State Dept. wants combat gear in Iraq

State Dept. wants combat gear in Iraq

WASHINGTON

The State Department says its diplomatic staff won’t be safe after the American military leaves Iraq unless it has its own combat-ready protection force, a warning that underscores concerns about the Iraq army and police the U.S. has spent billions of dollars training and equipping.

Vehicles and aircraft used by the department’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security to protect personnel in other parts of the world are “inadequate to the extreme security challenges in Iraq,” according to documents the State Department sent to the Pentagon in April.

Jackson’s doctor keeps Calif. license

LOS ANGELES

Michael Jackson’s family sat solemnly across the courtroom from the doctor charged in the death of the pop legend, listening as a judge said Monday he could not suspend Dr. Conrad Murray’s medical license in California and that it could take months for the case to go to trial.

Superior Court Judge Michael Pastor said the schedules of everyone involved in the case and the need for preparation time required that a preliminary hearing be moved back to at least Aug. 23, with a requirement to start within 60 days after that.

Study: Patients fail to get treatments

ATLANTA

Millions of cancer survivors have put off getting medical care because they couldn’t afford it, according to a new study.

All together, more than 2 million of 12 million U.S. adult cancer survivors did not get one or more needed medical services, the researchers estimate.

The study is being called the first to estimate how often current and former patients have skipped getting care because of money worries. It was led by Kathryn Weaver, a researcher at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem, N.C.

UN condemns Kyrgyzstan violence

UNITED NATIONS

The U.N. Security Council is condemning the violence in Kyrgyzstan and calling for calm and a return to the rule of law.

The council said in a statement after a briefing late Monday by Undersecretary-General B. Lynn Pascoe that it supports efforts by Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and regional organizations “to deal in an appropriate way with the situation.”

Officials say at least 138 people have been killed and 1,800 wounded since the violence began last week.

Woman gets life in kidnapping, murder

STOCKTON, Calif.

A Sunday school teacher who pleaded guilty to kidnapping and murdering a neighbor girl in Northern California made a tearful apology to the victim’s family Monday as she was sentenced to prison for the rest of her life.

The punishment came after Melissa Huckaby, 29, reached a plea deal with prosecutors that took the death penalty and the possibility of parole off the table in the killing of 8-year-old Sandra Cantu of Tracy, whose body was found in a suitcase pulled from an irrigation pond.

Holloway’s father returns to Aruba

ORANJESTAD, Aruba

Natalee Holloway’s father was back in Aruba on Monday, hoping the suspect in his daughter’s disappearance has provided local authorities with new clues since being arrested in the killing of a 21-year-old woman in Peru.

Dave Holloway planned to discuss the latest developments with prosecutors and investigators at a meeting today, said Tim Miller, a friend and the founder of Texas EquuSearch, a group that has repeatedly searched for the missing Alabama woman since her disappearance in 2005.

Associated Press