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McCain calls for surge in Afghanistan

ALBUQUERQUE, July 15 (UPI) -- John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee for U.S. president, said Tuesday the strategy that worked in Iraq can work in Afghanistan.

The Arizona senator, speaking at a town hall meeting in Albuquerque, attacked his likely opponent, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., for his views on U.S. policy in the two countries.

"Senator Obama will tell you we can't win in Afghanistan without losing in Iraq," McCain said. "In fact, he has it exactly backwards. It is precisely the success of the surge in Iraq that shows us the way to succeed in Afghanistan. It is by applying the tried and true principles of counter-insurgency used in the surge -- which Senator Obama opposed -- that we will win in Afghanistan."

McCain said that the success of the surge in Iraq means that troops will be available for a similar increase in U.S. forces in Afghanistan. He said that NATO also needs a counter-insurgency strategy and an integrated command.

Medvedev: No new arms race

MOSCOW, July 15 (UPI) -- Russian President Dmitry Medvedev says he won't allow challenges from the United States and NATO to draw the country into a new nuclear arms race.

Medvedev said Tuesday such an arms race would be harmful to Russia's economy and development as a post-Soviet Union state, the Russian information agency Novosti reported Tuesday.

Medvedev delivered a new set of foreign policy guidelines to the country's senior diplomatic corps in Moscow. He said Russia was unalterably opposed to moves by the United States to establish a missile defense shield in Eastern Europe and to weaponize outer space, moves that he said could trigger an arms race.

The Russian president also cast doubt on the effectiveness of "military-political blocs" like NATO, which he said weren't capable of addressing the threats and challenges of the modern world. Instead, he proposed instituting broader "network diplomacy" to tackle them, Novosti said.

Bush vetoes bill restoring Medicare pay

WASHINGTON, July 15 (UPI) -- U.S. President Bush vetoed a bill Tuesday that would have restored a cut in Medicare payments to doctors, saying he did not support the method used to fund it.

Congress is expected to override the veto, The Hill reported.

The president said that he backs restoration of the 10.6 percent cut, but not the means used to fund it. Congress moved money from private Medicare Advantage plans.

"Taking choices away from seniors to pay physicians is wrong," Bush said. "I urge the Congress to send me a bill that reduces the growth in Medicare spending, increases competition and efficiency, implements principles of value-driven health care and appropriately offsets increases in physician spending."

Bush said that the bill would risk prescription benefits available through Medicare Part D and hurt the 9.6 million people enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans.

The bill passed both houses of Congress by veto-proof margins, 355-59 in the House and 69-30 in the Senate. A number of Republican senators have already promised to vote to override the president.

Peres pardons Lebanese terrorist

JERUSALEM, July 15 (UPI) -- Israeli President Shimon Peres on Tuesday pardoned a notorious Lebanese prisoner after the Israeli Cabinet approved a prisoner exchange with Hezbollah.

In his message Peres said that he spoke to the families of Samir Kuntar's victims before making the decision, Haaretz reported. Kuntar was sentenced to life in prison for killing four people in a 1979 attack. "In this decision there is no forgiveness or absolution for the murderer's heinous actions," Peres said. "I will not forget and I won't forgive."

Peres, who signed the pardon less than 12 hours before the scheduled exchange, said that Kuntar's release depends on Hezbollah meeting its pledges, The Jerusalem Post reported.

Earlier Tuesday, the Cabinet approved the exchange of Kuntar and four other Lebanese prisoners for Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, two reservists kidnapped two years ago.

Families of Goldwasser and Regev renewed their calls on Cabinet ministers to support the prisoner swap with Hezbollah, Haaretz said. Family members said they were concerned that criticism of Hezbollah's report on Arad may give the terrorist group an excuse for voiding the deal.

Bush officials can't recall Tillman facts

WASHINGTON, July 15 (UPI) -- A U.S. congressional committee report criticized the "near universal lack of recall" by the Bush administration about the friendly-fire death of Pat Tillman.

The report from the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee said administration officials turned over 1,500 pages of e-mails and other documents related the to 2004 death the National Football League star-turned Army Ranger in Afghanistan, but none contained any mention of "fratricide," the San Jose Mercury-News reported Tuesday.

Committee investigators also said their interviews with such White House figures as communications chiefs Scott McClellan and Dan Bartlett and speechwriter Michael Gerson yielded nothing but "I don't recall" answers about when they or U.S. President George Bush first learned Tillman didn't die fighting the Taliban as the White House first said, but from friendly fire.

The newspaper said the timing of Bush's knowledge of the nature of Tillman's death is important because the soldier's family has accused the U.S. Department of Defense of covering up the facts to detract from a spate of bad news coming from the battlefield that month.

FAA to install runway traffic lights

CHICAGO, July 15 (UPI) -- Pilots at Chicago's O'Hare International and 19 other major airports nationwide will soon see runway stoplights, the Federal Aviation Administration says.

At a cost of nearly $20 million an airport, the hope is to cut the risk of runway collisions and to help test piloting instruments on taxiways and runways, the Chicago Tribune reported Tuesday.

The stoplight system, tested successfully at airports in Dallas and San Diego is based on an array of radar sensors providing the real-time location of aircraft and vehicles moving on the airfield.

When constructed over the next three years, it can also can predict whether the routes taken by planes match directions issued by air-traffic controllers or represent an immediate danger.

"The runway status lights are a huge step forward for safety, especially in poor visibility," Kay said. "They will alert pilots to problems before a controller has a chance to open his mouth." said Rory Kay, a United Airlines captain and executive air safety chairman at the Air Line Pilots Association.