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Tuesday, March 24, 2015 — 7
EVAN VUCCI/AP
Secretary of State John Kerry, right, shakes hands with Afghan Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah, left, and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani after a news conference at Camp
David Presidential retreat, on Monday, March 23 in Camp David, Md.
Afghan, U.S. leaders discuss
relations after 14 year war
RICK BOWMER/AP
In this Feb. 5, 2015, file photo, Utah Gov. Gary Herbert speaks to members of the media during a news conference at the Utah
State Capitol, in Salt Lake City.
Utah to use firing squads
if lethal drugs unavailable
Officials lay
groundwork for
security plans
CAMP
DAVID,
Maryland
(AP) — In a show of unity, U.S.
and Afghan officials laid the
groundwork for new relations
between the two countries on
Monday, including plans to seek
American funding to maintain
an Afghan security force of
352,000 and long-term counter-
terrorism efforts. Discussions
over future U.S. troop levels con-
tinue as the war winds down.
In an all-day session at the
Camp David presidential retreat
in Maryland’s Catoctin moun-
tains, dozens of U.S. and Afghan
officials, including Secretary of
State John Kerry, Defense Sec-
retary Ash Carter, Afghan Presi-
dent Ashraf Ghani and chief
executive Abdullah Abdullah
gathered to relaunch a relation-
ship strained by nearly 14-years
of war and often-testy relations
with former Afghan President
Hamid Karzai.
During the meeting, the U.S.
agreed to seek funding through
2017 for an Afghan force of
352,000, a level the nation has
yet to meet, Carter said. U.S.
officials said the Afghan gov-
ernment is trying to improve
recruiting to make up for secu-
rity forces who leave the service.
They also agreed to require
the Afghan government to com-
plete specific reforms and meet
other milestones in order to
receive up to $800 million. U.S.
officials said the Afghans sug-
gested the incentive-based fund-
ing idea. The leaders of the two
nations also said they would
restart routine ministerial-level
Defense and State Department
meetings.
Ghani is to meet with Presi-
dent Barack Obama on Tuesday,
an engagement during which
officials expect the U.S. to make
clear its decision to slow the pace
of the withdrawal of American
troops from Afghanistan. Ghani
and Abdullah fought a conten-
tious election last year to replace
Karzai, and their power-sharing
agreement was lauded by Kerry,
who played a key role in broker-
ing it.
“It is easy today to underesti-
mate the measure of courage and
leadership and selflessness that
was demanded at that moment,
and that both of these leaders
continue to show in their com-
mitment to a unity government,”
Kerry said.
He added that “huge challeng-
es remain” but that the agree-
ments to be reached this week
will help pave the way for stabil-
ity and security. Kerry said that
the joint appearance at Camp
David, along with the White
House meetings, should serve
as notice to the Taliban that the
U.S.-Afghan relationship is back
on track and they should negoti-
ate rather than fight.
“All of these underscore to any
Taliban, to anybody who wants
to engage in violence that we are
prepared in the long term to sup-
port our friends in Afghanistan,”
Kerry said.
Obama has promised to pull
remaining U.S. troops out by the
end of his presidency. But defi-
ciencies in the Afghan security
forces, heavy casualties in the
ranks of the Afghan army and
police, a fragile new govern-
ment and fears that Islamic State
fighters could gain a foothold
in Afghanistan have combined
to persuade Obama to slow the
withdrawal.
Law could help
overcome difficulty
obtaining fatal
injections
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) —
Utah became the only state to
allow firing squads for execu-
tions when Gov. Gary Herbert
signed a law Monday approv-
ing the method for use when no
lethal injection drugs are avail-
able, even though he has called it
“a little bit gruesome.”
The Republican governor has
said Utah is a capital punishment
state and needs a backup execu-
tion method in case a shortage of
the drugs persists.
“We regret anyone ever com-
mits the heinous crime of aggra-
vated murder to merit the death
penalty, and we prefer to use
our primary method of lethal
injection when such a sentence
is issued,” Herbert spokesman
Marty Carpenter said. Howev-
er, enforcing death sentences is
“the obligation of the executive
branch.”
The governor’s office, in a
statement announcing the new
law, noted that other states
allow
execution
methods
other than lethal injection. In
Washington state, inmates can
request hanging. In New Hamp-
shire, hangings are fallback if
lethal injections can’t be given.
And an Oklahoma law would
allow the state to use firing
squads if lethal injections and
electrocutions are ever declared
unconstitutional.
Utah’s new approval of fir-
ing squads carries no such legal
caveat and represents the lat-
est example of frustration over
botched executions and the dif-
ficulty of obtaining lethal injec-
tion drugs as manufacturers
opposed to capital punishment
have made them off-limits to
prisons.
The bill’s sponsor, Republi-
can Rep. Paul Ray of Clearfield,
argued that a team of trained
marksmen is faster and more
decent
than
the
drawn-out
deaths involved when lethal
injections go awry — or even if
they go as planned.
Though Utah’s next execution
is probably a few years away, Ray
said wants to settle on a backup
method now so authorities are
not racing to find a solution if
the drug shortage drags on. Ray
didn’t return messages seeking
comment Monday.
Opponents of the measure
say firing squads are barbaric,
with the American Civil Liber-
ties Union of Utah saying the bill
makes the state “look backward
and backwoods.”
Utah
lawmakers
stopped
offering inmates the choice of
firing squad in 2004, saying the
method attracted intense media
interest and took attention away
from victims.
Utah is the only state in the
past 40 years to carry out such a
death sentence, with three exe-
cutions by firing squad since the
U.S. Supreme Court reinstated
the death penalty in 1976.
The last was in 2010, when
Ronnie Lee Gardner was put to
death by five police officers with
.30-caliber Winchester rifles in
an event that generated interna-
tional interest and elicited con-
demnation from many.
Gardner killed a bartender
and later shot a lawyer to death
and wounded a bailiff during a
1985 courthouse escape attempt.
The bailiff’s widow, VelDean
Kirk, who witnessed Gardner’s
execution, said she supports the
new law. “I don’t think it’s bar-
baric,” she said. “I think that’s
the best way to do it.”
Netanyahu addresses
remarks made during
last week’s election
JERUSALEM (AP) — Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
apologized to Israel’s Arab citi-
zens on Monday for remarks he
made during last week’s parlia-
ment election that offended mem-
bers of the community.
The move appeared to be an
attempt to heal rifts and mute
criticism at home and in the
United States. Netanyahu drew
accusations of racism in Israel,
especially from its Arab minority,
and a White House rebuke when,
just a few hours before polling
stations were to close across the
country, he warned that Arab citi-
zens were voting “in droves.”
But
President
Barack
Obama’s chief of staff, Denis
McDonough, rejected Netanya-
hu’s attempt to distance himself
from his comments, telling an
Israel advocacy group Monday
that the U.S. can’t just overlook
what Netanyahu said on the eve
of his re-election.
Netanyahu, whose Likud Party
won re-election in the vote, met
with members of the Arab com-
munity at the prime minister’s
residence in Jerusalem on Mon-
day and apologized.
He said he knows his “com-
ments last week offended some
Israeli citizens and offended
members of the Israeli-Arab com-
munity.”
“This was never my intent. I
apologize for this,” Netanyahu
said. “I view myself as the prime
minister of each and every citizen
of Israel, without any prejudice
based on religion, ethnicity or
gender.”
“I view all Israeli citizens as
partners in the building of a pros-
perous and safe state of Israel, for
all Israelis,” he also said.
A recently established alliance
of four small, mostly Arab parties
called the Joint List made unprec-
edented gains in the March 17
election, earning enough votes to
make it the third-largest party in
Israel’s parliament. Arab citizens
make up 20 percent of Israel’s pop-
ulation. Equality is guaranteed in
Israel’s laws but many Arabs have
long complained of discrimina-
tion, mainly in the job and hous-
ing market.
Ayman Odeh, the head of the
Joint List, told channel 2 TV that
Netanyahu’s apology was not
accepted.
“This is not a real apology,”
Odeh said. “He incited against cit-
izens who were exercising their
basic right to vote for Knesset.”
Odeh also accused Netan-
yahu of “zigzagging” by saying
one thing one day and a different
another.
In the final days of the cam-
paign, Netanyahu angered the
U.S. by taking a tough stance
toward the Palestinians and by
saying a Palestinian state will not
be established on his watch in the
current climate of regional chaos
and violence. Resolving the con-
flict between Israel and the Pales-
tinians in a two state solution is a
key U.S. foreign policy priority.
In his speech to J Street, an
Israel advocacy group that is
sharply critical of Netanyahu,
McDonough
warned
Israel
against annexing the West Bank,
where Palestinians hope to estab-
lish their future state. He said
Netanyahu’s prediction that a
Palestinian state wouldn’t come
about on his watch was “very
troubling” and questioned Netan-
yahu’s broader commitment to
the two-state solution the U.S.
and Israel have officially support-
ed for years.
Israeli leader
makes apology