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4A – Daily News – Tuesday, December 21, 2010 WORLD BRIEFING British failure to clear snow turns travel into mess LONDON (AP) — The Christmas travel season turned angry and chaotic Monday as British officials struggled to clear snow and ice that paralyzed rail and air links and spawned cancella- tions and delays stranding thousands around the world. More than 48 hours after Britain’s last snowfall, some furious passengers with boarding passes for Monday flights were not even allowed into London’s Heathrow Airport. Inside, piles of garbage grew and some people slept on termi- nal floors. Other travelers waited in the cold for up to six hours to get inside London’s St. Pancras train station, where they had to wait still longer for Eurostar trains to main- land Europe. Chagrined British offi- cials promised an inquiry into the failure to clear the remnants of a storm that dumped five inches over parts of England Saturday morning. Other European airports rebounded from weekend snowfall and resumed close to normal flight schedules by Monday. ‘‘It can’t be beyond the wit of man surely to find the shovels, the diggers, the snowplows or whatever it takes to clear the snow out from under the planes, to get the planes moving and to have more than one runway going,’’ London Mayor Boris Johnson said as British Airways canceled its Monday short-haul sched- ule from Heathrow. Obama presses GOP to back arms control pact WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama tried to sway reluctant Republican senators on Monday to back a new arms control treaty with Russia as GOP aversion to giving a politically damaged presi- dent another victory intrud- ed on his national security agenda. The White House and senior Democrats expressed confidence that they had the votes for the accord that was signed by Obama and Russ- ian President Dmitry Medvedev in April. The two countries negotiated the New START pact to cap nuclear weapons and restart weapons inspections in the spirit of U.S. efforts to reset the relationship between the former Cold War foes. Obama, who delayed his holiday vacation, lobbied senators by phone as he pressed to complete the treaty before January when Republicans increase their numbers by five in the Sen- ate, casting the accord’s fate in doubt. Bolstering his argument for quick action, Adm. Mike Mullen, chair- man of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, sent a letter to con- gressional leaders reiterating support for the accord. ‘‘This treaty enhances our ability to do that which we in the military have been charged to do: Protect and defend the citizens of the United States. I am confi- dent in its success as I am in its safeguards. The sooner it is ratified, the better,’’ Mullen wrote. Senior Democrats pushed toward a decisive vote on Tuesday to cut off debate and set the stage for a final vote later in the week. A top Democrat announced the backing of one key Republican — longtime Mississippi Sen. Thad Cochran — but acknowl- edged that getting to the necessary two-thirds vote the Constitution requires for ratification would be far from easy. Dozen men arrested in terrorism plot LONDON (AP) — In Reflectionssays Bonnie Burlison • Grace LeBaudour Candy Harman • Kathy Reed Kathy Hiebert • Chaunda Jensen Susan Williams • Cheryl Trenholm Gift Certificates Scarves, Jewelry, Hair Care Product 527-5557 848 Johnson Street Red Bluff 1010 Jefferson St., Red Bluff White Christmas?” Zoom Whitening Special $ Expires 12/31/2010 Moore & Pascarella 527-7800 “Are you dreaming of a 29900 ($126.00 Savings) the biggest anti-terrorist sweep in Britain in nearly two years, police on Mon- day arrested a dozen men accused of plotting a large- scale terror attack on targets inside the United Kingdom. The suspects, who ranged in age from 17 to 28, had been under surveillance for weeks and were believed to have links to Pakistan and Bangladesh, security offi- cials said. The arrests come amid growing concerns in Europe over terrorism following a suicide bombing in Sweden and reported threats of a ter- ror attack on a European city modeled on the deadly shooting spree in Mumbai, India. Police swooped in before dawn Monday in coordinat- ed raids on houses in four cities — London, the Welsh city of Cardiff and the Eng- lish cities of Birmingham and Stoke-on-Trent. The officers were unarmed, sug- gesting any planned attack was not imminent. The raid, a joint opera- tion by Britain’s domestic spy agency MI5 and police, was the largest since April 2009, when 12 men were detained over an alleged al- Qaida bomb plot in the northern city of Manchester. North Korea calls South Korean drills ’reckless’ YEONPYEONG ISLAND, South Korea (AP) — North Korea backed off threats to retaliate against South Korea for mil- itary drills Monday and reportedly offered conces- sions on its nuclear program — signs it was looking to lower the temperature on the Korean peninsula after weeks of soaring tensions. But Pyongyang has feint- ed toward conciliation before and failed to follow through. The North’s gestures came after South Korea launched fighter jets, evacu- ated hundreds of residents near its tense land border with the North and sent res- idents of islands near disput- ed waters into underground bunkers in case Pyongyang followed through on its vow to attack over the drills. ‘‘It appears that deter- rence has been restored,’’ said Daniel Pinkston, Seoul- based analyst with the Inter- national Crisis Group think tank. ‘‘The North Koreans only understand force or show of force.’’ North Korea has previ- ously been accused of using a mix of aggression and conciliatory gestures to force international negotia- tions that usually net it much-needed aid. Real progress on efforts to rid the North of its nuclear weapons programs has been rare. Mexican presidential candidate returns home 7 months after kidnapping MEXICO CITY (AP) — A former Mexican presiden- tial candidate was freed Monday more than seven months after his kidnapping, telling reporters outside his Mexico City home that he is well and forgives his cap- tors. Diego Fernandez de Cevallos, a top Mexican political power broker who ran unsuccessfully for presi- dent in 1994, gave no details about his abductors in what was the highest-profile and most brazen kidnapping in Mexico’s recent history. ‘‘As far as the kidnappers are concerned, as a man of faith I have forgiven (them),’’ he said, looking fit as he stood in a gray sweat shirt and pants outside his luxurious Mexico City home. ‘‘As a citizen, I think that the authorities have some work to do.’’ In a statement, President Coupon Happy Holidays our gift to you Watch Battery Free Must have coupon Exp 12-24-10 Gold Exchange 530 528-8000 423 Walnut St. Red Bluff Felipe Calderon said he talked by telephone with Fernandez de Cevallos, 69, a leading member of Calderon’s conservative National Action Party, expressing his joy at the release of his friend and promising to use the full force of the law to bring the kidnappers to justice. The national party, known as PAN, issued a statement calling the seven- month kidnapping ‘‘a period of anguish and worry,’’ and urging the government to investigate and punish those responsible ‘‘with the ulti- mate consequences.’’ Pope: Church must reflect on what’s wrong with Christianity that allowed sex abuse VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Benedict XVI told Vatican officials Monday that they must reflect on Herb Shop • VITAMINS • MINERALS • HERBS Suite #E, Red Bluff, CA 96080 (530) 528-2930 many more sale items 333 So. Main St. Balance Essentials 50% off the church’s culpability in its child sex-abuse scandal, but he also blamed a secu- lar society in which he said the mistreatment of chil- dren was frighteningly common. In his traditional, end- of-the-year speech to Vati- can cardinals and bishops, Benedict said revelations of abuse in 2010 reached ‘‘an unimaginable dimen- sion’’ that required the church to accept the ‘‘humiliation’’ as a call for renewal. ‘‘We must ask ourselves what was wrong in our proclamation, in our whole way of living the Christian life, to allow such a thing to happen,’’ the pope said. Benedict also said, however, that the scandal must be seen in a broader social context, in which child pornography is seem- ingly considered normal by society and drug use and sexual tourism are on the rise. ‘‘The psychological destruction of children, in which human persons are reduced to articles of mer- chandise, is a terrifying sign of the times,’’ Bene- dict said. 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