Fighting erupts in African nation

Fighting erupts in African nation

BANGUI, Central African Republic

Wielding rifles and machetes, armed Christian fighters who support the Central African Republic’s exiled president assaulted the capital at dawn on Thursday, leaving nearly 100 people dead. Shrouded bodies were lined up in a mosque as dozens of wounded lay on blood-stained hospital floors.

The ambush on Muslim neighborhoods of Bangui came as the United Nations voted to send a contingent of French troops to try to stabilize the country, and French President Francois Hollande announced plans to double the force.

Scores died in Thursday’s attack, including 48 people whose bodies were laid out at a mosque in a northern suburb of Bangui. Separately, a Doctors Without Borders spokeswoman, Amelie Ketoff, said 50 more deaths had been confirmed, bringing the toll to 98.

35 trapped whales head to deeper water

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla.

Thirty-five pilot whales that had been trapped near the Everglades headed into deeper water Thursday, giving rescuers hope that they would return to their open ocean habitat and avoid beaching.

A Coast Guard helicopter located the whales several miles out to sea after they were found to have vanished from their previous location, a remote shoreline on the Gulf side of Everglades National Park, where several whales already had beached themselves and died.

Wendy’s worker drops pot in burger

ATLANTA

A Wendy’s employee who dropped a partially smoked blunt in a customer’s cheeseburger has been fired and charged with marijuana possession.

Police in the city of Lovejoy, Ga., about 25 miles south of downtown Atlanta, said a customer drove home with her food Nov. 1, took a bite out of the burger and noticed a strange smell wafting from it.

The woman pulled the bun off and saw a partially smoked blunt inside, police said. A blunt is marijuana rolled into a hollowed-out cigar. The woman called the restaurant’s manager and met there with police soon afterward.

In an incident report released Thursday, authorities said 32-year-old Amy Elizabeth Seiber admitted that the marijuana belonged to her as soon as she saw police standing in the restaurant with her manager.

1 boy dies in Idaho school bus crash

KUNA, Idaho

A school bus collided with a dump truck Thursday morning at a rural Idaho intersection, killing an 11-year-old boy and injuring four other children.

Daniel Robert Cook died of blunt force trauma suffered in the 8 a.m. crash, which happened on a two-lane country road about 20 miles west of Boise, Canyon County Coroner Vicki DeGeus-Morris said.

Ill. governor signs pension overhaul

CHICAGO

In a private ceremony attended by a handful of lawmakers, Gov. Pat Quinn signed landmark legislation Thursday to reform Illinois’ massively underfunded pension system, though labor unions immediately threatened a lawsuit challenging the new law.

The overhaul, approved by the General Assembly this week after years of delay and inaction, cuts benefits for most employees and retirees. It has a June 1 effective date, but could be delayed by the legal challenges as a coalition of unions said lawyers were directed Thursday to file a lawsuit.

Combined dispatches