Recovery of Korean War remains on hold
WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon said Wednesday that it has suspended its efforts to arrange negotiations on recovering additional remains of U.S. service members killed in North Korea during the Korean War.
The Pentagon's Defense POW-MIA Accounting Agency said in a statement that it has had no communication with North Korean authorities since the Hanoi summit between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in February.
That meeting focused on the North's nuclear weapons and followed a June 2018 summit at which Kim committed to permitting a resumption of U.S. remains recovery, which had been suspended by the U.S. in 2005. The remains recovery effort is technically separate from the talks between Washington and Pyongyang over nuclear weapons.
The Pentagon agency had hoped to arrange for recovery operations this spring, but the North never agreed to face-to-face negotiations to work out details such as payments required for the provision of support services by the North Korean army.
"We have reached the point where we can no longer effectively plan, coordinate, and conduct field operations in [North Korea] during this fiscal year, which ends on Sept. 30, 2019," the agency said.
Last summer, the North turned over 55 boxes of what it said were the remains of an undetermined number of U.S service members killed in the North during the 1950-53 war.
Boy, 9, charged in mom's fatal shooting
FAWN RIVER TOWNSHIP, Mich. -- A 9-year-old boy has been charged with murder in the fatal shooting of his mother in their southern Michigan home, according to court documents.
The woman was found early Monday, St. Joseph County prosecutor John McDonough told WWMT-TV. Fawn River Township is about 160 miles west-southwest of Detroit.
The boy also is charged with using a firearm during the commission of a felony. Documents filed Tuesday in St. Joseph County Circuit Court show that the woman was shot with a rifle.
The Associated Press is not identifying the victim because to do so would identify the juvenile suspect. The boy was undergoing a psychiatric evaluation, according to Sheriff Bradley Balk.
It isn't clear whether the boy was charged as an adult or a minor. Authorities have not released the circumstances of the killing or details of why the child was charged.
McDonough and Balk did not respond to messages left seeking comment.
Fire in NYC's Harlem kills family of 6
NEW YORK -- Six family members, including four children, were killed early Wednesday when a fire that apparently started on a stove ravaged a Harlem apartment, authorities said.
Firefighters, who were called about 1:40 a.m., rushed into the flames and thick smoke and found a man and a woman, as well as two girls and two boys, ages 3 to 11, in bedrooms of the fifth-floor apartment, according to Fire Commissioner Daniel Nigro. They were pronounced dead by emergency medical technicians.
Several other people suffered minor injuries as the building was evacuated.
"Preliminarily we believe the fire was an accident and that it started in the kitchen on the stove, quickly extended out of the kitchen and eventually involved every room in this apartment including the two rooms where the victims were found," Nigro said at a briefing.
Television reports showed neighbors standing in a circle and praying outside the Frederick E. Samuel Houses.
"As the fire was burning, I was hearing one of the little girls screaming," fourth-floor resident Eric Allen told the New York Post.
The head of the New York City Housing Authority, Kathryn Garcia, said a battery-operated smoke detector in the apartment had been tested in January.
Oregon teachers rally for more funding
PORTLAND, Ore. -- Tens of thousands of Oregon teachers, many holding signs and wearing red shirts tied to a nationwide movement pushing lawmakers to better fund education, walked off the job Wednesday to demand more money for schools.
Schools around the state closed for part of the day, with some offering day care and free lunch programs.
An estimated 20,000 people massed in a downtown Portland park for a rally before beginning a march through the city. The demonstrators -- a mix of teachers, parents and students -- wore red to support the "Red for Ed" campaign that's taken hold nationwide and chanted that slogan.
Oregon has some of the largest class sizes and lowest graduation rates in the United States.
The walkout comes as Republicans in the state Senate are blocking a vote on a $1 billion education tax. A Democratic supermajority was poised to approve $1 billion in additional annual funding for schools, raised through a half-percent tax on some of Oregon's wealthiest businesses.
A Section on 05/09/2019