China explosion: Tianjin death toll rises in port blasts
- 5 minutes ago
- Asia
At least 44 people are now known to have died, and more than 500 injured, following two major explosions in China's northern port city of Tianjin.
Twelve firefighters were among the dead, China's official Xinhua news agency said as it reported a doubling of the death toll.
Two blasts happened in a warehouse storing "dangerous and chemical goods" in the port area of the city.
They caused a huge fireball that could be seen from space.
Buildings within a 2km radius (1.5 miles) had windows blown out, office blocks were destroyed and hundreds of cars burnt-out.
Turmoil in Burma's military-backed ruling party as leaders are deposed
Key figures including the parliament’s Speaker removed amid tensions within Union Solidarity and Development party, which grew out of former junta
Burmese security forces have surrounded the headquarters of the ruling Union Solidarity and Development party in the country’s capital, Naypyidaw, and senior regime figures have been removed from their posts, as tensions mount ahead of elections in November.
Sources within the headquarters of the USDP – which is effectively a political extension of the military – said on Thursday that Shwe Mann, party chairman and Speaker of the parliament, had been deposed and was under police guard. His closeness to opposition leader and democracy figurehead Aung San Suu Kyi is believed to have soured his relationship with military leaders in Burma, also known as Myanmar.
South Korea President Park pardons business tycoon
South Korean tycoon Chey Tae-won, who's serving a second jail term for fraud, has been pardoned. He's one of 6,527 people freed by President Park Geun-hye, who once vowed to restrain powerful family conglomerates.
President Park Geun-hye risked mounting public aversion to powerful family groupings - known as "chaebol" - on Thursday, saying South Korea needed jailed business executives to help "revitalize" the country's spluttering economy.
Chey, who chairs the nation's third largest conglomerate, the SK Group, has served 31 months out of his 48-month jail term for funneling funds from two affiliate firms into his own personal investment portfolio.
He had remained chairman of SK Group while in prison.
Dozen businessmen included in pardon
A dozen other lesser known businessmen were also included in Thursday's pardons described by South Korea's justice ministry as a gesture to "give them chances" to help bolster the economy.
United Nations fires peacekeeping chief in Central African Republic
The head of the UN's peacekeeping mission in the Central African Republic was fired over the force's handling of dozens of misconduct allegations, including rape and killing. "Enough is enough," Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said after announcing the news.
UNITED NATIONS — The U.N. chief has fired the head of the peacekeeping mission in the Central African Republic over the force's handling of dozens of misconduct allegations, including rape and killing.
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Wednesday he has accepted the resignation of Babacar Gaye of Senegal.
"Enough is enough," he said.
He has called a special session of the U.N. Security Council for Thursday over the issue of sexual abuse allegations."I cannot put into words how anguished and angered and ashamed I am by recurrent reports over the years of sex abuse and exploitation by U.N. forces," said Ban, who first heard about the latest allegations Tuesday, a week after the first U.N. officials were informed.
Mexico hands out free TVs to the poor in massive giveaway
Cradling a flat-screen television set in her arms, Tomasa López beamed at her good fortune: She’d just taken part in the world’s biggest distribution of free digital televisions.
López, a domestic servant, was among thousands of people who’ve thronged a cavernous tent in the populous working-class Iztapalapa district, one of hundreds of venues across Mexico where the poor are receiving some of the 10 million digital television sets the government is giving away at no charge.
It’s a program costing the Mexican treasury $1.6 billion in a push to convert the nation from analog television signals to a digital format. The United States made the switch in 2009.
“I am happy,” López said. “We’ve always wanted a digital television. We’ll see more channels. The kids will see cartoons.”
Mothers of ISIS
In Calgary, between the soccer practices and the hours at her accounting job and the potlucks with the neighbors, Christianne Boudreau spent every spare minute watching Islamic State videos, her nose pressed up against the computer screen.
She sat in the basement of her middle-class home in her middle-class suburb, a bare room that once belonged to her eldest son, Damian, and watched men posturing with big guns like teenagers. She watched firefights. She watched executions. But Boudreau barely registered any of the bloodshed. She was focused on the faces behind the balaclavas, trying to spot her son’s eyes.
In Copenhagen, Karolina Dam was wild with fear. Her son Lukas had been in Syria for seven months. Three days earlier, she received word that he had been injured outside Aleppo, but she was convinced that he was dead. Sitting alone that evening, nervously puffing on a vaporizer, she couldn’t stop herself from sending a Viber message into the ether. “Lukas,” she wrote, “I love you so much my beloved son. I miss you and want to hug and smell you. Hold your soft hands in mine and smile at you.”
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