Gyrocopter pilot frustrated as his message isn't getting through

RUSKIN (Florida): The letter carrier who caused a full-scale security review in Washington when he violated national airspace by landing his gyrocopter on Capitol USA News Hill expressed frustration on Sunday that his message wasn't getting through. 

Doug Hughes had hoped to raise awareness about the influence of big money in politics by deliberately breaking the law to deliver 535 letters, one for each member of Congress. Instead, the overwhelming focus of news coverage has been about the gaps he exposed in national security

"We've got bigger problems in this country than worrying about whether the security around DC is ironclad," Hughes told Associated Press. "We need to be worried about the piles of money that are going into Congress." 

Hughes, 61, spoke as he returned to his home in Florida to await prosecution on charges of violating national airspace and operating an unregistered aircraft. He said his house arrest begins on Monday, and he will wear an electronic monitoring ankle bracelet until a May 8 court hearing in Washington.

US offers Ukraine $17.7 million in humanitarian aid

WASHINGTON: US Vice President Joe Biden spoke with Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko USA News on Monday about the ongoing crisis in eastern Ukraine and offered an additional $17.7 million in aid for essentials like food, shelter and water, the White House said.

New York Times wins Pulitzers for West Africa Ebola coverage

NEW YORK: The New York Times won two prestigious Pulitzer prizes on Monday for USA News coverage of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, described by the Pulitzer board as courageous and vivid journalism that engaged the public and held authorities accountable.

The Pulitzer for Public Service, announced at Columbia University, went to Charleston, South Carolina's Post and Courier for its series on domestic violence.

The Pulitzers honor extraordinary work in US journalism, literature, drama and other areas and bring welcome attention and recognition to newspapers and websites.

"Till Death Do Us Part" by the Post and Courier probed why South Carolina is among the deadliest states in the country for women. Doug Pardue, one of a four-person team that produced the series, said it pushed the state legislature to pursue greater protection for abused women.

"I'm glad to see that journalism is awarded for this type of reporting," said Pardue. "It's a story that touches so many people."

For its Ebola coverage, The New York Times staff won the prize for international reporting and freelancer Daniel Berehulak won for feature photography.

US warship heads to Yemeni waters; could block Iran weapons

WASHINGTON: The Navy aircraft carrier, USS Theodore Roosevelt is steaming toward USA News the waters off the country to beef up security and join other American ships that are prepared to intercept any Iranian vessels carrying weapons to the Houthi rebels. 

The deployment comes after a UN Security Council resolution approved last week imposed an arms embargo on the leaders of the Iranian-backed Shiite Houthi rebels. The resolution passed in a 14-0 vote with Russia abstaining. 

Navy officials said Monday that the Roosevelt was moving through the Arabian Sea. A massive ship that carries F/A-18 fighter jets, the Roosevelt is seen more of a deterrent and show of force in the region. 

The Navy has been beefing up its presence in the Gulf of Aden and the southern Arabian Sea in response to reports that a convoy of about eight Iranian ships is heading toward Yemen and possibly carrying arms for the Houthis. Navy officials said there are about nine US warships in the region, including cruisers and destroyers carrying teams that can board and search other vessels. 

Yemen, the Arab world's poorest country, has been pushed to the brink of collapse by ground fighting and the Saudi-led airstrikes in support of current President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, who was forced to flee to Saudi Arabia. Observers say the fighting in the strategic Mideast nation is taking on the appearance of a proxy war between Iran, the Shiite powerhouse backing the Houthis, and Sunni-dominated Saudi Arabia. 

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the ship movement on the record. 

Saudi Arabia and several of its allies, mainly Gulf Arab countries, have been trying to drive back the rebels, who seized the capital of Sanaa in September and have overrun many other northern provinces with the help of security forces loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh. The US supports the Saudi campaign. 

Western governments and Sunni Arab countries say the Houthis get their arms from Iran. Tehran and the rebels deny that, although the Islamic Republic has provided political and humanitarian support to the Shiite group. 

The US has been providing logistical and intelligence support to the Saudi coalition launching airstrikes against the Houthis. That air campaign is now in its fourth week, and the US has also begun refueling coalition aircraft involved in the conflict. 

White House spokesman Josh Earnest would not comment specifically on any Navy movements in Yemeni waters, but said the US has concerns about Iran's ``continued support for the Houthis. 

"We have seen evidence that the Iranians are supplying weapons and other armed support to the Houthis in Yemen. That support will only contribute to greater violence in that country. These are exactly the kind of destabilizing activities that we have in mind when we raise concerns about Iran's destabilizing activities in the Middle East." 

He said "the Iranians are acutely aware of our concerns for their continued support of the Houthis by sending them large shipments of weapons." 

The expanded US Navy activity in the region comes at a sensitive time, as the US and six world powers have reached a framework deal with Iran to control its nuclear program. Since the preliminary deal with reached on April 2, Iran and the US have been disputing the details of the deal. And on Monday, a lawyer for Tehran-based Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian said Tehran had charged Rezaian with espionage and three other crimes. The Obama administration dismisses the charges as "absurd." 

Air Canada plane crash lands at Halifax airport, 23 injured

MONTREAL: Twenty-three USA News people were injured when an Air Canada jet struck an antenna and crash landed as it attempted to touch down in heavy snow at Halifax airport early Sunday. 

All but one of the injured were later released from hospital following the incident, which came just five days after a pilot killed himself and 149 others when he slammed his Germanwings plane into the French Alps. 

Like the doomed Germanwings flight, the Air Canada plane involved in Sunday's incident was an Airbus A320. 

Flight AC624 from Toronto "exited runway upon landing at Halifax," the airline said on Twitter, and pictures showed the nose of the plane sliced off, its landing gear collapsed and at least one engine badly mangled. 

Passengers said the plane had circled over the airport before coming in to land and had "bounced" upon impact, shortly after midnight. 

Investigators were probing what caused the incident, but heavy snow was falling in the eastern Canadian city and Environment Canada had issued a snowfall alert, warning of low visibility. 

Transportation Safety Board investigator Mike Cunningham told a press conference the plane had struck an antenna array approximately 350 meters (1,150 feet) before the start of the runway. 

The collision caused "significant damages to the aircraft," he said, ripping off the landing gear. 

Five crew and 133 passengers were on board the plane, according to Air Canada. 

TSB investigators have recovered the black box flight recorders for analysis of cockpit exchanges with air traffic control and flight data. 

Passengers described scenes of panic. "There was a couple people, all bloodied. Everybody was able to get out, but what was worse was that they left us for an hour outside in the blowing snow," Lianne Clark told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. 

Some ran from the plane "because the fuel was coming out and we were scared," she said. 

Halifax airport spokesman Peter Spurway said passengers had appeared shaken as they left the plane, describing the incident as "scary." 

Power was out at the airport at the time of the incident, but it was unclear whether there was an impact on the situation. 

"We did lose power, we're not sure if the two incidents are connected. They may be but we're not sure," Spurway told AFP. 

Back-up generators were running when the flight landed and the runways were lit, he added. 

Both runways were closed overnight but the airport was slowly returning to normal early Sunday. 

Images showed the aircraft sitting on the airfield with its badly damaged nose as thick snow covered the ground. 

Spurway reported the damage as "extensive" and said at least one emergency chute had opened. 

Several counties in the eastern coastal province of Nova Scotia were affected by Saturday's winter weather alert. 

"We at Air Canada are greatly relieved that no one was critically injured," said Klaus Goersch, executive vice president and chief operating officer of Air Canada. 

"Yet we fully appreciate this has been a very unsettling experience for our customers and their families, as well as our employees, and we are focused on caring for all those affected." 

Two missing men likely found amid NYC gas explosion rubble: Fire official

NEW YORK: Two bodies found on USA News Sunday at the site of a gas explosion that destroyed three New York City apartment buildings last week, injuring 22 people, were believed to be those of two unaccounted for men, the city's top fire official said. 

The bodies were found about 20 feet apart of one of the buildings reduced to rubble by the blast and fire in Manhattan's East Village neighborhood on Thursday, Fire Department Commissioner Daniel Nigro told reporters. 

While Nigro said a medical examiner had not officially determined that the remains belonged to the two people who remain unaccounted for, local broadcaster NY1 News said one of the missing men, 23-year-old Nicholas Figueroa, had been identified by his family as one of the bodies found on Sunday. Also missing was Moises Lucon. 

"Those were the two people that had been reported missing and we think we found those two," Nigro said, though he did not rule out the chance of a third victim. "The feeling is that everyone who had been reported missing has now been found." 

Figueroa and Lucon were believed to be in a sushi restaurant in the building where the explosion occurred, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio has said. Lucon, 26, worked at the restaurant. 

On Sunday, rescue workers could be seen digging through the rubble backed by cranes hoisting debris and a front loader pushing twisted metal and bits of furniture into a pile on a street. Rescuers had been using used cadaver dogs to search for victims. 

At a nearby restaurant, Local 92, a sign read: "Our hearts [are] with people who got hurt and lost their homes."

In all, three buildings collapsed out of four that caught fire, and 11 buildings were evacuated, leaving residents of 144 apartments homeless. 

Investigators were looking into whether gas and plumbing work being done privately in one building led to the explosion, and utility Con Edison said that its utility crew found dangerous gas line connections that created a "hazardous situation" during a visit in August prompted by the smell of gas in the basement. 

The utility said it shut off the building's gas for about 10 days, until it was determined to be safe. 

The basement could hold the key to the cause of the devastation, police said. On Friday, de Blasio said the blast was possibly tied to someone inappropriately tapping into a gas line. 

Nigro also said workers had not reached the basement of the building and authorities had not reached any conclusions about the cause of the blast. 

An hour before the blast Con Edison inspectors had been at the scene and determined that pre-existing work was not satisfactory, but the problems were not safety-related, de Blasio said. 

Utility discovered 'hazardous situation' months before NYC blast

NEW YORK –  More than seven months before an explosion and fire leveled USA News three apartment buildings in Manhattan's East Village, utility workers discovered that the gas line to a restaurant in one of them had been illegally tapped, creating a hazardous situation, according to the company.

On Aug. 6, a meter reader at the restaurant detected the smell of gas and reported it, said Consolidated Edison spokesman Allan Drury. A gas crew dispatched to the site found multiple leaks in a gas line that had been tapped, Drury said, adding that the restaurant was the only customer in the building authorized to receive gas.

The discovery led Con Edison to shut down gas service to the building for about 10 days while the building owner made repairs. Gas service was restored after the utility deemed it safe, Drury said.

City officials suspect that leaking natural gas was the source of Thursday's explosion and fire, which sparked a raging blaze that took hundreds of firefighters to quell. De Blasio visited a firehouse Saturday to thank some of them.

Meanwhile, emergency workers painstakingly looked for signs of two missing people, scooping through piles of loose brick, wood and debris with their hands and using dogs to search the rubble. Authorities acknowledged the chances of finding either person alive were slim.

Officials estimated it could take a week of 24-hour-a-day work to sift through the heap. "It's going to be slow and arduous," Fire Commissioner Daniel Nigro said.

Detectives issued posters seeking information on the whereabouts of the men believed to have been in the sushi restaurant on the ground floor of one of the collapsed buildings: 26-year-old Moises Lucon, who worked at the restaurant, and 23-year-old Nicholas Figueroa, a bowling alley worker who had been there on a date.

Their families showed photos of their loved ones and asked for help.

"We have just been walking down the streets, one by one," brother Zacarias Lucon told the Daily News of New York. "We are just so exhausted and upset."

Figueroa's relatives said they were holding out hope.

"My brother is strong," Neal Figueroa told reporters. "Even if he is still in the rubble, I know he would still be in a predicament to get himself out, and so I'm just praying for that."

But hope was dimming. When asked about whether anyone would have survived, city Emergency Management Commissioner Joseph Esposito said: "I would doubt that very seriously."

As some of the several evacuated buildings near the explosion site were declared safe for residents to return, Micha Gerland stood at a police barricade and surveyed the remains of his apartment.

"I still don't believe it," said Gerland, 37, who escaped with nothing but his wallet, phone, keys and the clothes he was wearing. "Who thinks that something like that happens?"

Inspectors from Con Ed had visited that building about an hour before the explosion and determined work to upgrade gas service didn't pass inspection, locking the line to ensure it wouldn't be used and then leaving, officials said.

Fifteen minutes later, the sushi restaurant's owner smelled gas and called the landlord, who called the general contractor, Chief of Detectives Robert Boyce said. Nobody called 911 or Con Ed.

The contractor, Dilber Kukic, and the owner's son went into the basement and opened a door, and then the explosion happened, burning their faces, Boyce said. Kukic, who has pleaded not guilty to an unrelated charge of bribing a housing inspector, declined through his lawyer to comment on the circumstances surrounding the explosion.

The building had an existing gas line intended to serve the sushi restaurant; the work underway was to put in a bigger line to serve the entire building, Con Ed President Craig Ivey said.

The landlord didn't respond to calls and emails Friday and Saturday from The Associated Press seeking comment.

9/11 opera Between Worlds envisages what happened inside the towers

We all remember where we were on 9/11. 

USA News The planes that flew into the twin towers of the World Trade Center blew a hole in the heart of the world. That day it seemed as if optimism, decency, empathy, love, were confronted and defeated by violence, atrocity, agony and death. 

Now, nearly 14 years later, new towers are rising by the site of the tragedy. But how has art processed the event? There have been novels, plays, countless documentaries, feature films, poems and even a strip cartoon returning to that day. 

A brief first wave of cinematic responses has included Paul Greengrass's 2006 fiction United 93, while documentary has flourished more readily, the testimony of those who were there proving overwhelmingly potent. 

From Don DeLillo's Falling Man to Jonathan Safran Foer's Incredibly Loud and Extremely Close, literature has mostly concerned itself with aftermaths and echoes, using the day itself as a catalyst. As far as I know, only Frederic Beigbeder's 2004 novel Windows on the World has imagined what happened inside the towers.

Hero cop in Boston Marathon bombing in coma after being shot in face

A Boston police officer USA News honored for his role in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombing was fighting for his life Saturday, a night after he was shot in the face during a traffic stop that ended when other officers shot and killed his attacker, the city's authorities said.

Officer John Moynihan, 34, was struck just below his right eye and the bullet remained lodged below his right ear. He was listed in critical condition and was in a medically-induced coma, Commissioner William Evans said.

"When he initially came in he was responsive, but he's heavily sedated. They basically have him in an induced coma at this time," Evans said.

"We're not sure of the extent of the damages, they rushed him up for a cat scan and at one point he was rushed to the ER and he was taken out and he's being monitored at this time. He's in tough shape," Evans said.

Moynihan and five other gang task force members, traveling in two cars, stopped a car Friday night after reports of shots fired.

The commissioner said the officers had blue lights flashing but none had pulled out their weapons. He said video from the scene shows Moynihan approaching the driver's door, and the suspect, Angelo West, 41, of Boston's Hyde Park neighborhood, suddenly pull a gun and shoot him at point-blank range.

Evans said West continued firing at the other officers as he tried to run away, emptying his .357 Magnum handgun, and was killed at the scene when police returned fire.  West had a violent criminal past with several prior gun convictions, according to Evans.

A woman driving by in a car suffered a flesh wound and is recovering was in good spirits, Evans said. Three other officers were taken to a hospital with stress-related problems.

Moynihan, 34, is on the police Youth Violence Task Force and is a highly decorated military veteran, Evans said.

He is a former Army Ranger who served in Iraq in 2006-2007 and was honored at the White House in May with the National Association of Police Organizations TOP COPS award. Moynihan received the award for being one of the first responders in Watertown following the April 2013 shootout with the Boston Marathon bombers.

Moynihan had helped transit police Officer Richard Donohue, who was shot in the leg and nearly bled to death when police tried to apprehend Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Lieutenant Michael McCarthy said.

Two other people in the car with West have not been charged in the shooting, Evans said, but are held on unrelated outstanding charges.

District Attorney Daniel Conley said the top prosecutor from his office will investigate the killing of West as state law requires and it will be "completely transparent."

"My thoughts and prayers are with the officer injured tonight, his family and friends and the entire Boston Police Department during this difficult time," Mayor Marty Walsh said in a statement released late Friday. "These acts of violence have no place in our neighborhoods. Our community is stronger than ever, and tonight we are thankful for all of those who put their lives on the on the line every day to protect our city."

Such shootings are rare in Boston, but firearms are a major concern in the city, the commissioner said.

A clergymen and anti-violence leader, the Rev. Mark Scott of the Azusa Christian Community, said he is praying for Moynihan and his family, and for a neighborhood that has been plagued by violence.

"There is much work that people have done with the police that has made our community a lot safer," he said.

US inquiry indicts cop who assaulted Indian granddad

WASHINGTON: A federal USA News grand jury has indicted the Alabama police officer who violently threw to the ground an Indian grandfather visiting his son in the town of Madison, saying he used "unreasonable force" while acting in uniform. Sureshbhai Patel, 57, was partially paralysed and had to spend several weeks in the hospital, and has only now resumed walking with the aid of a walker. 

The one-count indictment filed in US District Court charges that Eric Sloan Parker (26) while acting in his official capacity as a police officer on February 6, injured Patel (identified in the indictment only by his initials SP) by slamming him to the ground.Parker's actions deprived Patel of his right under the US Constitution to be secure from unreasonable seizures, which includes the right to be free from unreasonable force by someone acting under color of law, according to the indictment. The indictment carries a maximum penalty of ten years in prison if proved in a court of law. Parker's attorney has said he expects his client, who has been fired from the Madison police force, to plead not guilty. 

Patel was out on a morning walk for exercise in the vicinity of his son's suburban house in Madison when a neighbour reported a "skinny black guy" in a call to 911 and asked the police to check him out. Officer Parker and a trainee colleague arrived on the scene in a patrol car and accosted Patel to question him, and found that he spoke limited English. Then, inexplicably, Parker tripped Patel and threw him to the sidewalk face down. The incident was captured by the dash board camera of the police car, and the video went viral, causing widespread outrage in India and also in the US. 

Concerned people, mainly Indian-Americans, raised more than $200,000 for Patel's medical expenses, since he had been in the US for just about two weeks at that point and was uninsured. Efforts by Parker to similarly raise at least $10,000 for legal expenses netted less than $3,500. 

The Madison police initially suggested that Patel resisted questioning, claiming in a that he "began putting his hands in his pockets", (a strict no-no in gun happy America) when the officers arrived, and that he "attempted to pull away" when the officers tried to pat him down. But following a review of the incident by its Office of Professional Standards, it concluded that the actions of officer Parker "did not meet the high standards and expectations of the Madison City police department". 

The statement included an apology to Patel's family, following which Parker was fired from the force, arrested and charged with third-degree assault, a misdemeanor to which he has pleaded not guilty. That case will go on separately. Patel meantime has filed a lawsuit in Federal District Court against Parker and the city of Madison, seeking unspecified damages. 

The justice department indictment was announced Friday by acting assistant attorney general Vanita Gupta of the Civil Rights Division, US attorney Joyce White Vance of the Northern District of Alabama, and special agent in charge Roger Stanton of the FBI, who investigated the case. Trial attorneys of the Civil Rights Division and assistant US attorneys from Alabama will now prosecute the case.

My father felt that our potential as individuals is far greater than most of us realize: Maya Bose

Britain has decided to honour the USA News man who pioneered sound - Dr Amar Bose - billionaire inventor of the Bose sound systems and headphones, with the prestigious Asian Award, previous winners being Ravi Shankar, Sir Being Kingsley, Freddie Mercury and Bruce Lee. Dr Bose's father was studying physics at Calcutta University when he was arrested and imprisoned for his opposition to British rule. He escaped and fled to the US in 1920. At the age 13, Bose began repairing radio sets for pocket money in Philadelphia. His daughter Maya talks to TOI's Kounteya Sinha about her father giving the world a peek into the genius' mind. 

Do you think India does enough to honour the brilliant Indian minds and scientists who live outside India? Very few people know that the maker of the legendary Bose speaker is actually an Indian. Did India do enough to recognise him and his work? 

India has always been extremely supportive in celebrating my father's accomplishments. The fact that many people did not know he was Indian is by no means a failing on the part of India but more a reflection of the fact that he was a very private person and did not like to talk about his personal life. I imagine his inclusion in this year's Asian Awards will increase awareness of his Indian background. 

How do you intend to keep the legacy of Dr Bose alive? 

My father will be remembered for his two passions in life - research and teaching. In 2011, he donated the majority of the stock of Bose Corporation to MIT in the form of non-voting shares. This led to the establishment of the Professor Amar G Bose Research Grants in 2014. In his life, he often explored controversial areas in his research and pursued projects that others felt were impossible. These grants were created in that spirit to provide funding for research that would be considered risky, inappropriate or unrealistic by established members of a given field and, thus, would have difficulty obtaining funding from traditional sources. My father was a teacher at MIT for 45 years, known for his dedication to his students. The Bose Award for Excellence in Teaching was established in order to recognize outstanding contributions to undergraduate education by members of the faculty. 

Did Dr Bose like India? 

My father liked India very much and what he liked most about it was its people. I remember him telling me how he was always very comfortable in India, even in large crowds, because he felt a warmth and open-heartedness from the people that was much more palpable than in the West. He was also drawn to the philosophy of Vedanta which his parents exposed him to from an early age. My father always said that he never went into business to make money. In this day and age where profit seems to be the primary focus of most companies, my hope is that Bose Corporation will continue to keep this sentiment as a guiding principle. 

What was Dr Bose's opinion about the engineers of modern times - like students from the Indian Institute of Technology? Did he think they had the courage to follow their goals to create, innovate and discover rather than just work for multi-national companies? 

My father felt that our potential as individuals is far greater than most of us realize. He felt that our abilities are limitless but that it is our beliefs about ourselves that can limit us. In regards to an engineer that chooses to create something completely new, perhaps forming his own company, versus an engineer that chooses to apply his mental skills by working for another company, he would not have judged one path to be superior over the other as long as both were passionate about their work. 

Was there an ultimate machine that your father wanted to build? 

It was never about one ultimate machine for him. In a way, every project was a dream project for him because it was the process of research and innovation that he loved so much. He was never one to bask in his results because that wasn't the interesting part for him. It was the process from which he derived his joy. 

Do you think poverty played a big role in bringing out your father's genius? 

That is an interesting question. I don't think that poverty played a big role in bringing out my father's genius but it may have played a minor role. I do know that he felt that being given too much in terms of wealth and material goods was not good for a person's character and so he consciously chose not to do this with my brother and I. I think he was born with a natural curiosity for figuring things out - problems, the unknown, whatever caught his attention. Perhaps poverty helped him to develop a more creative approach to problem solving as it may have posed limitations that he had to work around. 

What do you miss most about your father? 

I miss having him in this world. I miss his optimism, his enthusiasm, the sparkle in his eye, his sense of humour and his belief in the abilities of all of us to achieve whatever we put our minds to. I loved listening to him talk about the challenges he faced in running a company and the creative solutions he would come up with. Together we loved watching old black-and-white movies, finding humour in small things, enjoying a beautiful view and sharing a good meal.

Michelle Obama declares 'Black Girls Rock!'

NEWARK: Michelle Obama mixed her message of education for girls with one of empowerment for black USA News women, declaring "Black girls rock!" at the annual awards show of the same name. 

The first lady was the most heralded participant at the 5th annual event, which honored Jada Pinkett Smith, Erykah Badu, Cicely Tyson, Ava DuVernay, Nadia Lopez and Helene Gayle. 

Obama told the audience to ignore voices that suggested that they were "not good enough." She celebrated the achievement of three young black women also honored and said education was the key to their success. 

Obama went to Princeton and Harvard. She said she wouldn't be where she was had she not taken her studies seriously, and she implored young black people to do the same. 

Bomb threat: Cops give "all-clear" to shopping centre near Pentagon

WASHINGTON: Arlington County Police USA News said in a tweet on Friday they gave the "all-clear" to a shopping center near the headquarters of the US Defense Department, with business returning to normal and roads re-opening, after bomb-sniffing dogs had inspected the area.

The stores had been evacuated and roads closed after an anonymous bomb threat was made on Friday afternoon to the center near the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia.

The Pentagon City Shopping Plaza and the Pentagon City Mall near the headquarters of the US Department of Defense in Arlington, Virginia, were evacuated and roads surrounding the area were closed after an anonymous bomb threat was made, the Arlington County Police Department said.

The entrance to the Metrorail station near the shopping centers was closed due to police activity as well, according to the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority.

The local Fox News affiliate reported bomb-sniffing dogs were searching the area.

The retail area is near the Pentagon.

Time for Iran to make tough decisions in nuclear talks: US

LAUSANNE, Switzerland: Negotiations USA News between six world powers and Iran over its nuclear programme have been "tough and very serious" and the next few days will show whether Tehran is ready to make the necessary hard decisions, a senior US official said on Friday.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani's overture to the leaders of the six powers on Thursday is "hopefully a sign that Iran is ready to make some of the tough decisions," the senior State Department official added on condition of anonymity.

The official said that other foreign ministers from the six-power group, which includes Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia as well as the United States, will arrive in the coming days to join the talks in Lausanne, Switzerland, ahead of an end-of-March deadline for a political framework agreement.

Tehran and the powers are struggling to hammer out a political framework accord that would lay the foundations for a full settlement by June 30.

Rouhani spoke with his French, Russian, British and Chinese counterparts on Thursday to try to break the impasse. He also sent a letter to the leaders of all six powers, including US President Barack Obama, though officials said the letter did not suggest Tehran was ready to compromise.

"The difficulty is that the Iranians are not moving enough. They like to negotiate right up to the precipice and they're very good at that," a Western diplomat said.

British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond, on a visit to Canada on Friday, voiced optimism.

"We will not do a bad deal but we are increasingly hopeful we may be able to do the right deal, which will ensure that Iran's access to nuclear technology is channelled entirely for peaceful purposes and that the world can be assured that Iran will not proceed towards developing a nuclear weapon," he said.

Under a final accord, Tehran would halt sensitive nuclear work for at least a decade and in exchange, international financial and oil and some U.N. sanctions on Iran would be lifted. A deal aims to end Iran's 12-year nuclear standoff with the West and reduce the risk of war in the Middle East.

Initial easing of U.N. Security Council sanctions could include such gestures as removal of individuals and entities from a travel-ban and asset-freeze blacklist and little more, said a Western diplomat, adding Tehran needed to bend further to allow a deal to be made in the coming days.

He said the U.N. arms embargo on Iran would not be lifted in the initial phase after any Iran deal, adding that such a move would be unwise given the volatile situation in the region.

While all sides agree they are inching toward a deal, there are major disagreements.

Tehran insists on the freedom to continue research on advanced centrifuges, machines that purify uranium for use in nuclear power plants or, if very highly enriched, in weapons, at the underground Fordow site, and immediate lifting of all U.N. sanctions and the most severe US and European Union sanctions.

"There has been massive progress on all the issues," a senior Iranian official told Reuters. "There are still disputes over two issues - R&D (research and development) and U.N. sanctions."

A Western official close to the talks confirmed that centrifuge research and enrichment in general remained the most difficult unresolved issue.

France is demanding the most stringent limits on future Iranian nuclear activity for it to support a deal, negotiators say, and its foreign minister played down the importance of the deadline.

"The important thing is the content not the deadline," Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius told reporters at the United Nations in New York. "There has been some progress, but there are things which are not yet solved."

Fabius is due to arrive in Lausanne on Saturday. His British and Russian counterparts will join the talks over the weekend. The Republican-led US Congress has threatened to impose new US sanctions on Iran if there is no March deal, although Obama has threatened to veto any such moves.

'Not very precise'

The United States and European partners are reluctant to allow Iran to operate centrifuges at the Fordow site and the issue is unresolved, Western officials said.

An Iranian government website said in November that Washington could let Iran keep some 6,000 early-generation centrifuges, down from nearly 10,000 now in operation.

After meeting US Secretary of State John Kerry on Friday, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told reporters that it was unclear if there would be a deal in the coming days.

"We think an agreement is still possible but when is another story," Zarif said.

If there is a political framework agreement in the coming days, the US and European delegations want it to be as specific as possible, including figures for permissible numbers of centrifuges Tehran could operate, uranium stockpiles and other sensitive technical issues.

Further technical details would be included in annexes to be agreed before July 1.

The six powers want limits on the most sensitive aspects of Iran's nuclear programme to be in place for at least a decade followed by years of intrusive U.N. inspections. They also want to be certain Tehran would need at least one year to produce enough high enriched uranium for a weapon should the Iranians decide to produce one.

Iran denies having any nuclear weapons ambitions.