UNITED STATES
College lockdown lifted
A lockdown has been lifted at North Carolina Central University in Durham after an on-campus shooting left one student injured. The university said in a statement that the shooting happened at about 11pm on Sunday on the edge of campus. The student was taken to a hospital with injuries that were not life-threatening, it said. The school sent a tweet from its official account at 11:15pm that mentioned an “active shooter” and urged students to seek shelter “away from gunfire.” An “all clear” was issued at 11:50pm, the statement said. University spokeswoman Ayana Hernandez says no arrests have been made. Campus police are investigating.
TURKEY
Six killed in clashes
Two policemen and four Islamic State (IS) militants were killed in a firefight early yesterday after police raided a house in the Kayapinar District of the mainly Kurdish city of Diyarbakir, security sources said, adding that fighting was ongoing. Authorities have extended operations into suspected IS cells after a double suicide bombing in Ankara that killed more than 100 people was blamed on the militant group. Last week, President Tayyip Erdogan said Syrian intelligence and Kurdish militants, not just IS, were behind the attack that targeted a rally of pro-Kurdish activists and civic groups. Erdogan said Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants, the Syrian mukhabarat secret police and the Syrian Kurdish PYD militia had worked together with Islamic State in the bombing on Oct. 10.
PAKISTAN
Snow strands hundreds
Hundreds of tourists were stranded yesterday after the earliest snowfall in 40 years blocked a main highway in the north, dumping 0.9m of snow on one town in less than 24 hours. Authorities sent heavy machinery along with troops and rescue workers to clear the roads in the Naran Valley in Mansehra District. Pakistanis enjoying a long weekend for Ashura in the holy month of Muharram had traveled to the area, popular for its natural beauty, when they were caught off guard by the unprecedented snowfall. “More than 1,200 people have so far been evacuated, but still some 800 to 1,000 people are stranded there and rescue work is ongoing,” said Najeeb Ur Rehman, the top police official in Mansehra District. One coal miner was killed late on Sunday when a mine collapsed due to a glacier break-off in Babusar area, about 40km from Naran. Authorities rescued 15 other coal miners trapped by the collapse, Rehman said. The snowfall has also damaged the power lines and some small bridges.
UNITED STATES
Storm batters Louisiana
Torrential rainstorms on Sunday battered Louisiana, leaving thousands without power, after pounding southeastern Texas as the remnants of Hurricane Patricia converged with a second storm. The heaviest band of rain moved over the Gulf of Mexico, triggering coastal flood warnings and flash flood watches in southwest Louisiana and soaking New Orleans, the National Weather Service (NWS) said. About 22,000 people were left without power in the greater New Orleans area. Some streets were flooded, while a high tide surge brought some coastal flooding as well. Rainfall has totaled as much as 18cm since late Saturday night, and forecasters predicted another 13cm could fall. The NWS issued a tornado watch for southeastern Louisiana and coastal Mississippi into early yesterday, and warned that severe thunderstorms could develop in the region.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion