economist at BMO Capital Markets, said that the increase

in core prices at the wholesale level could attract attention at the Federal Reserve, where a number of officials have said they will be watching for signs of higher inflation in determining when to raise a key interest rate again.

The Fed raised the rate in December for the first time in seven years but held off boosting rates in January.

The Fed has said further increases will depend on seeing movement toward achieving the Fed’s goal of

annual price increases of 2 percent. The Fed believes that is the optimal level for inflation and readings below that target raise concerns about the potential threat of deflation.

Inflation pressures at the consumer level have also been low. For all of 2015, consumer prices were up just 0.7 percent, the smallest annual increase in seven years. For January, energy prices fell 5 percent, reflecting big drops in all types of energy.q

The economy created 151,000 jobs in January, pushing the unemployment rate down to an eight-year low of 4.9 percent. The Fed reported Wednesday that industrial production rose 0.5 percent in January, the best showing since July, though retail sales last month remained modest.

In December, the Fed had lifted its target for overnight bank lending from a record low to a new range of 0.25 percent to 0.5 percent — the first hike after seven years of near-zero rates. It also released projections that indicated four additional quarter-point moves in 2016.

But since the start of this year, global financial markets have been rocked by disclosures that China, the world’s second largest economy, may be slowing more than previously believed. Oil prices have tumbled, while the U.S. dollar has strengthened. Both of those developments could make it harder for the Fed to achieve its inflation target. Many private economists have cut their forecasts for Fed rate hikes this year from four down to two or fewer.

Fed Chair Janet Yellen acknowledged the darker economic landscape in Congressional testimony last week. But she said it was too soon to know whether the new risks would be severe enough to alter interest rate policies.

Yellen said the Fed was not on a “pre-set” course for rate hikes and would assess at its next meeting on March 15-16 whether recent developments have slowed the U.S. economy or threatened to derail the Fed’s goal of pushing inflation back toward 2 percent. q

U.S. NEWS A7

Thursday 18 February 2016

US Financial Front:

Factory output rises in January by most in 6 months

C. S. RUGABER AP Economics Writer WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. factories cranked out more autos, furniture and food last month, boosting production by the most since July.

Manufacturing output rose 0.5 percent in January, after falling in four of the previous five months, the Federal Reserve said Wednesday. Overall industrial production, which includes mining and utilities, added 0.9 percent, the biggest jump in 14 months.

The data could raise hopes that manufacturing may be stabilizing after output declined for much of last year. The strong dollar and weak overseas growth have cut into exports and the profits of large multinational corporations. By some measures, U.S. factories had contracted since last fall.

“This encouraging report should help quiet the recession calls of late,” Jennifer Lee, an economist at BMO Capital Markets, said.

Americans are spending at a solid pace, offsetting some of the overseas drag.

Some economists have noted that manufacturing’s weakness has been concentrated in sectors that are particularly sensitive to low oil prices and the global economy’s health, such as aerospace and industrial machinery.

Meanwhile, auto sales rose to a record level in 2015, and the production of cars and car parts rose 2.8 percent, the most since July.

Furniture output climbed 1.4 percent, and food production advanced 0.8 percent. “The major driver of manufacturing growth is

consumer spending for basics and durable goods,” said Dan Meckstroth, chief economist at MAPI, a manufacturing research group.

“We expect to see many ups and downs in manufacturing production this year.” Utility output jumped 5.4 percent as Americans turned up the heat in their homes after an unseasonably warm December. Mining, which includes oil and gas drilling, was flat after four months of declines.

Sharply lower oil prices have caused big drops in mining, which now may be leveling off.

The dollar has increased about 20 percent since July 2014, which makes U.S. goods more expensive overseas and lowers the price of competing imports. China, the world’s second-largest economy, has seen its growth slow, which has hit developing countries that export to China and weakened the global economy.

Yet some economists argue that most of U.S. manufacturing has not been affected by overseas trends.

Alexander Lin, an economist at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, points out that only a few sectors are heavily dependent on international trade, including aircraft, steel and other metals, and appliances.

“Negative sentiment toward U.S. manufacturing may be overdone,” Lin wrote in a research note last week.

Tom Porcelli, chief economist at RBC Capital Markets, estimates that only about 30 percent of U.S. manufacturing has actually reported a drop in output over the past year.q

A Boeing employee works on a horizontal stabilizer for a Boeing 787 Dreamliner, at Boeing in Salt Lake City. On Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2016, the Federal Reserve reported on industrial production for January.

(AP Photo/Rick Bowmer)

A8

Thursday 18 February 2016

WORLD NEWS

Explosion in Ankara kills at least 28 SUZAN FRASER Associated Press ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — A car bomb went off in the Turkish capital Wednesday near vehicles carrying military personnel, killing at least 28 people and wounding 61 others, officials said.

The explosion occurred during evening rush hour in the heart of Ankara, in an area close to parliament and armed forces headquarters and lodgings.

out attacks in the country recently. In October, suicide bombings blamed on IS targeted a peace rally outside the main train station in Ankara, killing 102 people in Turkey’s deadliest attack in years.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan condemned the bombing saying it exceeds all “moral and humane boundaries.”

Turkey is determined to fight those who carried out the attack as well as the

Russian and Syrian forces have prompted tens of thousands of Syrian refugees to flee to Turkey’s border. Turkey so far has refused to let them in, despite being urged to do so by the United Nations and European nations, but is sending aid to Syrian refugee camps right across the border.

Turkey, which is already home to 2.5 million Syrian refugees, has also been a key focus of European

Buses carrying military personnel were targeted while waiting at traffic lights at an intersection, the Turkish military said while condemning the “contemptible and dastardly” attack.

“We believe that those who lost their lives included our military brothers as well as civilians,” Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus said.

At least two military vehicles caught fire and dozens of ambulances were sent to the scene. Dark smoke could be seen billowing from a distance.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Kurtulmus pledged that authorities would find those behind the bombing. He said the government had appointed seven prosecutors to investigate the attack, which he described as being “well-planned.”

Kurdish rebels, the Islamic State group and a leftist extremist group have carried

“forces” behind the assailants, he said.

“Our determination to retaliate to attacks that aim against our unity and future grows stronger with every action,” Erdogan said. “It must be known that Turkey will not refrain from using its right to self-defense at all times.”

Wednesday’s attack comes at a tense time when the Turkish government is facing an array of challenges. A fragile peace process with Kurdish rebels collapsed in the summer and renewed fighting has displaced tens of thousands of civilians.

Turkey has also been helping efforts led by the United States to combat the Islamic State group in neighboring Syria, and has faced several deadly bombings in the last year that were blamed on IS. The Syrian war is raging along Turkey’s southern border. Recent airstrikes by

Union efforts to halt the biggest flow of refugees to the continent since World War II. Hundreds, sometimes thousands, of refugees leave every night from Turkey to cross the sea to Greece in smugglers’ boats.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg strongly condemned the “terrorist attack” and offered his condolences to the families of the victims. Stoltenberg said there can be no justification “for such horrific acts” and that “NATO Allies stand shoulder to shoulder in the fight against terrorism.”

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said: “In the battle against those responsible for these inhuman acts we are on the side of Turkey.”

Washington also condemned the attack, according to a statement by Mark Toner, deputy spokesman of the U.S. State Department. q

UN envoy to Libya says time is running out, IS expanding MAGGIE MICHAEL Associated Press CAIRO (AP) — The U.N. envoy to Libya is urging its parliament to endorse a unity government that can help combat a mushrooming Islamic State affiliate, he told The Associated Press on Wednesday, the fifth anniversary of the uprising that toppled Moammar Gadhafi and plunged the country into chaos.

“Every day lost in political dialogue is a day of gain of Daesh,” Martin Kobler said in the interview, referring to the extremist group by its Arabic acronym. “There is chaos. There is anarchy in which Daesh expands.”

Libya’s internationally recognized government and parliament has convened in the far east since 2014, when Islamist-allied militias seized the capital, Tripoli, in support of rival authorities. The two competing parliaments are each backed by a loose array of militias and tribes.

The divisions have allowed IS to expand across the northern coast of the oil-rich North African country, which is just across the Mediterranean from Italy and has also become a major conduit for African migrants heading to Europe. IS controls the central city of Sirte and a number of oil installations, and has carried out attacks across the country.

President Barack Obama said Wednesday that the United States will continue to target IS in Libya after a raid last year killed a top commander.

But defeating the group will require a government with broad legitimacy and a unified army, and the international community can only lift an arms embargo once a unity government is in place.

On Sunday, a U.N.-designated council presented a new 18-member Cabinet in the Moroccan city of Skhirat, weeks after the internationally-backed House of Representatives rejected an earlier lineup, citing reservations about its size and the distribution of portfolios among the country’s three regions. Powerful factions in Tripoli have also rejected the unity government, raising concerns about whether it would be able to meet in the capital.

Kobler hailed the new proposal, describing it as a “balanced list” and saying politicians should accept the deal so they can begin to address the country’s “disastrous” humanitarian situation.

Around 2.4 million Libyans — out of a population of 6 million— depend on humanitarian aid, with 1.3 million receiving food aid, Kobler said. He said people line up in front of bakeries and bring their own medicines to hospitals hit by shortages. Oil production has dropped from 1.6 million barrels a day to 350,000, and Central Bank reserves are dwindling.

“Ninety-five percent of the Libyan people are behind the political deal and want to see a strong government that takes care of basic necessities,” Kobler said.

Libyans wanted far more when they took to the streets five years ago.

Inspired by the Arab Spring uprisings sweeping the region, Libyans rose up against Gadhafi, who launched a fierce military crackdown in response. As his tanks closed in on the rebel-held eastern city of Benghazi, NATO launched an air campaign to drive them back.

The rebels captured and killed Gadhafi in October of that year, ending his four-decade rule.

Libya held its first-ever democratic election the following year, but the real power was held by an array of militias, including former rebel brigades, local tribes and Islamic militant groups. A dispute between rival political factions turned bloody in 2014, leading to the current impasse.q

WORLD NEWS 9

Thursday 18 February 2016

Merkel: German ‘national interest’ for UK to remain in EU GEIR MOULSON Associated Press BERLIN (AP) — Chancellor Angela Merkel said Wednesday that it’s in Germany’s national interest for Britain to remain in the European Union, and she also pressed her fellow European leaders to work with Turkey to curb the migrant influx.

An EU summit on Thursday and Friday aims to reach an agreement on a package of measures to keep Britain in the 28-nation bloc, and Merkel hopes to make some headway toward an elusive European solution of the migrant crisis.

Germany is the EU’s most populous — and economically powerful — nation and also has taken in the most refugees. But Merkel’s open-door stance to asylum-seekers has been under increasing pressure both from abroad and at home, including from within her own conservative bloc.

In a speech to parliament, Merkel painted a largely positive picture of chances of an agreement on Britain’sEU reform demands, which she said are in many cases “justified and understandable.”

British Prime Minister David Cameron hopes to secure a deal for a looser union with the bloc.

“Germany will make its contribution so that a result that satisfies everyone can be achieved, if possible already at the summit beginning tomorrow,” she said.

“I am convinced that it is in our national interest for Great Britain to remain an active member in a strong and successful European Union,” she added.

Merkel said Britain is an ally for Germany in promoting competitiveness and

free trade, and that “Europe needs Great Britain’s foreign and security policy commitment to assert our values and interests in the world.”

wrote to government leaders in the wake of his whirlwind tour that took him to five capitals in little more than one day.

In case the talks would still

clear that she won’t be pushing the contentious subject of new quotas to distribute migrants around Europe. She reiterated that it would be “laughable” for

German Chancellor Angela Merkel delivers a speech a day before an EU council meeting, at the German parliament Bundestag in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2016. Merkel said that it’s in Germany’s national interest for Britain to remain in the European Union, and pressed her fellow European leaders to work with Turkey to curb the migrant influx.

(AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

EU President Donald Tusk said late Wednesday that the outcome of the talks was still on a knife’s edge.

“Frankly: there is still no guarantee that we will reach an agreement,” he

break down, he wrote, “it would be a defeat both for the UK and the European Union, but a geopolitical victory for those who seek to divide us.”

On migrants, Merkel made

Europe to approve such quotas when it has barely started to share refugees under existing agreements.

Instead, she said, the key issue is to work with Turkey to try to stem the flow of mi-

grants across the Aegean Sea to EU member Greece rather than shutting down Greece’s northern border with Macedonia. Some 850,000 people made the sea crossing to Greece last year, with over 150,000 more arriving by boat in Italy and far smaller numbers elsewhere.

“Our common goal is to drastically and lastingly reduce the number of refugees so as to better help those people who really need our assistance,” she said. Turkey hosts more than 2.5 million Syrian refugees. EU countries, keen to prevent more of them heading for Europe, last year pledged 3 billion euros ($3.3 billion) to help Syrian refugees in Turkey.

“We as the European Union must learn to protect maritime borders,” Merkel said.

“If we don’t learn, we won’t succeed next time with Italy, across the sea from Libya.”

“A continent that doesn’t manage that and only reacts by sealing (borders) off just behind the maritime border, and says ‘we’re not interested in whoever is behind the fence’ — I am convinced that can’t be the European answer,” she said.q

Hungary PM blasts migrant flow as threat to Europe V. ISACHENKOV Associated Press MOSCOW (AP) — Hungary’s prime minister vented his anger against the influx of migrants on a visit to Russia on Wednesday, saying that it threatens the identity of EU nations and raises terror threats.

Viktor Orban made the comments during a visit to Russia, speaking a day before a European Union summit where the migrant

crisis is expected to feature prominently on the agenda.

Orban said after talks with President Vladimir Putin that Hungary disagrees with those in the EU who see the flow of migrants as something good.

“Europe’s largest nations now believe it’s mostly positive,” he said through an interpreter. “Our view is that it’s bad.”

Without naming Germany

or any other EU member, Orban went on to assail those in the EU who see Hungary’s desire to protect its ethnic and Christian roots as a “voice from the Dark Ages.”

In remarks heralding fierce debates at the EU summit, Orban said that for Hungary “Christian and national values will be as important in the future as they were in the past,” adding that his nation believes that

“uncontrolled migration will cause more harm than good.”

He went on to assail the EU mechanism requiring members to host migrants, saying that “no one can be forced to live with the people whom they don’t want to live with.”

Asked about his view, Putin said that he wouldn’t weigh in on an EU domestic issue, but praised Orban for his stance.q

A10 WORLD

Thursday 18 February 2016

NEWS

US stealth jets fly over S. Korea amid N. Korea standoff

LEE JIN-MAN Associated Press OSAN AIR BASE, South Korea (AP) — Four of the most advanced U.S. fighter jets flew over South Korea on Wednesday in a clear show of force against North Korea, a day after South Korea’s president warned of the North’s collapse amid a festering standoff over its nuclear and missile ambitions.

The stealthy, high-tech F-22

planes capable of sneaking past radar undetected landed at Osan Air Base near Seoul after the flyover escorted by other U.S. and South Korean fighter jets.

Pyongyang will likely view the arrival of the planes flown from a U.S. base in Japan as a threat as they are a display of U.S. airpower apparently aimed at showing what the United States can do to defend its ally South Korea from

potential aggression from North Korea.

“The F-22 ‘Raptor’ is the most capable air superiority fighter in the world, and it represents one of many capabilities available for the defense of this great nation,” Lt. Gen. Terrence J. O’Shaughnessy, deputy commander of the U.S. military command in South Korea, said in a statement.

“The U.S. maintains an ironclad commitment” to the

defense of South Korea, he said.

The U.S. military would not say how long the F-22s will be deployed in South Korea.

The United States often sends powerful warplanes to South Korea in times of tension with North Korea.

Last month it sent a nuclear-capable B-52 bomber to South Korea after North Korea defiantly conducted its fourth nuclear test.

The international standoff over North Korea deepened earlier this month when Pyongyang ignored repeated warnings by regional powers and fired a long-range rocket carrying what it calls an Earth observation satellite. Washington, Seoul and others consider the launch a prohibited test of missile technology.

Foreign analysts say the North’s rocket launch and nuclear test put the country further along it its quest for a nuclear-armed missile that could reach the U.S. mainland.South Korea’s president on Tuesday warned North Korea faces collapse if it doesn’t abandon its nuclear bomb program, an unusually strong broadside that is certain to infuriate Pyongyang.

KIM TONG-HYUNG Associated Press SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Koreans’ stomachs are the latest front in the standoff with North Korea.

South Koreans have been told not to eat at North Korea’s restaurants around the world, although such

visits aren’t illegal, the South’s Foreign Ministry said Wednesday.

Most of the restaurants are in China, and Chinese and other nationalities frequent them more than South Koreans do, so analysts see little impact. But the move is symbolic of a tougher

stance from the South since North Korea’s nuclear test last month and its recent rocket launch, which many outsiders see as a banned test of ballistic missile technology. Washington and Seoul have been calling for more stringent financial and trade sanctions

against Pyongyang. President Park Geun-hye has taken a much harder line than during past standoffs with the North, closing a jointly run factory park that the South believes helped finance Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles program. Park on

One of four U.S. F-22 stealth fighters flies over Osan Air Base in Pyeongtaek, South Korea, Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2016. Four U.S. F-22 stealth fighters flew over South Korea on Wednesday in a clear show of power against North Korea, a day after South Korea’s president warned of the North’s collapse amid a festering standoff over its nuclear and missile ambitions.

(AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)

In a speech at parliament, President Park Geun-hye said South Korea will take unspecified “stronger and more effective” measures to make North Korea realize its nuclear ambitions will result only in accelerating its “regime collapse.”

Park made the speech while defending her government’s decision to shut down a jointly run factory park in North Korea in response to the North’s rocket launch. Pyongyang retaliated by expelling all the South Koreans there, put its military in charge of the area and cut off key communication hotlines between the Koreas.

It is unusual for a top South Korean official to publicly touch on such a government collapse because of worries about how sensitive North Korea is to talk of its authoritarian government losing power. Pyongyang has long accused Washington and Seoul of agitating for its collapse.

After the rocket launch, Seoul announced that talks would begin with Washington on deploying a sophisticated U.S. missile defense system in South Korea and that the allies’ annual military drills in the spring will be the biggest ever. q

South Koreans’ stomachs latest front in standoff with North Tuesday also warned of “regime collapse” in the North, formerly a taboo subject in the South, which cherishes the notion of an eventual peaceful reunification on the peninsula that was divided at the end of World War II by the Soviet Union and the United States.q

WORLD NEWS A11

Thursday 18 February 2016

Migrants find refuge ‘north of the middle of nowhere’ KARL RITTER Associated Press HAMMERFEST, Norway (AP) — After hiding below the horizon for two long months, the sun has finally risen in Hammerfest, casting a pale pink hue over the Arctic landscape surrounding the world’s northernmost refugee shelter.

From her modest room, Huda al-Haggar admires the wonderland of snow and ice, a sight so different from her native Yemen, where a Saudi airstrike destroyed her home, forcing her to flee with her young son.

“It’s wonderful when I wake up in the morning and see this picture, the sea and the mountains. It’s a wonderful place,” the young woman says as 5-year-old Omar plays with Lego on her lap.

The wooden barracks where al-Haggar and her son live used to house oil workers until Europe’s migrant crisis reached the jagged shores of northern Norway, where the continent drops dramatically into the Arctic Ocean.

Waiting for their asylum claims to be processed, hundreds of people in emergency shelters in Hammerfest and neighboring towns are slowly getting used to the extreme climate and unfamiliar customs of the High North.

They say they have adapted to the cold — the temperature rarely drops below minus 10 degrees C (14 F) along the coast, though it gets much colder further inland. It’s the darkness that throws them off.

Rami Saad, a 23-year-old Syrian from Damascus with a neatly groomed beard and tight slacks, says workers at the Hammerfest center warned him about the polar night but he didn’t believe them until late No-

vember, when “suddenly there was no sun.”

The lack of daylight messed up his body clock, like the day when he rolled out of bed at 11 and ambled to the cafeteria to have lunch.

used that route last year before the government tightened the border in November and started deporting those who were not deemed to be in need of protection in Norway.

Though that’s just a trickle

crazy,” Hansen says, clasping a cup of black coffee inside the main cabin. “Is it possible to have people in darkness on an island?” Not only was it possible, it was a big success, according to Hansen and Paal Manns-

Afghan asylum seeker Roheek Yausofi waits his turn for food cooked on an open fire, with fish caught the day before by his father, on the island of Seiland, northern Norway, Tuesday, Feb. 2, 2016. Waiting for their asylum claims to be processed, hundreds of people in emergency shelters in Hammerfest and neighboring towns are slowly getting used to the extreme climate and unfamiliar customs of the High North. They say they have adapted to the cold _ the temperature rarely drops below minus 10 degrees C (14 F) along the coast, though it gets much colder further inland.

(AP Photo/Alastair Grant)

“But there was nobody there,” Saad says, giggling.

“It was 11 p.m.”

Few of the asylum-seekers expected to end up here, 280 miles (460 kilometers) north of the Arctic Circle, when they left their homelands in the Middle East, Africa and Asia to escape violence, poverty, forced marriages or armies they didn’t want to join.

Some were relocated by Norwegian authorities after entering the country from Sweden in the south.

Others blazed a new trail into Western Europe by first entering Russia and then crossing its Arctic border with Norway.

More than 5,000 people, mostly Syrians and Afghans,

compared to the 1 million people who entered Europe last year from the south across the Mediterranean Sea, it forced Norwegian authorities to quickly set up migrant shelters in small towns separated by mile upon mile of untouched wilderness.

In Alta, a scenic two-hour drive to the south, the Northern Lights Hotel was converted into a shelter for unaccompanied minors.

On Seiland island, a nature reserve west of Hammerfest, Stig Erland Hansen was asked to temporarily house dozens of asylum-seekers in a remote lodge where he hosts adventure tourists during the summer.

“At first I thought it was

verk, who manages the camp, a cluster of wooden houses facing a pristine fjord. Reachable only by boat, the isolated location gives you a sense of being at the end of the world — or as Mannsverk put it: “north of the middle of nowhere.”

Yet the 36 asylum-seekers staying here, all but one from Afghanistan, seem surprisingly at ease. Hansen and Mannsverk say it’s because they try to keep them active: fishing, chopping wood, sledding, skiing, and hiking instead of just sitting around waiting for a decision by the Norwegian Immigration Directorate, which can take more than a year.

The camp on Seiland is a

far cry from the crowded and jail-like migrant centers in some parts of Europe. Afghan children laugh and holler as they sled down the slope from the camp to the rocky shoreline, where men speaking Dari rinse fish caught in the icy fjord.

Later, as the sun drops behind the mountains, they will cook them over an open fire with onion, tomatoes, eggs and spices brought in from the mainland.

To some the contrast with the life they left behind is almost surreal.

“I was in Afghanistan, a country far away from here and now I’m in the north of Norway. I could never have imagined this,” says 20-year-old Zakria Sedequi.

He says he fled Afghanistan’s Maidan Wardak province after the Taliban tried to recruit him. An ugly scar over his left eyebrow suggests they didn’t ask nicely. Sedequi says they rammed the butt of a Kalashnikov rifle into his forehead. He documented the bloody mess with his cellphone camera.

Inside the camp, 62-yearold Shukria Nawabi tears up as she recalls the hardship her family faced in Kabul. She has lived on Seiland since October with her husband, daughter and grand-daughter Helenar, a 7-year-old with pigtails, pink tights and a sheepish smile.

Wrapped in a shawl, her daughter, Sufya, seems almost offended when asked whether the family struggled to adjust to the darkness on this desolate island.

“If you were in my place,” she says, “where bombs are going off in the street, where women are treated badly, and you come to this place, would you worry about the darkness and the isolation?”q

A12 WORLD

Thursday 18 February 2016

NEWS

Colombia’s police chief resigns over sexual misconduct probe BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — The head of Colombia’s police resigned Wednesday amid accusations of illegal enrichment and sexual misconduct with young cadets that threatened to tarnish the reputation of one of the South American nation’s most-prestigious institutions.

Gen. Rodolfo Palomino’s resignation came a day after Colombia’s inspector

general opened an administrative probe into the accusations, which surfaced in the media late last year.

Palomino, in this third year as police chief, reiterated his innocence at a press conference and said the charges are part of a campaign to slander him.

“I can’t allow that because of an investigation against the director, doubts be cast on the police’s hon-

orability,” Palomino said surrounded by his family and high-ranking officers.

“Human beings are never above the institutions they serve.”

The accusations against Palomino range from his purchase of a luxury home outside Bogota that was apparently incompatible with his police salary and alleged illegal wiretaps against journalists.

But the most damning charges, which have monopolized public attention the past few days, are Palomino’s alleged participation in a male prostitution ring, dubbed the “Community of the Ring” by local media, that allegedly forced entry-level cadets to cater to high-ranking officers and even members of congress.

Palomino has for months

fought accusations by a former colonel that he abused his position for sexual favors years ago.

In announcing the probe Tuesday, Inspector General Alejandro Ordonez said authorities obtained testimony and a videotaped conversation from 2008 between a then-senator and police captain that it said corroborates existence of the prostitution ring.q

Puerto Rico mulls debt moratorium, other options amid crisis

The U.S. flag flies in front of Puerto Rico’s Capitol in San Juan, Puerto Rico. This week the government released a long-awaited draft of its financial report that warns of solvency issues as it pushes to obtain a restructuring mechanism from U.S. Congress to deal with its public debt.

(AP Photo/Ricardo Arduengo)

DANICA COTO Associated Press SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Puerto Rico may suspend debt payments and order independent agencies to take over some public corporations to confront a

worsening economic crisis, officials said Wednesday.

These and other emergency measures are being considered as the government’s liquidity continues to dwindle, said Gubernatorial Chief of Staff Grace

Santana. “The government lacks the money needed to keep providing essential services ... and meet debt payments due on May 1 and June 1. It’s a fact,” she said, referring to the more than $1.1 billion due soon.

The announcement came just hours after the government released a longawaited financial report that said there is “substantial doubt” the island’s public agencies can keep operating under current fiscal constraints. The 370page report released Tuesday said the Government Development Bank, which is the local government’s main source of short-term liquidity, could run out of money to operate and honor its obligations. It also said that the island’s retirement systems could soon collapse. The report found that the government’s deficit increased by $2.5 billion in fiscal year 2014 for a total of $49.2 billion, in part because of higher operating expenses and an increase in liabilities including bonds. Meanwhile, the government’s net position decreased by $1.7 billion during that period.

Puerto Rico has been pressuring the U.S. Congress to obtain a restructuring mechanism to help it cope

with $72 billion in public debt that the governor has said is unpayable. Some Republican legislators had demanded to see the financial report, which is 10 months overdue and has not yet been audited.

Treasury Secretary Juan Zaragoza said Wednesday that an audited version would be available in upcoming months and said there is nothing in the financial statement that people already didn’t know.

Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla criticized some U.S. legislators for not acting on Puerto Rico’s crisis because it had not released its financial statement.

“The risk of Congress not providing such framework, which costs nothing to U.S. taxpayers, is condemning Puerto Rico to a legal morass that will jeopardize essential services for U.S. citizens living in Puerto Rico, further accelerate outmigration to the U.S. mainland and severely impair creditors’ ability to recover on their claims,” he said.q

Key Venezuela opposition leader calls for recall of Maduro HANNAH DREIER Associated Press CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — The Venezuelan opposition’s top vote-getter is calling for a recall referendum against President Nicolas Maduro.

Two-time presidential candidate Henrique Capriles called for a referendum to oust the socialist leader Wednesday. Capriles, who leads the more moderate wing of Venezuela’s oppo-

sition, previously stopped short of calling for Maduro’s ouster.

Maduro has been on a collision course with opposition leaders since critics of Venezuela’s socialist government took control of Congress in January for the first time in more than a decade.

Last week, the Supreme Court overturned the one decision Congress has made since being sworn

in — their attempt to deny Maduro emergency powers to death with the economy.

Congress has been weighing several options for removing Maduro from office, including shortening his term, and calling a constitutional referendum.

But many fear that the Supreme Court, which has never ruled against the executive branch, would simply overturn these efforts.

A voter referendum may be a longer and more risky path, but Capriles said it is one the government will be forced to recognize.

“Now is the time,” he said.

“They will not be able to overturn a referendum.”

A governor who narrowly lost to Maduro in the last presidential election in 2013, Capriles leads the opposition party that won a plurality of seats in the new Congress.

Maduro’s approval ratings have languished in the 20 percent range for most of his term, but a recall referendum is no sure thing. The opposition would need to gather nearly 4 million signatures to trigger the recall process. If a vote is called, winning a simple majority will not be enough. The opposition will need to surpass the number of votes Maduro won in 2013. q

LOCAL A13

Thursday 18 February 2016

Paseo Herencia Shopping Center is the Place for Lovers! to get you cuddling up to your significant other.

The mall is always very community conscious, and welcomed volunteers from the Key Club of Colegio Arubano, who sold roses for charity. It was easy to demonstrate one’s affection for their special lady, while feeling good knowing they were helping the less fortunate.

Shopping deals on perfect gifts, from delicious scents at Maggy’s to a stunning watch or fine jewelry at PALM BEACH - Paseo Herencia Shopping Center in Palm Beach offers a wealth of shopping, events and entertainment that make any evening fun, but especially holidays like Valentine’s Day. Almost all their varied eateries offered specials that were ideal for couples wishing to enjoy a romantic dinner under the stars, whether simple or elegant.

Visitors to the mall on Sunday evening were also treated to the musical stylings of singer extraordinaire, Anya, who definitely has a way with love songs.

Her repertoire that evening included favorites like

Sade’s “Sweetest Taboo” and “Close to You” by the Carpenters, which certainly set the mood. Anya appears every Sunday evening at 8:00 PM, and her smooth vocals are sure

one of many such shops that line Paseo Herenica’s halls. Guaranteed that loving couples and all ages had a great night spending Valentine’s Day on Aruba. q

A14 LOCAL

Thursday 18 February 2016

Sidebar Bistro Says Happy Birthday to a Special Mom

-Fresh FM radio DJ Rico Rijk puts a birthday mom in the spotlight.

ORANJESTAD - On a daily basis Fresh FM radio host Rico Rijk has the privilege to surprise someone with a free breakfast for two at Sidebar Bistro. And last Wednesday was no different, so it seemed. A moving email, sent by Caroline Croes to congratulate her mom, was one of the most remarkable ones the radio station received lately. For the past four years now Caroline’s mother, Lyvia Figaroa, has been suffering from advanced kidney failure, leading to unpleasant hemodialysis treatment.

With and increasing loss of hearing and sight, patiently waiting for a donor kidney and life-long diabetes, Lyvia’s life has changed dramatically. Raising two kids as a single mom didn’t allow her any vacation or spare time and since her sickness has advanced, this luxury seems to be gone forever.

As Lyvia’s birthday was coming up on Tuesday February 16th, her daughter Caroline sent an emotional email to local radio station Fresh FM 104.3 to nominate her mom for the “Sidebar Breakfast of the day”, a daily item of the

popular morning show.

Radio DJ Rico Rijk didn’t hesitate for a moment and called Caroline on-air to hear her story and allowing her to congratulate her mom on the radio. Unfortunately due to loss of hearing her mom wasn’t able to hear her best wishes and that was enough reason for the DJ to invite them over to Sidebar Bistro right after the show, so that he could personally welcome and congratulate this special mom.

“Imagine the surprise for Caroline’s mom when we welcomed her at Sidebar.

She was so happy and how great is it that we get to give away such a warm

and delicious gift to Lyvia”, Rico Rijk says. “We receive so many emails on a daily

basis, but this one hit us all in the heart. We are grateful that we can do this for

them and it shows the fantastic support we have from Sidebar Bistro.”

Lyvia was stunned and also humble by all the attention. After reading the email her daughter had sent, she understood what happened and expressed sincere gratitude. When politely asked for her age, she answered with a wink and a smile: just 26 years old.

Sidebar Bistro’s manager, Kim d’Hont explains why they give away a free breakfast every day on the radio. “It feels good to surprise and pamper people who deserve special attention. In this case, Mrs. Figaroa has been struggling for years with her sickness and raising two children as a single mom. This was the least we could do.”

Sidebar Bistro is well known for its delicious Gourmet Burgers, its extensive bourbon selection and American craft beers. “Most of our guests come for our gourmet burgers, and this is a unique way to let everybody know about our extended and renewed breakfast, lunch and dinner menu,” Kim d’Hont proudly states.

Sidebar Bistro is located in Renaissance Marketplace across from Ocean Suites and is open daily from 8am till midnight. More information can be found online at sidebararuba.com or by phone: +297 588 5511. Radio show “Rico in the morning” is ¬¬broadcasted from Monday through Friday from 6am till 9am at Fresh Fm 104.3.q

LOCAL A15

Thursday 18 February 2016

Club di Movimiento Performs at Studio Owner University TM BUBALI - Club di Movimiento was selected from over 50,000 dancers worldwide to perform a cultural Carnival Showcase at Studio Owner University TM, an International gathering of dance educators and dance studio owners from all over the globe. Studio Owner University TM is presented by More Than Just Great Dancing TM. Studio Owner University TM was held at the Renaissance Aruba Resort on Thursday, February 11th and welcomed nearly 100 guests to the island from over 25 states in North America, 2 Canadian Providences and Aruba.

Club di Movimiento is the exclusive Aruba Affiliate Member of More Than Just Great Dancing TM, an affiliate group of dance studios that provide positive programs, top-quality curriculum and high standards of dance studio instruction. q

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A16 LOCAL

Thursday 18 February 2016

For 2016:

PPC Poker Tour Adds 6-Events at Foxwoods Resort Casino champion and award two $5,000 PPC Aruba World Championship packages.

The PPC Aruba World Championship runs November 2-8, 2016 at the Hilton Aruba Resort and features a $2,400 buy-in, $500,000 guarantee Main Event. WSOP Bracelet winner Ronnie Bardah and Mark Kroon will be featured pros. 2015 PPC Aruba Main Event Champion Vin-

ORANJESTAD - The PPC Poker Tour (PPC), which hosts US and destination poker events, returns to Foxwoods Resort Casino to host the six PPC Foxwoods

Aruba $100,000 guaranteed events. Look for the first event February 10-11 during the annual Foxwoods Mega Stack Challenge.

The first PPC Foxwoods ran February 10-11, and the next two will run March 2122, May 11-12. These 2-day events will feature a $400 buy-in, $100,000 guarantee

event. Players can buy into any of the two Day 1 sessions, which will be held at 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. The field combines the following AMIGOE day at 11 a.m. to crown a cent Fiozenzatook down the title this past November for $106,047 plus a $5,000 PPC Aruba package. Aristoteles Neto turned a $65 satellite at Foxwoods into $62,764 and became the 2014 PPC Aruba Champion.

Robin Kazemieh from Germany won the 2013 Main Event title taking home $59,139. 2012 WPT Player of the Year Joe “Floes” Serock won the 2012 PPC Aruba and finished 3rd in 2013. Serock has over $2 million in career earnings.

Event dates for June, October and December of 2016 to be announced.

Highlights: PPC Poker Tour to host 6-events at Foxwoods in 2016 All events are $400 buy-in, $100,000 guaranteed Top-2 win $5,000 packages to the 2016 PPC Aruba World Championship $500,000 guarantee Main Event - 2016 PPC Aruba World Championship Additional stops: Ho-Chunk Wisconsin, Isle Casino Pompano and Daytona Beach Tour sponsors: Savoy Watches, Kicker Problem, Vacation Travel Specialists, Maryland Live, Blue Shark Optics, All In Magazine & Mark Hoke Show Tour pros: Ronnie Bardah, Mark Kroon & Chris “Fox” Wallaceq

SPORTS A17

Thursday 18 February 2016

Nike drops Manny Pacquiao in wake of anti-gay statements TIM DAHLBERG AP Boxing Writer Manny Pacquiao’s latest disparaging comments about gays have cost him a contract with Nike.

It may not be the only endorsement Pacquiao loses, even as he and promoter Bob Arum scramble to contain the damage done by a television interview in the Philippines in which the boxer said gay people “are worse than animals.”

“What he’s saying is diametrically opposed to what I believe,” said Arum, who is promoting Pacquiao’s upcoming fight with Timothy Bradley. “I’m in favor of gay rights and same sex marriage. I’m apologetic personally to the gay movement in the United States.”

Nike issued a brief statement Wednesday saying it was severing its ties with the boxer over his comments about gays. The company said it no longer will have any business dealings with the boxer. “We find Manny Pacquiao’s comments abhorrent,” the statement said. “Nike strongly opposes discrimination of any kind and has a long history of supporting and standing up for the rights of the LGBT community.” Pacquiao, a congressman who is now running for Senate in the Philippines, made the comments to a television station that was asking candidates about their views on same sex marriage.

“It’s just common sense,” Pacquiao said in the remarks posted online by the TV5 network. “Have you seen any animal having male-to-male or femaleto-female relations?”

Continued on Next Page

ISRAEL AMBASSADOR

Omri Casspi having breakout season In this Nov. 3, 2015, file photo, Sacramento Kings forward Omri Casspi, of Israel, grabs a rebound during an NBA basketball game against the Memphis Grizzlies in Sacramento, Calif.

Associated Press Page 22

A18 SPORTS

Thursday 18 February 2016

Rory McIlroy begins his road to the Masters

DOUG FERGUSON AP Golf Writer LOS ANGELES (AP) — The road to the Masters starts on the other side of the country for Rory McIlroy.

McIlroy has heard enough of Riviera that he decided to play the Northern Trust Open for the first time, and 27 holes over the last two days have left him convinced that it was a smart move and that it was worth it to add one more event to a busy schedule.

He is playing five of the next six weeks, and every field will be among the strongest in golf for this time of the year.

“I think the Masters at this point of the year is on pretty much everyone’s mind,” McIlroy said Wednesday.

“You’re building up to it.

You’ve got some great events between now and then, but obviously I’d love my game to be in peak shape for Augusta in April.”

McIlroy has played twice this year, a tie for third in Abu Dhabi and a tie for sixth in Dubai, and typically waits until the Florida swing to get into gear.

Instead, he tees it up Thursday off Sunset Boulevard with a field that has five of the top eight in the world, starting with Jordan Spieth at No. 1. The Honda Clas-

in and week out against some of the best fields in the world. You want to challenge yourself, and you want to test yourself against the best that’s out here.

“I think we’ll see that happen here, and then obviously as we move into Florida.”

Even so, Augusta is on his mind.

McIlroy had all the attention on him last year during the weeks leading to the Masters as the undisputed No. 1 player in the world

going after a third straight major and a chance to complete the career Grand Slam.

Now he’s one of three battling for No. 1 in the world.

McIlroy slipped back to No. 3 this week behind Day. When he won the Match Play last year, he told about a ritual of going to the Official World Golf Ranking website to see the size of his lead at No. 1. Now, he doesn’t look at the ranking as much. He knows he’s not No. 1.

“I will check them. I saw that Jason overtook me last week,” he said. “Need a cup of coffee to perk me up after it.”

Given the strength of fields over the coming weeks, McIlroy has a chance to change that.

“It’s still a big deal,” McIlroy said. “Look, even if you’re a player or a fan, anyone wants to know who the best golf is in the world. It’s important to me. I’m not really competitive in much other things, but this I’m very competitive and want to try and get back there as fast I can.”

So is Spieth, who has his own love affair with Riviera.

Spieth said he was torn between going to college at Texas or USC when he was in high school (he eventual-

ly chose Texas), and one of the perks of the Trojans was having a playing membership at Riviera while he was in college.

He played on an exemption as an amateur in 2012 and missed the cut when he missed a 10-foot par putt on the 18th hole. He was three shots behind going into the final round in 2014 until closing with a 71.

And a year ago, he made bogey trying to make birdie, and it wound up keeping him out of a playoff.

Throw in the NCAA title that Texas won at Riviera in 2012, and Spieth figures he has played Riviera as much as any PGA Tour course outside the state of Texas.

“It’s one of my favorites in the entire world,” he said.

McIlroy sounded as though he was ready to join the fan club. James Hahn won last year in a playoff after he, Dustin Johnson and Paul Casey finished at 6-under 278. Only the U.S. Open last year (5 under) had a higher winning score to par.

“It’s a real treat when you come to a golf course like this where it’s not overly long, you don’t have to really bomb it off the tee, but it’s real strategic,” McIlroy said. “You’ve got to place your ball on the right sides of the fairways. q

In this Oct. 12, 2015, file photo, Manny Pacquiao takes questions at the Asia Society in New York.

Associated Press

the Philippines, where the issue of same sex marriage has not been decided.

“What he said is completely for home consumption for Filipinos wrestling with the question of legalizing same sex marriage,” Arum said.

In addition to his campaign for the Senate, Pacquiao is currently training for the April 9 fight in Las Vegas against Bradley in what he says will be his last bout.

Arum said he could lose some other fight sponsors because of the remarks.

Pacquiao has not fought since losing to Floyd Mayweather Jr. last May in the richest fight ever. Pacquiao reportedly made more than $100 million for the fight, and is guaranteed $20 million to fight Bradley.

Arum said he expects

some people not to buy the fight on pay-per-view because of the comments, but that others might buy it because of them.

“Instead of promoting a fight with a fighter I’m promoting a fight with a politician,” Arum said.

“It’s like of Donald Trump was a boxer and I was promoting Donald Trump when he was running for president. I would be killed by the media for all the stupid statements he is making.”

It’s not the first time Pacquiao has been involved in a furor over gay rights. In 2012 he was quoted as saying he was against same sex marriage because “It’s the law of God” though he denied inferring that homosexuals should be put to death.q

Rory McIlroy of Northern Ireland tees off on the 15th hole during 2nd round of the Omega Dubai Desert Classic golf tournament in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, Friday, Feb. 5, 2016.

Associated Press

sic next week in Florida is expected to have a strong field, and then Doral will bring together the top three — Spieth, Jason Day and McIlroy — for the first time since September.

McIlroy also is scheduled to play at Bay Hill and then the Match Play for the top 64 in the world.

“It’s going to be a great stretch of golf,” he said.

“I think the guys that are up at the top of the world rankings now, we like to play quite a bit. ... It’s great to be able to play week

Nike Pacquiao Continued on Next Page

Animals, he said, were better because they recognize gender differences, and “if you have male-tomale or female-to-female (relationships), then people are worse than animals.”

Pacquiao’s remarks were criticized by several Filipino celebrities, and he responded by issuing an apology of sorts. In it, Pacquiao said he was still against same sex marriage but loved all people.

Arum told The Associated Press that Pacquiao is an evangelical Christian who believes that homosexuality is wrong, and that he was trying to win votes in

SPORTS A19

Thursday 18 February 2016

Williams reminds Kings what he does, helping Caps win 3-1

The Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — Evgeny Kuznetsov’s tiebreaking goal with two minutes remaining off an assist from ex-Kings player Justin Williams, a score that withstood a coach’s challenge for goalie interference, lifted the NHL-leading Washington Capitals to a 3-1 comeback victory over Los Angeles on Tuesday night.

Kuznetsov’s 16th goal, but first in a month, gave him 20 points in his past 14 games. Andre Burakovsky got a secondary assist on that score, after tying the game with 48.1 seconds left in the second period.

Jason Chimera added an empty-netter with 8.6 seconds left.

Anze Kopitar put Los Angeles ahead in the first period on a short-handed goal.

Washington goalie Philipp Grubauer, getting a rare start in place of Braden Holtby, made 39 saves.

SHARKS 4, LIGHTNING 2 TAMPA, Florida (AP) — Matt Nieto and Joel Ward both had a goal and an assist as the Sharks beat the Lightning.

Joe Pavelski and Melker Karlsson also scored for the Sharks, who are 7-2-2 over their last 11 games. Martin Jones improved to 11-2-1 in his last 14 decisions after making 28 saves.

The Lightning, losers in four of their last five games, got goals from Ryan Callahan and Cedric Paquette.

Steven Stamkos was pointless in the Lightning’s first game since general manager Steve Yzerman announced Monday that the team captain won’t be

moved before this month’s trade deadline. Stamkos, who has a no-trade clause in his contract, is in the final year of a deal that pays him about $5.5 million this season. He is eligible to become an unrestricted free agent in July.

FLYERS 6, DEVILS 3 NEWARK, New Jersey (AP) — Wayne Simmonds and Nick Cousins scored 50 seconds apart in a fourgoal third period and the Philadelphia Flyers got a big game from its special teams in posting a victory over New Jersey, snapping the Devils’ three-game winning streak.

Rookie defenseman Shayne Gostisbehere extended his point scoring streak to 13 games with a goal, Brayden Schenn had a goal and two assists and Claude Giroux added three assists as the Flyers won for the second time in seven games (2-3-2). Jakub Voracek and Ryan White also scored in the third period and Michal Neuvirth made 21 saves.

Tyler Kennedy, Jordin Tootoo and Kyle Palmieri scored for the Devils.

Special teams were the difference. The Flyers killed 6 of 7 power plays and converted on 2 of 4 extra-man chances.

BRUINS 2, BLUE JACKETS 1, OT COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Loui Eriksson scored 33 seconds into overtime to lift the Bruins over the Blue Jackets.

Torey Krug and David Krejci assisted on the goal, which helped the Bruins earned their seventh win in their past eight road games.

Philadelphia Flyers center Claude Giroux, left, goes down while competing for the puck with New Jersey Devils defenseman Damon Severson during the first period of an NHL hockey game, Tuesday, Feb. 16, 2016, in Newark, N.J. Associated Press NHL Capsules

Patrice Bergeron also scored for Boston and Tuukka Rask made 28 saves.

Alexander Wennberg scored on a first-period penalty shot for the Blue Jackets.

Joonas Korpisalo made 28 saves for Columbus.

HURRICANES 2, JETS 1 RALEIGH, North Carolina

(AP) — Jordan Staal and Riley Nash scored powerplay goals, and the Hurricanes earned a victory over the Jets.

The Hurricanes swept the season series. Carolina won 5-3 at Winnipeg on Feb. 5.

The win snapped Winnipeg’s four-game road winning streak. The Jets had

not lost on the road since Jan. 7 against Dallas. Winnipeg had won in its previous five trips to Raleigh.

Eddie Lack made 20 saves for Carolina, facing eight shots through the first 44½ minutes. Carolina outshot Winnipeg 29-21, including 25-8 at one point early in the third period. q

20 SPORTS

Thursday 18 February 2016

Nadal, Ferrer and Thiem advance at Rio Open STEPHEN WADE AP Sports Writer RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — After an hour-long delay for rain, Rafael Nadal advanced to the second round at the Rio Open with 6-1, 6-4 win over fellow Spaniard Pablo Carreno.

Nadal won gold in the Beijing Olympics in 2008 but missed the London Olympics with an injury. Despite being asked about it repeatedly, he’s staying away from talking about the Rio’s Olympics that open in six months.

“The Olympics is a very important event, a very special one, and I’m going to try my best when the Olympics arrive,” Nadal said.

“But for now I’m playing the ATP tournament in Rio. That’s the most important thing for me.”

Also advancing Tuesday were No. 2 David Ferrer, who beat Nicolas Jarry of Chile 6-3, 7-6 (3), and No. 5

Rafael Nadal of Spain, returns the ball to Pablo Carreno of Spain, at the Rio Open tennis tournament, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Tuesday, Feb. 16, 2016.

Associated Press

Dominic Thiem, who had a 6-3, 6-4 win over Pablo Andujar of Spain.

Not much will faze Thiem in this week’s Rio Open.

He beat Nadal — the king of clay — last week in the semifinals in Buenos Aires, and then won the event for his fourth clay-court title.

“Both things gave me a lot of confidence, but after the match with Nadal I wanted to give everything to win the tournament,” the

22-year-old Austrian said.

“The win against Rafa would have been worth only half if I had lost the final.” No. 3 Jo-Wilfried Tsonga had his match rained out against Thiago Monteiro. They will play Wednesday.

In first-round upsets, Federico Delbonis of Argentina beat sixth-seeded Jack Sock of the United States 7-5, 6-1 and Alexandr Dolgopolov upset No. 8 seed Thomaz Bellucci 6-7 (3), 7-5, 6-2.

On the women’s side, topseeded Teliana Pereira of Brazil lost 6-3, 7-5 to Petra Martic of Croatia, and second-seeded Johanna Larsson of Sweden defeated Lourdes Dominguez Lino of Spain 7-5, 6-4.

Pereira’s early loss is a blow for the women’s side of the combined WTA-ATP event on outdoor clay. She is only ranked No. 43 but gave local organizers a hometown favorite.q

SPORTS A21

Thursday 18 February 2016

NASCAR’S biggest losers hopeful of major upset at Daytona DAN GELSTON AP Sports Writer DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (AP) — The 1962 New York Mets, the mid-70s Tampa Bay Bucs and the current Philadelphia 76ers have nothing on Casey Mears.

The nephew of four-time Indianapolis 500 champion Rick Mears, Casey has a tortured losing streak that is closing in on 300 races.

His chances of winning the Daytona 500 on Sunday are about as slim as the gap between cars in bumperto-bumper pack racing.

“I don’t like the stat that I have, the longest-running winless streak,” Mears said.

“But I think a lot of those things drive you to push and work hard now to try to end that.”

Don’t worry Mears, you actually don’t have the longest streak.

According to STATS LLC, the longest active losing streaks in the Sprint Cup series by drivers attempting this year’s Daytona 500 are held by: — Bobby Labonte, 395 races.

— David Gilliland, 330 races.

— Mears, 296 races.

— Reed Sorenson, 234 races.

— Michael Waltrip, 218 races.

Those are just a few of the of forlorn drivers who will trudge into “The Great American Race” without much expectation of pulling off The Big One and adding to the short list of upsets at Daytona International Speedway.

With few exceptions, the majority of the long shots

Casey Mears drives down pit road before going out on the track during a practice session for the NASCAR Sprint Unlimited auto race at Daytona International Speedway, Friday, Feb. 12, 2016, in Daytona Beach, Fla. Associated Press

are on the wrong side of NASCAR’s power structure.

They drive low-funded cars with inferior equipment and have inexperienced crews that put them in the hole before the green flag even drops.

The days of an underdog like Alan Kulwicki scratching together the resources to win a championship, much less multiple races, are over. Cars owned by Roger Penske, Rick Hendrick, Stewart-Haas and Joe Gibbs won 35 of the 36 Cup points races last season. Martin Truex Jr. was the lone outlier, winning once for Furniture Row Racing.

For some drivers, the thought of starting the en-

gine knowing there was no chance of catching Jimmie and Junior — or even winless Danica — was a blow to their pride.

Justin Allgaier went 0 for 75 in three years at the Cup level before dropping to the second-tier Xfinity Series.

“I saw a side of myself that I didn’t necessarily like,” he said. “I started doing some things with the way I approached the track, and I didn’t like the way I was doing that. I’ve struggled to understand why it works the way it works with myself.”

Greg Biffle was once one of NASCAR’s regular winners, getting to victory lane six times in 2005 and finishing fifth in the standings in 2012.

He’s coming off back-toback winless seasons for the first time in his Cup career.

“Last year, unfortunately, we knew that next month we weren’t going to show up to the race track and win,” he said. “We didn’t have the cars to do it.”

Mired in mediocrity, Biffle’s team underwent a major offseason overhaul that in-

cluded a new crew chief to try and rediscover his winning ways.

Mears has watched Germain Racing morph through the years into a potentially competitive team and he flashed some speed in Daytona qualifying. He had heavyweight ownership behind him early in his career before he bounced around with the have-nots.

He failed to qualify for the 2010 Daytona 500 driving for a start-and-park team.

The start-and-park teams were NASCAR’s equivalent of tanking, fielding a noncompetitive car in hopes of guaranteed cash and little risk of destroying parts.

With a new charter system in place, that ignominious era of early exits has largely been drummed out of the series.

“It’s the worst thing you’ve ever done as a competitor,” Mears said. “I don’t know how you do it, but you have to because you want to continue to be in the sport.”

But much like that 2-15 matchup in the NCAA Tournament, there is still a glimmer that — on any

given Sunday at Daytona — there is hope.

Waltrip went 462 races without a victory before winning the 2001 Daytona 500.

Trevor Bayne, driving in this year’s field, pulled one of NASCAR’s biggest stunners at Daytona in 2011. Derrike Cope — who? — won the 1990 Daytona 500.

They all have more Daytona 500 victories than threetime series champion Tony Stewart. Dale Earnhardt won just once before he died in the 2001 race.

But Daytona is largely a race for the big boys. There are nine former winners in the 40-car field.

“I used to say it’s a crapshoot. It just isn’t,” Sprint Unlimited winner Denny Hamlin said. “The same guys don’t win all the time if it’s a crapshoot. I think that guys like Dale Junior that continually put themselves up at the front when it counts at these superspeedway races, it’s because he knows something that the rest of the field does not. Those are the guys that you need to look at and figure out how you can get better to get to their level.”q

A22

Thursday 18 February 2016

SPORTS

Israel’s first NBA player Omri Casspi having breakout season ARON HELLER Associated Press TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — When Omri Casspi was 13, his family took him on a Bar Mitzvah trip to the United States, the highlight of which was a visit to New York City where the Israeli youngster stood in front of Madison Square Garden and boldly vowed he would one day play there.

“It was more of an illusion.

I’m sure thousands of other Israeli kids did the same thing,” Casspi recalled, “but it’s a dream that somehow came true.”

Eight years later, Casspi captured his country’s imagination by becoming the first Israeli to have success playing in the NBA. Just being drafted, and suiting up, was considered a moment of national pride in this sports-crazed country. But Casspi has persevered and now, in his seventh NBA season, the 27-year-old is having a breakout season, averaging career highs in minutes, points and rebounds and helping lead his Sacramento Kings into the mix of a tight playoff race that could mark the team’s first postseason appearance since 2006.

His career year has already included a stint as the top three-point percentage shooter in the league and an epic shootout with Stephen Curry during a career-high 36-point per-

In this Nov. 30, 2015, file photo, Sacramento Kings forward Omri Casspi, right, high-fives teammate Darren Collison after scoring during the Kings’ NBA basketball game against the Dallas Mavericks in Sacramento, Calif.

Associated Press

formance against Golden State in December. For the 6-foot-9 forward averaging career highs of 12.3 points and 6.4 rebounds a game, it’s the culmination of a lifelong basketball journey.

“There are a lot of components (to success), it’s not something that happened overnight. It’s a process of years of work, of dedication, of learning,” he said.

“When I was younger I was very raw. I had the potential but I hadn’t worked on it all yet ... my game is a lot different now.”

Casspi’s renowned work ethic has been a common theme throughout his ca-

reer. He wasn’t a blue chip prospect like former University of Connecticut standout Doron Sheffer or Euroleague star Oded Katash, a pair of local prodigies who most predicted would be the first Israelis in the NBA but couldn’t break through. Casspi was more of a natural athlete whose skills needed work before he rose to stardom at Maccabi Tel Aviv, Israel’s most prominent club.

“What characterizes Omri is perseverance and dedication. Even when he goes through difficult stretches he just doesn’t give up,” said Guy Goodes, who

coached Casspi at Maccabi. “When everyone else is hanging out at the beach, he is working on his game and improving.”

After the Kings drafted him in the first round of the 2009 draft, he had a solid rookie season, averaging 10.3 points a game. But then his production steadily began to drop and his NBA future came into question as he struggled through tough times in Cleveland and Houston. The turnaround began when he returned to Sacramento last season and found a permanent place in veteran coach George Karl’s rotation.

“He understands the philosophy probably better than most of the guys,” Karl said. “For me, he’s come back with such a great attitude toward the defensive end of the court. He’s been a pleasure to coach this year.”

Karl noted how Casspi, whose reputation used to be primarily as a slasher, has seen his biggest improvement as a 3-point shooter.

“He’s worked at it to the point where he’s, I think, shocked himself to be honest with you. I don’t think he could have thought he could be a 40, 40-something (percent) 3-point shooter,” he said.

Goodes credits Karl for shifting Casspi from small to power forward.

“Playing him at the four gives him a lot more options to shoot the 3-pointer and put the ball on the floor and that is doing wonders for him,” Goodes said.

“He’s got a coach and a team that believe in him and he’s playing with a lot of confidence.”

While Casspi remains a role player in Sacramento, he’s a star in Israel.

Others have been drafted and guard Gal Mekel played very briefly for the Dallas Mavericks and New Orleans Pelicans, but Casspi has remained the only one to truly fulfil a national obsession of reaching the NBA.q

Pistons acquire Harris from Magic for Jennings, Ilyasova NOAH TRISTER AP Sports Writer DETROIT (AP) — With a playoff spot within reach this year, the Detroit Pistons made a trade they hope will benefit them both now and in the future. The Pistons acquired forward Tobias Harris from Orlando on Tuesday in a deal that sent guard Brandon Jennings and forward Ersan Ilyasova to the Magic. The 23-year-old Harris gives Detroit another athletic young

player, and he’ll be under team control for a while.

Harris signed a $64 million, four-year deal to stay with the Magic last summer, when he was a restricted free agent. “This is a move that can be looked at as a long-term move, as one that will fit with our core group of players, and we’ll be able to keep them together,” Detroit general manager Jeff Bower said.

Detroit, which is a halfgame out of the final play-

off spot in the Eastern Conference, gave up its starting power forward in Ilyasova.

Jennings was the Pistons’ backup point guard, and they could afford to part with him after making a long-term commitment to starter Reggie Jackson.

Detroit hasn’t made the postseason since 2009.

Bower said the Pistons were interested in Harris when he was a free agent, but his restricted status made acquiring him hard. q

Orlando Magic’s Tobias Harris (12) loses the ball as he goes to the basket against Los Angeles Clippers’ Lance Stephenson, left, during the second half of an NBA basketball game, Friday, Feb. 5, 2016, in Orlando, Fla. Associated Press

TECHNOLOGY A23

Thursday 18 February 2016

Automatic braking for cars: Private talks on technology pace

JOAN LOWY Associated Press WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. government regulators and the auto industry are taking a more lenient approach than safety advocates like when it comes to phasing in automatic braking systems for passenger cars, according to records of their private negotiations.

The technology automatically applies brakes to prevent or mitigate collisions, rather than waiting for the driver to act. It’s the most important safety technology available today that’s not already required in cars.

Such systems should be standard in all new cars, says the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. But instead of mandating it, the government is trying to work out a voluntary agreement with automakers in hopes of getting it in cars more quickly.

But safety advocates say voluntary agreements aren’t enforceable and are likely to contain weaker standards and longer timelines than if the government had issued rules.

There are about 1.7 million rear-end crashes a year in the U.S., killing more than 200 people, injuring 400,000 others and costing about $47 billion annually. More than half of those crashes could be avoided or mitigated by automatic braking or systems that warn drivers of an impending collision, NHTSA estimated.

In this frame grab from video provided by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), taken in 2015, a vehicle closes in on a Strikeable Surrogate Vehicle (SSV) at the IIHS Vehicle Research Center in Ruckersville, Va. Associated Press

“Consumers are going to come up the losers in this process,” said Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety.

Meeting minutes obtained

by The Associated Press of three of the meetings that NHTSA has held with automakers since October that show the government is considering significant concessions.

Records of the third negotiating session, on Nov. 12, show that automatic braking systems would be allowed that slow vehicles by as little as 5 mph (8 kph) before a collision. Manufacturers would be allowed to

exempt 5 percent of their vehicles from the standard.

The discussion included an additional exemption for models that manufacturers intend to phase out or redesign.

The minutes don’t specify a model year by which the technology would have to be included in cars. The group did decide that discussion of any deadline would begin with “the latest date submitted by any automaker” for when they would be ready to make the change.

The agency is required by law to provide meeting minutes of such negotiations and to make them

public. Only minutes from the first meeting were in the agency’s public docket, but a NHTSA spokesman provided minutes to the other two minutes in response to a request from the AP. Minutes to a fourth meeting were unavailable, the AP was told.

“This is what happens when you start negotiating with the auto industry,” said Joan Claybook, a safety advocate and NHTSA’s administrator during the Carter administration. “They want to negotiate this out and they want to negotiate that out,” and establish a deadline driven by

their production schedules rather than safety considerations.

Besides NHTSA, meeting participants included 16 automakers, two auto industry trade groups and the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, the insurance industry’s safety research arm.

Representatives from Transport Canada, the Canadian government’s auto safety regulator, also attended.

Mark Rosekind, NHTSA’s administrator, has said the federal rule-making process is so cumbersome and time-consuming that a voluntary agreement is likely to get the technology into all cars faster.

He said regulations remain an option.

The Association of Global Automakers, which has taken the lead for the industry on the issue, didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment.

“Regulations can be too rigid when technology like this is changing quickly,” said Russ Rader, a spokesman for insurance institute.

“A complicated regulation could make it more difficult for the automakers and their suppliers to continue to develop the systems.”

Safety advocates who met with Rosekind this week said he told them he hopes to wrap up negotiations on a voluntary agreement within the month. Safety groups have filed a petition asking NHTSA to issue regulations instead.q

Obama creates cyber panel, says long-term vigilance needed

BY KEVIN FREKING ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama on Wednesday appointed his former national security adviser, Tom Donilon, to lead a new commission on cybersecurity that will make detailed recommendations on how the nation should better protect itself against computer attacks.

Donilon will serve as chairman of the Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity. Obama will appoint former IBM chief executive Sam Palmisano

to serve as vice chairman.

Their task, Obama said, is to produce a report by Dec. 1 that will guide future presidents on the infrastructure necessary to confront longterm computer challenges.

Obama said the Internet has brought incredible opportunity and wealth, but it also means “that more and more of our lives are being downloaded.”

“Right now, we are not as well organized as we need to be to make sure that we’re dealing with all these threats in an effective way,” Obama said.

Obama issued an executive order establishing the bipartisan commission earlier this month. It comes as federal agencies are facing ever-more sophisticated attacks. Among the most serious breaches in the past year occurred when hackers gained access to the personal information of more than 22 million U.S. federal employees, retirees, contractors and others, and millions of sensitive and classified documents maintained by the Office of Personnel Management. q

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest listens during the daily briefing at the White House in Washington, Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2016. Earnest talked about the death of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

Associated Press

A24 BUSINESS

Thursday 18 February 2016

Stocks leap for a 3rd day, driven by gains in oil and tech

MARLEY JAY AP Markets Writer NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks climbed Wednesday as investors clung to hope for an international deal to stem a global glut in crude oil with production cutbacks. That sent the price of oil sharply higher, as well as the stocks of major energy companies like Chevron. Tech stocks also rose, led by Microsoft and Facebook.

The gains capped a threeday rally, the longest so far in 2016, that has wiped out about half of the market’s losses since the beginning of the year. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index hit its lowest point of the year last Thursday, and has risen about 5 percent since then. Priceline, Fossil, and Garmin rose after reporting robust earnings.

The Dow Jones industrial average gained 257.42 points, or 1.6 percent, to 16,453.83. The S&P 500 rose 31.24 points, or 1.7 percent, to 1,926.82. The Nasdaq composite index jumped 98.11 points, or 2.2 percent, to 4,534.06.

The price of oil recovered as investors again hoped

for an international deal that will cap or cut production. Several OPEC nations are in talks about freezing production at January’s levels, but that deal requires all of OPEC’s members to agree, and Iran said Wednesday that it won’t stop increasing its exports.

Still, investors appeared to be encouraged that the countries are talking.

The price of U.S. crude jumped $1.62, or 5.6 percent, to $30.66 a barrel in New York. Brent crude, a benchmark for international oils, rose $2.32, or 7.2 percent, to $34.50 a barrel in London.

U.S. crude soared Friday on anticipation of a deal, but even with the recent gains, it’s still down 17 percent this year.Energy stocks climbed along with the price of oil.

Chevron rose $3.50, or 4.1 percent, to $88.31 and Hess picked up $2.63, or 6.4 percent, to $43.47. Tech stocks made big gains, led

by Microsoft, which added $1.33, or 2.6 percent, to $52.42, and Facebook, which rose $3.59, or 3.5 percent, to $105.20.

Oil and natural gas company Devon Energy missed

Trader William McInerney works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Stocks climbed Wednesday as investors clung to hope for an international deal to stem a global glut in crude oil with production cutbacks.

(AP Photo/Richard Drew)

out on those gains after saying it will eliminate 20 percent of its staff in the first quarter and slash its spending and its quarterly dividend in response to the diminished price of oil.

The stock lost 93 cents, or 4.4 percent, to $20.33. It’s down 69 percent over the last year.

For almost six months, stocks have surged and dropped repeatedly as in-

vestors worry about issues like the health of China’s economy, the Federal Reserve’s plans on interest rates, and plunging oil prices. Sameer Samana, global quantitative strategist for Wells Fargo Investment Institute, said the ride isn’t over yet.

“None of those issues have gone away,” Samana said.

“You’ll continue to see that kind of pattern.”

Samana said U.S. companies, and large stocks in particular, are doing pretty well and that investors will eventually start paying more attention to their performance. But he said it’s possible that volatility in financial markets will start to affect the broader economy, cutting into consumer spending and prompting businesses to cut jobs. q

NEW YORK (AP) — T-Mobile US Inc.’s fourth-quarter profit nearly tripled, topping Wall Street expectations as the company add-

ed 2.1 million customers during the period The Bellevue, Washingtonbased wireless carrier reported profit of 297 million,

or 34 cents per share as revenue rose 1.1 percent to $8.25 billion.

The average estimate of eight analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research was for earnings of 12 cents per share.

During the quarter, added 2.1 million customers, bringing its total customer count to more than 63 million The wireless carrier said it was the 11th consecutive quarter that it added more than 1 million new customers.

For the year, the company reported a profit of $733 million, or 82 cents per share. Revenue was reported as $32.05 billion.

Shares of T-Mobile US Inc. rose 95 cents, or 2.6 percent, to $37.40 in morning trading. The stock has risen almost 18 percent in the last 12 months.q

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BUSINESS A25

Thursday 18 February 2016

Airbus, Boeing announce $3B airplane deals at Singapore show A. LIANG Associated Press SINGAPORE (AP) — Airbus and Boeing announced modest aircraft orders at the Singapore Airshow on Wednesday that indicated a lull in demand for the big manufacturers after the 2014 show hauled in more than $30 billion of deals.

Airbus announced an order for six A350-900s, valued at $1.8 billion at list prices from Philippine Airlines. Boeing announced a deal for 12 of its 737 jets with a privately-owned Chinese carrier Okay Airways, valued at $1.3 billion.

Boeing and Airbus executives at the show have voiced confidence that air travel in Asia will continue to grow strongly. They said no Asian airlines had deferred orders already placed.

But some industry experts say the slump in oil pric-

A Boeing 737 MAX airplane is shown on the assembly line in Renton, Wash. Airbus and Boeing announced modest aircraft orders at the Singapore Airshow on Wednesday.

(AP Photo/Ted S. Warren)

es over the past several months means airlines will keep their older less-fuel efficient aircraft for longer and buy fewer new jets.

“One of the reasons why the order books are full is

because the fuel price was high, so there was an incentive to buy the more fuel-efficient planes and get rid of the old ones,” said David Stewart, an aviation and aerospace adviser at

Bombardier to streamline, cut 7,000 jobs NEW YORK (AP) — Bombardier says it plans to cut approximately 7,000 jobs — or about 10 percent of its global workforce— over two years, even as it adds jobs in growing areas of its business.

The company said Wednesday that the job cuts will include production and non-production employees, with 2,000 of the positions being contractors.

It had 70,900 employees worldwide at 2015’s end, according to Bombardier.

The positions to be eliminated are mostly in Canada and Europe, Bombardier said. The biggest cut — 3,200 positions — will be

in the transportation segment. The aerostructures and engineering services unit will eliminate 2,500 jobs, while the product development engineering, aerospace division will cut 800 positions. The business aircraft segment will eliminate 500 jobs.

Bombardier Inc. has been modifying production rates for some of its aircraft and said it is adjusting its workforce to meet market demand. In addition, aerospace development programs and projects are slowing down as expected, so employee levels are being looked at to match future workloads.

At the same time, it says it will hire for other positions in growing areas of its business. Bombardier Inc. plans to hire for its C Series aircraft program and other areas.

Bombardier said Wednesday that the job cuts and hirings will occur in 2016 and 2017. The company anticipates $250 million to $300 million in restructuring charges related to the job cuts.

Bombardier also announced that Air Canada has signed a letter of intent for up to 75 C Series aircraft. Based on the list price of the aircraft, a firm order would be valued at about $3.8 billion.q

ABN Amro reports big jump in 2015 profit AMSTERDAM (AP) — ABN Amro, the Dutch bank that began a phased return to the market last year, says its 2015 net profit soared 70 percent to 1.9 billion euros ($2.1 billion), despite rising regulatory costs.

Chairman of the bank’s managing board Gerrit Zalm said Wednesday that

“2015 was a good year for the bank.”

Operating income rose 5 percent to 8.4 billion euros ($9.4 billion) from 2014. Underlying net profit, stripping out exceptional items, rose 24 percent.

The Dutch state spent 21.7 billion euros to nationalize the bank during 2008’s

financial crisis, together with the Dutch operations of Belgium’s now-defunct Fortis NV, which was part of a consortium trying to take over ABN Amro.

The first chunk of ABN Amro — around 20 percent of its stock — was re-privatized in November.q

ICF International.

“But now the fuel price is low, so some airlines will keep their older planes longer, and therefore not need the new. It’s a quiet time for all of us.”

Airlines are also deterred by the filled order books of both Airbus and Boeing, that could mean a long wait for the delivery of airplanes, Stewart said.

Okay Airways Wang Shusheng said his company’s order for 737s is not part of a deal Boeing signed with China last year to supply 300 aircraft worth $38 billion.

He said the order will “further modernize our fleet and ensure we operate the most efficient fleet well into the future”.

Both jet manufacturers made their announcements on the second day of the Singapore Airshow, which ends Feb. 21. More than 1,000 companies are taking part.

The previous show in 2014 generated deals worth $32 billion, and organizers will release this year’s total after the event’s trade period ends on Friday.q

A26 COMICS

Thursday 18 February 2016

Mutts

Conceptis Sudoku

6 Chix

Blondie

Mother Goose & Grimm

Baby Blues

Zits

Yesterday’s puzzle answer

Sudoku is a number-placing puzzle based on a 9x9 grid with several given numbers. The object is to place the numbers 1 to 9 in the empty squares so that each row, each column and each 3x3 box contains the same number only once. The difficulty level of the Conceptis Sudoku increases from Monday to Sunday.

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A28 SCIENCE

Thursday 18 February 2016

Study shows beluga whales dive to great depth to catch cod DAN JOLING Associated Press ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Beluga whales off Alaska’s northern coast target Arctic cod and will dive to great depths to reach them, according to data collected over 15 years that provides insight into their foraging patterns in the remote region undergoing profound changes from climate warming and a loss of sea ice.

The dive information on two U.S. Arctic Ocean beluga populations showed the white whales in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas diving as deep as 900 meters — or more than 2,950 feet.

The lead author of the study says it adds to the limited information scientists have on the diet and behavior of the two whale populations.

“In the context of a changing Arctic with changes in sea ice in particular, but also changes in anthropogenic interest, it’s sort of important to get some benchmarks and some baseline information,” said lead author Donna Hauser, a doctoral student in the University of Washington’s School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences.

Belugas are small, toothed whales born gray that turn white as they age. They have muscular bodies with distinctive, bulbous structures on the forehead

This May 11, 2011 photo released by North Slope Borough and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) shows a beluga whale pod in the Chukchi sea near Alaska.

Associated Press

and a thick blubber layer that can be 5 inches thick, according to the Alaska Department of Fish and Game.

Male belugas grow as long as 15 feet and females to 12 feet. They feed on salmon, crab, shrimp, squid, clams and small schooling fish such as herring, capelin, smelt and cod. They are hunted by Alaska Native subsistence hunters.

Alaska has five populations of beluga whales.

Two spend winters in the Bering Sea, and when sea ice melts head through the Bering Strait into the Chukchi or Beaufort seas.

During the study, researchers applied tags linked to satellites to whales. When tagged belugas surfaced to breathe, the tags would transmit locations and dive depths.

Hauser and other researchers looked at data collected from 30 whales tagged over 15 years from 1997 to 2012.

One retained a tag for 18 months.

Polar bears and Pacific walrus need sea ice as a platform for hunting. Beluga whales can move around it.

The researchers tracked belugas into feeding areas

that formerly had been covered year-round with sea ice, trying to learn what habitat they use on their long migrations.

Without much information about the diet of belugas in the Arctic Ocean, Hauser and other researchers matched dive information to data they had on the location of schools of Arctic cod and found a correlation.

The whales likely made dives based on where prey was concentrated by oceanographic features such as undersea slopes from shallow to deep water, Hauser said. The whales commonly dove 650 to 1,000 feet.

“So we could confirm, for one thing, that there was this correspondence between the depths the Chukchi belugas were diving and the depths at which Arctic cod were most abundant,” she said.

The tags attached to the belugas could record dives to 1,000 meters, or 3,280 feet.

One male beluga dove to 956 meters, or more than 3,100 feet, in the Canada Basin, which reaches depths of more than 10,000 feet. Researchers don’t know why belugas would dive so deep there, Hauser said.

The research was published in the journal Marine Ecology Progress Series in December.q

PEOPLE & ARTS A29

Thursday 18 February 2016

Actress’ Instagram post draws attention of authorities SEDONA, Ariz. (AP) — A heart carved into red rock is drawing the attention of authorities in Arizona who are investigating to see if actress Vanessa Hudgens is the culprit.

Hudgens posted a photo of the carving, bearing the names Vanessa and Austin, on her Instagram page Sunday but later removed it. Other photos with the hash tag “sedonadreams”

still appeared on the site Tuesday.

The media brought the photo to the attention of the Coconino National Forest, which manages land around Sedona renowned for the towering red rocks, spokesman Brady Smith said. Authorities are investigating the incident, he said Tuesday.

A representative for Hudgens, 27, did not immedi-

Original 1929 Oscar cast to make statuettes awarded in 2016 LOS ANGELES (AP) - The statuettes for the upcoming Academy Awards are based on an original Oscar from 1929.

The film academy announced Tuesday that a New York foundry is restoring features of the original design to the Oscar statuettes for 2016 using digital scans and 3-D printers.

It took Polich Tallix Fine Art Foundry three months to make the 50 statuettes needed for the Feb. 28 ceremony using the high-tech process. Oscar was previously made in a more traditional way

by Chicago’s R.S. Owens & Company, the academy’s foundry for the past 34 years.

Oscar is still plated in 24-karat gold. Gold plat-

In this Jan. 5, 2016 photo provided by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, to give the Oscar statuette seen here in Brooklyn, N.Y., their striking appearance, all surfaces have to be perfect.

ing is only one micron thick and would not cover even the smallest indent; therefore to accomplish a perfect surface.q

Sandy Duncan’s Broadway return is short-lived MARK KENNEDY AP Drama Writer NEW YORK (AP) — Sandy Duncan’s return to Broadway — and in a musical about Peter Pan — will be short-lived.

The actress, who played the boy who won’t grow up on Broadway from 197981, has left “Finding Neverland” after only a few performances, citing “family obligations.”

“Finding Neverland” is adapted from the 2004 whimsical film of the same name about a widow

whose four young sons inspired playwright J.M. Barrie to write the children’s classic. Duncan over the weekend began playing the widow’s mother, joining Tony Yazbeck as Barrie and Kelsey Grammer as both the American theatrical producer Charles Frohman and a fearsome Captain Hook.

Duncan, known for her TV turn in “The Hogan Family,” previous was on Broadway in “Chicago,” and “The Boyfriend.” She turns 70 on Saturday.q

ately respond to messages left by The Associated Press. Hudgens recently appeared on Fox’s live production of “Grease.”

She’s best known for her role as Gabriella Montez in the “High School Musical” television show and movie Smith said he isn’t sure whether law enforcement has located a heart that matches the one posted

by Hudgens within the forest’s 250 square-mile Red Rock Ranger District. Authorities will be researching social media posts and trying to contact any witnesses, he said.

Damaging a natural feature on U.S. Forest Service land is a misdemeanor punishable by up to six months in jail and a maximum $5,000 fine. Smith

In this March 2, 2014 file photo, Vanessa Hudgens, left, and Austin Butler arrive at 2014 Elton John Oscar Viewing and After Party in West Hollywood, Calif.

Associated Press

said he’s unaware of any signs in the district to inform people of the law. Forest officials try to maintain the natural beauty of the area,

he said. “People make mistakes whether knowingly or unknowingly,” Smith said.

But that doesn’t excuse illegal activity, he added.q

A30 PEOPLE

Thursday 18 February 2016

& ARTS Director hopes ‘Zero Days’ will spark debate on cyberwarfare Alex Gibney, director of the FIlm ‘Zero Days’ answers questions during an interview with The Associated Press at the 2016 Berlinale Film Festival in Berlin, Germany, Wednesday, Feb. 17, 2016.

Associated Press

FRANK JORDANS Associated Press BERLIN (AP) — When machines at a nuclear plant in Iran suddenly began spinning out of control six years ago, suspicion quickly fell on the United States and Israel, especially after a sophisticated virus was found that appeared to have been tailored to sabotage a key process in the enrichment of weapons-grade uranium.

Computer security experts dubbed the virus Stuxnet, describing it as the most powerful cyberweapon the world had yet seen.

While the attack on the Natanz plant appeared to have met its immediate objective — to disrupt Iran’s nuclear weapons program — the emergence of Stuxnet was soon compared to the dropping of the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima in 1945 for its ability to change the course of warfare.

A broad public debate about the use of cyberweapons has yet to happen, however, although every modern society is vulnerable to attacks on its critical infrastructure, says Alex Gibney, an Academy Award-winning documentary maker who spent years investigating the Stuxnet case for his new film, “Zero Days.”

The movie, which premieres at the Berlin Film Festival on Wednesday, traces the origins of Stuxnet to joint U.S.-Israeli efforts to foil Iran’s nuclear weapons program without resorting to airstrikes. But interviews with past and present intelligence officials in both countries soon met with a wall of silence that frustrated Gibney.

“Obviously the Manhattan Project (to develop the first

U.S. atomic bomb) was a secret project, but when the bombs when off in Hiroshima and Nagasaki nobody said ‘What bombs?

Did bombs drop? We’re shocked,’” he said.

Even after it became clear that other countries had not only obtained copies of Stuxnet but used parts of it in attacks, and the virus was spreading through computer systems in the United States, the U.S. government largely refused to engage in a debate on the pros and cons of cyberwarfare, said Gibney.

“You would expect people to keep covert operations a secret but once they’re blown, and particularly when they seem to cross over into so much physical destruction, at what point does it become almost nonsensical to not engage about those subjects?”

Unlike the case of former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, who approached journalists with classified information about U.S. electronic surveillance programs, Gibney said finding someone who would talk was “a long slog.”

“I talked to some friends of mine who had been in the Obama administration and there was a sense of pretty extraordinary fear of even talking off the record about this topic,” he said.

“It was toxic. So it was really a problem, this one.”

Eventually some in the intelligence community came forward, according to Gibney. Their identities remains hidden throughout the film, masked by an actress who voices their words.

One, a purported NSA employee, confirms the agency “did Stuxnet.” The anonymous source also

describes the operation — known internally as “Olympic Games” — as small compared to wider contingency plans for a cyberattack on Iran known as “Nitro Zeus.”

The CIA declined to comment on the claims made in the film, some of which have been previously reported by the New York Times and the Jerusalem Post. It referred questions to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Some experts believe Stuxnet helped spur negotiations toward last year’s nuclear accord with Iran. Gibney thinks the blowback resulting from the release of such a sophisticated cyberweapon outweighs the benefits. With Russia, China, North Korea and Iran now believed to be among the countries with major cyberarmies, he thinks it’s time to talk about the implications of a free-for-all in the field of electronic warfare.

“In a world that’s so interconnected, if hospitals go down, if water filtration systems go down, if electricity goes down, suddenly in the modern world those effects can be catastrophic,” Gibney told The Associated Press.

Still, the history of international accords to limit the use of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons offers some hope, he said.

“One thing we know about technology, and one thing we know about agreements is that over time you learn. You learn how to understand and defend against these weapons, and also how to figure out how to regulate their use,” he said.q

PEOPLE & ARTS

A31

Thursday 18 February 2016

College racial tensions to play out on TV drama

LYNN ELBER AP Television Writer LOS ANGELES (AP) — A white college student goes out to party costumed as black rapper Lil Wayne, angering African-Americans who see it as evidence of insidious campus racism.

The incident may sound familiar but it’s fictional, part of a five-episode arc in the upcoming season of “Switched at Birth,” the Freeform (formerly ABC Family) channel drama.

While black student protests at campuses nationwide have made news headlines, “Switched at Birth” is providing a rare, if not unprecedented, TV dramatization of the turmoil.

With characters in college, the series has “both the ability and the responsibility to tell those stories,” executive producer Lizzy Weiss said.

“We are really trying to be accurate and honest about both sides of the debate,” she said. The white student, for example, contends he was celebrating his favorite hip-hop artist, not mocking blacks, with the costume.

But the climactic episode, scheduled to tape this

This photo provided by Disney shows Adam Hagenbuch, left, as Mingo and Katie Leclerc as Daphne Vasquez in a scene from “The Call” episode of the television series, “Switched at Birth.”

Associated Press

week, belongs to the protesters. The series returns in spring, with the date yet to be announced.

“That’s the point in the story where we realized we needed to shift perspective entirely and let our black characters lead their own story. ... We see the entire episode from their points of view,” Weiss said.

The party incident is one of a series of events that drive African-American students

to action at the show’s fictional version of the University of Missouri-Kansas City.

Mirroring real events, Weiss said, black students encounter “everything from micro-aggressions, as they’re called, small things on a daily basis that students of color experience and usually swallow ... to larger acts that are impossible to swallow, and which galvanize them.”

It’s a fitting topic for the se-

ries to tackle, both because of its college setting and because, as Weiss puts it, “Switched at Birth” is about those who endure being treated as “outsiders.”

The drama launched in 2011 as the story of two teenage girls — Daphne (Katie Leclerc), who is deaf, and Bay (Vanessa Marano) — who learn that a hospital error sent them home with the wrong parents, and how that discovery

affects them, their families and friends. “We’ve always had deaf protagonists, and we’ve always done stories that you don’t normally get to see on TV ... and that tell different versions of diversity,” Weiss said. Among them: an episode that was done entirely in sign American Sign Language with subtitles, and a story line about a Down syndrome pregnancy. Last year, the series dramatized the issue of college sexual assault.

Weiss said the upcoming campus story arc was inspired by the rise of black student activism, especially at the University of Missouri in Columbia, where protests including student demonstrations and a threatened strike by the school’s football team led to the president’s resignation last year.

“I’m a storyteller and it was a fantastic story, and it’s a really important story, to show you can make change. You can, as young people, demand change,” she said.

The story arc that unfolds in the first half of the season features “Switched at Birth” actresses Bianca Bethune and Sharon PierreLouis and newcomer Sam Adegoke.q

Singer, actress Denise Matthews, known as Vanity, dies JESSE J. HOLLAND Associated Press Vanity, a Prince protege who renounced her sexy stage persona to become a Christian minister, has died. She was 57.

The singer and actress, born Denise Matthews, died Monday at a hospital in Fremont, California, said Gisela Hernandez, a spokeswoman for Washington Hospital Health Care System. Hernandez did not give a cause of death.

Matthews’ sister Renay said the death was from complications over longstanding kidney issues.

She said Denise Matthews was happy in recent years.

“She loved her time in the ‘80s, but I think she loved her recent time more, because she had been at peace,” Renay Matthews

said.

A native of Niagara Falls, Ontario, Matthews first rocketed to stardom through her association with Prince and the 80s girl group Vanity 6. During her time in music, Vanity released four albums with Motown and Warner Brothers and was known for her sultry appearance and sexually-themed music, including “Nasty Girl.” She also appeared in films in the late 1980s and early 1990s, including “The Last Dragon,” ‘’52 Pick-Up” and “Action Jackson.”

Matthews’ health took a turn for the worse in 1992 and she was hospitalized for kidney failure, which she blamed on cocaine and other drug use.

“I was sick inside. I was a crack cocaine addict and didn’t even know how to

wake up in the morning without some smoke,” she said in an Associated Press story in 1999.

She renounced her Hollywood lifestyle and became a Christian minister.

She married former Oakland Raider Anthony Smith in 1995 and they divorced the next year.

On a GoFundMe page aimed at helping her pay her medical bills, Matthews said four months ago she had gone through 23 surgeries and was on dialysis three times a week. She said she was also diagnosed with sclerosing encapsulating peritonitis, a rare benign cause of small bowel obstruction.

Matthews expressed no regrets about leaving her celebrity lifestyle behind.

“When I was Vanity, it was

all about me,” she said in 1999. “But when I’m preaching the word of God, it’s Jesus Christ speaking through me. I don’t want people to know who I was back then, but the new creature that God has made me.”

Musicians around the world expressed sorrow at Matthews’ death.

Prince, who was touring in Australia, dedicated several songs to Matthews during a show, according to the Herald Sun newspaper. q