NPR 2012-04-21

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Zimmermen's wife Shellie said that he’s not a flight risk, that he’s not a violent person. His father said as much as the same thing. His mother testified on his behalf, saying that he'd worked as a mentor⁵ for a young African-American teenager, and that he also had worked organizing aid for a homeless man who'd been beaten in the town of Sanford. 

 

NPR's Greg Allen.

 

Norway's confessed mass killer⁶ Anders Behring Breivik has been telling a court exactly how he murdered some of his victims. Seventy-seven people died in last year's attacks, most of them youths. NPR's Philip Reeves says survivors⁷ listened to Breivik's account in horror.

 

Breivik's testimony⁸ was relayed to nearby courtrooms, where survivors and relatives of the victims had gathered. They sobbed⁹ and hugged, as the Norwegian described how he mowed¹⁰ down panic-stricken teenagers at a youth summer camp on a small island outside Oslo. Breivik said some of them were so paralyzed with fear. They stood perfectly¹¹ still and couldn't run. Breivik said he couldn't recall parts of the rampage, but he described some killings¹² in gruesome detail. He remembered shooting young people as they begged for their lives. He also spoke¹³ of his motions after arriving on the island, disguised as a policeman before opening fire. “My whole body tried to revolt when I took the weapon in my hand,” he said, “there were 100 voices in my head saying ‘Don't do it.’” Philip Reeves, NPR News.

 

The World Health Organization is urging couples to seek HIV testing together, and if one partner is infected, NPR's Richard Knox says, the WHO recommends antiviral treatment to protect the uninfected partner.

 

Up to now, the WHO has emphasized HIV testing for individuals. Now it says couples should get tested together, so both partners know the results. When one partner is infected, that person should start taking HIV drugs, even if they’re not yet medically necessary. That's because recent research shows treatment usually prevents transmission to the uninfected partner. The WHO says many new infections around the world occur in couples where one partner is infected, but most people don't know their HIV status. The new recommendation expands the number of people eligible¹⁴ for treatment with HIV drugs, which cost about 100 dollars a year in developing countries. Right now nearly seven million are on treatment, about half the eligibles¹⁵. Richard Knox, NPR News.

 

Dow's up 75 points.

 

This is NPR.

 

Skepticism is growing within the international community that any measure of a Syrian ceasefire will hold. Some say that if anything, a truce¹⁶ never had a chance to take hold. As a result, a proposal by Russia and the European Union to send up to 300 additional UN monitors to Syria is running into resistance in the Security Council. There currently is about 30 monitors on the ground. Further fueling doubts about the ceasefire, more reports today that Syrian troops have fired on thousands of protesters who rallied after Friday's prayers, and state media say a roadside explosion has killed ten soldiers. 

 

Recently independent South Sudan is ordering the immediate¹⁷ withdrawal¹⁸ of its troops from a strategic oil field across the border in the North, but NPR's Ofeibea Quist-Arcton reports Sudan claims its forces have liberated¹⁹ the disputed region. 

 

Sudan says its army has driven Southern soldiers out of Heglig after heavy fighting. South Sudan occupied the Heglig oil field which the South calls Panthou last week, defying international calls to pull out, saying it wanted a UN buffer²⁰ force deployed²¹. Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir has been threatening a regime change in Juba, the South’s capital. He says he should never have conceded independence in July to his erstwhile foes²². Bashir's incendiary comments describing South Sudan's leaders as insects from whom the South must be liberated pumped up the pressure between the two neighbors, prompting fears of a return to war. Ofeibea Quist-Arcton, NPR News, Dakar.

 

US stocks mixed with the Dow up 74 points, NASDAQ off one and the S&P 500 gaining three points at last glance. 

 

I’m Lakshmi Singh, NPR News.

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