EGYPT
Scores killed in train crash
Two passenger trains collided on Friday just outside Alexandria, killing 43 people, the country’s deadliest rail accident in more than a decade, authorities said. Magdy Hegazy, a top health official in Alexandria, said that along with the 43 killed, 122 people were injured. The Egyptian Railways Authority said earlier that a train coming from Cairo crashed into the back of a train that was waiting at a small station in the district of Khorshid, just east of Alexandria. By nightfall, cranes aided by floodlights began to remove the wreckage off the tracks to allow rail traffic to resume. Rescue teams continued to look for more bodies and injured passengers inside the carriages. Figures recently released by the state’s statistics agency show that 1,249 train accidents took place last year, the highest number since 2009 when the number reached 1,577.
INDIA
Children die in hospital
Parents of at least 35 children who have died in a hospital in northern India over the past three days have alleged that the fatalities were due to the lack of oxygen supply in the children’s ward. District Magistrate Rajiv Rautela yesterday said that the deaths of the children being treated for different ailments at the Baba Raghav Das Medical College Hospital in Gorakhpur city in Uttar Pradesh state were due to natural causes. He denied that the lack of oxygen led to their deaths. Parents said oxygen supply to the ward ran out on Thursday night and patients’ families were given self-inflating bags to help the children breathe. The Uttar Pradesh government has ordered an investigation.
CHINA
Tornado hits Inner Mongolia
A tornado struck northern China, lashing it with rain, killing five people, injuring more than 50 and destroying homes in a major city in Inner Mongolia, state media said yesterday. The tornado hit Chifeng, about 1,046km east of Hohhot, on Friday afternoon, the People’s Daily newspaper and news agency Xinhua said. State media showed photographs of collapsed houses and buildings flattened by the storm, which destroyed at least 30 houses in three villages and affected 270 people, the People’s Daily said.
PORTUGAL
Strong winds spread fires
The nation is battling a new rash of forest fires ahead of a weekend of warm temperatures, as authorities warned of further blazes. About 1,800 firefighters backed by hundreds of vehicles were trying to douse about 10 fires across the country, authorities said on Friday. “Despite the relentless fires, the situation is now more stable,” civil protection agency spokeswoman Patricia Gaspar said in Lisbon. Emergency workers had nearly gained control of wildfires across Portugal’s drought-hit central region on Thursday, but stronger winds fanned flames in several areas.
UNITED STATES
Hundreds protest border wall
Hundreds of pastors, farmers and advocates were to march at sunrise yesterday along the levee next to the Rio Grande in opposition to the wall the government wants to build on the river separating Texas and Mexico. The march is the first major protest against the border wall staged in the Rio Grande Valley. President Donald Trump’s administration has proposed building 97km of wall in the valley. It is part of a US$1.6 billion proposal to begin the president’s signature immigration priority. Organizers said they wanted to highlight how strongly locals oppose a wall and push Texas’ elected officials to oppose funding it.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was