World/Nation
• VA intends to refocus on customer service
WASHINGTON - On the eve of Veterans Day, the Veterans Affairs Department announced a reorganization Monday designed to make it easier for veterans to gain access to the sprawling department and its maze-like websites.
VA Secretary Robert McDonald called the restructuring the largest in the department's history and said it will bring a singular focus on customer service to an agency that serves 22 million veterans.
"As VA moves forward, we will judge the success of all our efforts against a single metric: the outcomes we provide for veterans," McDonald said. The VA's mission is to care for veterans, "so we must become more focused on veterans' needs," he said.
The VA has been under intense scrutiny since a whistleblower reported this spring that dozens of veterans may have died while awaiting treatment at the Phoenix VA hospital, and that appointment records were manipulated to hide the delays. A report by the department's inspector general said workers falsified waitlists while their supervisors looked the other way or even directed it, resulting in chronic delays for veterans seeking care and bonuses for managers who appeared to meet on-time goals.
The inspector general's office identified 40 patients who died while awaiting appointments in Phoenix, but said officials could not "conclusively assert" that the delays caused the deaths.
• U.S. reviewing democracy work in hostile areas
WASHINGTON - The State Department said Monday it was reviewing some of its secretive democracy-promotion programs in hostile countries after The Associated Press reported that the nation's global development agency may effectively end risky undercover work in those environments.
The proposed changes follow an AP investigation this year into work by the U.S. Agency for International Development, which established a Twitter-like service in Cuba and secretly sought to recruit a new generation of dissidents there while hiding ties to the U.S. government. The agency's proposed changes could move some of that work under America's diplomatic apparatus.
State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki declined to elaborate on the plan Monday, saying it was "premature" because of ongoing deliberations. "We continue to believe we need to find creative ways to promote positive change in Cuba, but beyond that, we're still assessing what any change or what any impact would be," she said.
USAID's proposed policy closely mirrors a Senate bill this summer, which would prohibit the agency from spending money on democracy programs in countries that reject the agency's assistance and where USAID would have to go to "excessive lengths to protect program beneficiaries and participants."
• China looks to boost regional role with pacts
HUAIROU, China - China is trying to boost its status as a regional power during a summit of world leaders by launching a rapid-fire series of trade and finance pacts which might dilute U.S. influence.
Opening Tuesday's Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, Chinese President Xi Jinping urged the 21 economies present to push ahead with regional economic integration and other efforts to promote business ties.
"Clarify the goal, the direction, the road map," Xi told the other leaders including President Barack Obama and Russia's Vladimir Putin. "At an early date, let prospects become reality and make the two sides of the Pacific highly open and integrated."
On the eve of the gathering, Beijing announced a free-trade agreement Monday with South Korea. Also Monday, regulators approved a plan to open Chinese stock markets wider to foreign investors by linking exchanges in Hong Kong and Shanghai. That followed the weekend announcement of a $40 billion Chinese-financed fund to improve trade links between Asian economies.
At the summit, China is promoting its own regional free-trade pact, despite U.S. pressure to make progress on other initiatives. It is the first time Beijing has taken the lead in promoting a multinational trade agreement.
- The Associated Press