News from Around America

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) introduced legislation Thursday to restructure the U.S. Postal Service, saying more regulation is necessary to “prevent another taxpayer bailout” of thefinancially strapped agency.

The bill would eliminate Saturday delivery and give the Postal Service greater latitude to close post offices and regional mail processing centers. A panel would be created to oversee the agency>, modeled on the District of Columbia’s Financial Control Board, with a broad mandate to reduce costs and bring the agency back to financial solvency. “Congress can’t keep kicking the can down the road on out-of-control labor costs and excess infrastructure of USPS,” Issa said in a statement.

The Obama administration on Thursday imposed new sanctions against Iran’s largest air carrier, accusing it of aiding government organizations that support international terrorism and nuclear proliferation.

The new measures announced by the Treasury Department allege links between Iran Air, the country’s national airline, and illegal weapons shipments to terrorist groups in Syria, and also to the transport of high-tech parts for Iran’s advanced missiles and nuclear programs.

The sanctions restrict U.S. firms from conducting business with the airline in the United States or overseas. Also targeted for sanctions was Tidewater Middle East Co., a major port operator in Iran.

India’s economic boom, which was resilient enough to shrug off the global financial crisis, is beginning to falter, hampered by stubbornly high inflation and years of political paralysis, economists and business leaders say.

In developments that parallel events in the other Asian powerhouse, neighboring China, rising prices have forced the government to steadily tighten monetary policy. Interest rates rose for the 10th time in 16 months last week.

But business leaders are unhappy. They say the medicine could be making the economic situation worse.

GUATEMALA CITY — Fueled by a cocaine trade that runs the length of Central America, the region is in danger of being overwhelmed not only by street gangsters but also sophisticated criminals with ties to elite members of society, U.N. officials warned Thursday.

As Central American leaders concluded two days of high-level meetings to negotiate a regional security plan and to seek money from donor nations, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime released a report documenting the high cost of drug trafficking in Central America, an impoverished backwater it described as ignored.

BEIJING —China said Thursday that dissident artist Ai Weiwei, who was released from jail a day earlier, remained under investigation and would be prohibited from leaving Beijing for at least the next year as A condition of his bail.

“Ai Weiwei is still under investigation,” Hong Lei, the Foreign Ministry spokesman, said at a regularly scheduled news briefing. “He is not allowed to leave his area of residence.”

Lei said that the “area of residence” referred to Beijing and that Ai was not being placed under house arrest.