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SYRIA

Family: ISIS chief raped U.S. hostage

American hostage Kayla Mueller was repeatedly forced to have sex with Abu Bakr Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic State group, U.S. intelligence officials told her family in June.

"They told us that he married her, and we all understand what that means," Carl Mueller, Kayla's father, told the Associated Press on Friday, which would have been his daughter's 27th birthday. Her death was reported in February.

Her mother, Marsha Mueller, added, "Kayla did not marry this man. He took her to his room and he abused her and she came back crying."

Mueller was held for a time by Islamic State financier Abu Sayyaf and his wife, known as Umm Sayyaf. Baghdadi took Mueller as a "wife," repeatedly raping her when he visited, according to a Yazidi teenager who was held with Mueller and escaped in October 2014. - AP
NORTH KOREA

Clocks turned back

Bells were rung in Pyongyang and celebrations held at midnight as the nation's clocks were set back 30 minutes to mark the Aug. 15, 1945 anniversary of the Korean Peninsula's liberation from colonial rule at the end of World War II. The new time zone, which North Korea calls "Pyongyang Time," was adopted by the then-unified Korea in 1908, but changed to the Japanese time zone on Jan. 1, 1912, two years after the peninsula was colonized.

- AP

ISRAEL

Hunger strike

A Palestinian prisoner who has refused food for 60 days lost consciousness Friday after a battle that pitted Israeli doctors against their government in a dramatic test of a new law that permits force-feeding of hunger strikers. Despite the law, two teams of doctors refused to force food down the throat of Mohammed Allan, saying it violated ethics. - McClatchy Newspapers

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