In the Nation

NEW HAVEN, Conn. - Incan artifacts removed from Machu Picchu nearly a century ago and held by Yale University belong to the people of Peru, Sen. Christopher J. Dodd said Wednesday.

Peru has had a lawsuit pending in federal court since 2008 demanding that Yale return artifacts taken by scholar Hiram Bingham 3d between 1911 and 1915. Yale said that it returned dozens of boxes of artifacts in 1921.

Dodd, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and chairman of its subcommittee on Latin America, traveled to the region last week and met with Peruvian President Alan Garcia and other government officials to discuss the dispute.

The Connecticut Democrat, who is retiring, said he had worked for years to seek a resolution. - AP

NEW YORK - A gas-station attendant detained last month in Massachusetts during the investigation of the failed Times Square bombing now is in custody in New York, authorities said Wednesday.

At a brief federal court appearance in New York on Wednesday, Aftab Khan was given a court-appointed attorney after he said he couldn't afford to hire his own. Khan and two other men were detained last month on immigration charges as authorities followed the money trail in their inquiry about terrorism suspect Faisal Shahzad.

Prosecutors said there were still no criminal charges against Khan but declined further comment. Authorities say that during days of voluntary questioning, Shahzad admitted rigging an SUV with a crude homemade bomb and planting it on a bustling section of Times Square on May 1. It failed to explode. - AP

COLUMBIA, S.C. - South Carolina's Democratic Party has asked its own Senate nominee to withdraw after learning the man has been charged with a felony.

Chairwoman Carol Fowler said she asked Alvin Greene to withdraw from the campaign against Sen. Jim DeMint on Wednesday after the Associated Press reported Greene had been charged with a felony. On Tuesday, Greene stunned state Democratic Party leaders by defeating a former state lawmaker, despite having no organized campaign.

Court records show Greene was arrested in November and charged with showing obscene Internet photos to a University of South Carolina student. Greene declined to comment earlier Wednesday. - AP

A judge has dismissed all Arizona charges against polygamist leader Warren Jeffs after the two alleged victims in the cases no longer wanted to proceed with prosecution. Judge Steven Conn on Wednesday granted a prosecutor's motion to dismiss the four charges of sexual conduct with a minor.

Four Providence police officers and 20 other people have been indicted in a wide-ranging Rhode Island cocaine investigation. Three of the officers had been arrested previously, and a fourth turned himself in Wednesday. State Police Superintendent Brendan Doherty said the indictments concluded a wiretap investigation begun last year.