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What’s changed in Myanmar?

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

  • Two years ago, Myanmar started unraveling decades of military rule
  • President Thein Sein vows to free all political prisoners
  • Despite reforms, locals are not convinced of change

Naypyidaw, Myanmar (CNN) — Around seven years ago, a sparse tract of land north of the cluttered chaos of Yangon was anointed Myanmar’s new capital by the country’s former military leaders.

Buildings were hastily erected in the new city of Naypyidaw to cater to an influx of arrivals, and later dozens of hotels moved in to meet demand for foreign visitors. These hotels sit one after the other on the sides of an eight-lane highway lined with newly planted trees.

They are all but full this week as more than 900 guests bed down for two days of talks around the typically wordy World Economic Forum theme of “Courageous Transformation for Inclusion and Integration.”

Two years ago, the world watched with a mixture of skepticism and awe as President Thein Sein took office and set about unraveling decades of oppressive military rule.

On Tuesday in a national radio address, the Burmese president took another step forward by announcing the imminent release of all political prisoners.

Since taking power in 2010, Thein Sein has freed dozens of prisoners of conscience, but activists have been pushing for the release of around 200 more.

According to state run newspaper, the New Light of Myanmar, Thein Sein said the prisoner release scheme was executed “with the sheer intention of forging national reconciliation,” adding that political gain was not the government’s motive.

Thein Sein’s efforts to rectify the wrongs of the past have scored him political points with foreign leaders and investors, however not all locals are convinced that the country’s transformation is doing anything for them.

Early Tuesday morning in the busy Bogalay Market in downtown Yangon, traders told CNN that they had seen little change.

Change in Myanmar: The market view

Win Shwe stood in a long coat at the market entrance, raising his hand every now and then as if to bless passersby. The 72-year-old was begging for a note or two of the local currency, the kyat. The typically dirty, crumpled notes are worth about 940 to one U.S. dollar. Two hundred kyat gets you a ride on a crowded bus. More buys a decent meal.

“This is a transformation time. But for poor people, nothing’s changed. The government mechanism is corruption,” he said, dropping his hand rolled cigarette onto the floor.

Nearby, Khin Than Win, 52, sits with her daughter Yin Yin Htay at their flower stall. “I agree that this is a transformation time,” she says. “But I see that the streets and the roads are wider than before. That’s the only change.”

Thein Sein said Tuesday that the country’s transition from military rule to democracy will take time.

“As the task is huge, there have been tangible changes rather than vivid changes. When there are vivid changes, our national economy will make progress with momentum,” he said.

There are fears though that any progress in the national economy hinges on the country’s ability to dampen ethnic tensions that have recently flared in northern parts of the country.

At least 50 people have been arrested after rioting in Lashio, which erupted last week after a Buddhist woman was allegedly doused in petrol and set alight, according to the Myanmar Times.

A mosque, Islamic school and hundreds of houses and businesses owned by Muslims were torched before the government imposed martial law and sent in troops.

It follows the murder of Muslim children and teachers in Meiktila by an angry mob in March.

The government has achieved some success in negotiating peace with ethnic rebels around the country, most recently signing a seven-point agreement in Kachin State, but the religious violence is relatively new and poses additional problems for the country’s leaders.

On Thursday, Thein Sein officially opened the World Economic Forum in Naypyidaw to an audience eager for assurance that problems can be resolved.

Myanmar is due to assume the chairmanship of the Association of Southeast Nations (ASEAN) next year, giving it once more a leading role in the region after decades in the dark.

Over the past two years, most sanctions have slowly lifted and the shroud of fear that kept locals from talking has slipped away.

Money has poured in as foreign investors spied the rare opportunity to enter a market long deprived of choice and, in many cases, basic public services.

This week, U.S. beverage giant Coca-Cola made its move, opening a bottling plant to meet demand with a local source almost 60 years after it pulled out.

“This is a market of 60 plus million consumers just embarking on a journey to join the world community if you like. In a way the same excitement when we saw the Berlin Wall came down,” CEO Muhtar Kent told CNN.

Excitement over the possibility of new growth is being tempered by very real concerns as the country works to repair years of neglect, cronyism and the deep mistrust of its people.

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What’s changed in Myanmar?

Judge limits texts, photos in Trayvon Martin case

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Robert Zimmerman Jr., left, the brother of George Zimmerman, the accused shooter of Trayvon Martin, talks with defense attorney Mark O’Mara, during a pre-trial hearing, Tuesday, May 28, 2013 in Sanford, Fla. George Zimmerman has been charged with second-degree murder for the 2012 shooting death of Trayvon Martin. He was not in court for the hearing. (AP Photo/Orlando Sentinel, Joe Burbank, Pool)

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SANFORD, Fla. (AP) — Attorneys won’t be able to mention Trayvon Martin’s drug use, suspension from school and past fighting during opening statements at the trial of a former neighborhood watch volunteer who fatally shot the teen, a judge ruled Tuesday.

However, Circuit Judge Debra Nelson left open the possibility that the defense could try again later during the trial if it could show relevance.

George Zimmerman is charged with second-degree murder in the 17-year-old’s killing and has pleaded not guilty, saying he acted in self-defense. He did not attend Tuesday’s hearing.

In another key motion Nelson refused to allow jurors to travel to the shooting scene during trial, and rejected a defense request to delay the trial set to begin June 10.

The judge called the request to let jurors see the crime scene “a logistical nightmare.”

Zimmerman’s attorney, Mark O’Mara, said Nelson’s decisions would not affect how he presented his case.

“We were hoping that we would have some limitations on people commenting upon information that is not yet relevant,” O’Mara said. “So the idea that the state will have to be careful about how they present their case — and certainly we’re going be careful about how we present ours — is exactly what we were hoping for.”

He acknowledged, however, that with the judge not delaying the trial the defense would “have a lot more work to do than we can get accomplished between now and June 10.”

The judge also ruled that some of the Martin’s texts and other social media statements won’t be allowed in opening statements, though it, too, could be allowed later with a ruling from the judge depending on how the case progresses.

O’Mara told the judge that Martin’s marijuana use and past fighting was central to the argument that Zimmerman used self-defense when he confronted Martin last year at a gated community in Sanford, Fla.

“We have a lot of evidence that marijuana use had something to do with the event,” O’Mara said. “It could have affected his behavior.”

An attorney for Martin’s family, Benjamin Crump, said the teen’s parents were pleased with the judge’s rulings on information they consider immaterial to the February 2012 shooting.

“Trayvon Martin is not on trial,” Crump said.

The judge ruled against a defense request that the pool of 500 jury candidates be sequestered during jury selection. She said jurors will be referred to by their jury numbers and prohibited their faces from being photographed. Nelson denied a prosecution request for a gag order that would prohibit attorneys from talking about the case.

O’Mara said he is concerned potential jurors could be affected by publicity the case is receiving.

The defense attorney had asked to push back the trial date because he said prosecutors had delayed turning over evidence as required. O’Mara is seeking sanctions against prosecutors, but a hearing on those sanctions was delayed until next week.

Before the judge decided to postpone the hearing on sanctions, a former prosecutor who used to work in the same office as the attorneys prosecuting Zimmerman testified he had told O’Mara about photos and text messages from Martin’s cell phone that hadn’t yet been turned over to the defense.

Former Assistant State Attorney Wesley White resigned last year from the State Attorney’s Office that covers northeast Florida.

___

Follow Kyle Hightower on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/khightower.

Associated Press

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Judge limits texts, photos in Trayvon Martin case

Heute ist Weltspieltag – Deutsches Kinderhilfswerk fordert Umdenken in der Ausgestaltung des deutschen Schulalltags

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Berlin (ots) – Das Deutsche Kinderhilfswerk fordert zum heutigen Weltspieltag ein Umdenken in der Ausgestaltung des deutschen Schulalltags. Mit einer strkeren Integration des Spiels in den Schulalltag sollen die freien Entfaltungsmglichkeiten von Kindern in Bildungseinrichtungen gefrdert werden, um sie in ihrer emotionalen und kognitiven Entwicklung zu untersttzen. Dazu mssen sich nach Ansicht des Deutschen Kinderhilfswerkes vor allem die Schulen der Frage stellen, wie sie bei zunehmendem Ganztagsbetrieb dem Bedrfnis der Kinder nach Spiel, Freizeit, Ruhe und Erholung im Sinne des Artikels 31 der UN-Kinderrechtskonvention gerecht werden knnen.

Der Weltspieltag steht in Deutschland und bei Partnern in sterreich und der Schweiz in diesem Jahr unter dem Motto “Spielen bildet!”. Mit dem Weltspieltag will das Deutsche Kinderhilfswerk gemeinsam mit seinen rund 200 Partnern im “Bndnis Recht auf Spiel” die Bedeutung des freien Spiels fr Kinder ins Bewusstsein rufen und fordert gleichzeitig mehr Untersttzung fr Konzepte ganzheitlichen Lernens. Rund um den Weltspieltag finden in mehr als 100 Kommunen rund 250 Aktionen statt, die vor Ort von ffentlichen Einrichtungen, Vereinen und Nachbarschaftsinitiativen durchgefhrt werden. Die Schirmherrschaft ber den Weltspieltag 2013 hat die Kinderkommission des Deutschen Bundestages bernommen, Botschafter ist der Fernsehmoderator und Autor Ralph Caspers.

“Beim Spielen lernen Kinder anders als in der Schule, und sie lernen anderes als in der Schule. Beim Spielen lernen Kinder freiwillig und mit Spa, ber Versuch und Irrtum, ohne Versagensngste. Spielen und Lernen sind keine Gegenstze, sondern eng miteinander verknpft. Die Vereinten Nationen sehen das Recht auf Spiel als so wichtig an, das sie es als spezielles Kinderrecht in die UN-Kinderrechtskonvention geschrieben haben. Es ist wichtig, dass Kinder ihre Potentiale viel breiter entfalten, und dazu gehren auch motorische und soziale Kompetenzen, die sie im Spiel entwickeln knnen. Wir freuen uns ber viele ffentlichkeitswirksame Aktionen in ganz Deutschland, die auf die Notwendigkeit des freien Spiels aufmerksam machen”, erklrt Holger Hofmann, Bundesgeschftsfhrer des Deutschen Kinderhilfswerkes.

“Kinder haben ein Recht auf freies Spiel – in der Schule, der Kita und auch im ffentlichen Raum. Immer wieder gibt es Klagen ber Lrmstrungen durch spielende Kinder. Spielpltze oder Kindergrten werden daraufhin streng reglementiert oder geschlossen. Dabei sollten Kinder nicht an den Rand gedrngt, sondern mitten in der Gesellschaft – einen durchaus hrbaren – Platz haben! Kinder brauchen in einer reglementierten und durchgetakteten Zeit wie unserer Rume, um einfach sie selbst sein zu knnen”, betont die Kinderkommission des Deutschen Bundestages.

“Ich kenne viele Kinder, die einen volleren Terminkalender haben als ich. Frs Spielen bleibt da kaum noch Zeit. Das ist bel, denn durchs Spielen lernen Kinder die Welt um sie herum kennen. Sie entwickeln dabei ganz nebenbei wichtige motorische, kognitive und soziale Fhigkeiten. Und das merken sie nicht einmal. Deshalb mssen wir mehr als bisher dafr sorgen, dass Kinder spielen knnen”, unterstreicht Ralph Caspers, Botschafter des Weltspieltages.

Das Deutsche Kinderhilfswerk rechnet zum Weltspieltag bundesweit mit vielen hundert Spiel- und Mitmachaktionen. In einigen Stdten werden ganze Straen gesperrt und zu einer Spielstrae umfunktioniert. Da kann dann nach Herzenslust gespielt, getobt und Rad gefahren werden kann. Vielerorts wird es Sport- und Bewegungsangebote geben oder Malaktionen bis hin zu Riesenseifenblasen. Es gibt Trommelworkshops, Spielstationen mit Geschicklichkeitsspielen und Spielen aus Omas und Opas Zeiten oder Schatzkisten basteln fr Kinderrechte.

Der Weltspieltag 2013 wird in Deutschland und bei Partnern in sterreich und der Schweiz zum sechsten Mal ausgerichtet. Zum Weltspieltag sind Schulen und Kindergrten, ffentliche Einrichtungen, Vereine und Nachbarschaftsinitiativen aufgerufen, in ihrer Stadt oder Gemeinde eine witzige, beispielgebende und ffentlichkeitswirksame Spielaktion durchzufhren. Die Partner sind vor Ort fr die Durchfhrung ihrer Veranstaltung selbst verantwortlich. Das Deutsche Kinderhilfswerk stellt umfangreiche Aktionsmaterialien zum Weltspieltag zur Verfgung, darunter ein Postkartenpuzzle zum diesjhrigen Motto oder das Spielheft mit Spielanregungen. Weitere Informationen unter www.weltspieltag.de.

Das Deutsche Kinderhilfswerk e.V., Interessenvertreter fr ein kinderfreundliches Deutschland, wurde 1972 in Mnchen gegrndet. Als Initiator und Frderer setzt sich der gemeinntzige Verein seit mehr als 40 Jahren fr Kinderrechte, Beteiligung und die berwindung von Kinderarmut in Deutschland ein.

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Heute ist Weltspieltag – Deutsches Kinderhilfswerk fordert Umdenken in der Ausgestaltung des deutschen Schulalltags

McCain makes surprise trip to visit Syrian rebels

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In this photo provided by U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., on his Twitter site, McCain visits troops at a Patriot missile site in southern Turkey, Monday, May 27, 2013. McCain quietly slipped into Syria for a meeting with Syrian rebels on Monday, confirms spokeswoman Rachael Dean. She declined further comment about the trip. (AP Photo/John McCain via Twitter)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Leaders of Syria’s opposition forces are getting a chance to make their case directly to Sen. John McCain. The Arizona Republican, who supports arming Syrian rebels, slipped into that country for a surprise visit.

A State Department official said the department was aware of McCain crossing into Syrian territory Monday, but further questions were referred to the senator’s office.

McCain spokeswoman Rachel Dean confirmed the trip, but declined further comment.

The visit took place at the same time as meetings in Paris involving efforts to secure participation of Syria’s opposition in an international peace conference in Geneva. And in Brussels, the European Union decided to lift the arms embargo on the Syrian opposition.

Associated Press

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McCain makes surprise trip to visit Syrian rebels

AP EXCLUSIVE: NKorea relaxes controls on salaries

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In this Monday, April 9, 2012 photo, North Korean women work in a thread factory in Pyongyang, North Korea. A North Korean economist said that the government introduced new economic management methods in April 2013 that relax state control of workers’ salaries. (AP Photo/David Guttenfelder)

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PYONGYANG, North Korea (AP) — North Korea relaxed state control of salaries last month, a government economist said, outlining a change in policy intended to boost production by giving companies latitude to provide workers with financial incentives.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Ri Ki Song, a professor at the Institute of Economics at North Korea’s Academy of Social Sciences in Pyongyang, said enterprises are now allowed to use some of their earnings to pay workers more.

Until recently, most salaries were set by the state. The new policy gives managers of factories and other businesses the right to determine workers’ salaries if they are able to improve productivity. The change follows a similar move last year to give managers at North Korean farms more power to make management decisions and to allow farmers to keep any surplus harvest to sell or barter instead of turning them over to the state.

“After repaying the state for its investment, enterprises can set salaries themselves, regardless of salaries fixed by the state, and pay workers according to their performance,” Ri said last week. Companies must also put aside funds for investment, continued production, development of technology and cultural activities, he said.

But Ri said the new economic management methods enacted April 1 were not signs that North Korea is adopting a capitalist free market system.

“This is nothing to do with reform and opening,” Ri said. “As I’ve said, the socialist ownership of the means of production is firmly established in our country, and we defend this.”

Foreign governments have looked for indications that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un might be open to reform since coming to power in December 2011. North Korea has a per capita GDP of $1,800 per year, according to the U.S. State Department, just a fraction of the living standards in its Northeast Asian neighbors, Japan and South Korea.

Kim, the third generation of his family to lead North Korea since 1948, inherited a nation plagued by chronic food, fuel and power shortages. He has said improving the economy is a priority, acknowledging economic hardship in North Korea and pledging to raise the standard of living.

Kim in a speech in January said the country’s most important task is the “building of an economic giant” and called for all of the year’s economic undertakings to be aimed “a radical increase in production and stabilizing and improving the people’s living standards.”

“We should hold fast to the socialist economic system of our own style, steadily improve and perfect the methods of economic management on the principle of encouraging the working masses to fulfill their responsibility and role befitting the masters of production,” Kim said.

However, Kim also has made the costly building of a nuclear arsenal a priority at a time when the United Nations says two-thirds of the population is coping with chronic food shortages.

The new policy on salaries went into effect after a trial period, Ri said.

“In the past, the state used to fix standard salaries, which meant you couldn’t pay more than a certain amount,” he said.

Now, factories and enterprises that perform well will be allowed to raise salaries, Ri said.

“And individual workers who work more can earn more,” he said.

Last September, AP quoted farmers as saying new directives aimed at boosting productivity at collective farms give managers more control over decisions on how to farm the land and allow farmers to keep any surplus after they fulfill state-mandated quotas.

By giving farmers incentives to grow more food, North Korea could be starting down the same path as China when it first began experimenting with a market-based economy, analysts said.

Associated Press

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AP EXCLUSIVE: NKorea relaxes controls on salaries

Kerry: US, allies, ready to step up aid rebels

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U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry gestures during a joint a news conference with Jordan’s Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh in Amman, Jordan, Wednesday, May 22, 2013. (AP Photo/Jim Young, Pool)

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AMMAN, Jordan (AP) — The United States and its Arab and European allies will step up their support for Syria’s opposition to help them “fight for the freedom of their country” if President Bashar Assad’s regime doesn’t engage in peace talks in good faith, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry vowed Wednesday.

Kerry allowed that President Barack Obama won’t send American troops to Syria. But he made clear that more aid to the rebels would be coming if the effort fails.

“In the event that we can’t find that way forward, in the event that the Assad regime is unwilling to negotiate Geneva in good faith, we will also talk about our continued support, growing support for opposition in order to permit them to continue to fight for the freedom of their country,” Kerry said, speaking to reporters ahead of a June conference in Geneva dedicated to finding strategies to end Syria’s two-year civil war based on a framework that would install a transitional government.

Obama “has also made it clear that he intends to support the broad-based opposition, and he has taken no options off table with respect to how that support may be provided, or what kind of support that might be,” the secretary told reporters at news conference with Jordanian Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh.

Kerry also warned Iran and the militant Hezbollah movement to stop providing assistance to Assad, saying such activity “perpetuates the regime’s campaign of terror against its own people.”

“We have to hope that Bashar Assad and his regime will understand the meaning of that and the Iranians and others will understand the meaning of that,” Kerry said. “The president will keep those options available to him short of American forces on ground.”

To that end, an administration official in Washington said the White House would soon notify Congress about an expanded package of non-lethal assistance to the Syrian rebels.

Details of the aid package are still being finalized, according to the official, who was not authorized to discuss the expanded aid publicly and insisted on anonymity. But, the package is likely to include vehicles and communications gear, the official said. It is not expected to include night vision goggles or body armor, underscoring the cautious approach the U.S. has taken regarding military-style assistance to the opposition.

As Kerry and his counterparts arrived at the meeting venue in Amman, about 250 pro-Assad demonstrators blocked the main entrance.

The protesters, a mix of Jordanians and Syrians, chanted “Death to America,” and, “Go home, Kerry we don’t want you here.”

At the news conference Kerry and Judeh both stressed that the goal is to get the Syrian government and opposition into political transition talks that could begin as early as next month in Geneva.

Without that, violence will continue and the death toll from the conflict will continue to rise.

“Let’s assume there is no Geneva 2,” Kerry said. “Let’s assume we don’t come together as community of nations to try to find a peaceful process. What will happen? What will happen is an absolute guarantee that violence will continue and the world will be standing on the sidelines doing nothing constructive to try to end that violence. That’s unacceptable.”

The comments came a day after a Senate panel voted to provide weapons to the rebels, the first time American lawmakers have endorsed the aggressive U.S. military step of arming the opposition.

With a degree of trepidation, the Foreign Relations Committee voted 15-3 for a bill that would provide lethal assistance and military training to vetted rebel groups, and would slap sanctions on anyone — such as Iran or Russia — who sells oil or transfers arms to the Assad regime. The measure would also establish a $250 million fund to aid in the transition if and when Assad falls.

___

Associated Press writers Julie Pace and Matthew Lee in Washington and Jamal Halaby in Amman contributed to this report.

Associated Press

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Kerry: US, allies, ready to step up aid rebels

Deutschland bei Autoreisezielen im Sommer 2013 vorne / ADAC wertet über 200 000 Routenplanungen aus

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17.05.2013 | 13:31

Deutschland bei Autoreisezielen im Sommer 2013 vorne
ADAC wertet ber 200 000 Routenplanungen aus

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Mnchen (ots) – Urlaub im eigenen Land steht in diesem Sommer bei deutschen Autofahrern nach wie vor an erster Stelle. Das ergab die Analyse von ber 200 000 Routenplanungen beim ADAC. Hierfr wurden Mitgliederanfragen nach ihren Reisezielen fr den Sommerurlaub ausgewertet. Bei der Prognose fr die Lieblingsurlaubslnder der Autoreisenden liegt Deutschland unangefochten an der Spitze, bei den Urlaubsregionen dominiert mit norditalienischen, sddeutschen und kroatischen Reisezielen klar der Sden.

Mit fast 40 Prozent und erneut leicht fallender Tendenz fhrt Deutschland die Top Ten der beliebtesten Urlaubslnder noch mit groem Abstand an. Italien dagegen legt deutlich zu: Fast 18 Prozent der Reisenden planen ihren Sommerurlaub dort. Platz drei und vier belegen wie auch im letzten Jahr Frankreich (6,4 Prozent) und sterreich (5,6 Prozent). Kroatien (4,6 Prozent) hlt unverndert Rang fnf vor Spanien (2,6 Prozent). Die Schweiz belegt mit zwei Prozent Platz sieben. Polen und die Trkei teilen sich mit 1,8 Prozent Platz acht. Das Schlusslicht der Top Ten sind die Niederlande.

Neben den Lndern hat der ADAC auch die beliebtesten Urlaubsregionen ermittelt. Oberbayern erobert Platz eins zurck und fhrt mit fnf Prozent die Top Ten der Regionen an, dicht gefolgt vom Gardasee (4,9 Prozent) auf Platz zwei und Sdtirol (4,7 Prozent) auf Platz drei. Die kroatische Region Istrien (4 Prozent) belegt wie im Vorjahr Platz vier. Die Ostsee/Mecklenburger Seenplatte (3,6 Prozent) hlt den fnften Platz, Schleswig-Holstein rutscht mit 3,3 Prozent auf Platz sechs. Der Gewinner der Saison ist die Toskana (2,7 Prozent), die vom zehnten Rang auf Platz sieben vorrckt. Den achten Rang belegt dieses Mal die Nordsee/Ostfriesische Inseln. Platz neun in der ADAC Auswertung teilen sich die Regionen Tirol und Eifel/Mosel/Mittleres Rheintal.

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Deutschland bei Autoreisezielen im Sommer 2013 vorne / ADAC wertet über 200 000 Routenplanungen aus

Minn. House approves gay marriage; would be 12th

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Rachel Ford cheers during a rally supporting a same-sex marriage bill in Minnesota on the steps of the State Capitol in St. Paul, Minn., on Wednesday May 8, 2013. The Minnesota House is scheduled to debate and vote Thursday on a measure that would make the state the 12th in the country to allow gay marriage. (AP Photo/Andy Clayton King)

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ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — A historic vote Thursday in the Minnesota House positioned that state to become the 12th in the country to allow gay marriages and the first in the Midwest to pass such a law out of its Legislature.

Lawmakers approved it 75-59, a critical step for the measure that would allow same-sex weddings beginning this summer. It’s a startling shift in the state, where just six months earlier voters turned back an effort to ban gay marriage in the Minnesota Constitution.

The state Senate plans to consider the bill Monday and leaders expect it to pass there, too. Gov. Mark Dayton has pledged to sign it into law.

“It’s not time to uncork the champagne yet. But it’s chilling,” Rep. Steve Simon, a suburban Democrat who backed the bill, said at a raucous rally in the state Capitol rotunda minutes after the vote.

Rep. Karen Clark, the bill’s sponsor, said her only goal was equal treatment under state law for same-sex couples. In a deeply personal speech, the Minneapolis Democrat talked of the support she got from her own family after coming out as gay decades ago.

“My family knew firsthand that same sex couples pay our taxes, we vote, we serve in the military, we take care of our kids and our elders and we run businesses in Minnesota,” she said.

Hundreds of supporters and opponents gathered outside the House chamber up to and during the debate, chanting and waving signs. They sang “We Shall Overcome” and the John Lennon song “Give Peace a Chance” — substituting the word “love” for “peace.”

Four of the House’s 61 Republicans voted for the bill, while two of its 73 Democrats voted no. None of the four Republicans committed support beforehand; one, Rep. Jenifer Loon, said she made up her mind during the three-hour House debate, in which lawmakers listened with rapt attention while their colleagues spoke.

“There comes a time when you just have to set politics aside and decide in your gut what is the right thing to do,” said Loon, whose suburban district southwest of Minneapolis voted strongly against last fall’s gay marriage ban. The other Republicans to vote for gay marriage also hail from suburban or exurban districts: Pat Garofalo of Farmington, David FitzSimmons of Albertville and Andrea Kieffer of Woodbury.

The two Democrats who voted no, Patti Fritz of Faribault and Mary Sawatzky of Willmar, represent largely rural districts where the gay marriage ban was backed by a majority of voters. But most of the Democrats from rural, more socially conservative areas ended up voting for the bill.

Opponents argued it would alter a centuries-old conception of marriage, and leave those people opposed for religious reasons tarred as bigots.

“We’re not. We’re not,” said Rep. Kelby Woodard, a Republican from Belle Plaine. “These are people with deeply held beliefs, including myself.”

House Republican Leader Kurt Daudt acknowledged that views on gay marriage are changing, but said the bill’s sponsors stood to alienate thousands of Minnesotans who still believe in the male-female definition of marriage.

“Hearts and minds are changing on this,” Daudt said. “But Minnesotans are still divided.”

That could be seen outside the House chamber, where supporters and opponents of the bill stood shoulder to shoulder and chanted with equal vigor. Gay marriage backers dressed in orange T-Shirts and held signs that read, “I Support The Freedom to Marry.” Behind them, opponents held up bright pink signs that simply read, “Vote No.”

Among the demonstrators was Grace McBride, 27, a nurse from St. Paul. She said she and her partner felt compelled to be there to watch history unfold. She said she hopes to get married “as soon as I can” if the bill becomes law. The legislation would allow her to do so starting Aug. 1.

“I have thought about my wedding since I was a little girl,” she said.

On the other side of the divide, Galina Komar, a recent Ukrainian immigrant who lives in Bloomington, brought her four-year-old daughter and one-year-old son to the Capitol to express her religious concerns.

“I do believe in God, and I believe God already created the perfect way to have a family,” Komar said.

Eleven other states allow gay marriages — including Rhode Island and Delaware, which approved laws in the past week.

Iowa allows gay marriages because of a 2009 court ruling. Leaders in Illinois — the only Midwestern state other than Minnesota with a Democratic-led statehouse — say that state is close to having the votes to approve a law too.

But most other states surrounding Minnesota have constitutional bans against same-sex weddings, so the change might not spread to the nation’s heartland nearly as quickly as it has on the coasts and in New England.

The Minnesota push for gay marriage grew from last fall’s successful campaign to defeat the constitutional amendment that would have banned it. Minnesota was the first state to turn back such an amendment, after more than two dozen states passed one over more than a decade.

The same election put Democrats in full control of state government for the first time in more than two decades, a perfect scenario for gay marriage supporters to swiftly pursue legalization. The bill cleared committees in both chambers in March, at the same time a succession of national polls showed opposition to gay marriage falling away nationally.

“There are kids being raised by grandparents, single parents, two moms or two dads,” said Rep. Laurie Halverson, a Democrat from a suburb south of St. Paul. “Some of those folks are my friends. And we talk about the same things as parents. We talk about large piles of laundry, and how much it hurts to step on a Lego. That’s what we do, because we’re all families.”

Associated Press

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Minn. House approves gay marriage; would be 12th

Syria blames Internet outage on technical problem

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FILE – In this Tuesday, May 7, 2013 file photo, Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi, left, speaks at a joint news conference as his Jordanian counterpart, Naser Judeh, listens in Amman, Jordan. Salehi wrote in an opinion piece in the Lebanese daily Al-Akhbar Wednesday, May 8, that it is up to the Syrian people to choose their political system and president, suggesting Tehran is not wedded to Assad’s continued rule. (AP Photo/Raad Adayleh, File)

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BEIRUT (AP) — A problem with a fiber optics cable was responsible for an Internet outage that cut off civil war-ravaged Syria from the rest of the world for nearly 20 hours, state media said Wednesday.

Internet service stopped abruptly Tuesday evening, prompting speculation that the regime had pulled the plug, possibly as a cover for military action. However, no large-scale military offensives were reported Wednesday and the opposition did not accuse the regime of sabotage.

In the past, the regime halted Internet service in selected areas during government offensives to disrupt communication among rebel fighters. The last nationwide outage, for two days in November, coincided with a major military operation near the capital, Damascus, and its international airport.

A U.S.-based Web watcher said the problem would have to occur somewhere inside Syria for the entire country to be affected, although it was impossible to tell from a distance exactly what happened.

Jim Cowie of Renesys, a company that monitors online traffic, said Syria is serviced by three underwater cables, but a problem in one of those would not be sufficient to cut off Internet nationwide.

Preventing Internet access has become a tool of last resort for governments trying to suppress unrest, particularly during the Arab Spring protests that eventually toppled leaders in four countries.

Tunisia, the birthplace of the Arab Spring, experienced frequent Internet disruptions during its period of mass protests, while service in Egypt was shut down for almost a week ahead of the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak in February 2011.

The Internet has also been an important tool in the bloody battle to topple Assad, now in its third year. With the Syrian government restricting foreign media access to the country, anti-regime activists talking on Skype and amateur videos posted online became important sources of information.

In rebel-controlled areas in the north and east of Syria, the regime cut off Internet service early in the uprising, forcing activists to use more expensive satellite phones.

Ahmad al-Khatib, an activist in the Jabal al-Zawiya region in the northwestern province of Idlib, said Internet has been down in his area for more than a year.

“It was normal news for us yesterday. It did not affect us,” he said via Skype. “Those who were affected are activists who use 3G and they are mostly activist in regime-controlled areas.”

He said that although 3G can be monitored by authorities, activists in Damascus still rely on it since those owning a satellite phone risk being flagged as potential rebel sympathizers.

Also Wednesday, the leader of the radical rebel group Jabhat al-Nusra was wounded by regime shelling in southern Damascus, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Several other fighters were injured in the incident, the Observatory said. The leader was identified by his nom de guerre, Abu Mohammed al-Golani.

Al-Nusra, which has pledged allegiance to the al-Qaida terror network, is one of the dominant forces in the civil war, and its fighters are often found on the front lines.

On the diplomatic front, the international envoy to Syria, Lakhdar Brahimi, welcomed a new U.S-Russian initiative to end the 26-month-old Syria conflict through negotiations.

A decision to convene an international conference later this month to build on a transition plan for Syria is “the first hopeful news” concerning Syria “in a very long time,” Brahimi said Wednesday.

The goal of the plan, set out in Geneva last year, is to bring the Assad regime and opposition representatives together for talks on an interim government. Each side would be allowed to veto candidates it finds unacceptable.

The proposal also calls for an open-ended cease-fire and the formation of a transitional government to run the country until new elections can be held.

Brahimi has repeatedly expressed frustration over the failure to find a political solution in Syria, and has lamented the divisions on the U.N. Security Council that have prevented any international action.

The main opposition group, the Syrian National Coalition, said Wednesday it welcomes efforts to reach a political solution, but said any transition must begin with the departure of Assad and officials in his regime. Syrian officials have said that Assad will stay in his post until his seven-year term ends next year and he will run again.

Meanwhile, U.S. officials said the Obama administration is providing $100 million in new Syria aid, but the money is for humanitarian purposes only and not linked to any decision on arming Syrian rebels.

The announcement will be made by Secretary of State John Kerry on Thursday in Rome, where his diplomacy includes a meeting with Jordan’s foreign minister, the officials said.

The new funds will help support 1.4 million Syrian refugees, including many in U.S. ally Jordan, and hundreds of thousands of other civilians still trapped by the violence inside Syria’s border. Total U.S. humanitarian assistance in the two-year war will climb to $510 million.

The U.S. officials weren’t authorized to speak publicly on the matter ahead of Kerry’s announcement and demanded anonymity.

The Obama administration has said it is considering providing weapons to vetted units in the armed opposition, among other military options, following last week’s revelation that U.S. intelligence suggests the Assad regime has used chemical weapons. The U.S. also is looking for ways to halt the violence that has killed more than 70,000 people.

But the U.S. maintains deep reservations about providing direct military assistance, given the growing presence of al-Qaida-linked and other extremists in the rebel ranks.

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Associated Press writer Bradley S. Klapper in Rome contributed reporting.

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Syria blames Internet outage on technical problem

Lawmakers trade political charges on Benghazi

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FILE – In this Thursday, Sept. 13, 2012 file photo, a Libyan man investigates the inside of the U.S. Consulate after an attack that killed four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens, on the night of Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2012, in Benghazi, Libya. Four members of Army special forces ready to head to Benghazi, Libya, after the deadly assault on the American diplomatic mission had ended were told not to go, according to a former top diplomat. Gregory Hicks also argued in an interview with Republicans on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee that if the U.S. military had flown aircraft over the Benghazi facility after it came under siege it might have prevented the second attack on the CIA annex that killed two CIA security officers. (AP Photo/Mohammad Hannon, File)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — House Republicans on Wednesday renewed charges that the Obama administration is covering up information about last year’s deadly assault in Benghazi, Libya, drawing an angry rebuke from Democrats who accused the GOP of politicizing the issue at a jam-packed hearing.

Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said the purpose of the hearing with three State Department witnesses was to get answers.

“These witnesses deserved to be heard,” Issa said.

Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland, the panel’s top Democrat, said he wasn’t questioning the motives of the witnesses. “I am questioning the motives of those who want to use them for political purposes,” he said.

Three State Department witnesses, including the former deputy chief in Libya, were testifying Wednesday before the panel. The hearing is the latest in a long-running and bitter dispute between the administration and congressional Republicans who have challenged the White House’s actions before and after the Benghazi attack.

The witnesses were Mark Thompson, acting deputy assistant secretary for counterterrorism; Gregory Hicks, the former deputy of mission in Libya; and Eric Nordstrom, a former regional security officer in Libya who testified before the panel in October.

On Sept. 11, 2012, two separate attacks hours apart on the U.S. facility in Benghazi killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans. An independent panel led by former top diplomat Thomas Pickering and retired Gen. Mike Mullen concluded that management and leadership failures at the State Department led to “grossly” inadequate security at the mission. The panel’s report singled out the State Department’s Bureau of Diplomatic Security and the Bureau of Near East Affairs.

The report failed to placate GOP lawmakers, conservatives and outside groups, some of whom contend that Benghazi is comparable to the Watergate and Iran-Contra scandals and deserves a more thorough examination. Two of the outside groups — Special Operations Speaks and Special Ops OPSEC — have been raising money on the issue.

The target of much of the conservative wrath is former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, a potential presidential candidate in 2016, who stepped down after four grueling years with very high approval ratings. In her last appearance on Capitol Hill in January, a defiant Clinton took responsibility for the department’s missteps leading up to the assault, while rejecting suggestions the administration had tried to mislead the country about the attack.

She insisted that requests for more security at the diplomatic mission in Benghazi didn’t reach her desk.

“I did not see these requests,” she said. “They did not come to me. I did not approve them. I did not deny them.”

Yet Republicans are pressing ahead, holding hearings and issuing an interim report that criticized her.

“It looks pretty clear that there was some catastrophic decision-making that in some way contributed to the death of those four Americans,” said Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. “And that part I think is what the investigation will unfold.”

The Pentagon provided Congress with a timeline of the actions of security personnel and other senior officials around the attack last November, but Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon, R-Calif., chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said Wednesday that it was insufficient.

The Oversight committee under Issa’s tutelage is looking to its witnesses to “put forward information about Benghazi that the Obama administration has tried to suppress,” said Frederick Hill, a spokesman for the panel.

Democrats see it differently.

“It’s politics,” said Rep. Peter Welch, D-Vt., a member of the panel.

“If it’s a fair-minded question of what we could do better (on security), that would benefit us all. But if it’s intended to embarrass the president or perhaps Hillary Clinton, then it will be damaging no matter who the next secretary of state is or who the next president is,” Welch added.

Last week in Missouri, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., another possible 2016 candidate, said that Clinton’s “dereliction of duty” in handling Libya should preclude her from holding office.

Committee Democrats argue that the investigation has become politicized, pointing to their exclusion from much of the Hill-based inquiry. Two Democratic staffers participated in an April 11 interview with Hicks, but the panel’s top Democrat said their efforts to find out about Thompson have been thwarted and they’ve been unable to talk to the witness.

“We have absolutely not one syllable about this guy. He’s going to appear in the committee tomorrow, we know nothing about him,” Cummings said. “That’s unprecedented.”

Cummings and other Democrats were furious about the interim report from the committees, released last month, which said senior State Department officials, including Clinton, approved reductions in security at the facilities in Benghazi. The report cited an April 19, 2012, cable that Republicans said had Clinton’s signature.

It’s standard procedure that cables from the State Department in Washington go out under the secretary’s authority and with her signature, or name, typed at the bottom, according to a five-page document put together by the State Department at the request of its senior leadership to rebut some of the claims about Benghazi.

Conservatives who are vital to the GOP in turning out the vote in midterm elections have pressured the party to act forcefully in investigating the Benghazi assault. In the House, more than 130 rank-and-file Republicans have signed onto a resolution calling for Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, to create a special select committee to look into the attacks, seeing the latest GOP investigation as less than satisfactory.

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Follow Donna Cassata at http://twitter.com/DonnaCassataAP

Associated Press

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Lawmakers trade political charges on Benghazi