Nation & World Digest

Obama to send troops to border

WASHINGTON

Under pressure to take action, President Barack Obama on Tuesday ordered 1,200 National Guard troops to boost security along the U.S.-Mexico border, pre-empting Republican efforts to force a congressional vote to send the troops.

Obama also will request $500 million for border protection and law-enforcement activities, according to lawmakers and administration officials.

hQueen talks austerity for UK

LONDON

Wearing her diamond-studded crown, Queen Elizabeth II arrived at Parliament in a gleaming horse-drawn carriage to deliver a message of austerity and making do with less in troubled economic times.

The speech laid out the agenda for Britain’s new coalition government — but its theme of slashing a record deficit and spurring fragile growth resonated across Europe’s ailing economies.

Governments across the continent announced more budget cuts Tuesday, even as their stock markets and the euro were beaten down by investors fearful of stagnant growth and soaring deficits.

Street battles rage

KINGSTON, Jamaica

Thousands of police and soldiers stormed the Jamaican ghettos where reggae was born in search of a reputed drug kingpin wanted by the United States, intensifying Tuesday a third day of street battles that have killed at least 30 people.

Underworld boss Christopher “Dudus” Coke has built a loyal following in Tivoli Gardens, the poor West Kingston slum that is his stronghold. U.S. authorities say he has been trafficking cocaine to the streets of New York City since the mid-1990s, allegedly hiring island women to hide the drugs on themselves on flights to the United States.

Business leader Haysbert dies at 90

BALTIMORE

Raymond V. Haysbert Sr., whose Parks Sausage Co. became the first black-owned business in the U.S. to go public in 1969, has died at age 90.

He died Monday at Union Memorial Hospital in Baltimore after suffering from congestive heart failure, his son Brian Haysbert said Tuesday.

Born in poverty in Cincinnati, Haysbert later became a member of the famed Tuskegee Airmen, serving in Africa and Italy in World War II before settling in Baltimore. There, he joined the company started by Henry Parks that became well known throughout the Northeast with advertisements featuring a hungry boy asking, “More Parks Sausages, Mom, please!”

Scherzinger wins ‘Dancing’ contest

LOS ANGELES

Nicole Scherzinger is the new champion of “Dancing With the Stars.”

Scherzinger took home the show’s mirror-ball trophy Tuesday in the season finale of the ABC contest reality program. The Pussycat Dolls frontwoman and partner Derek Hough bested Olympic figure skater Evan Lysacek and his partner, Anna Trebunskaya.

Associated Press