Indonesian rescuers dig through volcanic ash after eruption kills 9

Indonesian rescuers dig through volcanic ash after eruption kills 9
Villagers flee during an eruption of Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki, a day after the previous eruption, in Boru Village, East Nusa Tenggara, on Tuesday. (AFP)
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Updated 06 November 2024
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Indonesian rescuers dig through volcanic ash after eruption kills 9

Indonesian rescuers dig through volcanic ash after eruption kills 9

Rescue workers on Tuesday sifted through smoldering debris and thick mud in search of survivors, a day after a volcano on Indonesia’s island of Flores erupted, killing at least nine people with its searing lava and ash.

Mount Lewotobi Laki Laki spewed thick brownish ash as high as 2,000 meters and searing lava, gravel and ash were thrown up to 7 kilometers from its crater, blanketing nearby villages and towns with tons of volcanic debris and forcing residents to flee.

The National Disaster Management Agency on Tuesday lowered the death toll from an earlier report of 10, saying a victim trapped under tonnes of debris in a collapsed house who was feared dead was rescued in critical condition. The agency said 63 other people were hospitalized, 31 of them with serious injuries.

More than 2,400 villagers streamed into makeshift emergency shelters after Monday’s eruption that burned down seven schools and 23 houses, including a convent of nuns, on the majority-Catholic island, said the agency’s spokesperson, Abdul Muhari.

Smoldering debris, thick mud and a power blackout hampered the evacuation and search efforts, said Kensius Didimus, a local disaster agency official.

“We’ll do everything we can to evacuate villagers by preparing trucks and motorbikes for them to flee at any time,” he said, adding that the debris and lava mixed with rainfall formed thick mud that destroyed the main roads on the island.

Authorities warned the thousands of people who fled the volcano not to return during Tuesday’s lull in activity. But some were desperate to check on livestock and possessions left behind. In several areas, everything — from the thinnest tree branch to couches and chairs inside homes — was caked with ash.


EU says asylum rights can be suspended for migrants ‘weaponized’ by Russia and Belarus

Updated 16 sec ago
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EU says asylum rights can be suspended for migrants ‘weaponized’ by Russia and Belarus

EU says asylum rights can be suspended for migrants ‘weaponized’ by Russia and Belarus
The number of migrants arriving at the borders of EU member states from Belarus has increased by 66 percent this year
The commission monitors EU laws to ensure that they are respected

BRUSSELS: The European Union on Wednesday gave a greenlight to Poland and other countries on Europe’s eastern flank to temporarily suspend asylum rights when they believe that Belarus and Russia are “weaponizing” migrants to destabilize the bloc.
Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced plans in October to introduce a law that would suspend asylum applications for up to 60 days as his country struggles with migratory pressures on its border with Belarus, angering human rights groups. The freeze has not yet been enacted.
The number of migrants arriving at the borders of EU member states from Belarus has increased by 66 percent this year, compared with 2023. Belarus authorities are accused of helping migrants to get into Europe, including by supplying them with ladders and other devices, according to the European Commission.
The EU’s executive branch also accuses Russian authorities of “facilitating these movements, given that more than 90 percent of migrants illegally crossing the Polish-Belarusian border have a Russian student or tourist visa.”
It said that “in view of the serious nature of the threat, as well as its persistence,” EU member countries can temporarily suspend a migrant’s request for international protection in exceptional circumstances. Some migrants are accused of attacking border guards.
The commission monitors EU laws to ensure that they are respected. The right for people to seek asylum when they fear for their lives or safety in their home countries is encoded in the bloc’s legislation and international law.
European Commission Executive Vice President Henna Virkkunen said a freeze on asylum rights should only be used “when the weaponization is posing security threats for member states and exceptional measures are needed.”
Member states would be permitted to restrict a migrant’s access to asylum rights, but only under “very strict conditions and (with)in legal limits,” she said. “So it means that they have to be truly exceptional, temporary, proportionate and for clearly defined cases.”
Virkkunen, who declined to provide details, said the commission is providing 170 million euros ($179 million) to Poland, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and non-EU country Norway to boost their border defenses, including upgrading electronic surveillance equipment, installing mobile detectors, improving telecommunication networks, and countering drones that might be sent into EU airspace.

Germany’s Scholz requests confidence vote on path to election

Germany’s Scholz requests confidence vote on path to election
Updated 17 min 26 sec ago
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Germany’s Scholz requests confidence vote on path to election

Germany’s Scholz requests confidence vote on path to election
  • If, as expected, Scholz loses the confidence vote, he must then ask the president to dissolve parliament, triggering fresh elections
  • Scholz has agreed with the opposition to hold the election on Feb. 23

BERLIN: German Chancellor Olaf Scholz sent a request to parliament on Wednesday to hold a vote of confidence on Dec. 16, setting a path to an early federal election next year after the collapse of his coalition last month.
Policymaking in Europe’s biggest economy has largely ground to a halt since Scholz’s fractious coalition of Social Democrats (SPD), Greens and neoliberal Free Democrats (FDP) imploded, leaving him heading a minority government.
If, as expected, Scholz loses the confidence vote, he must then ask the president to dissolve parliament, triggering fresh elections. Scholz has agreed with the opposition to hold the election on Feb. 23.
Last week, French Prime Minister Michel Barnier lost a no-confidence vote, underscoring the unusual degree of political instability plaguing both of Europe’s top powers.
Polls suggest the opposition conservatives are on track to win the federal election, with a survey on Monday putting them on 31 percent, followed by the far-right Alternative for Germany on 18 percent, Scholz’s SPD on 17 percent and the Greens on 13 percent.
The FDP and the newly-created Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance are both polling just under the 5 percent threshold to enter parliament but analysts say voters can shift quickly as they are less loyal than they once were.


An explosion in the Afghan capital kills the Taliban refugee minister

An explosion in the Afghan capital kills the Taliban refugee minister
Updated 57 min 50 sec ago
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An explosion in the Afghan capital kills the Taliban refugee minister

An explosion in the Afghan capital kills the Taliban refugee minister
  • The explosion struck inside the ministry, killing Khalil Haqqani, officials said
  • His last official photo showed him at a meeting chaired by the deputy prime minister, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, earlier Wednesday

ISLAMABAD: A suicide bombing in the Afghan capital on Wednesday killed the Taliban refugee minister and two others, officials said, in the most brazen attack on a member of the Taliban inner circle since they returned to power three years ago.
The explosion struck inside the ministry, killing Khalil Haqqani, officials said. His last official photo showed him at a meeting chaired by the deputy prime minister, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, earlier Wednesday.
Khalil Haqqani is the uncle of Sirajuddin Haqqani, the acting interior minister who leads a powerful network within the Taliban.
Haqqani was the most high-profile casualty of a bombing in Afghanistan since the Taliban returned to power and the first Cabinet member to be killed since the takeover. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the blast.
The government’s chief spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, said in a post on X that Haqqani’s death was a great loss and described him as a tireless holy warrior who spent his life defending Islam.
Haqqani’s killing may be the biggest blow to the Taliban since their return to power given his stature and influence, according to Michael Kugelman, director of the Wilson Center’s South Asia Institute. It also comes at a time when the Taliban have staked their legitimacy on restoring peace after decades of war, he added.
“The killing of a top Haqqani leader inside one of its own ministries undercuts that core narrative,” he said.
Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar condemned the killing as a “terrorist attack.”
“Pakistan unequivocally condemns terrorism in all its forms and manifestations,” Dar said, adding his government was in touch with Kabul to get further details.
The Daesh group’s affiliate, a major rival of the ruling Taliban, has carried out previous attacks across Afghanistan.
In early September, one of its suicide bombers in a southwestern Kabul neighborhood killed at least six people, wounding 13 others.
But suicide attacks have become increasingly rare since the Taliban seized power in August 2021 and US and NATO forces withdrew. Such attacks have mostly targeted minority Shiite Muslims, especially in the capital.


Ukraine loses ground near Pokrovsk, Russian force within 3 km of strategic hub

Ukraine loses ground near Pokrovsk, Russian force within 3 km of strategic hub
Updated 11 December 2024
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Ukraine loses ground near Pokrovsk, Russian force within 3 km of strategic hub

Ukraine loses ground near Pokrovsk, Russian force within 3 km of strategic hub
  • “As a result of prolonged clashes, two of our positions were destroyed, one was lost,” Nazar Voloshyn, Ukraine’s military spokesman, said
  • Kyiv has urged its allies to get it into the strongest possible position on the battlefield before any talks do happen

KYIV: Russian troops destroyed or captured several Ukrainian positions near the eastern city of Pokrovsk, Kyiv’s military said on Wednesday, as Moscow bears down on the strategic logistics hub that is home to a unique Ukrainian coking mine.
After months of accelerating advances toward Pokrovsk, Moscow’s forces are now as close as 3 kilometers (1.9 miles) from the southern outskirts of the city, according to Ukraine’s DeepState, which maps the front lines using open sources.
“As a result of prolonged clashes, two of our positions were destroyed, one was lost. Currently, measures are being taken to restore positions,” Nazar Voloshyn, Ukraine’s military spokesman for the eastern front, said in televised comments.
Pokrovsk, situated about 18 kilometers (11 miles) from the boundary of Ukraine’s Donetsk and Dnipropetrovsk regions, has for months been the area of the fiercest battles in Russia’s 33-month-old full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
In October and November, the Russian military advanced toward the city at its fastest rate since the early months of the war, analysts said. Ukraine, which has been on the back foot since its failed 2023 counteroffensive, says Russia has been sustaining some of its heaviest losses of the war to date.
Both Ukraine and Russia have their eye on the growing prospect of a push for peace talks, with US President-elect Donald Trump preparing to enter office on Jan. 20, having called for an immediate ceasefire and a swift end to the war.
Kyiv has urged its allies to get it into the strongest possible position on the battlefield before any talks do happen.
Russia, which Ukraine says has over 70,000 troops on the Pokrovsk front, has rapidly advanced toward Shevchenko, a village to Pokrovsk’s south, in recent weeks.
Its forces are currently trying to gain a foothold in the village and sending in reconnaissance and sabotage groups, Voloshyn said. Ukraine is holding them back for now, he added.
The fall of Pokrovsk, an important logistics center for the Ukrainian military in the east, would amount to the biggest military setback for Kyiv in months.
The city also hosts Ukraine’s only domestic coking coal supplier for its once-giant steel industry.
The mine, which was still operating as of Dec. 6, lies 10 km (6.2 miles) west of Pokrovsk, the far side from where Russian troops have been advancing.


Father and stepmother convicted of Sara Sharif’s brutal murder after UK trial

Sara Sharif was found dead in August 2023 at her home in Woking. (Surrey Police)
Sara Sharif was found dead in August 2023 at her home in Woking. (Surrey Police)
Updated 11 December 2024
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Father and stepmother convicted of Sara Sharif’s brutal murder after UK trial

Sara Sharif was found dead in August 2023 at her home in Woking. (Surrey Police)
  • The jury convicted Urfan Sharif and Batool of Sara’s murder
  • Sara’s uncle Faisal Malik, 29, was found not guilty of murder but guilty of causing or allowing Sara’s death

LONDON: The father and stepmother of Sara Sharif, a 10-year-old girl who was found dead in her home in Britain, were on Wednesday convicted of her murder after a trial which heard harrowing details of her treatment before her killing.
Sharif was found dead in August 2023 at her home in Woking, a town southwest of London, after what prosecutors say was a campaign of “serious and repeated violence.”
The family fled to Pakistan immediately after Sara Sharif was killed, before they were arrested in September 2023 at London’s Gatwick airport after flying from Dubai.
Prosecutor Bill Emlyn Jones told jurors at the start of the trial that Sara had suffered a litany of injuries, including burns, broken bones and bite marks.
Sara’s father Urfan Sharif, 43, and his wife Beinash Batool, 30, stood trial at London’s Old Bailey court charged with her murder, which they denied.
The jury convicted Urfan Sharif and Batool of Sara’s murder. Sara’s uncle Faisal Malik, 29, was found not guilty of murder but guilty of causing or allowing Sara’s death.
Sharif and Batool will be sentenced on Dec. 17.
Emlyn Jones told jurors at the start of the trial that Urfan Sharif had called police and said: “It wasn’t my intention to kill her, but I beat her up too much.”
Sharif gave evidence and initially denied responsibility for Sara’s death. He accepted slapping Sara to discipline her, but denied beating her in a regular or sustained way.
But Urfan Sharif, under questioning from Batool’s lawyer Caroline Carberry, later said he took “full responsibility” for his daughter’s death.
Lawyers for Batool, who did not give evidence, said Urfan Sharif was violent and controlling and that she was scared of him.