Massachusetts' highest court has upheld a sentence imposed on a landlord convicted of pushing a Muslim tenant down the stairs, including a requirement that she take a class on Islam.
	The Supreme Judicial Court ruled today in the case of Daisy Obi, a Christian minister from Nigeria.
	A judge sentenced Obi to two years in jail, but said she would only have to serve six months and ordered her to attend a class on Islam.
	Obi's lawyer said requiring Obi to take the class violated her free exercise of religion.
	The high court did not rule directly on Obi's objections to the class requirement, but waived that claim because she never raised that objection at trial.
	Obi's tenant complained that Obi taunted her with anti-Muslim remarks before pushing her.

Court OKs jail time for minister who pushed Muslim tenant

PTI Automatic

The deputy manager of Ron Paul's 2012 presidential campaign was today sentenced to three months in prison, after a judge determined he played a larger role than two other aides who were spared prison time.
	Like his two colleagues, Dimitri Kesari was accused of conspiring to cause false campaign contribution reports to be filed with the Federal Election Commission.
	The three men argued they broke no laws when they paid a video production company, which passed on USD 73,000 to former state Sen. Kent Sorenson. He dropped support for Michele Bachmann and endorsed Paul six days before the 2012 Iowa caucuses.
	Yesterday, campaign chairman Jesse Benton and manager John Tate were sentenced to two years' probation and six months of home confinement for the same crimes.
	Kesari's attorney, Jesse Binnall says the judge found Kesari played more of a roll in arranging and concealing the payments to Sorenson.
	The men plan to appeal their convictions.

Third Ron Paul aide gets prison time for campaign violations

Torrential rains triggered floods and landslides on the Indonesian island of Java, killing at least 20 villagers and leaving 14 others missing, an official said today.
	The worst-hit district was West Java's Garut, where 17 people were found dead and 13 others were missing after two rivers overflowed yesterday night.
	The dead in Garut included an 8-month-old baby and eight other children, the National Disaster Management Mitigation Agency said.
	Agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said about 1,000 villagers were evacuated to army barracks and other temporary shelters.
	He said three villagers were killed in Sumedang district and one person was missing after landslides buried two houses and destroyed a mosque. About 100 villagers were evacuated.
	More than 30 villagers were injured in the two districts, Nugroho said.
	He said heavy downpours were expected to continue and increase until January, partly because of La Nina, the flip side of El Nino, which has a general cooling ...

20 dead in floods, landslides on Indonesia's Java island

South African police today set off stun grenades and threw tear gas at stone-throwing students from a leading university who were demonstrating for free education.
	The chaos in the streets around the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg followed violent protests on the campus yesterday that forced the university's closure for the rest of the week.
	Several students were injured in the latest unrest, South African media reported.
	The University of the Witwatersrand said it is identifying those who participated in yesterday's campus violence and will take action against them. Protesters threw stones at security guards outside a main campus building, smashing some windows. Some guards threw projectiles back at the students.
	Classes were also suspended today at the University of Cape Town because of security concerns. Stellenbosch University said it obtained a court order requiring 30 protesters to leave a campus building they had occupied, or face removal by the ...

South African police clash with university students

The United Arab Emirates has opened its first jetty outside the Persian Gulf that is capable of loading oil onto some of the world's biggest tanker ships.
	The launch of the new USD 650 million facility in the eastern city of Fujairah today will make it easier for hulking tanker ships known as "very large crude carriers" to load their cargo rather than have it ferried to them out at sea.
	Docking at Fujairah's Indian Ocean-facing port means the tankers will not have to sail through and back out the narrow Strait of Hormuz at the mouth of the Gulf.
	Fujairah is the terminus of a pipeline opened in 2012 that bypasses the Strait of Hormuz, which nearby Iran has in the past threatened to close.

UAE opens first jetty outside Gulf to load fuel onto tankers

More than 19,000 students on the small Canadian province of Prince Edward Island have been evacuated because of a "potential threat."
	The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said today that students at more than 60 English language and French language schools are being taken to safe locations by staff outside the schools, where buses are meeting them.
	Police provided no other details.
	Parents and guardians are being asked to wait for further instructions before picking up their children.
	Parker Grimmer, the island's director of public schools, says police contacted the school system this morning about "a threat that was of a significant nature" and asked for the evacuation of all schools.
	Three schools in the nearby province of Nova Scotia -- NSCC Marconi Campus, Cape Breton University and the NSCC technology campus in Halifax -- also have also been evacuated due to potential threats.

Police evacuate all schools on Canada's Prince Edward Island

Iraqi state TV says the finance minister has been dismissed following a no-confidence vote from parliament over alleged corruption and mismanagement.
	The dismissal today of Hoshyar Zebari, a former foreign minister and one of the country's leading Kurdish politicians, comes as Iraq is grappling with an economic crisis driven by low oil prices and the costs of battling the Islamic State group.
	The vote came after weeks of political wrangling over the allegations. Zebari is the second minister to be dismissed by parliament, which voted to fire the defense minister last month.
	Iraq is currently in negotiations with the International Monetary Fund to secure badly needed loans.

Iraqi parliament dismisses finance minister

Thai officials have ended the search for victims of a weekend boat accident after recovering 28 bodies and accounting for all the people listed as missing.
	The Marine Department announced today that the last body recovered from Sunday's accident on the Chao Phraya river was that of a 70-year-old woman.
	After her body was recovered yesterday, the damaged boat was lifted from the water for an inspection to investigate the cause of the accident.
	The boat was carrying more than 100 Thais home from an Islamic religious festival when it hit an underwater obstruction and sank quickly just a few meters (yards) from shore, about 80 kilometers (50 miles) north of Bangkok. The boat's capacity was reported to be 50 passengers.
	The department said the boat's helmsman was arrested yesterday for violating navigation laws by allowing too many passengers on board and having an expired license.

Search ends in Thai boat accident after 28 bodies recovered

An airstrike on a medical facility in northern Syria has killed at least five staff members, the medical relief organisation that runs the facility said today.
	The Paris-based International Union of Medical Care and Relief Organisations, known by its French initials UOSSM, said the attack last night levelled a medical triage point it operates in rebel-held territory outside the contested city of Aleppo.
	The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said at least 13 people were killed in the attack, including nine militants, some of them belonging to the al-Qaeda-linked Fatah al-Sham Front.
	The US office of UOSSM said two nurses and two ambulance drivers were killed and one nurse remained in a critical condition following the attack on the medical facility in Khan Touman. UOSSM said the nurse later died of her injuries.
	It said two of its ambulances, which are run by UOSSM and the World Health Organisation, were destroyed and the three-story building ...

Airstrike on Syrian medical facility kills 5 staff

Samsung Electronics says it has received three reports of Galaxy Note 7 battery fires in China.
	The company said today that Samsung and its battery supplier Amperex Technology Ltd. Had investigated two of those cases in China and found the cause of the fires was external.
	Samsung was unable to obtain the sample for the reported third Note 7 fire because the consumer refused to hand in the phone.
	Two reports of Samsung phone fires emerged on Chinese social media over the weekend, rattling nerves there because China is the only country where Samsung has continued to sell the Galaxy Note 7 despite a global recall earlier this month.
	The company has recalled 2.5 million handsets in 10 countries due to a battery manufacturing flaw.

Samsung says there are 3 reports of China phone battery fire

A court in northern Vietnam has sentenced nine people to death for heroin trafficking.
	The state-run online newspaper Zing says ringleader Trang A Tang and eight other Vietnamese nationals were convicted of trafficking 626 kilograms of heroin from Laos and Thailand into Vietnam between 2009 until the ring members were arrested in 2013.
	The People's Court in Bac Ninh province handed them death sentences today at the end of a four-day trial.
	Three others, including Tang's wife and father, were given life in prison on the same charges.
	Court officials were not immediately available for comment. Vietnam has some of the world's toughest drug laws, with the trading or trafficking of at least 100 grams of heroin punishable by death.

Vietnam sentences 9 to death for heroin trafficking

A joint task force of North Dakota and federal officials is investigating a clash between Dakota Access pipeline protesters and private security guards earlier this month, a county sheriff announced.
	The Morton County Sheriff's Department is heading up the probe of the September 3 incident on private land, after which private security guards and protesters reported injuries.
	Tribal officials say about 30 protesters were pepper-sprayed and some were bitten by dogs at the construction site near the Standing Rock Indian Reservation.
	The task force includes members of the Morton and Mercer County sheriff's departments, the state Bureau of Criminal Investigation and the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs. Morton County Sheriff Kyle Kirchmeier said the BIA is representing Native American tribes.
	Kirchmeier said the investigation will determine which firms were hired to provide security that day and whether they were licensed. The task force also is looking into whether tribal artifacts ...

Task force looking into security, pipeline protesters' clash

Chinese authorities are investigating a company that researchers say sold North Korea materials that can be used by its growing nuclear weapons program in a crackdown that reflects Beijing's growing frustration with its isolated neighbor.
	The announcement about Hongxiang Industrial Development Co. In Dandong, a northeastern border city in Liaoning province, was unusually explicit for Beijing, whose dealings with the North are shrouded in secrecy.
	Hongxiang is suspected of unspecified "serious economic crimes," according to separate announcements by police in Liaoning and China's foreign ministry. They gave no details but a South Korean think tank said last month it supplied aluminum oxide and other materials that are used in processing nuclear bomb fuel.
	Beijing has long been North Korea's main source of aid and diplomatic support but President Xi Jinping's government is showing growing frustration with Pyongyang's pursuit of nuclear weapons in defiance of foreign pressure.
	China .

China probes company accused of North Korea trade violations

It was a unique event for the United Nations laced with nostalgia, humor and tributes the secretary-general and the US president toasting each other for the last time in front of the world's leaders.
	Every year, the UN chief hosts a formal lunch for the presidents, prime ministers and potentates attending the annual ministerial meeting of the UN General Assembly.
	And every year, the US president responds as representative of the host country on behalf of the leaders. But Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said yesterday's lunch was unique.
	"Never before have a president of the United States and a secretary-general of the United Nations completed their terms at about the same time within just 20 days of each other."
	Ban then looked at Barack Obama, sitting just a few feet away at the head table, and said: "Mr President, we need to find something to do!"
	The secretary-general's second five-year term ends Dec. 31. Obama leaves the White House on January 20 after eight years.
	"I ...

UN chief and US president toast each other for last time

Iran's chief of staff of the armed forces says a USD 38 billion aid deal between the United States and Israel makes Iran more determined to strengthen its military.
	In comments broadcast live on Iranian state TV, Gen Mohammad Hossein Bagheri says the U.S.-Israel aid deal "will make us more determined in strengthening the defense power of the country."
	Last week the US signed an unprecedented new security agreement with Israel that will give the Israeli military $38 billion over 10 years.
	Iran does not recognize Israel and supports anti-Israeli militant groups such as Palestinian Hamas and Lebanon's Hezbollah.
	Bagheri's remarks were given during an annual military parade Wednesday marking the anniversary of Iraq-Iran war in 1980.

Iran 'determined' to boost military after US-Israel deal

He bought bomb ingredients on eBay and recorded a mirthful video of himself igniting a blast in a backyard. In a handwritten journal, he warned that bombs would resound in the streets and prayed he'd be martyred rather than caught, authorities say.
	Ahmad Khan Rahami's jihad journal ended with a stark message, according to court papers: "Death to your oppression."
	Federal court complaints filed yesterday gave a chilling glimpse into what authorities say motivated the Afghan-born US citizen to set off explosives last weekend in New York City and New Jersey, including a bomb that injured 31 people in Manhattan.
	The blasts came two years after the FBI looked into him but came up with nothing tying him to terrorism.
	Rahami remains hospitalized with gunshot wounds from a shootout with police that led to his capture Monday outside a bar in Linden, New Jersey.
	It wasn't immediately clear whether he had a lawyer who could comment on the charges against him, which include federal terror ...

Bomb suspect vowed 'death to your oppression,' feds say

The United States today flew a pair of supersonic bombers over ally South Korea for the second time in as many weeks in a show of force following North Korea's latest nuclear test earlier this month.
	US Forces Korea said one of the two B-1B bombers landed at Osan Air Base, 120 kilometers from the border with North Korea, but did not say when it will return to Andersen Air Force Base in Guam.
	Such flyovers are common when animosity rises on the Korean Peninsula, which is technically in a state of war because the 1950-53 Korean War ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty. The United States also flew two B-1B bombers over South Korea on September 13.
	"What we are showing today is just one tool we have to choose from a wide array of options. The alliance grows stronger every day and we remain prepared to defend and to preserve the security of the Korean Peninsula and the region," Lt. Gen. Thomas Bergeson, commander of the US 7th Air Force in South Korea, said in a statement.
	North 

US flies bombers over South Korea again in show of force

Cambodia has deported 50 Chinese and 13 Taiwanese citizens to China over an alleged internet scam, complying with demands from Beijing, a senior police official said today.
	The suspects were flown out of Cambodia yesterday, said Gen. Ouk Haiseila, chief of the Cambodian Interior Ministry's Immigration Investigation Bureau. He said the Chinese government sent a special plane from Beijing to take them back.
	In June, Taiwan protested after Cambodia deported 25 Taiwanese internet scam suspects to rival China in the latest snub of the self-ruled island. Cambodia regards Taiwan to be part of China.
	The latest group of 63 suspects was arrested late last month in a rented house in Phnom Penh, Cambodia's capital.
	They were accused of defrauding victims in China using phone calls made over the internet.
	Since 2012, at least 982 Chinese and Taiwanese accused of taking part in internet scams have been arrested and deported back to China, according to Ouk Haiseila.
	Although Taiwan's ...

Cambodia deports 63 Chinese, Taiwanese over alleged web scam

With no European competitions clogging up their schedules, Chelsea and Liverpool are placing more importance on the English League Cup than usual this season.
     They both advanced to the last 16 on Tuesday but took different routes.
     Chelsea came from two goals behind at Premier League champion Leicester, taking an end-to-end game to extra time at 2-2 thanks to goals from defenders Gary Cahill and Cesar Azpilicueta before Cesc Fabregas' double clinched a 4-2 win.
     Liverpool had it much easier, dispatching second-tier Derby in a 3-0 victory with Ragnar Klavan, Philippe Coutinho and Divock Origi scoring the goals.
     Chelsea and Liverpool both rested key players but still fielded strong lineups in a bid to stay alive in one of three competitions they'll enter this season.
     Liverpool is a record eight-time League Cup winner, while Chelsea is joint-second in the all-time list of trophy winners with five titles.
     Leicester has much bigger priorities this season. Aside .

Chelsea, Liverpool stay on course in English League Cup

One American pilot was killed and another injured when they ejected from a U-2 spy plane shortly before it crashed in Northern California on morning, the US Air Force said.
	The plane crashed shortly after taking off from Beale Air Force Base on a training mission around 9am, military officials said yesterday.
	They did not release the pilots' names or any information about the condition of the surviving airman.
	The aircraft, assigned to the 1st Reconnaissance Squadron, crashed in the Sutter Buttes, a mountain range about 60 miles (97 kilometers) north of Sacramento.
	The U-2 "Dragon Lady" is a surveillance and reconnaissance plane capable of flying above 70,000 feet (21,336 meters), an extremely high altitude that's twice as high as a typical commercial airliner flies.
	The U-2 is known as one of the most difficult aircraft to fly at low altitudes due to the characteristics that allow it to travel near space, according to an Air Force fact sheet.
	Beale Air Force Base is home to the 

1 Air Force pilot dead, 1 hurt after ejecting in California

A coalition of 21 states is suing the US Department of Labor over a new rule that would make more higher-earning workers eligible for overtime pay.
	Nevada Attorney General Adam Laxalt filed the lawsuit in Texas yesterday, urging the court to block implementation before the regulation takes effect on Dec 1.
	The measure would shrink the so-called "white collar exemption" and more than double the salary threshold under which employers must pay overtime to their workers.
	Laxalt said the rule would burden private and public sectors and represents inappropriate federal overreach. Officials from the labor department didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.
	Other plaintiffs include Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, Nebraska, New Mexico, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas, Utah and Wisconsin.
	This version has been edited to reflect that the white collar exemption is reduced, not repealed.

AP

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