NATIONAL BRIEFS

WASHINGTON: U.S. criticized on green fund

The Financial Times reported Thursday that the United States is refusing to sign a global climate fund as negotiations intensify ahead of the UN climate summit next week in Durban, South Africa. It quoted U.S. officials as saying the United States, backed by Saudi Arabia, had still not agreed to adopt a blueprint for the Green Climate Fund. Countries agreed to create the fund last year to channel up to $100 billion a year by 2020 to help developing countries fight climate change. The State Department had no immediate comment.

NEW HAMPSHIRE: GOP confronts gay nuptials

Whether they like it or not, Republican presidential candidates are joining New Hampshire's intensifying gay marriage debate. State lawmakers plan in the coming weeks to take up a measure to repeal the law allowing same-sex couples to wed and a vote is expected sometime in January -- the month in which New Hampshire holds the nation's first Republican presidential primary contest. Already, candidates have been put on the spot over the hot-button social issue when most, if not all, would rather be talking about voters' No. 1 concern: the economy. The impending focus on gay marriage carries risk for several candidates, including Mitt Romney, Rick Perry and Herman Cain, whose inconsistencies on the topic are well-documented. The GOP candidates' increasingly vocal support for "traditional marriage" also threatens to alienate younger Republicans and independents here who support legal recognition of same-sex couples. That note of divisiveness could bode poorly for the eventual GOP nominee come the general election.

PENNSYLVANIA: Turkey crashes into eatery

A wild turkey didn't survive its crash through a plate-glass window at an empty restaurant in Penn Hills in western Pennsylvania. Police said the feathered fowl didn't survive impact when it barreled into the dining room of the Eat'n Park in Penn Hills on Thursday afternoon. The restaurant was closed at the time.