AP News in Brief 10-31-19

Fire burns down structures at historic Japanese castle in Okinawa

TOKYO — A fire early Thursday burned down structures at Shuri Castle on Japan’s southern island of Okinawa, nearly destroying the UNESCO World Heritage site.

Firefighters were still battling the blaze a few hours after the fire started early Thursday and nearby residents were evacuated to safer areas, Okinawa police spokesman Ryo Kochi said.

The fire in Naha, the prefectural capital of Okinawa, started from the castle’s main structure. The main Seiden temple and a Hokuden structure, or north temple, have burned down. A third main structure Nanden, or south temple, was nearly destroyed, Kochi said.

Nobody has been injured. The cause of the fire was not immediately known.

Footage on NHK television showed parts of the castle, engulfed in orange flames and turning into charred skeleton, collapsing to the ground.

Bolton summoned; 1st big vote set on impeachment probe

WASHINGTON — House investigators are asking former national security adviser John Bolton to testify in their impeachment inquiry, deepening their reach into the White House as the probe accelerates toward a potential vote to remove the president.

Democratic lawmakers want to hear next week from Bolton, the hawkish former adviser who openly sparred over the administration’s approach to Ukraine — in particular, President Donald Trump’s reliance on his personal attorney Rudy Giuliani for a back-channel operation. Bolton once derided Giuliani’s work as a “drug deal” and said he wanted no part of it, according to previous testimony.

Bolton’s attorney, Charles Cooper, said Wednesday evening that his client would not appear without a subpoena.

The Democrats are also calling John Eisenberg, the lawyer for the NSC who fielded an Army officer’s concerns over Trump’s phone call with the Ukraine president, and Michael Ellis, another security council official, according to a person familiar with the invitation and granted anonymity to discuss it.

The rush of possible new witnesses comes as the House prepares to take its first official vote Thursday on the process ahead. That includes public hearings in a matter of weeks and the possibility of drafting articles of impeachment against the president.

Pentagon releases new details on al-Baghdadi raid

WASHINGTON — The general who oversaw the U.S. raid on Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi provided the most detailed account yet of the operation Wednesday and said the U.S. is on alert for possible “retribution attacks” by extremists.

Gen. Kenneth “Frank” McKenzie, head of U.S. Central Command, said al-Baghdadi’s remains were buried at sea within 24 hours of his death inside an underground tunnel where he fled as special operations soldiers closed in on him.

The Pentagon released the first government photos and video clips of the nighttime operation, including one showing Delta Force commandos approaching the walls of the compound in which al-Baghdadi and others were found.

Another video showed American airstrikes on other militants who fired at helicopters carrying soldiers to the compound. The U.S. also bombed the compound after the soldiers completed the mission so that it would not stand as a shrine to al-Baghdadi.

“It looks pretty much like a parking lot with large potholes right now,” McKenzie said.

Twitter bans political ads ahead of 2020 election

SAN FRANCISCO — Twitter, reacting to growing concern about misinformation spread on social media, is banning all political advertising from its service. Its move strikes a sharp contrast with Facebook, which continues to defend running paid political ads, even false ones, as a free speech priority.

“While internet advertising is incredibly powerful and very effective for commercial advertisers, that power brings significant risks to politics, where it can be used to influence votes to affect the lives of millions,” Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said Wednesday in a series of tweets announcing the new policy.

Facebook has taken fire since it reiterated in September that it will not fact-check ads by politicians or their campaigns, which could allow them to lie freely. CEO Mark Zuckerberg told Congress in October that politicians have the right to free speech on Facebook.

Zuckerberg wasted no time responding to Twitter’s move. During Facebook’s conference call for earnings, which began less than an hour after Dorsey’s tweet, the Facebook chief offered an impassioned monologue about what he called his company’s deep belief “that political speech is important.”

Zuckerberg stood by the company’s decision to run unchecked political ads and denied that the choice is financially motivated, saying such ads make up less than half of a percent of Facebook revenue.

From wire sources

Fires spare Reagan library but menace homes near Los Angeles

SIMI VALLEY, Calif. — A wind-whipped outbreak of wildfires outside Los Angeles on Wednesday threatened thousands of homes and horse ranches, forced the smoky evacuation of elderly patients in wheelchairs and narrowly bypassed the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, protected in part by a buffer zone chewed by goats.

With California tinder dry and fires burning in both the north and south, the state was at the mercy of strong winds, on high alert for any new flames that could run wild, and weary from intentional blackouts aimed at preventing power lines from sparking more destruction.

The blaze near the Reagan library in Simi Valley was driven by strong Santa Ana winds that are the bane of Southern California in the fall and have historically fanned the most destructive fires in the region.

The cause was not yet determined, but Southern California Edison filed a report with state regulators to say it began near its power lines. Electrical equipment has sparked some of California’s worst wildfires in recent years and prompted utilities to resort to precautionary power outages. SoCal Edison had not cut power in the area at the time this fire started.

The library, which holds the presidential archives and includes grounds with the graves of Reagan and his wife, Nancy, was well-equipped when flames surrounded it. It relies on a combination of high-tech defenses such as fireproof doors, sprinklers and an underground vault, as well as a decidedly no-tech measure — hundreds of goats brought in every year to graze on brush and create a firebreak.

Trump pick for Russia envoy grilled by senators on Ukraine

WASHINGTON — The No. 2 official at the State Department faced off Wednesday with senators demanding to know why he didn’t know more about the Trump administration’s backchannel diplomacy with Ukraine and the dismissal of the former U.S. ambassador to Kyiv, issues now at the heart of the impeachment inquiry into the president.

Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan, President Donald Trump’s nominee to be ambassador to Russia, told senators at his confirmation hearing that he did not know of any attempt by the president or others to press Ukraine to open a corruption probe into Joe Biden’s son, Hunter. He said he knew that Trump’s personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, had spearheaded a campaign to oust Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch from her post, but said he didn’t know details, including what motivated it.

“My knowledge in the spring and summer of this year about any involvement with Mr. Giuliani was in connection with a campaign against our ambassador to Ukraine,” Sullivan said.

Sullivan had the job of informing Yovanovitch in late March that she was being recalled early from her post. He said Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had told him only that Yovanovitch had lost the confidence of the president. He said he was given no other explanation and told Yovanovitch that he did not believe she had done anything to warrant her removal.

Sullivan said he reviewed a package of negative information about Yovanovitch that was given to the department by “someone at the White House” after he and Pompeo inquired about complaints against her. But Sullivan said he concluded it contained nothing that would warrant action against her.

___

Chile cancels climate, trade summits amid protest chaos

SANTIAGO, Chile — Chilean President Sebastián Piñera said Wednesday that he is canceling two major international summits so he can respond to protracted nationwide protests over economic inequality that have left more than a dozen people dead, hundreds injured and businesses and infrastructure damaged.

The decision to call off the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation and U.N. global climate gatherings, planned for November and December, respectively, dealt a major blow to Chile’s image as a regional oasis of stability and economic development.

Piñera said he was forced to cancel both events due to the chaos unleashed by 12 days of protests. Demonstrators are demanding greater economic equality and better public services in a country long seen as an economic success story. Shops have been vandalized and buildings set on fire, shutting down numerous subway stations.

The situation had stabilized somewhat by midday Wednesday, Except for the presence of a few hundred protesters, the streets of the capital, Santiago, were mostly quiet, with no reports of vandalism.

“This has been a very difficult decision that causes us great pain,” Piñera said in a televised address. “A president always has to put the needs of his countrymen first.”