UN agency to feed 2.5 million Syrians in April

BEIRUT (AP) — The World Food Program aims to feed 2.5 million Syrians next month, up from 1.7 million today, as more Syrians are displaced by their country's civil war and the economy is disintegrating, a spokeswoman said Friday.

Also, negotiations over the release of 21 U.N. peacekeepers held by Syrian rebels appeared to have hit an impasse Friday. The rebels say they will release the U.N. troops, all Filipinos, only after Syrian regime forces withdraw from the area where the hostages have been held since Wednesday, a Philippine government official said. The Syrian regime is unlikely to comply.

The kidnapping has underlined potential complications from the Syria conflict. The U.N. personnel were monitoring a 40-year-old truce between Israel and Syria when they were captured. Israel is concerned about the Syria fighting spilling across the frontier.

Russia's foreign minister said in a TV interview Friday that Syrian President Bashar Assad will not step down, meaning that the civil war will likely drag on.

Since the start of the Syria conflict two years ago, nearly 4 million of Syria's 22 million people have been driven from their homes by the fighting, according to U.N. estimates. This includes those who fled to neighboring countries and some 2 million who sought shelter inside Syria.

In one recent wave, more than 20,000 families fled fighting in the northeastern Raqqa province, seeking refuge in the neighboring district of Deir el-Zour, according to the World Food Program. The U.N. agency said that in recent days it distributed food to some 20,000 people in public shelters in Deir el-Zour. More food trucks are to deliver food there Friday.

Earlier this week, Syrian rebels completed their capture of the provincial capital of Raqqa after several days of fighting. The takeover marked the first time rebels seized a major Syrian city. Raqqa has a population of about 500,000.

In addition to the internally displaced, Syrians who remain in their homes are also in increasing need of food aid, the agency said. The Syrian economy has been hit hard by the two-year-old conflict, and basics such as food and fuel are becoming scarce in many areas.

"The needs are huge and are growing," said Elisabeth Byrs, a spokeswoman for the WFP. "It's kind of a vicious cycle, the collapse of the economy, and more and more people are displaced."

She said the U.N. agency distributed food to 1.7 million Syrians in February, with the help of local partners. The agency plans to reach 2 million in March and 2.5 million in April, she said.

The uprising erupted two years ago, with peaceful protests deteriorating into a brutal civil war, initially in response to a harsh regime crackdown on dissent. More than 70,000 people have been killed, according to U.N. estimates.

Assad has dug in, aided by powerful allies Russia, China and Iran, and the conflict has been locked in a stalemate. Despite some military and diplomatic gains by the rebels, neither side has been able to score a breakthrough.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told the BBC on Friday that Russia would not pressure Assad to step down. "It's not for me to decide, it's not for anybody else to decide, except the Syrian people," he said.

Assad "is not going to leave," Lavrov said. "We know this for sure, and all those who get in touch with him know that he is not bluffing."

Climate to Warm Beyond Levels Seen for 11,300 Years

• Published: March 7th, 2013

Enduring storm surprises New England with big snow

A woman makes her way across the bus station in downtown New Bedford, Mass., as heavy snow falls Friday, March 8, 2013. The storm dropped up to a foot of snow in some parts of New England, caused coastal flooding in Massachusetts. (AP Photo/The Standard-Times, Peter Pereira)

People walk through driving snow near courthouses in lower Manhattan during a storm on Friday, March. 8 2013, in New York. A very wet snow is causing slippery road conditions in the metropolitan area and several inches have fallen on eastern Long Island and Westchester, Rockland and Putnam counties.(AP Photo/Peter Morgan)

WHITMAN, Mass. (AP) — The late-winter storm that buried parts of the country was forecast to be little more than a nuisance for most of New England. Try telling that to Connecticut and Massachusetts residents who spent two days shoveling as much as 2 feet of snow.

"The forecast was 4 to 6 inches and I think I'm looking at about 12 to 14 inches," West Roxbury resident Mark Spillane said as snow continued to fall Friday. "I did not expect to have to bring out the snow blower."

The storm was centered far out in the Atlantic Ocean, and by the time it reached New England, forecasters were focused on the potential for coastal flooding and not snow, which in many places was predicted to reach a maximum of 6 or 8 inches.

The coastline was battered by three high tides during the duration of the storm, the worst Friday morning, when some roads in coastal towns were flooded with up to 3 feet of water. A vacant house on Plum Island, off the northeast coast of Massachusetts, was ripped from its foundation and collapsed into the sea. Other homes there were badly damaged.

But in most places, it was the persistent snow that threw people for a loop.

The National Weather Service reported nearly 13 inches of snow at Boston's Logan International Airport as of 1 p.m., with more than 2 feet in a few Massachusetts towns and nearly that much in many others. Some parts of Connecticut and New Hampshire also saw more than a foot.

With spring less than two weeks away, Lisa Parisella, of Beverly, Mass., had been ready to dig out her sandals. Instead, she found herself donning her winter boots for a trip to the grocery store to make sure she had enough food for her kids, whose classes were canceled Friday.

"This was unexpected," said Parisella, 47, an office manager. Forecasts had called for 1 to 8 inches. Instead, her town had well over a foot by noon, and snow continued to fall. "I was ready to start decorating for spring. I was thinking, March, ready to take out the sandals, and I'm taking out the boots again."

Tim Wicker, a self-employed 32-year-old resident of Norwich, Conn., said the latest storm wasn't too bad, but he was also longing for spring.

"The other day I was out in a T-shirt," Wicker said. "Now we're dealing with this again. It's going to be 54 on Sunday. It's just New England."

Charley Foley, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Taunton, said the higher snowfalls were caused by winds swirling around the storm that subtly changed course from the northeast to a more northerly direction. That allowed the storm to tap colder air from Canada, pick up moisture from the warmer ocean and dump snow on New England.

"We did get somewhat surprised by higher snow amounts," Foley said.

The storm had been giving forecasters fits for days. After pummeling the Midwest earlier in the week, it dumped nearly 2 feet of snow in some parts of the mid-Atlantic but largely spared the nation's capital despite warnings that as much as 10 inches could fall on Washington.

Some school districts, including Boston, were criticized for holding classes Friday despite icy sidewalks and poorly plowed roads.

Boston public schools spokesman Lee McGuire said schools were kept open because the weather forecast was so fluid. Thursday night's forecast called for just a few inches of snow.

"We made the best decision we could with the information we had at the time," McGuire said.

The district said students whose parents kept them home Friday would be considered "constructively present" and their absences would be excused.

Boston resident Vera Miller was angry about the decision. She kept her grandchildren home after taking a look outside Friday morning.

"I said, 'Oh no, you kids are staying home today,'" Miller said. "I just felt that school should have been canceled."

The snow made for a slippery Friday morning commute as far south as Pennsylvania and New York.

In Scituate, Mass., a shoreline town about 20 miles south of Boston, police Chief Brian Stewart breathed a sigh of relief Friday morning after high tide. The town got some coastal flooding — it almost always does during major storms — and eight roads were closed under 2 to 3 feet of water.

"It's coming over the usual spots," he said. "I would say we were fortunate because at this point we have no reports of injuries or major damage."

In Whitman, which had nearly a foot of snow by 10 a.m., Maureen Chittick's house was among those that lost electricity for a while. Grandchildren Nicole Clark, 15, and Gary Clark, 13, came inside for an old-fashioned game with marbles after shoveling the snow out of her driveway.

"I was shoveling and I saw purple flowers underneath," Nicole Clark said. "I thought to myself, 'Summer is never going to come.' I just want summer. Bring on the hot, the beach!"

___

Jay Lindsay in Beverly, Mass.; Bridget Murphy in Boston; Rodrique Ngowi in West Roxbury, Mass.; and John Christoffersen in New Haven, Conn., contributed to this report.

Malaysia says 31 Filipinos fatally shot in Borneo

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Malaysian security forces gunned down 31 Filipino intruders in Borneo on Thursday, the highest number of casualties in a single day since nearly 200 members of a Philippine Muslim clan took over an entire village last month, police said.

However, representatives of the Filipino group denied their members had been killed.

The armed clansmen have wreaked political havoc for bothMalaysia and the neighboring Philippines by trying to stake a long-dormant royal territorial claim to Malaysia's sprawling, resource-rich state of Sabah in Borneo.

Most of the Filipinos had eluded capture in a coastal Sabah district filled with palm oil plantations and forested hills after Malaysian forces attacked them with airstrikes and mortar fire on Tuesday.

Police and military forces tracking them waged a fierce gunbattle that ended in the deaths of 31 clansmen Thursday, national police chief Ismail Omar said, adding that no Malaysians were injured.

But Abraham Idjirani, a Philippine-based representative for the clansmen, said he spoke by telephone Thursday evening with the group's leader, who insisted all of them remained accounted for. He claimed Malaysian forces had instead killed dozens of civilian villagers.

The conflicting claims could not immediately be explained.

Ismail said at least 52 Filipinos have now been killed in the past week since hostilities in the Sabah security crisis escalated. Eight policemen also were fatally shot by the Filipino clansmen and their allies last week in various parts of Sabah.

Less than two hours before the announcement of the casualties, Prime Minister Najib Razak rejected a cease-fire call by Philippine-based members of the clan led by Jamalul Kiram III, who claims to be the sultan, or hereditary ruler, of the southern, predominantly Muslim province of Sulu in the Philippines.

A brother of Kiram, the sultan who lives in Manila, is heading the group in Sabah. Kiram had ordered them to observe a unilateral cease-fire starting Thursday afternoon by holding their current position and taking a defensive posture.

Najib responded by saying Malaysia would accept only unconditional surrender by the clansmen, who slipped into Sabah by sea around Feb. 9.

"They have to surrender their arms. They have to do it as soon as possible," Najib said at a nationally televised news conference.

"Don't believe this offer of a cease-fire by Jamalul Kiram," Malaysian Defense Minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi wrote on Twitter. "For the sake of the people of Sabah and Malaysia, eliminate all militants first."

Idjirani said a cease-fire would be in line with a statement of concern by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon late Wednesday.

Ban "urges an end to the violence and encourages dialogue among all the parties for a peaceful resolution of the situation," according to the statement issued by Ban's representative.

Ban voiced concerns about how the crisis might affect civilians, including Filipino migrants in Sabah, and urged "all parties to facilitate delivery of humanitarian assistance and act in full respect of international human rights norms and standards," according to the statement.

Malaysia's government has insisted it made every effort to coax the Filipinos to leave and had to use force after the group fatally shot two policemen last week. Six other police officers were ambushed and killed by other Filipinos believed to be linked to the clansmen in another Sabah district.

The Filipinos say Sabah belonged to their royal sultanate for more than a century and should be handed back. Malaysia has dismissed their claim to the state, which has been part of Malaysia for five decades.

An estimated 800,000 Filipinos, mostly Muslims from insurgency-plagued southern provinces, have settled in Sabah over the years to seek work and stability.

___