• published: 16 Mar 2015
• views: 83

Thanks to http://gandalf.ddo.jp/ for audio and text VOA news for Monday, March 16th, 2015 From Washington, this is VOA news. I'm Ray Kouguell reporting. A U.S. call to negotiate with Syria. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry says the United States will have to reach agreement with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to enable a political transition of power and bring a stop to the five-year-old civil war that's left thousands of dead. Secretary Kerry spoke Sunday in CBS's "Face the Nation." He did not specify what the terms of a potential agreement with Mr. Assad could include. "We are working very hard with other interested parties to see if we can re-ignite a diplomatic outcome. Why? Because everybody agrees there is no military solution. There is only a political solution.” A U.S.-backed attempt by the U.N. to mediate a truce between opposition groups and the Syrian government failed last year. With another round of nuclear talks to begin this week between Washington and Tehran, Secretary Kerry says the obstacles to an agreement are largely political, rather than technical. America's top diplomat will meet in Switzerland with Iranian counterpart Mohammed Javad Zarif in the next round of talks on the future of Iran's nuclear program. Ten U.S. aid workers who may have been exposed to the Ebola virus in Sierra Leone are being evacuated to the United States. U.S. officials say the individuals will be housed near the University of Nebraska Medical Center, the National Institutes of Health in Maryland, or Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. Three male British teenagers allegedly seeking to join Islamic State extremists in Syria have been arrested in London after being deported from Turkey. Scotland Yard police Sunday did not identify the three suspects, but said they were detained Friday in Istanbul. Turkish media reports say the trio -- two 17 and another 19 -- were arrested after a flight from Barcelona. This is VOA news. Hundreds of thousands of Brazilians took to the streets in cities across the country Sunday, demanding the ouster of President Dilma Rousseff over government corruption. Much of the public anger toward President Rousseff stems from revelations of a kickback scheme at state-run oil company Petrobras, which prosecutors call the biggest corruption scheme ever uncovered in Brazil. At least $800 million was paid in bribes and other funds by the nation's biggest construction and engineering firms in exchange for inflated Petrobras contracts. Dozens of political figures, including close allies of the president, and former Petrobras executives, are under investigation. Sierra Leone President Earnest Bai Koroma says Vice President Samuel Sam-Sumana should not fear for his life or feel threatened. Sam-Sumana went into hiding after his guards were suddenly disarmed and replaced without his knowledge or approval. He earlier had been expelled from the ruling All People's Congress after being accused of fomenting violence and seeking to establish a new party. Sam-Sumana is reported to have asked for asylum in the American embassy. Two suicide bombings outside Christian churches in the eastern city of Lahore Sunday killed at least 15 people and wounded more than 70 others. A militant gang allied with the outlawed Pakistani Taliban has claimed responsibility. Ayaz Gul reports. The bombings minutes apart targeted a Catholic and a Protestant church in a majority Christian suburb, Youhanabad, where thousands of people had gathered for Sunday services. Hospital officials say many of those wounded in the attack are in critical condition. A senior Lahore police officer, Haider Ashraf, says two gunmen wearing suicide vests tried to shoot their way into the worship places. He said one police officer was killed and several others sustained injuries while successfully preventing the bombers from entering the prayer halls and limiting the damage. Ayaz Gul, for VOA news, Islamabad. Police in the Midwest U.S. city of Ferguson, Missouri, have made an arrest in connection with last week's shooting of two police officers outside police headquarters. Both men were hospitalized and released. St. Louis prosecutor Robert McCulloch says 20-year-old Jeffrey Williams told authorities he was firing at someone with whom he was in a dispute, not at the police officers. "He has acknowledged his participation in firing the shots, that he did fire the shots that struck the two officers.” Williams is charged with two counts of first-degree assault, one count of firing a weapon from a vehicle and three counts of armed criminal action. Relief supplies are flowing into Vanuatu after a devastating tropical cyclone slammed into the South Pacific Island nation late Friday and Saturday. At least eight deaths reported; the death toll expected to rise. I'm Ray Kouguell in Washington. That's the latest world news from VOA.