Israel’s evacuation orders have displaced 90% of Gaza residents, UN says
GAZA (AP) – Successive Israeli evacuation orders in Gaza, including 12 just in August, have displaced 90 per cent of its 2.1 million residents since the Israel-Hamas war began in October, the top UN humanitarian official for the Palestinian territory says.
U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris says she and President Joe Biden are working to end the war in Gaza, where the International Rescue Committee says the polio virus has been circulating for the first time in a quarter-century because of the destruction of hospitals and water infrastructure, along with overcrowded living conditions.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Office says a delegation from the country has arrived in Cairo to resume efforts to salvage a cease-fire deal. The talks are being mediated by the United States, Egypt and Qatar. A crucial sticking point involves Israel’s demand for lasting control over two strategic corridors in Gaza.
Five Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon on Friday killed at least eight people, including a child and several Hezbollah militants, state media reported.
Snipers kill 4 hostage-takers at Russian prison who claimed allegiance to Islamic State group
MOSCOW (AP) — Snipers from Russia’s national guard on Friday killed four inmates who had seized prison guards as hostages and declared allegiance to the Islamic State group, Russian media reports said.
The National Guard Service said the rebellious inmates were “neutralized” and all the hostages had been freed, although the number of hostages was not immediately specified, the reports said.
Details of the violence at the prison in Surovkino, 860 kilometres (535 miles) southeast of Moscow, were sparse and it was not clear how the inmates had taken hostages several hours earlier.
Before the inmates were shot, state news agency Tass said four victims were taken to a local hospital and two of them were in serious condition. Unconfirmed reports on Telegram messaging channels said one or two people died.
Russian news site Meduza posted a video that it said was from the scene, showing men wielding knives inside and in a prison yard and several men in what appeared to be guard uniforms lying in blood on the ground.
Greek coast guards open fire on migrant smuggling boat after alleged ramming attempt, killing 1 man
ATHENS, Greece (AP) — The crew of a Greek coast guard vessel opened fire on a speedboat smuggling migrants from neighbouring Turkey, killing one man, Greek authorities said Friday.
A coast guard statement said the shot was fired after the speedboat’s helmsman tried to ram the Greek patrol boat in a bid to escape arrest.
The remaining 13 migrants on the speedboat were unharmed and were taken to the southeast Aegean Sea island of Symi.
The statement said the incident occurred northwest of Symi after the helmsman of the smuggling boat repeatedly ignored instructions to stop. It said he “carried out dangerous manoeuvres, directly endangering — by an attempted ramming — the crew” of the Greek boat.
It was unclear whether the dead man had been steering the migrant smuggling vessel, which the coast guard said had been heading from the nearby Turkish coast to Symi.
Police did not say whether they had made any arrests of suspected smugglers.
A woman plunges into an 8-metre-deep hole after pavement sinks in Malaysia
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — A woman plunged into an 8-metre (26-foot) -deep sinkhole in the centre of Kuala Lumpur after the pavement caved in, Malaysian police said. She was then believed to have been swept away by an underground water current,
The incident happened in the Dang Wangi area of the Malaysian capital, where local police chief Sulizmie Affendy Sulaiman said that, based on eyewitness accounts, the woman was walking along the pavement when the earth suddenly collapsed beneath her. She was identified as a 48-year-old tourist from India.
Rescuers barricaded part of the area and used an excavator to clear the debris in the sinkhole, but there was no sign of the victim yet. Sulizmie declined to comment when asked about the possible condition of the woman, or the cause of the incident.
Kuala Lumpur police chief Rusdi Mohamad Isa said there was a strong water flow underground and that the woman may have been swept away.
As more floods batter Bangladesh and India, death toll rises to 30
By: Julhas Alam
DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — Floods wreaked more havoc in India’s northeast and neighbouring Bangladesh’s eastern region, raising this week’s total death toll to 30, officials and media reports said Friday.
Rain stopped in many parts of Bangladesh on Friday and weather officials in Dhaka said the waters had started receding in some areas, but said the flooding would not be over for days.
In India’s Tripura state, eight more people died in the last 24 hours, raising the death toll to 19 since Monday, said a state disaster management official on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to speak to the media. Earlier, 11 people were reported dead.
In Bangladesh, seven more people died in the last 24 hours, Dhaka-based Ekhon TV reported Friday. Earlier, four deaths were reported in raging waters flooding downstream from India, and amid incessant rains in the country’s eastern region.
A seventh body is recovered from sunken super yacht off Sicily, believed to be Mike Lynch’s daughter
ROME (AP) — Italian rescuers on Friday brought ashore the last of seven bodies from a super yacht that sunk off the coast of Sicily, the Coast Guard said. It is believed to be that of the daughter of British tech magnate Mike Lynch, who also perished when the boat sank earlier this week.
Hannah Lynch, 18, was the last person unaccounted for aboard The Bayesian, a 56-metre (184-foot) British-flagged yacht that went down in a storm early Monday.
Mike Lynch’s body was recovered Thursday. He had been celebrating his recent acquittal on fraud charges with his family and the people who had defended him at trial in the United States. His wife, Angela Bacares, was among the 15 survivors.
Rescuers struggled for four days to find all the missing bodies, making only slow headway through the interior of the wreck lying on the seabed 50 metres (164 feet) below the surface.
Civil protection officials said they believe the ship was struck by a tornado over the water, known as a waterspout, and sank quickly.
27 killed after a bus with Indian pilgrims drives off a Nepal highway and crash
By: Binaj Gurubacharya
KATHMANDU, Nepal (AP) — At least 27 people were killed and 16 others injured when a bus carrying dozens of Indian pilgrims drove off a key highway and crashed on Friday in Nepal, officials said.
The bus veered off Prithvi Highway and rolled toward a fast-flowing river. Its roof was ripped open before stopping on the rocky bank just shy of the Marsyangdi’s rushing, murky water.
Rescue workers recovered 27 bodies from the wreckage and flew the 16 injured to the capital Kathmandu for treatment, according to Armed Police Force spokesperson Shailendra Thapa.
The wreckage was found near Abukhaireni, a town about 120 kilometres (75 miles) west of the capital, Kathmandu and the river. It would be removed only on Saturday as it was already dark and recovery was difficult, Thapa said.
There were 43 people on board the bus and all of them were Indian nationals, confirmed the Indian Embassy in Kathmandu. The embassy also said the bus fell about 150 metres (500 feet) from the highway, and they were coordinating with local authorities undertaking relief and rescue operations.
Iceland volcano erupts again but spares the nearby town of Grindavik for now
By: Marco Di Marco And David Keyton
GRINDAVIK, Iceland (AP) — Lava continued to spew from a volcano in southwestern Iceland on Friday — the sixth time since December the volcano has erupted on the Reykjanes Peninsula.
The eruption from a new fissure began shortly after 9 p.m. Thursday following a series of strong earthquakes and within the hour a 4-kilometre (2.4-mile) fissure cut through the Sundhnúkur crater.
Iceland authorities say the eruption’s effects remain localized with road closures but do not threaten the population.
Halldór Björnsson, head of weather and climate at the Norwegian Meteorological Agency, told the Icelandic news portal Vísir that unlike previous eruptions, the lava flow was not heading for the town of Grindavik that was largely evacuated in December when the volcano came to life after being dormant for 800 years.
