OFFICIAL: DEPUTY AG ROSENSTEIN EXPECTED TO DEPART IN MARCH

WASHINGTON» A Justice Department official says Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein is expected to leave his position in the middle of next month.

The official was not authorized to discuss the move by name and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity on Monday night.

The White House is expected to name a replacement for Rosenstein this week.

Rosenstein’s departure had been expected with the confirmation of William Barr as attorney general last week.

Rosenstein has been on the job for nearly two years.

He oversaw special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation after then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself. Barr now oversees the remaining work in Mueller’s investigation into potential coordination between the Kremlin and the Trump campaign and decide how much Congress and the public know about its conclusion.

Philippines says 136 people have died in measles outbreak.

MANILA» The Philippine health secretary said Monday that 136 people — mostly children — have died of measles and 8,400 others have fallen ill in an outbreak blamed partly on vaccination fears.

A massive immunization drive that started last week in hard-hit Manila and four provincial regions may contain the outbreak by April, Health Secretary Francisco Duque III said. President Rodrigo Duterte warned in a TV message Friday of fatal complications and urged children to be immunized.

About half of the 136 who died were children aged 1 to 4 and many of those who perished were not inoculated, the officials said.

Bus hits dump truck in Bolivia; at least 24 reported dead.

LA

PAZ» A passenger bus crashed head-on with a dump truck in southern Bolivia on Monday, killing at least 24 people and injuring 12 more, police said.

The accident occurred in a dense fog on the high-plains highway connecting Potosi and Oruro, about 135 miles south of the capital.

Police said the bus was en route to Oruru from the town of Villazon on the Argentine border.

Tensions rising after Kashmir attack as gunbattle kills 9.

INDIA» Tensions escalated SRINAGAR, after a suicide attack in disputed Kashmir, with nine people killed Monday in a gunbattle that broke out as Indian soldiers searched for militants.

Government forces surrounded a village in the southern Pulwama area on a tip that militants were hiding there, security officials said. As troops began conducting searches, they came under heavy gunfire, leading to a clash that killed four soldiers, three suspected militants, a police official and a civilian.

Three army officers, a senior police officer and three other soldiers were wounded in the operation, which follows the suicide attack last Thursday on a paramilitary convoy that killed at least 40 soldiers.

U.N. hoping for immediate pullout of forces from Yemen ports.

NATIONS» The UNITED

United Nations said Monday it hopes Yemen’s warring parties will immediately carry out an agreement to pull their forces out of the key port of Hodeida and two smaller ports, as well as a U.N. facility holding enough grain to feed 3.7 million people for a month.

U.N. deputy spokesman Farhan Haq told reporters that implementation is key at Hodeida, which handles about 70 percent of Yemen’s imports, the two other ports, and the Red Sea Mills, where the U.N. humanitarian chief has implored Houthi Shiite rebels to facilitate access.

The conflict in Yemen began with the 2014 takeover of the capital, Sanaa, by the Iranianbacked Houthis, who toppled the government of Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi.