Mass. House OKs bill to allow interim senator

Mass. House OKs bill to allow interim senator

BOSTON — The Massachusetts House of Representatives has approved a bill allowing Gov. Deval Patrick to name an interim appointment to the Senate seat left vacant by the death of Edward Kennedy.

The House voted 95-58 in favor of the bill Thursday evening. The bill now moves to the Massachusetts Senate.

House Speaker Robert DeLeo, a Democrat, said the change is needed to ensure Massachusetts continues to be represented by two senators until voters can choose a replacement during a Jan. 19 special election.

Patrick, a Democrat and ally of President Barack Obama, also supports the change.

Republicans, who number just 16 in the House, oppose the bill.

EU urges Obama to back call to cap bankers’ pay

BRUSSELS — EU leaders issued a joint plea to U.S. President Barack Obama on Thursday to back their call for rich and developing nations to cap bankers’ pay and to impose deeper cuts on emissions for a new global-climate-change pact.

All 27 EU nations are in “total unity” that the world cannot repeat the “scandal” of bonuses for executives and traders that triggered banks to take huge risks, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said.

Cadaver dogs pick up scent in suspects’ yard

ANTIOCH, Calif. — Authorities investigating two missing-girl cases say that cadaver dogs have picked up a scent that may indicate there are buried remains in the backyard of a Northern California couple already charged in a kidnapping.

Alameda County Sheriff’s Department spokesman Sgt. J.D. Nelson said Thursday two dogs alerted at a site in the backyard of Phillip and Nancy Garrido.

The couple is charged with the 1991 kidnapping of Jaycee Dugard.

Their Antioch home has become a focal point of investigators reviewing outstanding kidnapping cases in the San Francisco Bay area.

Investigators plan to scan the site today with high-tech equipment.

Cheney has back surgery

WASHINGTON — Former Vice President Dick Cheney underwent elective back surgery Thursday, a procedure his office said “went well.”

Cheney, 68, underwent the operation at George Washington University Hospital to deal with lumbar spinal stenosis, a common cause of lower back pain in older adults.

Spinal stenosis is a narrowing of the spinal canal — the passage for the spinal cord — which in turn puts pressure on nerves, causing pain. Surgery is done to widen the passage and ease that pressure, typically by removing a bit of the vertebra.

Top terrorist killed in raid

SOLO, Indonesia — Special forces raided a hide-out Thursday and killed militant mastermind Noordin Muhammed Top, striking at the heart of the terrorist network behind a deadly campaign of suicide attacks in Indonesia, including the Bali nightclub bombings.

It was the latest success against terror figures worldwide, starting with a U.S. missile that took out a key Taliban commander in Pakistan last month.

Besides knocking out Southeast Asia’s most-wanted man, Thursday’s operation also netted a fugitive bomb maker believed to have designed explosives for twin suicide bombings at luxury hotels in Jakarta in July.

Teen attacks at school

ANSBACH, Germany — An 18-year-old armed with an ax, knives and Molotov cocktails attacked his high school in southern Germany on Thursday, injuring eight students and a teacher before police shot and arrested him, authorities said.

As the mayhem erupted on the third floor, roughly 700 other students fled the building, including some who barricaded a classroom door before running down an emergency staircase. Many took shelter in a nearby office building.

The teenager entered the four-story school in Ansbach at 8:30 a.m., shortly after classes started, Bavarian Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann said.

He climbed to the third floor, where he lit a Molotov cocktail and threw it into an 11th-grade classroom, apparently striking a girl in the head and burning several other people, authorities said.

He then attacked some nearby girls with the ax, inflicting serious skull wounds on one of them, said Udo Dreher, the top police officer at the scene.

Dreher said it was not clear if the attacker, who had no police record, purposely selected his victims.

Associated Press