Wintry Mix of Snow, Freezing Rain Pummels Mid-Atlantic

Richmond, Va. — A winter storm that contributed to at least five deaths in the Midwest pummeled the mid-Atlantic region for a second day Sunday, bringing with it an icy mix that knocked out power, cancelled flights and contributed to hundreds of car accidents.

Virginia State Police said the driver of a military surplus vehicle was killed late Saturday after he lost control on Interstate 81 because of slick road conditions.

Virginia State Police said they responded to more than 230 traffic crashes and helped more than 100 disabled vehicles in Virginia from midnight to noon Sunday.

The storm knocked out power for nearly 200,000 people in Virginia and North Carolina on Sunday, according to PowerOutage.us.

DNA of Wolf Declared Extinct In Wild Lives on in Texas Pack

Dallas — Researchers say a pack of wild canines found frolicking near the beaches of the Texas Gulf Coast carries a substantial amount of red wolf genes, a surprising discovery because the animal was declared extinct in the wild nearly 40 years ago.

The finding has led wildlife biologists and others to develop a new understanding that the red wolf DNA is remarkably resilient after decades of human hunting, loss of habitat and other factors had led the animal to near decimation.

“Overall, it’s incredibly rare to rediscover animals in a region where they were thought to be extinct and it’s even more exciting to show that a piece of an endangered genome has been preserved in the wild,” said Elizabeth Heppenheimer, a Princeton University biologist involved in the research on the pack found on Galveston Island in Texas. The work of the Princeton team was published in the scientific journal Genes.

The genetic analysis found that the Galveston canines appear to be a hybrid of red wolf and coyote, but Heppenheimer cautions that without additional testing, it’s difficult to label the animal.

Afghan Taliban Mounts New Attacks as Peace Talks Continue

Kabul, Afghanistan��— Taliban militants have accelerated attacks across Afghanistan in a show of strength as the U.S. pushes forward with negotiations to end the 17-year-long war.

The increased violence comes as accelerated peace talks and reports that the U.S. plans to significantly cut troop levels in Afghanistan.

The U.S. special representative for Afghanistan reconciliation, Zalmay Khalilzad, has stepped up efforts to bring the Taliban to negotiations, with Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Russia and Iran involved in discussions with the Taliban over the past few months, either with the U.S. or in parallel. Neither track has involved Afghan government representatives.

The insurgents have been battling Afghan forces in the north of the strife-torn country for territorial gain in the past week. They’re fighting now in or on the outskirts of Balkh, Takhar, Baghlan, Kunduz and Sar-e-Pul provinces, according to local government officials.

Local military officials refused to provide exact numbers of casualties. In four separate email statements sent by Taliban spokesmen Zabihullah Mujahed and Qari Yousef Ahmadi, the Taliban claimed responsibility for all attacks, adding that it took over several villages, destroyed several bases of Afghan forces, took weapons and ammunition and killed or wounded more than 150 soldiers. The Taliban also sustained heavy casualties, local officials said.

— Wire reports

U.S. President Donald Trump last year ordered his government to initiate peace talks with the insurgents to end the war in which more than 2,300 U.S. soldiers have died and that has cost the nation more than $900 billion.

Theresa May warns that UK Parliament will kill Brexit if her deal is rejected

By Andrew Atkinson

Bloomberg News

LONDON ��Theresa May enters one of her most tumultuous weeks as prime minister as the U.K. Parliament prepares to decide the fate of her Brexit deal, and possibly her tenure as prime minister.

With her agreement facing almost certain defeat in a House of Commons vote Tuesday, May will make an eleventh-hour appeal with a warning that there’s now more of a chance that members of Parliament will block Brexit than of the U.K. leaving the European Union without a deal.

“What if we found ourselves in a situation where Parliament tried to take the U.K. out of the EU in opposition to a remain vote? People’s faith in the democratic process and their politicians would suffer catastrophic harm,” May will say in a speech in Stoke-on-Trent on Monday, according to extracts released by her office. “We all have a duty to implement the result of the referendum.”

Her choice of Stoke is significant. The city in central England, 135 miles (217 kilometers) north of Parliament in London and once the heart of the global pottery industry, voted more emphatically to leave the EU than anywhere else in the U.K. in the 2016 referendum.

May’s warning comes after the Sunday Times reported that some lawmakers are planning to seize control of the legislative agenda from the government in an act that would allow Parliament to extend the March 29 Brexit deadline or even overturn the decision to leave the EU.