In brief | Nation & world | 4-23-14

Most Sherpa guides decide to leave Everest in walkout after avalanche

KATMANDU, Nepal — Most Sherpa mountain climbers have decided to leave Mount Everest, a guide said Tuesday, confirming a walkout certain to disrupt a climbing season that was already marked by grief over the 16 lives lost in Everest’s deadliest disaster.

“It is just impossible for many of us to continue climbing while there are three of our friends buried in the snow,” said Dorje Sherpa, an experienced Everest guide from the tiny Himalayan community that has become famous for its high-altitude skills and endurance.

“I can’t imagine stepping over them,” he said of the three Sherpa guides who remain buried in ice and snow after Friday’s deadly avalanche. Thirteen bodies have been recovered.

The avalanche was triggered when a massive piece of glacier sheared away from the mountain along a section of constantly shifting ice and crevasses known as the Khumbu Icefall — a teacherous area where overhanging immensities of ice as large as 10-story buildings hang over the main route up the mountain.

Special teams of Sherpas, known as Icefall Doctors, fix ropes through what they hope to be the safest paths, and use aluminum ladders to bridge crevasses. But the Khumbu shifts so much that they need to go out every morning — as they were doing when disaster struck Friday — to repair sections that have broken overnight and move the climbing route if needed.

Ukraine’s leader orders new ‘anti-terror’ operation; military plane reportedly hit by gunfire

KIEV, Ukraine — Ukraine’s acting president ordered security forces to resume “anti-terror” operations in the country’s east Tuesday after the bodies of two people allegedly abducted by pro-Russia insurgents were found and a military aircraft was reported to be hit by gunfire.

The twin developments — which came just hours after U.S. Vice President Joe Biden left Kiev, the Ukrainian capital — raised fears that last week’s international agreement on easing Ukraine’s crisis was failing.

The agreement calls for all sides to refrain from violence and for demonstrators to vacate public buildings. It does not specifically prohibit security operations, but Ukraine suspended its so-called “anti-terrorist operation” after the accord.

Pro-Russia insurgents who have seized police stations and other public buildings in eastern Ukraine are defying the call to vacate, saying they were not party to the agreement by Ukraine, Russia, the United States and the European Union.

In a statement, acting President Oleksandr Turchynov said the two bodies found Tuesday in Slovyansk bore signs of torture. One of them was a member of the city council and a member of Turchynov’s party, he said.

Supreme Court has major doubts about Ohio law barring campaign lies

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court appears to be highly skeptical of laws that try to police false statements during political campaigns, raising doubts about the viability of such laws in more than 15 states.

Justices expressed those concerns early and often Tuesday during arguments in a case challenging an Ohio law that bars people from recklessly making false statements about candidates seeking elective office.

The case has attracted widespread attention, with both liberal and conservative groups saying the law tramples on the time-honored, if dubious, tradition of political mudslinging. Critics say free speech demands wide-open debate during political campaigns, including protection for negative speech that may sometimes twist the facts.

The high court is not expected to rule directly on the constitutional issue because the current question before the justices is only a preliminary one: Can you challenge the law right away, or do you have to wait until the state finds you guilty of lying?

But the justices couldn’t resist going after the law itself, pointing out that the mere prospect of being hauled in front of state officials to explain comments made in the heat of an election has a chilling effect on speech.

By wire sources