In the Nation

EL PASO, Texas - A U.S. appeals court yesterday denied the U.S. government's latest bid to keep anti-Castro Cuban militant Luis Posada Carriles jailed until his trial next month on immigration-fraud charges.

The decision by the New Orleans-based Fifth Circuit Court reversed a decision last week to temporarily block Posada, 79, from being released from the Otero County, N.M., jail on $250,000 bond.

One of his lawyers said it was unclear when the former CIA operative could be set free. Dean Boyd, a Justice Department spokesman, said his agency was evaluating its options.

The governments of both Venezuela, where he is a naturalized citizen, and his native Cuba want Posada extradited to Venezuela to face charges that he was in Caracas when he plotted the deadly 1976 bombing of a Cuban jet.- AP

POTOSI, Mo. - Seven more charges, including attempted murder, have been filed against a former pizzeria manager accused of kidnapping two boys and holding one of them for four years.

Michael Devlin, 41, was already charged with kidnapping Ben Ownby, 13, in January in Franklin County and kidnapping Shawn Hornbeck, then 11, in 2002 in Washington County. The boys were found Jan. 12 at Devlin's Kirkwood apartment.

Washington County prosecutor John Rupp filed the additional charges Monday, accusing Devlin of attempted murder, kidnapping, armed criminal action, three counts of forcible sodomy and one count of attempted forcible sodomy.

Michael Kielty, an attorney for Devlin, said prosecutors had not shared details of the allegations against his client. - AP

WASHINGTON - The State Department wants to slash the number of years foreign employees must work at U.S. embassies or consulates before they can apply for American citizenship.

To reward foreigners who have worked in difficult and dangerous conditions and may be at risk, particularly in Iraq and Afghanistan, the department said it would ask Congress to cut the requirement from 15 years to three.

"We want to do right by people who have served well and honorably on behalf of their country and the United States," department spokesman Sean McCormack said yesterday.

The proposal would authorize the secretary of State "under exceptional circumstances" to permit foreign-service nationals to apply sooner for special immigrant visas. - AP

A former student at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell, Nikhil Dhar, 23, was sentenced yesterday to four to five years in prison for stabbing a professor in the neck in 2005 because she gave him a failing grade.

Two Secret Service officers were injured in an accidental shooting yesterday in a security booth at the southwest gate of the White House. Secret Service spokeswoman Kim Bruce said one officer was injured in the leg and the other had a shrapnel wound in his face. The gun involved was a service-issued weapon, she said.

Surveillance tapes that allegedly show a Houston youth-prison guard and a teenage inmate entering a closet surfaced days after a grand jury declined to indict him on abuse charges.