World Nation Briefs February 9, 2013
Searchers resume hunt for former officer
BIG BEAR LAKE, Calif. - A scaled-back search party took advantage of a break from stormy weather Saturday to hunt for a former Los Angeles police officer suspected in three killings, using heat-sensing helicopters and fanning out in fresh snow as vacationing families and weekend skiers frolicked nearby.
The stark blue skies that emerged after a Friday snowstorm allowed San Bernardino County sheriff's choppers to fly low over the forest and SWAT teams to look for tracks and other clues that might lead to Christopher Dorner, 33, whose burned-out pickup truck was discovered in town Thursday.
Authorities suspect Dorner in a series of attacks in Southern California over the past several days that left three people dead, including a police officer. Authorities say he has vowed revenge against several former LAPD colleagues who he believed cost him his law enforcement career.
The manhunt didn't appear to bother the majority of tourists intent on enjoying Saturday's perfect winter weather, which made for strikingly odd contrasts: the sound of barking bloodhounds mixed with rap music blaring off the ski slopes; a family with kids strolling by a deputy, who was clad in full tactical gear and practicing his aim on a small snowdrift.
Fear of assassinations haunts opposition
CAIRO - Watching the events in Tunisia, where a leading anti-Islamist politician was shot to death this past week, members of Egypt's liberal opposition are fearfully asking: Could it happen here too?
Their fears of a renegade Islamist attack on any of the top opposition leaders have been hiked by religious edicts issued by hardline clerics on TV saying they must be killed. But even before those edicts, activists have been worried by signs they say show that ruling Islamists are starting to target their ranks - disappearances of activists from protests, telephone death threats, warnings from security officials.
First lady attends Chicago girl's funeral
CHICAGO - Hundreds of mourners and dignitaries including first lady Michelle Obama packed the funeral Saturday for a Chicago honor student whose killing catapulted her into the nation's debate over gun violence.
Yet one speaker after another remembered 15-year-old Hadiya Pendleton not so much as a symbol but as a best friend, an excellent student with dreams of going to college and a sometimes goofy girl with a bright smile and big personality. They said she was a typical teen who wanted to borrow her friends' clothes and who never left home without her lip gloss.
And to her mother, Pendleton was the daughter she tried to keep busy so she'd be beyond the reach of the seemingly endless gang violence in the nation's third-largest city.
Hadiya Pendleton was shot and killed Jan. 29 as she stood with friends at a park about a mile from President Barack Obama's Chicago home in the Kenwood neighborhood.
- The Associated Press