QUOTE OF THE DAY

“Progress is very slow indeed, but the sides have engaged in an acceptable manner.”

Lakhdar Brahimi, the U.N. mediator tasked with negotiating a peace deal between the Syrian government and rebels, after the first round of talks ended with little progress Article, this page

Musharraf denied bid for care abroad

ISLAMABAD - A Pakistani court hearing the case against former military ruler Pervez Musharraf on charges of high treason rejected Friday a request that he be allowed to go abroad for treatment, his lawyer and a court official said.

Instead, the court issued an arrest warrant for the retired general. But the warrant is “bailable” - meaning he can avoid jail by applying for bail and depositing a bond of about $20,000. The court said it didn’t have the authority to remove his name from the exit control list, which restricts him from going abroad.

The judges’ decision is the latest in the legal battles that Musharraf has faced since returning to his homeland in March 2013 to take part in the country’s elections. Instead of returning to a hero’s welcome, he was almost immediately hit with a barrage of cases and with threats from the Pakistani Taliban and was barred from running in the election.

A lawyer for Musharraf, Mohammed Ali Saif, said the judges ruled that Musharraf must appear in court next Friday.

High radiation at U.K. plant said normal

LONDON - Elevated radiation levels detected Friday at the Sellafield nuclear reprocessing plant in northwestern England were caused by naturally occurring background radon, not by any faults at the aging plant, the operating company said.

Only essential workers were asked to report for work while safety teams worked to pinpoint the cause of the elevated radiation, which was reported on one monitor in the northern end of the sprawling site - the largest nuclear site in Europe.

Sellafield Ltd. said its on-site monitors detected unusual activity overnight, leading it to reduce staffing levels Friday morning as a precaution.

“Following investigation and analysis, we can now confirm these levels to be naturally occurring background radon,” the company said.

The plant was never shut down and there was no evacuation. The company said there had been no risk to public safety.

Nuclear reprocessing involves separating uranium and plutonium from nuclear waste for reuse as fuel and treating the waste for storage. Reprocessing has taken place at Sellafield for more than 50 years.

Militant attacks kill 17 troops in Yemen

SANA, Yemen - Suspected al-Qaida militants launched surprise attacks Friday on a checkpoint and a police patrol in Yemen, killing 17 troops, military and security officials said.

One attack took place in the ancient city of Shibam in the restive province of Hadramawt, where attackers surprised the soldiers as they were having lunch and battled them for nearly half an hour before fleeing the scene, officials said. Fifteen troops were killed.

At least five of the attackers were hit and either killed or wounded, but militants carried them away, the officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.

In the other attack, gunmen targeted a police patrol in the central province of Bayda, killing two, said Adel al-Asbahi, the provincial security chief.

Red Cross: 30 killed in African capital

BANGUI, Central African Republic - Central African Republic’s capital is experiencing “unprecedented levels of violence,” with at least 30 people killed in the past three days, Red Cross officials warned Friday as heavily armed rebels regrouped in a nearby town.

In one attack this week, marauding gangs with machetes hacked to death a man as French peacekeepers awaited instructions from their base. By the time they fired warning shots 10 minutes later, the man had already been slain by the crowd.

The attacks have largely targeted Muslim civilians accused of having supported the Seleka rebels who overthrew the government in March 2013, ushering in months of violence against the Christian majority. An armed Christian movement known as the anti-Balaka arose in opposition to Seleka and included supporters of ousted President Francois Bozize.

Now that the Seleka leader who installed himself as president has stepped down and many rebels have left the capital, Muslim civilians have become increasingly targeted for attack.

Front Section, Pages 6 on 02/01/2014