Category: News

  • Man, 2 dogs killed in house fire in northeast Australia

    SYDNEY — An investigation has been underway after a man died in a house fire in northeastern Australia.

    Police in the state of Queensland said in a statement on Tuesday that emergency services were called to the fire in the small town of Warwick, 130 km southwest of Brisbane, at 9:45 p.m. local time on Monday.

    Firefighters deployed to the scene were able to prevent the fire from spreading to nearby properties and a subsequent search of the house located a 20-year-old man deceased inside.

    “Two dogs also died as a result of the fire,” Queensland Police said.

    A firefighter told Seven Network television that smoke in the house was thick, making the chances of surviving without a breathing apparatus very low.

    XINHUA

  • 2 Israeli troops killed, 2 injured in Gaza clash: army

    JERUSALEM — An Israeli deputy company commander and another soldier were killed, and two others were injured, in a clash with militants in northern Gaza, the Israeli military said on Monday.

    The military identified one of the dead as Eitan Israel Shiknazi, 24, from the settlement of Eli in the West Bank, a deputy company commander in the infantry Nahal Brigade’s 932nd Battalion. He “fell during combat” in the northern Gazan city of Beit Hanoun, the military said in a statement.

    The name of the other fatality was not released because his family had not yet been notified, the military said, adding that he and the two injured soldiers also belonged to the 932nd Battalion.

    Israel’s state-owned Kan TV reported that the four soldiers were hit by an anti-tank missile fired by militants at the building where they were staying.

    The latest deaths brought the total number of Israeli soldiers killed to 827 since the beginning of the country’s multi-front war in October 2023.

    According to the Gaza health authorities on Monday, Israeli strikes have killed 45,854 people and injured 109,139 others in the Palestinian enclave since the conflict.

    XINHUA

  • Eight dead in Russia apartment building fire

    MOSCOW – Eight people were killed after a fire broke out in a wooden apartment building in Russia’s western Kirov region, the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations (EMERCOM) said Sunday.

    The fire occurred in the village of Kilmez, about 1,000 km northeast of Moscow. Initial reports indicated that seven people died, and an eighth body was discovered in the debris-cleaning process.

    The EMERCOM teams are investigating the cause of the fire.

    Kirov Governor Alexander Sokolov said that the building was home to 11 residents, primarily pensioners.

    XINHUA

  • 2 dead, 3 missing after fishing boat capsizes in eastern Japan

    TOKYO — Two people died and three others went missing after a fishing boat capsized off Ibaraki Prefecture in eastern Japan early Monday, local media reported.

    The fishing boat with 20 people aboard capsized at around 2:05 a.m. local time off a port in Kashima in Ibaraki Prefecture, northeast of Tokyo, Kyodo News reported, citing local authorities.

    Fifteen people were rescued, and bodies of two men in their 50s and 60s were recovered, who were confirmed dead later, the report said.

    The Japan Coast Guard believes that the boat may have capsized because too many fish got caught in the net, causing it to lose balance.

    The coast guard and others are continuing their search for the missing.

    XINHUA

  • Washington Post cartoonist quits after paper rejects sketch of Bezos bowing to Trump

    This photo was posted by cartoonist Ann Telnaes on her website, with a caption saying it was a rough draft of the cartoon “killed” by Washington Post.

    A cartoonist has decided to quit her job at the Washington Post after an editor rejected her sketch of the newspaper’s owner and other media executives bowing before President-elect Donald Trump.

    Ann Telnaes posted a message Friday on the online platform Substack saying that she drew a cartoon showing a group of media executives bowing before Trump while offering him bags of money, including Post owner and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.
    Telnaes wrote that the cartoon was intended to criticize “billionaire tech and media chief executives who have been doing their best to curry favor with incoming President-elect Trump.”

    Several executives, Bezos among them, have been spotted at Trump’s Florida club Mar-a-Lago.

    She accused them of having lucrative government contracts and working to eliminate regulations.

    Telnaes said that she’s never before had a cartoon rejected because of its inherent messaging and that such a move is dangerous for a free press.

    “As an editorial cartoonist, my job is to hold powerful people and institutions accountable,” Telnaes wrote.

    “For the first time, my editor prevented me from doing that critical job. So I have decided to leave the Post. I doubt my decision will cause much of a stir and that it will be dismissed because I’m just a cartoonist. But I will not stop holding truth to power through my cartooning, because as they say ‘Democracy dies in darkness.’”

    The Association of American Editorial Cartoonists issued a statement Saturday accusing the Post of “political cowardice” and asking other cartoonists to post Telnaes’ sketch with the hashtag #StandWithAnn in a show of solidarity.

    “Tyranny ends at pen point,” the association said. “It thrives in the dark, and the Washington Post simply closed its eyes and gave in like a punch-drunk boxer.”

    The Post’s communications director, Liza Pluto, provided The Associated Press on Saturday with a statement from David Shipley, the newspaper’s editorial page editor. Shipley said in the statement that he disagrees with Telnaes’ “interpretation of events.”

    He said he decided to nix the cartoon because the paper had just published a column on the same topic as the cartoon and was set to publish another.

    “Not every editorial judgment is a reflection of a malign force. … The only bias was against repetition,” Shipley said.

    AN-AP

  • Russian journalist killed in drone attack

    MOSCOW — A Russian war correspondent was killed and four other media workers injured in a Ukrainian drone strike in the Donetsk region, Russia’s RIA Novosti news agency reported Saturday.

    The drone struck a car carrying Russian journalists on the Donetsk-Gorlovka highway, killing Alexander Martemyanov, a stringer for the Russian newspaper Izvestia, the report said.

    “After filming the aftermath of the shelling in Gorlovka, we were returning to Donetsk. On the highway, a kamikaze drone struck our car,” said RIA Novosti correspondent Maxim Romanenko, who was among the injured.

    Denis Pushilin, head of the Donetsk region, said on Telegram that all injured journalists are receiving medical treatment.

    Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said those attacks against Russian journalists will face “deserved and inevitable punishment.”

    XINHUA

  • 2 killed in light plane crash off Australia’s east coast

    SYDNEY — Two people have died in a light plane crash off Australia’s east coast north of Sydney.

    Police in the state of New South Wales (NSW) said in a statement on Saturday night that emergency services were called to reports of a light plane crash in the ocean near the town of Nambucca Heads, approximately 400 km north of Sydney, at 4 p.m. local time.

    “The pilot and passenger of the aircraft died at the scene and are yet to be formally identified,” NSW Police said.

    The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) reported that the wreckage was found about 1.5 km off the coast.

    Water police, ambulance crews and a rescue helicopter were deployed to the scene.

    Fire and Rescue NSW Superintendent Grant Rice told the ABC that debris had washed up along the shoreline.

    NSW Police said it has commenced an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the incident, with the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) assisting.

    XINHUA

  • Gaza civil defense says 19 killed in Israeli strikes

    GAZA STRIP – Rescuers in Gaza said on Saturday that at least 19 people, including eight children, were killed in Israeli strikes across the Palestinian territory.

    According to the civil defense agency, an air strike at dawn on the house of the Al-Ghoul family in Gaza City killed 11 people, seven of them children.

    “The home, which housed several displaced people, was completely destroyed,” said civil defense spokesman Mahmud Bassal.

    “It was a two-story building and several people are still under the rubble,” he added, saying Israeli drones had “also fired on ambulance staff.”

    Contacted by AFP, the Israeli army did not immediately comment on the strike.

    AFP images from the neighborhood of Shujaiya, in the east of Gaza City, showed residents combing through smoking rubble and bodies lined up on the ground, covered in white sheets.

    “A huge explosion woke us up. Everything was shaking,” said witness Ahmed Mussa.

    “I was surprised to see (the strike) was on the house of our neighbors, the Al-Ghoul family. It was home to children, women. There wasn’t anyone wanted or who posed a threat.”

    Elsewhere, the civil defense agency said five security officers, tasked with accompanying aid convoys, were killed by an Israeli strike as they were driving in a car in the southern city of Khan Yunis.

    Bassal accused Israel of having “deliberately targeted” them in order to “affect the humanitarian supply chain and increase the suffering” of the population.

    The army has not yet responded to the accusations.

    Local rescuers also said three members of the same family, including a child, were killed when their house was bombed in Khan Yunis.

    Israel’s retaliatory military campaign has killed at least 45,717 people in Gaza, the majority of them civilians, according to figures from the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry which the United Nations considers reliable.

    AN-AFP

  • Russia intercepts 4 drones over Leningrad region

    ST. PETERSBURG — Four drones were shot down in Russia’s Leningrad Oblast, regional Governor Alexander Drozdenko said Saturday.

    “The night and morning of Jan. 4 saw a record number of UAVs destroyed. Four aircraft were downed over the Leningrad Oblast with the use of electronic warfare and small arms,” Drozdenko wrote in a post on social media Telegram.

    He said there were no casualties or damages and the drone threat warning has been cancelled.

    Pulkovo Airport in St. Petersburg imposed temporary flight restrictions twice overnight and in the morning for safety concerns.

    XINHUA

  • Many injured as protest rally turns violent in India’s Manipur

    NEW DELHI — Many people, including a senior police official, were injured after a protest rally turned violent and attacked the superintendent of police’s office in the northeastern state of Manipur, officials said Saturday.

    The violence broke out in Kangpokpi district, about 44 km north of Imphal, the capital city of Manipur.

    Authorities have deployed additional police force in the district to contain the situation.

    Many protesters, who sustained injuries during the clashes, were also admitted to hospital.

    Manipur has been on edge since May 3, 2023 when large-scale violence broke out in the state during a tribal protest over the inclusion of the non-tribal Meitei community for a scheduled tribe status — designated for disadvantaged socio-economic groups which gives them reservations in education and government jobs.

    XINHUA