WASHINGTON — A former Blackwater security contractor was sentenced Wednesday to life in prison for his role in the 2007 shooting of unarmed civilians in Iraq that left 14 people dead.

Federal Judge Royce Lamberth issued the sentence after a succession of friends and relatives requested leniency for Nicholas Slatten, who was found guilty of first-degree murder by a jury in December. It was Slatten’s third trial in the case after an earlier conviction was overturned and a second jury deadlocked, resulting in a mistrial.

Prosecutors charged that Slatten, 35, was the first to fire shots in the September 2007 massacre of Iraqi civilians at a crowded traffic circle in Baghdad. In all, 10 men, two women and two boys, ages 9 and 11, were killed.

The defense had argued that Slatten and other Blackwater contractors opened fire only after they saw what they mistakenly thought was a potential suicide car bomber moving quickly toward their convoy.

In 2014, a jury convicted Slatten and three other contractors — Paul Alvin Slough, Evan Shawn Liberty and Dustin Laurent Heard— who were part of a four-vehicle convoy that was protecting State Department personnel in the area. An appeals court overturned that conviction, saying Slatten should have been tried separately from the three other men.

Slatten, a decorated Army veteran who served two tours in Iraq, and his defense said he would appeal what they called a wrongful conviction fueled by politics and errors by prosecutors and the U.S. justice system.

Court suspends Italian agency’s ban on migrant rescue ship

ROME — An Italian court has upheld an appeal by the Spanish rescue ship Open Arms, suspending the Italian Interior Ministry’s decision to ban the ship from entering Italian waters.

The rescue ship with 147 migrants onboard has been stuck in the Mediterranean for nearly two weeks due to the ban imposed by Italy’s hard-line Interior Minister Matteo Salvini, whose anti-immigration policies have put Rome on a collision course with its European Union partners.

The Italian court ruled that the ban violates international laws in light of the “exceptionally grave and urgent situation due to the protracted stay of the migrants on our boat,” Open Arms said in a statement Wednesday.

The group said its ship is now heading toward Italian waters and expects to reach them Thursday morning.

Teen activist Greta Thunberg sets sail for climate summits

PLYMOUTH, England — Eco-activist Greta Thunberg set sail Wednesday from England for New York as part of her campaign to pressure politicians to put climate change at the top of their agendas.

The 16-year-old activist is hitching a ride on a sailboat designed to make a zero-carbon trans-Atlantic journey, and she plans to attend the U.N. climate summits next month in New York and in Santiago, Chile, in December.

Thunberg gained global attention last year when she refused to go to school in the weeks ahead of her native Sweden’s general election to highlight the impact of climate change. She continued her school strike on Fridays after the election, spurring thousands of young people around the world to follow suit.

Rep. King suggests rapes, incest benefited world population

DES MOINES, Iowa — Rep. Steve King on Wednesday defended his call for a ban on all abortions by questioning whether “there would be any population of the world left” if not for births due to rape and incest.

Speaking in the Des Moines suburb of Urbandale, the Iowa Republican reviewed legislation he has sought that would outlaw abortions without exceptions for rape and incest. King justified the lack of exceptions by questioning how many people would be alive if not for those conceived through rapes and incest.

“What if we went back through all the family trees and just pulled out anyone who was a product of rape or incest? Would there be any population of the world left if we did that?” King asked, according to The Des Moines Register.

Vaping companies sue to delay US review

WASHINGTON — A vaping industry group sued the U.S. government on Wednesday to delay a review of thousands of e-cigarettes on the market.

The legal challenge by the Vapor Technology Association is the latest hurdle in the Food and Drug Administration’s yearslong effort to regulate the multibillion-dollar vaping industry, which includes makers and retailers of e-cigarette devices and flavored solutions.

The vaping group argued that the latest deadline of next May to submit products for review could wipe out many of the smaller companies. The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Kentucky.

E-cigarettes first appeared in the U.S. more than a decade ago and have grown in popularity despite little research on their long-term effects, including whether they can help smokers quit cigarettes.

Campaign to crack down on impaired motorists

WASHINGTON — About 30,000 police officers will be out on the roads around the country through the Labor Day weekend to crack down on impaired driving, an annual effort that this year poses potential risks to immigrants who fear getting stopped and deported given the strict immigration policies pursued by the Trump administration.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration announced Wednesday it will run the high-visibility enforcement campaign during what is one of the deadliest times on U.S. roads.

The campaign — If You Feel Different, You Drive Different — Drive High, Get a DUI” — begins Friday and has a $13 million media budget to run public service announcements on television, radio, online and on social media and in cinemas.

In Canada: The nation’s ethics commissioner said Wednesday that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau improperly pressured a former attorney general to halt the criminal prosecution of a company.

Ethics Commissioner Mario Dion said Trudeau’s attempts to influence the then attorney general and justice minister, Jody Wilson-Raybould, were contrary to the constitutional principle of prosecutorial independence.

Wilson-Raybould believes she was demoted to veterans’ affairs minister in January because she didn’t give in to pressure to enter into a remediation agreement with major employer SNC-Lavalin, a Canadian company accused of bribing Libyan officials.