President plans to keep troop levels in Iraq steady

President plans to keep troop levels in Iraq steady

WASHINGTON — President Bush will keep roughly the same number of U.S. forces in Iraq through the end of the year and pull about 8,000 troops home by February, a drawdown that’s both slower and smaller than long anticipated.

In a speech to be delivered today, Bush says more forces could withdraw in the first half of 2009. But for now, the situation isn’t changing significantly.

By the time the troops return home on the timeline Bush is proposing, someone else will be making the wartime decisions from the Oval Office.

The measured reductions in troops reflect the military’s attempt to protect security gains in Iraq, while also freeing up some added forces in Afghanistan.

Russia set to launch Iran’s nuclear plant

MOSCOW — The Russian state-run company building Iran’s first nuclear plant said Monday that preparations for the reactor’s launch had entered their final stage.

Atomstroiexport chief Leonid Reznikov said that by year’s end, the company will take steps that will make the launch of the Bushehr plant “irreversible.”

Company spokeswoman Irina Yesipova said the launch date will be determined after talks between Russian and Iranian nuclear officials this month.

Iranian officials have said that Bushehr would be launched this fall.

Nonproliferation expert David Albright, whose Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security tracks countries under nuclear suspicion, suggested that the steps referred to by Russia probably involved the loading of fuel into the reactor.

Group files lawsuit over NYC surveillance plan

NEW YORK — A civil rights group sued the New York Police Department on Monday seeking to learn more about a plan to use license plate readers and a network of 3,000 surveillance cameras to help protect lower Manhattan from terrorist threats.

The New York Civil Liberties Union claims the NYPD has moved forward with its plan without explaining how the department will use and store images and data captured by the video cameras, license-plate readers and other security devices.

“A plan of this scope, expense and intrusiveness demands robust public debate and legislative oversight,” said Donna Lieberman, the group’s executive director. “The public has a right to this information.”

The department already has turned over 91 pages of material about the so-called Lower Manhattan Security Initiative, which is expected to cost tens of millions of dollars. But the NYCLU said the documents were redacted, and that more information should be disclosed.

U.S. strike kills nine

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Missiles fired from U.S. drone aircraft hit a seminary and houses associated with a Taliban commander, killing at least nine people, including both militants and civilians, officials and witnesses said.

With violence spiraling in Afghanistan, Washington is becoming more aggressive about insurgent havens abutting the Afghan border, despite the strain it places on relations with Pakistan just as its new president takes office.

Monday’s incident occurred in a village in North Waziristan, a militant stronghold in Pakistan’s tribal belt and a possible hiding place for Osama bin Laden and al-Qaida No. 2 Ayman al-Zawahri.

Residents told of seeing two Predator drones in the sky shortly before multiple explosions hit a seminary and several nearby houses in the village of Dande Darba Khel.

Police: Bank robber takes hostages, kills self

TUCSON, Ariz. — A gunman took several hostages during a failed bank robbery Monday, then killed himself after authorities surrounded the building, police said.

No hostages appear to have been injured during the two-hour standoff, Police spokesman Sgt. Mark Robinson said.

He said the unidentified gunman demanded money from a teller and was leaving the bank when he saw a county prosecutor’s office investigator approaching. The investigator, who was wearing a gun and badge and who had intended to do some banking, called for help, Robinson said.

The gunman briefly took several people hostage but had released all but a few bank employees when he killed himself.

Associated Press