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• "With a million people in flight, millions more displaced internally, and thousands of people continuing to cross the border every day, Syria is spiraling towards full-scale disaster," Guterres said.
• Syria's uprising began in March 2011 with protests against President Bashar Assad's authoritarian rule. When the government cracked down on demonstrators, the opposition took up arms and the conflict turned into a full-blown civil war. The United Nations estimates that more than 70,000 people have been killed.
• The relentless violence also has devastated many cities and forced hundreds of thousands of Syrians to seek refuge abroad.
• ___

• LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Flyers reacted with shrugs but largely agreed with a new policy announced by the Transportation Security Administration that airline passengers will be able to carry small knives and previously forbidden sports equipment on planes.
• "It's common sense," said Pat O'Brien, who stood at Los Angeles International Airport after arriving from Durango, Colo. "You can make anything into a knife so I don't have a problem with it at all. You can sharpen a credit card to make a sharp implement."
• Aviation security consultant John L. Sullivan agreed with O'Brien, saying a pen or toothbrush can be sharpened like the "shivs" inmates sometimes make in prison.
• "There are a lot of things you can use on an airplane if you are intent on hurting someone," said Sullivan, co-founder of the Welsh-Sullivan Group in Dallas. "Security is never 100 percent."
• The changes announced by the TSA Tuesday take effect April 25. Box cutters, razor blades and knives that don't fold or that have molded grip handles will still be prohibited.
• ___

• HAGERSTOWN, Md. (AP) -- After pummeling the nation's midsection with heavy snow, a late-winter storm was making its way Wednesday toward the nation's capital, where residents braced for the possibility of snarled traffic and power out

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