Bipartisan group of senators to unveil framework for immigration overhaul

A key group of senators from both parties will unveil on Monday the framework of a broad overhaul of the nation’s immigration laws, including a pathway to citizenship for more than 11 million illegal immigrants.

The detailed, four-page statement of principles will carry the signatures of four Republicans and four Democrats, a bipartisan push that would have been unimaginable just months ago on one of the country’s most emotionally divisive issues.

The document is intended to provide guideposts that would allow legislation to be drafted by the end of March, including a potentially controversial “tough but fair” route to citizenship for those now living in the country illegally.

[Do you think the new immigration plan will work? Discuss this and other immigration issues in The Washington Post’s new political forums.]

It would allow undocumented immigrants with otherwise clean criminal records to quickly achieve probationary legal residency after paying a fine and back taxes.

But they could pursue full citizenship — giving them the right to vote and access to government benefits — only after new measures are in place to prevent a future influx of illegal immigrants.

Those would include additional border security, a new program to help employers verify the legal status of their employees and more-stringent checks to prevent immigrants from overstaying visas.

And those undocumented immigrants seeking citizenship would be required to go to the end of the waiting list to get a green card that would allow permanent residency and eventual citizenship, behind those who had already legally applied at the time of the law’s enactment.

The goal is to balance a fervent desire by advocates and many Democrats to allow illegal immigrants to emerge from society’s shadows without fear of deportation with a concern held by many Republicans that doing so would only encourage more illegal immigration.

“We will ensure that this is a successful permanent reform to our immigration system that will not need to be revisited,” the group asserts in its statement of principles.

The framework identifies two groups as deserving of special consideration for a separate and potentially speedier pathway to full citizenship: young people who were brought to the country illegally as minors and agricultural workers whose labor, often at subsistence wages, has long been critical to the nation’s food supply.

Expanding visas

The plan also addresses the need to expand available visas for high-tech workers and promises to make green cards available for those who pursue graduate education in certain fields in the United States.

“We must reduce backlogs in the family and employment visa categories so that future immigrants view our future legal immigration system as the exclusive means for entry into the United States,” the group will declare.

The new proposal marks the most substantive bipartisan step Congress has taken toward new immigration laws since a comprehensive reform bill failed on the floor of the Senate in 2007.

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Myolie Wu seeing new mystery man

SHENZHEN, China: Hong Kong actress Myolie Wu revealed Monday that she is now seeing someone, months after she ended her eight-year relationship with actor Bosco Wong, reported Hong Kong media.

When asked if she has any suitors recently, Wu told reporters "that's about right".

Speaking at a hotel in Shenzhen, where she was shooting a wedding scene for her new Chinese drama "Scent of Beauty", Wu said she is "happy" and that the new man in her life is "not of the entertainment industry".

Although Valentine's Day is just round the corner, Wu expressed that they may not be spending it together as they are "still at the 'friends' stage".

Apart from love, Wu also spoke about her career.

Wu is one of the many Hong Kong stars that have headed to China in recent years, lured by high acting fees.

The actress denied rumours that she is making a killing taking on roles in Chinese productions, though she conceded that her acting fee in "Scent of Beauty" was "enough to buy a property".

-CNA/ha

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Court adjourns Patiala gang rape case till Feb 4

PATIALA: Patiala court, on Monday, adjourned the Patiala gang rape and suicide case till February 4 after the defence lawyer sought the copy of a compact disc, allegedly containing statement of the victim.

"The CD was prepared by a cameraman of Samana and now police have made that a case property. We want to hear the exact wording of the girl," said Kundan Singh Nagra, counsel of the accused, after coming out of court. All five accused including Balwinder Singh, Gurprit Singh, Sandip Singh, Chinder Kaur and dismissed sub-inspector Nasib Singh were present in the court.

On November 13, 2012, Balwinder and Gurprit had allegedly kidnapped the minor girl from Badshahpr village, and repeatedly raped her at the tubewell room of Sandip Singh near Brahamanmajra village. Instead of taking any action, the cops had allegedly pressurized the family for compromise and had finally registered a rape case on November 27. But since the police did not arrest any accused, who continued to harass the victim, she consumed poison on December 26 and died in the evening.

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Space Pictures This Week: Martian Gas, Cloud Trails

Image courtesy SDO/NASA

The sun is more than meets the eye, and researchers should know. They've equipped telescopes on Earth and in space with instruments that view the sun in at least ten different wavelengths of light, some of which are represented in this collage compiled by NASA and released January 22. (See more pictures of the sun.)

By viewing the different wavelengths of light given off by the sun, researchers can monitor its surface and atmosphere, picking up on activity that can create space weather.

If directed towards Earth, that weather can disrupt satellite communications and electronics—and result in spectacular auroras. (Read an article on solar storms in National Geographic magazine.)

The surface of the sun contains material at about 10,000°F (5,700°C), which gives off yellow-green light. Atoms at 11 million°F (6.3 million°C) gives off ultraviolet light, which scientists use to observe solar flares in the sun's corona. There are even instruments that image wavelengths of light highlighting the sun's magnetic field lines.

—Jane J. Lee

Published January 28, 2013

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US Mom Missing in Turkey Took Side Trips

Sarai Sierra, the New York mother who disappeared in Turkey while on a solo trip, took several side excursions out of the country, but stayed in contact with her family the entire time, a family friend told ABC News.

Turkish media reported today that police were trying to establish why Sierra visited Amsterdam and Munich. Police were also trying to establish the identity of a man Sierra, 33, was chatting with on the Internet, according to local media.

Rachel Norman, a family friend, said the man was a group tour guide from the Netherlands and said Sierra stayed in regular touch with her family in New York.

Steven Sierra, Sarai's husband, and David Jimenez, her brother, arrived in Istanbul today to aid in the search.

The men have been in contact with officials from the U.S. consulate in the country and plan to meet with them as soon as they open on Tuesday, Norman said.

After that, she said Sierra and Jimenez would meet with Turkish officials to discuss plans and search efforts.

Family of Sarai Sierra|AP Photo

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Sarai Sierra was supposed to fly back to the United States on Jan. 22, but she never showed up for her flight home.

Her two boys, ages 11 and 9, have not been told their mother is missing.

Sierra, an avid photographer, left New York on Jan. 7. It was her first overseas trip, and she decided to go ahead after a friend had to cancel, her family said.

"It was her first time outside of the United States, and every day while she was there she pretty much kept in contact with us, letting us know what she was up to, where she was going, whether it be through texting or whether it be through video chat, she was touching base with us," Steven Sierra told ABC News before he departed for Istanbul.

But when it came time to pick her up from Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey, Sierra wasn't on board her scheduled flight.

Steven Sierra called United Airlines and was told his wife had never boarded the flight home.

Further investigation revealed she had left her passport, clothes, phone chargers and medical cards in her room at a hostel in Beyoglu, Turkey, he said.

The family is suspicious and said it is completely out of character for the happily married mother, who met her husband in church youth group, to disappear.

The U.S. Embassy in Turkey and the Turkish National Police are involved in the investigation, WABC-TV reported.

"They've been keeping us posted, from my understanding they've been looking into hospitals and sending out word to police stations over there," Steven Sierra said. "Maybe she's, you know, locked up, so they are doing what they can."

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Satellite images reveal activity at North Korean test site

SEOUL: New satellite images reveal ongoing activity at North Korea's atomic test site, according to a US research institute, as expectation mounts of an imminent nuclear detonation by the isolated state.

The images, as recent as January 23, suggest the facility would be ready to conduct a test "in a few weeks or less" once the order is given, the US-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University posted on its 38 North website on Sunday.

"Snowfall and subsequent clearing operations as well as tracks in the snow reveal ongoing activity at buildings and on roadways near the possible test tunnel," it said.

The institute's analysis followed a series of daily threats from North Korea that it is preparing its third nuclear test in response to UN sanctions imposed on Pyongyang for a long-range rocket launch in December.

In a meeting with top security officials, North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un ordered "substantial and high-profile important state measures," fuelling speculation of an imminent detonation.

Military chief Hyon Yong-Chol, the head of the army's politburo Choe Ryong-Hae and spy chief Kim Won-Hong attended the meeting, state television reported on Sunday.

Last week's UN resolution imposing sanctions threatened further "significant action" if Pyongyang conducted a nuclear test.

The North's two previous detonations in 2006 and 2009 followed a similar pattern of a missile launch, followed by UN measures, followed by a nuclear test.

US warnings about the consequences of a third test have been backed by unusually strident criticism of Pyongyang by its sole major ally China.

Last week, a state-run newspaper close to China's ruling Communist Party, said in an editorial that Beijing would "not hesitate" to reduce aid to North Korea if it went ahead.

China has been the primary benefactor of Pyongyang since the 1950-1953 Korean War, providing critical diplomatic and economic support.

- AFP/al

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Rajnath Singh meets Jagadish Shettar, says no crisis in Karnataka

NEW DELHI: Karnataka chief minister Jagadish Shettar met BJP president Rajnath Singh on Monday to discuss the political situation the southern state following the decision of 13 MLAs, loyal to BS Yeddyurappa, to quit.

Talking to reporters after the meeting, Rajnath Singh said: "There is no crisis in Karnataka. Our government will complete its term."

Describing his meeting as a courtesy call, Shettar said: "This is just a courtesy call. I came here to wish Rajnath ji for his selection as party's president and to seek his blessings."

The meeting comes in wake of Rajnath Singh making clear to Jagadish Shettar last Friday not to compromise on the BJP's principles even if it threatens the survival of the government in the southern state.

Thirteen MLAs loyal to Karnataka Janata Party chief Yeddyurappa had gone in a delegation last Wednesday to meet Speaker K G Bopaiah to submit their resignation from Assembly membership.

As Bopaiah was not present, they had later submitted copies of their resignation letters to Governor H R Bhardwaj.

In the 225-member Karnataka Assembly, BJP has a strength of 117 excluding the Speaker and requires 113 for a simple majority. Congress has 71 members and JDS 26. There are seven Independents and two vacancies. One member is nominated.

(From inputs from PTI)

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Doomed Dolphin Speaks to New York's Vibrant Wildlife

By the time New Yorkers spied a dolphin swimming through the superfund sludge of the Gowanus Canal last Friday, it was too late. The marine mammal didn't even survive long enough for a rescue plan to come together. First sighted on Friday afternoon, the dolphin perished at 6:00 p.m.

The reason the marine mammal died, and why the dolphin swam up the polluted waterway in the first place, is as yet unknown. But the sad story of the wayward creature highlights the strange nature of New York City, the global epitome of urbanity. Hidden within Gotham are native carnivores, marine mammals, and even species that have scarcely been seen before.

Marine mammals are arguably the most high-profile of New York City's wild residents and visitors. The Gowanus Canal dolphin was only the latest to venture within city limits. Just a month ago, a 60-foot-long finback whale (Balaenoptera physalus) became stranded in the Rockaway Inlet of Queens. The emaciated animal died the day after it was discovered.

There seems to be no singular reason explaining why marine mammals such as the Gowanus dolphin and Queens' finback whale wander up the city's rivers or strand on beaches. Each case is unique. But not all the city's marine mammal visitors suffer terrible fates.

In 2006, a hefty manatee (Trichechus spp.) took a long jaunt from its Florida home up the East Coast, including a detour down New York's Hudson River. The sirenian survived the trip, continuing on to Cape Cod before reportedly turning back south to a destination unknown. Hopefully the manatee didn't encounter any great white sharks (Carcharodon carcharias) on the return journey, a marine predator we know patrols the waters off New York.

Of course, New York City's whales, seals, and occasional manatee can only skirt the city along its shores and canals. You likely won't see a seal caterpillaring its way along Broadway.

Yet the city's interior also hosts a strange accumulation of wildlife, including native animals that are carving out spaces for themselves in the concrete corridors and exotic species that we have introduced to city life.

Coyotes (Canis latrans) may be the cleverest of New York City's hidden wildlife. Thanks to camera traps, and the occasional police chase through Lower Manhattan, researchers are keeping track of the wily canids and studying how they are so successfully taking up residence in many of the nation's cities. "Most small, urban parks will likely hold a pair and their offspring at most—coyotes are very territorial," said Cornell University ecologist Paul Curtis.

The secretive carnivorans bring a welcome element to urban neighborhoods—an appetite for rodents—and are experts at cracking open new niches alongside people.

Black bears (Ursus americanus) may be next. The bears have proliferated in northern New Jersey in recent years, and in 2010, a black bear came within three miles of the George Washington Bridge, a major thoroughfare between New Jersey and Manhattan. The bear obviously would have eschewed rush hour traffic and the tolls, but the local population is so bountiful that it's not unreasonable to think some enterprising bear might eventually wander into the big city.

Strangely, you may actually be more likely to run into a crocodylian predator in New York City than a black bear. New Yorkers have a nagging habit of importing—and losing-alligator—like caimans and other reptiles within the city.

In 2010, an 18-inch long caiman took refuge under a parked Datsun in Astoria, Queens. No one knows how the reptile wound up on the street, but given the trend of owners buying cute crocodylians and later dumping them, someone may have abandoned the poor little caiman.

This would hardly be the first time. In 2006, another little caiman was found in the leaf litter behind Brooklyn's Spring Creek Towers, while "Damon the Caiman" swam around a Central Park lake in the summer of 2001. These caimans are only some of the most famous—according to a New York Times report, the Brooklyn-based Animal Care and Control deals with about ten caimans each year.

Many other unusual and exotic animals have romped through New York. Under some of their most notable animal celebrities, the city's Parks and Recreation department lists guinea pigs, boa snakes, and even a tiger that escaped from a circus in 2004 and ran down Jackie Robinson Parkway before his owners were able to get him back.

The Big Apple even contains species that have never been documented before. No, not the ballyhooed "Montauk Monster"—actually a rotted raccoon—but a distinct species of leopard frog. Described early this year, the cryptic amphibian was given away by its unique mating call.

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'Barrier of Bodies' Trapped Nightclub Fire Victims

A fast-moving fire roared through a crowded, windowless nightclub in southern Brazil early Sunday, filling the air in seconds with flames and a thick, toxic smoke that killed more than 230 panicked partygoers, many of whom were caught in a stampede to escape.

Inspectors believe the blaze began when a band's small pyrotechnics show ignited foam sound insulating material on the ceiling, releasing a putrid haze that caused scores of university students to choke to death. Most victims died from smoke inhalation rather than burns in what appeared to be the world's deadliest nightclub fire in more than a decade.

Survivors and the police inspector Marcelo Arigony said security guards briefly tried to block people from exiting the club. Brazilian bars routinely make patrons pay their entire tab at the end of the night before they are allowed to leave.

But Arigony said the guards didn't appear to block fleeing patrons for long. "It was chaotic and it doesn't seem to have been done in bad faith because several security guards also died," he told The Associated Press.

Later, firefighters responding to the blaze initially had trouble getting inside the Kiss nightclub because "there was a barrier of bodies blocking the entrance," Guido Pedroso Melo, commander of the city's fire department, told the O Globo newspaper.

Germano Roratto/AFP/Getty Images

Brazil Nightclub Fire: Nearly 200 People Killed Watch Video

Authorities said band members who were on the stage when the fire broke out later talked with police and confirmed they used pyrotechnics during their show.

Police inspector Sandro Meinerz, who coordinated the investigation at the nightclub, said one band member died after escaping because he returned inside the burning building to save his accordion. The other band members escaped alive because they were the first to notice the fire.

"It was terrible inside — it was like one of those films of the Holocaust, bodies piled atop one another," said Meinerz. "We had to use trucks to remove them. It took about six hours to take the bodies away."

Television images from Santa Maria, a university city of about 260,000 people, showed black smoke billowing out of the Kiss nightclub as shirtless young men who attended the university party joined firefighters using axes and sledgehammers to pound at the hot-pink exterior walls, trying to reach those trapped inside.

Bodies of the dead and injured were strewn in the street and panicked screams filled the air as medics tried to help. There was little to be done; officials said most of those who died were suffocated by smoke within minutes.

Within hours a community gym was a horror scene, with body after body lined up on the floor, partially covered with black plastic as family members identified kin.

Outside the gym police held up personal objects — a black purse, a blue high-heeled shoe — as people seeking information on loved ones crowded around, hoping not to recognize anything being shown them.

Teenagers sprinted from the scene after the fire began, desperately seeking help. Others carried injured and burned friends away in their arms. Many of the victims were under 20 years old, including some minors. About half of those killed were men, about half women.

The party was organized by students from several academic departments from the Federal University of Santa Maria. Such organized university parties are common throughout Brazil.

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Senate’s pragmatic ranks depleted by one with Chambliss’s departure

The trio of Southern gentlemen came to the Senate together in 2003, the leading edge of a renegade Republican class set on shaking up the chamber’s staid ways and aggressively promoting the Bush White House’s conservative agenda.

Ten years later, Sens. Lamar Alexander (Tenn.), Saxby Chambliss (Ga.) and Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.) are now establishment dealmakers and elder statesmen — roles that earn them respect in Washington but could lead to tough challenges from fellow Republicans when they run for re-election next year.

On Friday, Chambliss announced that there would be no re-election for him, opting for retirement over another run that was certain to include a heated primary challenge, possibly from several candidates. Chambliss took pains to say that he would have won and instead cited Washington “gridlock” as his reason for retiring.

Regardless, Chambliss’s departure is another blow to the pragmatic wing of the Senate, with a lineup of potential successors all hailing from the staunchly conservative camp of the Georgia GOP.

Chambliss’s successor is likely to contribute to a rightward movement over the past four years that has made the ranks of Senate Republicans more conservative, but also led to repeated political disappointment. A handful of 2010 and 2012 Republican primaries produced nominees who bungled their way to general election defeat, when victory once appeared certain.

What happens with the other two Southerners could go a long way to determining the ideological makeup of the Senate Republican caucus.

Alexander and Graham are both running, raising money and appearing throughout their states. Alexander, a former two-term governor and U.S. education secretary, has the stronger footing for the moment, having locked up the endorsements of his state’s GOP congressional delegation and every prominent Republican state official. Graham has no prominent challenger yet, but Palmetto State Republicans are sizing up the race trying to decide if he’s ripe for a challenge.

That Alexander, Chambliss and Graham have found themselves in this situation, a decade after debuting as rabble rousers who helped return the chamber to GOP control, is the latest demonstration of how much the Republican Party has changed. Its voters more than ever demand a confrontational tone and in-your-face tactics, the sort of behavior that they have shied away from.

“The big change is in terms of strategy and tactics,” said Stuart Rothenberg, editor of the nonpartisan Rothenberg Political Report, noting that the three incumbents are all fairly conservative in their policy positions. “The war has changed. Republican voters want every fight to be hand-to-hand combat. They don’t want to give any ground.”

Alexander rejected the idea that the trio had “gone Washington” as they each became more powerful. “I know my way around here. We’re each finding our niche, and that’s pretty normal after 10 years,” he said in a recent interview.

Before his Friday announcement, Chambliss had been viewed as the most vulnerable Republican incumbent to a challenge from within. His apostasies to the new Republican posture were numerous in recent years, most prominently being his close partnership with Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) in an effort to craft a bipartisan package of tax hikes and entitlement cuts to rein in the federal government’s $16.4 trillion debt.

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