USA

Antiwar activist Cindy Sheehan arrived in Cuba Saturday, without obtaining mandatory US government approval, to protest the Guantánamo Bay military prison on the island that holds about 400 terror suspects. She and 11 other activists plan to travel across Cuba this week and arrive at the detention camp on Thursday, five years after it opened. Sheehan could be fined thousands of dollars for traveling to Cuba without a special government license.

Toys "R" Us agreed to award an infant its $25,000 prize for being the first US baby born in 2007, even though her mother is not a legal US resident. The company had come under fire for disqualifying the girl on such grounds, which had been listed in the contest's eligibility rules but not its promotional ads. Yuki Lin was born in New York at midnight on Jan. 1. Two other babies, born at the same time, will also receive the award. Toys "R" Us initially intended to give only one prize and offered it to Jayden Swain of Georgia after disqualifying Lin, who had been named the winner by random draw.

The Marines squad leader accused of killing civilians in Haditha, Iraq, is said to have ordered five unarmed Iraqis out of a taxi and killed them, according to a report by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service that was published in The Washington Post Saturday. The cab had appeared on the scene shortly after a roadside bomb killed one marine and injured two. Staff Sgt. Frank Wuterich and three other marines are charged with the murder of 24 people in Haditha, the largest criminal case in the US involving civilian deaths in Iraq.

Americans adopted fewer foreign children in 2006 than in the previous year, marking the first significant decline since 1992. International adoptions fell from 22,728 in 2005 to 20,679 last year. The number of children brought to the US from China, Americans' top choice for adoption, decreased by 18 percent to 6,493. Possible reasons for the drop, say analysts, include countries' wariness of foreign parenting, stricter rules, and a sense of national pride.

Crews fired artillery shells Sunday to trigger avalanches so they would not pose a threat to motorists on the mountain pass where eight people had been buried by an avalanche the day before. The travelers were 50 miles west of Denver on their way to a ski resort when their cars were knocked off the road. Rescue workers carried out the survivors Saturday. Three snowstorms have hit the area in three weeks.