WASHINGTON — U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Monday that Iran is sliding into a military dictatorship, a new assessment suggesting a rockier road ahead for U.S.-led efforts to stop Tehran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
As the first high-level Obama administration official to make such an accusation, Clinton was reflecting an ever-dimming outlook for persuading Iran to negotiate limits on its nuclear program, which it has insisted is intended only for peaceful purposes. The U.S. and others — including Qatar and Saudi Arabia, which Clinton visited Sunday and Monday — believe Iran is headed for a nuclear bomb capability.
Clinton also was revealing the logic of the administration’s plan to target the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps with a new round of international sanctions intended to compel Iran to curb its nuclear ambitions before it increases the likelihood of a military clash.
Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister on Monday said the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear ambitions demands a more immediate solution than sanctions. He didn’t identify a preferred short-term resolution.
Alabama: Professor’s gun a mystery, husband says
The husband of University of Alabama in Huntsville professor accused of fatally shooting three colleagues said Monday that the couple went to a shooting range recently, but that he didn’t know where she got the gun she used for practice. Amy Bishop is accused shooting six people at a faculty meeting Friday meeting, three fatally. Two of the survivors remained in critical condition Monday. Police have previously said Bishop had no permit for the gun they believe she used in the shooting, and investigators said they didn’t know where she got it. It’s not clear if that was the same gun that her husband, James Anderson, knew about.
Florida: Astronauts move old space station docking port
Astronauts did some rearranging at the International Space Station for the second night in a row Monday, moving an old docking adapter into a new position. A pair of spacemen used the station’s hefty robot arm to remove the 10-year-old adapter from the space station and transfer it to a port at the new room, Tranquility. There, it will provide extra parking for visiting vessels and serve as a buffer against micrometeorite hits. As that work was going on, the crews of the shuttle Endeavour and the station were connecting power and data lines in the new $27 million observation deck.
New Jersey: Small-plane crash kills 5
A small plane trying to land at Monmouth Executive Airport broke apart and tore through a snowy field next to a runway near Wall Township on Monday afternoon, killing all five people aboard, including a teenager and a child, and scattering debris over 200 feet. The cause of the Cessna 337 Skymaster’s crash was being investigated.
Colorado: Teenager beaten to death after hit by car
Police in Thonton say a 16-year-old boy died after he was hit by a car then beaten by its occupants. Police spokesman said a house party spilled into a street about 1:26 a.m. Monday, when the teenager was struck by the car. They said people in the car began beating the boy and others around him. The teenager later died from injuries to his head and upper body. Officers are trying to determine whether a dispute at the party triggered the beating.
Belgium: Head-on commuter train crash leaves 18 dead
A rush-hour commuter train sped through a red signal and slammed into an oncoming train Monday as it left a suburban Brussels station, killing at least 18 people and disrupting rail traffic in northern Europe. Investigations were likely to focus on whether human error was responsible or if it could have been influenced by the persistently freezing temperatures that have iced up the European capital. Officials said 80 people were injured, 20 of them seriously. The fate of the two drivers was not immediately known.
From Herald news services
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