Dozens

North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple should not sign any of the legislature's half-dozen bills that seek to subvert a well-established constitutional right to abortion. Late last week, the North Dakota legislature passed a bill that would ban a woman from having an abortion as soon as the heartbeat of the fetus is detected, which can happen as early as six weeks into a pregnancy. If Republican Gov. Jack Dalrymple signs it into law, North Dakota will have the ignominious distinction of being the most restrictive state in the country on abortion.

Masako Unoura-Tanaka fears that the world will forget the horror of March 11, 2011, when 100-foot-tall swells barreled into northeastern Japan. The tsunami, triggered by a magnitude 9 quake, killed more than 18,000 people and battered nuclear reactors in Fukushima, setting off the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl. Unoura-Tanaka had been visiting relatives in coastal Kesennuma that day and escaped by abandoning her vehicle and climbing to the top of a four-story building. "When I was on the roof, I was watching these ladies," she said.

Los Angeles County Assessor John Noguez, who has been in jail since his October arrest on two dozen corruption charges, finally made bail on Friday. Noguez is accused of taking $185,000 in bribes from Ramin Salari, a prominent property tax consultant and generous Noguez campaign fundraiser. In return for the cash, Noguez is alleged to have lowered property tax bills for some of Salari's wealthy clients. Both Noguez and Salari pleaded not guilty following their Oct. 17 arrest, and have vigorously denied any wrongdoing.

WASHINGTON - With budget talks in tatters and his top priorities tied up in the Senate, President Obama took his Republican opponents out to dinner Wednesday, part of a multi-step, multi-meal plan to thaw the chilly relations with Congress that threaten his second-term agenda. Obama and nearly a dozen GOP senators broke bread at the elegant Jefferson Hotel near the White House, a meeting the host and guests billed as another chance to revisit stalled negotiations over the nation's deficit.

When Junior's Deli closed in late December, longtime customers lined up for a last, nostalgic nosh at the 53-year-old Westside institution. But Brian Won's main reaction was "meh. " "The food was unremarkable," said the West Los Angeles IT specialist, 32, who visited to use up a Groupon voucher. "Given that there are so many good places to eat in L.A., I have a really hard time saying yes to that. " Increasing apathy, particularly from younger patrons, has driven traditional Jewish delicatessens from their mid-century pinnacle.

BEIRUT - A powerful car bomb ripped through central Damascus, the Syrian capital, on Thursday, killing dozens and dramatizing the wide gulf between the persistent violence and fledgling efforts to jump-start peace talks in the country's almost 2-year-old war. State news media said at least 53 people were killed and 235 injured in a devastating midmorning attack that yielded disturbing images of smoldering vehicles and charred and dismembered bodies...

CORONADO - On most days, a three-mile stretch of Silver Strand beach here is used for training Navy SEALs, sailors and Marines. Thursday was not a usual day. Dozens of sailors spent the morning in a slow, head-down walk along the restricted beach, searching for detritus that could harm the Western snowy plover and the California least tern, two imperiled bird populations that use the strand for nesting. "This is our office," said sailor Daniel Torres, 26, from New Mexico, one of the Navy beachmasters - specialists in bringing vehicles and other heavy equipment ashore from amphibious assault ships.

BEIRUT - More than two dozen people, many of them children, have been killed in the bombardment of a neighborhood in the embattled northern Syrian city of Aleppo, opposition activists said Tuesday. The incident is the latest reported attack with mass casualties in the historic city, once Syria's commercial hub but for more than seven months a battleground where remaining residents face frequent threats. At least 31 civilians, 14 of them children, were killed in the strike late Monday on the rebel-controlled Jabal Badro district, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a Britain-based pro-opposition group.

WASHINGTON - A clandestine Chinese military unit has conducted sophisticated cyber espionage operations against dozens of American and Canadian companies, according to a private report that provides unusual new details about China's involvement in cyber theft of economic and trade secrets. The report by computer security firm Mandiant Corp. in Alexandria, Va., breaks new ground by attributing attacks against 141 companies to a specific 12-story office building in the financial center of Shanghai.

Nguyen Hoang Vi was knocked from her motorcycle in an accident she believes was no accident. The windows of a car she was riding in were smashed nine months later, gashing her arms, legs and face, she told activists . Last spring her passport was taken away, rights groups say. Then, in December, police arrested and stripped her, saying she was hiding “illegal exhibits” inside her body, she alleged . State nurses forcibly searched her...