Japan’s Abe trying to free 2 hostages

Japan’s Abe trying to free 2 hostages

TOKYO

Japan is doing all it can to free two hostages the Islamic State group is threatening to kill unless it receives $200 million, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Wednesday, vowing never to give in to terrorism. Abe returned to Tokyo from a six-day Middle East tour slightly ahead of schedule and convened a Cabinet meeting soon after.

“We are fighting against time, and we’ll make an all-out effort and use every diplomatic route that we have developed to win the release of the two,” he said.

11 stabbed in attack

TEL AVIV, ISRAEL

A knife-wielding Palestinian stabbed 11 morning commuters on and near a bus Wednesday, striking in the heart of Tel Aviv and reigniting fears of continued violence ahead of Israeli elections in March.

The attack was the latest in a spate of Palestinian attacks against Israelis over recent months.

Police identified the attacker as Hamza Mohammed Matrouk, 23, from Tulkarem, West Bank. Police said Matrouk confessed the attack, saying this summer’s Gaza war, tensions surrounding a Jerusalem site holy to Jews and Muslims and extremist Islamic videos promising him an “arrival to heaven” fueled the violence.

Official: No signs of sabotage in crash

JAKARTA, Indonesia

Indonesia’s top accident investigator said Wednesday that there are no indications of foul play in last month’s crash of an AirAsia jetliner carrying 162 people.

AirAsia Flight 8501 plunged into the Java Sea on Dec. 28 shortly after the pilots asked to climb from 32,000 feet to 38,000 feet to avoid threatening clouds, but were denied permission because of heavy air traffic. No distress signal was received.

Residents lash out over use of mugshots

NORTH MIAMI BEACH, FLA.

Dozens of angry residents — some carrying poster-size photos of North Miami Beach Police Chief J. Scott Dennis riddled with bullet holes — flooded North Miami Beach City Hall on Tuesday night to decry the police department’s practice of using police mugshots of African-Americans as targets for sniper shooting training.

Residents demanded the chief’s resignation and called for the city to apologize for the practice, which came to light after a Florida Army National Guard member, who was at the Medley shooting range last month for training, spotted a photo of her brother laced with bullet holes in a garbage can at the range.

After nearly two hours of public comment, the council passed a law to permanently ban the practice and review the police department’s policies.

GOP drops plan to debate abortion bill

WASHINGTON

In an embarrassing setback, House Republicans abruptly decided Wednesday to drop planned debate of a bill criminalizing virtually all late-term abortions after objections from GOP women and other lawmakers left them short of votes.

The decision came on the eve of the annual March for Life, when thousands of anti-abortion demonstrators stream to Washington to mark the anniversary of the 1973 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion.

Republican leaders had planned on Thursday House passage of the legislation, which would ban most abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy.

But they ran into objections from women and other Republican lawmakers unhappy that the measure limited exemptions for victims of rape or incest to only those who had previously reported those incidents to authorities.

Combined dispatches