National news briefs

Clinton urges Syria on peace with Israel

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Obama administration is pressing Syria to resume long-stalled peace talks with Israel as part of its push for broad settlement between Arab countries and the Jewish state.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton met on Monday in New York with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem to make the case for negotiations. The State Department said Clinton was the first secretary of state to meet Syria's top diplomat in three years, although special Mideast envoy George Mitchell has made several visits to Syria in the past year.

"The secretary affirmed our objective of comprehensive peace in the Middle East, which included the Syrian track," department spokesman P.J. Crowley said, adding that she and Moallem had agreed to "develop some ideas on that."

California governor delays execution

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger delayed the state's first execution since 2006 by nearly two days Monday to allow more time for courts to consider the condemned inmate's appeals.

Albert Greenwood Brown is now scheduled to die by lethal injection at 9 p.m. Thursday, said Terry Thornton, spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Brown initially was scheduled for execution at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday.

Brown's attorneys have filed simultaneous appeals to the federal courts and state courts, seeking to block his execution on the grounds that the state improperly adopted its new lethal injection procedures. They allege that execution under the new regulations would amount to cruel and unusual punishment.

Skakel says lawyer was incompetent

NEW HAVEN, Conn. (AP) — Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel has filed another appeal of his 2002 murder conviction, this time arguing his high-profile trial attorney was incompetent. Skakel, a nephew of Robert F. Kennedy's widow, Ethel Kennedy, says in the appeal filed late Monday that Michael Sherman had significant financial problems and did not devote enough money to prepare the case.

He says Sherman failed to challenge the state's star witnesses by finding witnesses who rejected his claim that Skakel confessed to the crime. Skakel says Sherman also did a poor job in closing arguments.

Burial set for former Alaska Sen. Stevens