SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California water regulators adopted sweeping, unprecedented restrictions on how people, governments and businesses can use water amid the state's ongoing drought, hoping to push reluctant residents to deeper conservation.

The State Water Resources Control Board approved rules Tuesday that force cities to limit watering on public property, encourage homeowners to let their lawns die and impose mandatory water-savings targets for the hundreds of local agencies and cities that supply water to California customers.

Gov. Jerry Brown sought the more stringent regulations, arguing that voluntary conservation efforts have so far not yielded the water savings needed amid a four-year drought. He ordered water agencies to cut urban water use by 25 percent from levels in 2013, the year before he declared a drought emergency.

"It is better to prepare now than face much more painful cuts should it not rain in the fall," board Chairwoman Felicia Marcus said Tuesday as the panel voted 5-0 to approve the new rules.

Although the rules are called mandatory, it's still unclear what punishment the state water board and local agencies will impose for those that don't meet the targets. Board officials said they expect dramatic water savings as soon as June and are willing to add restrictions and penalties for agencies that lag.

But the board lacks staff to oversee each of the hundreds of water agencies, which range dramatically in size and scope. Some local agencies that are tasked with achieving savings do not have the resources to issue tickets to those who waste water, and many others have chosen not to do so.

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FILE - In this July 9, 2014, file photo, a house is reflected in a puddle of water from an irrigated …

Despite the dire warnings, it's also still not clear that Californians have grasped the seriousness of the drought or the need for conservation. Data released by the board Tuesday showed that Californians conserved little water in March, and local officials were not aggressive in cracking down on waste.

A survey of local water departments showed water use fell less than 4 percent in March compared with the same month in 2013. Overall savings have been only about 9 percent since last summer.

Under the new rules, each city is ordered to cut water use by as much as 36 percent compared with 2013. Some local water departments have called the proposal unrealistic and unfair, arguing that achieving steep cuts could cause higher water bills and declining property values, and dissuade projects to develop drought-proof water technology such as desalination and sewage recycling.

Representatives of San Diego-area water agencies have been especially critical of the water targets, noting that the region has slashed consumption and agencies have spent $3.5 billion to prepare for dry periods after facing severe cuts in earlier droughts.

"San Diego has lived the horror of what the state is going through right now," Mark Weston, the board chairman of the San Diego County Water Authority, told state regulators Tuesday.

After a 10-hour hearing that included more than 5 hours of public testimony, the water board again on Tuesday rejected calls to create easier targets for communities in drier areas or for cities that have been conserving since before the drought.

An economic analysis of the water board's proposal commissioned by the board estimated that private water utilities and local water departments would lose a total of about $1 billion in revenue through lost water sales if they meet the board's targets, meaning they are likely to raise prices to make up the difference.

Residents and businesses use less than a fifth of the water withdrawn from the state's surface and groundwater supplies. Farms in the state's agricultural heartland have had deliveries from government reservoir systems slashed and some have been ordered to stop diverting water that is normally available to them from streams and rivers.

Brown said last week he would push for legislation boosting authorizing fines of up to $10,000 for extreme wasters of water, but he needs legislative approval to do so, and no bill has been introduced. Another tool — tiered pricing, in which the price rises as water use goes up — is in question after a court struck down water rates designed to encourage conservation in San Juan Capistrano in Orange County.

By Mirwais Harooni and Kay Johnson

KABUL (Reuters) - An Afghan judge sentenced four men to death on Wednesday for the mob killing of 27-year-old woman accused of burning a Koran in Kabul, a case that sparked outrage and rare street protests against religious extremism in the capital.

The caretaker of a Muslim shrine who falsely accused the woman of desecrating Islam's holy book was among those sentenced to death.

Eight defendants were jailed for 16 years for participating in the attack in which a crowd beat and kicked the woman, named Farkhunda, and set her body on fire in central Kabul as bystanders chanted "God is great".

Judge Safiullah Mujadidi found 18 others not guilty due to lack of evidence.

The four men sentenced to death were convicted of murder, in part on the basis of mobile phone footage of the attack that was played in court during the five-day trial.

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Defendants attend their trial at the Primary Court in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, May 3, 2015. The t …

Some of those arrested were tracked down after posting footage of the attack on social media and bragging about taking part.

Nineteen police officers were also on trial, accused of standing by and doing nothing to stop the violence. Their verdicts and sentencing are due later in the week.

The attack proved a polarizing incident in Afghanistan, a deeply conservative Muslim country. Initially, some clerics said the killing was a defense of Islam.

Many others were outraged by the attack, even before an investigation showed that Farkhunda had been falsely accused of desecrating Islam's holy book.

Farkhunda, who was a long-time student of Islam, had a running dispute with Zain-ul Abedeen, the caretaker of a local shrine, over his selling of amulets and other good luck charms. She considered the practice un-Islamic.

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Defendants attend a hearing in the case of a 27-year-old Afghan woman named Farkhunda who was beaten …

Apparently in retaliation, he publicly accused her on March 19 of burning a Koran and led the crowd that surrounded her and beat her to death.

Zain-ul Abedeen and the three others condemned to death can appeal against their sentences.

Several protests against religious extremism and violence against women sprung up in Kabul, including one in the last week that re-enacted the attack.

Such demonstrations are rare, even though women's rights were enshrined in the constitution after the Taliban's hard-line Islamist regime was ousted in 2001.

Under the Taliban's five-year rule, women were banned from leaving home without a male guardian, denied education and forced to wear the all-covering burqa.

(Writing by Kay Johnson; Editing by Nick Macfie)

European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini speaks during a joint news conference with China's State Councilor Yang Jiechi at Diaoyutai State Guest House in Beijing, China, May 5, 2015. REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon

BEIJING (Reuters) - A destabilized and isolated Russia is in nobody's interests, and sanctions are only being kept in place because a truce agreement in the conflict in Ukraine is not being fully implemented, the European Union's foreign policy chief said on Wednesday.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov accused "someone in the European Union" on Tuesday of trying to ensure a ceasefire in eastern Ukraine does not hold.

Pro-Russian separatists and the Ukrainian government agreed the truce in the Belarussian capital Minsk on Feb. 12, but it has failed to end all fighting and the Lithuanian president told Reuters it was now all but dead.

Speaking to students during a visit to Beijing, the EU's top diplomat Federica Mogherini said that while she did not see Russia as an "actor" of instability or insecurity, violations of Ukraine's territorial integrity and sovereignty were a matter of universal concern.

"Like China, our European priority is for the violence to stop in the east of Ukraine. Our efforts, as Europeans, are all focused on the full implementation of the Minsk agreements, and we are concretely contributing to that," she said at the elite Peking University.

"At the same time, the European Union has developed a policy of sanctions towards Russia, but I could not stress enough in all my speeches that a sanctions policy is not in itself a policy - it's an instrument, a tool. And as such we are keeping that as long as the Mink agreement is not fully implemented."

Kiev and the West accuse Moscow of sending arms and troops to help the separatists in fighting which has killed more than 6,100 people in just over a year.

Russia denies the accusations and says the West instigated the overthrow of a Moscow-backed Ukrainian president last year as part of efforts to reduce Russian influence in the region.

Mogherini said that in many other areas, such as talks on Iran's controversial nuclear program, Russia was often a constructive partner.

"A destabilized and isolated Russia is not in the interest of the European Union, is not for sure in the interest of the Russian people, and I believe it's not in the interest of the Russian leadership, but it is for them to decide," she added.

(Reporting by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Alex Richardson)

While Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul continues his bid for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination, his father is starring in an ad that warns darkly that the United States is teetering on the brink of a devastating financial crisis whose effects can only be avoided by following his investment advice.

“Hi, Ron Paul here,” the former GOP congressman and two-time Republican presidential candidate says in the radio ad published by BuzzFeed. “Today I have an urgent message for every American who’s retired or thinking about retiring soon. You see, our own government’s disastrous policies have now put you, me and everyone over the age of 50 at great risk. Sometime in the near future, we’re going to have yet another financial crisis. This one won’t be solved with bailouts, and it will hit seniors the hardest.”

The 79-year-old warns of a coming economic armageddon — one not backed up by mainstream economic projections. According to a recent report from Moody’s Analytics, the U.S. economy is expected to grow 3 percent for the year despite a slowdown due, in part, to an unseasonably bad winter. And the value of the U.S. dollar has increased almost 15 percent from last year.

“I fear there will be civil unrest, a drop in stock prices, pension fund collapses, big changes to Social Security and Medicare, the erosion of personal liberties, bank and brokerage closings and ultimately a major crisis as the U.S. dollar is rejected for almost any nonpaper alternative,” Paul continues.

Ron Paul’s doomsday view could complicate his son’s bid for the GOP nomination as Rand Paul looks to run a more mainstream campaign than did his father, who lost three separate bids for the presidency before leaving Congress and becoming a source of investment advice for apocalyptic thinkers.

“This is the second most interesting father-son psychodrama in the presidential race,” Washington Post political reporter Karen Tumulty told Yahoo News last month. “On one hand, [Rand Paul] wants to draw distinctions [with Ron Paul], but on the other hand, tap into that energy his father was able to build.”

The minute-long spots direct listeners to a website that includes a 54-minute infomercial-style video produced by Stansberry & Associates Investment Research, a conservative investment advice newsletter.

“Dr. Ron Paul strongly believes when the next crisis hits, there will be no warning, and the government won’t save you,” a voice-over says. “Go online towww.ronpaulwarning6.com, where you’ll learn simple steps you can take to protect your retirement.”

In the video, billed as an exclusive interview with the 12-term former congressman, Paul says the pending crisis will be “worse than our Great Depression.”

“In short, I believe that we as a nation are on the brink of a massive financial crisis infinitely worse than the crisis of 2008,” he says. “And that’s because it won’t be a banking and mortgage problem but a full-blown currency crisis the likes of which we’ve never experienced in this country. The savings of millions of people could be wiped out overnight. The stock market could crash by 50 percent or more. The way of life we’ve enjoyed as Americans for over 50 years could come to an end. It’s not a question of if this will happen, but when.”

The former Libertarian presidential candidate says that as a result of the inevitable currency crisis, “the middle class gets wiped out, the way you work, live, retire in America — everything is going to change.”

But “the real killer,” Paul says, “will be the effect of all this on our society and on our liberties.”

Ron Paul also appears in a similar, Stansberry-produced video carrying the same message.

“People won’t have any clue what to do when there’s a line around the block just to access the ATM,” he says. “I think we’ll see problems in the big cities especially — in fact, we’re already seeing the beginnings of that: Ferguson, the riots in New York and Detroit.”

The informercial eventually offers viewers a $49.50 Stansberry hard-copy “Survival Blueprint” that includes, among other tips, “the strategy that can save you and your neighborhood,” “how to quickly open a foreign bank account” and “the secret ‘paper currency’ used by the world’s wealthiest people.”

Those who try to leave the website are even prompted with a pop-up warning: “Please: Don’t wait until it’s too late.”

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People stare as we tell our daughter Alana goodbye at the John Wayne Airport in California. Alana is a Muslim, and her head scarf turns heads every time.

Alana laughs to lighten the moment. “Oh, I hate airports,” she whispers to me. “As soon as I get on a plane, I know what people are saying, “Oh, God. A Muslim!”

The day before in the Nashville Airport, she got a full patdown by a TSA agent who asked to check her makeup bag, then said it tested positive for explosives.

“Explosives?” she asked.

Her old tote bag, an Eddie Bauer standby, was filled with a haul of new MAC cosmetics she’d recently purchased. Lipstick alert?

“He even swabbed my hands,” Alana says, still trying to laugh.

But her eyes look wounded, so I hurt for her and for the 1 billion-plus Muslims in the world who do not carry explosives in their makeup bags and never will.

I ache for the rest of us as our nation has become infatuated by fear of Muslims.

My Jim Crow childhood taught me about fear of “the other.” Growing up black in Colorado and drawing stares and glares, I struggled with my black friends to fight with every tool the suspicion and shunning that marked our lives — even if our tools (humor, anger, denial) didn’t work.

With my daughter, however, I want something to work.

We are a nation divided, of course, and always have been. Racially, as a result, we’ve turned paranoid, and mixing faith into our divide makes us vicious.

A cartoon contest for caricatures of Muhammad? The heart of the context is not about art or free speech. It stems from fear.

Traveling to Nashville recently, I did a miserable double-take myself when a young Muslim family came through the jet door and squeezed down the too-small aisle. The young mom, with head draped in a long hijab, finally wrestled her two small children into their seats — knowing, I’m sure, that almost every pair of eyes in the plane was trained on their movements.

We are hard-wired, apparently, to distrust difference, even when we know better. Faith differences threaten to turn us into paranoid and hateful beings. While our better angels tell us to calm down — to give folks the benefit of the doubt — the devil in our heads cries lipstick alert. In Garland, Tex., a cartoon-drawing event became a sorrowing excuse to trash others’ belief yet again.

So, what will we do?

I’ve been asking that question since 2001, when Alana called from college to say she had left the teachings and doctrines of her childhood Christian faith to become a Muslim.

“A what?”

That’s what my aging, widowed mother said when I told her Alana had converted to Islam. “A Muslim?” She struggled to say the word, wondering how our small family would bear two faiths under one roof.

In fact, we struggle. Navigating our divide has tested every Christian principle of love I ever learned: No judgment. No fear. No hypocrisy.

How did Jesus put it when a distrusting crowd set to stone a suspected adulterer? Sure, stone her — if you haven’t sinned yourself. “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her,” he said.

Then he knelt to write in the sand, listing, as some theologians say, the many sins of the men ready to hurl rocks and condemnation.

Some have made their living drumming up Islamophobia. They have forgotten what Jesus knew. It’s far easier to suspect and hate others than do real service in the world, plus take a hard look at ourselves.

Someone asked me recently if I had put down my Bible long enough to read my daughter’s Qur’an? I have. But, in truth, I haven’t read all of it. My bigger failure, though, for many years was thinking she wasn’t worthy of the trouble to pick up what she considered her sacred text. And I’m her mother. If differences in our faith bring out the worst in a mom, what chance is there for the rest of us?

How do we fight our fears, suspicions and worry for our current impasse? Love provides a powerful antidote. I spent too many years after my daughter’s conversion pointing fingers at her, not at myself — a true waste of God’s time.

To love isn’t complicated theology, but it is courageous. Theologian and civil rights leader Howard Thurman explained that to love is “to make one’s heart a swinging door.” Love focuses on both giving and receiving.

Terrorism can’t stand the onslaught of such radical courage.

Patricia Raybon is an award-winning author and essayist. Her newest book, co-authored with daughter Alana Raybon, is “Undivided: A Muslim Daughter, Her Christian Mother, Their Path to Peace.”