N. Korea building missile launch pad capable of aiming at U.S.: report

A satellite image of the Sohae site taken in Oct. 2013 and released by the U.S.-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins on Wednesday.

North Korea is improving one of its missile launch sites and may soon be able to fire rockets large enough to hit mainland United States, according to experts.

Recent satellite images appear to show that one of the country's launch stations has been modified to accommodate an intercontinental missile 25 percent larger than one it fired into space in Dec. 2012, according to a report by Johns Hopkins University’s U.S.-Korea Institute (USKI) published Wednesday.

The report added that the launch pad, which could be ready as early as March, would allow for "a more robust rocket test program in the future involving larger space launch vehicles and road-mobile ballistic missiles able to attack targets in Northeast Asia and the United States."

Director of National Intelligence James Clapper warned the Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday LINK? that North Korea had gone through with its threat to continue its nuclear weapons program, posing “a serious threat to the United States and to the security environment in East Asia.”

The satellite images appeared to show that North Korea has also tested a rocket engine for a new road-mobile intercontinental missile called the KN-08, the report said. Rockets have been displayed at parades in the capital Pyongyang but analysts have speculated these were mock-ups.

Outwardly, however, North Korea is on something of a charm offensive, having hosted the press in New York, London and Beijing in the past week.

North Korea's ambassador to the U.K., Hyun Hak-bong, gave an interview to Sky News on Thursday in which he blamed the U.S. for its hostile policies. He said his country had "no option but to have the nuclear deterrent."

The North sent the South an open letter earlier this month in which it called for an end to hostilities. The letter warned that the tense stand-off between the two nations could lead to "an all-out…nuclear war" from which "no Korean can escape."

It comes ahead of the annual joint military exercises between the U.S. and South Korea. Last year more than 10,000 American personnel participated. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un responded with a series of internationally-condemned missile tests and suggested he was about to launch a nuclear attack.

Entire Syrian neighborhoods wiped out by Assad: rights group

DigitalGlobe via HRW

A satellite image dated October 2012 shows what Human Rights Watch says is the complete demolition of the Masha' al-Arb'een neighborhood in Hama, Syria.

The Syrian regime has used explosives and bulldozers to demolish the homes of thousands of civilians, according to dramatic before-and-after pictures obtained by international advocacy group Human Rights Watch.

The demolitions in the capital Damascus and the city of Hama served no obvious military goal and violate international rules of war, the organization said in a report entitled “Razed to the Ground: Syria’s Unlawful Neighborhood Demolitions in 2012-2013.”

"Wiping entire neighborhoods off the map is not a legitimate tactic of war," said Ole Solvang, emergencies researcher at the organization. "These unlawful demolitions are the latest additions to a long list of crimes committed by the Syrian government."Screenshot obtained by the group allegedly show government soldiers and civilian contractors overseeing the demolition of a seven-story apartment building with controlled explosions in the Zahirat neighborhood of Damascus."This was collective punishment of communities suspected of supporting the rebellion,” he said.

The United Nations estimates that some 9.3 million Syrians need aid as a result of the war, which is pits the government of President Bashar Assad against the largely Sunni rebels.

On January 7, the U.N. announced it had stopped updating its death toll estimates from the civil war,saying that it can no longer verify the sources of information that led to its last count of at least 100,000 in late July.

Atlanta paralyzed by less than 3 inches of snow

Atlanta paralyzed by less than 3 inches of snow

Ill-equipped to deal with snowfall, the city is mired in gridlock with angry commuters taking 22 hours to get home after slogging through jammed highways or spending the night in their cars.

ATLANTA — Light snow was falling when Samantha Avers left Duluth, a northeast Atlanta suburb, on Tuesday afternoon. She figured she would be home quickly, for it was only a 30- to 45-minute drive.

Twenty-two hours later, Avers, an account manager who had just moved to balmy Atlanta from northern Virginia, wearily parked in her Smyrna neighborhood Wednesday morning. She had been stranded in hellish snowstorm traffic, napped in her car in the middle of a freeway, eaten fruit from her Superman lunch box, watched "Private Practice" on her iPadand drank a gas station beer from a coffee cup.

Hers was just one of the horror stories from the great Atlanta snow-out of 2014.

Forecasters had warned of a freak Southern snowstorm, but schools and offices remained open Tuesday. Mass chaos and gridlock ensued when offices closed early and an exodus of midday commuters headed home.

Less than 3 inches of snow brought the city to a freezing halt. Children camped out in schools or on buses. Hundreds of motorists were marooned for hours on highways and onramps; some abandoned their cars and walked home through the snow. Workers spent the night in their offices.

One woman delivered a baby inside a car stuck on a frozen highway, aided by her husband and a police officer. She named the girl Grace.

Georgia National Guard troops delivered military meals and water to stranded motorists. Other troops and police rescued children from schools and delivered them to firehouses and other sanctuaries. Georgia Gov.Nathan Deal said all students made it home safely by Wednesday.

But another hard freeze was predicted overnight.

On social media, parents and commuters scolded school and city officials, as well as Georgia's governor and Atlanta's mayor, for not shutting things down ahead of the storm.

"I want heads [to roll] tomorrow," one parent posted on the Facebook page of the DeKalb County School District in Georgia. He complained that his wife still had not returned home by midnight after fighting her way through snow and traffic to try to retrieve the couple's child from school.

"Horrible horrible horrible horrible job," another parent wrote.

Atlanta city officials had assured the public that they had learned the harsh lessons of a 2011 ice storm that paralyzed the city. "Atlanta, we are ready for the snow," Mayor Kasim Reed posted on his Twitter account Tuesday.

But by Wednesday morning, Reed's tweets sought to reassure angry residents that the city was working hard to plow roads and get everyone home: "We know you want to get home, and we are going to work all day until you can return safely."

The National Weather Service reported that 2.6 inches of snow fell at Atlanta's international airport — a ho-hum January day for the Northeast or Midwest, but a disaster in a region that is unaccustomed to snow. Like many Southern cities, Atlanta lacks the equipment, expertise and experience to quickly clear snow-clogged streets and highways.

Deal did not declare a state of emergency until Tuesday afternoon, when traffic snarls had already developed. Governors in North and South Carolina, Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama also declared states of emergency, though snowfalls were generally lower than predicted there and in many parts of the South.

In Georgia, Deal and Reed stood side by side Wednesday to take shared responsibility, but also to defend their response.

"We made a mistake by not staggering when people should leave," Reed said at a morning news conference.

"I'm willing to take whatever blame comes my way," agreed Deal, who is up for reelection this fall. "Obviously there were errors."

But the governor argued that if the state had advised businesses and government to shut down earlier — or not opened at all, as now seems prudent — critics would have complained if the storm had fallen short.

Amanda Knox awaits another verdict from Italian court

Amanda Knox watches retrial from home

More than two years after they were acquitted of murdering a British exchange student, Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito await another Italian court verdict Thursday as judges decide whether to uphold or overturn their conviction.

But the American student will not be in court to hear the decision. Instead, she will be thousands of miles away.

Knox has been back home in Seattle since an appeal court acquitted her and ex-boyfriend Sollecito in 2011 of the murder ofMeredith Kercher in November 2007.

Kercher, 21, was found partially naked in a pool of blood in the house she shared with Knox in the picturesque town of Perugia, where both women were exchange students.

Knox says she is afraid to return to Italy, where she spent four years behind bars.

"I will become ... a fugitive," she told Italian daily La Repubblica this month, when asked what she would do if she was found guilty.

Italy's Supreme Court in March overturned the pair's acquittals, saying that the jury did not consider all the evidence and that discrepancies in testimony needed to be answered.

The case was sent to a retrial in Florence.

After hearing the defense team's final rebuttals, the jury retired to deliberate and a verdict was not expected until after 5 p.m. local time (11 a.m. ET).

Dressed in a purple sweater with sunglasses nestled on his collar, Sollecito made it to the tribunal for the session that was beamed around the world.

Amanda Knox retrial verdict: Six things to know

Ruling unclear

The retrial began last September, refocusing international attention on the case that grabbed headlines in Italy, Britain and the United States -- but neither Knox or Sollecito were present in court.

It has renewed questions about the effectiveness of Italy's justice system given widespread doubts over the handling of the investigation and key pieces of evidence.

Prosecutor Alessandro Crini has said both Knox and Sollecito should be convicted and handed a 26-year sentence for homicide, with an additional four years for Knox for slander.

Both have maintained their innocence.

With little change in the case details over the years, it is not clear how presiding judge Alessandro Nencini will rule.

Regardless of the decision, both sides will have the opportunity to appeal that verdict to Italy's Supreme Court. That process could take months.

If Knox is ultimately found guilty, Italy could request her extradition from the United States.

Timeline: Kercher murder case

'Fugitive'

Knox, 26, and Sollecito, 29, were convicted in 2009 of killing Kercher, who was found with more than 40 stab wounds and a deep gash in her throat.

Prosecutors say she was held down and stabbed after she rejected attempts by Knox, Sollecito and another man, Ivory Coast-born Rudy Guede, to involve her in a sex game. Guede is the only person still in jail for the murder and many aspects still remain unexplained.

Speaking on Thursday, Knox' defense team asked for an acquittal.

Lawyer Carlo Della Vedova said the team was "serene" about the verdict because they believe the only conclusion from the case files is an acquittal.

Knox has always denied murdering Kercher and has maintained she is not guilty in a written statement to the Florence court.

"I must repeat to you. I'm innocent. I did not rape, I did not steal ... I did not kill Meredith," Knox said a lengthy e-mail presented by her lawyer to the court in December.

Sollecito was in the Dominican Republic at the start of the retrial but returned to Italy.

In November, he took to the stand to make a spontaneous declaration, saying the charges against him were "absurd."

"For me, it's a nightmare that goes beyond imagination," he said of what he's been through.

'No one remembers Meredith'

A lawyer for the Kercher family, Francesco Maresca, said the victim's brother and sister, Lyle and Stephanie, would attend court to hear the decision.

The case has dragged on for more than six years, frustrating attempts by Kercher's family to discover the truth about her death. The three trials have done little to clear up mysteries surrounding the details of the murder.

"They are tired of this long trial and they want justice," Maresca said.

The Kercher family welcomed the retrial ruling, Maresca said in March, adding they believed the ruling that acquitted Knox and Sollecito was "superficial and unbalanced."

They believe more than one person was in the room when Kercher was killed, he said.

"No one remembers Meredith, while the two defendants write books, speak to the media and earn money," Maresca told the court in closing remarks last month.

Ferguson advocates for Knox

One person who has been advocating for Knox is Ryan Ferguson -- the Missouri man who walked free last November after being imprisoned for nearly a decade. He was wrongly convicted of murdering a newspaper editor, and a state appeals court overturned his conviction.

"We kind of had this connection in the sense that we've been through this justice system ... It's relatively the same. We've been through this, and there's not a whole lot of people" who've had the same experience, he told CNN's "New Day."

"So it's cool and we can kind of just talk to each other. She wanted to reach out and say if you need to talk to anybody, if you need any help, I'm here for you. If not, I completely understand. So that's how we began communicating."

Asked about Knox' current state of mind, he said she's staying positive.

"She seems to be doing very well. I'm impressed with her. It's so daunting at this time," he said. "Within 48 hours she should know her fate. You can't start living life until they actually clear you and until you're free essentially. So I'm amazed how she's doing. She's working hard on school and continuing life the best she can. She believes the courts are going to do the right thing based on the facts. I agree."

6 gunmen killed as police retake Iraq ministry, security sources say

Iraqi police have won back full control of a ministry building stormed by gunmen who took civil servants hostage, security sources said Thursday.

Six gunmen were killed in the police operation to retake part of the Human Rights Ministry, which is next to the Ministry of Transport in northeast Baghdad. Police killed four militants, while two of the militants detonated suicide vests, the security sources said.

Two police officers were killed and seven injured in the attack, the sources added. The hostages were freed unharmed.

Security and Interior Ministry sources earlier said four gunmen and three police officers had been killed.

Roads were blocked around the Iraqi capital following the attack, and areas leading to Baghdad's fortified Green Zone were closed.

The United Nations said 2013 was the deadliest year in Iraq since 2008, with almost 8,000 people killed in violence, most of them civilians.

Fears of all-out sectarian war have increased since fighting broke out at the end of last year to the west of Baghdad in Anbar province, where al Qaeda-backed militants and Iraqi security forces have been battling for control of Falluja and Ramadi.

More than 140,000 people have been made homeless since the new conflict erupted, according to Iraq's Ministry of Displacement and Migration.

The United Nations said last week it was scaling up its humanitarian response to help those displaced by the violence.

182 inmates escape from Philippine jail in typhoon-hit province, most quickly recaptured

 Philippine police say 182 inmates complaining of hunger and squalid conditions have escaped from a provincial jail in an eastern province that was devastated by a monster storm in November.

Regional police chief Henry Losanes says authorities recaptured 148 of the inmates hours after they stormed out of the Leyte provincial jail in Palo town at dawn Thursday. Police are hunting down the remaining 34, who are facing trial on charges including drug trafficking, rape and murder.

It's not immediately clear how the detainees escaped in such large numbers.

Losanes says the recaptured inmates told investigators they escaped because of limited food and poor conditions and the slow prosecution of their cases.

More than 6,200 people were killed when Typhoon Haiyan hit Leyte island on Nov. 8.

Thailand Prepares For Controversial General Election

Thailand Prepares For Controversial General Election

BANGKOK, THAILAND - JANUARY 30: An anti-government protester holds a sign as she marches down a major street in Bangkok January 30, 2014. The general elections will take place on February 2 as the anti-government protesters vow to cause chaos by blocking polling stations. Bangkok Shutdown has been in effect for over two weeks as the anti-government protesters continue to block major intersections. The Thai government imposed a 60-day state of emergency in Bangkok and the surrounding provinces in an attempt to cope with the on-going political turmoil however this decree has had no effect on the mass protests. )