The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
Monday, January 28, 2013 - 3A
NEWS BRIEFS
LANSING
State lawmakers
consider going
part-time
Michigan lawmakers are look-
ing at legislation that would make
themselves part-time politicians.
Backers of bills that have been
or will be introduced in the new
legislative session say the Michi-
gan Legislature is only one of four
in the nation to be truly on the job
full time. They argue there's no
reason they can't do their work
in fewer days and with fewer dol-
lars.
Critics, including Gov. Rick
Snyder and some legislative lead-
ers, say the demands of the work
require full-time attention.
"I know there is a difference of
opinion on this and some of my
colleagues will have plenty to say
about it," St. Joseph Republican
Sen. John Proos told the Detroit
Free Press for a story Sunday.
CHICAGO
Chicago woman
loses fourth child
to gun violence
At least five people were
gunned down Saturday in'Chi-
cago, including a 34-year-old
man whose mother had already
lost her three other children to
shootings.
Ronnie Chambers, who was
his mother Shirley's youngest
child, was shot in the head while
sitting in a parked car on the
city's West Side. A 21-year-old
man who was also in the car was
wounded, police said.
Shirley Chambers, whose two
other sons and daughter were
shot in separate attacks more
than a decade ago, was left griev-
ing again on Saturday, WLS-TV
reported.
"Right now, I'm totally lost
because Ronnie was my only sur-
viving son," Chambers said.
French army
advances to
Timbuktu
Venezuelan police officers stand guard outside the morgue where the bodies of prisoners killed in a riot were takes in
Barquisimeto,Venezuela.
2,000 inmates evacuated ofter
deadly Venezuelan prison fight
Dozens killed
and wounded in
gun battle
CARACAS, Venezuela (AP)
- Venezuelan authorities fin-
ished evacuating more than
2,000 inmates on Sunday
from a prison where the gov-
ernment said 58 people were
killed in one of'the deadliest
prison clashes in the nation's
history.
More than two days after the
bloodshed, Penitentiary Service
Minister Iris Varela released
an official death toll and said
46 wounded victims remained
hospitalized.
She said the evacuation of
Uribana prison in the city of
Barquisimeto was completed on
Sunday morning. inmates were
loaded aboard buses and driven
to other prisons.
She and other officials
appeared on television inside.
the empty prison compound,
among wandering dogs and
sheep that the inmates had
kept. They pointed out make-
shift shacks constructed with
wood scraps and sheets of zinc
where some inmates had taken
shelter in the overcrowded
prison.
Varela said that the violence
erupted on Friday when groups
of armed inmates began firing
shots at National Guard troops
who were attempting to carry
out an inspection.
"There was resistance to
what was imminent ... a peace-
ful inspection," Varela said,
adding that groups of prison-
ers had opened fire "on a large
scale."
Those killed included
inmates as well as two Prot-
estant pastors and one soldier,
she said. One victim's body was
burned, Varela said.
The death toll provided by
the government differed from
that given a day earlier by Dr.
Ruy Medina, director of Cen-
tral Hospital in the city, who
had said 61 were reported killed
and about 120 were wounded.
Medina said that nearly all of
the injuries were from gun-
shots.
Relatives of the victims
mourned in funerals, while
survivors' families waited anx-
iously to hear where inmates
were taken.
"I still don't know where my
son is," said Nayibe Mendez, the
mother of a 22-year-old inmate
who was unhurt. She spoke,
by telephone from outside the
prison, where she and others
gathered waiting for lists show-
ing where their relatives were
transported.
The riot was the latest in
a series of deadly clashes in
Venezuela's overcrowded and
often anarchical prisons, where
inmates typically obtain weap-
ons and drugs with the help of
corrupt guards. Critics called
it proof that the government is
failing to get a grip on a wors-
ening national crisis in its peni-
tentiaries.
Two-week-long
mission into Mali
targets extremists
SEVARE, Mali (AP) - French
and Malian forces pushed toward
the fabled desert town of Timbuk-
tu on Sunday, as the two-week-
long French mission gathered
momentum against the Islamist
extremists who have ruled the
north for more than nine months.
So far the French forces have
met little resistance from the mil-
itants, though it remains unclear
what battles may await them far-
ther north. The Malian military
blocked dozens of international
journalists from trying to travel
toward Timbuktu.
Lt. Col. DiarranKone, aspokes-
man for Mali's defense minister,
declined to give details Sunday
about the advance on Timbuktu,
citing the security of an ongoing
military operation.
Timbuktu's mayor, Ousmane
Halle, is in the capital, Bamako,
and he told The Associated Press
he had no information about the
remote town, where phone lines
have been cut for days.
A convoy of about 15 vehicles
transporting international jour-
nalists also was blocked Sunday
afternoon in Konna,' some 186
miles (300 kilometers) south of
Timbuktu.
The move on Timbuktu comes
a day after the French announced
they had seized the airport and
a key bridge in Gao, one of the
other northern .provincial capi-
tals under the grip of radical
Islamists.
"People were coming out into
the streets to greet tpe arrival of
the troops and celebrate," said
Hassane Maiga, a resident of
Gao. "At night, youth from Gao
went out alongside the Malian
military. They scoured homes in
search of the Islamists and the
youth smashed the houses."
French and Malian forces
were patrolling Gao Sunday
afternoon searching for rem-
nants of the Islamists and main-
taining control of the bridge
and airport, said Kone, the Mali
military spokesman.
The French special forces,
which had stormed in by land
and by air, had come under fire
in Gao from "several terror-
ist elements" that were later
"destroyed," the French mili-
tary said in a statement on its
website Saturday.
In a later press release entitled
"French and Malian troops liber-
ate Gao," the French ministry of
defense said they brought back
the town's mayor, Sadou Diallo,
who had fled to Bamako.
However, a Gao official inter-
viewed by telephone by The
Associated Press said late Sat-
urday that coalition forces so far
only controlled the airport, the
bridge and surrounding neigh-
hnl-.Ann^a in P-i.a aafrn
ministry official clarified that
the city had not been fully liber-
ated, and that the processoffree-
ing Gao was continuing.
Both officials insisted on ano-
nymity because they were not
authorized to speak publicly on
the matter.
Gao, the largest city in north-
ern Mali, was seized by a mix-
ture of al-Qaida-linked Islamist
fighters more than nine months
ago along with the other north-
ern provincial capitals of Kidal
and Timbuktu.
The rebel group that turned
Gao into a replica of Afghanistan
under the Taliban has close ties
to Moktar Belmoktar, the Alge-
rian national who has long oper-
ated in Mali and who last week
claimed responsibility for the
terror attack on a BP-operated
natural gas plant in Algeria.
His fighters are believed to
include Algerians, Egyptians,
Mauritanians, Libyans, Tuni-
sians, Pakistanis and even
Afghans.
Since France began its mili-
tary operation, the Islamists
have retreated from three small
towns in central Mali: Diabaly,
Konna and Douentza. However,
the Islamists still control much
of the north, including Kidal.
The Pentagon said late Satur-
day that Defense Secretary Leon
Panetta told France the United
States will aid the French mili-
tary with aerial refueling mis-
sions.
U.S. aerial refueling planes
would be a boost to air support
for French ground forces as they
enter vast areas of northern
Mali, which is the size of Texas,
that are controlled by al-Qaida-
linked extremists.
The U.S. was already helping
France by transporting French
troops and equipment to the
West African nation. However,
the U.S. government has said
it cannot provide direct aid to
the Malian military because the
country's democratically elected
president was overthrown in a
coup last March.
The Malian forces, however,
are now expected to get more
help than initially promised
from neighboring nations.
Col. Shehu UsmanAbdulkadir,
a Nigerian in charge of regional
forces heading to Mali, told The
Associated Press that the Afri-
can force will be expanded from
an anticipated 3,200 troops to
some 5,700 - a figure that does
not include the 2,200 soldiers
promised by Chad.
Most analysts had said the
earlier figure was far too small to
confront the Islamists given the
huge territory they hold.
The Mali conflict has been
dominating the African Union
summitinAddis Ababa,Ethiopia,
which runs through Monday. On
Sunday, U.N. Secretary-General
Ban Ki-moon met in the Ethio-
pian capital with Mali's interim
--id-t+Dinn-i-In T-n
PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND Victims of Holocaust mourned at
Theater tests new s o lc ur at
'tweet seats
Sarah Bertness slipped into
her seat at a recent staging of the
musical "Million Dollar Quartet"
and, when the lights dimmed,
started doing something that's
long been taboo inside theaters:
typing away at her iPhone.
The 26-year-old freelance
writer from Providence wasn't
being rude. She had a spot in the
"tweet seat" section at the Provi-
dence Performing Arts Center.
The downtown theater is now
setting aside a small number of
seats - in the back - for those
who promise to live-tweet from
the performance using a spe-
cial hash tag. They might offer
impressions of the set, music or
costumes, lines of dialogue that
resonate with them or anything
else that strikes them, really.
LONDON
UK Iawmaker:
Short skirts, high
* heels rape risk
A British lawmaker's sug-
gestion that young women who
wear high heels and short skirts
put themselves at greater risk of
rape has drawn widespread con-
demnation.
"If you are blind drunk and
wearing those clothes how able
are you to get away?" Conser-
vative Party lawmaker Rich-
ard Graham, of Gloucester, was
quoted as saying by his local
newspaper, The Citizen.
Anti-rape activists said Gra-
ham's comments smacked of
blaming rape victims for having
been assaulted.
But Graham said in a blog post
Saturday that his interview "in
no way intimates ANY excuse for
predatory behavior."
In further comments to The
Citizen, Graham said, "Risk
management is a million miles
from saying anything like 'she
was asking for it."'
Graham could not be reached
for comment Sunday.
-Compiled from
Daily wire reports
Auschwitz and across the world
Solemn prayers
mark Holocaust
Remembrance Day
WARSAW, Poland (AP) -
Holocaust survivors, politi-
cians, religious leaders and
others marked International
Holocaust Remembrance Day
on Sunday with solemn prayers
and the now oft-repeated
warnings to never let such hor-
rors happen again.
Events took place at sites
including Auschwitz-Birke-
nau, the former death camp
where Hitler's Germany
killed at least 1.1 million peo-
ple, mostly Jews, in southern
Poland. In Warsaw, prayers
were also held at a monument
to the fighters of the Warsaw
Ghetto Uprising of 1943.
Pope Benedict XVI, speak-
ing from his window at St.
Peter's Square at the Vatican,
warned that humanity must
always be on guard against a
repeat of murderous racism.
"The memory of this
immense tragedy, which above
all struck so harshly the Jew-
ish people, must represent for
everyone a constant warning
so that the horrors of the past
are not repeated, so that every
form of hatred and racism is
overcome, and that respect for,
and dignity of, every human
person is encouraged," the
German-born pontiff said.
Not all words spoken by dig-
nitaries struck the right tone,
however.
On the sidelines of a cer-
emony in Milan, former
Italian Premier Silvio Berlus-
coni sparked outrage when he
praised Benito Mussolini for
"having done good" despite
the Fascist dictator's anti-
Jewish laws. Berlusconi also
defended Mussolini for allying
himself with Hitler, saying he
likely reasoned that it would
be better to be on the winning
side.
The United Nations in 2005
designated Jan. 27 as a yearly
memorial day for the victims
of the Holocaust - 6 million
Jews and millions of other
victims of Nazi Germany dur-
ing World War II. The day was
chosen because it falls on the
anniversary of the liberation in
1945 of Auschwitz, the Nazis'
most notorious death camp
and a symbol of the evil inflict-
ed across the continent.
"Those who experienced the
horrors of the cattle cars, ghet-
tos, and concentration camps
have witnessed humanity at its
very worst and know too well
the pain of losing loved ones to
senseless violence," U.S. Presi-
dent Barack Obama said in a
statement.
Obama went on to say that
like those who resisted the
Nazis, "we must commit our-
selves to resisting hate and
persecution in all its forms.
The United States, along with
the international commu-
nity, resolves to stand in the
way of any tyrant or dictator
who commits crimes against
humanity, and stay true to the
principle of 'Never Again."'
As every year, Holocaust
survivors gathered in the cold
Polish winter at Auschwitz -
but they shrink in number each
year.
This year the key event in
the ceremonies was the open-
ing of an exhibition prepared
by Russian experts that depicts
Soviet suffering at the camp
and the Soviet role in liberat-
ing it. The 6pening was presid-
ed over by Sergey Naryshkin,
chairman of the Russian State
Duma.
Several years ago, Polish
officials stopped the opening
of a previous exhibition. It was
deemed offensive because the
Russians depicted Poles, Lith-
uanians and others in Soviet-
controlled territory as Soviet
citizens. Poles and others pro-
tested this label since they
were occupied against their
will by the Soviets at the start
of World War II.
The new exhibition - titled
"Tragedy. Courage. Libera-
tion" and prepared by the
Museum of the Great Patriotic
War in Moscow - removes
the controversial terminology.
It took years of discussions
between Polish and Russian
experts to finally complete it.
The exhibition narrates
* the Nazi crimes committed
against Soviet POWS at Aus-
chwitz, where they were the
fourth largest group of pris-
oners, and at other sites. And
it shows how the Red Army
liberated the camp on Jan. 27,
1945, and helped the inmates
afterward.
Also Sunday, a ceremony
was held in Moscow at the
Jewish Museum and Toler-
ance Center, which opened in
November and is Russia's first
major attempt to tell the story
of its Jewish community. The
museum portrays Russia as a
safe and welcoming place for
Jews today despite its history
of pogroms and discrimina-
tin
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