World/Nation

Iran nuke deal likely to be reached today

VIENNA - An Iran nuclear agreement appeared likely within hours, diplomats said late Monday after a day in which American and Iranian negotiators appeared to be struggling to clear final obstacles and looking like they'd miss their fourth deadline in less than two weeks.

Three diplomats familiar with the talks said the announcement could come early Tuesday, possibly during pre-dawn hours in Vienna. One said some of the top officials involved in the negotiation needed to leave Austria's capital in the morning, thus hastening the declaration.

The diplomats weren't authorized to speak publicly on the status of the negotiations and demanded anonymity. Their reports of a breakthrough capped a seesaw day of developments that started with high hopes for an accord. The mood soured as vexing questions including the future of a U.N. arms embargo on Iran proved troublesome.

Pentagon announces plan on transgenders

WASHINGTON - The Pentagon's current regulations banning transgender individuals from serving in the military are outdated, Defense Secretary Ash Carter said Monday, ordering a six-month study aimed at formally ending one of the last gender- or sexuality-based barriers to military service.

Carter said he is creating a working group that will review the policies and determine if lifting the ban would have any impact on the military's ability to be ready for battle. But he said the group will begin with the presumption that transgender people should be able to serve openly "without adverse impact on military effectiveness and readiness, unless and except where objective, practical impediments are identified."

The plan, which was first reported by The Associated Press, gives the services time to methodically work through the legal, medical and administrative issues and develop training to ease any transition, and senior leaders believed six months would be sufficient.

"The Defense Department's current regulations regarding transgender service members are outdated and are causing uncertainty that distracts commanders from our core missions," Carter said in a statement released Monday. "At a time when our troops have learned from experience that the most important qualification for service members should be whether they're able and willing to do their job, our officers and enlisted personnel are faced with certain rules that tell them the opposite."

Carter asked his personnel undersecretary, Brad Carson, to lead the working group of senior military and civilian leaders to take an objective look at the issue, including the costs, and determine whether it would create any insurmountable problems that could derail the plan. The group would also develop uniform guidelines.

Mexico drug lord escape should have been noticed

ALMOLOYA, Mexico - The digging would have caused noise. The planners would have needed blueprints and maps. The entrance would have to be in a place beyond the view of security cameras at Mexico's toughest prison.

As authorities hunted Monday for any sign of Mexico's most powerful drug lord, security experts said it's clear that Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman's escape through an elaborately designed tunnel must have involved help on a grand scale.

"How did Chapo escape? In one word: Corruption," wrote Alejandro Hope, a former member of Mexico's domestic intelligence service, in his blog El Daily Post.

"He escaped through a mile-long tunnel, wide enough to hold a motorcycle, and ending in one of the few blind spots in Mexico's most-secure prison. How do you do that without some high-level corruption?"

U.S. authorities believe the tunnel through which Guzman made his audacious exit Saturday evening must have been in the works for at least a year, nearly as long as the head of the notorious Sinaloa Cartel had been at the Altiplano prison 55 miles west of Mexico City.

Scott Walker enters 2016 GOP presidential field

WAUKESHA, Wis. - Scott Walker vowed Monday to fight for America's interests abroad and for his conservative policies in Washington, launching a 2016 Republican presidential bid by highlighting his clashes with labor unions as his campaign taunted his Democratic critics.

The 47-year-old second-term governor embraced his "fighter" reputation as he formally declared his candidacy in an evening speech, his family at his side, and protesters gathered just outside the convention hall.

"We are running to serve as your president of the United States of America," Walker said.

"Americans deserve a president who will fight and win for them," he said. "You see, it doesn't matter if you're from a big city, a suburb or a small town, I will fight and win for you. Healthy or sick, born or unborn, I will fight and win for you."

He becomes the 15th high-profile Republican to enter the GOP presidential contest, yet claims to occupy a unique space in the congested field. He not only fights for conservative principles, he says, but he also wins elections and policy debates in a state that typically supports Democrats.

Speaking in the same hall where he celebrated his successful recall election three years earlier, Walker showed his successful, if divisive, fights with labor unions would serve as the foundation for his presidential campaign.

- The Associated Press