NATIONAL BRIEFS

WASHINGTON: Sanctions aim at Iran

The Obama administration hit seven foreign companies Tuesday, including Venezuela's state oil company and an Israeli shipping firm, with sanctions for doing business with Iran that helps fund its nuclear program. Separately, sanctions were imposed on 15 people and companies in China, Iran, North Korea, Syria and elsewhere for trading in missile technology and weapons of mass destruction.

WWII deception criticized

Acting Solicitor General Neal Katyal, in an extraordinary admission of misconduct, took one of his predecessors to task for hiding evidence and deceiving the Supreme Court in two World War II rulings that upheld the detention of 110,000 Japanese-Americans. Katyal said Tuesday that Charles Fahy, an appointee of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, deliberately hid from the court a report from the Office of Naval Intelligence that concluded the Japanese-Americans on the West Coast did not pose a military threat. Fahy was defending Roosevelt's executive order that authorized forced removals from "military areas." Katyal, 41, who is of Indian-American heritage and is the first Asian-American to hold the post, said he decided "to set the record straight" at a Justice Department event honoring Asian-Americans and Pacific Islanders. In 1943, the high court unanimously upheld a curfew imposed on Japanese-Americans in the case of Gordon Hirabayashi v. United States. And in 1944, the court in a 6-3 decision upheld the removal order imposed on Japanese-Americans in Fred Korematsu v. United States. Scholars and judges have denounced the rulings as among the worst in the court's history, but neither the high court nor the Justice Department had formally admitted the mistake -- at least until now.

CALIFORNIA: Family of four found dead

A family of four was found dead Tuesday in a swimming pool and bathtub at their San Diego home, in what police say was apparently a triple murder-suicide. Alfredo Pimienta, 44; his wife, Georgina, 38; Priscilla, 17; and Emily, 9, all appeared to have drowned.