World/Nation Briefs November 23, 2014

Investigators: Giardina may have made counterfeit chips

WASHINGTON - The admiral fired last year as No. 2 commander of U.S. nuclear forces may have made his own counterfeit $500 poker chips with paint and stickers to feed a gambling habit that eventually saw him banned from an entire network of casinos, according to a criminal investigative report obtained by The Associated Press.

Although Rear Adm. Timothy M. Giardina's removal as deputy head of U.S. Strategic Command was announced last year, evidence of his possible role in manufacturing the counterfeit chips has not previously been revealed. Investigators said they found his DNA on the underside of an adhesive sticker used to alter genuine $1 poker chips to make them look like $500 chips.

Nor had the Navy disclosed how extensively he gambled.

The case is among numerous embarrassing setbacks for the nuclear force. Disciplinary problems, security flaws, weak morale and leadership lapses documented by The Associated Press over the past two years prompted Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel on Nov. 14 to announce top-to-bottom changes in how the nuclear force is managed that will cost up to $10 billion.

The records obtained by the AP under the Freedom of Information Act show Giardina was a habitual poker player, spending a total of 1,096 hours - or an average of 15 hours per week - at the tables at the Horseshoe casino in Council Bluffs, Iowa, in the 18 months before being caught using three phony chips in June 2013.

Al-Shabab Islamic extremist rebels kill 28 non-Muslims

NAIROBI, Kenya - One gunman shot from the right, one from the left, each killing the non-Muslims lying in a line on the ground, growing closer and closer to Douglas Ochwodho, who was in the middle.

And then the shooting stopped. Apparently each gunman thought the other shot Ochwodho. He lay perfectly still until the 20 Islamic extremists left, and he appears to be the only survivor of those who had been selected for death.

Somalia's Islamic extremist rebels, al-Shabab, attacked a bus in northern Kenya at dawn Saturday, singling out and killing 28 passengers who could not recite an Islamic creed and were assumed to be non-Muslims, Kenyan police said.

Those who could not say the Shahada, a tenet of the Muslim faith, were shot at close range, Ochwodho told The Associated Press.

Nineteen men and nine women were killed in the bus attack, said Kenyan police chief David Kimaiyo.

Strong quake strikes central Japan, injures at least 30

TOKYO - A strong earthquake in the mountainous area of central Japan that hosted the 1998 Winter Olympics destroyed more than half a dozen homes in a ski resort town and injured at least 30 people, officials said.

The magnitude-6.8 earthquake struck Saturday evening near Nagano city shortly after at a depth of 6 miles, the Japan Meteorological Agency said. The U.S. Geological Survey measured the quake's magnitude at 6.2. Since the quake occurred inland, there was no possibility of a tsunami.

Ryo Nishino, a restaurant owner in Hakuba, a ski town west of Nagano, told Japanese broadcaster NHK that he had "never experienced a quake that shook so hard. The sideways shaking was enormous." He said he was in the restaurant's wine cellar when the quake struck, and that nothing broke there.

Japan's Nuclear Regulation Authority said no abnormalities were reported at three nuclear power plants in the affected areas. All of Japan's nuclear plants are offline following a magnitude-9.0 earthquake and massive tsunami in 2011 that sent three reactors at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant into meltdown. Fukushima is about 155 miles northeast of where Saturday's earthquake occurred.

Thirty people were injured, at least two seriously, the Federal Disaster Management Agency said Sunday.

Shifting attitudes on assault may explain Cosby timing

Tamra Wade struggled mightily over whether to go to the police more than a decade ago, when, she said, a trusted professor forced himself on her in an empty classroom. Ultimately she couldn't bring herself to do it.

But if it happened now, she said, she'd be a lot bolder - not just because she's older, but because she feels there's less of a stigma connected to being a victim of sexual assault.

And this, say advocates for sexual assault victims, may be one reason why the allegations against Bill Cosby have exploded into public consciousness now so much more than they did when they emerged a decade ago: an evolving cultural understanding of the crime of sexual assault, and increased empathy toward those claiming to be victims.

"I think our society really has changed," said Wade, a data analyst who now mentors young assault victims. "Ten years ago, it was much harder for a victim to get an audience listening to her. Now there's less of a stigma, and that gives people more confidence to come forward."

A key element in the cultural shift, say some advocates, have been a series of high-profile cases like the Penn State molestation scandal, stories of abuse in the military or the Catholic Church, and cases of date rape at university campuses. Particularly when a number of people come forward, it's harder for the public to ignore, they said.

Obama approves limited re-engagement with fighters

WASHINGTON - U.S. troops in Afghanistan may once again engage Taliban fighters, not just al-Qaida terrorists, under new guidelines quietly approved by President Barack Obama, administration officials said.

The armed forces were to limit their operations in Afghanistan to counterterrorism missions against al-Qaida after this year, until Obama broadened the guidelines in recent weeks. The plan comes as the U.S. combat mission in Afghanistan draws to a close, thousands of troops return home and the military prepares for a narrower counterterrorism and training mission for the next two years.

Obama's decision also means the U.S. can conduct air support when needed.

One U.S. official said the military could only go after the Taliban if it posed a threat to American forces or provided direct support to al-Qaida, while the latter could be targeted more indiscriminately.

- The Associated Press