Meanwhile President Obama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel are warning Russia could face further economic sanction if the situation in Ukraine does not improve. NPR’s Scott Horsley reports the leaders are focusing their attention on plan Ukrainian election later this month. 

 

Governments in the US and especially Europe have been worried about sanction in whole section in the Russian economy for fear that could rebound and hit their own citizens in the pocket book. But after White House meeting with Merkel, Obama said they may have no choice. 

 

Russian leadership must know that if it continues to destabilize eastern Ukraine and disrupt this month’s presidential election, we will move quickly on additional steps, including further sanctions that will impose greater cost.

 

While largely united on Ukraine, Merkel said she and Obama still have differences to work out over US surveillance tactics. US-German ties were freed by reports that American spies had listened in on Merkel’s own telephone.  Scott Horsley, NPR News, the White House. 

 

President Obama says this week’s botched execution of inmate in Oklahoma is deeply troubling.  NPR’s Carrie Johnson reports he asks the Justice Department to study problems with capital punishment. 

 

The Perez says the death penalty is appropriated for certain terrible crime including mass killings and murder of children but he says he worries about racial bias and situation where inmates on death roll have later been proving innocent. He says the growth of execution of Oklahoma prisoner raises significant questions about how capital punishment is applied and carried out. The president has asked Attorney General Eric Holder to prepare analysis of the death penalty and confront some difficult question about uneven justice. Carrie Johnson, NPR News, Washington.

 

Partial victory for both parties in a legal fight between the device makers Apple and Samsung after the liberation has began this week the four men, four women join the determine, Samsung infringed on Apple smartphone patents in order to pay 120 million dollars in damages still that well below the 2.2 billion Apple has been seeking. The NNNNN even more importantly the judge did not granted Apple to permanent injunction they sought against the sale of Samsung phones. Jury also ruled against Apple at least one instance order they paid to the Korean smartphone maker 148,000 dollars in damages. 

 

A down into the week on Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 45 points, end the session 16,512. The NASDAQ lost three points today to close at 4,123. The S&P 500 dropped two points. 

 

You are listening to NPR News in Washington.

 

An apparent ceasefire in the Syrian city of Homos where government and rebel troops now agreed to 48-hour cooling off period aimed to allow hundreds of fighters hold up in the city’s old quarters to evacuate. The move likely mean the city once held as the capital of the revolution named NNN Syrian President Bashar al-Assad will fell back into government control. The ceasefire follows an intense pounding of rebel-held district by government forces. Evacuation is expected to begin tomorrow.

 

House Speaker John Boehner says he will create a select committee to investigate the attack on American diplomatic post in Benghazi, Libya. NPR’s Esphy Dultei reports the move keeps issue alive through the coming midterm election.

 

Four Americans including the ambassador to Libya died in the September 11th 2012 attack on the US compound in Benghazi. The incident has since become the major issue for conservative politicians in media who charge cover up by the Obama administration. In a statement, Boehner says he will bring the creation of select committee to the floor for a vote to build on the work of other houses committee over the past two years. In his own statement, democratic senate majority leader Harry Reid says multiple investigation into the attacks have not found malfeasance and that Republicans are trying to gin up for political food fight. Esphy Dultei, NPR News, Washington.

 

Californian congressman says a teen stowaway in airplane wheel well winding up in Hawaii should never be able to access the plane. Congressman Eric Swalwell announcing today plans to ask the transportation security administration to test its perimeter alert systems at several US airports on the heels of the incident. The team from Santa Clara, California said he jumped a fence to get into the airports surviving the 5.5-hour flight, in spite of frigid temperatures where apparently embarking on the journey to see his mother who is in refugee camp in eastern Ethiopia.