Latest migrant tragedy in Aegean highlights EU divisions

Latest migrant tragedy in Aegean highlights EU divisions

A local residents stands over the body of a dead baby in Petra village on the northeastern Greek island of Lesbos, Friday, Oct. 30, 2015. The deaths occurred amid a surge of crossings to Greek islands involving migrants and refugees from Syria, Afghanistan and other countries ahead of winter and as European governments weight taking tougher measures to try and limit the number of arrivals in Europe.

  

LESBOS, Greece (AP) -- Drowned babies and toddlers washed onto Greece's famed Aegean Sea beaches, and a grim-faced diver pulled a drowned mother and child from a half-sunk boat that was decrepit long before it sailed. On shore, bereaved women wailed and stunned-looking fathers cradled their children.

At least 27 people, more than half of them children, died in waters off Greece Friday trying to fulfill their dream of a better life in Europe. The tragedy came two days after a boat crammed with 300 people sank off Lesbos in one of the worst accidents of its kind, leaving 29 dead.

It won't be the last.

As autumn storms threaten to make the crossing from Turkey even riskier and conditions in Middle Eastern refugee camps deteriorate, ever more refugees - mostly Syrians, Afghans and Iraqis - are joining the rush to reach Europe.

More than 60 people, half of them children, have died in the past three days alone, compared with just over a hundred a few weeks earlier.

Highlighting political friction in the 28-nation European Union, Greece's left-wing prime minister, Alexis Tsipras, cited the horror of the new drownings to accuse the block of ineptitude and hypocrisy in handling the crisis.

Hungary's right-wing foreign minister, Peter Szijjarto, used the same word - hypocrisy - about critics of his country's fencing off its southern border to keep migrants out.

Szijjarto described the influx as the biggest challenge the EU has ever faced. While that may be an over-statement, the crisis has pitted countries like Greece, with well over 500,000 arrivals so far, against eastern Europeans who are unwilling to take in refugees - or, like Hungary, insist that anyone leaving a relatively safe country, such as Turkey or Greece, for a wealthy one like Germany is by definition an economic migrant.

Speaking in Athens, Tsipras accused Europe of an "inability to defend its (humanitarian) values" by providing a safe alternative to the sea journeys.

"The waves of the Aegean are not just washing up dead refugees, dead children, but (also) the very civilization of Europe," he said, dismissing Western shock at the children's deaths as "crocodile tears."

"What about the tens of thousands of living children, who are cramming the roads of migration?" he said. "I feel ashamed of Europe's inability to effectively address this human drama, and of the level of debate ... where everyone tries to shift responsibility to someone else."

Tsipras' government has appealed for more assistance from its EU partners. It argues that those trying to reach Europe should be registered in camps in Turkey, then flown directly to host countries under the EU's relocation program, to spare them the sea voyage. But it has resisted calls to demolish its own border fence with Turkey, which would also obviate the need to pay smugglers for a trip in a leaky boat.

"My opinion is that at this stage - for purely practical reasons - ... the opening of the border fence is not possible," Greek Migration Minister Yiannis Mouzalas said.

"When talking about receiving refugees, it's not under our control - they are coming," he told state ERT TV. 

"So it's a question of how we address this problem. ... We will not put them in jail or try to drown them. 

They will have all the rights that they are allowed under (international) agreements and Greek law."

Greece's Merchant Marine Ministry said 19 people died and 138 were rescued near the eastern island of Kalymnos early Friday, when a battered wooden pleasure boat capsized. Eleven of the victims were children, including three babies.

At least three more people - a woman, a child and a baby - died when another boat sank off the nearby island of Rhodes, while an adult drowned off Lesbos.

On the Turkish side, four children drowned and two were missing after two new accidents Friday involving boats en route to the Greek islands of Lesbos and Samos, Turkey's state-run news agency said.

Nearly 600 people were rescued by the Greek coast guard in the past 24 hours, while thousands more made it safely from Turkey to Greece's eastern islands.

Far to the west in Spain, rescuers found the bodies of four people and were searching for 35 missing from a boat that ran into trouble trying to reach Spain from Morocco.

Jean-Christophe Dumont, head of the migration division at the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, said more than a million people are expected to reach Europe this year.

"For next year I think it's clear the migration pressure will remain," he said. "It's not a tap that you can turn on and off. Even if the flow would stop, it would actually not stop, because you will see family reunification - the aftermath of the flow of refugees."

The influx has overwhelmed authorities in financially struggling Greece. The country is the main point of entry for people fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and Africa, after an alternative sea route from Libya to Italy became too dangerous.

Most go to Lesbos, a normally quiet island known as the olive-producing birthplace of the ancient poet Sappho. As residents grappled with Wednesday's latest tragedy, thousands of new arrivals crowded into the main town of Mytilene and makeshift camps nearby, crowding around stalls selling canned food, backpacks, blankets and other basics for their long trek across Europe.

Many slept rough on the waterfront lined with yachts, rescue vessels and the remains of broken up dinghies.

At one of the largest camps, muddy roads were strewn with garbage - shoes, plastic bags, underpants, shreds of clothing - as thousands camped on a hillside. Local residents used vans to sell tents, toiletries, and sandwiches, as camp dwellers hung laundry on olive trees, taking advantage of a break in the rain.

Mustafa Hosab sat with four cousins eating a kebab on the waterfront.

"We're from Idlib, in northern Syria, near Turkey. We left because the fighting was changing all the time and it's not safe," he said. "We'll go wherever we can, maybe Germany or Sweden. We came from Turkey, and the boat was OK. We were lucky."

Iran to take a seat among world powers for Syria talks

Iran to take a seat among world powers for Syria talks

FILE - In this Saturday, Sept. 26, 2015 file photo, US Secretary of State John Kerry, left, meets with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif at United Nations headquarters. Iran sits down with the United States, Russia, Europeans and key Arab states for the first time since the Syrian civil war began to discuss the future of the war-torn country. It will also break ground by bringing President Bashar Assad’s main supporter, Iran, to the same table as its regional rivals, including Turkey and Saudi Arabia, who have been backing many of the insurgent groups.

BEIRUT (AP) -- Iran will take part in international talks on Syria for the first time this week, giving it a voice in the effort to find a resolution to the more than 4-year-old civil war that has so far defied even the slightest progress toward peace.

A crucial backer of Syrian President Bashar Assad, Tehran has been shunned from all previous talks on Syria. Its inclusion now marks recognition by the United States that no discussion on Syria's future can succeed without Iran at the table.

News of Iran's attendance outraged Syrian rebels, who said its participation will only prolong the conflict.

The gathering, which takes place Thursday and Friday in Vienna, will also put Iran in the same room with its most bitter regional rival, Saudi Arabia, raising the potential for tensions. The kingdom, along with other Gulf countries, has been funneling weapons to rebel factions, while Iran has sent financing, weapons and military advisers to ensure Assad's survival.

Iran's participation reflects its newfound place in the international community following the nuclear deal reached with world powers earlier this year. It also shows the seismic shift brought about by Russia's direct military involvement in Syria since launching a campaign of airstrikes on behalf of Assad last month. That intervention has emboldened Assad's supporters.

Russia's intervention - and its insistence that it seeks a political solution - have created a new dynamic. While no one expects a breakthrough, the Vienna talks are the most serious attempt yet to put an end to a conflict that has killed a quarter of a million people and displaced millions of others, touching off a humanitarian crisis of spectacular proportions and unleashing Islamic extremists across the Middle East.

Here is a look at what's at stake:

WHO'S AT THE TABLE - AND WHO'S NOT

The core power players at the talks are Russia and Iran, the two top supporters of Assad, and the U.S., Saudi Arabia and Turkey, the top backers of the opposition. Those countries, with the exception of Iran, attended a first round of talks in Vienna last week.

Who's not there? Assad's government and the Syrian opposition.

That reflects the intent of the gathering. It's not a negotiation between combatants; it's an attempt by the outside powers with a hand in the conflict to reach common ground on a solution. If the track eventually leads to progress, the parties would then have to persuade - or, more likely, strong-arm - their allies in Syria to go along.

The conference has also been widened from last week's round to include countries from around the region and Europe. The expansion from a huddle of the key players to an international conference appears aimed at ensuring that all those who could influence the conflict are roped into backing any results.

Among those invited are Jordan, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, all backers of the rebels, as well as the Iranian-allied Iraqi government and Lebanon, home to the Shiite Hezbollah guerrilla force that has also sent fighters to shore up Assad.

THE ISSUES

At the heart of the Vienna talks - and the most contentious issue - is the future of Assad.

Participants are trying to resuscitate the 2012 Geneva Communique which called for the formation of a transitional government in Syria that would oversee free and fair elections as part of a broader political transition.

Yet in the 40 months since the communique was signed by Russia, the U.S. and other nations - though not Iran - there has been no movement toward implementing it, mainly because talks have always hit a wall when it comes to what role, if any, Assad should have in the transition.

The United States says it's willing to see Assad participate in the transition but the process must end with him stepping down. Saudi Arabia has said Assad must go first, though it has appeared to soften that stance. Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said Wednesday that Assad must step down "within a specific timeframe."

Iran and Assad contend there is no reason for him to go. He won re-election last year in a vote in the midst of the civil war that Western countries called a sham, and his term does not end until 2021. Russian lawmakers who met Assad last week said he was willing to hold early presidential elections that he would run in - a non-starter for the opposition. Assad's office issued a statement Tuesday reiterating that he would not consider any political initiatives "until after eradicating terrorism."

POTENTIAL BACKLASH

Inviting Iran to the talks, especially if no agreement is reached, could create a backlash. Al-Jubeir, the Saudi foreign minister, said if the talks fail, "we will resort to other options." He did not elaborate, but his words suggest the kingdom would step up military aid to the rebels.

The opposition is eager to see that happen. "Every assistance to Assad must be met with assistance to the opposition," said Bebars al-Talawy, a Homs-based activist.

Rebels and activists in Syria denounced Iran's inclusion. Ahmed Ramadan, a member of the Western-backed opposition-in-exile, the Syrian National Coalition, said inviting Iran ensures the meeting will be a failure and lead to an escalation in fighting.

Another problem is the opposition's lack of unity. The Syrian National Council touts itself as the representative of the opposition, but it has no authority over the dozens of rebel factions battling on the ground, who range from nominally secular nationalists to hard-line Islamic militants. While many have formed alliances, they answer to different commanders and have different international patrons.

The one thing they have in common: They all hate Iran and Russia and are likely to reject any solution that strengthens their hand in Syria or doesn't clearly lead to Assad's departure.

WHAT MIGHT EMERGE?

It's unlikely that a concrete deal on Syria will come out of the talks any time soon - or even a vague, common vision for the future.

The Obama administration has said repeatedly that all the countries must agree on a unified, secular and pluralistic Syria governed with the consent of its people. But even if all sides say that's their goal, that doesn't mean they agree on what it means or how to bring it about.

If the U.S. and its allies contend that vision cannot be reached with Assad in power, Iran and Russia can counter that a fragmented rebellion dominated by Sunni Islamic hard-liners will hardly achieve it either. It's hard to conceive who could bring about such unity and pluralism, with hatreds stoked among Syria's Sunnis, Alawites, Shiites and other sects by nearly five years of mutual slaughter.

At best, the conference might bring a re-commitment to the 2012 Geneva Communique, this time with Iran signed onto it, and perhaps an agreement to begin talks on implementing the transition it calls for, according to U.N. diplomats who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the delicate issue ahead of the talks.

But that would hardly be an advance over 2012.

ANOTHER FALSE DAWN?

Syria's civil war has defied every international effort toward a political settlement. Various international conferences and U.N. observer missions failed to make a difference, and two of the U.N.'s most seasoned diplomats quit in frustration. The Vienna track could similarly crumble.

Any optimism now is based on speculation that Russia is not wedded to keeping Assad in power and that including Iran could be a game-changer.

The biggest accomplishment from the talks may be in building some degree of trust among the powers that have turned Syria's civil war into a proxy conflict. The only reason either side in the war has survived this long is because of outside backing. In Vienna, each side will likely sound out the other for possible confidence-building measures or wiggle-room in their positions that could lead to common ground.

Despite risks, Carson not backing off Nazi, slavery examples

Despite risks, Carson not backing off Nazi, slavery examples

In this Oct. 24, 2015, photo, Republican presidential candidateBen Carson greets audience members after speaking outside the Alpha Gamma Rho fraternity at Iowa State University during a campaign stop in Ames, Iowa. Carson and the other Republican presidential candidates are getting ready for the third GOP debate on Oct. 28, in Boulder, Colo.

  

COCONUT CREEK, Fla. (AP) -- On the eve of the his party's third debate, Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson promised not to curb his penchant for using extreme examples to prove his points, such as equating abortion with slavery and comparing Islamic State fighters to patriots of the American Revolution.

"I don't buy the PC stuff. I just don't buy it," Carson said in a Tuesday interview with The Associated Press. He said the country can discuss complicated issues as adults, and he suggested people could learn from his example.

"One of my goals is to get us to mature as a society," he said. "We should be mature enough to be able to talk about things without going into a tizzy."

To date, Carson's style has not affected his climb through the GOP's ranks to challenge Donald Trump as a front-runner for the Republican nomination. Indeed, many conservatives embrace the unvarnished approach of the retired neurosurgeon who has never before run for office.

Yet Carson's own advisers worry the rhetorical grenades may complicate his ability to go far in the competitive and still unsettled Republican field.

Beyond his outsider status, Carson's appeal comes largely from his identity as a mild-mannered physician with a measured approach to the rough-and-tumble of politics. Regular references to Nazis and slavery, his advisers suggest, could threaten to obscure his larger message as a man with the temperament to quell the acrimony of Washington.

"It is not a (deliberate) strategy," said Carson's communications director, Doug Watts, pointing specifically to Carson's decision to use the Holocaust as a way to illustrate why the U.S. shouldn't enact tougher gun restrictions.

"The Nazis may not be the most perfect comparison," Watts said. "We've spoken to him several times and said, 'You can find better examples,' and he understands that."

Yet a few minutes later, in the interview with AP, Carson again argued against gun control by referencing the Nazis and repeated his recent comments about abortion and slavery.

"What happened in Nazi Germany can never happen again unless we forget it, unless we won't talk about it," Carson said.

He noted that he first linked abortion and slavery two decades ago, as part of his shift from supporting abortion rights to opposing abortion in virtually all cases.

The only major black candidate in the 2016 field of either party, Carson recounted Tuesday how two of his ancestors, brother and sister, were separated by different slave owners.

"It always makes me tear up a little bit when I think about what people had to go through," he said.

"I was never pro-abortion, but I was pro-choice," he said. "I felt that even though I didn't believe in it, I didn't really have the right to say what anybody else did. And the thing that really changed my mind about that was thinking ... that if the abolitionists said that, said, 'Well, I don't believe in slavery, but everybody else can do whatever they want,' I think maybe we may still have slavery."

Carson also often uses extreme moments from his own life when talking with voters, including stories about his violent upbringing in inner-city Detroit. At a public event Tuesday to accept the endorsement of cage fighter Vitor Belfort, Carson said his temper as a teenager prompted him to try "to stab another teenager" years ago.

"By the grace of God, he had on a large metal buckle ... and the knife blade struck it and broke," Carson said. "It shows you how God, he took a knife that I was trying to kill somebody with, and he gave me a knife to save lives."

Carson's place in preference polls hasn't been affected negatively by his statements that he would not support electing a Muslim as president, his equating the passion of Islamic State militants in the Middle East to that of America's Revolutionary War soldiers, and suggesting that prison terms lead some inmates to choose homosexuality.

Even as he spent subsequent days explaining each remark, his fundraising and polls numbers often improved.

"Dr. Carson isn't bound by having to say what you think you have to say, and that's refreshing," supporter Rick Chaffin, a 60-year-old Air Force retiree, said recently at one of the candidate's book signings in Georgia.

Matt Strawn, a former Iowa Republican Party chairman, pointed to Carson's months of outreach in the first caucus state. "Iowa caucus-goers really feel they know who Ben Carson is as a man," he said, "which may help explain why these kind of headline-grabbing statements aren't really having a negative effect."

Watts, the Carson aide, said that for all the staff concerns, the candidate's preparations for the Wednesday debate have not included instructions on avoiding references to slavery or Nazis.

"He'll find his equilibrium," Watts said. "That I'm sure."

The candidate, meanwhile, said he has no qualms about taking the stage as a front-runner alongside Trump: "I relish it."

PRESS RELEASE Philadelphia, PA USA- Power WVSR 1360.1 AM/Power88 The FM announces Gilbert Lomax Jr. and Doris Hall-James: Music Single "Knocks Me Off My Feet" (Single) 2014 Week One Premier, Wednesday, October 2015 at 7pm- Music Cd Cover Featuring and Introducing Amber Middleton, Beauty Model

PRESS RELEASE Philadelphia, PA USA- Power WVSR 1360.1 AM/Power88 The FM announces Gilbert Lomax Jr. and Doris Hall-James: Music Single "Knocks Me Off My Feet" (Single) 2014 Week One Premier, Wednesday, October 2015 at 7pm- Music Cd Cover Featuring and Introducing Amber Middleton, Beauty Model

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Lasers may ease pain for 'napalm girl' in AP photograph

Lasers may ease pain for 'napalm girl' in AP photogr

FILE - In this June 8, 1972, file photo, 9-year-old Kim Phuc, center, runs with her brothers and cousins, followed by South Vietnamese forces, down Route 1 near Trang Bang after a South Vietnamese plane accidentally dropped its flaming napalm on its own troops and civilians. The terrified girl had ripped off her burning clothes while fleeing. In late September 2015, Phuc, 52, began a series of laser treatments at the Miami Dermatology and Laser Institute to smooth and soften the pale, thick scar tissue that she has endured for more than 40 years.

MIAMI (AP) -- In the photograph that made Kim Phuc a living symbol of the Vietnam War, her burns aren't visible - only her agony as she runs wailing toward the camera, her arms flung away from her body, naked because she has ripped off her burning clothes.

More than 40 years later she can hide the scars beneath long sleeves, but a single tear down her otherwise radiant face betrays the pain she has endured since that errant napalm strike in 1972.

Now she has a new chance to heal - a prospect she once thought possible only in a life after death.

"So many years I thought that I have no more scars, no more pain when I'm in heaven. But now - heaven on earth for me!" Phuc says upon her arrival in Miami to see a dermatologist who specializes in laser treatments for burn patients.

Late last month, Phuc, 52, began a series of laser treatments that her doctor, Jill Waibel of the Miami Dermatology and Laser Institute, says will smooth and soften the pale, thick scar tissue that ripples from her left hand up her arm, up her neck to her hairline and down almost all of her back.

Even more important to Phuc, Waibel says the treatments also will relieve the deep aches and pains that plague her to this day.

With Phuc are her husband, Bui Huy Toan, and another man who has been part of her life since she was 9 years old: Los Angeles-based Associated Press photojournalist Nick Ut.

"He's the beginning and the end," Phuc says of the man she calls "Uncle Ut." ''He took my picture and now he'll be here with me with this new journey, new chapter."

It was Ut, now 65, who captured Phuc's agony on June 8, 1972, after the South Vietnamese military accidentally dropped napalm on civilians in Phuc's village, Trang Bang, outside Saigon.

Ut remembers the girl screaming in Vietnamese, "Too hot! Too hot!" He put her in the AP van where she crouched on the floor, her burnt skin raw and peeling off her body as she sobbed, "I think I'm dying, too hot, too hot, I'm dying."

He took her to a hospital. Only then did he return to the Saigon bureau to file his photographs, including the one of Phuc on fire that would win the Pulitzer Prize.

Phuc suffered serious burns over a third of her body; at that time, most people who sustained such injuries over 10 percent of their bodies died, Waibel says.

Napalm sticks like a jelly, so there was no way for victims like Phuc to outrun the heat, as they could in a regular fire. "The fire was stuck on her for a very long time," Waibel says, and destroyed her skin down through the layer of collagen, leaving her with scars almost four times as thick as normal skin.

While she spent years doing painful exercises to preserve her range of motion, her left arm still doesn't extend as far as her right arm, and her desire to learn how to play the piano has been thwarted by stiffness in her left hand. Tasks as simple as carrying her purse on her left side are too difficult.

"As a child, I loved to climb on the tree, like a monkey," picking the best guavas, tossing them down to her friends, Phuc says. "After I got burned, I never climbed on the tree anymore and I never played the game like before with my friends. It's really difficult. I was really, really disabled."

Triggered by scarred nerve endings that misfire at random, her pain is especially acute when the seasons change in Canada, where Phuc defected with her husband in the early 1990s. The couple live outside Toronto, and they have two sons, ages 21 and 18.

Phuc says her Christian faith brought her physical and emotional peace "in the midst of hatred, bitterness, pain, loss, hopelessness," when the pain seemed insurmountable.

"No operation, no medication, no doctor can help to heal my heart. The only one is a miracle, (that) God love me," she says. "I just wish one day I am free from pain."

Ut thinks of Phuc as a daughter, and he worried when, during their regular phone calls, she described her pain. When he travels now in Vietnam, he sees how the war lingers in hospitals there, in children born with defects attributed to Agent Orange and in others like Phuc, who were caught in napalm strikes. If their pain continues, he wonders, how much hope is there for Phuc?

Ut says he's worried about the treatments. "Forty-three years later, how is laser doing this? I hope the doctor can help her. ... When she was 18 or 20, but now she's over 50! That's a long time."

\Waibel has been using lasers to treat burn scars, including napalm scars, for about a decade. Each treatment typically costs $1,500 to $2,000, but Waibel offered to donate her services when Phuc contacted her for a consultation. Waibel's father-in-law had heard Phuc speak at a church several years ago, and he approached her after hearing her describe her pain.

At the first treatment in Waibel's office, a scented candle lends a comforting air to the procedure room, and Phuc's husband holds her hand in prayer.

Phuc tells Waibel her pain is "10 out of 10" - the worst of the worst.

The type of lasers being used on Phuc's scars originally were developed to smooth out wrinkles around the eyes, Waibel says. The lasers heat skin to the boiling point to vaporize scar tissue. Once sedatives have been administered and numbing cream spread thickly over Phuc's skin, Waibel dons safety glasses and aims the laser. Again and again, a red square appears on Phuc's skin, the laser fires with a beep and a nurse aims a vacuum-like hose at the area to catch the vapor.

The procedure creates microscopic holes in the skin, which allows topical, collagen-building medicines to be absorbed deep through the layers of tissue.

Waibel expects Phuc to need up to seven treatments over the next eight or nine months.

Wrapped in blankets, drowsy from painkillers, her scarred skin a little red from the procedure, Phuc made a little fist pump. Compared to the other surgeries and skin grafts when she was younger, the lasers were easier to take.

"This was so light, just so easy," she says.

A couple weeks later, home in Canada, Phuc says her scars have reddened and feel tight and itchy as they heal - but she's eager to continue the treatments.

"Maybe it takes a year," she says. "But I am really excited - and thankful."

Carter: Soldier heroically entered Kurdish-IS firefight

Carter: Soldier heroically entered Kurdish-IS firefight
 

FILE - In this Sept. 30, 2015, file photo Defense Secretary Ash Carter speaks to reporters during a news conference at the Pentagon. Carter says the American soldier killed in the mission that rescued 70 hostages from an Islamic State prison in Iraq was a hero for rushing into a firefight to defend his Kurdish partners, even though the plan called for the Kurds to do the fighting on their own. On Oct. 23, Carter applauded 39-year-old Army Master Sgt. Joshua L. Wheeler of Roland, Oklahoma, who died of his wounds Oct. 22.

  

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The U.S. soldier fatally wounded in a hostage rescue mission in Iraq heroically inserted himself into a firefight to defend Kurdish soldiers, even though the plan called for the Kurds to do the fighting, Defense Secretary Ash Carter said Friday.

"This is someone who saw the team that he was advising and assisting coming under attack, and he rushed to help them and made it possible for them to be effective, and in doing that lost his own life," Carter told a Pentagon news conference.

Carter applauded Army Master Sgt. Joshua L. Wheeler, 39, of Roland, Oklahoma, who died of his wounds Thursday.

The defense chief gave the most extensive public description yet of what transpired during the pre-dawn raid on an Islamic State prison compound near the town of Hawija. About 70 people, including at least 20 members of the Iraqi security forces, were freed. It was the first time U.S. troops had become involved in direct ground combat in Iraq since the war against the Islamic State was launched in August 2014, and Wheeler was the first U.S. combat death.

Carter said he expects U.S. forces to be involved in more such raids against Islamic State targets, describing it as part and parcel of what the Pentagon calls a "train, advise and assist" mission in support of Iraqi forces. At one point he said, "It doesn't represent assuming a combat role" - but later, in noting that it is difficult to see the full picture of what happened during the Hawija raid, he said: "This is combat. It's complex."

Carter portrayed Wheeler as a hero and said he would be present when Wheeler's body is returned to the U.S. on Saturday.

"As the compound was being stormed, the plan was not for the U.S. ... forces to enter the compound or be involved in the firefight," Carter said. "However, when a firefight ensued, this American did what I'm very proud that Americans do in that situation, and he ran to the sound of the guns and he stood up. All the indications are that it was his actions and that of one of his teammates that protected those who were involved in breaching the compound and made the mission a success."

"That is an inherent risk that we ask people to assume," Carter added. "Again, it wasn't part of the plan, but it was something that he did, and I'm immensely proud that he did that."

Carter noted that his understanding of what happened is based on early reports.

After his remarks at the Pentagon, other U.S. officials said the plan for the rescue mission had called for the U.S. special operations troops, who are members of the elite and secretive Delta Force, to stay back from the prison compound and let the Kurds do the fighting. The Americans transported the Kurds to the scene aboard five U.S. helicopters.

Carter said the U.S. and its Kurdish partners collected valuable intelligence at the scene, including documents and electronics. This, he said, shows "the great value of raids of this kind, and I expect we'll do more of these kinds of things."

In explaining his decision to approve the use of U.S. troops to support the Kurds in their rescue mission, Carter said there was intelligence indicating that those inside the prison compound faced mass execution by their Islamic State captors.

"Their graves had already been prepared," he said. Asked how he knew this, Carter said: "It happens that we had seen that beforehand. We were watching this compound" after Kurdish authorities determined that it held numerous hostages.

"The graves were right next door to the compound," he said, adding that although it was impossible to know for certain that their purpose was to dispose of executed prisoners, "it sure looked like that."

Wheeler was flown from the scene after suffering his wounds and died after receiving medical treatment in Irbil in northern Iraq.

He was assigned to the U.S. Army Special Operations Command in Fort Bragg, North Carolina.

U.S. combat troops have rarely, if ever, participated directly in combat against IS fighters on the ground since the U.S. mission began in 2014. The U.S. has mostly limited its role to training and advising Iraqi and Kurdish forces, airdropping humanitarian relief supplies and providing daily airstrikes in IS-held areas of Iraq and Syria.

Doris J. Hall-James and Gilbert F. Lomax Jr.: Simply Music Studio Offers Music Alternative in Philadelphia and Yeadon Borough by Van Stone frontpagenews1@yahoo.com (267) 293-9201

Doris J. Hall-James and Gilbert F. Lomax Jr.: Simply Music Studio Offers Music Alternative in Philadelphia and Yeadon Borough by Van Stone frontpagenews1@yahoo.com (267) 293-9201

Above: Doris J. Hall-James, Master Music Professional,

Studio Owner/CEO of the Simply Music Incorporated Music Studio.

West Philadelphia/Yeadon Borough- Doris J. Hall-James, Master Music Professional, studio owner/CEO of the Simply Music Incorporated music studio, and Gilbert Franklin Lomax Jr., a Master Music Professional as well, encourage youth and adults to volunteer in helping recording sessions which changes lives. 

One fine goal of Hall-James, who is the studio owner and the CEO of Simply Music, is to ensure you feel at ease there so that you can relax, work effectively, and enjoy the music recording process.

Doris and Gilbert, of the Simply Music studio, are skilled music producers, and they receive donations from businesses and families to help fund studio time for young people and adults.

Through the program which is a non-profit, young people and adults who do community service are encouraged to take musical instrument lessons (piano, flute, guitar, and other aspects of music training such as vocal coaching, songwriting, music theory studio recording, and music software). The results of the lessons are posted in a newsletter and newspaper involving the Yeadon Borough Mayor, the Yeadon Borough Public Library, and local and national music artists in Philadelphia.    

For more serious lessons, “students and professionals receive recording studio time at the Simply Music studio at a cost,” says Doris, owner, a skilled piano lesson instructor, and formerly a singer, has performed in Philadelphia and surrounding areas over the years and regularly teaches at the Simply Music Studio located at 251 South 60^th Street near the corner of 60^th and Irving Street West Philadelphia. 

Gilbert’s musical career, spanned five decades, has earned his reputation as a top creator of Soul, Gospel, Jazz music, and more.  He has distinguished himself as a “songwriter, a producer, an arranger, and a music studio executive for Doris’s and his Green Room Audio Sounds Studio (GRASS),” says Lomax Jr. The Green Room Audio Sounds Studio is located in West Philadelphia also. 

And outside of music, “I’m also a military veteran, a gardening advocate, and helped launch singing careers in r & b music,” he said during a Green Room Sounds Project discussion.

Both Doris and Gilbert have earned their reputation as leaders of music education and entertainment in the studio in the city and borough.

And “their work at the music studio promotes volunteering in the street and work activity,” says the Mayor of the Yeadon Borough, Mayor Rohan Hepkins when meeting about the Simply Music song producers effort to help reduce violence in both Yeadon and Philadelphia areas. 

Doris and Gilbert have been writing songs for musicians and want to give back to the music community that's helped them over the years. 

They are trying to use music and sound as a means to U-turn students in the direction of achievement.  Youth and Adults who are interested in making use of the Simply Music studio can also volunteer in ways they believe can build success. 

Musical instrument volunteer teachers and volunteer clerical workers are welcome to help. 

Until others start coming along to help support the non-profit group, Simply Music studio is funded solely by Doris and Gilbert. A few sponsors have helped with musical equipment needed to build the studio.  

To learn more, to donate, to volunteer, or to take lessons: call 267-603-3767 or e-mail simplymusic1@verizon.net or lomaxg2@verizon.net.