Tag: InternationalNews

{Former employee of care centre in Sagamihara arrested, reportedly saying “the disabled should all disappear”.}

A knife-wielding former employee has killed at least 19 people and injured 25 at a care centre for the mentally disabled in Japan, in the country’s worst mass killing in decades.

The 26-year-old man, who reportedly threatened to kill hundreds of disabled people earlier this year, later turned himself in at a police station, admitting to officers: “I did it.” He reportedly also said: “The disabled should all disappear.”

Authorities identified the attacker as Satoshi Uematsu and said he had worked at the facility in Sagamihara, a city of more than 700,000 people west of Tokyo, until February.

Broadcaster NTV said the man told police he had been fired and held a grudge against the care centre.

The attack began in the early hours of the morning when Uematsu allegedly broke a first-floor window to get into the building. Public broadcaster NHK reported that he tied up one caregiver before starting to stab the residents.

A doctor at one of the hospitals where victims were taken said some had “deep stab” wounds to the neck.

“The patients are very shocked mentally, and they cannot speak now,” the doctor told NHK.

A fleet of ambulances, police cars and fire trucks converged on the Tsukui Yamayuri-en centre, a low-rise complex nestled against forested hills, which was cordoned off and draped with yellow “Keep Out” tape.

The killing is believed to be the worst such incident in Japan since 1938, when a man went on a killing spree armed with an axe, sword and rifle, killing 30 people.

{{‘Stained with blood’}}

Fire department spokesmen told AFP news agency that the dead included nine men and 10 women aged from 18 to 70, and that another 25 people were wounded, 20 of them seriously.

An official from Kanagawa prefecture, which takes in Sagamihara, identified the suspect and said he had turned up at the police station with the murder weapons.

Uematsu “broke a glass window and intruded into the facility at about 2:10am (17:10 GMT) and stabbed those staying there,” Shinya Sakuma told a press conference in the prefecture’s capital Yokohama.

“When Uematsu turned himself in, he was found carrying kitchen knives and other types of knives stained with blood.”

Police said they received a call from the centre around 2:30am – about 20 minutes after the assault began – reporting that a man armed with knives had entered the facility. They said he turned himself in half an hour later.

Local media reported Uematsu had sent a letter to the speaker of the lower house of Japan’s parliament in February threatening to kill 470 disabled people.

In the letter, which he hand-delivered to security personnel, he also presented his vision of a society in which the seriously handicapped could be euthanised with the approval of family members.

It brought him to the attention of Tokyo police, who informed Sagamihara authorities that he was a potential threat to others, NHK and other media reported.

Uematsu was hospitalised on February 19, the same day he left his job at the care centre, but was discharged 12 days later when the doctor deemed he would not attack anyone, NHK said.

{{‘Unbelievable’}}

People in Uematsu’s neighbourhood, about a 10-minute walk from the crime scene, expressed disbelief.

He was a “normal, nice boy” who always smiled and offered a greeting, said next-door neighbour Akihiro Hasegawa.

“This is unbelievable,” the 73-year old told AFP, adding that Uematsu lived in the house with his parents until they moved out four or five years ago.

Hasegawa also said that he had seen an extensive shoulder-to-chest tatoo on Uematsu and there was a rumour in the neighbourhood he might have been fired from the facility because of it.

“This is a very tragic, shocking incident in which many innocent people became victims,” top government spokesman Yoshihide Suga told a press conference.

He added that officials would immediately discuss measures to prevent a similar incident from happening.

Japan has one of the lowest rates of violent crime in the developed world, and attacks involving weapons of any kind are unusual.

“It’s very rare that we come across this kind of violence on this scale,” journalist Michael Penn, who is based in Japan, told Al Jazeera. “It’s a very, very serious and very large-scale incident here.”

Some Japanese couldn’t believe the crime had occurred in their country.

“It’s crazy,” posted a Twitter user. “When I first heard 19 people died, I thought it was somewhere overseas.”

{Bomb in rucksack carried by Syrian man goes off after he is refused entry to music festival in city of Ansbach.}

A 27-year-old Syrian man died when a bomb he was carrying in a rucksack went off outside a music festival in Germany and wounded 12 people, an official said.

A spokesman for the prosecutor’s office in Ansbach said the attacker’s motive wasn’t clear.

“Whether there is an Islamist link or not is purely speculation at this point,” said the spokesman, Michael Schrotberger.

The man had been refused refugee status in Germany a year ago, a top security official in Bavaria, where the incident took place, said early on Monday.

Bavaria Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann said the man had tried to commit suicide twice before.

“We don’t know if this man planned suicide or if he had the intention of killing others,” Herrmann said.

Three of the 12 wounded were seriously hurt, police said.

Herrmann said the man had apparently been denied entry to the Ansbach Open music festival shortly before the explosion, which happened outside a restaurant called Eugens Weinstube.

He added that, despite his asylum request being denied, the man had been allowed to remain in Germany because of the war in Syria.

{{Europe on edge}}

“He came to Germany two years ago and his asylum application was rejected last year for reasons that we don’t know right at this minute,” Al Jazeera’s Dominic Kane, reporting from Berlin, said.

“He had been based in Germany with the knowledge that he was not going to receive permanent asylum in this country. He had twice before tried to take his life and he had at some point in the recent past been receiving psychiatric help.”

The blast is the third incident to hit the southern state of Bavaria in a week, after nine were killed in a shooting rampage in Munich and several were wounded in an axe attack on a train.

A large area around the site of the explosion in the city of around 40,000 people was still sealed off hours later. More than 2,000 people were evacuated from the festival.

Europe has been on edge for months after a string of deadly attacks claimed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS), including bombings in Brussels and carnage at Bastille Day celebrations in the southern French city of Nice.

Police said neither Sunday’s machete attack nor Friday’s shooting in Munich showed any signs of being connected to ISIL or similar groups.

ISIL claimed responsibility for the July 18 axe attack in Germany, and for the July 14 attack in which a Tunisian man drove a truck into Bastille Day holiday crowds in the French city of Nice, killing 84 people.

{Coalition proposes national framework to keep people convicted of “terrorism” in jail even after sentences finish.}

Australia will indefinitely detain people convicted of “terrorism-related” charges if it feels they pose an ongoing danger to society upon their release, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has said.

Turnbull said the proposed measure was prompted by an increase in the frequency and severity of attacks around the world.

“In the wake of Orlando, Nice, and other terrorist incidents, as well as our own experience … we cannot afford for a moment to be complacent,” Turnbull said in a statement on Monday.

“This legislation will enable additional periods of imprisonment for terrorist offenders who have served their sentences but are still judged to present an unacceptable risk to the community.”

The proposal, to be discussed with state and territory officials who must then pass legislation, is similar to arrangements already in place for sex offenders and extremely violent individuals in some states.

Attorney-General George Brandis said the extension of detention would be a court supervised process with regular reviews and reassessments.

“It will of course only apply to individuals who, as they approach the end of a sentence of imprisonment, continue to pose an unacceptably high risk to the community because of their failure to be rehabilitated as a result of a penal sentence,” he said.

Under the proposed laws, the age at which children could be held would be lowered from 16 to 14.

Turnbull said the steps were necessary but proportionate.

“They balance the need to keep the community safe with our commitment to privacy and the rights of the individual,” Turnbull said, stressing that ultimately it was important the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant group was defeated.

A total 44 people have been charged with “terrorism” offences in Australia since 2014, including some involved in the planning of mass attacks on the public, Turnbull said.

{The teenager is under investigation for possibly having failed to report the plans of the gunman, according to police.}

German police have arrested an Afghan teenager on suspicion of a connection to the killing of nine people by an 18-year-old gunman in Munich, authorities said.

The 16-year-old was under investigation for possibly having failed to report the plans of the gunman, David Ali Sonboly, who later shot and killed himself, a police statement said on Sunday.

“There is a suspicion that the 16-year-old is a possible tacit accomplice to (Friday’s) attack,” the police said.

The teenager reported to police immediately after the shooting and was interviewed, but investigators later uncovered contradictions in his statements.

Munich attack: Suspect ‘obsessed’ with mass shootings

He is also being investigated for his possible involvement in a Facebook post inviting people to meet at a cinema complex near the main railway station in Munich.

The gunman had lured people to the McDonald’s restaurant, where the shooting began on Friday, using a fake Facebook page he had created in May.

Sonboly, a Iranian-German teen, was “derranged” and “obsessed” with mass shootings but had no political motivation behind the attack, police said.

He had planned his attack for a year and chose his victims at random, according to investigators.

The attack sent Germany’s third largest city into lockdown as police launched a massive operation to track down what had initially been thought to be up to three assailants.

The Munich assault has sparked a debate about whether Germany’s strict gun laws should be tightened further, and the fact that Sonboly was able to acquire the pistol online will raise questions over how to stop others from doing the same.

The attack came just four days after a 17-year-old asylum seeker went on a rampage with an axe and a knife on a train in Bavaria, injuring five people. He was believed to be a “lone wolf” Afghan or Pakistani inspired by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS)

{Authorities say the banned satellite dishes are morally damaging, despite high-level calls for reform of the law.}

Iranian authorities have destroyed 100,000 satellite dishes and receivers as part of a widespread crackdown against illegal devices they say “deviate morality and culture”.

General Mohammad Reza Naghdi, the head of Iran’s Basij militia, oversaw the destruction ceremony in Tehran on Sunday and warned of the impact that satellite television was having in the country.

“The truth is that most satellite channels… deviate the society’s morality and culture,” AFP news agency reported him as saying.

“What these televisions really achieve is increased divorce, addiction and insecurity in society.”

Naghdi said that a total of one million Iranians had already voluntarily handed over their satellite dishes to authorities.

Conservatives regularly denounce the channels as an attempt to corrupt Iranian culture and Islamic values.

Iranian police regularly raid neighbourhoods and confiscate dishes from rooftops, and under Iranian law, satellite equipment is banned and those who distribute, use, or repair them can be fined up to $2,800.

On Friday, Culture Minister Ali Jannati called for a revision of the law.

“Reforming this law is very necessary as using satellite is strictly prohibited, but most people use it,” Jannati said.

“This means that 70 percent of Iranians violate the law” by owning satellite dishes, he added.

Naghdi criticised Jannati’s comments and said those in charge of cultural affairs “should be truthful with people rather than following what pleases them”.

“Most of these satellite channels not only weaken the foundation of families but also cause disruptions in children’s education and children who are under the influence of satellite have improper behaviour,” Naghdi said.

There are dozens of foreign-based Farsi satellite channels broadcasting mostly news, entertainment, films and series.

President Hassan Rouhani, whose four-year mandate ends in June 2017, has repeatedly said that the ban on satellite dishes is unnecessary and counterproductive.

{At least 11 Iraqis killed aftert bomber blows himself up at police checkpoint in the mainly Shia district of Kadhimiya.}

A suicide bomber has detonated an explosive vest near a security checkpoint in northwest Baghdad, Iraqi officials said.

A police officer told the Associated Press news agency that an attacker on foot blew himself up on Sunday morning at one of the entrances to the Shia district of Kadhimiyah, killing at least eight civilians and three policemen. Another 20 other people were wounded.

Sources at the Kadhimiya hospital, where victims of the blast were taken, said the death toll could rise as some of the wounded were in a critical condition.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack.

Baghdad is on high alert for attacks after a blast in the central Karada district on July 3, claimed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), killed more than 300 people. It was one of the deadliest bombings since the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Earlier this month, visiting US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said Washington will send 560 more troops to Iraq to help in the fight against ISIL, also known as ISIS.

The United Nations says more than 3,000 civilians have been killed in violence across the country this year.

{Territorial disputes in the South China Sea expected to overshadow meeting of Southeast Asian foreign ministers in Laos.}

Southeast Asian foreign ministers will hold crunch talks in Laos on Sunday at a summit already overshadowed by infighting over Beijing’s sabre rattling in the South China Sea.

The gathering in Vientiane that began on Sunday is the first major regional talks since the UN-backed tribunal ruled earlier this month that China did not have historic rights to vast swathes of the strategic sea.

US Secretary of State John Kerry, who arrives in Laos on Monday, and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi are among the delegates attending meetings on the sidelines of the summit.

The 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which includes four members who have competing claims with Beijing over parts of the strategic sea, has long presented itself as the best place for China to negotiate with neighbours over disputes.

Beijing has resisted that approach, insisting that territorial disputes must be settled bilaterally.

In recent years, ASEAN has struggled to present a united front against China with allegations that the regional superpower has forged alliances with smaller countries like Laos and Cambodia through aid and loans.

READ MORE: Taking a cruise to disputed South China Sea islands

“These 10 independent nations with independent relationships with China makes it very difficult for all of them to say yes to a communique, particularly when it’s a very dicey topic like the South China Sea,” said Al Jazeera’s Scott Heidler, reporting from Vientiane.

The UN tribunal ruling was a victory for the Philippines, which brought the case, and fellow ASEAN members Vietnam, Brunei and Malaysia who also claim parts of the South China Sea.

But it infuriated Beijing which rejected the verdict and has ramped up both its rhetoric and military manoeuvres in the disputed waters in the last two weeks.

ASEAN diplomats have been working on a joint communique to be issued at the end of the five-day meeting but disagreements have festered on how to approach the tribunal ruling.

Those involved in talks told AFP that Cambodia, a staunch Beigin ally, has so far opposed any mention of it.

A working draft of the communique obtained by AFP on Saturday showed the section titled “South China Sea” as blank.

Late night talks

“Our house is in a mess right now,” one diplomat involved in the talks told reporters late Saturday as the day’s attempts to reach a consensus came to a close.

Washington has backed the Philippines and other South China Sea claimants against Beijing, arguing for free passage through what it considers international waters.

A State Department official said the US would push for ASEAN to ease tensions over the South China Sea and find common ground.

But the official added: “I’d put a little more value on the conversation that happens among the ministers themselves than I do in the often lengthy and torturous prose that is pulled together by the staff afterwards.”

It is not clear whether Kerry intends to meet his counterpart Wang for talks during their visit.

Chinese pressure was blamed last month for a startling show of discord by the bloc, when countries swiftly disowned a joint statement released by Malaysia after an ASEAN-China meeting.

That statement had expressed alarm over Beijing’s activities in the South China Sea. Cambodia and Laos were later fingered as being behind moves to block the joint statement.

The ongoing impasse in Vientiane has led to fears of a repeat of a 2012 summit in Cambodia where the bloc failed to issue a joint communique for the first time in its history because of disagreements over the South China Sea.

A failure by ASEAN to respond to the tribunal will do little to counter criticism that the bloc risks veering into obscurity as a talking shop with little real diplomatic clout.

{An erupting volcano has not prevented Indonesia’s Tenggerese people from performing their annual ceremony.}

An erupting volcano has not prevented Tenggerese people from performing their annual ceremony, which involves climbing to the rim of Mount Bromo’s crater and delivering offerings like goats, chicken, and vegetables to the Hindu Gods.

The ceremony dates back to the 15th century when a childless couple – ancestors of the Tenggerese – prayed to God to be given children. God gave them 25 children, and in return, they sacrificed the youngest. Since then, once a year during a full moon, the Tenggerese hold what is called the Kasada Ceremony to honor the sacrifice of the youngest son of their ancestors.

This year, however, Mount Bromo is erupting and the government has warned religious Hindus to stay at least 1 kilometre from the crater. Only 20 priests are allowed to go up to the crater to throw offerings. The warning has been completely ignored.

The Tenggerese people believe the mountain will not harm them. But if they do not perform the ceremony, they fear bad things will fall upon them, such as a failed harvest, a pandemic, or even worse. So, starting in the dark, they walked up the steep slope of the erupting volcano, to stand on the rim of the crater and give their offerings.