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DNA analysis has identified theremains found in a carin the Columbia River as those of an Oregon family that went missing in 1958 while on a trip to find Christmas greenery, authorities said Thursday.

The state medical examiner's office has identified parents Kenneth and Barbara Martin and their daughter Barbie from remains located in the river within the wreckage of the car, the Hood River County Sheriff's Officesaid. The sheriff's office said it concluded its investigation and found no evidence of a crime.

The Ford station wagon thought to belong to the family was found in 2024 by Archer Mayo, a diver who had been looking for it for several years. Authorities pulled part of the car from the river the following year.

The family vanished in December of 1958. The bodies of two of the family's children were found months after the disappearance, but the other members never turned up.

The search for the Martin family was a national news story at the time and led some to speculate about the possibility of foul play, with a $1,000 reward offered for information.

"Where do you search if you've already searched every place logic and fragmentary clues would suggest?" an Associated Press article asked in 1959, months after the disappearance.

Only the frame and some attached components were retrieved from the water because of the "extent to which the vehicle had been encased in sediment," the sheriff's office said. Analysis of those items allowed investigators to conclude that it was indeed the Martin family's car.

Later in 2025, Mayo located human remains that were ultimately turned over to the state medical examiner's office.

Scientists developed DNA extracts from the remains and generated a profile that was compared with relatives of the Martin family, allowing for the identifications, authorities said.

Othram, a DNA lab in Texas,did forensic analysis on the remains, which ultimately led to the positive identification.

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Othram's Colby Lasyonetold CBS affiliate KOIN-TVthat more than a dozen experts worked on the case, noting they extracted a bone sample and used advanced techniques to isolate and analyze the DNA. DNA comparisons with a living relative positively identified Kenneth Martin.

"Skeletal remains that have been submerged in water for decades can be particularly challenging to work with," Lasyone said. "Unfortunately, the skeletal remains for the other individuals were too degraded and couldn't be worked with."

Mayo also found remnants of a shoe and a camera case with Kenneth's name and address, seat belt buckles and camera film, KOIN-TV reported.

"Maybe there'll be pictures published one day of what that is, because that's a pretty cool piece to a mystery," he told the the station.

Mayo told KOIN-TV he was gratified the case was finally solved.

"It's not going to get more resolved than it is now and so that feels good," he told the station. "And that really lets us write the last chapter of that book."

In 2020,KOIN-TV did a four-part podcast on the case.

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MOSCOW, April 15 (Reuters) - Russia is ready to increase energy supplies to China ahead of an expected visit by ‌President Vladimir Putin, Russian news agencies quoted Foreign Minister ‌Sergei Lavrov as saying on Wednesday at a news conference in Beijing.

Russia's President Putin holds talks via video link with China's President Xi

The agencies quoted ​Lavrov as saying that the visit would take place in the first half of the year, while the Vedomosti newspaper cited sources as saying it would be during the week beginning May 18.

President Xi ‌Jinping met Lavrov on ⁠Wednesday, assuring Moscow of China's friendship and saying that China and Russia must trust and support each ⁠other, deepen cooperation, and defend each other's interests.

U.S. President Donald Trump is also scheduled to meet Xi during his first visit to China ​in ​eight years on May 14 and ​15.

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Lavrov told the news ‌conference that Russia was ready to help China and other countries affected by the Middle East crisis with energy supplies.

"Russia can, of course, make up for the resource shortfall facing both China and other countries that are interested in working with us on an ‌equal and mutually beneficial basis," Lavrov ​told the news conference in China.

Lavrov also ​said that Russia and ​China had all the necessary means to avoid reliance ‌on what he described as ​U.S. efforts to ​disrupt global energy markets through conflict in the Middle East.

"Thank God, China and Russia have every capability, including those already ​in use, reserve capacity, ‌and planned capacity, to avoid depending on such aggressive ​gambits, which undermine the global economy," he said.

(Writing by ​Gleb Bryanski; Editing by Mark Potter)

Health officials and law enforcement agencies across the country are raising alarms about an emerging synthetic opioid that is believed to be up to 10 times stronger thanfentanyl.

The drug is known as cychlorphine, but is scientifically referred to as N-propionitrile chlorphine.

Because of its extreme potency, even very small doses of cychlorphine are potentially lethal. Officials said it has been linked to a growing number of overdose deaths and is being found in other illicit drugs.

Another major concern is that it requires multiple doses of naloxone, known by the brand name Narcan, to try and reverse an overdose.

RELATED STORY |US overdose deaths fell 27% last year, the largest one-year decline ever seen

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The Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) San Francisco Field Division has identified the drug in cases around Northern California, according to a local ABC-affiliate.

In eastern Tennessee, the Knox County Regional Forensic Center noted that cychlorphine had been detected in 41 deaths across its 23-county service area as of early April.

ICYMI |Walgreens launches a cheaper, generic version of over-the-counter Narcan

Citing "reports," the Knox County Regional Forensic Center claimed that officials believe cychlorphine originated in China in 2024 and quickly moved to Europe before hitting the United States in late 2024 where it possibly first appeared in Florida.

TheCenter for Forensic Science Research and Educationsaid it was first detected in mid-2024 and has been showing up in toxicology reports from at least eight states and several Canadian provinces.

April 17 (Reuters) - Myanmar has reduced the sentence of imprisoned ex-leader Aung San Suu Kyi, her lawyer told Reuters on Friday, as part of an amnesty by a new president who ousted her government ‌in a coup five years ago.

Suu Kyi, 80, was serving a 27-year sentence for a litany of charges ‌her allies said were politically motivated to keep her at bay, ranging from incitement and corruption to election fraud and violating a state secrets law.

The ​sentence has been cut by one-sixth, but it remains unclear whether the Nobel Peace Prize winner will be allowed to serve the rest of her sentence under house arrest, the lawyer said.

Suu Kyi, who had dismissed the charges against her as "absurd", has not been seen in public since the end of her marathon trials, and her whereabouts have been unknown.

Earlier, state media reported that President Min ‌Aung Hlaing approved an amnesty for 4,335 prisoners, ⁠the third such move in the past six months. Amnesties typically take place in Myanmar each year to mark Independence Day in January and New Year in April.

Among the prisoners freed was ⁠Suu Kyi ally Win Myint, who served as president from 2018 until the 2021 military coup. State broadcaster MRTV said he was "granted a pardon and the reduction of his remaining sentences under specified conditions."

A spokesperson for the military-backed government did not immediately respond to ​a ​request for comment.

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The United Nations said U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres "takes note" ​of the moves, while underscoring "the need for meaningful efforts ‌to ensure the swift release of all those arbitrarily detained, including State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, and to create conditions conducive to a credible political process."

"A viable political solution must be founded on an immediate cessation of violence and a genuine commitment to inclusive dialogue. This requires an environment that allows the people of Myanmar to freely and peacefully exercise their political rights," Guterres' spokesperson said in response to media queries.

The United States welcomed Win Myint's release but called for ‌the military government to free all those unjustly detained, including Suu ​Kyi.

"We urge Burma’s military and other armed groups to immediately cease violence ​harming civilians, ensure unhindered humanitarian access across the country, ​and engage in meaningful dialogue to end the crisis and achieve a sustainable peace," a State ‌Department spokesperson said.

The 2021 coup against Win Myint and ​Suu Kyi's democratically elected government ​was led by Min Aung Hlaing. It plunged the Southeast Asian country into a nationwide civil war that continues to rage.

Min Aung Hlaing was elected president on April 3 following polls in December and January during which the opposition ​was stifled and largely absent. Critics and ‌Western governments dismissed the vote as a sham designed to entrench military rule behind a democratic facade.

(Reporting by ​Reuters Staff; Additional reporting by David Brunnstrom in Washington; Writing by David Stanway and Martin Petty; Editing ​by Muralikumar Anantharaman, Christian Schmollinger, John Mair and Andrew Heavens)

WASHINGTON (AP) — More than 10,000 American troops are helpingenforce the blockadeon Iranian ports, and while no ships have yet been boarded, the U.S. military said Thursday that it is warning Iran-linked ships that it could fire warning shots or escalate to other force if they try to outrun the Navy.

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In the first three days of the military action, 14 ships have turned around rather than confront the naval blockade, according to U.S. Central Command, which oversees the Iran war.

Some Iran-linked or sanctioned vessels that have left the Persian Gulf throughthe Strait of Hormuz, the crucial waterway for energy shipments, have appeared to halt their movements, turn off their radio transponders or head back toward Iran's coast, shipping data firms say.

Vessels that approach the blockade, which is being enforced in Iran’s territorial seas and international waters and not in the Strait of Hormuz, are given a warning, Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters at the Pentagon.

“Any ship that would cross the blockade would result in our sailors executing pre-planned tactics designed to bring the force to that ship — if need be, board the ship and take her over,” he said.

U.S. Central Command released a recording of a radio broadcast sent to vessels in the region that said the military was ready to use force if needed to compel compliance with the blockade.

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“Vessels will be boarded for interdiction and seizure transiting to or from Iranian port,” the message said.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told reporters that “less than 10% of America’s naval power” is being used to enforce the blockade. The Navy has 16 warships — 11 destroyers, three amphibious assault ships, an aircraft carrier, and a littoral combat ship — in the Middle East out of a battle force of roughly 300 total warships.

Also supporting the blockade is a series of different aircraft as well as surveillance, reconnaissance and intelligence operations designed to give the Navy the latest information on the vessels it is encountering.

Restricting Iran's sea access is a global effort, Caine said, and U.S. military assets in other parts of the world, including in the Pacific, would pursue vessels illegally shipping Iranian oil or trying to provide material support to Tehran.

Caine noted the congestion of the area around the blockade, likening it to a crowded parking lot and U.S. destroyers to high-powered sports cars.

“There is a lot out there," Caine said. "It is like driving a sports car through a supermarket parking lot on a payday weekend, with thousands of kids in that parking lot, as you attempt to maneuver through there to get to that ship that would attempt to run that blockade.”