Nation & World Digest

Instability remains in Kyrgyzstan

BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan

Consolidating their victory after a bloody uprising, opposition leaders declared Thursday they would hold power in Kyrgyzstan for six months and assured the U.S. it can keep a strategic air base here — at least for now.

There were signs of instability, though, as deposed President Kurmanbek Bakiyev refused to relinquish power after the revolt, which left at least 75 people dead and hundreds wounded.

With darkness descending, roving bands of armed marauders trawled the streets of the capital, Bishkek, despite warnings from the opposition leadership that looters would be shot.

Gingrich: Obama is ‘most radical’

NEW ORLEANS

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is calling Barack Obama “the most radical president in American history.”

Gingrich is a potential presidential candidate in 2012 who says his fellow Republicans must work together to stop what he calls Obama’s “secular, socialist machine.”

Highly charged words, for sure. But it’s standard fare at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference, a gathering in New Orleans that is drawing presidential hopefuls such as Gingrich.

Jury to decide case against Boy Scouts

PORTLAND, Ore.

A $29 million sex-abuse lawsuit against the Boy Scouts of America is in the hands of a jury after a lawyer for the victim closed the case by arguing the Scouts failed to act when they knew they had a serious problem.

In closing arguments, Kelly Clark said the organization had been keeping a list of Scout leaders and volunteers suspected of abuse since the 1920s but never came up with any system to improve screening, reporting or prevention.

But a lawyer for the Scouts, Chuck Smith, told the jury the organization relied on local Scout leaders and volunteers to take action because they were supervising the boys.

5 would-be bombers arrested, police say

KABUL

Acting on an intelligence tip, Afghan police said they arrested five would-be suicide bombers Thursday as they tried to enter Kabul, thwarting a major attack and capturing the largest such team ever in the capital.

Police believe the bombers were sent by an al-Qaida- linked insurgent group based in Pakistan, and their capture follows widespread rumors that militants were planning attacks in the diplomatic quarter of Kabul.

Cold War-era Soviet diplomat dies

MOSCOW

Anatoly Dobrynin, a Soviet diplomat who represented Moscow during the Cuban missile crisis and later in key superpower negotiations to curb the growth of nuclear arsenals, is dead at age 90, Russia’s Itar-Tass news agency reported Thursday.

Dobrynin never intended to become a diplomat but ended up as one of the Cold War’s most prominent and respected, playing a key role in resolving the Cuban missile crisis and representing the Soviet Union in Washington for a quarter-century.

EPA finds problems at Calif. toxic dump

FRESNO, Calif.

A federal investigation found that a major hazardous-waste facility at the center of a birth-defects controversy improperly disposed of a chemical known to cause cancer and reproductive problems.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency sent a notice of violation Thursday to the Chemical Waste Management landfill involving federal laws on the disposal of PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls, a now-banned transformer fluid.

Associated Press