VOA news for Sunday, March 13th, 2016 Thanks to http://gandalf.ddo.jp/ for audio and text From Washington, this is VOA news. I'm David Byrd reporting. Presidential candidates vie for votes ahead of primaries on Tuesday. Republican frontrunner Donald Trump was in Ohio earlier Saturday 1 day after canceling a rally in Chicago because of a mass protest against him. Trump told voters in Cleveland that the protests Friday night at the University of Illinois at Chicago were led by supporters of Democratic Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders. "Where do these people come from? You know Bernie was saying Mr. Trump should speak to his crowd, Mr. Trump. You know where they come from? Bernie's crowd. They're Bernie's crowd. Thank you. Get them out. Good.” Meanwhile, Texas Senator Ted Cruz told a crowd in Missouri that if Trump wins the Republican nomination, it would hand the general election to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. "65-70% of Republicans nationwide recognize that Donald Trump is not the best candidate to go head-to-head with Hillary Clinton. And if Donald is the nominee Hillary will wins, and if Hillary wins it is a disaster for the country.” Hillary Clinton told her supporters that Donald Trump's rhetoric and anger are not the way to solve the country's problems. "You know, if you play with matches, you can start a fire you can't control. That is not leadership. It is political arson.” Florida Senator Marco Rubio denounced Trump as dividing both the party and the country. Ohio Governor John Kasich said Trump's campaign is "toxic.” There are 5 primaries Tuesday, including 2 winner-take-all contests in Florida and Ohio. For more on these stories, visit our website. This is VOA news. The Islamic State has launched 2 chemical attacks near the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, killing a 3-year-old girl and wounding 600 people and causing 100s more to flee. Iraqi officials said Saturday the latest attack took place early Saturday in the small town of Taza, which was also struck by a barrage of rockets carrying chemicals 3 days earlier. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has vowed to retaliate against the Islamic State group for the attack. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry says that U.N.-sponsored peace talks on Syria should go ahead as planned Monday despite what he called "perceived truce violations" by the Syrian government. The top U.S. diplomat said Russian and American monitors are meeting in both Geneva and Amman to try to figure out how to reduce violence in Syria. Meanwhile, Syria's Foreign Minister Walid Muallem said that the Syrian government remains committed to the cease-fire agreement. However, he said its delegation to the peace talks will only wait 24 hours for the opposition delegation to arrive for the talks. Muallem said Saturday in Damascus the diplomats would leave for Geneva on Sunday. A Syrian opposition official says the foreign minister is "halting the Geneva talks before they start.” French police arrested 14 people protesting the presence of a migrant camp in Calais after they blocked bridges and set fire to tires, calling for foreigners to go home. The protesters calling themselves "Identity Generation" gathered early Saturday, carrying banners that said "Go Home" and "No Way.” Calais has become a bottleneck for migrants trying to cross the English Channel to Britain. 1000s of people have gathered in a refugee camp known as "the Jungle" for its abysmal living conditions. And, a 10-year-old Palestinian boy and his 6-year-old sister died Saturday following an overnight Israeli missile strike in Hamas-controlled Gaza. The Israeli military said in a statement that it launched retaliatory airstrikes against 4 Hamas militant training camps after 4 rockets landed in open areas of southern Israel late Friday. Officials said no one was hurt by those rockets. The children died after missile fragments hit their home near one of the training camps. Their deaths marked the first fatalities from airstrikes since October. An Israeli military spokesman said that militants use the rocket strikes to "threaten the security and safety of the people of southern Israel.” For more on these stories, please visit our website voanews.com. I'm David Byrd in Washington. That's the latest world news from VOA.

• published: 13 Mar 2016
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