CR IP TI ON BS SU
SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 2013
Christian hostel has own view of the Syrian rebels
Iraq’s Kurds vote amid rows and regional tensions
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As 2016 looms, Clinton keeps up with supporters
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Gunmen storm mall, execute 25 shoppers Kenya’s worst attack since 1998 Qaeda bombing
NAIROBI: The body of a man lies on the ground as armed policemen try to get entry into the Westgate yesterday after masked gunmen stormed an upmarket mall and sprayed gunfire on shoppers and staff, killing at least 20. — AFP
MPs prepare to grill Minister of Planning
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NAIROBI: Militant gunmen stormed a shopping mall in Nairobi yesterday killing at least 25 people, including children, and sending scores fleeing into shops, a cinema and onto the streets in search of safety. Shooting continued hours after the initial assault as troops surrounded the Westgate mall and police and soldiers combed the building, hunting down the attackers shop by shop. A police officer inside the building said the gunmen were barricaded inside the Nakumatt supermarket, one of Kenya’s biggest chains. “We got three bodies from this shop,” he said, standing a dozen meters from the supermarket entrance and pointing to a children’s shoe shop, where blood lay in pools. He turned to a nearby hamburger bar where music still played and food lay abandoned in a similar bloody scene. A shop manager who managed to escape said at one point “it seemed that the shooters had taken control of all the mall”. “They spoke something that seemed like Arabic or Somali,” said a man who escaped the mall and gave his name only as Jay. “I saw people being executed after being asked to say something,” he added. The Westgate mall attack was the single biggest since Al-Qaeda’s east Africa cell bombed the US embassy in Nairobi, in 1998 killing more than two hundred people. In 2002, the same militant cell attacked an Israeli-owned hotel and tried to shoot down an Israeli jet in a coordinated attack. Two plainclothes policemen lay on the floor with guns trained on the Nakumatt supermarket entrance. Tiles were smeared with blood, bullet casings were strewn on the floor and shop windows were shattered. A police man dragged the corpse of a young girl across the floor and lay her on a stretcher. Some local television stations reported hostages had been taken, but there was no official confirmation. The Somali militant group Al Shabaab, which Kenya blames for shootings, bombings and grenade attacks against churches and the security forces, had threatened to strike the Westgate mall, popular with the city’s Continued on Page 13
Indian man accused of killing roommate
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100 killed in Mexico landslides
Saudi targets a MERS-free Haj RIYADH: Saudi authorities are optimistic that October’s Haj pilgrimage to the kingdom, one of the world’s annual largest gatherings, will pass without outbreaks of the deadly MERS coronavirus, the health minister said yesterday. The virus, which appeared first in the kingdom last year, has killed 58 people worldwide, 49 of them in Saudi Arabia, according to official Saudi figures and the World Health Organization (WHO). But “we are optimistic we can achieve yet another success as the Haj pilgrimage season nears” after the minor pilgrimage season during the fasting month of Ramadan “succeeded despite health challenges such as the coronavirus,” said Abdullah Al-Rabia. No MERS outbreaks were recorded at last year’s Haj, nor during the Umrah season in July and August of this year. Saudi Arabia has “longstanding experience” dealing with health challenges brought by the large numbers of people who come to the kingdom-home to Islam’s holiest sites. Around two million people are expected at this year’s Haj, which begins on October 13 and lasts five days. Authorities have urged the elderly and chronically ill to avoid the event and have reduced the number of people they will allow to perform come. The WHO said it had been informed of 132 lab-confirmed cases of MERS, including the deaths. With the exception of a cluster of cases in the eastern town of Al-Ihsa, the focal point of the outbreak has been the capital, scientists said yesterday in an online report published on The Lancet. Experts are struggling to understand MERS, for which there is still no vaccine. It is considered a cousin of the SARS virus that erupted in Asia in 2003 and infected 8,273 people, nine percent of whom died. Like SARS, MERS is thought to have jumped from animals to humans, and it shares the former’s flu-like symptoms-but differs by also causing kidney failure. — AFP
ACAPULCO: More than 100 people have been killed and scores are missing in landslides and flooding caused by heavy rain in Mexico, a senior government official said late Friday. Interior Minister Miguel Angel Osorio Chong delivered the grim news from the resort town of Acapulco, in one of the worst-affected regions, with President Enrique Pena Nieto by his side. The death toll stood at 101, with 68 people missing following a massive mudslide that swallowed half of the village of La Pintada, in Guerrero state, Osorio Chong said. Mexico was hammered by the one-two punch of tropical storms Ingrid and Manuel, which left a trail of destruction that damaged tens of thousands of homes, flooded cities and washed out roads. After regenerating into a hurricane and hitting the northwestern state of Sinaloa late Thursday, affecting 100,000 people and killing three, Manuel finally dissipated over the mountains. The state of Guerrero was the hardest hit, with at least 65 deaths and its Pacific resort of Acapulco left isolated after the two roads
to Mexico City were covered in landslides. Osorio Chong also said that authorities are searching for a police helicopter that had been evacuating people from La Pintada when it disappeared Thursday. Only crew members were apparently missing. Rescuers have abandoned the search by air because of heavy fog, but have continued to search by land, Osorio Chong said. “We are really worried,” the minister earlier told Radio Formula. “They risked their lives all the time, because it was important to evacuate people.” Thousands of tourists trapped in flood-stricken Acapulco for almost a week packed into cars and buses on Friday after authorities reopened the road link to Mexico City following the storms. Traffic piled up as police allowed cars to leave in groups of 50 to avoid huge backups on the “Sun Highway.” The highway department warned travelers that the trip north, which usually takes around four hours, would last nine to 10 hours, with only a single lane open Continued on Page 13
AZAZ: A Free Syrian Army fighter takes cover during fighting with the Syrian Army in Azaz, Syria. — AP
Syria rebels fume over chemical weapon deal Oppn gradually losing West
ACAPULCO: An old woman resident of a rural zone of Acapulco called Agua Caliente walks amid the rubble of her home, in Guerrero state, Mexico. — AFP
AMMAN: The Syrian opposition feels badly let down by Washington’s decision to do a deal with Moscow to eliminate Bashar Al-Assad’s chemical weapons but diplomats are warning the Syrian National Coalition that it risks losing Western support if it cannot adapt to new realities. The rift that has alienated the Syrian opposition from the United States threatens to derail international efforts to end the two and a half year civil war, diplomatic and opposition sources said. It comes as the war has turned into a something of a stalemate on the battlefield and the rebels had been looking to the United States to tilt the balance in their favor by intervening militarily to punish Assad for using chemical weapons. The behind the scenes dispute, in which Saudi Arabia and Turkey
appear to be siding with the opposition, developed last week as the United States and Russia made their deal to destroy Assad’s chemical arsenal following a nerve gas attack on rebel areas of Damascus that killed hundreds, the sources said. The agreement, from which the United States hopes a wider political settlement can emerge, has reduced the likelihood of a US strike on Assad’s forces that the opposition had hoped would weaken him militarily and force him to attend a planned new peace conference. The opposition is therefore furious that Washington suddenly and without its knowledge changed course a week after informing leaders of the main Syrian National Coalition that a strike was imminent, according to coalition members. Continued on Page 13