After Protests, Polish Legislators Vote To Reject Abortion Ban
After mass street protests in Poland, legislators with the country’s ruling party have abruptly reversed their positions and voted against a proposal to completely ban abortion. Poland already has some of the most restrictive abortion laws in Europe — abortion is illegal except in cases of rape, incest, a threat to the life of the mother or irreparable damage to the fetus. The proposed law would make abortion illegal in all instances: Violations would carry a prison sentence of up to five years for women and their doctors.
Yahoo Said to Have Aided U.S. Email Surveillance by Adapting Spam Filter
A system intended to scan emails for child pornography and spam helped Yahoo satisfy a secret court order requiring it to search for messages containing a computer “signature” tied to the communications of a state-sponsored terrorist organization. News of the order has opened a new chapter in a public debate over the trade-offs between security needs and privacy rights that has cast a spotlight on the sometimes cooperative, sometimes antagonistic relationship between Silicon Valley companies and the United States government.
United States Criticizes Israel Over West Bank Settlement Plan
The Obama administration on Wednesday criticized the Israeli government for approving plans to create a new Jewish settlement on the West Bank, three weeks after it signed a military aid package with the United States and just as President Obama was traveling to Jerusalem for the funeral of Shimon Peres. The State Department “strongly condemned” the move, asserting that it violated Israel’s pledge not to construct new settlements and ran counter to the long-term security interests Israel was seeking to protect with the military deal, which provides $38 billion in assistance over the next decade.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/06/world/middleeast/obama-israel-west-bank-settlements.html
Hurricane Matthew marches closer to U.S.; forces mass evacuations
Evacuation of hundreds of thousands of people was underway Wednesday in Florida and South Carolina as Hurricane Matthew roared closer to the U.S. after leaving 16 people dead and leaving a path of destruction across Haiti. The weather prompted Florida Gov. Rick Scott to ask President Obama to declare a pre-landfall emergency, activate 1,000 more National Guard members to join the 1,500 already positioned in the state and suspend all tolls in the affected areas, including the entire Florida Turnpike, Alligator Alley, Central Florida Expressway Authority and the Miami-Dade Expressway Authority.
L.A. County sheriff’s sergeant is killed in Lancaster shooting; suspected gunman is in custody Los Angeles County sheriff’s sergeant was shot and killed in Lancaster on Wednesday while responding to a residential burglary call, setting off a manhunt for a gunman who tried to flee in the slain lawman’s cruiser and held two teenagers hostage before he was captured, authorities said. Sheriff’s officials identified the victim as Steve Owen, a 29-year department veteran who had previously won the agency’s highest honor for courage. He was the first sheriff’s deputy fatally shot while on duty in more than a decade.
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-deputy-shot-lancaster-20161005-snap-story.html
