Tag: InternationalNews

{UK police may consider manslaughter charges after finding tower cladding failed safety tests in blaze that killed 79.}

A fire that engulfed a London tower block killing at least 79 people earlier this month started in a fridge-freezer, London police said while adding that cladding on the building failed all safety tests.

Police said that 79 people were dead, or missing and assumed dead, after the blaze rapidly spread through the 24-storey Grenfell Tower, which was built in 1974, on June 14.

Detective Superintendent Fiona McCormack said the Hotpoint model, FF175BP, was not subject to recall and that the manufacturer was doing further tests.

“We now have expert evidence that the fire was not started deliberately,” McCormack said before adding the police were considering manslaughter charges given the high number of deaths.

Police were also investigating companies involved in the building and refurbishment of the tower, and possible “health and safety and fire safety offences”, she said.

Exterior cladding and tiles recovered from the building have failed fire safety tests, said McCormack.

The cladding was installed on the council-owned building as part of a refurbishment completed last year.

Whirlpool Corp, the world’s largest maker of home appliances, owns the Hotpoint brand in the Europe and Asia Pacific regions. In the United States, the brand now belongs to Haier, following the Chinese group’s purchase of General Electric Co’s appliance business.

“We are working with the authorities to obtain access to the appliance so that we can assist with the ongoing investigations,” Whirpool said in a statement.

“Words cannot express our sorrow at this terrible tragedy.”

The blaze prompted a wider review of social housing which has identified at least 600 towers in England with similar cladding.

McCormack repeated calls for anyone with information on who might have been in the tower to come forward.

“What we haven’t got is a picture of how many people might have been in there. That’s the number I’m really worried about,” she said.

Police fear the death toll may be higher because some residents may have been living in the tower illegally.

“Our forensic search may not be complete until the end of the year,” she added.

Prime Minister Theresa May stressed on Thursday that all victims, regardless of their immigration status, would be able to access whatever help they need.

Source:Al Jazeera

{Suicide attack near provincial police chief’s office kills at least 12 people and wounds 14 others.}

Islamabad, Pakistan – At least 12 people have been killed and 14 wounded in a suicide car bomb attack near the provincial police chief’s office in the southwestern Pakistani city of Quetta, police officials told Al Jazeera.

The explosion on Friday morning targeted a police checkpost near a complex that is housing the Balochistan police chief’s office, local police officer Muhammad Akbar said.

At least six police officers were among those killed, Ali Mardan, a senior police officer, told Al Jazeera.

Initial reports indicated a vehicle approached the checkpost and explosives were set off when the driver of the vehicle was stopped by the police, provincial government spokesperson Anwar ul Haq Kakar told local television channel Geo News.

“At 8:45am (03:45 GMT), there was an old car, a Toyota Corolla … that came here near the [police chief’s] office and it was stopped by the police personnel. That is when the blast took place,” he said.

“There was no exchange of fire, but it’s possible that law-enforcement personnel may have fired into the air.”

Jamaat-ur-Ahrar, a faction of the Pakistan Taliban, has claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement sent out its spokesperson Asad Mansoor.

Altaf Hussain, local police official, said: “Some of the wounded are still in critical condition. Most are police personnel, as well as a traffic warden.”

“It was a suicide attack. They came to the intersection and then blew themselves up there,” said Hussain.

Al Jazeera’s Kamal Hyder, reporting from Islamabad, said the IG’s office was the likely target of the attack.

“The attack took place in the red zone, close to the IG’s office as well as the State Bank of Pakistan,” he said.

“Authorities are saying the IG’s office could’ve been the target.”

Quetta, the provincial capital of Balochistan province, has seen frequent attacks targeting government buildings and security forces, as well as civilians.

In February, two bomb disposal squad members were killed and 11 others wounded in an explosion under Quetta’s Saryab bridge, local media reported.

In August last year, at least 74 people were killed in a suicide attack on the city’s Civil Hospital, while another 60 were killed in an attack on a police academytwo months later.

Past attacks in the province have been claimed by the Pakistani Taliban, ISIL, as well as by Baloch separatist fighters who are fighting for independence from Pakistan.

The province has also seen a number of attacks carried out by the Lashkar-e-Jhangvi’s Al Alami faction, an extremist group, with ties to ISIL, known for targeting Shia Muslims.

Targeting CPEC

The resource-rich province is central to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a $56bn trade and infrastructure project that seeks to create a major trade route from southwestern China to the Arabian Sea through the Balochistan port of Gwadar.

Security in Balochistan has been a major concern for CPEC, with separatists regularly attacking workers building road and other projects associated with the corridor.

Earlier this month, two Chinese citizens were kidnapped and killed in the province.

Pakistan has established a Special Security Division comprising 15,000 troops to secure the CPEC corridor and projects associated with it.

The Pakistani government and military have repeatedly blamed neighbours India for fomenting instability in Balochistan, although officials have presented limited evidence to back this claim.

On Thursday, Kulbhashan Yadav, an Indian national who has been convicted and sentenced to death by a military court for funding and planning attacks in Balochistan for the Indian spy agency RAW, submitted a confessionand mercy petition to Pakistan’s army chief, the Pakistani military said.

Source:Al Jazeera

{US officials believe latest test could be for intercontinental ballistic missile as tensions soar on Korean peninsula.}

North Korea has tested a rocket engine that the US believes could be part of its programme to develop an intercontinental ballistic missile, US officials said.

The test, believed to have taken place on Thursday, is the latest in a series of engine and missile trials this year and comes amid soaring tensions over Kim Jong-un’s nuclear weapons programme.

US officials, speaking anonymously to news agencies, said the engine could potentially be fitted to an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

North Korea’s state media, normally quick to publicise successful missile-related developments, did not carry any reports on the engine test.

The US, South Korea and Japan are ramping up capabilities to defend against the threat from North Korea.

On Friday, South Korean President Moon Jae-in inspected the test-launch of a mid-range missile that is being developed by its military.

“I believe in dialogue, but dialogue is possible when it’s backed by strong defence and engagement policy is possible only when we have security ability that can overwhelm the North,” President Moon was quoted by his office as saying at the test site.

Moon’s office did not disclose the details of the missile being tested, but South Korea has been working to develop ballistic missiles with a range of 800km, a voluntary cap under an agreement with the US.

The US has also urged China, Pyongyang’s sole ally, to exert more economic and diplomatic pressure on North Korea to help rein in its nuclear and missile programmes.

Calling North Korea the “top security threat” to the US on Wednesday, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said China has a “diplomatic responsibility to exert much greater economic and diplomatic pressure on the regime if they want to prevent further escalation in the region”.

China’s top diplomat, Yang Jiechi, told President Donald Trump in a meeting at the White House that Beijing was willing to “maintain communication and coordination” with the US in an effort to defuse tension on the Korean peninsula, according to a statement from China’s Foreign Ministry on Friday.

Last month, the head of the US Defense Intelligence Agency told Congress that North Korea, if left unchecked, was on an “inevitable” path to obtaining a nuclear-armed missile capable of striking the US mainland.

The continental US is around 9,000km from North Korea. ICBMs have a minimum range of about 5,500km, but some are designed to travel 10,000km or farther.

Source:Al Jazeera

{Pakistan army releases new video confession from Kulbhushan Jadhav who was sentenced to death on allegations of spying.}

An Indian man sentenced to death on charges of spying in Pakistan has sought clemency from the country’s army chief after admitting charges of espionage against him, the Pakistani military has said.

Kulbhushan Jadhav, who was arrested in March last year, filed a mercy petition admitting “his involvement in espionage, terrorist and subversive activities” in Pakistan, the army said in a statement on Thursday.

“Seeking forgiveness for his actions, he has requested the Chief of Army Staff to spare his life on compassionate grounds,” the statement added.

Jadhav, a former Indian naval officer, was sentenced to death by a military tribunal in Pakistan earlier this year.

India approached the International Court of Justice (ICJ) which ordered Pakistan to stay Jadhav’s execution.

Pakistan’s government accepted the decision, saying it does not affect Jadhav’s current status as his execution was not imminent because of pending appeals.

On Thursday, India dismissed Pakistani military’s statement as farcical and an attempt to influence the proceedings of the ICJ.

“The details and circumstances of the alleged mercy petition by Mr Jadhav are not clear and even the fact of its existence is doubtful and shrouded as the proceedings against Mr Jadhav have been in opacity,” the Indian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.

It renewed a demand for consular access to Jadhav and the grant of visas to his family to meet him in prison.

Pakistan also released a new confessional video statement from Jadhav on Thursday, in which he said he visited Pakistan’s southern city of Karachi twice for intelligence gathering on naval installations.

In the video, he admits to working for India’s RAW agency and financing Baloch separatists to carry out attacks on Pakistani military targets.

His visit to Pakistan “was to establish and meet the leadership of Baloch sub-nationals, the BLA or the BRA and establish and infiltrate around 30 to 40 RAW operatives along the Makran Coast for operations along with Baloch sub-nationals and miscreants or terrorists”, Jadhav said in the video.

Balochistan, Pakistan’s largest but least developed province, has been battling a years-long separatist uprising that the army has repeatedly characterised as “terrorism”.

Jadhav said Pakistan arrested him after he entered Balochistan, a statement that contradicts New Delhi’s claim that he was kidnapped from Iran last year.

Ties between India and Pakistan remain difficult and on Thursday there was fresh fighting on the disputed border in Kashmir, at the heart of 70 years of animosity.

The two countries have fought three wars since gaining independence from Britrish rule in 1947. Two of them have been over Kashmir.

Source:Al Jazeera

{Pentagon declined to speculate on who was operating it but said drone advanced on coalition forces in Syria’s southeast.}

The US military says it has shot down an armed, Iran-made drone that had been bearing down on its forces near a garrison in Syria’s southeast.

In the latest sign of increasingly frequent confrontation with Damascus and its allies, Tuesday’s incident closely followed Sunday’s downing of a piloted Syrian army jet by the US in the southern Raqqa countryside after it dropped bombs near US-backed forces.

The Pentagon said a US F-15 aircraft, flying over Syrian territory, fired on the drone after it displayed hostile intent and advanced on coalition forces.

Pentagon spokesman Captain Jeff Davis said it had “dirty wings”, meaning it was armed.

“I can tell you it was an Iranian-made drone,” Davis said, declining to speculate on who was operating it.

The area falls in a part of Syria that was recently identified as a military priority by Damascus, and strategically important for Iran as it seeks to secure a land corridor between forces it backs in Syria and Iraq.

The US-led coalition said the location was close to where another “pro-[Assad] regime” drone, which intelligence sources had also identified as Iranian, was shot down on June 8.

The drone was shot down after it dropped bombs, aimed only at dirt, but in an area close enough to coalition forces that it was considered a threat.

In an indirect reference to Iranian-backed forces that have been gathering in the eastern desert region, a US-led coalition statement cited a recent escalation of tensions and said it would not “tolerate any hostile intent and action of pro-regime forces”.

READ MORE: Syria’s civil war explained

Russia, also an ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, issued a warning of its own to the United States in response to the downing of the Syrian jet, saying on Monday it would view as targets any planes flying west of the Euphrates River, though it stopped short of saying it would shoot any down.

Still, the Pentagon said it had not seen hostile action from Moscow.

“Public statements aside, we have not seen the Russians do any actions that cause us concern. We continue to operate, making some adjustments for prudent measures,” Davis said.

Meanwhile, the US and Russian militaries swapped accusations about an unsafe intercept involving a US spy plane and a Russian fighter jet over the Baltic Sea.

{{‘Deconfliction zone’}}

In Syria’s tangled conflict, Washington backs a coalition of rebel forces fighting both President Assad and fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, known as ISIS) group.

The US military has repeatedly warned forces fighting on Assad’s side to stay away from a “deconfliction zone”, agreed with Russia, near a garrison used by US special forces and US-backed armed groups around Al-Tanf.

In recent weeks, US-led coalition’s warplanes struck pro-Assad government forces to prevent them advancing from the Al-Tanf garrison in southeastern Syria at a spot where the country’s borders meet Iraq and Jordan.

Washington also described those attacks as self-defence.

The competition between the Syrian army and its allies and US-backed rebel groups has stepped up in the Badia desert that stretches to the Iraqi border, after ISIL abandoned large swaths of territory to focus on defending Raqqa and Deir Az Zor.

The Syrian army has since made rapid advances, allowing them to reach the border for the first time in years.

Source:Al Jazeera

{Kalanick taking time out to heal from mother’s death and giving company ‘room to embrace new chapter in Uber’s history’.}

Uber’s troubled CEO and cofounder Travis Kalanick has resigned after a shareholder revolt, the company said in a statement.

Wednesday’s announcement came after a shareholder revolt as the company launched a new campaign to change its image amid a number of sexual harassment claims in the workplace, among other concerns.

The company’s board confirmed the move, saying that Kalanick is taking time to heal from the death of his mother in a boating accident “while giving the company room to fully embrace this new chapter in Uber’s history”.

On Tuesday, five of the ride-hailing app’s major investors demanded the chief executive step down immediately in a letter delivered to him in Chicago.

In a statement, Kalanick said his resignation would help Uber go back to building “rather than be distracted with another fight”, an apparent reference to efforts on the board to remove him.

A week ago, the 40-year-old said he would take an indefinite leave of absence from the company. He will remain on the board of directors.

The resignation came after a series of costly missteps under Kalanick.

On Tuesday, Uber embarked on a 180-day programme to change its image by allowing riders to give drivers tips through the Uber app, something the company had resisted under Kalanick.

The San Francisco-based company is trying to reverse the damage done to its reputation by revelations of sexual harassment in its offices, allegations of trade secrets theft, and an investigation into efforts to mislead government regulators.

Uber’s board said in a statement that Kalanick had “always put Uber first”.

Earlier this year, Uber came under fire through a #DeleteUber campaign, following Kalanick’s acceptance to serve as an adviser to US President Donald Trump.

Kalanick later stepped down from the advisory council.

The company’s hard-charging style has led to legal trouble.

The US Justice Department is investigating Uber’s past usage of phoney software designed to thwart local government regulators who wanted to check on whether Uber was carrying passengers without permission.

Uber is also fighting allegations that it relies on a key piece of technology stolen from Google spin-off Waymo to build self-driving cars.

Source:Al Jazeera

{Country’s top court approves lawsuit request against government critic while Maduro sacks top military officials.}

Venezuela’s supreme court has approved proceedings against Attorney General Luisa Ortega who is accused of allegedly committing “grave errors” in her role as the nation’s top law enforcement official.

The country’s highest court accepted a lawsuit request against Ortega by a Socialist Party MP Pedro Carreno on Tuesday.

Ortega, a strong critic of President Nicolas Maduro, has been called a “traitor” by the ruling Socialists since March when she opposed a bid by the Supreme Tribunal to strip the opposition-controlled National Assembly of its powers.

She has also launched legal challenges to Maduro’s plans to rewrite the constitution, which critics view as another attempt to cling on to power as he faces increasingly violent protests against his government.

Ortega remained defiant in the face of the high court’s move, saying the ruling was an attack not against her but the very foundations of the Venezuela’s democracy.

“Hanging over the country is a bleak outlook that could destroy the state,” Ortega told Union Radio.

“We have to begin demanding that they start providing the bills of where all this money is coming from that that they spend on stages and for the marches.”

Al Jazeera’s Teresa Bo, reporting from the capital, Caracas, said: “Ortega cannot be removed from office without the support of the National Assembly, which is apparently controlled by the opposition.”

Meanwhile, President Maduro fired four top military commanders and the head of the police on Tuesday, as protests continued in the capital.

Maduro also announced the recruitment of 40,000 new police officers and national guardsmen, the BBC reported.

Opposition leaders placed cardboard coffins and body bags at the gates of the National Guard headquarters after the killing of another protester.

“The opposition is calling for more protests and civil disobedience,” said Al Jazeera’s Bo. “The crisis is far from over.”

At least 75 people have been killed in the anti-government protests, which have continued almost daily since early April, according to the latest figures from Venezuela’s Public Ministry.

The country has been facing widespread food and medicine shortage since 2014 when the price of oil crashed, depriving Caracas of a major source of revenue.

Source:Al Jazeera

{Suspension is ‘precautionary measure’ amid rising tensions between Russia and US over downing of a Syrian jet.}

Australia’s military said it was temporarily halting air missions over Syria, following the shooting down of a Syrian jet by US forces.

The decision came amid increasing tension between the US and Russia, which warned it would track coalition aircraft in Syria as potential “targets” and halted a military hotline with Washington over the incident.

“As a precautionary measure, Australian Defence Force (ADF) strike operations into Syria have temporarily ceased,” Australia’s Department of Defence said in a statement.

“ADF operations in Iraq will continue as part of the coalition.”

Russia made clear it was changing its military posture in response to the US downing of a Syrian military jet on Sunday, which, according to Damascus, is the first such incident since the start of the conflict in 2011.

READ MORE: Syria’s displaced – ‘This Ramadan is full of grief’

“ADF personnel are closely monitoring the air situation in Syria and a decision on the resumption of ADF air operations in Syria will be made in due course,” Australia’s Department of Defence said.

Al Jazeera’s Andrew Thomas, reporting from the Australian city of Cairns, said Australia’s decision signals that it may believe there is a threat.

“Symbolically this is very important because Australia is a key partner in the US-led coalition operating over Syria and Iraq and for it to withdraw its aircraft, even temporarily, is a sign that they feel there is a threat from Russian aircraft and the Syrians,” Thomas said.

“In the short term they’re going to take stock and decide whether to resume operations over Syria or not.”

Meanwhile, the US has moved quickly to contain an escalation of the situation, with a top general saying the country would work to relaunch a “deconfliction” hotline established in 2015.

Russia said Washington had failed to use the line – a vital incident-prevention tool – before targeting the plane near Raqqa.

Australia is part of the coalition fighting the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) in Iraq. In late 2015, it extended air operations into Syria on US’ request.

It has six fighter jets based in the United Arab Emirates that strike targets in Syria and Iraq.

In September, Australia said it would widen the scope of targets in the air war against ISIL by allowing its pilots to strike support and logistics resources in Iraq and Syria.

Australia has conducted one of the highest number of airstrikes in Syria and Iraq, according to Airwars, a Britain-based non-profit research group monitoring airstrikes.

Source:Al Jazeera

{Many express outrage over Virginia police’s decision not to investigate murder of Muslim teenager as a hate crime.}

The murder of a teenage Muslim girl beaten and killed by a bat-wielding motorist near a Virginia mosque was likely a “road rage incident”, not a hate crime, US police said, prompting outrage from many who say the teen was targeted because of her religion.

Darwin Martinez Torres, 22, has been arrested and charged with Nabra Hassanen’s murder in an incident police say began as a road dispute with a male teenager who was among Hassanen’s group.

“It appears that the suspect became so enraged over this traffic argument that it escalated into deadly violence,” Fairfax County police spokeswoman Julie Parker said at a news conference on Monday.

Parker said there was no indication the attack near the All Dulles Area Muslim Society mosque early on Sunday was motivated by race or religion.

She added that there was no sign that Martinez used racial slurs as he chased the group of teens into a car park, emerged from his car with a baseball bat and struck Hassanen before loading her into a car and dumping her body in a pond in a neighbouring town.

Hassanen’s father, Mohmoud Hassanen Aboras, told The Guardian newspaper he believes his daughter was killed because “she is Muslim”.

He also told reporters he doesn’t want anyone to feel the pain he feels.

“My daughter is dead, and I don’t want anyone to feel what I feel, to lose your 17-year-old daughter … Christian, Muslim, Jew, Hispanic, whatever,” he said.

Authorities said its findings could change pending an ongoing investigation.

{{‘Words shape narrative’}}

Police had announced earlier on Monday that they were “not investigating [Hassanen’s] murder as a hate crime”, provoking deep scepticism among many within the Muslim community.

Abas Sherif, a spokesman for the victim’s family, said Hassanen and the other girls in her group were wearing headscarves, leaving many to believe she was targeted because of her religion.

Online, many expressed outrage over the decision by police not to investigate the incident as a hate crime.

{{Anti-Muslim hate crimes}}

Others highlighted the surge of anti-Muslim crimes and the rise of Islamophobia worldwide in recent years, also pointing to Monday’s attack in north London’s Finsbury Park, in which a man drove a van into a group of people leaving Ramadan prayers at a nearby mosque.

The Council on American-Islamic Affairs (CAIR), an Islamic civil rights organisation, urged US police to “conduct a thorough investigation of possible bias motive in [Hassanen ‘s] case, coming as it does at a time of rising Islamophobia and anti-Muslim hate attacks nationwide”.

In a recent report, CAIR documented a 57 percent increase in anti-Muslim bias incidents from 2015 to 2016.

“This was accompanied by a 44 percent increase in anti-Muslim hate crimes in the same period,” the report said.

In May, two men were stabbed to death as they tried to stop a white supremacist who was bullying Muslim women on a train in Portland, Oregon.

Critics argue the rhetoric by President Donald Trump has contributed to the rise. Trump signed an executive order earlier this year that would ban travellers from six Muslim-majority countries from entering the US. That order has been frozen by several courts.

Others point to the way Islam has been been portrayed by media organisations, particularly those in the US.

CAIR also documented at least 10 anti-Muslim laws that were enacted by state legislatures between 2013 and 2015.

Source:Al Jazeera