In this task, you are given news articles and you need to generate a highlight, i.e., a short summary, with a maximum length of 10 lines.

(CNN) -- For the first time since a reported massacre there, U.N. observers on Saturday entered the Syrian town of Tremseh, where opposition activists say more than 200 people were killed. The violence took place Thursday, on what may have been the single deadliest day in the 16-month crisis. It prompted a fresh round of condemnation from world leaders. In Tremseh, the U.N. team found evidence of an attack, including a burned school, damaged houses, and proof that artillery, mortars and small arms were used, said Sausan Ghosheh, spokeswoman for the head of the U.N. Supervising Mission in Syria. She added that the number of causalities remains unclear. "The attack ... appeared targeted at specific groups and houses, mainly of army defectors and activists. There were pools of blood and blood spatters in rooms of several homes together with bullet cases," Ghosheh said in a statement. U.N. observers are expected to return to the town Sunday to continue their fact-finding work. Still grappling with the attack, Syrians endured yet another bloody day Saturday as regime forces fired from low-flying helicopters and a bomb exploded at a state security headquarters, opposition activists said. At least 73 people were killed in Saturday violence, including 20 in Homs, 11 in Damascus Suburbs and 13 in Hama province, the Local Coordination Committees of Syria said. Fourteen additional deaths were reported in Deir Ezzor and 12 in Idlib, among others. Another opposition group, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said a car bombing targeted a state security building in Hama, and "a number of state security personnel were killed and wounded." Syrian state-run TV said at least three civilians and a security officer were killed in Muhrada by a suicide bomber in a truck. Farther south, the Daraa province town of Khirbet Ghazaleh came under heavy shelling and machine gun fire after the Syrian army surrounded it with tanks, the LCC said. "Helicopters fly over the city at a low altitude with a continued siege of the city and gunfire from snipers," the opposition network said. Meanwhile, Deir Ezzor was subject to intense shelling by government forces, as well as fierce clashes between regime forces and the Free Syrian Army, the LCC said. How long can al-Assad hang on? According to the opposition network, more than 200 villagers were killed in the Hama-area town of Tremseh on Thursday, and dozens more were killed elsewhere across the country. U.N. spokeswoman Ghosheh said a large patrol had been sent from Damascus to Tremseh on Saturday to assess the situation, amid widely differing accounts of what happened from opposition activists and the government. An initial reconnaissance mission was sent Friday following assurances of a cease-fire in the area, the spokeswoman said, but it was too late in the day to do much. "The patrol assessed the situation -- if there was in fact a cease-fire and our access to the town," she said. "An 11 vehicle integrated patrol, comprised of specialized military and civilian observers, arrived ... on Saturday after confirming that a cease-fire was in place." International anger against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has ratcheted up since the Tremseh incident, with at least one U.S. official suggesting the need for more pressure on al-Assad's regime. As outrage grows in Syria, report of a 'breakthrough' for humanitarian aid . "Through these repeated acts of violence against the Syrian people, President Assad has lost legitimacy to lead. It is time for him to go. It is time for the political transition that is long overdue to finally get under way," Josh Earnest, a White House spokesman, told reporters Friday. "It certainly does build strong international support ... to continue to ramp up the pressure on Assad," he added, citing "ongoing conversations at the United Nations about additional ways that we can build some international agreement and raise the stakes even further." Syria moving chemical weapons? Activists in the city of Hama, meanwhile, gave a grisly account of the assault in Tremseh. Witnesses inside the town told the activists by telephone that Syrian military forces had launched a full-scale attack against the opposition Free Syrian Army inside the town, which was surrounded by government tanks and artillery. As the government forces rained artillery rounds into the town, a number of village residents fled their houses, going into the streets, where many of them were shot dead by the government militias, the activists told CNN. The government painted a starkly different picture of Tremseh than that detailed by opposition groups. The state-run Syrian Arab News Agency blamed "armed terrorist groups" for the violence. It said the government said residents called security forces for help after the terrorist groups raided the neighborhood. Regime forces arrested some of the members of the terrorist groups and confiscated their weapons, the government said. Syria's detached and deluded elite? "Armed forces successfully dealt with the terrorists without casualties taking place among the citizens. They searched into the terrorists' dens where they found the dead bodies of a number of citizens who had been abducted and killed by the terrorist groups," SANA reported, citing a military source. CNN cannot independently verify reports from Syria because the nation has restricted access by international journalists. Meanwhile, many who survive the violence are caught in a precarious humanitarian situation. The chief U.N. organization that coordinates emergency aid warned Friday that more Syrians will die if contributing nations do not follow through and fund its relief operation. "We have run out of language to describe how it is for the civilian population," said John Ging, operations director and chairman of the Syria Humanitarian Forum for the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. "It is physical and it is psychological." CNN's Saad Abedine, Dan Lothian and Hamdi Alkhshali contributed to this report.
NEW: At least 73 people are killed across Syria on Saturday, opposition activists say .
U.N. monitors arrive in Tremseh and find evidence of an attack .
An opposition group says more than 200 people were killed there Thursday .
The Syrian government blames the Tremseh incident on armed terrorist groups .

Washington (CNN) -- If the threat of underwear bombs became known last Christmas, why did airport screeners only recently begin aggressively checking for them? The answer is two-fold, Transportation Security Administration Director John Pistole told reporters Tuesday. First, the lack of a permanent leader at the TSA hindered change, he said. Secondly, the agency needed time to train screeners on the new pat-down protocols. The threat of hidden bombs became instantly clear on December 25, 2009, Pistole said, when authorities arrested Umar Farouk AbdulMutallab, a Nigerian man, after his failed attempt to ignite his hidden explosive on a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit, Michigan. TSA officials immediately started looking at what they needed to do to modify technology or pat downs to detect the bombs, he said. But at that time, the top job at TSA was filled by a career official. The White House delayed nominating a TSA chief and then White House and Congressional Republicans feuded for a year over nominees. Much of the debate centered on whether the nominees supported unionization of airport screeners. Two of President Obama's nominees withdrew from consideration. "Frankly it just came down to the fact there was not a presidentially appointed, Senate-confirmed administrator in place until I was confirmed at the end of June to make a really significant decision like that, that would have impact on a number of people," Pistole said. "That was a big part of it." Pistole was sworn in as administrator in July and soon thereafter made the decision to go through "enhanced pat downs." Training time accounts for the rest of the delay, as the TSA quietly began pilot programs in Boston, Massachusetts, and Las Vegas, Nevada, in August, and rolled the program out nationwide in early November. Pistole consistently has said it was his decision to implement enhanced pat downs. He said he opted not to publicize them in advance because he felt to do so would be to give a "roadmap" to would-be terrorists. Implementation of the pat downs was further delayed because time was needed to train screeners on the new protocols, he said. Those protocols are considered sensitive security information, and have not been shared with the public. But Pistole said protocols do not allow for screeners to grope passengers. Pistole said some passenger descriptions of the procedures are "so wildly outside the standard operating protocols that it just absolutely should not be happening. If it is, then we'll take appropriate action." "If we receive any complaints from a passenger about something happening, then we immediately follow up both with that passenger and with our security officers," he said. Most airport checkpoints have closed circuit television systems, which help investigators find out what happened, he said. Videotape helped dispel one passenger's complaint that she was handcuffed to a chair and mistreated, he said. "If there's a security officer that did something that's not appropriate, then we take appropriate action. I just want to make sure that I have all the facts," Pistole said.
The failed underwear bombing last Christmas raised the threat of bombs hidden in clothes .
Pistole says after that, the pat-down program was delayed by two factors .
The TSA lacked a permanent leader until July .
Extensive training also was required before implementation of the program, he says .

(CNN) -- Former Louisiana Gov. Edwin Edwards was released from federal prison Thursday after serving about 10 years, the federal Bureau of Prisons said. Edwards was convicted of racketeering, conspiracy and extortion after prosecutors said he asked for payoffs from people who applied for riverboat casino licenses in New Orleans in the 1990s. Edwards, 83, had pursued a pardon from President George W. Bush, but never got one. He began serving his sentence in February 2001. He was released from prison to a halfway house, said Edmond Ross, spokesman for the Bureau of Prisons. At Edwards' trial in 2000, star witness Edward J. DeBartolo Jr., former owner of the San Francisco 49ers, got a reduced sentence in exchange for testifying about his own $400,000 bribe to Edwards. He said he had felt compelled to make the payment. DeBartolo ended up not going through with the project after the scandal broke. Allegations of corruption dogged Edwards throughout much of his political career, but he always maintained that he'd never lose an election, and famously joked that he'd keep his office unless he was caught "in bed with a dead girl or a live boy." Frequently during his trial -- for allegedly extorting almost $3 million from casino applicants -- he held his own court on the courthouse steps. "Today, I took care of some housekeeping and had my car fixed and went and cashed a check before they freeze my accounts," he told reporters at one point. Edwards served several terms in office -- from 1972 to 1980, 1984 to 1988 and 1992 to 1996. The Democrat, U.S. Navy aviation cadet and lawyer began his career as a city councilman and state representative before being elected to Congress, and then governor. He won his first gubernatorial term "by an unprecedented combination of 'Cajun' and black votes," according to his biography on the Louisiana Secretary of State's website. "Edwards named blacks to key state positions and his support of black politicians resulted in a mutually beneficial relationship," the biography says. His third term "was marked by federal indictments, but not convictions, for mail fraud, obstruction of justice and public bribery," the biography adds. The bio does not refer to Edwards' conviction later on. The U.S. District Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Louisiana, on its website, describes Edwards as "leader of the corrupt enterprise whose objectives included the illegal and corrupt manipulation of the riverboat gaming licensing process during and after his four terms as governor." "Also convicted were Edwin's son, Stephen Edwards and his close associates Andrew Martin, Cecil Brown, and Bobby Johnson," the office says. CNN's Dave Alsup contributed to this report.

The former governor was convicted of extortion in casino industry .
Edwards had pursued a pardon from President Bush .
A former NFL team owner testified about a bribe during Edwards' trial .
Edwards said he'd keep his office unless he was caught with a "dead girl or a live boy"