Tradisional Sabah Borneo

BANGKOK (AP) — Japanese Emperor Akihito paid his respects to the late Thai King Bhumibol Adulyadej on Sunday, arriving in Bangkok following a weeklong trip to Vietnam aimed at winning support against Chinese expansionism.

The monarchies — two of a handful remaining in Asia — have maintained close ties. Bhumibol first visited Japan in 1963, touching off a decades-long friendship with numerous visits back and forth, most recently a visit by Akihito to Thailand in 2006.

Akihito, accompanied by his wife, Empress Michiko, laid wreathes and signed a condolence book at the Grand Palace in Bangkok. He later met with King Vajiralongkorn Bodindradebayavarangkun, who ascended the throne after the death of his widely revered father in October.

The emperor's two-day visit to Bangkok comes as Thailand tilts closer to China, Japan's main rival in East Asia.

Thailand and Japan have traditionally enjoyed close relations, unburdened by the legacy of World War II that has complicated Japan's relations with other Asian countries. After a brief struggle, Thailand formally became Japan's ally through much of the war, suffering little of the destruction wrought on others like China, Myanmar and the Philippines.But following a 2014 coup, Thailand's Western allies cut back on assistance, pushing the country's ruling military junta closer to Beijing.

"The visit is symbolic of Japan's interest in boosting Japanese-Thai relations at a time when China seems to enjoy favor in Bangkok," said Paul Chambers, research director at the Institute of Southeast Asian Affairs.

China frightens many in Southeast Asia with expansionist policies in the South China Sea. But China's claims do not clash with Thai territorial waters, paving the way for friendly relations.

The 83-year-old emperor is Japan's constitutional head of state, a role symbolic rather than political. However, his trips often serve to bolster relations with nations friendly to Tokyo.

The emperor's itinerary has been packed with visits across Southeast Asia, a move aimed at shoring up a regional bulwark against China. Vietnam, which has sparred with China over territorial waters, rolled out the red carpet for Akihito's visit last week. In January 2016, the Japanese imperial family visited the Philippines, which also has disputes with China, paying its respects at a World War II memorial.   AP

WASHINGTON (AP) -- At a circular booth in the middle of the Trump International Hotel's balcony restaurant, President Donald Trump dined on his steak — well-done, with ketchup — while chatting up British Brexit politician Nigel Farage.

A few days later, major Republican donors Doug Deason and Doug Manchester, in town for the president's address to Congress, sipped coffee at the hotel with Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif.

After Trump's speech, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin returned to his Washington residence — the hotel — and strode past the gigantic American flag in the soaring lobby. With his tiny terrier tucked under an arm, Mnuchin stepped into an elevator with reality TV star and hotel guest Dog the Bounty Hunter, who particularly enjoyed the Trump-stamped chocolates in his room.

It's just another week at the new political capital of the nation's capital.

The $200 million hotel inside the federally owned Old Post Office building has become the place to see, be seen, drink, network — even live — for the still-emerging Trump set. It's a rich environment for lobbyists and anyone hoping to rub elbows with Trump-related politicos — despite a veil of ethics questions that hangs overhead."I've never come through this lobby and not seen someone I know," says Deason, a Dallas-based fundraiser for Trump's election campaign.

For Republican Party players, it's the only place to stay.

"I can tell you this hotel will be the most successful hotel in Washington, D.C.," says Manchester, adding that he would know because he has developed the second-largest Marriott and second-largest Hyatt in the world. Manchester says Trump's hotel will attract people based on its location near the White House and Congress, the quality renovation and the management team.

Then there's also the access.

Although Trump says he is not involved in the day-to-day operations of his businesses, he retains a financial interest in them. A stay at the hotel gives someone trying to win over Trump on a policy issue or political decision a potential chit.

That's what concerns ethics lawyers who had wanted Trump to sell off his companies as previous presidents have done.

"President Trump is in effect inviting people and companies and countries to channel money to him through the hotel," said Kathleen Clark, a former ethics lawyer for the District of Columbia and a law professor at Washington University in St. Louis.

She said the "pay to play" danger is even greater than it would be if people wanted to donate to a campaign to influence a politician's thinking. Spending money at a Trump property "is about personally enriching Donald Trump, who happens to be the president of the United States."

The White House strongly disputes there's any ethical danger in Trump's business arrangements.

Trump can see his hotel from the White House. When a Fox News interviewer mentioned that to him recently, Trump responded, "Isn't that beautiful?" But while the interviewer pointed out that he can see the property from his desk in the Oval Office, Trump said, "I'm so focused on what I'm doing here that I don't even think about it."

Still, Trump couldn't resist the short trip over there for dinner on his only weekend night out in Washington since becoming president.

A reporter for the website Independent Journal Review was tipped off about Trump's dining plans and sat at a table near him. He noted the president's dinner fare and companions, who also included daughter Ivanka Trump and her husband, Trump adviser Jared Kushner.On other nights, the posh hotel is the kind of place where on a mid-February evening, you could bump into Trump television personality Katrina Pierson having cocktails with Lynne Patton, a former Trump Organization executive who's now working at the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Trump campaign and inauguration hands Tom Barrack, Boris Epshteyn, Nick Ayers and Rick Gates are among the many who have stayed there in recent weeks.

Rooms start at above $500 most nights, according to the hotel's website and a receptionist. That's up hundreds of dollars from when the hotel first opened, not long before Election Day. Patricia Tang, the hotel's director of sales and marketing, declined to answer questions about how business is going.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan lashed out Sunday at Germany for blocking several rallies there ahead of an April vote in Turkey on boosting his powers as head of state, likening it to Nazi practices.

"Your practices are not different from the Nazi practices of the past," Erdogan told a women's rally in Istanbul, ahead of an April 16 referendum on whether to approve changes to the constitution.

"I thought it's been a long time since Germany left (Nazi practices). We are mistaken," he said.

Several German towns prevented appearances by Erdogan's ministers last week, citing security and safety concerns.

The cancellations have infuriated the Turkish government, which accused Berlin of working against the "Yes" campaign in the referendum and summoned the German ambassador to the foreign ministry in protest.

"You will lecture us about democracy and then you will not let this country's ministers speak there," said an angry Erdogan, adding that Germany was not "respecting opinion and thought".Chancellor Angela Merkel on Saturday called Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim to try to defuse the row, and the two countries' foreign ministers are set to meet later this week.   AFP

Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch has shown a willingness to limit the participation of environmental groups in lawsuits involving public lands, writing in one case that allowing conservationists to intervene could complicate and slow down the judicial process, according to an Associated Press review of his rulings as a federal appeals court judge.

Gorsuch has spent a decade on the Denver-based 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which hears disputes about public lands ranging from energy companies' drilling rights to the use of off-road vehicles in national forests across six Western states.

With public lands cases and other contentions issues, Gorsuch applied a uniform set of legal principles, said Donald Kochan, associate dean and professor at Chapman University Dale E. Fowler School of Law.

"I think that his record, although the number of cases is quite limited, shows that at times it has led to decisions that one might consider environmentally favorable, and about an equal number of times it has led to decisions some might think are environmentally unfavorable," Kochan said. "For those who think that he will lean toward one outcome or another, I think they'll be surprised on how the more neutral application of his philosophy will often lead to confounding results."In public lands cases in which he sought to limit environmental groups' participation, Gorsuch at times has favored the position of federal agencies. But his record on such cases is relatively limited considering that the territory the appeals court covers contains vast swaths of national forests and parks.

Denise Grab, a lawyer with New York University Law School's Institute for Policy Integrity, said Gorsuch has a "mixed bag" of rulings related to public lands and the environment, yet seems "unusually eager to throw roadblocks in the way of public interest groups who want their day in court."

In 2013, Gorsuch parted from the two-judge majority on a panel that said environmental groups should have the chance to participate in a particular suit. The New Mexico Off-Highway Vehicle Alliance had challenged a plan that reduced the number of roads and trails available to off-road vehicles in Santa Fe National Forest.

His colleagues on the appeals court said the groups should be allowed to join the case because "there is no guarantee that the Forest Service will make all of the environmental groups' arguments in litigation."Gorsuch disagreed, saying there was only one issue to consider and no conflict between the groups and government over how to approach it.

"An intervenor becomes a full-fledged party, able to conduct discovery, file motions, and add new issues and complexity and delay to the litigation," Gorsuch wrote.

Grab called that "very unusual," and noted that neither party in the suit had objected to the environmental groups intervening.

"An environmental group is not the government. It has different goals," Grab said. "In most cases, intervention is allowed."

Gorsuch doesn't always take the road less traveled, and often sides with other members of the 10th Circuit.

When an outdoor group sued the U.S. Forest Service over a temporary order that allowed motorcycles to ride on certain trails inside western Colorado's San Juan National Forest, Gorsuch wrote a unanimous opinion in May 2015 for the three-judge panel dismissing the case on procedural grounds.

Backcountry Hunters and Anglers could not establish their ability to bring the case because if the order they challenged as being too lenient was struck down, the agency would revert to an earlier, even less-strict version of the trail plan, so the organization's conservation goal would not be advanced, Gorsuch wrote.

"A further victory for Backcountry in this case promises only more, not fewer, vehicles on forest trails and the group hasn't offered a timely argument how that turn of events might help its members," he wrote.

Gorsuch has been sympathetic to outdoor enthusiasts, even when ruling against them, and has shown his Colorado roots in his writings.

"Everyone enjoys a trip to the mountains in the summertime. One popular spot is Mount Evans — a fourteen thousand foot peak just a short drive from Denver and with a paved road that goes right to the summit," he wrote in a 2011 case.n that case, Gorsuch was on a panel that found that the Forest Service could legally charge fees to visit the summit because it provided amenities such as a nature center, which thousands of visitors use annually. Those who sued had challenged the fee policy, saying it overstepped the Forest Service's statutory authority to charge visitors.

Writing for the panel, Gorsuch said the fees were permissible, but he left open the possibility that the fees could be challenged, just not the way the plaintiffs sought to.

"In rejecting the plaintiffs' facial challenge we hardly mean to suggest that the Service's policy can't be attacked at all. It might well be susceptible to a winning challenge as applied to certain particular visitors, perhaps even the plaintiffs themselves. But that's a path the plaintiffs haven't asked us to explore and so one we leave for another day," Gorsuch wrote.

In 2011, Gorsuch showed his distaste for drawn-out litigation when he sided with a majority of other judges who found The Wilderness Society lacked standing in a suit related to off-road vehicles on federal land, including in Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

Officials in Kane County, Utah, had asserted rights on roads crossing   AP

"On the one hand we are opening ourselves up to the future. On the other hand, we understand the dangers and will try to balance the two," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his cabinet in broadcast remarks.

According to the new policy, which must still be ratified by parliament, people caught smoking marijuana would be fined rather than arrested and prosecuted. Criminal procedures would be launched only against those caught repeatedly with the drug.

Selling and growing marijuana would remain criminal offences in Israel.

"Israel cannot shut its eyes to the changes being made across the world in respect to marijuana consumption and its effects," Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked said in a statement.

In the United States, 28 states have legalized marijuana for medical use and since 2012, several have also approved marijuana for recreational use.

Shaked said Israeli authorities would now put their focus on education about the possible harmful effects of drug use.Marijuana use is fairly common in Israel. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime has said that almost nine percent of Israelis use cannabis, though some Israeli experts believe the numbers are higher.

Israeli police figures showed only 188 people were arrested in 2015 for recreational use of marijuana, a 56 percent drop since 2010, and many of those apprehended in that time were never charged.

About 25,000 people have a licence to use the drug for medicinal purposes in Israel, one of the world leaders in medical marijuana research.

In February, a government committee gave an initial nod for the export of medical cannabis, though final legislative measures will likely take months.  REUTERS

NEW YORK (AP) — Days before taking office, President-elect Donald Trump attempted to navigate the fallout of his flap with a civil rights leader and colleague of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. while also losing a member of his incoming administration to accusations of plagiarism.

Trump on Monday met with one of King's sons on the holiday marking the life of the slain American icon just days after the president-elect attacked Rep. John Lewis on Twitter. Lewis and the elder King were among the Big Six leaders of the civil rights movement of the 1960s.

Trump accused Lewis, D-Ga., for being "all talk" after Lewis questioned the legitimacy of Trump's election. The president-elect also advised the veteran congressman to pay more attention to his "crime ridden" Atlanta-area district. Trump's comments drew widespread criticism and have done little to reassure those uneasy about the transition from the nation's first black president to a president-elect still struggling to connect with most nonwhite voters.

Martin Luther King III downplayed the slight, saying that "in the heat of emotion a lot of things get said on both sides." King, who said he pressed Trump on the need for voting reform to increase participation, deemed the meeting "constructive." King said that while he disagreed with the president-elect's comments, he believed "at some point in this nation we've got to move forward."

"He said that he is going to represent all Americans. He said that over and over again," King told reporters in the lobby of Trump Tower after the nearly hourlong meeting. "I believe that's his intent, but I think we also have to consistently engage with pressure, public pressure. It doesn't happen automatically."

Trump, who struggled for support from minority voters on Election Day, briefly joined King in the lobby but ignored reporters' shouted questions about his comments about Lewis.

Lewis had suggested that Trump's November victory was delegitimized due to Russian interference and said he would boycott Friday's Inauguration. More than two dozen Democratic members of Congress have said they will sit out the Trump ceremony. Among them is Tennessee Rep. Steve Cohen, who said Monday that "this president 'semi-elect' does not deserve to be president of the United States. He has not exhibited the characteristics or the values that we hold dear."

The Martin Luther King holiday is meant to honor community service and volunteerism, and many Americans, including President Barack Obama, spend part of the day doing a service project of some kind. Trump, who cancelled a planned trip to Washington, spent the day inside the Manhattan skyscraper that bears his name.

Meanwhile, conservative media commentator Monica Crowley will not be joining the Trump administration following accusations of plagiarism, according to a transition official.

Crowley, a frequent on-air presence at Fox News Channel, had been slated to join Trump's National Security Council as a director of strategic communications. On Monday, she withdrew her name from consideration after CNN reported last week that several passages in a 2012 book Crowley wrote were plagiarized. Publisher HarperCollins then pulled the book.

Crowley's retreat was first reported by The Washington Times. The transition official confirmed the decision on the condition of anonymity because the official was not authorized to speak publicly about the matter.

Trump has continued to lash out at his critics in the intelligence community and questioned whether the CIA director himself was "the leaker of fake news" in a Sunday night tweet.

The extraordinary criticism from the incoming president came hours after CIA chief John Brennan charged that Trump lacks a full understanding of the threat Moscow poses to the United States, delivering a public lecture to the president-elect that further highlighted the bitter state of Trump's relations with American intelligence agencies.

"Now that he's going to have an opportunity to do something for our national security as opposed to talking and tweeting, he's going to have tremendous responsibility to make sure that U.S. and national security interests are protected," Brennan said on "Fox News Sunday," warning that the president-elect's impulsivity could be dangerous.

In more than one venue Monday, speakers and attendees expressed reservations about President-elect Donald Trump and his incoming administration, some even raising the specter of the Ku Klux Klan.

"When men no better than Klansmen dressed in suits are being sworn in to office, we cannot be silent," said Opal Tometi, a Black Lives Matter co-founder, told a crowd in Brooklyn.

King's daughter offered a less direct message, encouraging 2,000 people at her father's Atlanta church to work for his vision of love and justice "no matter who is in the White House."

Bernice King spoke at Ebenezer Baptist hours before her brother, Martin Luther King III, met privately with the president-elect at Trump Tower in New York. The younger King described the meeting as "productive."

Trump won fewer than 1 out of 10 black voters in November after a campaign of racially charged rhetoric, and tensions have flared anew with his recent criticism of civil rights icon John Lewis, whom the president-elect called "all talk" and "no action."

Bernice King avoided a detailed critique of Trump, but said the nation has a choice between "chaos and community," a dichotomy her father preached about. "At the end of the day, the Donald Trumps come and go," she said, later adding, "We still have to find a way to create ... the beloved community."

The current Ebenezer pastor, the Rev. Raphael Warnock, did not call Trump by name, but praised his predecessor. "Thank you, Barack Obama," he said. "I'm sad to see you go."

In South Carolina, speakers at a state Capitol rally said minority voting power has never been more important and some attendees expressed unease about Trump joining forces with Republican congressional majorities.

"It's going to be different, that's for sure," said Diamond Moore, a Benedict College senior who came to the Capitol. "I'm going to give Trump a chance. But I'm also ready to march."

In New York, Martin Luther King III told reporters that Trump pledged to be a president for all Americans, but King III added "we also have to consistently engage with pressure, public pressure" because "it doesn't happen automatically."

Trump did not participate publicly in any Martin Luther King Jr. Day observances. President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama took part in a service project at a shelter in Washington.

Back in Atlanta, Sen. Bernie Sanders brought the Ebenezer assembly to its feet with his reminder that King was not just an advocate for racial equality, but a radical proponent for economic justice — a mission that put him at odds with the political establishment.

"If you think governors and senators and mayors were standing up and saying what a great man Dr. King was, read history, because you are sorely mistaken," roared Sanders, who invoked the same themes from his failed presidential campaign.

Sanders, who struggled to attract black voters in his Democratic primary fight with Hillary Clinton, recalled King opposing the Vietnam War as exploiting the poor. He also noted King was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee, where he'd gone to rally striking sanitation workers, white and black.

Activist priest Michael Pfleger, himself a self-described radical, built on Sanders' message with a 45-minute keynote message indicting the nation's social and economic order, which he said would get worse under Trump.The Chicago priest said "white hoods" of the Klan "have been replaced by three-piece suits." He bemoaned high incarceration rates, a "militarized, stop-and-frisk police state," profligate spending on war and a substandard education system.

Pfleger said many Americans too quickly dismiss violence in poor neighborhoods as the fault of those who live there, when the real culprit is a lack of opportunity and hope. "If you put two lions in a cage and you don't feed them," he said, "one will kill the other in the pursuit of survival."

Warnock, meanwhile, zeroed in on Trump for his treatment of Lewis, now a Georgia congressman who represents most of Atlanta.

Lewis angered Trump when he told NBC's "Meet the Press" that he views Trump as "illegitimate" because of alleged Russian interference in the campaign. Trump retorted on Twitter that Lewis is "all talk" and said his district is "falling apart" and "crime infested."Anybody who suggests that John Lewis is all talk and no action needs a lesson in American history," Warnock said, notably declining to say the president-elect's name.

As a young man, Lewis was arrested and beaten by authorities as he demonstrated for civil and voting rights for black Americans.

Lewis was in Miami at King Day events.

Some Republicans have defended Trump's criticism of Lewis, arguing it is inappropriate for a congressman to question an incoming president's legitimacy.

Clara Smith, an Atlanta resident who came Monday to Ebenezer, scoffed at any GOP indignation, remembering that Trump for years questioned whether Obama was a "natural born citizen" as the Constitution requires.

"He carried on with that knowing full well what he was doing" to the first black president, Smith, 66, said.

Elsewhere, residents in Memphis are honoring King with neighborhood clean-up events and a daylong celebration at the National Civil Rights Museum.Bicyclists in Detroit have marked the day by pedaling to sites connected to a historic visit King made to the city.

___AP