Nuclear talks merit another extension

LAUSANNE, Switzerland — Wrapping up six days of marathon nuclear talks with mixed results, Iran and six world powers prepared today to issue a general statement agreeing to continue negotiations in a new phase aimed at reaching a comprehensive accord by the end of June, officials told The Associated Press today.

The joint statement is to be accompanied by additional documents that outline more detailed understandings, allowing the sides to claim enough progress has been made thus far to merit a new round, the officials said.

The talks have already been extended twice as part of more than a decade of diplomatic attempts to curb Tehran’s nuclear advance, and the next stage will be presented as a new phase, because most of the parties had ruled out another prolongation of this round.

Civilians killed by Saudi-led airstrikes

SANAA, Yemen — The U.N. human rights office and the international Red Cross say they are alarmed by the high civilian causalities in the violence in Yemen, where airstrikes by a Saudi-led coalition have been targeting Shiite rebels since last week.

Today’s statement from Geneva said U.N. human rights staffers in Yemen have verified that at least 19 civilians died when airstrikes hit a refugee camp in northern Yemen, with at least 35 wounded, including 11 children.

There were different reports of casualty figures from Monday’s strike. The Houthi rebels said 40 people died while Doctors Without Borders tweeted that 29 people were killed.

The International Committee of the Red Cross is appealing to the parties in the conflict to allow delivery of medical supplies to the wounded.

Anne Frank likely died month earlier

THE HAGUE, Netherlands — Research by the Anne Frank House museum shows that the Jewish girl whose World War II diary about her life hiding made her a symbol for all Holocaust victims likely died earlier than previously thought.

The conclusion was published today on the 70th anniversary of the official date of the deaths of Anne and her sister Margot that was set by Dutch authorities after the war.

Researchers Erika Prins and Gertjan Broek, however, say Anne and Margot likely died of typhus in February 1945.

The research based on a combination of eyewitness accounts and documents, and at least one new interview, also once more underscores the horrific conditions Jews endured in the Bergen-Belsen camp where Anne died at the age of 15.

EU farmers protest lifting of milk quotas

BRUSSELS — Dairy farmers have hit the streets of Brussels to protest the lifting of European Union milk quotas amid concerns the move will flood the market with cheap surplus milk.

Belgian milk farmer Yvan Deknudt said today that “with quotas being lifted, we’re really scared that production is going to explode and we won’t be able to pay our costs anymore.”

The quotas were introduced more than 30 years ago to try to halt massive overproduction that had resulted in so-called milk lakes and butter mountains in the EU. They will be lifted altogether Wednesday.

The system is being removed as world demand for milk grows so that European producers can compete with U.S. and Australian farmers.