SENATORS FRUSTRATED ON KHASHOGGI
Senators who have grown increasingly uneasy with the U.S. response to Saudi Arabia after the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi are set to grill top administration officials Wednesday at a closed-door briefing that could determine how far Congress goes in punishing the longtime Middle East ally.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell says “some kind of response” is needed from the U.S. for the Saudis’ role in the gruesome death. While President Donald Trump has equivocated over who is to blame, the Senate is considering a vote as soon as this week to halt U.S. involvement in the Saudiled war in Yemen.
Roadside bomb kills three U.S. troops near Afghan city of Ghazni.
Three U.S. service members were killed Tuesday when a roadside bomb detonated next to their vehicle in the embattled province of Ghazni, U.S. military officials said.
Three other U.S. service members were wounded along with a U.S. military contractor, they added. The survivors were evacuated from the area and are receiving medical attention. The names of the dead and the injured were not immediately released.
Belgium investigates doctors who euthanized autistic woman.
LON-
DON» Belgian officials are investigating whether doctors improperly euthanized a woman with autism, the first criminal investigation in a euthanasia case since the practice was legalized in 2002 in the European nation.
Three doctors from East Flanders are being investigated on suspicion of having “poisoned” Tine Nys in 2010. The 38-yearold had been diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome, a mild form of autism, two months before she was euthanized by a doctor in an apparently legal killing that she had asked for.
22 dead in blast next to chemical plant in China.
An explosion outside a chemical plant in northeastern China has killed 22 people and destroyed scores of vehicles.
An official news release Wednesday said the explosion occurred just after midnight at a loading dock next to the plant operated by the Hebei Shenghua Chemical Industry Co. Ltd. The plant is in the city of Zhangjiakou, which is to play host to the 2022 Winter Olympic Games.
It injured 22 other people and destroyed 38 trucks and 12 passenger cars.
Candidate-backed group challenges Georgia election process.
A political organization backed by Democrat Stacey Abrams filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday challenging the way Georgia’s elections are run, making good on a promise Abrams made as she ended her bid to become the state’s governor.
State elections officials “grossly mismanaged” the 2018 election in a way that deprived some citizens, particularly low-income people and people of color, of their right to vote in violation of their constitutional rights, the lawsuit says. It was filed by Fair Fight Action against interim Secretary of State Robyn Crittenden and state election board members in their official capacities.
“The general election for governor is over, but the citizens and voters of Georgia deserve an election system that they can have confidence in,” Lauren Groh-Wargo, Abrams’ campaign manager who’s now CEO of Fair Fight Action, told reporters on the steps of the federal courthouse in Atlanta.
More than 40,000 people called to report problems they faced when they tried to register. — Denver Post wire services