The Star Online: World Updates
The Star Online: World Updates |
- Gas tanker truck explodes outside Mexico City, kills 22
- Authorities tried earlier to visit house where Ohio women found
- Drought-stricken Panama orders power rationing, closes schools
| Gas tanker truck explodes outside Mexico City, kills 22 Posted: 07 May 2013 08:43 PM PDT MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - A gas tanker truck exploded on a highway north of Mexico City on Tuesday, killing at least 22 people and injuring more than 30 as a fireball tore through cars and homes. Pablo Bedolla, mayor of the Mexico City suburb of Ecatepec, said 22 people died in the blast that engulfed early morning traffic. Television footage showed burned-out vehicles and debris strewn all over the highway on the edge of the capital.
Local media reported that at least 10 of those killed were children. "It was a ball of fire which exploded as though they'd put a spotlight in the whole window," resident Carlos Gonzalez Silva told Mexican radio. "We opened the door and it was like fire had blown through the whole of the garden." Bedolla said the blast had injured more than 30 people and damaged 45. Emergency services in the State of Mexico, which abuts the capital, said 16 vehicles were hit by the explosion. President Enrique Pena Nieto expressed his condolences. Mexican radio station Formato 21 said a family of four, including two children aged 6 and 11, were among the dead. In January, a massive blast at the headquarters of state oil giant Pemex in downtown Mexico City claimed dozens of lives. Media reports said the gas tanker did not belong to Pemex. The state oil company said it would help in rescue efforts. (Reporting by Dave Graham and Lizbeth Diaz; Editing by Doina Chiacu, Sandra Maler and Mohammad Zargham) Copyright © 2013 Reuters | ||
| Authorities tried earlier to visit house where Ohio women found Posted: 07 May 2013 08:39 PM PDT CLEVELAND (Reuters) - Three Ohio women newly freed from a decade-long kidnapping ordeal huddled privately with loved ones on Tuesday as police scoured the Cleveland house where the captives had been held for clues to how their confinement went unnoticed for so long.
Three brothers were arrested as suspects shortly after Monday evening's rescue of the women and are expected to be formally charged soon. One of them, Ariel Castro, a former school bus driver and owner of the house, was thought to live there alone. Mayor Frank Johnson confirmed that Cleveland child welfare officials had paid a visit to the house in early 2004 because Castro had left a child on a school bus. But the ensuing inquiry found no criminal intent, officials said. Otherwise, the mayor denied that authorities overlooked or failed to respond to suspicious activity at the two-story home since any of the three victims were reported as missing. The women, believed to have been abducted separately from the surrounding neighbourhood and held prisoner for years, were found alive together by a neighbour alerted by cries for help coming from the house. He broke through the door to rescue one of the women, Amanda Berry, whose 2003 disappearance as a teenager was widely publicized in the local media, and helped her place a frantic emergency call to authorities. "Help me! I'm Amanda Berry. ... I've been kidnapped and I've been missing for 10 years and I'm here. I'm free now," Berry can be heard saying in a recording of the call released by police. Found with Berry, now 27, was her 6-year-old daughter, conceived and born during her captivity, and two other women - Gina DeJesus, 23, who vanished at age 14 in 2004, and Michelle Knight, 32, who was 20 years old when she went missing in 2002. Ariel Castro, 52, had been fired from his job last November because of lack of judgment, was arrested almost immediately. Two brothers, Pedro Castro, 54, and Onil Casto, 50, were taken into custody a short time later. Police have not said what role each man is suspected of playing in the case, but Berry named Ariel Castro in her 911 call as the man from whom she was trying to escape. Initial euphoria in Cleveland's West Side over the women's rescue soon gave way to questions about why their captivity went undetected, despite what neighbours said were a number of suspicious or disturbing incidents at the house in the low-income community. NEIGHBORS REPORT SUSPICIOUS INCIDENTS "We didn't search hard enough. She was right under our nose the whole time," said Angel Arroyo, a church pastor who had handed out flyers of DeJesus in the neighbourhood where she ultimately surfaced. Aside from the school bus incident in 2004, city officials said a database search found no records of calls to the house or reports of anything amiss during the years in question. "We have no indication that any of the neighbours, bystanders, witnesses or anyone else has ever called regarding any information, regarding activity that occurred at that house on Seymour Avenue," Mayor Johnson said at a news conference. Israel Lugo, a neighbour, said he called police in November 2011 after his sister observed a girl at the house holding a baby and crying for help. He said police came and banged on the door several times but left when no one answered. More recently, about eight months ago, Lugo said, his sister saw Ariel Castro park his school bus outside and take a large bag of fast food and several drinks inside. "My sister said something's wrong ... That's when my mom called the police," he said. Lugo said police came and warned Castro not to park the bus in front of his house. Neighbour Anthony Westry said a little girl could often be seen peering from the attic window of the Castro house. "She was always looking out the window," he said. Castro would take her to the park to play very early in the morning, "not around the time you would take kids to play," he said. Cleveland police, who have said they believe Berry, DeJesus and Knight were confined to the Castro house for their entire captivity, did not immediately respond to repeated requests for comment about reported calls from neighbours. In the one acknowledged visit to the house by Children and Family Services officers in January 2004, more than a year after Knight disappeared and eight months after Berry went missing, no one answered the door, the mayor said. They "knocked on the door but were unsuccessful in connection with making any contact with anyone inside that home," he said. Police said Castro was interviewed extensively during the investigation regarding the child left on the bus, and that no criminal wrongdoing was found. 'BELIEVE IN MIRACLES' On Tuesday, FBI and other law enforcement officials searched the Castro house and other properties, according to police, who did not elaborate. The houses in the neighbourhood stand close together, typically separated only by a driveway. Two houses to one side of his home are boarded up. After their rescue, the three women at the centre of the saga were taken to a local hospital, reunited with family and friends and released. As authorities pressed their investigation, the trio remained secluded with family members. Cleveland FBI special agent Vicki Anderson told Reuters that federal agents were "taking care of the victims" to help shield them from the media onslaught, which has included news teams from around the world. "If you don't believe in miracles, I suggest you think again," DeJesus' aunt Sandra Ruiz told reporters on Tuesday in comments on Cleveland TV. "This is a miracle," Ruiz said. But she added: "Watch who your neighbour is because you never know." Ruiz later emerged from the home of DeJesus' father to appeal to a throng of reporters to respect the family's privacy, saying, "Give us some breathing room." The disappearances of Berry and DeJesus were well known in Cleveland, although Knight's case had attracted less attention, evidently because authorities and some relatives believed she had run away, a grandmother told the Cleveland Plain Dealer. An uncle of the Castro brothers has said members of their family and the DeJesus family "grew up together." Born in Puerto Rico, Ariel Castro played bass in Latin music bands in the area. Records show he was divorced more than a decade ago and his ex-wife had since died. He is known to have at least one adult daughter and son. On a Facebook page believed to be his, Castro said last month that he had just become a grandfather for a fifth time. Court records show he was arrested in 1993 on a domestic violence charge that was subsequently dismissed. (Additional reporting by Barbara Goldberg, Greg McCune and Atossa Araxia Abrahamian; Writing by Steve Gorman and Ellen Wulfhorst; Editing by Grant McCool, Bernard Orr, Cynthia Johnston and Philip Barbara)
Factbox - Three Cleveland women all went missing in same area Copyright © 2013 Reuters | ||
| Drought-stricken Panama orders power rationing, closes schools Posted: 07 May 2013 08:38 PM PDT MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Panama on Tuesday ordered government offices and private businesses to slash their power consumption and temporarily closed schools in response to a drought that has sapped the country's hydroelectric energy supply. Opening hours for government offices will be reduced, while supermarkets, bars, cinemas, restaurants, casinos and other night spots would have to close between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. from Monday to Thursday, according to a statement from the president's office. Private businesses in the tropical Central American nation will also be forced to cut air-conditioning use by four hours a day, beginning Wednesday. It's unclear how long the rationing will last, though government officials say they would reconsider on Sunday how soon they could re-open schools. Panama, one of Latin America's fastest-growing economies, uses hydroelectric power to generate 60 percent of its electricity. But reservoirs are now low after months without rain. The Panama Canal, which transports about five percent of world trade, is unaffected by the power rationing because it produces its own energy, a spokeswoman said. The drought has killed hundreds of cattle, damaged crops, and caused some $200 million in losses in Panama. The government on Tuesday declared a drought emergency in four provinces, representing about a third of the nation's territory. (Reporting by Lomi Kriel; Editing by Paul Simao) Copyright © 2013 Reuters |
| You are subscribed to email updates from The Star Online: World Updates To stop receiving these emails, you may unsubscribe now. | Email delivery powered by Google |
| Google Inc., 20 West Kinzie, Chicago IL USA 60610 | |
0 ulasan:
Catat Ulasan