Dems open door to taking part in Benghazi probe

Dems open door to taking part in Benghazi probe

WASHINGTON

House Democrats opened the door Tuesday to participating in a special panel’s investigation of the deadly attack in Benghazi, Libya, even if they see it as little more than an election-year ploy by Republicans to discredit the Obama administration and motivate GOP voters.

Laying out her party’s conditions, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said Republicans must conduct interviews and share information as part of their new inquest into the Obama administration’s response to the Sept. 11, 2012, attack that killed four Americans. She called for the same number of Democrats as Republicans on the panel, a demand the GOP majority immediately rejected.

Ukrainian troops advance on militia

DONETSK, Ukraine

A pro-Russia militia holding an eastern Ukrainian city came under further pressure Tuesday from advancing government troops, but militants acted with impunity elsewhere in the turbulent region.

The foreign ministers of Ukraine and Russia met Tuesday, but their open disagreements did nothing to suggest a diplomatic solution was near.

Diplomacy was to be taken up again today during a meeting in Moscow between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Swiss President Didier Burkhalter, whose country chairs the Organ-ization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

Hillary Clinton: Gun culture ‘way out of balance’

WASHINGTON

Hillary Rodham Clinton said Tuesday the nation’s gun culture has gotten “way out of balance” and the U.S. needs to rein in the notion that “anybody can have a gun, anywhere, anytime.”

The former secretary of state and potential 2016 Democratic presidential candidate said the idea that anyone can have a gun is not in the “best interest of the vast majority of people.” But she said that approach does not conflict with the rights of people to own firearms.

Clinton waded into the polarizing issue of gun politics during an appearance at the National Council for Behavioral Health conference in Oxon Hill, Md., pointing to recent shootings that involved teens who had been playing loud music and chewing gum and a separate incident involving the typing of text messages in a movie theater.

Vatican: 848 priests defrocked for abuse

GENEVA

The Vatican revealed Tuesday that over the past decade, it has defrocked 848 priests who raped or molested children and sanctioned another 2,572 with lesser penalties, providing the first breakdown of how it handled the more than 3,400 cases of abuse reported to the Holy See since 2004.

The Vatican’s U.N. ambassador in Geneva, Archbishop Silvano Tomasi, released the figures during a second day of grilling by a U.N. committee monitoring implementation of the U.N. treaty against torture.

Hash-oil explosions rise in Colorado

DENVER

The opening months of Colorado’s first-in-the-nation recreational marijuana industry have seen a rise in fiery explosions and injuries as pot users try to make the drug’s intoxicating oil in crude home-based laboratories.

Since Jan. 1, when sales began, the state’s only certified adult burn center has treated 10 people with serious injuries they suffered while making hash oil, compared with 11 in 2013 and one in 2012.

Associated Press