Nation and World briefs for November 25

Thanksgiving travel 2015: Cheap gas but fears of terrorism

LOS ANGELES (AP) — That other Thanksgiving tradition — congested highways and jammed airports — is getting underway with gas prices low and terrorism fears high.

An estimated 46.9 million Americans are expected to take a car, plane, bus or train at least 50 miles from home over the long holiday weekend, according to the motoring organization AAA. That would be an increase of more than 300,000 people over last year, and the most travelers since 2007.

Among the reasons given for the increase: an improving economy and the cheapest gasoline for this time of year since 2008.

On Tuesday, some travelers were gearing up for an early exit.

“There’s a little bit of a tie-up here, but I’m sure once we get going, things will be great,” Mark Sullivan said as he waited at New York’s Port Authority bus terminal. He was traveling to see family in Springfield, Massachusetts.

Obama and Hollande pledge solidarity against Islamic State

WASHINGTON (AP) — In a show of Western solidarity, President Barack Obama and French President Francois Hollande vowed Tuesday to escalate airstrikes against the Islamic State and bolster intelligence sharing following the deadly attacks in Paris. They called on Russia to join the international efforts, but only if Moscow ends its support for Syria’s embattled president.

“Russia is the outlier,” Obama said during a joint White House news conference with Hollande.

Tuesday’s meeting came hours after Turkey shot down a Russian warplane near the Syrian border. The incident underscored the complex military landscape in Syria, where a sprawling cast of countries and rebel groups are engaged on the battlefield and in the skies overhead, sometimes with minimal coordination.

Obama said Russian cooperation in the fight against the Islamic State would be “enormously helpful.” But he insisted a partnership is impossible as long as Russia stands by Syrian President Bashar Assad, who is blamed by the U.S. for plunging his country into chaos and creating the vacuum that allowed the Islamic State to strengthen.

“We hope that they refocus their attention on what is the most substantial threat, and that they serve as a constructive partner,” Obama said of Russia.

Turkey shoots down Russian jet it says violated its airspace

MOSCOW (AP) — Turkey shot down a Russian warplane on Tuesday that it said ignored repeated warnings and crossed into its airspace from Syria, killing at least one of the two pilots in a long-feared escalation in tensions between Russia and NATO. Russian President Vladimir Putin denounced what he called a “stab in the back” and warned of “significant consequences.”

The shoot down — the first time in half a century that a NATO member has downed a Russian plane — prompted an emergency meeting of the alliance. The incident highlighted the chaotic complexity of Syria’s civil war, where multiple groups with clashing alliances are fighting on the ground and the sky is crowded with aircraft bombing various targets.

“As we have repeatedly made clear we stand in solidarity with Turkey and support the territorial integrity of our NATO ally, Turkey,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told a news conference after the meeting of the alliance’s decision-making North Atlantic Council, called at Turkey’s request.

The pilots of the downed Su-24 ejected, but one was killed by Syrian rebel fire from the ground as he parachuted to Earth, said the Russian general staff, insisting the Russian jet had been in Syrian airspace at the time. One of two helicopters sent to the crash site to search for survivors was also hit by rebel fire, killing one serviceman and forcing the chopper to make an emergency landing, the military said.

Stoltenberg urged “calm and de-escalation” and renewed contacts between Moscow and Ankara. Russia has long been at odds with NATO, which it accuses of encroaching on Russia’s borders, as well as with Turkey’s determination to oust Syrian President Bashar Assad, a longtime Moscow ally.

Chicago officer charged with murder in killing of black teen

CHICAGO (AP) — A white Chicago police officer who shot a black teenager 16 times last year was charged with first-degree murder Tuesday, hours before the city released a video of the killing that many people fear could spark unrest.

City officials and community leaders have been bracing for the release of the dash-cam video, fearing the kind of unrest that occurred in cities such as Baltimore and Ferguson, Missouri, after young black men were slain by police or died in police custody.

A judge ordered that the recording be put out by Wednesday. Moments before the footage was made public Tuesday evening, the mayor and the police chief appealed for calm.

“People have a right to be angry. People have a right to protest. People have a right to free speech. But they do not have a right to … criminal acts,” Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy said.

Reporters were directed to download the video from a password-protected website, but the site was apparently overwhelmed with requests, and the footage could not immediately be obtained by The Associated Press.

Group raised suspicions before 5 were shot at police protest

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Protesters demanding justice for a black man fatally shot by Minneapolis police were settling in for their ninth night of demonstrations when something just didn’t seem right.

Lingering in the crowd were four people who seemed out of place. They were asked to leave. Moments later, shots rang out about a block away.

“I really did think it was like firecrackers or something initially because it was so loud and there was like this acrid smell,” protester Jie Wronski-Riley said. “I thought, ‘Surely, they are not shooting at us.’”

Then Wronski-Riley heard the cries of wounded people on the ground. “I really understood the danger we were in and what had happened.”

Police say five people were shot in the attack, which unfolded late Monday near a police precinct where dozens of protesters have been camped out since the Nov. 15 fatal shooting of Jamar Clark. None suffered life-threatening wounds.

Republican campaign rhetoric has Muslim-Americans on edge

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — Muslim-Americans who sued the New York Police Department over a surveillance program launched after 9/11 say calls from the Republican presidential campaign to put them under more scrutiny are recklessly seizing on public fears and distressing Muslims in the U.S.

As national security has become a focus in the 2016 race after the Paris attacks, Donald Trump has declared “we’re being foolish, we’re kidding ourselves” if law enforcement doesn’t keep close surveillance on mosques, and he expressed support for the idea of a database for tracking Muslims in the United States. Another GOP contender, Ben Carson, said mosques, schools, supermarkets, car repair shops and “any place where radicalization is going on” should be monitored.

Such rhetoric is “reckless and ignorant,” said attorney Baher Azmy, who is representing Muslim-Americans who sued the NYPD.

“I think it has a deeper scar, a psychological scar, on the Muslim community, which is a consequence of these types of surveillance programs,” said Azmy, of the Center for Constitutional Rights. “It’s dangerous because we’ve been down this road before and ugly rhetoric matched with political power can really harm actual people, real lives.”

The Associated Press revealed in 2011 how New York police, in a since-disbanded demographics unit, infiltrated Muslim student groups, put informants in mosques and otherwise spied on Muslims as part of a broad effort to prevent terrorist attacks. A federal appeals court last month reinstated the lawsuit challenging the surveillance, comparing the spying to other instances of heightened scrutiny of religious and ethnic groups, including Japanese-Americans during World War II.

Tunisia declares state of emergency after bus blast kills 12

(AP) Tunisia’s president declared a 30-day state of emergency across the country and imposed an overnight curfew for the capital after an explosion Tuesday struck a bus carrying members of the presidential guard, killing at least 12 people and wounding 20 others.

The government described it as a terrorist attack. The blast on a tree-lined avenue in the heart of Tunis is a new blow to a country that is seen as a model for the region but has struggled against Islamic extremist violence. Radical gunmen staged two attacks earlier this year that killed 60 people, devastated the tourism industry and rattled this young democracy.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack against the presidential guard, an elite security force that protects only the president.

President Beji Caid Essebsi, who wasn’t in the bus at the time, declared the state of emergency and curfew on the Tunis region. He convened an emergency meeting of his security council for Wednesday morning.

Speaking on national television, he said Tunisia is at “war against terrorism” and urged international cooperation against extremists who have killed hundreds around Europe and the Mideast in recent weeks, from Paris to Beirut to a Russian plane shot down over Egypt.