Mexican candidate promises to trim immigration to U.S.
Mexico City – Leftist Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador strove to portray himself as a moderate while formally registering his presidential candidacy Sunday, promising to reduce immigration to the United States and maintain a balanced foreign policy.
Portrayed as a radical or populist by detractors, the former Mexico City mayor has worked to move toward the political center after his once-commanding lead in public-opinion polls ahead of the July 2 election shrank since late fall.
Calling for “a broad, representative and inclusive citizens movement,” Lopez Obrador promised Mexicans “a new economy” but said it wouldn’t be based on ideology.
“Changing the current economic system is indispensable,” he told a cheering crowd of supporters at the Federal Electoral Commission’s headquarters in southern Mexico City. “Not for ideological reasons, but for the common good.”
Lopez Obrador said that as president he will work to stem the tide of millions of Mexicans who cross into the United States legally and otherwise in search of higher-paying jobs.
“The objective is that nobody (should) have to abandon the country and their family in order to find work,” he said.
THORNWELL, La.
Fire kills man, niece after he saved three
A man who had helped his wife and daughter and a friend escape a burning home ran back inside for his 6-year-old niece but never made it out.
Fire investigators were trying to determine what started the blaze early Saturday. Relatives said the family awoke around 3:30 a.m. to find the house on fire.
Louis Richard Jr., 45, was found 2 feet from the back door, still carrying his niece, Angel Dawn Ortego, said Jefferson Davis Parish Sheriff Ricky Edwards. Richard and his wife, Tammy, were the little girl’s guardians.
Tammy Richard, the couple’s 9-year-old daughter, and her 11-year-old friend who was sleeping over, survived.
INDIANAPOLIS
MLK nephew accused of fire in suicide try
Authorities say a nephew of slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. set fire to his apartment in an apparent suicide attempt.
Derek King, 46, sought mental health counseling after Tuesday’s blaze, said a Lawrence Police Department spokesman.
He said Derek King endangered the lives of himself and others when he allegedly set the fire in his apartment and then refused to leave when rescuers arrived.
Arson investigators determined that the fire was intentionally set, and the spokesman said King could face charges.
King, associate pastor at Ebenezer Missionary Baptist Church, declined to comment.
CARACAS, Venezuela
Belafonte assails Bush as he praises Chavez
The American singer and activist Harry Belafonte called President Bush “the greatest terrorist in the world” on Sunday and said millions of Americans support the socialist revolution of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.
Belafonte led a delegation of Americans, including the actor Danny Glover and Princeton University scholar Cornel West, that met with Chavez for more than six hours late Saturday.
“No matter what the greatest tyrant in the world, the greatest terrorist in the world, George W. Bush says, we’re here to tell you: Not hundreds, not thousands, but millions of the American people … support your revolution,” Belafonte told Chavez during a radio broadcast.
The 78-year-old Belafonte, famous for his calypso-inspired music, including “The Banana Boat Song (Day-O),” was a close collaborator of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and is now a UNICEF goodwill ambassador.
BELGRADE, Serbia-Montenegro
Rembrandt, Rubens paintings stolen
Two robbers broke into a museum in Novi Sad, Serbia, on Sunday, tied up the guards and made away with four precious oil paintings, including works by Rembrandt and Rubens.
The stolen pieces included Rembrandt van Rijn’s “Portrait of Father” and Peter Paul Rubens’ “Seneca.”
DOGUBAYAZIT, Turkey
Bird-flu fears spread after 3 test positive
Fears rose Sunday that a deadly strain of bird flu was spreading in Turkey after preliminary tests showed two children and an adult tested positive for the virus in Ankara – the first known cases outside an eastern region.
Health officials cautioned that the H5N1 strain so far has only been confirmed in humans who were in close and prolonged contact with fowl but said they were monitoring the virus for fear it could mutate into a form easily transmissible among humans and spark a pandemic.
VIENNA, Austria
New tests can’t prove if skull is Mozart’s
It’s a Mozart mystery as haunting as his “Requiem” – and apparently, it won’t be solved any time soon.
After months of sophisticated DNA sleuthing reminiscent of a “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation” episode, forensics experts admitted Sunday on national television they still can’t say with certainty whether an ancient skull belonged to the composer as some believe.
Past tests on the skull also were inconclusive, and a joint analysis conducted by the Institute for Forensic Medicine in Innsbruck and the U.S. Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory in Rockville, Md., raised more questions than answers, lead researcher Dr. Walther Parson conceded.
DUSHANBE, Tajikistan
Fire kills 13 in home for disabled children
A fire swept through a home for disabled children Sunday in the Tajik capital of Dushanbe, killing 13 before firefighters arrived, witnesses said.
Distraught neighbors said they pulled dozens of children from the burning building as they waited for help.
Two of the home’s 100 or so charges were hospitalized, one with smoke inhalation and another with a broken leg, said Makhmud Kasimov, the nation’s first deputy minister of labor and public protection.
The building housed children with mental and physical disabilities including cerebral palsy, and some were unable to escape without help.
