IN BRIEF
Tour boat overturns on
upstate New York lake
LAKE GEORGE, N.Y. — A boat
carrying tourists on a senior citi
zens’ cruise overturned Sunday on
a lake in upstate New York, killing
at least 21 people and sending more
than two dozen others to a hospital.
Authorities were investigating
whether a large passing tour boat
created a wake that caused the acci
dent, Warren County Sheriff Larry
Cleveland said.
The 40-foot, glass-enclosed Ethan
Allen capsized around 3 p.m.
on Lake George about 50 miles
north of Albany in the Adirondack
Mountains.
The accident apparently hap
pened so fast that none of the pas
sengers was able to put on a life
jacket, Cleveland said.
Patrol boats that reached the
scene within minutes found other
boaters already pulling people from
the water. All passengers had been
accounted for within two hours.
Twenty-seven people were taken
to a hospital in nearby Glens Falls.
All of the injured were cold and wet,
some with broken ribs and some
complaining of shortness of breath.
Five people were to be admitted,
hospital spokesman Jason
White said.
Talabani tells prime
minister to step down
KIRKUK, Iraq — Iraq’s Kurdish
president called on the country’s
Shiite prime minister to step down,
the spokesman for the president’s
party said Sunday, escalating a po
litical split between the two factions
that make up the government.
President Jalal Talabani has ac
cused the Shiite-led United Iraqi Al
liance, which holds the majority in
parliament, of monopolizing power
in the government and refusing to
move ahead on a key issue for
Kurds, the resettlement of Kurds in
the northern city of Kirkuk.
“The time has come for the Unit
ed Iraqi Alliance and the Kurdistan
coalition to study Prime Minister
Ibrahim al-Jaafari’s stepping aside
from his post,” said Azad
Jundiyani, a spokesman for
Talabani’s Patriotic Union of Kurdis
tan. “This is for the benefit of the
political process.”
Jundiyani would not say whether
the Kurds would withdraw from the
government if the Shiite alliance
does not back them in removing
al-Jaafari. Talabani has made indi
rect threats to withdraw from the
coalition if Kurdish demands are
not met.
Bush considers 'lots of
options' for high court
WASHINGTON — President Bush
is watching his first Supreme Court
nominee, Chief Justice John
Roberts, take the helm of the high
court Monday while weighing his
options for nominating a second
justice who also could shape the
bench for years to come.
“He’s still working,” White
House Chief of Staff Andy Card said
Sunday about the president’s effort
to choose a replacement for retiring
Justice Sandra Day O’Connor. “Still
considering lots of options. ”
The White House will not dis
close who is on Bush’s short list, or
hint at when an announcement will
be made.
Legal experts who are in touch
with administration officials say the
president is most likely to choose a
woman to replace O’Connor, even
though many of the often-men
tioned candidates are white men.
Cathedral holds first Sun
day service since Katrina
NEW ORLEANS — Churchgoers
gathered to pray at the historic St.
Louis Cathedral, convening in the
building described as the “soul of
the city” for its first Sunday Mass
since Hurricane Katrina hit New Or
leans more than a month ago.
Emergency workers and soldiers
— many of them out-of-towners
who descended on Louisiana in the
aftermath of the hurricane — mixed
with newly returning residents
as they prayed for the resolve to
carry on.
One man, standing in the back
of the church, said to himself as if
in prayer: “Welcome back,
New Orleans. ”
Louisiana Archbishop Alfred C.
Hughes spoke of the more than 900
people who perished and offered
hope for those who remain to face
rebuilding a region that still has
some floodwaters, scattered power
outages and wind damage.
“This is indeed an historic mo
ment in the life — not only in the
church of New Orleans but in the
whole city,” Hughes said. “The
structure which harbors the soul of
our city has come back to life. ...
Thanks be to God.”
Sharon and Abbas agree
to meet as violence eases
JERUSALEM — Israel Prime Min
ister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian
Leader Mahmoud Abbas agreed
Sunday to hold their first summit
since Israel’s pullout from Gaza as
part of their efforts to restart the
stalled Middle East peace process,
officials from both sides said.
The announcement came as a
new flare-up in fighting — blamed
for the cancellation of a previously
scheduled summit — eased in
recent days.
Israeli officials said Sunday they
were suspending the wide-ranging
offensive against Palestinian mili
tants following a lull in rocket at
tacks against Israeli towns, but said
they would restart the operation if
the rocket fire resumed. The offi
cials said the operation succeeded
in weakening militants’ ability to at
tack Israel from Gaza.
As the offensive wound down,
Hamas militants waged gunbattles
with Palestinian police across Gaza
City on Sunday night that killed two
people — one bystander and one
police officer — and wounded at
least 50 others, including 10 police
officers, according to the Palestinian
Interior Ministry.
Pope opens meeting with
the world's bishops
VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict
XVI inaugurated his first major Vati
can event since being elected in
April, welcoming more than 250 of
the world’s bishops to Rome on
Sunday for a meeting about some of
the pressing issues facing the
Catholic Church.
Flanked by cardinals, bishops,
patriarchs and other prelates from
118 countries, Benedict celebrated a
two-hour Latin-filled Mass in St. Pe
ter’s Basilica to open the three-week
synod, during which bishops will
make recommendations to the pope
on running the church.
“Let us pray that the Holy Spirit
illuminates, inspires and guides the
work of the synod and pushes us to
charity, agreement and the service
of the truth,” Benedict said in an
opening prayer.
Officially, the Oct. 2-23 meeting
was called to discuss the Eucharist,
the sacrament in which Catholics
receive Communion, believed by
the faithful to be the body and
blood of Christ.
FAA inspections of North
west raise questions
MINNEAPOLIS — Reports filed
by federal aviation inspectors dur
ing the first month of a strike by
Northwest Airlines Corp.’s mechan
ics challenge assertions by execu
tives that operations are running
smoothly, according to a newspa
per’s review of the records.
In a story for Sunday’s editions,
the Star TVibune newspaper report
ed that the inspection records —
which were reviewed by two inde
pendent aviation experts — de
scribe training deficiencies among
replacement workers, thin staffing,
maintenance blunders and mistakes
in recording aircraft repairs.
It cites one incident in which me
chanics failed to find a dead bird in
the engine of a jet about to leave
Memphis, Tenn., but a co-pilot spot
ted it before takeoff.
In another case, it said inspectors
watched replacement workers in
Philadelphia work through the night
to replace a brake. That job normal
ly takes experienced mechanics less
than three hours, the experts said.
—The Associated Press
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