The Star Online: World Updates
The Star Online: World Updates |
- Syria forces sweep Aleppo as Assad promises reform
- Russia says plane crash kills 44, eight injured
- At least 44 killed in Russian plane crash
| Syria forces sweep Aleppo as Assad promises reform Posted: 20 Jun 2011 08:59 PM PDT AMMAN (Reuters) - Syrian forces have extended a security sweep near the Turkish border to the merchant city of Aleppo, activists said, as President Bashar al-Assad pledged reforms that protesters said failed to meet popular demands.
Tens of students at Aleppo University were arrested on Monday and 12 people, including a mosque preacher, were detained in the nearby village of Tel Rifaat, halfway between Aleppo and the Turkish border, following protests, rights campaigners said. Protesters at the university campus had criticised a speech by Assad, only his third since the uprising against his rule began three months ago, inspired by popular protests across the Arab world that ousted autocratic rulers in Tunisia and Egypt. In the speech given at Damascus University, Assad reiterated a commitment to "national dialogue" and promised new laws on the media and parliamentary elections but activists were dismissive and the United States demanded "action, not words" from Assad. Syrian rights groups say at least 1,300 civilians have been killed and 10,000 detained in a fierce military crackdown. "Road blocks in Aleppo are noticeably more today, especially on roads leading north toward Turkey and toward the east. I saw military intelligence agents arrest two brothers in their 30s, apparently just because they were from Idlib," a resident of Aleppo, who owns an import business, told Reuters by phone. He was referring to the northwestern province where troops and tanks have been deployed in towns and villages for the past 10 days to quell protests against Assad, according to witnesses. The military assault has sent thousands of refugees streaming over the nearby border into Turkey. Central neighbourhoods in the mixed city of Aleppo, Syria's second biggest, have been largely quiet, with a heavy security presence and the political and business alliance intact between Aleppan Sunni business families and the ruling hierarchy, from Syria's minority Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam. Syria, a country of 20 million, is mainly Sunni, and the protests demanding political freedoms and an end to 41 years of Assad family rule have been biggest in mostly Sunni rural areas and towns and cities, as opposed to mixed areas. TURKEY SAYS CRITICAL WEEK AHEAD Ankara has become increasingly critical of the Syrian president, having previously backed him in his drive to seek peace with Israel and improve relations with the United States. A senior Turkish official said on Sunday that Assad had less than a week to start implementing long-promised political reforms before "foreign intervention" begins, although he did not specify what this might mean. Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini, speaking ahead of the EU meeting, said Assad had a last chance to "concretely start reforms", but added that many people were losing hope. Under mounting international pressure and facing wider street protests despite the military crackdown, Assad said that Syria was facing security threats and accused "saboteurs" among the protesters of serving a foreign conspiracy to sow chaos. Following the speech, protesters took to the streets across Syria, with cities like Hama and Deir al-Zor seeing large night-time demonstrations, residents said. In Hama, scene of a 1982 attack to crush an uprising led by the Muslim Brotherhood that killed thousands of civilians during the rule of Assad's father, Hafez al-Assad, protesters chanted "damn your soul, Hafez". (Reporting by Khaled Yacoub Oweis; Editing by Elizabeth Fullerton) Copyright © 2011 Reuters Full Feed Generated by Get Full RSS, sponsored by USA Best Price. | ||
| Russia says plane crash kills 44, eight injured Posted: 20 Jun 2011 08:59 PM PDT BESOVETS, Russia (Reuters) - At least 44 people were killed and eight injured when a passenger plane broke up and caught fire on coming into land in fog in north-western Russia, an Emergency Ministry spokeswoman said on Tuesday. The Tupolev-134 plane, carrying 52 people including nine crew, crashed near a road about 1 km (0.6 miles) from the runway at the Besovets airport outside the northern city of Petrozavodsk at about 11.40 p.m. local time (1940 GMT) on Monday. "The preliminary information is that 44 people were killed," spokeswoman Irina Andriyanova said by telephone. "Eight people were injured and seven of them are in a very grave condition." The www.lifenews.ru Internet news website, which posted a full list of the passengers, said a 10-year-old boy named Anton had survived the crash but gave no details about his condition. "We took a child to the local hospital -- the child was in a very grave condition," a medical worker told a local television crew at the scene. She said a total of five people were taken to hospital. A video made by a witness on her mobile phone, and filmed by the television crew, showed flames soaring from the wreckage into the night sky near where the plane crashed, in the region of Kareliya about 700 km (430 miles) north-west of Moscow. "Everything was on fire," a witness who declined to give his name told the television crew. A photographer at the scene saw charred wreckage from the plane and dozens of emergency workers and firemen. The crash comes on the eve of the Paris Air Show which Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin is due to attend. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who has swapped his Tupolev for a French-made executive jet, in April criticised flaws in domestically-built planes and the nation's poor safety record. One of the most high-profile Tupolev air disasters in recent times occurred in April 2010 when Polish President Lech Kaczynski's official Tupolev Tu-154 plane crashed near Smolensk airport in western Russia, killing 96 people including Kaczynski, his wife and a large number of senior officials. The Tu-134 plane that crashed on Monday was operated by the private company RusAir and was travelling from Moscow's Domodedovo airport. RusAir, which specialises in charter flights, declined immediate comment. Most of the passengers were Russian but a Swedish national was also on the aircraft, Interfax news agency said. The Tuploev-134 is a Soviet aircraft whose maiden flight was in 1967. It was unclear when the plane which crashed was made. The aircraft's black boxes have been recovered. (Writing by Guy Faulconbridge, Editing by Elizabeth Fullerton) Copyright © 2011 Reuters Full Feed Generated by Get Full RSS, sponsored by USA Best Price. | ||
| At least 44 killed in Russian plane crash Posted: 20 Jun 2011 08:28 PM PDT BESOVETS, Russia (Reuters) - At least 44 people were killed when a passenger plane broke up and caught fire on coming into land in heavy fog in north-western Russia, an Emergency Ministry spokeswoman said on Tuesday. The Tupolev-134 plane, carrying 52 people including nine crew, crashed near a road about 1 km (0.6 miles) from the runway at the Besovets airport outside the northern city of Petrozavodsk at about 11.40 p.m. local time (1940 GMT) on Monday. "The preliminary information is that 44 people were killed," spokeswoman Irina Andriyanova said by telephone. "Eight people were injured and seven of them are in a very grave condition." The www.lifenews.ru Internet news website, which posted a full list of the passengers, said a 10-year-old boy named Anton had survived the crash but gave no details about his condition. "We took a child to the local hospital -- the child was in a very grave condition," a medical worker told a local television crew at the scene. She said a total of five people were taken to hospital. A video made by a witness on her mobile phone, and filmed by the television crew, showed flames soaring from the wreckage into the night sky near where the plane crashed, in the region of Kareliya about 700 km (430 miles) north-west of Moscow. "Everything was on fire," a witness who declined to give his name told the television crew. A photographer at the scene saw charred wreckage from the plane and dozens of emergency workers and firemen. The crash comes on the eve of the Paris Air Show which Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin is due to attend. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who has swapped his Tupolev for a French-made executive jet, in April criticised flaws in domestically-built planes and the nation's poor safety record. One of the most high-profile Tupolev air disasters in recent times occurred in April 2010 when Polish President Lech Kaczynski's official Tupolev Tu-154 plane crashed near Smolensk airport in western Russia, killing 96 people including Kaczynski, his wife and a large number of senior officials. The Tu-134 plane that crashed on Monday was operated by the private company RusAir and was travelling from Moscow's Domodedovo airport. RusAir, which specialises in charter flights, declined immediate comment. Most of the passengers were Russian but a Swedish national was also on the aircraft, Interfax news agency said. The Tuploev-134 is a Soviet aircraft whose maiden flight was in 1967. It was unclear when the plane which crashed was made. The aircraft's black boxes have been recovered. (Writing by Guy Faulconbridge, Editing by Elizabeth Fullerton) Copyright © 2011 Reuters Full Feed Generated by Get Full RSS, sponsored by USA Best Price. |
| 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