USA

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic presidential hopefuls denounced President Donald Trump’s decision to pull U.S. troops back from northern Syria, saying in an Ohio debate on Tuesday he had endangered America’s longtime Kurdish allies while empowering foes Russia and Syria.

In the first Democratic presidential debate since Trump announced the withdrawal, the 12 candidates on the stage were united in painting the Republican president as reckless and a danger to American interests around the world.

WASHINGTON, Oct. 15 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Vice President Mike Pence on Tuesday declined to submit documents related to the Trump administration's dealings with Ukraine as requested by a congress request.

In a letter to the House of Representatives on Tuesday -- the deadline for Pence to hand over the records -- Matthew Morgan, the vice president's counsel, repeated the Trump administration's view that the ongoing impeachment inquiry led by House Democrats is "unfair" and lacks "due process."

WASHINGTON, Oct. 15 (Xinhua) -- The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Tuesday lowered its global growth forecast for 2019 to 3 percent in the newly-released World Economic Outlook (WEO) report, down 0.2 percentage point from its estimation in July.

Noting that this is the slowest pace since the global financial crisis, IMF chief economist Gita Gopinath said during a press conference at the global lender's headquarters that "growth continues to be weakened by rising trade barriers and growing geopolitical tensions."

WASHINGTON (AP) — The impeachment inquiry is revealing vivid new details about the high-level unease over President Donald Trump’s actions toward Ukraine, and those of his personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, as the swift-moving probe by House Democrats showed no signs of easing.

The testimony from the witnesses, mainly officials from the State Department and other foreign policy posts, is largely corroborating the account of the government whistleblower whose complaint first sparked the impeachment inquiry, according to lawmakers attending the closed-door interviews.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — A New Mexico man convicted of killing his parents and three younger siblings when he was 15 apologized to the rest of his family Tuesday as he asked a judge for an opportunity at rehabilitation and redemption.

Nehemiah Griego, now 22, was the last person to address the court during an emotional daylong sentencing hearing. He expressed remorse for the 2013 killings, saying he was a different person at the time.

USA (AP) -- Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York is endorsing Bernie Sanders for president and will appear with him at a rally in her home district this weekend.

Sanders deputy communications director Sarah Ford confirmed the news Tuesday.

The endorsement is a major boon for the 78-year-old Vermont senator, who has faced questions over his health since suffering a heart attack two weeks ago.

FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) — The furor Tuesday over the killing of a black woman by a white Fort Worth officer became increasingly about a gun pointed at a bedroom window. But the police chief and activists said the focus was on the wrong gun.

Officer Aaron Dean was arrested on a murder charge Monday in the slaying of Atatiana Jefferson. Police released an arrest warrant Tuesday quoting the victim’s 8-year-old nephew as saying Jefferson had pulled out a gun after hearing suspicious noises behind her house.

HELENA, Mont. (AP) — Authorities evacuated an elementary school in Montana on Tuesday after officials found what they thought were the remnants of a homemade bomb that exploded, but it turned out to be a plastic bottle filled with nuts and bolts left in the schoolyard.

School officials in Helena made the discovery shortly before classes began at Rossiter Elementary School. They blocked off the area and called 911, Lewis and Clark County Sheriff Leo Dutton said.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — “Desperate Housewives” star Felicity Huffman — aka inmate No. 77806-112 — reported Tuesday to a federal prison in California to serve a two-week sentence in a college admissions scandal that underscored the lengths some wealthy parents will go to get their children into top universities.

Huffman’s husband, actor William H. Macy, dropped her off at the Federal Correctional Institution, Dublin, a low-security prison for women in the San Francisco Bay Area, according to TASC Group, which represents Huffman.

WASHINGTON (AP) — When Syria’s Kurdish fighters, America’s longtime battlefield allies against the Islamic State, announced over the weekend that they were switching sides and joining up with Damascus and Moscow, it seemed like a moment of geopolitical whiplash.

But in fact, the move had been in the works for more than a year. Fearing U.S. abandonment, the Kurds opened a back channel to the Syrian government and the Russians in 2018, and those talks ramped up significantly in recent weeks, American, Kurdish and Russian officials told The Associated Press.