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WASHINGTON — A gray-haired Vietnam veteran satrustling on the paper of an exam-ining table at the small veteransclinic in Grants Pass, Ore., on a re-cent afternoon when his doctor forthe day appeared on a screen infront of him, wearing a white labcoat and bulbous headphones.

“Take some deep breaths. Allthe way in . . . and, sir, do you wantto give me a good cough?” the doc-tor said as he listened to the veter-an’s heart and lungs from about2,400 miles away in his office over-looking the White House.

The doctor was David Shulkin,the new secretary of veterans af-fairs, and this was not some pub-licity stunt. Dr. Shulkin believes itis impossible to right the stum-bling bureaucracy used by ninemillion veterans without under-standing the experience of pa-tients in the examining room. SoDr. Shulkin, the leader of the coun-try’s second-largest federalagency, has been seeing patientsregularly, both in person and re-motely, since he was named theDepartment of Veterans Affairs’under secretary of health in

V.A. Chief TriesNew Approach:Seeing Patients

By DAVE PHILIPPSand NICHOLAS FANDOS

David Shulkin last month.GABRIELLA DEMCZUK FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES

Continued on Page A14

They are called “must-runs,”and they arrive every day at tele-vision stations owned by the Sin-clair Broadcast Group — shortvideo segments that are centrallyproduced by the company. Stationmanagers around the country aredirected to work them into thebroadcast over a period of 24 or 48hours.

Since November 2015, Sinclairhas ordered its stations to run adaily segment from a “TerrorismAlert Desk” with updates on ter-rorism-related news around theworld. During the election cam-paign last year, it sent out a pack-age that suggested in part thatvoters should not support HillaryClinton because the DemocraticParty was historically pro-slav-ery. More recently, Sinclair askedstations to run a short segment inwhich Scott Livingston, the com-pany’s vice president for news, ac-cused the national news media ofpublishing “fake news stories.”

As Sinclair prepares to expandits stable of local TV stations witha proposed acquisition of TribuneMedia — which would add 42 sta-tions to Sinclair’s 173 — advocacygroups have shown concern aboutthe size and reach the combinedcompany would have. Its stationswould reach more than 70 percentof the nation’s households, includ-ing many of the largest markets.

Critics of the deal also cite Sin-clair’s willingness to use its sta-tions to advance a mostly right-leaning agenda. That practice hasstirred wariness among some ofits journalists concerned about in-trusive direction from headquar-ters.

That is what has happened inSeattle, a progressive city whereSinclair owns the KOMO broad-

Tilting Right,TV News Titan

Roils Its Staff

By SYDNEY EMBER

Continued on Page A16

The letter delivered by hand tothe Home for the Aged of the LittleSisters of the Poor commandedone of its residents — a JohnCurry — to appear before a tri-bunal of the Roman Catholic Arch-diocese of New York. Refusalcould lead to “ecclesiastical penal-ties,” a phrase conjuring eternaldiscomfort.

The retired laborer obeyed. En-tering the archdiocesan offices inMidtown, he left behind the thor-oughly modern New York of July1937 — abuzz with the recent dis-appearance of the aviator AmeliaEarhart — and returned to a re-mote County Mayo place called,simply, Knock. To one day in 1879,when he was 5, a day he said heremembered as well as last night.

“Are you the John Curry who ismentioned as having been an eye-witness to the alleged apparitionof the Blessed Virgin at KnockChurch on that date?” a priestasked. “And if so — ”

The witness interrupted tomake at least one thing clear:“Yes, sir, I am the very JohnCurry.”

It is precisely because he wasthe very that John Curry is now ofthe moment. He was recently dis-interred from a Long Island ceme-tery in order to be reinterred on

Saturday in choice Manhattanclay: the small cemetery of theBasilica of St. Patrick’s OldCathedral in Little Italy.

His prominent headstone is al-ready planted, his lifelong distinc-tion chiseled in the blue-blackgranite:

“Witness to the Apparition atKnock.”

What you choose to believe is

up to you. This is merely the storyof an Irish immigrant who diedwithout means in Gotham obscur-ity, then rose to such postlifeprominence that, amid consider-able pageantry, the archbishop ofNew York, Cardinal Timothy M.Dolan, will celebrate his requiemMass and pray over his newearthly home.

A Vision of 1879 Ireland, a Reward in New YorkBy DAN BARRY

John Curry, center, in an undated photo, saw an apparition as achild in Knock, Ireland. He will be reburied in Manhattan.

VIA KNOCK SHRINE

Continued on Page A20

WASHINGTON — PresidentTrump on Friday warned JamesB. Comey, the F.B.I. directorwhom he fired this week, againstleaking anything negative abouthim, saying that Mr. Comey “bet-ter hope” that there are no secrettapes of their conversations thatthe president could use in retalia-tion.

The suggestion that the presi-dent may be surreptitiously re-cording his meetings or telephonecalls added a twist at the end of aweek that roiled Washington. Thepresident and his spokesman lat-er refused to say whether he tapeshis visitors, something Mr. Trumpwas suspected of doing when hewas in business in New York.

“James Comey better hope thatthere are no ‘tapes’ of our conver-sations before he starts leaking tothe press!” Mr. Trump wrote onTwitter.

Mr. Trump appeared to be refer-ring to an article in The New YorkTimes that said he had asked Mr.

Comey to pledge loyalty during adinner at the White House shortlyafter the inauguration, only to berebuffed by the F.B.I. director, whoconsidered it inappropriate.

Mr. Trump denied the account,but it was not clear whether hewas genuinely revealing the exist-ence of clandestine recordings orsimply making a rhetorical pointthat Mr. Comey’s version of eventswas false.

Mr. Trump chose not to clarifywhen asked later in the day by FoxNews if there were tapes of con-versations. “That I can’t talkabout. I won’t talk about it,” hesaid. “All I want is for Comey to behonest.”

No president in the past 40years has been known to regu-larly tape his phone calls or meet-

ings because, among other rea-sons, the recordings could be sub-poenaed by investigators as theywere during the Watergate inves-tigation that ultimately forcedPresident Richard M. Nixon to re-sign. Phone calls with foreignleaders are typically transcribedwith the knowledge of otherparticipants.

Democrats were incredulous.“For a president who baselesslyaccused his predecessor of ille-gally wiretapping him, that Mr.Trump would suggest that he,himself, may have engaged insuch conduct is staggering,” saidRepresentative Adam B. Schiff ofCalifornia, the top Democrat onthe House Intelligence Commit-tee.

Representatives John ConyersJr. of Michigan and Elijah E. Cum-mings of Maryland, the topDemocrats on the judiciary andoversight committees, sent a let-ter to the White House demandingcopies of any recordings if theyexist. The letter noted that “it is acrime to intimidate or threaten

Trump Stirs a New Question: Are There Tapes?By PETER BAKER

and MICHAEL D. SHEARRefusing to State if

He Records HisConversations

Continued on Page A13

DANDONG, China — As theend of the fashion season ap-proached, and the suits anddresses arrived in her company’swarehouses here in the Chineseborder town of Dandong, the ac-countant crammed about $100,000into a backpack, then boarded arickety train with several co-workers.

She asked to be identified onlyby her surname, Lang, given thesensitivity of their destination:North Korea.

After a six-hour journey, she re-called, they arrived at a factorywhere hundreds of women usinghigh-end European machinessewed clothes with “Made inChina” labels. Her boss handedthe money to the North Koreanmanager, all of it in American billsas required.

Despite seven rounds of UnitedNations sanctions over the past 11years, including a ban on “bulkcash” transfers, large avenues oftrade remain open to North Korea,allowing it to earn foreign cur-rency to sustain its economy andfinance its program to build a nu-clear weapon that can strike theUnited States.

Fraudulent labeling helps sup-port its garment industry, whichgenerated more than $500 millionfor the isolated nation last year,according to Chinese trade data.

North Korea earned an addi-tional $1.1 billion selling coal toChina last year using a loophole inthe ban on such exports, and re-searchers say tens of thousands ofNorth Koreans who work over-seas as laborers are forced to sendback as much as $250 million an-nually. Diplomats estimate thecountry makes $70 million moreselling rights to harvest seafoodfrom its waters.

China accounts for more than80 percent of trade with North Ko-rea, and the Trump administra-tion is counting on Beijing to usethat leverage to pressure it intogiving up its nuclear arsenal. TheChinese government took a bigstep in February by announcingthat it was suspending imports ofcoal from the country through theend of the year.

But China has a long record ofshielding North Korea from more

THE ART OF LIVINGUNDER SANCTIONS

North Korea MaintainsAvenues of Trade

This article is by Jane Perlez, Yu-fan Huang and Paul Mozur.

Workers in Pyongyang at the Kim Jong-suk Silk Mill, a factory named after the North Korean leader Kim Jong-un’s grandmother.ED JONES/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE — GETTY IMAGES

Continued on Page A8

SAN FRANCISCO — Hackersexploiting malicious softwarestolen from the National SecurityAgency executed damagingcyberattacks on Friday that hitdozens of countries worldwide,forcing Britain’s public health sys-tem to send patients away, freez-ing computers at Russia’s InteriorMinistry and wreaking havoc ontens of thousands of computerselsewhere.

The attacks amounted to an au-dacious global blackmail attemptspread by the internet and under-scored the vulnerabilities of thedigital age.

Transmitted via email, the ma-licious software locked Britishhospitals out of their computersystems and demanded ransombefore users could be let back in —with a threat that data would bedestroyed if the demands were notmet.

By late Friday the attacks hadspread to more than 74 countries,according to security firms track-ing the spread. Kaspersky Lab, aRussian cybersecurity firm, saidRussia was the worst-hit, followedby Ukraine, India and Taiwan. Re-ports of attacks also came fromLatin America and Africa.

The attacks appeared to be thelargest ransomware assault onrecord, but the scope of the dam-age was hard to measure. It wasnot clear if victims were payingthe ransom, which began at about

$300 to unlock individualcomputers, or even if those whodid pay would regain access totheir data.

Security experts described theattacks as the digital equivalent ofa perfect storm. They began witha simple phishing email, similar tothe one Russian hackers used inthe attacks on the Democratic Na-tional Committee and other tar-gets last year. They then quicklyspread through victims’ systemsusing a hacking method that theN.S.A. is believed to have devel-oped as part of its arsenal of cy-berweapons. And finally they en-crypted the computer systems ofthe victims, locking them out ofcritical data, including patientrecords in Britain.

The connection to the N.S.A.was particularly chilling. Startinglast summer, a group calling itselfthe “Shadow Brokers” began topost software tools that camefrom the United States govern-ment’s stockpile of hackingweapons.

The attacks on Friday appearedto be the first time a cyberweapondeveloped by the N.S.A., fundedby American taxpayers and stolenby an adversary had been un-leashed by cybercriminalsagainst patients, hospitals, busi-nesses, governments and ordi-nary citizens.

Something similar occurred

HACKERS USE TOOLTAKEN FROM N.S.A.

IN GLOBAL ATTACKA Digital ‘Perfect Storm’ Hits Hospitals,

Businesses and a Russian Ministry

By NICOLE PERLROTH and DAVID E. SANGER

Continued on Page A9

Long reluctant, Elisha Wiesel, the Holo-caust memoirist’s son, is taking a morepublic role. The Saturday Profile. PAGE A6

INTERNATIONAL A4-9

Furthering His Father’s WorkVoters in rural Oregon are seeing whathappens when taxpayers force govern-ment into retreat. Libraries are closing.Jails might be next. PAGE A10

Saying No to New Taxes

State-of-the-art factories for Ford andG.M. illustrate a shift to mostly auto-mated manufacturing in the world’slargest automobile market. PAGE B3

BUSINESS DAY B1-8

A Robot Revolution in China

An exhibition in the Netherlands fo-cuses on work that the Nazis looted andowners have fought to recover. PAGE C1

ARTS C1-7

Lessons on Stolen Art

The government has not yet allowedparents to see scores of Chibok school-girls released by Boko Haram. PAGE A7

Still Waiting for Nigerian GirlsAn Italian coaching academy is a pipe-line for soccer strategists who have wonchampionships across Europe. PAGE D1

SPORTSSATURDAY D1-6

Boot Camp for Champions

Students reflected on their “beautifulcontradictions” as they wrote aboutwork and privilege. Your Money. PAGE B1

Standout Teenage Essayists

A one-night show, “All the President’sMen?,” re-enacted confirmation hear-ings of the Trump cabinet. PAGE C1

Political Theatrics

In print only: The New York Times ispublishing its first section just for kids.It’s packed with lots of fun projects,including how to create your own su-perhero and how to make your ownslime, a NASA-designed paper airplaneand chocolate-chip pizza.

THIS WEEKEND

Special Section for Kids

Bret Stephens PAGE A23

EDITORIAL, OP-ED A22-23

A former engineer was charged withinvoluntary manslaughter in a 2015wreck that killed eight people. PAGE A17

NATIONAL A10-17

Charges in Amtrak Derailment

Joseph Ponte, who resigned as NewYork City correction commissioner,spoke of his three-year run. PAGE A19

NEW YORK A19-21

Departing Jails Chief Reflects

Late Edition

VOL. CLXVI . . . No. 57,596 © 2017 The New York Times Company NEW YORK, SATURDAY, MAY 13, 2017

Today, rain becoming heavy, breezy,high 54. Tonight, evening rain,heavy at times, breezy, low 48. To-morrow, a few showers, breezy, high64. Weather map is on Page C8.

$2.50