Thursday morning news: June 6, 2019

President Trump, Queen Elizabeth II commemorate DDay » AUDIO: [Sound of D-Day ceremony]

Sounds from a ceremony in Portsmouth, England, to commemorate the D-Day invasion of Word War II.

Queen Elizabeth II was among the world leaders on hand to honor the fallen.

ELIZABETH: 75 years ago, hundreds of thousands of young soldiers, sailors and airmen left these shores in the cause of freedom. 

And President Trump read a prayer President Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered in a radio address on June 6th, 1944.

TRUMP: Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our Nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity. 

300 surviving World War II veterans also gathered to remember those who didn’t make it home. 98-year-old Ray Lambert was an Army medic in the war.

LAMBERT: It’s like – come to visit them again. I can see their names, read their names, and it means a lot to me. 

President Trump will take part in commemorations in France today near the Normandy beaches.

HHS halts fetal tissue research » The Department of Health and Human Services announced Wednesday it has terminated a major contract for research that used tissue from aborted babies. WORLD Radio’s Kristen Flavin has more.

KRISTEN FLAVIN, REPORTER: The contract with the University of California, San Francisco, funded research that made mice with human-like immune systems for studying diseases. HHS also said an ethics advisory board may review any new grant applications for similar research.

In a statement, HHS said “promoting the dignity of human life from conception to natural death is one of the very top priorities of President Trump’s administration.”

Last September, HHS began reviewing contracts that used human fetal tissue for testing. Later that year, the National Institutes of Health announced a new $20-million grant to researchers looking into other research models, such as adult stem cells.

Reporting for WORLD Radio, I’m Kristen Flavin.  

Parkland deputy charged with negligence » Prosecutors have charged a former sheriff’s deputy with 11 crimes for failing to confront a gunman during last year’s school shooting in Parkland, Florida.

56-year-old Scot Peterson was on duty as the school resource officer during the massacre in February 2018 at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. As the sound of gunfire erupted inside the school, he remained outside.

Seventeen people died in the attack.

In a Broward County courtroom Wednesday, Judge Jackie Powell told Peterson that he’ll remain behind bars until his bond is met.

POWELL: The court does find probably cause and also the bonds that were imposed along with special conditions – those special conditions will remain in place, and a total bond of $102,000.

Peterson faces charges of child neglect, culpable negligence, and perjury. He faces a possible prison sentence of nearly 100 years.

The charges follow a 14-month investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

Death toll rises from violent military crackdown on protesters » In Sudan, the death toll has risen sharply after Monday’s violent military raid on a camp of protesters. Volunteers are searching the Blue Nile River for bodies that military forces may have dumped in the water. WORLD Africa reporter Onize Ohikere reports.

ONIZE OHIKERE, REPORTER: The military has cut off internet access for civilians, making it hard for them to report on the violence.

But a Sudanese medical group says it has seen 40 bodies pulled from the river. That brings the death toll from the military’s violent crackdown to 100.

The ruling military council denies ordering the bloody attack. And a top general said the council is ready to resume negotiations with protest leaders with “no restriction.”  

But a spokesman for the protest movement rejected the call for more talks. He said the military crackdown continues.

Protesters say they’ll keep demonstrating to demand the military turn over power to a civilian government.

Reporting for WORLD Radio, I’m Onize Ohikere.

Syrian Kurds send women, children captured with ISIS to US » Kurdish authorities in northern Syria have transferred eight America women and children captured with ISIS back to the U.S.

Kurdish official Abdulkarim Omar said the group includes two women and six children. If confirmed by the U.S. government, this is the second repatriation of U.S. nationals from Syria. Earlier this year, a woman and four children returned to America.

Thousands of ISIS members and their families remain in camps and detention centers in northern Syria. Omar said only “humanitarian cases” are being repatriated, adding that they’re not releasing women accused of working with ISIS.

(Dominic Lipinski/Pool Photo via AP) US President Donald Trump, left and Queen Elizabeth II laugh, during the State Banquet at Buckingham Palace, in London, Monday, June 3, 2019. 

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.