The News in 2 Minutes

From The Associated Press

US formally protests Iranian ship harassment

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The United States on Thursday lodged a formal diplomatic protest with Iran over an incident last weekend in which Iranian speedboats harassed U.S. warships in the Persian Gulf.

The protest repeats U.S. complaints about Sunday’s “provocative” action in the Strait of Hormuz and was sent to the Iranian Foreign Ministry via the Swiss Embassy in Tehran, which represents U.S. interests in Iran, the State Department said.

In Tehran, Iranian Foreign Ministry officials said they were unaware of the U.S. protest.

At a Pentagon news conference, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said the Iranian boats had acted “in a pretty aggressive manner.”

Arizona moves forward on auto emissions rules

PHOENIX ?—Arizona environmental regulators are moving to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from passenger automobiles.

The Department of Environmental Quality on Thursday issued draft rules that Director Steve Owens says could be formally approved by early summer.

However, the rules cannot take effect without federal permission. Arizona and other states are suing the federal government to allow their rules to take effect.

The department is acting a 2006 executive order by Gov. Janet Napolitano on climate change.

DEQ says the proposed rules include tailpipe emission standards for new vehicles, requirements for the sale of some zero-emissions vehicles in the state and reduction of greenhouse gas emissions overall from new vehicles sold in Arizona. The rules would apply to vehicles beginning with the 2011 model year.

Bush demands end of Israeli occupation

JERUSALEM — President Bush called for a halt to Israel’s military occupation of land the Palestinians claim for a state and an end to the terrorist threat over the Jewish homeland, spelling out the U.S. bottom line Thursday for ending the long and bloody Mideast conflict.

“Now is the time to make difficult choices,” Bush said. An agreement will require “painful concessions” by both sides, Bush said, but he predicted one could be reached within a year, putting himself more firmly on the line than ever for an achievement considered unlikely by many experts.

The White House said Bush would return to the Mideast at least once and possibly more this year, including another stop in Israel for its 60th anniversary celebrations in May.

Bush came away with no breakthroughs or apparent concessions from two days of separate talks with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in Jerusalem and with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in the Palestinian West Bank. There was no joint meeting of the three leaders, but Olmert and Abbas assured Bush they were serious about reaching an agreement.

Bush’s peacemaking checklist, combining existing U.S. policy with a few new elements, was his most detailed summary yet of U.S. expectations for resolving some of the hardest issues in a final peace accord. He outlined his position in a five-minute statement to reporters summoned to a room in the King David Hotel, overlooking Jerusalem’s holy and historic Old City.

The biggest hurdles to an agreement are: conflicting claims to the holy city of Jerusalem, different views about the outlines of a future Palestinian state, and the fate of Palestinian refugees and millions of their descendants. Bush pointedly dodged the Jerusalem question, simply calling it “one of the most difficult challenges on the road to peace.”

In Washington, the State Department announced that the United States would make an initial 2008 donation of $40 million to the U.N agency that assists the more than four million Palestinian refugees in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. It said in a statement that more contributions would be made throughout the year.

Sir Edmund Hillary dies; first to climb Mt. Everest

WELLINGTON, New Zealand—Sir Edmund Hillary, the unassuming beekeeper who conquered Mount Everest to win renown as one of the 20th century’s greatest adventurers, has died, New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark announced Friday. He was 88.

He had pride in his feats. Returning to base camp as the man who took the first step onto the top of the world’s highest peak, he declared: “We knocked the bastard off.”

The accomplishment as part of a British climbing expedition even added luster to the coronation of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II four days later, and she knighted Hillary as one of her first act.

But he was more proud of his decades-long campaign to set up schools and health clinics in Nepal, the homeland of Tenzing Norgay, the mountain guide with whom he stood arm in arm on the summit of Everest on May 29, 1953.

New driver’s licenses rules meant to deter terrorists

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Americans born after Dec. 1, 1964, will have to get more secure driver’s licenses in the next six years under ambitious post-9/11 security rules to be unveiled Friday by federal officials.

The Homeland Security Department has spent years crafting the final regulations for the REAL ID Act, a law designed to make it harder for terrorists, illegal immigrants and con artists to get government-issued identification.

REAL ID still faces stiff opposition from civil liberties groups.