In the Nation

WASHINGTON - Republicans yesterday said a Homeland Security Department intelligence assessment unfairly characterized military veterans as right-wing extremists.

House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R., Ohio) described the report as offensive and called on the department to apologize to veterans. The assessment, sent to law enforcement officials last week, warns that right-wing extremists could use the bad state of the economy and the election of the first black president to recruit members.

It also said returning veterans who have difficulties reassimilating into their communities could be susceptible to extremist recruiters or might engage in lone acts of violence.

The commander of the American Legion, David Rehbein, expressed concern to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano. She defended the assessment and others by Homeland Security, saying, "We monitor the risks of violent extremism taking root here in the United States." She said her department respects and honors veterans and said she intends to meet with Rehbein next week. - AP

WASHINGTON - The Justice Department has reined in electronic surveillance by the National Security Agency after finding the agency had improperly accessed American phone calls and e-mails.

The problems were discovered during a review of the intelligence activities, the Justice Department said in a statement last night, and "comprehensive steps to correct the situation and bring the program into compliance," were taken.

Domestic eavesdropping has been a contentious issue since 2005, when the New York Times revealed that for years following the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the NSA intercepted international phone conversations and e-mails involving U.S. citizens without a warrant. Court approval is now required. - AP

WASHINGTON - Richard Armitage, who was a deputy secretary of state in the Bush administration, said he hoped he would have had the courage to resign had he known that the CIA was subjecting terrorism suspects to waterboarding.

Armitage told Al-Jazeera English television in an interview broadcast yesterday that waterboarding was torture. But he said he did not think CIA officials who engaged in waterboarding and other forms of harsh interrogation should be prosecuted.

The CIA has acknowledged using waterboarding on three high-level terror detainees in 2002 and 2003, with the permission of the White House and Justice Department. - AP

John Demjanjuk was exhausted and in pain after Tuesday's aborted try by immigration officers to deport him from Ohio to Germany, and a court should consider whether the alleged Nazi death-camp guard, 89, would even survive an overseas flight, his son said yesterday.

Newly installed Archbishop Timothy Dolan of New York said yesterday that he would use the prominence of his job to challenge efforts to legalize same-sex marriage in the state.