hPenn State scientist finds world’s tiniest snake

hPenn State scientist finds world’s tiniest snake

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — A Penn State University scientist said he has discovered the globe’s tiniest species of snake in the easternmost Caribbean island of Barbados, with full-grown adults typically stretching less than 4 inches long.

S. Blair Hedges, an evolutionary biologist at Penn State whose research teams also have discovered the world’s tiniest lizard in the Dominican Republic and the smallest frog in Cuba, said the snake was found slithering beneath a rock near a patch of Barbadian forest.

Hedges said the tiny-title-holding snake, which is so diminutive it can curl up on a U.S. quarter, is the smallest of the roughly 3,100 known snake species. It was introduced to the scientific world Monday in the journal Zootaxa.

Jury deliberating case of bin Laden’s ex-driver

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba — America’s first war crimes trial since World War II went to the jury Monday as a panel of six U.S. military officers began deliberating whether to send Osama bin Laden’s former driver away for life.

The jurors, who were hand-picked by the Pentagon, were reviewing evidence from a two-week trial at the Guantanamo Bay Navy base that has become the first full test of the Bush administration’s system for prosecuting alleged terrorists.

They met behind closed doors for about 45 minutes before recessing until this morning.

Salim Hamdan, a Yemeni held here since May 2002, faces a maximum sentence of life in prison if convicted of conspiracy and supporting terrorism.

Roadside bomb kills 2 U.S. soldiers in capital

BAGHDAD — A roadside bomb killed two U.S. soldiers in a predominantly Shiite area in Baghdad on Monday, the first deadly attack against American troops in the capital in nearly a month.

At least nine Iraqis also were killed in explosions elsewhere in the Baghdad area, Iraqi officials said, in a grim reminder of the dangers that continue to face security forces and civilians despite significant security gains over the past year.

The U.S. military said another American soldier was wounded when the blast struck a U.S. patrol at about 9:30 a.m. in eastern Baghdad. The area was the site of fierce clashes and frequent roadside bombings blamed on Shiite militiamen before a cease-fire by anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Another crime-fighter resigns job in Mexico

MEXICO CITY — A prosecutor who oversaw Mexico’s extradition of drug traffickers has resigned — the second senior crime-fighter to quit in a week, an official said Monday.

Jose Luis Santiago Vasconcelos was Mexico’s top anti-drug prosecutor for two decades before taking his recent position as deputy attorney general for international affairs.

He resigned for personal reasons, according to an official with the attorney general’s office, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the government has not made an official announcement.

Assistant Attorney General for Organized Crime Noe Ramirez resigned last week as part of a law enforcement shake-up by President Felipe Calderon. His administration has yet to achieve a drop in rampant drug violence despite a massive deployment of soldiers and federal police to fight organized crime.

More sanctions for Iran

WASHINGTON — World powers agreed Monday to toughen U.N. sanctions against Iran after the Islamic Republic failed to accept by the weekend deadline a proposal aimed at resolving the crisis over its nuclear program, the State Department said Monday.

The decision by Britain, China, France, Germany, Russia and the United States came after a senior Iranian general warned that if attacked, Iran “easily” could block the Strait of Hormuz, the Persian Gulf passage through which 40 percent of the world’s petroleum supplies are shipped.

The Iranian threat and the world powers’ agreement to seek new sanctions seemed to dash the hopes for a breakthrough that rose after the Bush administration, in a policy reversal, participated last month for the first time in direct talks with Iran on its nuclear program.

Sneaker with bones, flesh found on Wash. beach

PORT ANGELES, Wash. — An athletic shoe containing bones and flesh has been found on a Washington state beach and authorities are investigating whether it may be linked to a series of human feet found in shoes along the coast of British Columbia.

Clallam County prosecutor Deb Kelly, who acts as coroner, said Monday the flesh and bones had been sent to the King County medical examiner’s office in Seattle to determine if the remains are human.

If the foot is human, the next step would be DNA testing to see if it matches feet found washed ashore in British Columbia.

Task force questions blood test for prostate cancer

WASHINGTON — The blood test millions of men undergo each year to screen for prostate cancer leads to so much unnecessary anxiety, surgery and complications that doctors should stop testing elderly men, and it remains unclear whether the test is worthwhile for younger men, a federal task force concluded Monday.

In the first update of its recommendations for prostate cancer screening in five years, the widely respected panel that sets government policy on preventive medicine said that the evidence that the test reduces the cancer’s death toll is too uncertain to endorse routine use for men at any age, and the potential harms clearly outweigh any benefits for men age 75 and older.

Parole board votes against reprieve for girls’ killer

WASHINGTON — The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles on Monday unanimously recommended against a reprieve for Jose Ernesto Medellin, a Mexican national who’s facing execution in Texas today for raping and murdering two teenage girls 15 years ago in Houston.

The recommendation, approved 7-0, now goes to Gov. Rick Perry for a final decision on Medellin’s fate.

The Bush administration, the Mexican government and much of the diplomatic community have warned of an international backlash if the execution proceeds without a hearing on Medellin’s claim that he was denied an opportunity to contact the Mexican consulate after he was arrested.

Immigrant children not getting enough exercise

CHICAGO — Many immigrant children get even less vigorous exercise than their U.S.-born counterparts, the largest study of its kind suggests.

Plenty of earlier evidence shows that U.S. children are pretty inactive. The new study of nearly 70,000 children simply found even lower levels of activity among immigrants.

Almost 18 percent of foreign-born children with immigrant parents got no vigorous exercise on any days of the week, and 56 percent didn’t participate in organized sports.

By contrast, 11 percent of U.S.-born children with American parents got no vigorous exercise, and 41 percent didn’t participate in sports.

Combined dispatches