Midday Roundup: Smugglers convicted in Syrian boy's death at sea

Justice for Aylan. A Turkish court sentenced two Syrian smugglers today to four years and two months each in prison over the death of 3-year-old Aylan Kurdi, the drowned Syrian boy whose picture brought international attention to the migrant crisis in Europe. Aylan, his brother, and his mother drowned during a harrowing trip from Bodrum, Turkey, to the Greek island of Kos. A photographer captured an image of Aylan’s lifeless body lying facedown on a Turkish beach. A court in Bodrum convicted Syrian nationals Muwafaka Alabash and Asem Alfrhad of human trafficking but acquitted them of causing the deaths through deliberate negligence. The smugglers blamed Aylan’s father, Abdullah Kurdi, saying he organized the trip. Kurdi has since returned to Syria.

Western roundup. Federal authorities arrested 12 people in five states Thursday on conspiracy, assault, and threats charges stemming from the 2014 standoff at Cliven Bundy’s ranch in southern Nevada. So far, 18 co-conspirators have been arrested for their association with Bundy, the patriarch of a family known for battling the federal government over land rights in the West. The indictment against him names two of his adult sons and five other men already in federal custody following the end of a nearly six-week armed occupation at a wildlife refuge in Oregon. Court documents accuse the men of leading more than 200 followers into an armed confrontation that forced federal Bureau of Land Management agents and contract cowboys to abandon an effort to corral and remove Bundy’s cattle from federal lands, where he is accused of letting them graze for decades without paying federal fees.

Friend request. The nation’s leading tech companies have paused their cutthroat battle for market domination to back Apple in its fight with the FBI over an encrypted iPhone used by an extremist killer. Google, Microsoft, AT&T, Facebook, and dozens of others in the tech industry filed amicus briefs supporting Apple ahead of a March 22 hearing in which the iPhone maker is asking U.S. Magistrate Sheri Pym to reverse an order requiring it to create a software program that overrides the phone’s security features. The program would let authorities try to unlock San Bernardino, Calif., shooter Syed Farook’s phone by guessing its passcode. Apple says it would make all other iPhones more vulnerable to future attacks.

Atomic threats. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un ordered his military ready to launch nuclear strikes at a moment’s notice after the UN adopted harsh sanctions against the totalitarian country for a recent nuclear test and long-range rocket launch. “The only way for defending the sovereignty of our nation and its right to existence under the present extreme situation is to bolster up nuclear force both in quality and quantity,” the North’s official news agency said, paraphrasing Kim. North Korea has threatened nuclear war in the past, but it is unclear just how advanced the country’s nuclear program really is. It is thought to have a handful of crude atomic bombs.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.