All but one of the US embassies and consulates are now reopen that the State Department temporarily closed earlier this month due to threats of terrorism emanating from the Arabian peninsula. “On Aug. 13, we reopened 18 of the 19 posts that had been closed recently,” said State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf, on Monday. The US embassy in Sanaa, Yemen, is the only one remaining closed, she said. Further, “due to a separate, credible threat,” the US consulate in Lahore, Pakistan, remains closed, said Harf on Aug. 12. (Harf transcript)
A new report from the Government Accountability Office calls for the Pentagon’s Chief Technology Officer to have budget certification authority over the military services’ research and development accounts—a move the services say would add a burdensome and unnecessary layer of bureaucracy.

