Carroll County Times

NATION/WORLD Wednesday, June 16, 2010, Page A5

Nation

AP PHOTO

Lightning sets statue on fire

Flames shoot up from the King of Kings
statue of Jesus Christ outside of Solid Rock
Church in Monroe, Ohio, in the early morn-
ing hours Tuesday. The six- story- tall statue
of Jesus with his arms raised along a high-
way was struck by lightning in a thunder-
storm Monday night.

Construction worker hunting AP PHOTO

Osama bin Laden detained President Barack Obama is shown after delivering a televised address from the Oval Office of the White House in
Washington Tuesday. Obama said the nation will continue to fight the oil spill for as long as it takes.
DENVER An American man has been de-

We will make BP pay

tained in the mountains of Pakistan after Pak-
istani authorities found him carrying a sword,
pistol and night-vision goggles on a Rambo-
style solo mission to hunt down and kill Osama
bin Laden.
Friends and family say construction worker
Gary Brooks Faulkner is a devout, good- hu-
mored Christian who has traveled widely in that
part of the world.
The 51-year- old Faulkner, who has a lengthy
arrest record and served time in a Colorado
prison, arrived June 3 in the town of Bumburate
and stayed in a hotel there. He was assigned a
police guard, as is common for foreigners visit-
ing remote parts of Pakistan.
When he checked out without informing po-
lice, officers began looking for him, according to
the top police officer in the Chitral region,
Mumtaz Ahmad Khan.
Democrats criticize lawmaker
who says Obama favors blacks
WASHINGTON Democrats Tuesday de-
nounced an Iowa Republican congressman who
says President Barack Obama favors blacks over
whites, and a GOP candidate from Colorado
canceled a fundraiser the Iowan was to keynote.
Rep. Steve King, known for sometimes incen-
diary remarks about immigration, Abu Ghraib
and other issues, criticized Obama and Attorney
General Eric Holder, who also is black, in an in-
terview Monday on G. Gordon Liddys nation-
ally syndicated radio talk show.
Im offended by Eric Holder and the presi-
dent also, their posture, said King, 61. It looks
like Eric Holder said that white people in Amer-
ica are cowards when it comes to race.
Official looks to ban citizenship
for illegal immigrants kids
PHOENIX Emboldened by passage of the
nations toughest law against illegal immigra-
tion, the Arizona politician who sponsored the
measure now wants to deny U.S. citizenship to
children born in this country to undocumented
parents.
Legal scholars are dubious about Republican
state Sen. Russell Pearces proposal and warn
that it would be blatantly unconstitutional, since
the 14th Amendment guarantees citizenship to
anyone born in the U.S.
But Pearce brushes aside such concerns. And
given the charged political atmosphere in Ari-
zona, and public anger over what many regard
as a failure by the federal government to secure
the border, some politicians think the idea has a
chance of passage.
Teams find crack in floor
of West Virginia mine
CHARLESTON, W.Va. Exploratory teams
have found a crack that could have allowed
methane gas to pour through the floor of the
West Virginia mine where 29 men died in the
nations worst coal mining explosion in 40 years,
owner Massey Energy Co. said Tuesday.
The Richmond, Va.- based company also re-
leased a 2004 report on two instances when gas
poured in through cracks in the floor of the
Upper Big Branch mine. Both occurred in dif-
ferent parts of the Raleigh County mine, but
near where coal was being extracted with a
longwall mining machine, which passes a cutter
back and forth along a 1,000- foot-wide portion
of the coal seam.
Associated Press
Obama accuses company of recklessness in address
ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON Vowing
to make BP pay, President
Barack Obama accused the oil
giant of recklessness in his
first address to the nation
from the Oval Office Tuesday
night, eight weeks to the day
after the catastrophic oil spill
began destroying waterways,
wildlife and a prized Gulf
Coast way of life.
We will fight this spill with
everything weve got for as
long it takes, declared
Obama, whose own presi-
dency has been stumbling be-
cause of the gushing oil.
A new Associated Press-
GfK poll even indicates as
many Americans disapprove
of his handling of the crisis
52 percent as felt that way
about President George W.
Bushs handling of the Katrina
aftermath.
Obama offered no immedi-
ate remedies for a frustrated
nation.
Rather he announced he
had asked former Mississippi
Gov. Ray Mabus to develop a
Bloody Sunday killings unjustified
Relatives rejoice
over findings of
12-year probe
ASSOCIATED PRESS
LONDONDERRY, Northern
Ireland Relatives of 13
Catholic demonstrators shot
to death by British troops on
Northern Irelands Bloody
Sunday cried tears of joy
Tuesday as an epic fact-find-
ing probe ruled that their
loved ones were innocent and
the soldiers entirely to blame
for the 1972 slaughter.
The investigation took 12
years and nearly $290 million,
but the victims families and
the British, Irish and U.S. gov-
ernments welcomed the find-
ings as priceless to heal one of
the gaping wounds left from
Northern Irelands four-
decade conflict that left 3,700
dead.
Thousands of residents of
Londonderry a predomi-
nantly Catholic city long syn-
onymous with Britains major
long- term Gulf Coast SENATE PLANS CLEAN- UP LEGISLATION
Restoration Plan to be
funded by BP PLC in con-
JUNEAU, Alaska Some Senate Democrats said
cert with local states, com-
munities, fishermen, conser- Tuesday they are preparing legislation that would re-
quire BP PLC to establish an escrow fund with per-
vationists and residents as
soon as possible. haps $20 billion to compensate victims and cover
He did not detail what this the cleanup costs of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.
effort he called it a battle U.S. Sen. Mark Begich of Alaska said he plans to in-
plan should include or
troduce a bill by Thursday that would not only require a
how much it might cost, a set-aside by BP sufficient to compensate those af-
price sure to be in the billions
fected by the spill but also to create an escrow sys-
of dollars. Whatever the bot-
tom line, he declared to his tem that other companies wanting to develop federal
prime- time television audi- drilling leases would agree to pay into if theyre respon-
ence, We will make BP pay. sible for a spill.
Thats not certain, however.
Begich, along with Sens. Jeanne Shaheen, of New
In declaring that BP wont
Hampshire, and Amy Klobuchar, of Minnesota, said the
control the compensation
fund for Gulf recovery, goal is to avoid a repeat of the 1989 Exxon Valdez dis-
Obama failed to mention that aster in Alaska. While Begich said its too early to say
the government wont control how much money should be set aside for the Gulf spill,
it, either. The president meets Senate Democrats, in a letter to BP CEO Tony Hayward,
BP executives in a White asked that $20 billion be put in escrow for economic
House showdown today.
damages and cleanup costs.
Fifty- seven days into the
crisis, oil continues to gush
from the broken wellhead, and his administrations re- Office while seated at the
millions of gallons a day, and
sponse to what Obama has storied Resolute desk, a bank
Obama has been powerless
to stem the leak. called the nations worst en- of family photos and an
vironmental disaster. American flag filling up
The sad episode has raised
doubts about his leadership He spoke from the Oval the backdrop.
mass killing from the North-
ern Ireland conflict gath-
ered outside the city hall to
watch the verdict come in, fol-
lowed by a lengthy apology
from Prime Minister David
Cameron in London that
moved many locals long dis-
trustful of British leaders.
The probe found that sol-
diers opened fire without jus-
tification at unarmed, fleeing
civilians and lied about it for
decades, refuting an initial
British investigation that
branded the demonstrators as
Irish Republican Army
bombers and gunmen.
Cameron, who was just 5
years old when the attack oc-
curred, said it was both un- AP PHOTO
justified and unjustifiable. Relatives of Bloody Sunday victims rip up copies of the
I couldnt believe it, I was Wigery Report, the initial and discredited report on the
so overjoyed, said Kay Duddy,
shooting, on the steps of the Guildhall in Londonderry,
clutching the handkerchief
Northern Ireland, Tuesday.
used to swab blood from her
17-year-old brothers body that a British prime minister world and its mother
day. Jackie Duddy, the first of would stand up in Parliament that Jackie Duddy and the rest
the 13 killed, was shot in the and tell the truth of what hap- of the deceased and injured
back. pened on Bloody Sunday, were innocent people. They
Never in my wildest Duddy said. were totally exonerated
dreams would I ever envisage David Cameron told the today, she said.

AP PHOTO and two homemade explosives biting lab.
Waiting to cross the border
Uzbek women and a child who fled from the southern Kyrgyz
city of Osh, wait for permission to cross into Uzbekistan Tues- lice officers were killed in an am- a Russian Soyuz rocket, its boost-
day. Uzbekistan closed the border Tuesday, leaving many
camped out on the Kyrgyz side or stranded behind barbed-
wire fences in no- mans land.
World
Mexican troops kill rity reasons, told The Associated
Press that the men killed Tuesday
The trio will be onboard the space
station to see the final shuttle
15 gunmen in Taxco were suspected of being tied to the Endeavour depart from its
Edgar Valdez Villarreal, a reputed last planned mission to the lab in
MEXICO CITY Soldiers bat-
tled gunmen for nearly an hour U.S.-born capo known as La Bar- November before the fleet is finally
Tuesday on the outskirts of the bie. retired.
popular tourist town of Taxco,
killing 15 suspects as escalating U.S.-Russian crew U.N. to take seized
bloodshed puts June in line to be-
come the deadliest month yet in blasts off to station flotilla goods to Gaza
Mexicos drug war.
Troops investigating suspicious BAIKONUR, Kazakhstan Two JERUSALEM The United Na-
activity came under fire from U.S. astronauts and a Russian tions will take to Gaza tons of aid
gunmen holed up in a house, the crewmate blasted off successfully supplies languishing in an Israeli
Defense Department said. It said today on a mission to the interna- port for two weeks since they were
no soldiers were hurt in the 40- tional space station that will see seized in a bloody sea confronta-
minute shootout. Twenty guns the last ever shuttle visit to the or- tion, the Israeli military said Tues-
day.
U.S. astronauts Douglas Whee- Richard Miron, a spokesman for
were recovered, it added.
The battle in Guerrero state lock and Shannon Walker and Rus- the U.N. Mideast envoy, confirmed
came one day after 12 federal po- sias Fyodor Yurchikhin lifted off in the deal. The military said the aid,
taken from a six-ship Gaza-bound
bush in neighboring Michoacan ers lighting up the the starry night- flotilla after nine people died in
state, a stronghold of drug activ- time sky over Central Asian steppe. clashes, would fill 70 trucks.
ity. Taxco police, who spoke on Their Soyuz TMA-19 spacecraft
condition of anonymity for secu- is set to reach the station Friday. Associated Press