GOP defends Trump as Bolton book adds pressure for witnesses

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senators faced mounting pressure Monday to summon John Bolton to testify at President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial even as Trump’s lawyers mostly brushed past extraordinary new allegations from the former national security adviser and focused instead on corruption in Ukraine and historical arguments for acquittal.

Outside the Senate chamber, Republicans grappled with claims in a forthcoming book from Bolton that Trump had wanted to withhold military aid from Ukraine until it committed to helping with investigations into Democratic rival Joe Biden. That assertion could undercut a key defence argument — that Trump never tied the suspension of security aid to political investigations.

The revelation clouded White House hopes for a swift end to the impeachment trial, fueling Democratic demands for witnesses and possibly pushing more Republican lawmakers to agree. It also distracted from hours of arguments from Trump’s lawyers, who declared anew that no witness has testified to direct knowledge that Trump’s delivery of aid was contingent on investigations into Democrats. Bolton appeared poised to say exactly that if called on by the Senate to appear.

“We deal with transcript evidence, we deal with publicly available information,” attorney Jay Sekulow said. “We do not deal with speculation.”

Trump is charged with abusing his presidential power by asking Ukraine’s leader to help investigate Biden at the same Trump was ordering that millions of dollars in aid be withheld. A second charge accuses Trump of obstructing Congress in its probe.

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Kobe helicopter tried to climb to avoid clouds before crash

CALABASAS, Calif. (AP) — The pilot of the helicopter that crashed near Los Angeles, killing former NBA superstar Kobe Bryant and eight others, told air traffic controllers in his last radio message that he was climbing to avoid a cloud layer before plunging more than 1,000 feet (305 metres) into a hillside, an accident investigator said.

Radar indicated the helicopter reached a height of 2,300 feet (701 metres) Sunday morning before descending, and the wreckage was found at 1,085 feet (331 metres), Jennifer Homendy of the National Transportation Safety Board said during a news conference Monday afternoon.

NTSB investigators went to the crash site in Calabasas on Monday to collect evidence.

“The debris field is pretty extensive,” Homendy said.

“A piece of the tail is down the hill,” she said. “The fuselage is on the other side of that hill. And then the main rotor is about 100 yards (91 metres) beyond that.”

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Los Angeles unites in grief for adopted son Kobe Bryant

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The chants rose in the plaza across from Staples Center. “Kobe!” and “MVP! MVP!” They came from hundreds of fans gathered to mourn the death of Kobe Bryant.

Candles burned alongside hand-lettered messages scrawled on signs and the pavement. Bunches of flowers piled up, some with purple-and-gold balloons attached.

Men, women and children of every ethnicity milled around, drawn to the heart of downtown Los Angeles where they had once celebrated five NBA championships won by Bryant and the Lakers.

This time, they were united in shock and sadness hours after Bryant, his daughter Gianna and seven others were killed in a helicopter crash northwest of the city on Sunday.

Like many Angelenos, Bryant was a transplant. Born in Philadelphia, he spent some of his earliest years in Italy, where he learned the language while his father played pro basketball. He later returned to the Philadelphia area and starred at suburban Lower Merion High, becoming the top prep player in the country.

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Trial highlights: Bolton takes centre stage from afar

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former national security adviser John Bolton took centre stage at President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial even though he was nowhere near the Capitol.

Bolton’s claims in a forthcoming book — that Trump told him he wanted to withhold security aid from Ukraine until it launched investigations into political rival Joe Biden — ramped up pressure on GOP senators to call him to testify.

Trump’s legal team has repeatedly insisted there was no linkage, and Trump tweeted on Monday that he never told Bolton such a thing.

Biden’s son Hunter also came under scrutiny as Trump’s lawyers focused on his high-paying job with a Ukrainian energy company when his father was vice-president.

Highlights of Monday’s session and what’s ahead as senators conduct just the third impeachment trial of a president.

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China reports 25 more virus deaths as US prepares evacuation

BEIJING (AP) — China on Tuesday reported 25 more deaths from a new viral disease, raising the total to at least 106, as the U.S. government prepared to fly Americans out of the city at the centre of the outbreak.

Health authorities in Hubei province, where the coronavirus first was detected in in December, reported 24 deaths and those in Beijing reported the Chinese capital’s first fatality. No national toll was announced, but 81 other deaths had been reported through Monday.

The U.S. Consulate in Wuhan, where authorities cut off most access Jan. 22 in an effort to contain the disease, was preparing to fly its diplomats and some other Americans out of the city. Japan, France and Mongolia and other governments also were preparing evacuations.

China had expanded its already sweeping disease-control efforts by extending the end of this week’s Lunar New Year holiday, the country’s busiest travel season, by three days to Sunday to keep the public at home and reduce the risk infection will spread.

Mongolia closed its vast border with China. Hong Kong and Malaysia announced they were barring entry to visitors from Hubei province. Chinese travel agencies were ordered to cancel group tours nationwide.

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‘I’m being raped’: Weinstein accuser details alleged assault

NEW YORK (AP) — Harvey Weinstein accuser Mimi Haleyi testified Monday that weeks after arriving in New York to work for one of his shows, she found herself fighting in vain as the once-revered showbiz honcho pushed her onto a bed and sexually assaulted her, undeterred by her kicks and pleas of, “no, please don’t do this, I don’t want it.”

Haleyi was the first to testify of the two women whose allegations led to Weinstein’s New York City criminal case. Sobbing at times, she described how the film producer turned a friendly meeting at his Manhattan apartment in June 2006 into a terrifying ordeal that had her contemplating escape plans as he forcibly performed oral sex on her.

“I was kicking, I was pushing, I was trying to get away from his grip,” the former “Project Runway” production assistant testified. “He held me down and kept pushing me down to the bed. Every time I tried to get up he pushed me down.”

Haleyi, now 42, told jurors she thought, “I’m being raped,” and wondered “If I scream rape, will someone hear me?” She said she told Weinstein she was menstruating in an attempt to deter him, but that didn’t stop him.

“I checked out and decided to endure it,” she said. “That was the safest thing I could do.”

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Auschwitz survivors warn of rising anti-Semitism 75 years on

OSWIECIM, Poland (AP) — Survivors of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp prayed and wept as they marked the 75th anniversary of its liberation, returning Monday to the place where they lost entire families and warning about the ominous growth of anti-Semitism and hatred in the world.

“We have with us the last living survivors, the last among those who saw the Holocaust with their own eyes,” Polish President Andrzej Duda told those at the commemoration, which included the German president as well as Jewish, Christian and Muslim leaders.

“The magnitude of the crime perpetrated in this place is terrifying, but we must not look away from it and we must never forget it,” Duda said.

About 200 camp survivors attended, many of them elderly Jews and non-Jews who travelled from Israel, the United States, Australia, Peru, Russia, Slovenia and elsewhere. Many lost parents and grandparents in Auschwitz or other Nazi death camps during World War II, but were joined by children, grandchildren and even great-grandchildren.

They gathered under an enormous, heated tent straddling the train tracks that had transported people to Birkenau, the part of the vast complex where most of the murdered Jews were killed in gas chambers and then cremated. Auschwitz was liberated by the Soviet army on Jan. 27, 1945.

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Fighting sharply rises in Yemen, endangering peace efforts

SANAA, Yemen (AP) — A drastic escalation in fighting between the Saudi-led military coalition and Houthi rebels in Yemen has killed and wounded hundreds of people over the past week, officials and tribal leaders said Monday.

The U.S.-backed Arab coalition battling to restore Yemen’s internationally recognized government stepped up airstrikes on rebel targets northeast of the capital, Sanaa, following a monthslong lull, while Houthis shelled government-held areas.

The sudden spike in violence across long-stalemated front lines threatened to exacerbate the five-year conflict and complicate indirect peace talks between Saudi Arabia and the Iran-backed rebels.

The U.N. Security Council called emergency consultations for Tuesday morning at Britain’s request on the latest developments. Britain’s U.N. ambassador, Karen Pierce, said the council would receive a closed-door video briefing from the U.N. envoy for Yemen, Martin Griffiths.

The warring factions have concentrated their forces in three main areas: Nehm, a half-hour drive from the capital; Jawf, a mountainous northern district; and Marib, a western province that saw one of the deadliest rebel attacks earlier this month. Fighting this week was the most intense those provinces had seen in three years, according to observers.

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California tests find illegal vapes tainted with additives

LOS ANGELES (AP) — California officials announced Monday that marijuana vape cartridges seized in illegal shops in Los Angeles contained potentially dangerous additives, including a thickening agent blamed for a national outbreak of deadly lung illnesses tied to vaping.

Officials also found that the illegal vapes confiscated in the December raids typically were not as potent as advertised, and sometimes contained just a fraction of the THC claimed on the labels, according to state testing results. THC is the chemical in marijuana that makes users feel high.

The findings highlight the risk for consumers at underground shops and delivery services that are common in Los Angeles and elsewhere around California, officials said.

“The prevalence of dirty and dangerous vape pens at unlicensed cannabis stores demonstrate how important it is for consumers to purchase cannabis goods from licensed retailers, which are required to sell products that meet state testing and labeling standards,” said Lori Ajax, who heads California’s Bureau of Cannabis Control.

The state conducted tests on the marijuana oil contained in a random sample of more than 10,000 illegal vape pens seized in the Los Angeles raids.

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DiCaprio, Zellweger and more Oscar hopefuls attend luncheon

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Renée Zellweger, Al Pacino and dozens of other Academy Award nominees bowed their heads in a moment of silence Monday for Kobe Bryant to open the annual Oscars luncheon, a sombre moment in an otherwise sunny annual affair that serves as a meet-and-greet, celebration and training session for each year’s class of nominees.

Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences President David Rubin asked the audience to honour the NBA star and 2018 Oscar winner, and his daughter, who were among nine people killed in a helicopter crash on Sunday.

“With all the success he had on the court, he was the most excited person in the room that day,” Rubin said of Bryant at the 2018 luncheon. Bryant went on to win an Oscar for best animated short for “Dear Basketball.”

The group of both longtime Oscar luminaries and first-time hopefuls broke into applause to end the silence.

Leonardo DiCaprio, Laura Dern, Robert De Niro and Quentin Tarantino were all set upon by groups of photographers as they walked into the luncheon being held just a few steps from the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles, home to the 92nd Academy Awards on Feb. 9.