DETROIT — Michigan State University interim President John Engler submitted his resignation Wednesday amid public backlash over his comments about women and girls sexually assaulted by now-imprisoned campus sports doctor Larry Nassar.

Engler, who had resisted earlier pressure to resign, announced his plans in an 11-page letter to Dianne Byrum, chairwoman of Michigan State’s Board of Trustees. It makes no mention of recent criticism of his remarks and instead lists what he considers to be his accomplishments in his one year of service, saying the university is a “dramatically better, stronger institution.”

Engler said he was in Texas attending a service for his late father-in-law. He says his resignation is effective Jan. 23.

His reversal tops off a stormy period for the university under Engler and is the second time a Michigan State president left during the Nassar scandal.

The final straw for the university’s board came last week when Engler told The Detroit News that Nassar’s victims had been in the “spotlight” and are “still enjoying that moment at times, you know, the awards and recognition.”

Nassar is now serving decades-long prison sentences for sexually assaulting patients and possessing child pornography.

Engler was hired last February after the resignation of President Lou Anna Simon over the Nassar scandal.

Irish official visits ex-Marine held on spying charge in Russia

MOSCOW — The brother of a former U.S. Marine with multiple citizenships says Irish government representatives have visited Paul Whelan at the Russian prison where he is being held on spying charges.

David Whelan said in a Wednesday statement that diplomatic staff members from Ireland reported that conditions were good in the Moscow prison where his brother is detained. The statement says U.S. officials are expected to visit Thursday.

Whelan was detained Dec. 28 and has been charged with spying, which carries a potential sentence of 20 years if he’s convicted. Russian officials have not released details of the allegations against him.

Whelan, who was living in Michigan and working as global security director for a U.S. company, also holds British and Canadian citizenship.

U.N. rights office says 890 killed in December clashes in Congo

GENEVA — The U.N. human rights office says “credible sources” indicate that at least 890 people were killed last month in clashes among four villages in western Congo.

Michelle Bachelet, the U.N. human rights chief, said the perpetrators should be brought to justice over such “shocking violence” that erupted between the Banunu and Batende communities in the Mai-Ndombe province. Her office said it has launched an investigation, along with national authorities in Congo.

The rights office said hundreds of houses and buildings were also burned down or pillaged in the violence, and an estimated 16,000 people sought refuge in neighboring Republic of Congo.

The Dec. 16-18 violence came days before Congo’s presidential election.

Watchdog calls for legal review of Trump’s hotel lease in D.C.

WASHINGTON — The inspector general for the General Services Administration says the agency improperly ignored the U.S. Constitution’s emoluments provision outlawing foreign gifts when it approved President Donald Trump’s management of his Washington hotel after his 2016 election.

The GSA’s inspector general said in a report released Wednesday that the “president’s business interest” in the Trump International Hotel site at the Old Post Office building raises emolument issues that “might cause a breach of lease.”

The inspector general urged a formal legal review. The watchdog said GSA agreed with its recommendation.

The lease has a clause barring any “elected official of the government of the United States” from deriving “any benefit.”

Migrants set sights on Mexico in trek toward U.S.

AGUA CALIENTE, Guatemala — More than 1,000 Hondurans were walking and hitchhiking through Guatemala on Wednesday, heading toward the Mexico border as part of a new caravan of migrants hoping to reach the United States.

Guatemala’s migration authority said just over 1,300 people were able to register at the border and pass through frontier controls under the watchful eyes of about 200 police and soldiers at the Agua Caliente crossing.

Migrants leaving Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala routinely cite poverty, lack of opportunity and gang violence as their motivation.

The latest trek north comes as President Donald Trump has been working to convince the American public that there is a crisis at the southern border to justify construction of a border wall.

Serbia court acquits 7 in ’08 torching of U.S. Embassy

BELGRADE, Serbia — A Serbian appeals court has acquitted the suspects in the 2008 rioting and torching of the U.S. Embassy in Belgrade after a rally against Kosovo’s declaration of independence.

The Appeals Court of Belgrade said Wednesday it has overturned suspended prison sentences for four suspects and confirmed an earlier acquittal of three more people by a lower court. The court says prosecutors have failed to provide enough evidence to back the indictment.

One person died when the American and other Western embassies were attacked by groups of nationalists and soccer hooligans angry over what they perceived as Western support for Kosovo’s statehood.

Kosovo declared independence in Feb. 2008 which Belgrade still does not recognize.

In St. Louis: Anchorwoman Marzieh Hashemi, an American who worked on Iranian state television, has been arrested by the FBI, Iran reported Wednesday. She was detained in St. Louis, where she had filmed a Black Lives Matter documentary after visiting relatives in Louisiana. She was then taken to Washington.

In Toronto: The U.S. State Department said that China’s death sentence on Robert Schellenberg of Canada is “politically motivated.” Canada has have been talking to world leaders about Schellenberg and the cases of two others arrested in China in apparent retaliation for the arrest of Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou.