In Brief: Nation & World: 3-15-16

St. Louis company sterilizes mosquitoes to fight Zika virus

ST. LOUIS — The battle against the Zika virus, which can cause birth defects and paralysis, has been taken to the source.

The deadliest creatures on Earth — mosquitoes — kill 725,000 people every year by passing on malaria, dengue fever, yellow fever and other diseases. Now the insects are blamed for spreading Zika, infecting 3 million to 4 million people across Latin America in the past year.

Conventional mosquito control involves spraying pesticides where the insects breed. But mosquitoes have developed resistance to many pesticides, and the spray kills helpful bugs. The World Health Organization says traditional pesticides have not significantly slowed other mosquito-borne diseases.

A St. Louis biotech company says it has another solution. Forrest Innovations plans to breed and release sterile mosquitoes to prevent reproduction and reduce the number of disease-carrying mosquitoes. Its first target is Rio de Janeiro, which has had the world’s largest Zika outbreaks and will host the upcoming summer Olympics.

“If we stop the mosquito, we can stop Zika, West Nile or any other viruses we might see in the next five years,” said Nitzan Paldi, Forrest’s CEO.

The concept is not new. Agriculture scientists have long used radiation to sterilize fruit flies, which are then released to kill off the crop-destroying pest. But fruit flies are much sturdier than mosquitoes, and radiation tends to kill the mosquito.

Forrest’s mosquito control program, called NoMoreMos, involves a different technique to sterilize male mosquitoes at a larval stage. After the males are sorted by machine (females weigh slightly more than males), the larvae receive a topical application of a solution that renders them sterile, but does not modify their genetic code.

It is more efficient to sterilize males and prevent them from fertilizing females’ eggs. And male mosquitoes don’t bite, since only females need blood for egg development. The idea is to outnumber the wild male mosquito population with the sterile males, who will win the competition for females’ attention.

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2016 race barrels toward potentially decisive primary day

HANOVERTON, Ohio — The tumultuous presidential primary season barreled toward a potentially decisive day for both Republicans and Democrats, with enough delegates up for grabs Tuesday to turn Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton from front-runners to likely nominees.

The biggest prizes are Florida and Ohio, states with a long history of making or breaking White House aspirations. Missouri, Illinois, and North Carolina also offer a crucial cache of delegates that could help Trump and Clinton pull further away from their rivals.

Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio hoped the two big states would give them a boost instead. Kasich seemed to have a better chance at that than Rubio.

The contests come at a remarkable moment in the presidential race for Republicans. Animosity toward Trump has risen to the point where he can rarely get through an event without being interrupted by protesters. The front-runner is also under scrutiny for appearing to encourage his supporters to physically confront those protesters, deepening divisions within the Republican Party.

In a lightly veiled jab at Trump, Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan of Wisconsin said candidates “need to take responsibility for the environment at their events.”

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Breitbart reporter involved in Donald Trump incident resigns

NEW YORK — The Breitbart News reporter allegedly roughed up last week at a Donald Trump press conference has resigned from the conservative website, saying that she can’t work for an organization that doesn’t support her, and three other news employees followed her out the door.

Michelle Fields, who said that she was grabbed by Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski as she attempted to question the candidate last Tuesday in Florida, was joined in her resignation by Breitbart editors Ben Shapiro and Jarrett Stepman, along with national security correspondent Jordan Schachtel.

Police in Jupiter, Florida, said Monday their investigation of the incident is ongoing. No charges have been filed.

Lewandowski has denied the allegation. Trump told CNN that the incident, also witnessed by a reporter from The Washington Post, was probably “made up.”

After initially publishing Fields’ account, Breitbart posted a story doubting its own reporter, saying the “likeliest explanation” is that Fields was grabbed by a security officer, not Lewandowski.

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Putin orders start of Russian military pullout from Syria

MOSCOW — President Vladimir Putin ordered the Russian military to withdraw most of its forces from Syria, timing his move to coincide with the launch of Syria peace talks Monday — an end game that allows the Russian leader to cash in on his gains and reduce his risks in the conflict.

The start of the negotiations in Geneva offers Putin an opportune moment to declare an official end to the 5½-month Russian air campaign that has allowed Syrian President Bashar Assad’s army to win back some key ground and strengthen his positions ahead of the talks. With Russia’s main goals in Syria achieved, the pullback will allow Putin to pose as a peacemaker and help ease tensions with NATO member Turkey and the Gulf monarchies vexed by Moscow’s military action.

At the same time, Putin made it clear that Russia will maintain its air base and a naval facility in Syria and keep some troops there. Syria’s state news agency also quoted Assad as saying that the Russian military will draw down its air force contingent but won’t leave the country altogether.

The Syrian presidency said Assad and Putin spoke on the phone Monday and jointly agreed that Russia would scale back its forces in Syria. It rejected speculation that the decision reflected a rift between the allies and said the decision reflected the “successes” the two armies have achieved in fighting terrorism in Syria and restoring peace to key areas of the country.

The Syrian army said it would continue its operations against the Islamic State group, the Nusra Front and other terrorist organizations “with the same tempo.”

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Brothers accused in recording attack that left officer dead

CHEVERLY, Md. — An undercover narcotics officer was mortally wounded by one of his colleagues as he responded to an attack on his police station by a gunman with a death wish, their police chief angrily explained on Monday.

And while Officer Jacai Colson lay dying, the gunman’s two brothers coldly recorded Sunday’s firefight on their cellphones, Prince George’s County Police Chief Hank Stawinski said, tapping a podium and trying to contain his emotions.

The gunman, Michael Ford, dictated a “last will and testament” just minutes before his two brothers drove him to the station, where he began spraying bullets at passing cars and even an ambulance to draw officers outside, police said.

Colson arrived at the station after the firing began. He was wearing civilian clothes without body armor and leaping out of an unmarked car.

“Police officers run to disorder. They run to the sound of shots,” the chief said. “It’s my sad duty to have to share with you that, circumstantially, we believe the fired round that led to Detective Colson’s death was fired by one of his fellow Prince George’s County officers reacting to this.”

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Disorder at Trump rallies: As American as cherry pie?

Even before the presidential candidate arrived at the rally, the arena seethed. Fistfights broke out as the national anthem played. Supporters tore up demonstrators’ signs, beat them with sticks, pummeled them with folding chairs.

The year was 1968; the candidate was Alabama Gov. George Wallace.

If you’re struggling with feelings of deja vu, you’re not alone. The recent dark turn of the 2016 presidential campaign — the ugly scuffles and confrontations at Donald Trump’s rallies — has brought back memories of the turmoil of the 1960s, and fueled fears that America is careering into a similarly angry and violent era.

Will it happen? There’s no way of knowing. Some note this is a different time: When Wallace climbed the stage of Detroit’s Cobo arena, on Oct. 29, 1968, college campuses were exploding, American cities were in rubble, and Wallace’s incendiary words were just some of many, many angry words of that era.

As contentious as our times may seem, they’re not that bad — yet. But protesters, drawn by Trump’s positions against immigrants and Muslims, have been ejected from his rallies; one North Carolina man was charged with assault after he was caught on video hitting a man being led out by deputies at the event in Fayetteville. Trump says he does not encourage violence; the fault, he says, lies with the demonstrators.

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Amtrak train derails in Kansas, injuring at least 32

CIMARRON, Kan. — An Amtrak train carrying more than 140 people derailed in rural Kansas early Monday, moments after an engineer noticed a significant bend in a rail and applied the emergency brakes, authorities said.

At least 32 people were hurt, two of them critically, authorities said.

A federal transportation official said the investigation would focus on the condition of the rails. Local authorities said they were checking whether a vehicle crash may have damaged the track before the accident.

The engineer of the train known as the Southwest Chief noticed the deformity in the rail and pulled the brakes, said Earl Weener of the National Transportation Safety Board. He put the train’s speed at the normal limit of 60 mph.

Weener said there was some initial indication of a “misalignment” on the rail. But it was unclear what that was or what caused it. He said the engineer was vigilant and noticed the variation on the track, causing him to brake.

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Palestinian-American IS fighter surrenders to Iraqi Kurds

IRBIL, Iraq (AP) — A 26-year-old man fighting with the Islamic State group gave himself up to Iraqi Kurdish forces in northern Iraq on Monday and when asked, said he is a Palestinian from the United States.

His driving license, posted on social media, had Alexandria, Virginia, as his home address and though U.S. authorities have yet to confirm whether he is an American citizen, the incident marked a rare voluntary surrender in Iraq of a militant fighting with the extremist group.

The IS fighter had been “lurking near the peshmerga lines” since late Sunday night, according to Maj. Gen. Feisal Helkani of the Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga forces who play a key role — along with the Iraqi military and Shiite militia forces — in battling the IS extremists.

Helkani said his troops first tried to shoot the man, assuming he was a would-be suicide bomber.

“Then in the morning, he walked across and gave himself up,” Helkani said, adding the man is a Palestinian-American who was fighting with IS in Iraq.

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Al-Qaida focuses attention on soft targets in West Africa

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — The attack on an Ivory Coast beach resort by an al-Qaida affiliate is the latest sign it is shifting its focus to soft targets associated with foreigners in an effort to destabilize economies and gain the group credibility among jihadis in its rivalry with the so-called Islamic State group.

The three gunmen who burst into the Grand-Bassam beach resort and killed 18 people were part of al-Qaida in the Islamic Maghreb, a group that grew out of the Algerian civil war in the 1990s and used to restrict itself to operations deep in the desert, hundreds of miles away.

In recent months, however, it has carried out devastating attacks against luxury hotels frequented by foreigners: first in Mali in November, then in Burkina Faso in January, and now even farther south in an Ivorian resort popular with tourists and locals alike.

“They are essentially shifting their strategy from operating in northern Mali and southern Algeria and parts of Libya to much more commercially relevant areas,” said Robert Besseling, director of the Exx Africa risk advisory group. “Therefore it undermines the whole region’s economy and the business confidence surrounding these economies.”

Al-Qaida’s North Africa branch was once known for striking military posts in Algeria and neighboring countries, but such attacks were often difficult and made little impact internationally.

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Vatican monsignor admits to passing documents in trial

VATICAN CITY — A Vatican monsignor admitted in court Monday that he passed confidential Holy See documents on to journalists but said he did so at a time when he feared for his life after a friendship with a woman turned sour.

Monsignor Angelo Lucio Vallejo Balda, a former high-ranking official in the Vatican’s finance office, was the first defendant called to testify in the Vatican’s controversial trial over leaked documents. In addition to Vallejo, the two journalists, the woman and Vallejo’s secretary are on trial.

Under repeated questioning from the chief prosecutor and the tribunal president, Vallejo confessed that he passed documents to journalists Gianluigi Nuzzi and Emiliano Fittipaldi.

“Yes, I passed documents,” he said. “I did it spontaneously, probably not fully lucid.”

“I was convinced I was in a situation without exit,” he said.

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US to fire monitor overseeing formerly for-profit colleges

WASHINGTON — The Education Department is removing a law firm hired to oversee the turnaround of schools owned by Corinthian Colleges Inc., a for-profit education company whose financial collapse had placed at risk more than $1 billion in federal student loans.

An Associated Press investigation identified conflicts with the ostensibly independent monitor.

The department said it was removing the firm, Hogan Marren Babbo & Rose Ltd. of Chicago, after the AP reviewed with senior agency officials its findings last week after a nine-month investigation examining the Obama administration’s response to Corinthian’s extraordinary collapse in 2014 amid allegations of mismanagement and fraud. The department had previously said only that it intended to review the firm’s performance going forward.

The chairman of the firm’s education practice, Charles P. Rose, declined Monday to discuss his firm’s removal. A spokeswoman for Zenith did not respond to an email and phone call asking how much the company had been paid.

The monitor has been overseeing the business practices of Zenith Education Group, an offshoot of a student-loan debt collection firm that took over Corinthian’s operations. It was serving as the U.S. government’s close-up eyes and ears, reviewing Zenith’s marketing materials and admissions phone calls and the accuracy of graduation and employment statistics.