JEWISH KING JESUS IS COMING AT THE RAPTURE FOR US IN THE CLOUDS-DON'T MISS IT FOR THE WORLD.THE BIBLE TAKEN LITERALLY- WHEN THE PLAIN SENSE MAKES GOOD SENSE-SEEK NO OTHER SENSE-LEST YOU END UP IN NONSENSE.GET SAVED NOW- CALL ON JESUS TODAY.THE ONLY SAVIOR OF THE WHOLE EARTH - NO OTHER. 1 COR 15:23-JESUS THE FIRST FRUITS-CHRISTIANS RAPTURED TO JESUS-FIRST FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT-23 But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming.ROMANS 8:23 And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.(THE PRE-TRIB RAPTURE)
OZONE DEPLETION JUDGEMENT ON THE EARTH DUE TO SIN
ISAIAH 30:26-27
26 Moreover the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold,(7X OR 7-DEGREES HOTTER) as the light of seven days, in the day that the LORD bindeth up the breach of his people,(ISRAEL) and healeth the stroke of their wound.
27 Behold, the name of the LORD cometh from far, burning with his anger, and the burden thereof is heavy: his lips are full of indignation, and his tongue as a devouring fire:
MATTHEW 24:21-22,29
21 For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.
22 And except those days should be shortened,(DAY LIGHT HOURS SHORTENED) there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake (ISRAELS SAKE) those days shall be shortened (Daylight hours shortened)(THE ASTEROID HITS EARTH HERE)
29 Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken:
REVELATION 16:7-9
7 And I heard another out of the altar say, Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous are thy judgments.
8 And the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun; and power was given unto him to scorch men with fire.
9 And men were scorched with great heat, and blasphemed the name of God, which hath power over these plagues: and they repented not to give him glory.
Texas power demand to hit 2016 peak amid heat wave: ERCOT-[Reuters]-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
(Reuters) - Demand for electricity in Texas is forecast to reach the highest so far in 2016 on Thursday as a brutal heat wave bakes the Lone Star State, according to the state's power grid operator, which expects supplies to be sufficient to meet the peak.The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which operates the grid in most of the state, predicted demand would reach 69,589 MW on Thursday, topping the unofficial hourly high for the year of 68,800 MW set on Wednesday.ERCOT forecast demand would remain high over the next seven days but was not expected to reach Thursday's forecast peak. The grid's high was 69,877 MW set on Aug. 10, 2015. In the spring, ERCOT forecast usage could reach 70,588 MW during the summer.That high demand for air conditioning boosted next-day power prices at the Ercot North hub to their highest level in a year. Gas prices at the Katy hub, near Houston, meanwhile, were still about 10 cents shy of their high for the year.In the spring, ERCOT forecast gas would power about 60 percent of generation during the summer peak.The U.S. National Weather Service issued a heat advisory for some of the biggest cities in Texas, including Dallas, because high temperatures and humidity could result in a heat index of up to 106 degrees Fahrenheit (41 Celsius).Meteorologists at AccuWeather forecast high temperatures in Houston, San Antonio and Dallas will reach the 90s and 100s almost every day for the rest of the month.ERCOT spokeswoman Robbie Searcy said the grid anticipates having enough power supplies to keep up with forecast demand so long as all generation expected to be available remains so.She noted wind resources were expected to produce more energy on Thursday than Wednesday with about 5,400 MW expected from wind at the peak hour later this afternoon.There are about 16,000 MW of wind generation in ERCOT, which typically produce most energy overnight.ERCOT has not issued any notices about operating reserves on Thursday. On both Tuesday and Wednesday, the grid issued advisories that operating reserves fell below 3,000 MW. The grid issued nine similar notices in July.Operating reserves are the extra generating capacity available to meet demand within a short period of time in case a generator goes down or there is another disruption to supply.(Reporting by Scott DiSavino; Editing by Bill Trott)
STORMS HURRICANES-TORNADOES
LUKE 21:25-26
25 And there shall be signs in the sun,(HEATING UP-SOLAR ECLIPSES) and in the moon,(MAN ON MOON-LUNAR ECLIPSES) and in the stars;(ASTEROIDS ETC) and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity;(MASS CONFUSION) the sea and the waves roaring;(FIERCE WINDS)
26 Men’s hearts failing them for fear,(TORNADOES,HURRICANES,STORMS) and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth:(DESTRUCTION) for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.(FROM QUAKES,NUKES ETC)
Tropical Storm Earl batters buildings in Belize, heads for Mexico-[Reuters]-By Henry Romero and Manuel Carrillo-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
BELIZE CITY (Reuters) - Tropical Storm Earl whipped Belize and Mexico's Caribbean coast with wind and heavy rain, battering cars, disrupting transportation and forcing hundreds into shelters as it moved through Guatemala toward southeastern Mexico on Thursday.Some flights to the Mexican seaside resort Chetumal and from the city of Campeche were canceled due to Earl, which smashed car windows and punched holes in the roofs of Belize City's wooden houses, downed trees and flooded parts of the coastline."It was a whole lot scarier than I thought," said Philip Gray, a church member from Birmingham, Alabama, who was staying in Belize City. "The wind was very, very strong, we saw the air conditioners on the roof coming apart ... so very dangerous."Earl had been designated a hurricane overnight, but rapidly weakened over high ground as dawn broke on Thursday, the Miami-based U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said in a statement.The storm was dumping heavy rains on parts of Central America and southeast Mexico, the NHC said. Mexico's government ended storm warnings, and floods or landslides were considered the main risk going forward.At 1800 GMT, Earl was producing maximum sustained winds of 45 miles per hour (72 km per hour), and was some 140 miles (225 km) southeast of the Mexican port of Ciudad del Carmen.Hundreds of people were sheltered in Belize City and parts of Honduras overnight, local authorities said.The damage to Belize City was concentrated in impoverished areas, and residents were seen early in the day attempting repairs amid the flood waters.Some 35 families were evacuated from the southern part of the Mexican state of Quintana Roo, chiefly in Banco Chinchorro, an atoll off the coast from Chetumal, Pedro Santos, a local emergency services official, said by telephone.Mexican airline Interjet canceled six flights to and from Chetumal on Wednesday and Thursday. The airline TAR said it had called off some flights from Campeche.Earl is forecast to weaken to a tropical depression later Thursday, the NHC said.Mexican national oil company Pemex said on Wednesday night it was monitoring Earl but had not evacuated workers at oil platforms concentrated in the southern Gulf of Mexico.The fifth named storm of the 2016 season, Earl was expected to bring 8 to 12 inches (20-30 cm) of rain in parts of Belize, Guatemala and southern and western Mexico through Friday morning, the NHC said.(Additional reporting by Jose Sanchez in Belize City and Swati Verma in Bengaluru; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe and Marguerita Choy)
Storms return to Southwest, but less intense than earlier-[Associated Press]-TERRY TANG and PAUL DAVENPORT-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
PHOENIX (AP) — Storms have hit areas of the Southwest again, but with less intensity than a day earlier when monsoon rains swamped the desert region, stranding drivers, flooding streets and prompting water rescues.Forecasters warned of the potential of more flooding in six states — Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada, Utah and California, particularly in washes and streams.Rain fell in the Four Corners region Wednesday but there were no reports of flooding or mudslides. More intense monsoon rain was expected in that area through Friday, according to the National Weather Service.Flood watches in effect covered large swaths of desert and forests and cities such as Phoenix, Las Vegas, Tucson and Albuquerque. There was some flooding in the Arizona border city of Nogales.Meteorologist Ken Drozd said more than an inch of rain fell on the U.S. side of the border along with 2 inches on the Mexico side, overwhelming washes and some streets. Fire officials, however, said the water was receding by late afternoon and traffic was moving normally.Heavy rains fell Wednesday in parts of northern Phoenix, according to report on the Arizona Republic website. And in Casa Grande, about 50 miles south of Phoenix, a monsoon storm knocked over trees and power poles. The Casa Grande Dispatch reported that up to 1,800 homes and businesses were without electricity for a few hours.A flash-flood watch remained in effect until late Wednesday night for the Phoenix metro area and parts of Maricopa, Pinal and Gila counties — meaning flooding was possible in washes, creeks and drainage areas.Just over a month ago in Phoenix, residents were swapping social media photos of boiling temperature readings. Now, images of flooded streets and dark skies were being shared after a storm dropped 2 inches of rain in an hour in some spots Tuesday.The rains bring some relief to crews fighting wildfires but also the potential for mudslides in areas blackened by flames. Because of the moisture, forest managers have been allowing wildfires to burn in areas where they didn't threaten structures or public safety.While there are fears that lightning could spark new blazes and strong winds could fan them, flooding remained the main threat, according to the National Weather Service in Flagstaff.The weather wreaked havoc on Tuesday evening's commute. Flooding closed an Interstate 17 underpass in Phoenix for five hours and firefighters rescued a man sitting atop his flooded car on the metro Phoenix thoroughfare.Arizona Department of Transportation spokesman Steve Elliott said pumps were overwhelmed by 3 inches of rain that fell within about a half-hour at an interchange where the freeway dips below street level."We're talking about moving swimming pools of water," Elliott said. "Those low-lying areas are great collectors of water."Heavy rain is typical during monsoon season. The phenomenon occurs each summer when the winds shift, bringing moisture north from the Pacific Ocean and Gulf of Mexico to produce radical and unpredictable weather changes."So a normal monsoon year you're going to have a few of these extreme events. It may sound like an oxymoron — they're extreme events but we know they're going to happen every year," Waters said.At least one Phoenix couple took advantage of the weather for some wet and wild fun. Alexandria Gleason and Levi Robertson came home from work to find the streets around their apartment building flooded."Levi was the one who jokingly suggested I should get one of my floats," Gleason said. "I said 'That's probably the best idea ever.'"Gleason said she bobbed in the streets in her doughnut-shaped float for about 15 minutes as the rain poured down.Robert Goluba, who lives in the Phoenix suburb of Gilbert, captured video of a recycling bin floating down the street in front of his home. The 15-year Arizona resident said Tuesday's storm was one of the stronger ones in recent years and he'll be ready for the next storm."I'm going to be waiting for somebody's Mercedes to float down to my yard," Goluba joked.Earl to weaken into tropical depression by
Thursday night: NHC-[Reuters]-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
(Reuters) - Tropical Storm Earl is rapidly weakening and expected to become a tropical depression by Thursday night, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said in its latest report on Thursday.Earl, which is about 115 miles (185 km) west of Belize City with maximum sustained winds of 50 mph (85 km/h), is forecast to move across northern Guatemala and southeastern Mexico Thursday night and Friday, the Miami based weather forecaster added.(Reporting by Apeksha Nair in Bengaluru; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)
FIRES AND EXPLOSIONS
REVELATION 8:7
7 The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up.
The Latest: California's Big Sur-area fire spreads overnight-[Associated Press]-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
BIG SUR, Calif. (AP) — The Latest on wildfires burning in the West (all times local):7:50 a.m.A wildfire north of Big Sur near California's Central Coast has grown again overnight after burning for nearly two weeks.The fire has scorched more than 79 square miles and is less than 30 percent contained. It has destroyed 57 homes and is threatening another 2,000 structures.A bulldozer operator also was killed on the fire lines during a rollover accident.Fire investigators determined an unattended campfire started the blaze July 22 in Garapata Park. No arrests have been made.More than 5,500 personnel are working the fire in steep, forested ridges.
More than 2 dozen large wildfires burn in Western states-[Associated Press]-The Associated Press-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
Federal officials say 27 large wildfires are burning in the West. Hot, dry temperatures often combined with winds have made firefighting conditions difficult, destroying homes and forcing evacuations. Here's a look at some of the fires:-CALIFORNIA-Authorities are considering potential penalties for whoever set an illegal campfire that ballooned into a massive wildfire near scenic Big Sur in California.Officials want the public's help in finding whoever started the fire that has charred almost 73 square miles and destroyed 57 homes.A bulldozer operator was killed on the fire lines during a rollover accident.To the north, officials said Wednesday that a grass fire in a popular recreational area north of San Francisco more than doubled in size in less than a day.The blaze has charred more than 7 square miles in Napa, Yolo and Solano counties since igniting Tuesday. It prompted the evacuation of an RV and tent campground off Highway 128 near Lake Berryessa.No vineyards are threatened.___IDAHO-Firefighters are setting up sprinkler systems to protect buildings in the central Idaho town of Lowman as a wildfire expanded to 75 square miles.Nearly 1,500 firefighters are battling the blaze burning timber in rugged terrain.Officials say slightly cooler weather and winds from the northwest should help firefighters trying to prevent flames from reaching the small town.Fire spokeswoman Jennifer Myslivy says no evacuations have been ordered.___MONTANA-A western Montana wildfire has grown to 11 square miles in the Bitterroot National Forest.The fire started on Sunday about 5 miles southwest of Hamilton and destroyed 14 homes along with dozens of outbuildings and some vehicles.About 630 homes remain evacuated.___NEVADA-Officials are reporting progress containing two large wildfires pushed by dry winds through remote rangeland and rugged canyons in northwestern Nevada.A fire that has charred more than 93 square miles in the Virginia Mountains near Pyramid Lake was about 68 percent contained.Another, farther north near Poodle Mountain, was 80 percent contained but has burned about 10 square miles in a wilderness study area.___OREGON-A wildfire burning southwest of Crater Lake spread to nearly 800 acres, prompting an evacuation warning for some parts of Crater Lake National Park.Fire spokeswoman Lucinda Nolan said crews are trying to keep the fire east of Pacific Crest Trail and west of Crater Lake Rim Drive.The park remained open.___UTAH-People in Utah were allowed back into their homes after a small wildfire forced evacuations early Wednesday at a neighborhood tucked against a mountainside south of Salt Lake City.Officials said the blaze spread quickly through tinder-dry dry grass and brush. Some fences were damaged, but no homes were lost and people were allowed back into the 39 evacuated homes midday.___WASHINGTON-Residents have been allowed to return to their homes after a 5-square-mile wildfire prompted the evacuation of about two dozen homes in central Washington.A fire spokesman, Trooper Jeff Sevigney, says the blaze about 7 miles north of Moses Lake burned less land than initially thought but destroyed two homes and six outbuildings.Officials say a large wildfire in south-central Washington has scorched about 275 square miles of brush and grassland and was expected to be contained on Thursday.___WYOMING-Progress has been made on fighting wildfires in western Wyoming, and most evacuation orders were lifted.The only area still evacuated was Granite Creek in Teton County, where a wildfire was burning in Bridger-Teton National Forest. The fire has burned 46 square miles and is 84 percent contained.
Firefighters forced to wait for 100K ammo rounds to explode-[Associated Press]-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
TOMS RIVER, N.J. (AP) — Firefighters have put out a fire at an office building in New Jersey after waiting for 100,000 rounds of ammunition stored inside to explode.The fire at the building in Toms River burned for two hours Thursday morning and ignited the ammunition. Toms River police spokesman Officer Ralph Stocco says that the building's owner is a competitive shooter.Toms River Fire Department District 1 Chief John Gonzalez told the Asbury Park Press ( http://on.app.com/2ao7wOY ) that the ammunition was popping for about 10 minutes. It took another few hours for the fire to stop smoldering.No one was in the building at the time of the fire and no one was hurt. It wasn't clear how the fire began.
WORLD POWERS IN THE LAST DAYS (END OF AGE OF GRACE NOT THE WORLD)
EUROPEAN UNION-KING OF WEST-DAN 9:26-27,DAN 7:23-24,DAN 11:40,REV 13:1-10
EGYPT-KING OF THE SOUTH-DAN 11:40
RUSSIA-KING OF THE NORTH-EZEK 38:1-2,EZEK 39:1-3
CHINA-KING OF THE EAST-DAN 11:44,REV 9:16,18
VATICAN-RELIGIOUS LEADER-REV 13:11-18,REV 17:4-5,9,18
WORLD TERRORISM
GENESIS 6:11-13
11 The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.(WORLD TERRORISM,MURDERS)(HAMAS IN HEBREW IS VIOLENCE)
12 And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
13 And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence (TERRORISM)(HAMAS) through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
GENESIS 16:11-12
11 And the angel of the LORD said unto her,(HAGAR) Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael;(FATHER OF THE ARAB/MUSLIMS) because the LORD hath heard thy affliction.
12 And he (ISHMAEL-FATHER OF THE ARAB-MUSLIMS) will be a wild (DONKEY-JACKASS) man;(ISLAM IS A FAKE AND DANGEROUS SEX FOR MURDER CULT) his hand will be against every man,(ISLAM HATES EVERYONE) and every man's hand against him;(PROTECTING THEMSELVES FROM BEING BEHEADED) and he (ISHMAEL ARAB/MUSLIM) shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.(LITERAL-THE ARABS LIVE WITH THEIR BRETHERN JEWS)
ISAIAH 14:12-14
12 How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer,(SATAN) son of the morning!(HEBREW-CRECENT MOON-ISLAM) how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!
13 For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north:
14 I (SATAN HAS EYE TROUBLES) will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.(AND 1/3RD OF THE ANGELS OF HEAVEN FELL WITH SATAN AND BECAME DEMONS)
JOHN 16:2
2 They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service.(ISLAM MURDERS IN THE NAME OF MOON GOD ALLAH OF ISLAM)
DID I NOT WARN CANADIANS.UNDER THE LIBERAL-DEMOCRATIC-PROGRESSIVES.THERE WILL BE A MOSQUE IN EVERY CANADIAN CITY.SO ISLAM CAN SPEW ITS SHARIA LAW HATE.AND CANADIANS CAN BE BEHEADED ON OUR CANADIAN STREETS.AS WELL AS TERRORIST ATTACK BIGTIME BY MUSLIM MALES.
New mosque being considered by Regina planning committee-[CBC]-August 3, 2016-YAHOONEWS
A report is recommending that Regina's planning commission approve a new mosque for the city's southeast despite objections from people in the neighbourhood.Concerns were raised about the mosque going into the location at 2318 East Assiniboine Ave.At a public meeting held on June 20, there were 21 nearby residents and businesses who said they were opposed to the prayer house.Concerns of those who objected included increased traffic to the strip mall, a lack of parking, that it would create noise and the size of the congregation would grow.Looking into peoples' concerns City administration found Assiniboine Avenue can handle up to 12,000 vehicles per day, and currently only sees about 5,100 per day.A survey was done on the parking lot. It found there were still a large number of parking stalls available during peak times of the day.Staff also looked at the Islamic calendar, finding the earliest prayer time would be 3 a.m. CST and the latest would be 11 p.m.The planning committee recommended the institution would be limited to accommodating no more than 20 people at a time.The committee will make its decision at its meeting Wednesday afternoon. If approved, the recommendation will go before city council on Aug. 29.
Austria wants EU to stop Turkey accession talks-By EUOBSERVER-aug 4,16
Today, 08:52-Austrian chancellor Christian Kern wants to stop talks with Turkey about joining the European Union because of the country's democratic and economic deficits. In an interview with Austrian broadcaster ORF Kern described accession talks as a "diplomatic fiction" and said he wanted EU leaders to rethink their approach to Turkey. He said he would ask for "an alternative concept" at the next European Council summit.
Death penalty not on Turkey's agenda, says MP By Nikolaj Nielsen-aug 4,16-euobserver
BRUSSELS, Today, 09:28-Turkey's parliament has no immediate plans to reintroduce the death penalty following last month's failed military coup, a senior MP from the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) has told EUobserver."It is not on our agenda at the moment, it is not on the agenda of the parliament," Sena Nur Celik said on Wednesday (3 August).Celik was heading a delegation of MPs from her country's parliamentary foreign relations committee on a visit to Brussels.She said the demand for capital punishment was high among the public at the moment, following the attempted military coup on 15 July that left over 240 dead and 2,000 injured."Of course I think it is because the emotions are very high at the moment and as time passes we will see how we feel," she said.Turkey abolished capital punishment over 10 years ago. The move was key to broader efforts for the troubled nation to one day join the European Union as a member state.Reinstating the penalty would require the constitution to be changed by a two-thirds majority vote, and other international commitments to be rowed back."It requires a very wide consensus of political parties," noted Celik.But recent threats made by president Recep Tayyip Erdogan to reinstate it have roused strong rebukes from top EU officials and Germany's chancellor Angela Merkel.In a fiery speech delivered a few days after the coup, Erdogan had said if the Turkish public demands the death penalty then it should be allowed."You cannot put aside the people's demands," he said, noting that the United States still carries out executions.The EU has described the death penalty as a "red line" for Turkey's membership talks.German foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said such a move would "prevent successful negotiations to join the EU".-Purge hits Brussels-Meanwhile, Celik said an official from Turkey's mission to the EU had been removed from her post for her alleged association with the outlawed Fethullah Gulen movement."If at the end of the investigation there is no link to this group then of course all the charges will be dropped," she said.Some 70,000 people have resigned and another 18,000 have been arrested over alleged associations with Gulen, an exiled political figure accused by the authorities of instigating the coup. They include teachers, civil servants and journalists.Gulen is a 75-year old cleric who has lived in Pennsylvania since 1991 and has denied any involvement in the coup.On Wednesday, Turkish authorities raided the offices of the country's national science research council, private broadcaster NTV reported.Johannes Hahn, the EU's commissioner dealing with Turkey's membership bid, had earlier said the speed and breadth of the purge appeared to suggest it may have been prepared in advance.Celik said Turkey's intelligence services had been investigating the group accused of instigating the coup since 2013."This is group is a cult-like organisation, which has infiltrated the Turkish public institutions," she said."Investigations regarding this group have been ongoing since 2013. We knew they had members in the judiciary, in the military, in public institutions. And the process of identifying and eliminating these members were ongoing in the country when the coup attempt happened on 15 July."Celik's delegation did not meet officials from the European Commission or the European Parliament.The delegation instead held meetings with Belgian deputies, Turkish community leaders and other Belgian state officials.A separate delegation of Turkish lawmakers was supposed to meet EU officials but was unable to schedule."Unfortunately because it was the holiday season they were unable to get the necessary appointments from the EU institutions, so that visit has been postponed until the vacation period is over," said Hakan Olcay, Turkey's ambassador to Belgium.
West backs terrorists and plotters, says Erdogan By Nikolaj Nielsen-euobserver
BRUSSELS, 3. Aug, 09:15-Turkey has accused the West of supporting terrorism and backing the failed coup to overthrow the government.In a fiery speech delivered at his 1,150 room palace in Ankara on Tuesday (2 August), president Recep Tayyip Erdogan demanded the United States hand over his bitter foe Fethullah Gulen.Gulen, a 75-year old cleric who has lived in Pennsylvania since 1991, has been accused of masterminding the 15 July coup. He denies any involvement."This coup attempt has actors inside Turkey, but its script was written outside. Unfortunately the West is supporting terrorism and stands by coup plotters," said Erdogan.The US, for its part, offered a mild rebuke to Erdogan's comments.US state department spokesman John Kirby said Erdogan “is certainly free to express his views and his frustrations as he sees fit."Kirby said "what matters is the partnership with Turkey is going forward."Turkish lawmakers have since been dispatched to the United States in a broader diplomatic effort to convince authorities that Gulen is behind the attack.Another group of Turkish lawmakers from the foreign affairs committee has also been sent to Brussels.Erdogan also took a swipe at human rights group Amnesty International, which alleged that some people detained in the government-led purge had been tortured.Erdogan said Turkey had “zero tolerance toward torture” and said the London-based rights group should visit those wounded in the coup.“If you have any self respect, you’ll come to Turkey ... you’ll visit our [wounded] in hospital, and you’ll see who did what to whom,” he said.Some 200 people died in the coup with another 2,000 injured.But Amnesty International’s secretary general Salil Shetty stood by the torture reports.In a statement issued after Ergodan's speech, he said the government must release people who have committed no crime.“The serious human rights violations documented by an Amnesty International team on the ground in Turkey are alarming," he said.Some 70,000 people have been forced to resign, including football referees, over their perceived affiliation in the plot to overthrow the government. Another 18,000 have been arrested, reports the Associated Press.Erdogan hits out at Italy-Erdogan's combative accusations continued later on Tuesday in an interview with Italian TV channel RAI.He criticised foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini, who had said Turkey must respect democracy, human rights and fundamental freedoms."Mrs Mogherini should have first come to Turkey. Now I ask: What would be the reaction if the Italian parliament was bombed?"Erdogan also traded barbs with Italy's prime minister Matteo Renzi over allegations of money laundering.Erdogan's 35-year-old son Bilal Erdogan risks arrest if he enters Italy, where he had been a student.Italian prosecutors launched an investigation earlier this year against Bilal in a corruption scandal that links back to his father's AKP party and other senior Turkish government officials."Italy should be attending to the mafia, not my son," said Ergodan.But Renzi replied on Twitter, saying that Italy's legal system was independent and that "judges answer to the Italian constitution and not the Turkish president".
Coup arrests push Turkish penal system to breaking point-[By Seda Sezer and Daren Butler]-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Even before last month's coup attempt, Turkey's penal system was overstretched, with crowded prisons and backlogged courts. Now, it is struggling to cope with an influx of thousands who have been detained in the aftermath of the attempted putsch.The government says the situation is under control, but pictures of some alleged coup plotters handcuffed, stripped to their underpants and detained in sweltering rooms have raised concern among rights groups. There are reports that some jails are so crowded that prisoners have to sleep in shifts.There are now so many alleged putschists that the government says it doesn't have a courthouse big enough to try them all and will need to build new ones. Some 3,000 prosecutors and judges are among those who have been detained, making it even more difficult to find members of the judiciary to handle trials.Turkey's prison population has trebled since 2002 when the ruling AK Party founded by President Tayyip Erdogan came to power. Some are jailed in connection with the conflict in the mainly Kurdish southeast, which in the last year has seen some of the worst violence since the insurgency began in 1984.There were 188,000 prisoners in Turkey as of March, around 8,000 more than the existing capacity. So far, 12,000 people have been jailed pending trial since the failed coup and thousands more detained for further questioning."In order to make space, they are piling people on top of each other," said Mustafa Eren, chairman of the Civil Society in the Penal System Foundation, a rights group.At the Tekirdag prison in northwest Turkey, authorities were cramming six people into three-man cells, he said. The Silivri prison west of Istanbul was so crowded that prisoners were being housed in its sports facilities, Eren said.A government official told Reuters there wasn't a prison problem."There is no shortage of prisons. We don't think there will be any problems with this because we've been making on-going investments in our prison system," the official said.The July 15 abortive putsch saw a faction of the military commandeer tanks, helicopters and fighter jets in an attempt to topple the government. Turkey blames followers of Fethullah Gulen, a Muslim cleric who has lived in self-imposed exile in rural Pennsylvania since 1999. Gulen has denies the charges he was behind the failed putsch, and has condemned the coup.-SLEEPING IN SHIFTS-"Jails had already exceeded capacity before July 15, with prisoners sleeping in corridors and by toilets," said Veli Agbaba, the deputy head of the main opposition, the secular Republican People's Party (CHP), who has made hundreds of prison visits in the last five years for his work on a CHP commission investigating conditions in jails.The overcrowding was such that prisoners were sleeping in shifts and in response new beds were being brought in, Agbaba said. The rooms are so crammed with beds that there is no floor space for walking, he said. "The severity of the prison problem is not one that can be solved by sending in new beds," he said.The pro-government Yeni Safak newspaper reported that authorities at Sincan prison in Ankara set up a large tent on the prison grounds to house coup-related detainees. The government has rejected the report, with a justice ministry official saying all suspects were held in prison buildings.Rights groups say the overcrowding is another form of torture for the prisoners, some of whom have been shown in photos and television footage with bandages and bruises since their incarceration."Footage clearly shows those soldiers were beaten when they were under custody. This is torture. You don't even need to go and investigate," said Ozturk Turkdogan, head of the Turkish Human Rights Association. "This is such a vengeful mentality and it should be abandoned."Turkdogan said rights groups met with Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus to air their concerns regards torture and detention conditions.Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said in a television interview this week that there is no torture in Turkish prisons.HOSTILE LAWYERS-Bozdag has said no court in the country is capable of handling the number of defendants, which could total up to 30,000, and that new courthouses will be built for the trials.He has said the putschists will be tried in Sincan - an Ankara district laden with symbolism, as it was the scene of an 1997 army show of strength months before it ousted an Islamist government.Suspects are having trouble finding adequate counsel because expert lawyers are either afraid to be associated with the coup or are personally repulsed by the putsch, said Turkdogan of Turkey's Human Rights Association.In some cases, legal aid is provided, but those lawyers are often inexperienced and intimidated by the authorities, he said.Illustrating the hostility for the accused, one lawyer entered a prison this week to speak to a suspect, a former air force commander portrayed in media as a coup leader, but tried to attack him before being taken away by jail guards, the prison authority said in a statement.A decade ago, in a bid to reduce prison crowding, the government introduced a "supervised release" scheme, under which prisoners sentenced to less than 18 months are freed on parole.The opposition CHP has called for this to be extended to sentences of up to two years, but justice Minister Bozdag rejected such a move earlier this year, saying it could hurt public order.New prisons are planned. Speaking to parliamentary commission members in January, the head of the prisons' directorate, Yavuz Yildirim, said Turkey planned to open 165 more prisons in the coming four years and close 131 old ones.In the past, Turkey has used amnesties to reduce prison numbers. The last major amnesty, in 2000, was carried out on the proposal of the wife of then-Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit. It lowered the population by more than a quarter, but three years later the numbers had risen back to the pre-amnesty level.(Additional reporting by Gulsen Solaker and Ercan Gurses in Ankara and Ayla Jean Yackley in Istanbul; Writing by Daren Butler; Editing by David Dolan and Peter Graff)
Turkish Cypriots protest over religious controls-By EUOBSERVER-aug 3,16
Today, 10:00-Hundreds of mostly young Turkish Cypriots took to the streets on Wednesday to protest against what they see as Turkish attempts to promote religion through cultural and sporting projects. A new coordination committee, set up to oversee funding of such projects, is headed by a Turkish national appointed by the Turkish government and is "all about religion", Turkish Cypriot lawmaker Zeki Celer told AP.
EU imposes dumping duties on China and Russia-By EUOBSERVER-aug 4,16
Today, 12:50-The European Commission has imposed five-year dumping duties on steel on China and Russia. The duties hit so-called cold rolled steel, used in car making and construction. The duties range from 19.7% to 22.1% for Chinese and from 18.7% to 36.1% for Russian companies.
EU asylum applications double post-Soviet peak By Nikolaj Nielsen-euobserver
BRUSSELS, 3. Aug, 14:38-The EU registered double the number of asylum seekers last year than its previous peak figure, after the collapse of the Soviet Union.Some 1.3 million people applied for asylum last year in the 28 EU states along with Norway and Switzerland, US-based Pew Research centre said in a report out on Tuesday (2 August)."Since 1985, Europe received about 11.6 million asylum applications – meaning that last year’s 1.3 million amounted to about one-tenth of all applications received during the past 30 years by current EU countries, Norway and Switzerland," notes the report.The 1.3 million figure also almost doubled the applications registered in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet empire in 1992, when roughly 700,000 applied.Roughly four-in-ten asylum seekers in Europe in 2015 were young men between 18 and 34 years old. Those coming from The Gambia, Pakistan and Bangladesh were almost exclusively male.Most asylum seekers were trying to reach preferred destinations such as Germany and Sweden.Sweden, for instance, received more applications than both France and the UK combined.But Germany remained the top destination overall with 442,000 applications lodged last year.Hungary (174,000) and Sweden (156,000) were next most popular, and Hungary also had the highest number of applicants as a proportion of its population.The country registered 1,770 applications for every 100,000 residents.Hungary's right-wing government launched an anti-immigration campaign in the lead up to an October referendum that will ask citizens to reject or approve the EU's scheme to distribute asylum seekers.Prime minister Viktor Orban recently described people fleeing war and persecution to seek protection in the EU as "a poison”.Meanwhile, dozens of migrants waiting at Serbia's border with Hungary launched a hunger strike around the same time Orban made the comments.The strike, which involved mostly Afghans and Pakistanis, has since reportedly ended with nobody allowed to enter Hungary.Sweden received 1,600 applicants out of 100,000 residents, Germany 540, France averaged 160, and the UK just 60.The EU average, including Norway and Switzerland, is around 250 applications per 100,000 residents.The vast majority of Syrians applied for asylum in just five EU states: Germany, Hungary, Sweden, Austria and the Netherlands.After Syria, the largest source countries for asylum inflows in the EU are Afghanistan, Iraq, Kosovo, Albania and Nigeria.
Opinion-EU's Kosovo meddling risks Balkans chaos By Edmond Ekrem Krasniqi-aug 4,16-euobserver
BRUSSELS, Today, 18:20-Kosovo has accumulated plenty of domestic problems since the 1998-1999 independence war, but the US and EU are just making things worse by pressuring its leaders to ratify a border agreement with neighbouring Montenegro.The border delineation was agreed in August 2015 and ratified by Montenegro's parliament four months later.But Kosovo's opposition has expressed serious doubts over the deal, claiming that over 8,000 hectares of land will be lost.Before Montenegro ratified the deal, its government offered to renegotiate. But Kosovo's government ignored this friendly gesture and instead pushed forward with its attempts to ratify.The consequences of Kosovo's parliament approving or rejecting the border deal are growing ever more serious.If the deal is ratified next week, eventually on 11 August before the visit of US Vice-president Joseph Biden, the opposition is likely to resume violent protests. Several hundreds of opposition protesters gathered in downtown Pristina on Thursday (4 August). The protest ended peacefully as the border delineation issue was not put on the parliament’s session agenda.If the parliament votes against it, then the government would be embarrassed and the opposition would be happy.But the government of Montenegro would not be happy at all and would be put in uncomfortable situation just two months before elections.The Montenegrins would not be able to implement the deal, and the pro-Russia Serb opposition would be able to attack the government of Milo Djukanovic.Yes this whole mess is not created by Pristina nor Podgorica. It originates from the European Commission.-Trials for perfect pupils?-Three years ago, the commission set out more than 90 benchmarks for Kosovo to meet to receive visa-free travel for its citizens. Among them was the border delineation.No such condition was placed on any other aspirant countries. Slovenia and Croatia have still border disputes unresolved. Croatia and Serbia as well. Croatia and Montenegro too.Of course, Kosovo's leaders will do everything the US and EU ask. They are so corrupt that they are not in a position to refuse.Yet border delineation was not the only request from Brussels. The commission also demanded that Kosovo should improve its attempts to tackle corruption and organised crime.Will the EU and US demand criminal trials against the Kosovo leaders who have proved to be such perfect pupils? I don’t believe so. If anybody goes on trial in the coming weeks or months on corruption charges it will not be the top leaders.-There is no rush-The EU and US want stability in Kosovo and the Western Balkans region, even if that stability brings angry protests from the opposition.The current stability is so fragile that it could explode for any reason. If Western powers push for ratification of the border deal at any cost, it could be the issue to trigger bloodshed inside Kosovo between the opposition and the government. This could even spark border incidents with Montenegro.The EU and the US should step back. The EU should liberalise the visas and switch to the same neutral approach over border delineation as it had with other countries in the region.At the same time, the EU and US are wrong believing that ratification will help the government of Milo Djukanovic, whose country is expected to join Nato next year, ones all Nato member countries ratify membership protocol.There is no rush at all, and the US and EU diplomats are completely wrong to insist on ratification. It will solve nothing. On the contrary, it will make everything worse.I hope I’m wrong.The author is Kosovo journalist/analyst and founder of dtt-net.com news agency on Western Balkans-EU topics
First aid delivery in weeks reaches Syrian refugees on Jordan border: U.N.[Reuters]-By Magdalena Mis-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - U.N. aid agencies have made their first deliveries of relief in weeks to thousands of Syrian refugees stranded on Jordan's northeastern border with Syria, the world body said on Thursday.More than 75,000 people, mostly women and children, have been stuck for months in makeshift camps in a no-man's land on the Syrian side of the border, after fleeing central and eastern Syria.International relief workers and refugees said in June they were running out of food after a militant suicide attack prompted the army to shut the area, allowing only water trucks to enter."Unable either to cross the border or turn back, the situation facing these women, men and children has grown more dire by the day," the U.N. World Food Programme (WFP) said in a joint statement with the United Nations' refugee agency (UNHCR), children's agency UNICEF, and International Organization for Migration (IOM)."Sheltering in makeshift tents in harsh desert conditions with temperatures of up to 50 degrees Celsius and sudden sand storms, they are without sufficient food and have barely enough water to survive," the statement said.The agencies said they delivered a month's supply of food and hygiene items but life-saving healthcare was also urgently needed with pregnant women, children, the elderly and the sick especially vulnerable.The WFP said last month many Syrians had used up all their savings to reach the sparsely populated, desert area in the hope of crossing the border, and lacked money to buy food. Some were falling ill.The WFP said the agencies used drones for the first time to monitor the distribution of aid."(It) allows for a certain degree of assurance that the assistance is going to the people it is intended for," Frances Kennedy, WFP spokeswoman, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by email from Rome.The WFP said last month it did not have access to the camps but relied on village elders to deliver aid.(Reporting by Magdalena Mis; Editing by Katie Nguyen.; Please credit Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women’s rights, corruption and climate change. Visit news.trust.org)
Pakistani copter crashes in Afghanistan, occupants feared held by Taliban-[Reuters]-By Mehreen Zahra-Malik and Jibran Ahmad-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - A Pakistani government helicopter crash-landed in Taliban-held territory in Afghanistan on Thursday and all passengers and crew are feared captured by the insurgents, officials said.The helicopter went down in Logar province, near Afghanistan's border with Pakistan's lawless and mountainous tribal areas."Those detained by the Taliban are Pakistanis," Sameem Saleh, spokesman for Logar's governor, said. "The chopper was not shot but made the landing because of technical failure."A Pakistan Foreign Office spokesman confirmed that a helicopter belong to the Punjab provincial government had gone down, saying the fate of the crew was not yet clear."The Afghan authorities have assured they will investigate and know about the whereabouts of the helicopter and the passengers," spokesman Nafees Zakaria said.He said seven passengers were on board, comprising six Pakistanis and one Russian, a technician. The pilot was Pakistani.Hameed Khan, district governor of Azra district of Logar, said the helicopter landed in his border district."They were detained by the Taliban," Khan said.A senior Pakistani military official said the Russian-made MI-17 transport helicopter was en route from Peshawar in northwest Pakistan to Uzbekistan for maintenance when it experienced technical failure and made an emergency landing.He said there was no information about the occupants.(Writing by Kay Johnson; editing by John Stonestreet)
Lake Chad 'forgotten' as world focuses on Boko Haram-hit Nigeria-[Reuters]-By Kieran Guilbert-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
DAKAR (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - The world must not forget about the impact of the Boko Haram insurgency on West Africa's Lake Chad region where 100,000 people are uprooted, as fears of famine rise in northeast Nigeria, aid agencies said on Thursday.Nearly 250,000 children in Nigeria's northeast Borno state, where food is in short supply, suffer from life-threatening malnourishment and many are dying, the United Nations and Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said last month.Yet hunger and malnutrition rates across the border in Chad, where poverty and desertification have been compounded by Boko Haram violence, are troubling, said Pascal Nshimirimana, Chad program manager for the International Medical Corps (IMC)."There is a lot of focus on the Nigerian side of the border, but the Chadian side is being forgotten," Nshimirimana said.The region is the world's most neglected humanitarian crisis, the U.N. aid chief said earlier this year."Even before the Boko Haram crisis, the lake region and western part of Chad had been victimized by floods and drought," Nshimirimana told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by phone.There are more than 100,000 people displaced by Boko Haram across the swamplands of Lake Chad, where the borders of Chad, Cameroon, Niger and Nigeria meet, the United Nations says.Chadian troops have ventured onto Lake Chad, a Boko Haram stronghold, and say they are taking back ground from the Islamist group, undermining their seven-year campaign to carve out a Nigerian caliphate.Yet there are still areas around the lake which are hard to reach and assist, the U.N World Food Programme (WFP) said."Insecurity, long distances, and a lack of infrastructure, with conditions made worse during the current rainy season, create additional hurdles to the provision of aid," said Abdou Dieng, WFP's regional director for West and Central Africa.While the global acute malnutrition rate for the lake region stands at 13.5 percent, just below the emergency threshold, some areas north of the lake surpass it, at 18 percent, the IMC said.Chad in April extended the state of emergency in the region, which has disrupted fishing, farming and cattle breeding and hit cross-border trade, markets and livelihoods, aid agencies say.More than 15,000 people have been killed and at least 2.7 million displaced by Boko Haram across the four Lake Chad countries. Despite being driven back, the Islamist militants still stage raids and suicide bombings across the region."The effects of prolonged food insecurity are palpable in all four countries bearing the brunt of Boko Haram violence," Dieng of the WFP told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.(Reporting By Kieran Guilbert, Editing by Katie Nguyen.; Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women's rights, trafficking, corruption and climate change. Visit news.trust.org)
truthwinz-aug 4,16-Abidini said they (hostages) were held at the airport for hours waiting for 'another plane to land'.They were told if it didn't land - they would not be released.End of story.It was a ransom.
armedandfree-aug 4,16-Impeach this lying maggot (SUNNI_ARAB_MUSLIM-OBAMA) before he gets out of office. Where is the justice system in this country?
Report: US airlifted $400 million to Iran as detained Americans were released-Published August 03, 2016 FoxNews.com
The U.S. government airlifted the equivalent of $400 million to Iran this past January, which occurred as four detained Americans were released by Tehran, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.The cash transfer was the first installment paid in a $1.7 billion settlement the Obama administration reached with Iran to resolve a failed 1979 arms deal dating from just before the Iranian Revolution.State Department spokesman John Kirby denied the cash transfer was done to secure the release of the four Americans -- Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian; Amir Hekmati, a former U.S. Marine; Christian pastor Saeed Abedini and Nosratollah Khosravi-Roodsari, whose case had not been publicized before the release."The negotiations over the [arms deal] settlement ... were completely separate from the discussions about returning our American citizens home," Kirby said in a statement. "Not only were the two negotiations separate, they were conducted by different teams on each side.""The funds that were transferred to Iran were related solely to the settlement of a long-standing claim at the U.S.-Iran Claims Tribunal at The Hague," Kirby's statement concluded.However, the Journal says U.S. officials acknowledge that Iranian negotiators on the prisoner exchange said they wanted the cash to show they had gained something tangible.The Journal also reported that President Barack Obama did not disclose the $400 million cash payment when he announced Jan. 17 that the arms deal dispute had been resolved. The administration has not disclosed how the $1.7 billion was paid, except to say it was not paid in dollars.The cash flown to Iran consisted of euros, Swiss francs, and other currencies because U.S. law forbids transacting American dollars with Iran. Since the cash was airlifted, Iran's Revolutionary Guard has arrested two more Iranian-Americans. Tehran has also detained dual-nationals from France, Canada and the U.K. in recent months."Paying ransom to kidnappers puts Americans even more at risk," Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., said ina statement. "While Americans were relieved by Iran’s overdue release of illegally imprisoned American hostages, the White House’s policy of appeasement has led Iran to illegally seize more American hostages."
Kerry defends $400 million payment to Iran, says U.S. pays no ransoms-[Reuters]-By Gram Slattery-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Thursday defended the Obama administration's payment of $400 million in cash to Iran, denying it was a ransom for the release of American prisoners by Tehran or tied to the Iran nuclear deal."The United States does not pay ransoms," Kerry told a news conference in the Argentine capital Buenos Aires.He said the transfer, which came out of a long-standing Iranian claim at the Iran-United States Claims Tribunal in The Hague, was negotiated on a separate track from the nuclear deal.By settling the claim, it saved U.S. taxpayers potentially billions of dollars in further interest payments, Kerry added."We believe this agreement for the $400 million that was paid in interest and settlement of the case actually saved the American taxpayer potentially billions of dollars," Kerry said."There was no benefit to the United States of America to drag this out," he said. "It would have worked against the interests of our taxpayers and with the nuclear deal done, the prisoners released, the time was right to take advantage of that and resolve the dispute in the way that it was resolved."As the U.S. presidential campaign heats up, Republicans, including Donald Trump, have attacked the Obama administration over the payment, questioning the timing of the transfer.The White House announced on Jan. 17, a day after the prisoner exchange, it was releasing $400 million in funds frozen since 1981, plus $1.3 billion in interest owed to Iran. The remaining interest has since been fully paid from the U.S. Treasury-administered Judgment Fund, according to a U.S. official.The funds were part of a trust fund Iran used before its 1979 Islamic Revolution to buy U.S. military equipment that was tied up for decades in litigation at the tribunal.On Wednesday, Representative Jason Chaffetz, chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, asked Kerry to appear at a future committee hearing to discuss the payment.The State Department confirmed it had received the request and would respond "as appropriate."(Reporting by Gram Slatery; Writing by Lesley Wroughton; Editing by Alden Bentley and Richard Chang)
Gang rape videos on sale in India amid rise in violent crimes against women-[Reuters]-By Rina Chandran-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
MUMBAI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Graphic mobile phone clips of gang rapes are being sold in shops in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, as a spate of rapes in one of the country's most violent states has sparked anger and calls for the chief minister to step down.The clips, which last 30 seconds to five minutes, are being sold in the "hundreds, perhaps thousands, every day", the Times of India reported. They cost 50-150 rupees ($0.75-$2) each."We are aware. We are taking necessary action. But it is difficult, as the sales are happening below the counter," Ajay Sharma, a deputy inspector general of police in the city of Agra, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.In recent weeks, several gang rapes have been reported in Uttar Pradesh, which ranks among the most unsafe for women.Last week, a woman and her 14-year-old daughter were dragged from their vehicle at gunpoint on a major highway and gang-raped for hours in nearby fields. Local media reported that initially the police did not respond to a call for help.The daily Indian Express reported that this week another woman was gang-raped in Uttar Pradesh, and said the incident had been recorded on a mobile phone.Increasingly, perpetrators are recording their crimes on mobile phones to use as a blackmailing tool and to dissuade victims from going to the police, the Times of India said.Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has come under fire over the rise in violent crimes against women, with #LawlessUP trending on Twitter this week.In 2014, there were 337,922 reports of violence against women including rape, molestation and abduction, a 9 percent increase on the previous year, according to official data.Rape victims in India suffer enormous stigma and endure an archaic and insensitive criminal justice system, women's rights activists say.During lengthy trials, victims and their witnesses are sometimes intimidated by the accused who, in some cases, are granted bail by the court.A wave of public protests following the fatal gang-rape of a woman on a Delhi bus in December 2012 prompted the government to enact stiffer penalties, including the death sentence for repeat rape offenders and the criminalisation of stalking.($1 = 66.854 Indian rupees)-(Reporting by Rina Chandran @rinachandran, Editing by Jo Griffin. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women's rights, trafficking, corruption and climate change. Visit news.trust.org to see more stories.)
South Carolina church shooting suspect attacked in jail-[Reuters]-By Harriet McLeod-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
CHARLESTON, S.C. (Reuters) - The gunman accused of killing nine black parishioners at a Charleston, South Carolina, church last year was attacked in jail by another inmate early Thursday but not badly injured, a local sheriff's spokesman said.Dylann Roof, 22, was outside of his cell at the North Charleston jail where he is detained when the assault occurred, Charleston County Sheriff's Major Eric Watson said in a phone interview. A detention officer broke up the fight, Watson said.Roof was examined by in-house medical staff after the brief physical altercation at the Sheriff Al Cannon Detention Center and had no immediately apparent injuries, Watson said.The other inmate, who was not named, will face assault charges, the major said, adding no weapons were involved in the fight.Roof "did not provoke what happened," Watson said.A news conference about the incident was planned for 1:30 p.m. ET.Roof is facing the death penalty in both federal and state court, where prosecutors charged him with dozens of offenses including murder. The deadly attack occurred during a Bible study session at Charleston's historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church on June 17, 2015.Court records filed by prosecutors in federal court last month said Roof used eight Glock handgun magazines and fired about 80 rounds during the massacre. The records alleged that Roof plotted the attack for months, calling the church from his home and paying a web hosting company where he posted a manifesto online as early as February 2015.(Reporting by Harriet McLeod; Writing by Colleen Jenkins; Editing by David Gregorio)
Police: London stabbings that killed US woman not terrorism-[The Canadian Press]-august 4, 2016-yahoonews
LONDON — A Norwegian-Somali teenager went on a knife rampage through London's Russell Square, a hub for students and tourists, fatally stabbing an American woman and injuring five other people.Police said Thursday that it wasn't terrorism — but in a city on edge after a summer of attacks elsewhere in Europe, both authorities and London residents initially responded as if it were. Police flooded the streets with extra officers and mobilized counterterror detectives before saying the shocking burst of violence appeared to have been "triggered by mental-health issues."Police officers used a stun gun to subdue the 19-year-old suspect at the scene of the stabbings late Wednesday, among busy streets lined with hotels close to the British Museum."Terror in London" ran the headline in the Mail Online, one of several media outlets to speculate that the attack was an act of terrorism. Police initially said terrorism was "one line of inquiry being explored."But hours later Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner Mark Rowley said "we have found no evidence of radicalization or anything that would suggest the man in our custody was in any way motivated by terrorism."He said detectives from the force's murder and terrorism squads had interviewed the suspect, his family and witnesses and searched properties."We believe this was a spontaneous attack and the victims were selected at random," Rowley said.London Mayor Sadiq Khan said "there is no evidence at all that this man was motivated by Daesh" — another name for the Islamic State group — or similar organizations.Rowley said the suspect, whose name hasn't been released, is a Norwegian of Somali ancestry — though police don't consider that "relevant to the motivation for his actions." Norway's National Criminal Investigation Service said he had left the Scandinavian country in 2002, when he was a small child.The name of the dead woman, thought to be in her 60s, hasn't been released. U.S. Ambassador Matthew Barzun confirmed she was American, tweeting: "Heartbreaking news that a U.S. citizen was killed in #RussellSquare attack. My prayers are with all the victims and their loved ones."Two Australians, an Israeli, an American and a British citizen were wounded, none with life-threatening injuries.While knife crime is a regular occurrence in London — there have been two other blade killings this week — the scale and randomness of the rampage rattled nerves. It came just days after authorities warned the British public to be vigilant in light of attacks inspired by the Islamic State group elsewhere in Europe.Student Megan Sharrock, 18, looked out her window and saw someone lying on the sidewalk under a blanket."There was like two rivers of blood running away from the person so we thought, yeah, someone has been killed," she said."It's really shocking, (a) scary world we live in to think that could happen," she said. "That could happen to anyone, just walking down the street."Helen Edwards, 33, who lives in the area, came out for a walk and found it thronging with armed police near. In a city with vivid memories of the deadly July 7, 2005, bomb attacks on public transport — two of which struck near Russell Square — she immediately suspected that an attack had occurred."There is always that thing in the back of your mind," she said. "You live with that threat of terrorism or other crimes in the back of your mind. It wasn't a huge shock I guess."The response to the attack is complicated by the frequent overlap between terrorism and mental illness. Many "lone wolf" attackers have a history of mental-health problems, including a Syrian who blew himself up in the German town of Ansbach last month and a Somali man who was sentenced to life this week for trying to behead a London Underground passenger.Emily Corner, a researcher at University College London who studies the links between mental illness and terrorism, said every incident of major violence now sparks the same debate: "Are they a terrorist or are they mentally ill?" In some cases, the answer is both, though Corner stresses that most terrorist attackers are not mentally ill, and most people with mental illness are not violent.The Russell Square attack came within hours of an announcement by London police that they were putting more armed officers on the streets to bolster public confidence in the wake of recent attacks in Europe.Most British police don't carry guns, a principle that remains unchanged. Even with the additional armed officers, the vast majority of London's 31,000 police officers won't be armed.Armed officers responded to Wednesday's stabbings, but didn't fire any shots.Rowley said "we should be proud of them and the British tradition of using the minimum necessary force."Police have urged Britons to be vigilant after attacks this year in France, Belgium and Germany, several committed by people who professed allegiance to the Islamic State group.In the last three years London has seen two knife attacks by people inspired by radical Islam. In May 2013, two al-Qaida-inspired London men killed off-duty soldier Lee Rigby in the street near his barracks. In January, mentally ill Muhiddin Mire tried to behead a London Underground passenger, shouting that he was doing it "for Syria."Knives are the most common murder weapon in Britain, which has strict gun-control laws. There were 186 knife killings in the year to March 2015, according to government statistics — a third of all murders.___Associated Press journalists Jonathan Shenfield in London, and Jan M. Olsen in Copenhagen, Denmark, contributed to this story.Jill Lawlesss And Danica Kirka, The Associated Press
Dozens of dead caribou found on remote Nunavut island-[CBC]-August 3, 2016-YAHOONEWS
Nunavut's Department of Environment is trying to find out what happened to dozens of dead Baffin caribou found on an uninhabited island in the Arctic.The carcasses of 47 caribou were spotted in July on Prince Charles Island by a research scientist with Environment and Climate Change Canada.The find comes a year and a half after the Nunavut government imposed an emergency caribou hunting ban on Baffin Island — and including Prince Charles Island — after finding their numbers had plummeted. In 2015, the first-ever Baffin Island caribou quota of 250 animals per year was imposed. Paul Smith studies Arctic birds and was flying around the island in a Twin Otter airplane scouting locations to build a research station.From the airplane, Smith saw unusual white shapes on the tundra."And as we came in on the final approach to land on this sandbar, I noticed that they were actually carcasses of caribou," Smith said."It was sort of an apocalyptic scene. There's carcasses of caribou, literally dozens of them on either side of this ridge as you land the airplane. It's not a really comforting sight to be surrounded by dead wildlife as you're stepping out of the airplane."Smith, along with Nunavut's Department of Environment, collected samples."Investigations into the cause and extent of the die-off and health of the deceased caribou is ongoing," reads a statement from a department spokesperson.-Caribou 'stronghold'-One of the reasons Smith chose Prince Charles Island to build a research station was because of its abundance of wildlife.An aerial survey by the territorial government in the winter of 2014 estimated a third of all Baffin caribou were found on Prince Charles Island.The survey estimated there were between 3,462 to 6,250 caribou, down from an estimated 100,000 from 1985."To come there and find all of these dead caribou suggesting this large die-off is troubling," said Smith, noting that he also saw 11 live caribou on the island."This is supposed to be the stronghold of this herd."
Bold wolf prompts tent camping ban in Banff National Park-[CBC]-August 3, 2016-YAHOONEWS
More than 200 campers staying in tents had to be relocated from Two Jack Main and Lakeside campgrounds in Banff National Park due to the bold behaviour of a wolf.A female yearling wolf from the Bow Valley pack has been entering campgrounds looking for food over the last several days and nights, said Greg Danchuk, manager of visitor experience for Banff National Park."She's moving from campsite to campsite, sniffing at and pawing at fire pits, under tables, anything that she can come to," he said. "Even Rubbermaid bins people might have something in, which could be food that is not supposed to be left out. When our wildlife experts are trying to adversely condition her, she doesn't seem to be very fazed by that, chalk balls and noise and these kinds of things."Danchuk said officials will continue to monitor the wolf's behaviour.-Campgrounds full-With most campgrounds full during the summer season, finding places to put people was difficult, said Danchuk."We've put people onto the ring road at Tunnel Mountain Campground, there's the group camping at Johnston Creek Canyon and other locations," he said."We've filled every available site we possibly could within the park."Failing to keep a campsite clean can result in a fine of up to $25,000.The Banff area is currently full for camping and officials are asking walk-up campers to go to Lake Louise, Yoho or Kootenay National Parks.All wolf sightings should be reported to Banff Dispatch at 403-762-1470.
AP Exclusive: North Korea hopes to plant flag on the moon-[The Canadian Press]-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
PYONGYANG, Korea, Democratic People's Republic Of — North Korean space officials are hard at work on a five-year plan to put more advanced satellites into orbit by 2020, and don't intend to stop there: They're also aiming for the moon, and beyond.In an interview with The Associated Press, a senior official at North Korea's version of NASA said international sanctions won't stop the country from launching more satellites by 2020, and that he hopes to see the North Korean flag on the moon within the next 10 years."Even though the U.S. and its allies try to block our space development, our aerospace scientists will conquer space and definitely plant the flag of the DPRK on the moon," said Hyon Kwang Il, director of the scientific research department of North Korea's National Aerospace Development Administration.North Korea's official name is the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.An unmanned, no-frills North Korean moon mission in the not-too-distant future isn't as far-fetched as it might seem. Outside experts say it's ambitious, but conceivable. While the U.S. is the only country to have conducted manned lunar missions, other nations have sent unmanned spacecraft there and have in that sense planted their flags."It would be a significant increase in technology, not one that is beyond them, but you have to debug each bit," Jonathan McDowell, an astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics who maintains an exhaustive blog on international satellites and satellite launches, said in an email to the AP.Hyon said the current five-year plan, at the order of leader Kim Jong Un, focuses on launching more Earth observation satellites and what would be its first geostationary communications satellite — which, technologically, would be a major step forward. He said universities are also expanding programs to train rocket scientists."We are planning to develop the Earth observation satellites and to solve communications problems by developing geostationary satellites. All of this work will be the basis for the flight to the moon," Hyon said on July 28, adding that he personally would like to see that happen "within 10 years' time."North Korea has marked a number of successes in its space program — and, of course, in its development of ever-more-sophisticated long-range missiles for military use. On Wednesday, it test-fired what was believed to be a medium-range ballistic missile into the seas off Japan, the fourth reported weapons launch it has carried out in about two weeks.It launched its latest satellite — the Kwangmyongsong 4, or Brilliant Star 4 — into orbit on Feb. 7, just one month after conducting what it claims was its first H-bomb test.That brought new sanctions because nuclear tests and rocket launches, which can have military applications, are banned under United Nations resolutions.Hyon said the sanctions are "ridiculous.""Our country has started to accomplish our plan and we have started to gain a lot of successes," he said. "No matter what anyone thinks, our country will launch more satellites."He said North Korea's long-term target is to use its satellites to provide data for crop and forestry assessments and improved communications. It also intends "to do manned spaceflight and scientific experiments in space, make a flight to the moon and moon exploration and also exploration to other planets."The U.S. made its first lunar flyby in 1959, only six months after its first satellite, Explorer 1, though it took eight more years and several failed attempts to succeed with a lunar orbiter. The USSR made its first moon shot after only three successful Sputnik satellites. Its probe — just a year and a half after Sputnik 1 — reached the moon, but missed its orbit."So it's not ridiculous to attempt a moon mission early in your space program," McDowell said."Given their low flight rate of one mission every few years, I think it is hard to see them succeeding in this in the next five years, but possible to see them attempting it," he said.North Korea currently has two satellites in orbit, KMS-3-2 and KMS-4. It put its first satellite in orbit in 2012, a feat few other countries have achieved. Rival South Korea, for example, has yet to do so.Hyon said that as of July 27, KMS-4 had completed 2,513 orbits, and that within one day after its launch it transmitted 700 photographic images back to Earth. He said it is still working properly and sending data whenever it passes over North Korea, which is four times a day.Foreign experts have yet to confirm any communications from the satellite."There's been no independent evidence that KMS-4 sent data back, but no evidence that it didn't, either," McDowell said.German analyst Markus Schiller, one of the world's foremost experts on North Korea's missiles and rockets, said a geostationary satellite might be a more ambitious goal for the country than a lunar flyby or crash-landing."Hitting the moon hard would require less performance — power, rocket size — than getting into GEO (geostationary equatorial orbit), but it will still be quite a challenge," he said in an email from Munich, where he is based."Judging from what I have seen so far with their space program, it will take North Korea about a decade or more to get to lunar orbit at best — if they really pursue this mission," he said. "My personal guess, however, is that they might try but they will fail, and we will not see a successful North Korea lunar orbiter for at least two decades, if ever."Hyon said claims that North Korea's space plan is a military program in disguise are hypocritical, considering the history of space exploration. The U.S., Russia and China all built their space programs out of military technology. Many of the rockets they use today were initially developed as ICBMs."It is the U.S. that militarized space," he said.He said the North Korean military has already succeeded in developing long-range missiles that can reach anywhere on Earth, "especially to American territory," and so "there is no need for our state to use the space program for ballistic missile development."That argument isn't likely to sway sanctions advocates in Washington or Seoul. But Schiller said the claim is plausible, given the advances in weaponry North Korea has displayed through its overtly military missile tests and the specific designs of the Unha rockets that are used to launch its satellites."I agree they (the military) will not learn any essential new things from launching another Unha rocket," he said. "Of course, there are lessons learned that you can also apply for the missile program. But the whole missile program shows so many different characteristics that they seem to be separated to a certain degree."Eric Talmadge, The Associated Press.
ISAIAH 30:26-27
26 Moreover the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold,(7X OR 7-DEGREES HOTTER) as the light of seven days, in the day that the LORD bindeth up the breach of his people,(ISRAEL) and healeth the stroke of their wound.
27 Behold, the name of the LORD cometh from far, burning with his anger, and the burden thereof is heavy: his lips are full of indignation, and his tongue as a devouring fire:
MATTHEW 24:21-22,29
21 For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.
22 And except those days should be shortened,(DAY LIGHT HOURS SHORTENED) there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake (ISRAELS SAKE) those days shall be shortened (Daylight hours shortened)(THE ASTEROID HITS EARTH HERE)
29 Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken:
REVELATION 16:7-9
7 And I heard another out of the altar say, Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous are thy judgments.
8 And the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun; and power was given unto him to scorch men with fire.
9 And men were scorched with great heat, and blasphemed the name of God, which hath power over these plagues: and they repented not to give him glory.
Texas power demand to hit 2016 peak amid heat wave: ERCOT-[Reuters]-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
(Reuters) - Demand for electricity in Texas is forecast to reach the highest so far in 2016 on Thursday as a brutal heat wave bakes the Lone Star State, according to the state's power grid operator, which expects supplies to be sufficient to meet the peak.The Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), which operates the grid in most of the state, predicted demand would reach 69,589 MW on Thursday, topping the unofficial hourly high for the year of 68,800 MW set on Wednesday.ERCOT forecast demand would remain high over the next seven days but was not expected to reach Thursday's forecast peak. The grid's high was 69,877 MW set on Aug. 10, 2015. In the spring, ERCOT forecast usage could reach 70,588 MW during the summer.That high demand for air conditioning boosted next-day power prices at the Ercot North hub to their highest level in a year. Gas prices at the Katy hub, near Houston, meanwhile, were still about 10 cents shy of their high for the year.In the spring, ERCOT forecast gas would power about 60 percent of generation during the summer peak.The U.S. National Weather Service issued a heat advisory for some of the biggest cities in Texas, including Dallas, because high temperatures and humidity could result in a heat index of up to 106 degrees Fahrenheit (41 Celsius).Meteorologists at AccuWeather forecast high temperatures in Houston, San Antonio and Dallas will reach the 90s and 100s almost every day for the rest of the month.ERCOT spokeswoman Robbie Searcy said the grid anticipates having enough power supplies to keep up with forecast demand so long as all generation expected to be available remains so.She noted wind resources were expected to produce more energy on Thursday than Wednesday with about 5,400 MW expected from wind at the peak hour later this afternoon.There are about 16,000 MW of wind generation in ERCOT, which typically produce most energy overnight.ERCOT has not issued any notices about operating reserves on Thursday. On both Tuesday and Wednesday, the grid issued advisories that operating reserves fell below 3,000 MW. The grid issued nine similar notices in July.Operating reserves are the extra generating capacity available to meet demand within a short period of time in case a generator goes down or there is another disruption to supply.(Reporting by Scott DiSavino; Editing by Bill Trott)
STORMS HURRICANES-TORNADOES
LUKE 21:25-26
25 And there shall be signs in the sun,(HEATING UP-SOLAR ECLIPSES) and in the moon,(MAN ON MOON-LUNAR ECLIPSES) and in the stars;(ASTEROIDS ETC) and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity;(MASS CONFUSION) the sea and the waves roaring;(FIERCE WINDS)
26 Men’s hearts failing them for fear,(TORNADOES,HURRICANES,STORMS) and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth:(DESTRUCTION) for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.(FROM QUAKES,NUKES ETC)
Tropical Storm Earl batters buildings in Belize, heads for Mexico-[Reuters]-By Henry Romero and Manuel Carrillo-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
BELIZE CITY (Reuters) - Tropical Storm Earl whipped Belize and Mexico's Caribbean coast with wind and heavy rain, battering cars, disrupting transportation and forcing hundreds into shelters as it moved through Guatemala toward southeastern Mexico on Thursday.Some flights to the Mexican seaside resort Chetumal and from the city of Campeche were canceled due to Earl, which smashed car windows and punched holes in the roofs of Belize City's wooden houses, downed trees and flooded parts of the coastline."It was a whole lot scarier than I thought," said Philip Gray, a church member from Birmingham, Alabama, who was staying in Belize City. "The wind was very, very strong, we saw the air conditioners on the roof coming apart ... so very dangerous."Earl had been designated a hurricane overnight, but rapidly weakened over high ground as dawn broke on Thursday, the Miami-based U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said in a statement.The storm was dumping heavy rains on parts of Central America and southeast Mexico, the NHC said. Mexico's government ended storm warnings, and floods or landslides were considered the main risk going forward.At 1800 GMT, Earl was producing maximum sustained winds of 45 miles per hour (72 km per hour), and was some 140 miles (225 km) southeast of the Mexican port of Ciudad del Carmen.Hundreds of people were sheltered in Belize City and parts of Honduras overnight, local authorities said.The damage to Belize City was concentrated in impoverished areas, and residents were seen early in the day attempting repairs amid the flood waters.Some 35 families were evacuated from the southern part of the Mexican state of Quintana Roo, chiefly in Banco Chinchorro, an atoll off the coast from Chetumal, Pedro Santos, a local emergency services official, said by telephone.Mexican airline Interjet canceled six flights to and from Chetumal on Wednesday and Thursday. The airline TAR said it had called off some flights from Campeche.Earl is forecast to weaken to a tropical depression later Thursday, the NHC said.Mexican national oil company Pemex said on Wednesday night it was monitoring Earl but had not evacuated workers at oil platforms concentrated in the southern Gulf of Mexico.The fifth named storm of the 2016 season, Earl was expected to bring 8 to 12 inches (20-30 cm) of rain in parts of Belize, Guatemala and southern and western Mexico through Friday morning, the NHC said.(Additional reporting by Jose Sanchez in Belize City and Swati Verma in Bengaluru; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe and Marguerita Choy)
Storms return to Southwest, but less intense than earlier-[Associated Press]-TERRY TANG and PAUL DAVENPORT-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
PHOENIX (AP) — Storms have hit areas of the Southwest again, but with less intensity than a day earlier when monsoon rains swamped the desert region, stranding drivers, flooding streets and prompting water rescues.Forecasters warned of the potential of more flooding in six states — Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada, Utah and California, particularly in washes and streams.Rain fell in the Four Corners region Wednesday but there were no reports of flooding or mudslides. More intense monsoon rain was expected in that area through Friday, according to the National Weather Service.Flood watches in effect covered large swaths of desert and forests and cities such as Phoenix, Las Vegas, Tucson and Albuquerque. There was some flooding in the Arizona border city of Nogales.Meteorologist Ken Drozd said more than an inch of rain fell on the U.S. side of the border along with 2 inches on the Mexico side, overwhelming washes and some streets. Fire officials, however, said the water was receding by late afternoon and traffic was moving normally.Heavy rains fell Wednesday in parts of northern Phoenix, according to report on the Arizona Republic website. And in Casa Grande, about 50 miles south of Phoenix, a monsoon storm knocked over trees and power poles. The Casa Grande Dispatch reported that up to 1,800 homes and businesses were without electricity for a few hours.A flash-flood watch remained in effect until late Wednesday night for the Phoenix metro area and parts of Maricopa, Pinal and Gila counties — meaning flooding was possible in washes, creeks and drainage areas.Just over a month ago in Phoenix, residents were swapping social media photos of boiling temperature readings. Now, images of flooded streets and dark skies were being shared after a storm dropped 2 inches of rain in an hour in some spots Tuesday.The rains bring some relief to crews fighting wildfires but also the potential for mudslides in areas blackened by flames. Because of the moisture, forest managers have been allowing wildfires to burn in areas where they didn't threaten structures or public safety.While there are fears that lightning could spark new blazes and strong winds could fan them, flooding remained the main threat, according to the National Weather Service in Flagstaff.The weather wreaked havoc on Tuesday evening's commute. Flooding closed an Interstate 17 underpass in Phoenix for five hours and firefighters rescued a man sitting atop his flooded car on the metro Phoenix thoroughfare.Arizona Department of Transportation spokesman Steve Elliott said pumps were overwhelmed by 3 inches of rain that fell within about a half-hour at an interchange where the freeway dips below street level."We're talking about moving swimming pools of water," Elliott said. "Those low-lying areas are great collectors of water."Heavy rain is typical during monsoon season. The phenomenon occurs each summer when the winds shift, bringing moisture north from the Pacific Ocean and Gulf of Mexico to produce radical and unpredictable weather changes."So a normal monsoon year you're going to have a few of these extreme events. It may sound like an oxymoron — they're extreme events but we know they're going to happen every year," Waters said.At least one Phoenix couple took advantage of the weather for some wet and wild fun. Alexandria Gleason and Levi Robertson came home from work to find the streets around their apartment building flooded."Levi was the one who jokingly suggested I should get one of my floats," Gleason said. "I said 'That's probably the best idea ever.'"Gleason said she bobbed in the streets in her doughnut-shaped float for about 15 minutes as the rain poured down.Robert Goluba, who lives in the Phoenix suburb of Gilbert, captured video of a recycling bin floating down the street in front of his home. The 15-year Arizona resident said Tuesday's storm was one of the stronger ones in recent years and he'll be ready for the next storm."I'm going to be waiting for somebody's Mercedes to float down to my yard," Goluba joked.Earl to weaken into tropical depression by
Thursday night: NHC-[Reuters]-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
(Reuters) - Tropical Storm Earl is rapidly weakening and expected to become a tropical depression by Thursday night, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said in its latest report on Thursday.Earl, which is about 115 miles (185 km) west of Belize City with maximum sustained winds of 50 mph (85 km/h), is forecast to move across northern Guatemala and southeastern Mexico Thursday night and Friday, the Miami based weather forecaster added.(Reporting by Apeksha Nair in Bengaluru; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)
FIRES AND EXPLOSIONS
REVELATION 8:7
7 The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up.
The Latest: California's Big Sur-area fire spreads overnight-[Associated Press]-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
BIG SUR, Calif. (AP) — The Latest on wildfires burning in the West (all times local):7:50 a.m.A wildfire north of Big Sur near California's Central Coast has grown again overnight after burning for nearly two weeks.The fire has scorched more than 79 square miles and is less than 30 percent contained. It has destroyed 57 homes and is threatening another 2,000 structures.A bulldozer operator also was killed on the fire lines during a rollover accident.Fire investigators determined an unattended campfire started the blaze July 22 in Garapata Park. No arrests have been made.More than 5,500 personnel are working the fire in steep, forested ridges.
More than 2 dozen large wildfires burn in Western states-[Associated Press]-The Associated Press-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
Federal officials say 27 large wildfires are burning in the West. Hot, dry temperatures often combined with winds have made firefighting conditions difficult, destroying homes and forcing evacuations. Here's a look at some of the fires:-CALIFORNIA-Authorities are considering potential penalties for whoever set an illegal campfire that ballooned into a massive wildfire near scenic Big Sur in California.Officials want the public's help in finding whoever started the fire that has charred almost 73 square miles and destroyed 57 homes.A bulldozer operator was killed on the fire lines during a rollover accident.To the north, officials said Wednesday that a grass fire in a popular recreational area north of San Francisco more than doubled in size in less than a day.The blaze has charred more than 7 square miles in Napa, Yolo and Solano counties since igniting Tuesday. It prompted the evacuation of an RV and tent campground off Highway 128 near Lake Berryessa.No vineyards are threatened.___IDAHO-Firefighters are setting up sprinkler systems to protect buildings in the central Idaho town of Lowman as a wildfire expanded to 75 square miles.Nearly 1,500 firefighters are battling the blaze burning timber in rugged terrain.Officials say slightly cooler weather and winds from the northwest should help firefighters trying to prevent flames from reaching the small town.Fire spokeswoman Jennifer Myslivy says no evacuations have been ordered.___MONTANA-A western Montana wildfire has grown to 11 square miles in the Bitterroot National Forest.The fire started on Sunday about 5 miles southwest of Hamilton and destroyed 14 homes along with dozens of outbuildings and some vehicles.About 630 homes remain evacuated.___NEVADA-Officials are reporting progress containing two large wildfires pushed by dry winds through remote rangeland and rugged canyons in northwestern Nevada.A fire that has charred more than 93 square miles in the Virginia Mountains near Pyramid Lake was about 68 percent contained.Another, farther north near Poodle Mountain, was 80 percent contained but has burned about 10 square miles in a wilderness study area.___OREGON-A wildfire burning southwest of Crater Lake spread to nearly 800 acres, prompting an evacuation warning for some parts of Crater Lake National Park.Fire spokeswoman Lucinda Nolan said crews are trying to keep the fire east of Pacific Crest Trail and west of Crater Lake Rim Drive.The park remained open.___UTAH-People in Utah were allowed back into their homes after a small wildfire forced evacuations early Wednesday at a neighborhood tucked against a mountainside south of Salt Lake City.Officials said the blaze spread quickly through tinder-dry dry grass and brush. Some fences were damaged, but no homes were lost and people were allowed back into the 39 evacuated homes midday.___WASHINGTON-Residents have been allowed to return to their homes after a 5-square-mile wildfire prompted the evacuation of about two dozen homes in central Washington.A fire spokesman, Trooper Jeff Sevigney, says the blaze about 7 miles north of Moses Lake burned less land than initially thought but destroyed two homes and six outbuildings.Officials say a large wildfire in south-central Washington has scorched about 275 square miles of brush and grassland and was expected to be contained on Thursday.___WYOMING-Progress has been made on fighting wildfires in western Wyoming, and most evacuation orders were lifted.The only area still evacuated was Granite Creek in Teton County, where a wildfire was burning in Bridger-Teton National Forest. The fire has burned 46 square miles and is 84 percent contained.
Firefighters forced to wait for 100K ammo rounds to explode-[Associated Press]-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
TOMS RIVER, N.J. (AP) — Firefighters have put out a fire at an office building in New Jersey after waiting for 100,000 rounds of ammunition stored inside to explode.The fire at the building in Toms River burned for two hours Thursday morning and ignited the ammunition. Toms River police spokesman Officer Ralph Stocco says that the building's owner is a competitive shooter.Toms River Fire Department District 1 Chief John Gonzalez told the Asbury Park Press ( http://on.app.com/2ao7wOY ) that the ammunition was popping for about 10 minutes. It took another few hours for the fire to stop smoldering.No one was in the building at the time of the fire and no one was hurt. It wasn't clear how the fire began.
WORLD POWERS IN THE LAST DAYS (END OF AGE OF GRACE NOT THE WORLD)
EUROPEAN UNION-KING OF WEST-DAN 9:26-27,DAN 7:23-24,DAN 11:40,REV 13:1-10
EGYPT-KING OF THE SOUTH-DAN 11:40
RUSSIA-KING OF THE NORTH-EZEK 38:1-2,EZEK 39:1-3
CHINA-KING OF THE EAST-DAN 11:44,REV 9:16,18
VATICAN-RELIGIOUS LEADER-REV 13:11-18,REV 17:4-5,9,18
WORLD TERRORISM
GENESIS 6:11-13
11 The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.(WORLD TERRORISM,MURDERS)(HAMAS IN HEBREW IS VIOLENCE)
12 And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
13 And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence (TERRORISM)(HAMAS) through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
GENESIS 16:11-12
11 And the angel of the LORD said unto her,(HAGAR) Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael;(FATHER OF THE ARAB/MUSLIMS) because the LORD hath heard thy affliction.
12 And he (ISHMAEL-FATHER OF THE ARAB-MUSLIMS) will be a wild (DONKEY-JACKASS) man;(ISLAM IS A FAKE AND DANGEROUS SEX FOR MURDER CULT) his hand will be against every man,(ISLAM HATES EVERYONE) and every man's hand against him;(PROTECTING THEMSELVES FROM BEING BEHEADED) and he (ISHMAEL ARAB/MUSLIM) shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.(LITERAL-THE ARABS LIVE WITH THEIR BRETHERN JEWS)
ISAIAH 14:12-14
12 How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer,(SATAN) son of the morning!(HEBREW-CRECENT MOON-ISLAM) how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!
13 For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north:
14 I (SATAN HAS EYE TROUBLES) will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.(AND 1/3RD OF THE ANGELS OF HEAVEN FELL WITH SATAN AND BECAME DEMONS)
JOHN 16:2
2 They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service.(ISLAM MURDERS IN THE NAME OF MOON GOD ALLAH OF ISLAM)
DID I NOT WARN CANADIANS.UNDER THE LIBERAL-DEMOCRATIC-PROGRESSIVES.THERE WILL BE A MOSQUE IN EVERY CANADIAN CITY.SO ISLAM CAN SPEW ITS SHARIA LAW HATE.AND CANADIANS CAN BE BEHEADED ON OUR CANADIAN STREETS.AS WELL AS TERRORIST ATTACK BIGTIME BY MUSLIM MALES.
New mosque being considered by Regina planning committee-[CBC]-August 3, 2016-YAHOONEWS
A report is recommending that Regina's planning commission approve a new mosque for the city's southeast despite objections from people in the neighbourhood.Concerns were raised about the mosque going into the location at 2318 East Assiniboine Ave.At a public meeting held on June 20, there were 21 nearby residents and businesses who said they were opposed to the prayer house.Concerns of those who objected included increased traffic to the strip mall, a lack of parking, that it would create noise and the size of the congregation would grow.Looking into peoples' concerns City administration found Assiniboine Avenue can handle up to 12,000 vehicles per day, and currently only sees about 5,100 per day.A survey was done on the parking lot. It found there were still a large number of parking stalls available during peak times of the day.Staff also looked at the Islamic calendar, finding the earliest prayer time would be 3 a.m. CST and the latest would be 11 p.m.The planning committee recommended the institution would be limited to accommodating no more than 20 people at a time.The committee will make its decision at its meeting Wednesday afternoon. If approved, the recommendation will go before city council on Aug. 29.
Austria wants EU to stop Turkey accession talks-By EUOBSERVER-aug 4,16
Today, 08:52-Austrian chancellor Christian Kern wants to stop talks with Turkey about joining the European Union because of the country's democratic and economic deficits. In an interview with Austrian broadcaster ORF Kern described accession talks as a "diplomatic fiction" and said he wanted EU leaders to rethink their approach to Turkey. He said he would ask for "an alternative concept" at the next European Council summit.
Death penalty not on Turkey's agenda, says MP By Nikolaj Nielsen-aug 4,16-euobserver
BRUSSELS, Today, 09:28-Turkey's parliament has no immediate plans to reintroduce the death penalty following last month's failed military coup, a senior MP from the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) has told EUobserver."It is not on our agenda at the moment, it is not on the agenda of the parliament," Sena Nur Celik said on Wednesday (3 August).Celik was heading a delegation of MPs from her country's parliamentary foreign relations committee on a visit to Brussels.She said the demand for capital punishment was high among the public at the moment, following the attempted military coup on 15 July that left over 240 dead and 2,000 injured."Of course I think it is because the emotions are very high at the moment and as time passes we will see how we feel," she said.Turkey abolished capital punishment over 10 years ago. The move was key to broader efforts for the troubled nation to one day join the European Union as a member state.Reinstating the penalty would require the constitution to be changed by a two-thirds majority vote, and other international commitments to be rowed back."It requires a very wide consensus of political parties," noted Celik.But recent threats made by president Recep Tayyip Erdogan to reinstate it have roused strong rebukes from top EU officials and Germany's chancellor Angela Merkel.In a fiery speech delivered a few days after the coup, Erdogan had said if the Turkish public demands the death penalty then it should be allowed."You cannot put aside the people's demands," he said, noting that the United States still carries out executions.The EU has described the death penalty as a "red line" for Turkey's membership talks.German foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said such a move would "prevent successful negotiations to join the EU".-Purge hits Brussels-Meanwhile, Celik said an official from Turkey's mission to the EU had been removed from her post for her alleged association with the outlawed Fethullah Gulen movement."If at the end of the investigation there is no link to this group then of course all the charges will be dropped," she said.Some 70,000 people have resigned and another 18,000 have been arrested over alleged associations with Gulen, an exiled political figure accused by the authorities of instigating the coup. They include teachers, civil servants and journalists.Gulen is a 75-year old cleric who has lived in Pennsylvania since 1991 and has denied any involvement in the coup.On Wednesday, Turkish authorities raided the offices of the country's national science research council, private broadcaster NTV reported.Johannes Hahn, the EU's commissioner dealing with Turkey's membership bid, had earlier said the speed and breadth of the purge appeared to suggest it may have been prepared in advance.Celik said Turkey's intelligence services had been investigating the group accused of instigating the coup since 2013."This is group is a cult-like organisation, which has infiltrated the Turkish public institutions," she said."Investigations regarding this group have been ongoing since 2013. We knew they had members in the judiciary, in the military, in public institutions. And the process of identifying and eliminating these members were ongoing in the country when the coup attempt happened on 15 July."Celik's delegation did not meet officials from the European Commission or the European Parliament.The delegation instead held meetings with Belgian deputies, Turkish community leaders and other Belgian state officials.A separate delegation of Turkish lawmakers was supposed to meet EU officials but was unable to schedule."Unfortunately because it was the holiday season they were unable to get the necessary appointments from the EU institutions, so that visit has been postponed until the vacation period is over," said Hakan Olcay, Turkey's ambassador to Belgium.
West backs terrorists and plotters, says Erdogan By Nikolaj Nielsen-euobserver
BRUSSELS, 3. Aug, 09:15-Turkey has accused the West of supporting terrorism and backing the failed coup to overthrow the government.In a fiery speech delivered at his 1,150 room palace in Ankara on Tuesday (2 August), president Recep Tayyip Erdogan demanded the United States hand over his bitter foe Fethullah Gulen.Gulen, a 75-year old cleric who has lived in Pennsylvania since 1991, has been accused of masterminding the 15 July coup. He denies any involvement."This coup attempt has actors inside Turkey, but its script was written outside. Unfortunately the West is supporting terrorism and stands by coup plotters," said Erdogan.The US, for its part, offered a mild rebuke to Erdogan's comments.US state department spokesman John Kirby said Erdogan “is certainly free to express his views and his frustrations as he sees fit."Kirby said "what matters is the partnership with Turkey is going forward."Turkish lawmakers have since been dispatched to the United States in a broader diplomatic effort to convince authorities that Gulen is behind the attack.Another group of Turkish lawmakers from the foreign affairs committee has also been sent to Brussels.Erdogan also took a swipe at human rights group Amnesty International, which alleged that some people detained in the government-led purge had been tortured.Erdogan said Turkey had “zero tolerance toward torture” and said the London-based rights group should visit those wounded in the coup.“If you have any self respect, you’ll come to Turkey ... you’ll visit our [wounded] in hospital, and you’ll see who did what to whom,” he said.Some 200 people died in the coup with another 2,000 injured.But Amnesty International’s secretary general Salil Shetty stood by the torture reports.In a statement issued after Ergodan's speech, he said the government must release people who have committed no crime.“The serious human rights violations documented by an Amnesty International team on the ground in Turkey are alarming," he said.Some 70,000 people have been forced to resign, including football referees, over their perceived affiliation in the plot to overthrow the government. Another 18,000 have been arrested, reports the Associated Press.Erdogan hits out at Italy-Erdogan's combative accusations continued later on Tuesday in an interview with Italian TV channel RAI.He criticised foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini, who had said Turkey must respect democracy, human rights and fundamental freedoms."Mrs Mogherini should have first come to Turkey. Now I ask: What would be the reaction if the Italian parliament was bombed?"Erdogan also traded barbs with Italy's prime minister Matteo Renzi over allegations of money laundering.Erdogan's 35-year-old son Bilal Erdogan risks arrest if he enters Italy, where he had been a student.Italian prosecutors launched an investigation earlier this year against Bilal in a corruption scandal that links back to his father's AKP party and other senior Turkish government officials."Italy should be attending to the mafia, not my son," said Ergodan.But Renzi replied on Twitter, saying that Italy's legal system was independent and that "judges answer to the Italian constitution and not the Turkish president".
Coup arrests push Turkish penal system to breaking point-[By Seda Sezer and Daren Butler]-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Even before last month's coup attempt, Turkey's penal system was overstretched, with crowded prisons and backlogged courts. Now, it is struggling to cope with an influx of thousands who have been detained in the aftermath of the attempted putsch.The government says the situation is under control, but pictures of some alleged coup plotters handcuffed, stripped to their underpants and detained in sweltering rooms have raised concern among rights groups. There are reports that some jails are so crowded that prisoners have to sleep in shifts.There are now so many alleged putschists that the government says it doesn't have a courthouse big enough to try them all and will need to build new ones. Some 3,000 prosecutors and judges are among those who have been detained, making it even more difficult to find members of the judiciary to handle trials.Turkey's prison population has trebled since 2002 when the ruling AK Party founded by President Tayyip Erdogan came to power. Some are jailed in connection with the conflict in the mainly Kurdish southeast, which in the last year has seen some of the worst violence since the insurgency began in 1984.There were 188,000 prisoners in Turkey as of March, around 8,000 more than the existing capacity. So far, 12,000 people have been jailed pending trial since the failed coup and thousands more detained for further questioning."In order to make space, they are piling people on top of each other," said Mustafa Eren, chairman of the Civil Society in the Penal System Foundation, a rights group.At the Tekirdag prison in northwest Turkey, authorities were cramming six people into three-man cells, he said. The Silivri prison west of Istanbul was so crowded that prisoners were being housed in its sports facilities, Eren said.A government official told Reuters there wasn't a prison problem."There is no shortage of prisons. We don't think there will be any problems with this because we've been making on-going investments in our prison system," the official said.The July 15 abortive putsch saw a faction of the military commandeer tanks, helicopters and fighter jets in an attempt to topple the government. Turkey blames followers of Fethullah Gulen, a Muslim cleric who has lived in self-imposed exile in rural Pennsylvania since 1999. Gulen has denies the charges he was behind the failed putsch, and has condemned the coup.-SLEEPING IN SHIFTS-"Jails had already exceeded capacity before July 15, with prisoners sleeping in corridors and by toilets," said Veli Agbaba, the deputy head of the main opposition, the secular Republican People's Party (CHP), who has made hundreds of prison visits in the last five years for his work on a CHP commission investigating conditions in jails.The overcrowding was such that prisoners were sleeping in shifts and in response new beds were being brought in, Agbaba said. The rooms are so crammed with beds that there is no floor space for walking, he said. "The severity of the prison problem is not one that can be solved by sending in new beds," he said.The pro-government Yeni Safak newspaper reported that authorities at Sincan prison in Ankara set up a large tent on the prison grounds to house coup-related detainees. The government has rejected the report, with a justice ministry official saying all suspects were held in prison buildings.Rights groups say the overcrowding is another form of torture for the prisoners, some of whom have been shown in photos and television footage with bandages and bruises since their incarceration."Footage clearly shows those soldiers were beaten when they were under custody. This is torture. You don't even need to go and investigate," said Ozturk Turkdogan, head of the Turkish Human Rights Association. "This is such a vengeful mentality and it should be abandoned."Turkdogan said rights groups met with Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus to air their concerns regards torture and detention conditions.Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said in a television interview this week that there is no torture in Turkish prisons.HOSTILE LAWYERS-Bozdag has said no court in the country is capable of handling the number of defendants, which could total up to 30,000, and that new courthouses will be built for the trials.He has said the putschists will be tried in Sincan - an Ankara district laden with symbolism, as it was the scene of an 1997 army show of strength months before it ousted an Islamist government.Suspects are having trouble finding adequate counsel because expert lawyers are either afraid to be associated with the coup or are personally repulsed by the putsch, said Turkdogan of Turkey's Human Rights Association.In some cases, legal aid is provided, but those lawyers are often inexperienced and intimidated by the authorities, he said.Illustrating the hostility for the accused, one lawyer entered a prison this week to speak to a suspect, a former air force commander portrayed in media as a coup leader, but tried to attack him before being taken away by jail guards, the prison authority said in a statement.A decade ago, in a bid to reduce prison crowding, the government introduced a "supervised release" scheme, under which prisoners sentenced to less than 18 months are freed on parole.The opposition CHP has called for this to be extended to sentences of up to two years, but justice Minister Bozdag rejected such a move earlier this year, saying it could hurt public order.New prisons are planned. Speaking to parliamentary commission members in January, the head of the prisons' directorate, Yavuz Yildirim, said Turkey planned to open 165 more prisons in the coming four years and close 131 old ones.In the past, Turkey has used amnesties to reduce prison numbers. The last major amnesty, in 2000, was carried out on the proposal of the wife of then-Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit. It lowered the population by more than a quarter, but three years later the numbers had risen back to the pre-amnesty level.(Additional reporting by Gulsen Solaker and Ercan Gurses in Ankara and Ayla Jean Yackley in Istanbul; Writing by Daren Butler; Editing by David Dolan and Peter Graff)
Turkish Cypriots protest over religious controls-By EUOBSERVER-aug 3,16
Today, 10:00-Hundreds of mostly young Turkish Cypriots took to the streets on Wednesday to protest against what they see as Turkish attempts to promote religion through cultural and sporting projects. A new coordination committee, set up to oversee funding of such projects, is headed by a Turkish national appointed by the Turkish government and is "all about religion", Turkish Cypriot lawmaker Zeki Celer told AP.
EU imposes dumping duties on China and Russia-By EUOBSERVER-aug 4,16
Today, 12:50-The European Commission has imposed five-year dumping duties on steel on China and Russia. The duties hit so-called cold rolled steel, used in car making and construction. The duties range from 19.7% to 22.1% for Chinese and from 18.7% to 36.1% for Russian companies.
EU asylum applications double post-Soviet peak By Nikolaj Nielsen-euobserver
BRUSSELS, 3. Aug, 14:38-The EU registered double the number of asylum seekers last year than its previous peak figure, after the collapse of the Soviet Union.Some 1.3 million people applied for asylum last year in the 28 EU states along with Norway and Switzerland, US-based Pew Research centre said in a report out on Tuesday (2 August)."Since 1985, Europe received about 11.6 million asylum applications – meaning that last year’s 1.3 million amounted to about one-tenth of all applications received during the past 30 years by current EU countries, Norway and Switzerland," notes the report.The 1.3 million figure also almost doubled the applications registered in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet empire in 1992, when roughly 700,000 applied.Roughly four-in-ten asylum seekers in Europe in 2015 were young men between 18 and 34 years old. Those coming from The Gambia, Pakistan and Bangladesh were almost exclusively male.Most asylum seekers were trying to reach preferred destinations such as Germany and Sweden.Sweden, for instance, received more applications than both France and the UK combined.But Germany remained the top destination overall with 442,000 applications lodged last year.Hungary (174,000) and Sweden (156,000) were next most popular, and Hungary also had the highest number of applicants as a proportion of its population.The country registered 1,770 applications for every 100,000 residents.Hungary's right-wing government launched an anti-immigration campaign in the lead up to an October referendum that will ask citizens to reject or approve the EU's scheme to distribute asylum seekers.Prime minister Viktor Orban recently described people fleeing war and persecution to seek protection in the EU as "a poison”.Meanwhile, dozens of migrants waiting at Serbia's border with Hungary launched a hunger strike around the same time Orban made the comments.The strike, which involved mostly Afghans and Pakistanis, has since reportedly ended with nobody allowed to enter Hungary.Sweden received 1,600 applicants out of 100,000 residents, Germany 540, France averaged 160, and the UK just 60.The EU average, including Norway and Switzerland, is around 250 applications per 100,000 residents.The vast majority of Syrians applied for asylum in just five EU states: Germany, Hungary, Sweden, Austria and the Netherlands.After Syria, the largest source countries for asylum inflows in the EU are Afghanistan, Iraq, Kosovo, Albania and Nigeria.
Opinion-EU's Kosovo meddling risks Balkans chaos By Edmond Ekrem Krasniqi-aug 4,16-euobserver
BRUSSELS, Today, 18:20-Kosovo has accumulated plenty of domestic problems since the 1998-1999 independence war, but the US and EU are just making things worse by pressuring its leaders to ratify a border agreement with neighbouring Montenegro.The border delineation was agreed in August 2015 and ratified by Montenegro's parliament four months later.But Kosovo's opposition has expressed serious doubts over the deal, claiming that over 8,000 hectares of land will be lost.Before Montenegro ratified the deal, its government offered to renegotiate. But Kosovo's government ignored this friendly gesture and instead pushed forward with its attempts to ratify.The consequences of Kosovo's parliament approving or rejecting the border deal are growing ever more serious.If the deal is ratified next week, eventually on 11 August before the visit of US Vice-president Joseph Biden, the opposition is likely to resume violent protests. Several hundreds of opposition protesters gathered in downtown Pristina on Thursday (4 August). The protest ended peacefully as the border delineation issue was not put on the parliament’s session agenda.If the parliament votes against it, then the government would be embarrassed and the opposition would be happy.But the government of Montenegro would not be happy at all and would be put in uncomfortable situation just two months before elections.The Montenegrins would not be able to implement the deal, and the pro-Russia Serb opposition would be able to attack the government of Milo Djukanovic.Yes this whole mess is not created by Pristina nor Podgorica. It originates from the European Commission.-Trials for perfect pupils?-Three years ago, the commission set out more than 90 benchmarks for Kosovo to meet to receive visa-free travel for its citizens. Among them was the border delineation.No such condition was placed on any other aspirant countries. Slovenia and Croatia have still border disputes unresolved. Croatia and Serbia as well. Croatia and Montenegro too.Of course, Kosovo's leaders will do everything the US and EU ask. They are so corrupt that they are not in a position to refuse.Yet border delineation was not the only request from Brussels. The commission also demanded that Kosovo should improve its attempts to tackle corruption and organised crime.Will the EU and US demand criminal trials against the Kosovo leaders who have proved to be such perfect pupils? I don’t believe so. If anybody goes on trial in the coming weeks or months on corruption charges it will not be the top leaders.-There is no rush-The EU and US want stability in Kosovo and the Western Balkans region, even if that stability brings angry protests from the opposition.The current stability is so fragile that it could explode for any reason. If Western powers push for ratification of the border deal at any cost, it could be the issue to trigger bloodshed inside Kosovo between the opposition and the government. This could even spark border incidents with Montenegro.The EU and the US should step back. The EU should liberalise the visas and switch to the same neutral approach over border delineation as it had with other countries in the region.At the same time, the EU and US are wrong believing that ratification will help the government of Milo Djukanovic, whose country is expected to join Nato next year, ones all Nato member countries ratify membership protocol.There is no rush at all, and the US and EU diplomats are completely wrong to insist on ratification. It will solve nothing. On the contrary, it will make everything worse.I hope I’m wrong.The author is Kosovo journalist/analyst and founder of dtt-net.com news agency on Western Balkans-EU topics
First aid delivery in weeks reaches Syrian refugees on Jordan border: U.N.[Reuters]-By Magdalena Mis-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - U.N. aid agencies have made their first deliveries of relief in weeks to thousands of Syrian refugees stranded on Jordan's northeastern border with Syria, the world body said on Thursday.More than 75,000 people, mostly women and children, have been stuck for months in makeshift camps in a no-man's land on the Syrian side of the border, after fleeing central and eastern Syria.International relief workers and refugees said in June they were running out of food after a militant suicide attack prompted the army to shut the area, allowing only water trucks to enter."Unable either to cross the border or turn back, the situation facing these women, men and children has grown more dire by the day," the U.N. World Food Programme (WFP) said in a joint statement with the United Nations' refugee agency (UNHCR), children's agency UNICEF, and International Organization for Migration (IOM)."Sheltering in makeshift tents in harsh desert conditions with temperatures of up to 50 degrees Celsius and sudden sand storms, they are without sufficient food and have barely enough water to survive," the statement said.The agencies said they delivered a month's supply of food and hygiene items but life-saving healthcare was also urgently needed with pregnant women, children, the elderly and the sick especially vulnerable.The WFP said last month many Syrians had used up all their savings to reach the sparsely populated, desert area in the hope of crossing the border, and lacked money to buy food. Some were falling ill.The WFP said the agencies used drones for the first time to monitor the distribution of aid."(It) allows for a certain degree of assurance that the assistance is going to the people it is intended for," Frances Kennedy, WFP spokeswoman, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by email from Rome.The WFP said last month it did not have access to the camps but relied on village elders to deliver aid.(Reporting by Magdalena Mis; Editing by Katie Nguyen.; Please credit Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women’s rights, corruption and climate change. Visit news.trust.org)
Pakistani copter crashes in Afghanistan, occupants feared held by Taliban-[Reuters]-By Mehreen Zahra-Malik and Jibran Ahmad-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - A Pakistani government helicopter crash-landed in Taliban-held territory in Afghanistan on Thursday and all passengers and crew are feared captured by the insurgents, officials said.The helicopter went down in Logar province, near Afghanistan's border with Pakistan's lawless and mountainous tribal areas."Those detained by the Taliban are Pakistanis," Sameem Saleh, spokesman for Logar's governor, said. "The chopper was not shot but made the landing because of technical failure."A Pakistan Foreign Office spokesman confirmed that a helicopter belong to the Punjab provincial government had gone down, saying the fate of the crew was not yet clear."The Afghan authorities have assured they will investigate and know about the whereabouts of the helicopter and the passengers," spokesman Nafees Zakaria said.He said seven passengers were on board, comprising six Pakistanis and one Russian, a technician. The pilot was Pakistani.Hameed Khan, district governor of Azra district of Logar, said the helicopter landed in his border district."They were detained by the Taliban," Khan said.A senior Pakistani military official said the Russian-made MI-17 transport helicopter was en route from Peshawar in northwest Pakistan to Uzbekistan for maintenance when it experienced technical failure and made an emergency landing.He said there was no information about the occupants.(Writing by Kay Johnson; editing by John Stonestreet)
Lake Chad 'forgotten' as world focuses on Boko Haram-hit Nigeria-[Reuters]-By Kieran Guilbert-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
DAKAR (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - The world must not forget about the impact of the Boko Haram insurgency on West Africa's Lake Chad region where 100,000 people are uprooted, as fears of famine rise in northeast Nigeria, aid agencies said on Thursday.Nearly 250,000 children in Nigeria's northeast Borno state, where food is in short supply, suffer from life-threatening malnourishment and many are dying, the United Nations and Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) said last month.Yet hunger and malnutrition rates across the border in Chad, where poverty and desertification have been compounded by Boko Haram violence, are troubling, said Pascal Nshimirimana, Chad program manager for the International Medical Corps (IMC)."There is a lot of focus on the Nigerian side of the border, but the Chadian side is being forgotten," Nshimirimana said.The region is the world's most neglected humanitarian crisis, the U.N. aid chief said earlier this year."Even before the Boko Haram crisis, the lake region and western part of Chad had been victimized by floods and drought," Nshimirimana told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by phone.There are more than 100,000 people displaced by Boko Haram across the swamplands of Lake Chad, where the borders of Chad, Cameroon, Niger and Nigeria meet, the United Nations says.Chadian troops have ventured onto Lake Chad, a Boko Haram stronghold, and say they are taking back ground from the Islamist group, undermining their seven-year campaign to carve out a Nigerian caliphate.Yet there are still areas around the lake which are hard to reach and assist, the U.N World Food Programme (WFP) said."Insecurity, long distances, and a lack of infrastructure, with conditions made worse during the current rainy season, create additional hurdles to the provision of aid," said Abdou Dieng, WFP's regional director for West and Central Africa.While the global acute malnutrition rate for the lake region stands at 13.5 percent, just below the emergency threshold, some areas north of the lake surpass it, at 18 percent, the IMC said.Chad in April extended the state of emergency in the region, which has disrupted fishing, farming and cattle breeding and hit cross-border trade, markets and livelihoods, aid agencies say.More than 15,000 people have been killed and at least 2.7 million displaced by Boko Haram across the four Lake Chad countries. Despite being driven back, the Islamist militants still stage raids and suicide bombings across the region."The effects of prolonged food insecurity are palpable in all four countries bearing the brunt of Boko Haram violence," Dieng of the WFP told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.(Reporting By Kieran Guilbert, Editing by Katie Nguyen.; Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women's rights, trafficking, corruption and climate change. Visit news.trust.org)
truthwinz-aug 4,16-Abidini said they (hostages) were held at the airport for hours waiting for 'another plane to land'.They were told if it didn't land - they would not be released.End of story.It was a ransom.
armedandfree-aug 4,16-Impeach this lying maggot (SUNNI_ARAB_MUSLIM-OBAMA) before he gets out of office. Where is the justice system in this country?
Report: US airlifted $400 million to Iran as detained Americans were released-Published August 03, 2016 FoxNews.com
The U.S. government airlifted the equivalent of $400 million to Iran this past January, which occurred as four detained Americans were released by Tehran, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday.The cash transfer was the first installment paid in a $1.7 billion settlement the Obama administration reached with Iran to resolve a failed 1979 arms deal dating from just before the Iranian Revolution.State Department spokesman John Kirby denied the cash transfer was done to secure the release of the four Americans -- Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian; Amir Hekmati, a former U.S. Marine; Christian pastor Saeed Abedini and Nosratollah Khosravi-Roodsari, whose case had not been publicized before the release."The negotiations over the [arms deal] settlement ... were completely separate from the discussions about returning our American citizens home," Kirby said in a statement. "Not only were the two negotiations separate, they were conducted by different teams on each side.""The funds that were transferred to Iran were related solely to the settlement of a long-standing claim at the U.S.-Iran Claims Tribunal at The Hague," Kirby's statement concluded.However, the Journal says U.S. officials acknowledge that Iranian negotiators on the prisoner exchange said they wanted the cash to show they had gained something tangible.The Journal also reported that President Barack Obama did not disclose the $400 million cash payment when he announced Jan. 17 that the arms deal dispute had been resolved. The administration has not disclosed how the $1.7 billion was paid, except to say it was not paid in dollars.The cash flown to Iran consisted of euros, Swiss francs, and other currencies because U.S. law forbids transacting American dollars with Iran. Since the cash was airlifted, Iran's Revolutionary Guard has arrested two more Iranian-Americans. Tehran has also detained dual-nationals from France, Canada and the U.K. in recent months."Paying ransom to kidnappers puts Americans even more at risk," Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., said ina statement. "While Americans were relieved by Iran’s overdue release of illegally imprisoned American hostages, the White House’s policy of appeasement has led Iran to illegally seize more American hostages."
Kerry defends $400 million payment to Iran, says U.S. pays no ransoms-[Reuters]-By Gram Slattery-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Thursday defended the Obama administration's payment of $400 million in cash to Iran, denying it was a ransom for the release of American prisoners by Tehran or tied to the Iran nuclear deal."The United States does not pay ransoms," Kerry told a news conference in the Argentine capital Buenos Aires.He said the transfer, which came out of a long-standing Iranian claim at the Iran-United States Claims Tribunal in The Hague, was negotiated on a separate track from the nuclear deal.By settling the claim, it saved U.S. taxpayers potentially billions of dollars in further interest payments, Kerry added."We believe this agreement for the $400 million that was paid in interest and settlement of the case actually saved the American taxpayer potentially billions of dollars," Kerry said."There was no benefit to the United States of America to drag this out," he said. "It would have worked against the interests of our taxpayers and with the nuclear deal done, the prisoners released, the time was right to take advantage of that and resolve the dispute in the way that it was resolved."As the U.S. presidential campaign heats up, Republicans, including Donald Trump, have attacked the Obama administration over the payment, questioning the timing of the transfer.The White House announced on Jan. 17, a day after the prisoner exchange, it was releasing $400 million in funds frozen since 1981, plus $1.3 billion in interest owed to Iran. The remaining interest has since been fully paid from the U.S. Treasury-administered Judgment Fund, according to a U.S. official.The funds were part of a trust fund Iran used before its 1979 Islamic Revolution to buy U.S. military equipment that was tied up for decades in litigation at the tribunal.On Wednesday, Representative Jason Chaffetz, chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, asked Kerry to appear at a future committee hearing to discuss the payment.The State Department confirmed it had received the request and would respond "as appropriate."(Reporting by Gram Slatery; Writing by Lesley Wroughton; Editing by Alden Bentley and Richard Chang)
Gang rape videos on sale in India amid rise in violent crimes against women-[Reuters]-By Rina Chandran-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
MUMBAI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Graphic mobile phone clips of gang rapes are being sold in shops in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, as a spate of rapes in one of the country's most violent states has sparked anger and calls for the chief minister to step down.The clips, which last 30 seconds to five minutes, are being sold in the "hundreds, perhaps thousands, every day", the Times of India reported. They cost 50-150 rupees ($0.75-$2) each."We are aware. We are taking necessary action. But it is difficult, as the sales are happening below the counter," Ajay Sharma, a deputy inspector general of police in the city of Agra, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.In recent weeks, several gang rapes have been reported in Uttar Pradesh, which ranks among the most unsafe for women.Last week, a woman and her 14-year-old daughter were dragged from their vehicle at gunpoint on a major highway and gang-raped for hours in nearby fields. Local media reported that initially the police did not respond to a call for help.The daily Indian Express reported that this week another woman was gang-raped in Uttar Pradesh, and said the incident had been recorded on a mobile phone.Increasingly, perpetrators are recording their crimes on mobile phones to use as a blackmailing tool and to dissuade victims from going to the police, the Times of India said.Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has come under fire over the rise in violent crimes against women, with #LawlessUP trending on Twitter this week.In 2014, there were 337,922 reports of violence against women including rape, molestation and abduction, a 9 percent increase on the previous year, according to official data.Rape victims in India suffer enormous stigma and endure an archaic and insensitive criminal justice system, women's rights activists say.During lengthy trials, victims and their witnesses are sometimes intimidated by the accused who, in some cases, are granted bail by the court.A wave of public protests following the fatal gang-rape of a woman on a Delhi bus in December 2012 prompted the government to enact stiffer penalties, including the death sentence for repeat rape offenders and the criminalisation of stalking.($1 = 66.854 Indian rupees)-(Reporting by Rina Chandran @rinachandran, Editing by Jo Griffin. Please credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters, that covers humanitarian news, women's rights, trafficking, corruption and climate change. Visit news.trust.org to see more stories.)
South Carolina church shooting suspect attacked in jail-[Reuters]-By Harriet McLeod-August 4, 2016-yahoonews
CHARLESTON, S.C. (Reuters) - The gunman accused of killing nine black parishioners at a Charleston, South Carolina, church last year was attacked in jail by another inmate early Thursday but not badly injured, a local sheriff's spokesman said.Dylann Roof, 22, was outside of his cell at the North Charleston jail where he is detained when the assault occurred, Charleston County Sheriff's Major Eric Watson said in a phone interview. A detention officer broke up the fight, Watson said.Roof was examined by in-house medical staff after the brief physical altercation at the Sheriff Al Cannon Detention Center and had no immediately apparent injuries, Watson said.The other inmate, who was not named, will face assault charges, the major said, adding no weapons were involved in the fight.Roof "did not provoke what happened," Watson said.A news conference about the incident was planned for 1:30 p.m. ET.Roof is facing the death penalty in both federal and state court, where prosecutors charged him with dozens of offenses including murder. The deadly attack occurred during a Bible study session at Charleston's historic Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church on June 17, 2015.Court records filed by prosecutors in federal court last month said Roof used eight Glock handgun magazines and fired about 80 rounds during the massacre. The records alleged that Roof plotted the attack for months, calling the church from his home and paying a web hosting company where he posted a manifesto online as early as February 2015.(Reporting by Harriet McLeod; Writing by Colleen Jenkins; Editing by David Gregorio)
Police: London stabbings that killed US woman not terrorism-[The Canadian Press]-august 4, 2016-yahoonews
LONDON — A Norwegian-Somali teenager went on a knife rampage through London's Russell Square, a hub for students and tourists, fatally stabbing an American woman and injuring five other people.Police said Thursday that it wasn't terrorism — but in a city on edge after a summer of attacks elsewhere in Europe, both authorities and London residents initially responded as if it were. Police flooded the streets with extra officers and mobilized counterterror detectives before saying the shocking burst of violence appeared to have been "triggered by mental-health issues."Police officers used a stun gun to subdue the 19-year-old suspect at the scene of the stabbings late Wednesday, among busy streets lined with hotels close to the British Museum."Terror in London" ran the headline in the Mail Online, one of several media outlets to speculate that the attack was an act of terrorism. Police initially said terrorism was "one line of inquiry being explored."But hours later Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner Mark Rowley said "we have found no evidence of radicalization or anything that would suggest the man in our custody was in any way motivated by terrorism."He said detectives from the force's murder and terrorism squads had interviewed the suspect, his family and witnesses and searched properties."We believe this was a spontaneous attack and the victims were selected at random," Rowley said.London Mayor Sadiq Khan said "there is no evidence at all that this man was motivated by Daesh" — another name for the Islamic State group — or similar organizations.Rowley said the suspect, whose name hasn't been released, is a Norwegian of Somali ancestry — though police don't consider that "relevant to the motivation for his actions." Norway's National Criminal Investigation Service said he had left the Scandinavian country in 2002, when he was a small child.The name of the dead woman, thought to be in her 60s, hasn't been released. U.S. Ambassador Matthew Barzun confirmed she was American, tweeting: "Heartbreaking news that a U.S. citizen was killed in #RussellSquare attack. My prayers are with all the victims and their loved ones."Two Australians, an Israeli, an American and a British citizen were wounded, none with life-threatening injuries.While knife crime is a regular occurrence in London — there have been two other blade killings this week — the scale and randomness of the rampage rattled nerves. It came just days after authorities warned the British public to be vigilant in light of attacks inspired by the Islamic State group elsewhere in Europe.Student Megan Sharrock, 18, looked out her window and saw someone lying on the sidewalk under a blanket."There was like two rivers of blood running away from the person so we thought, yeah, someone has been killed," she said."It's really shocking, (a) scary world we live in to think that could happen," she said. "That could happen to anyone, just walking down the street."Helen Edwards, 33, who lives in the area, came out for a walk and found it thronging with armed police near. In a city with vivid memories of the deadly July 7, 2005, bomb attacks on public transport — two of which struck near Russell Square — she immediately suspected that an attack had occurred."There is always that thing in the back of your mind," she said. "You live with that threat of terrorism or other crimes in the back of your mind. It wasn't a huge shock I guess."The response to the attack is complicated by the frequent overlap between terrorism and mental illness. Many "lone wolf" attackers have a history of mental-health problems, including a Syrian who blew himself up in the German town of Ansbach last month and a Somali man who was sentenced to life this week for trying to behead a London Underground passenger.Emily Corner, a researcher at University College London who studies the links between mental illness and terrorism, said every incident of major violence now sparks the same debate: "Are they a terrorist or are they mentally ill?" In some cases, the answer is both, though Corner stresses that most terrorist attackers are not mentally ill, and most people with mental illness are not violent.The Russell Square attack came within hours of an announcement by London police that they were putting more armed officers on the streets to bolster public confidence in the wake of recent attacks in Europe.Most British police don't carry guns, a principle that remains unchanged. Even with the additional armed officers, the vast majority of London's 31,000 police officers won't be armed.Armed officers responded to Wednesday's stabbings, but didn't fire any shots.Rowley said "we should be proud of them and the British tradition of using the minimum necessary force."Police have urged Britons to be vigilant after attacks this year in France, Belgium and Germany, several committed by people who professed allegiance to the Islamic State group.In the last three years London has seen two knife attacks by people inspired by radical Islam. In May 2013, two al-Qaida-inspired London men killed off-duty soldier Lee Rigby in the street near his barracks. In January, mentally ill Muhiddin Mire tried to behead a London Underground passenger, shouting that he was doing it "for Syria."Knives are the most common murder weapon in Britain, which has strict gun-control laws. There were 186 knife killings in the year to March 2015, according to government statistics — a third of all murders.___Associated Press journalists Jonathan Shenfield in London, and Jan M. Olsen in Copenhagen, Denmark, contributed to this story.Jill Lawlesss And Danica Kirka, The Associated Press
Dozens of dead caribou found on remote Nunavut island-[CBC]-August 3, 2016-YAHOONEWS
Nunavut's Department of Environment is trying to find out what happened to dozens of dead Baffin caribou found on an uninhabited island in the Arctic.The carcasses of 47 caribou were spotted in July on Prince Charles Island by a research scientist with Environment and Climate Change Canada.The find comes a year and a half after the Nunavut government imposed an emergency caribou hunting ban on Baffin Island — and including Prince Charles Island — after finding their numbers had plummeted. In 2015, the first-ever Baffin Island caribou quota of 250 animals per year was imposed. Paul Smith studies Arctic birds and was flying around the island in a Twin Otter airplane scouting locations to build a research station.From the airplane, Smith saw unusual white shapes on the tundra."And as we came in on the final approach to land on this sandbar, I noticed that they were actually carcasses of caribou," Smith said."It was sort of an apocalyptic scene. There's carcasses of caribou, literally dozens of them on either side of this ridge as you land the airplane. It's not a really comforting sight to be surrounded by dead wildlife as you're stepping out of the airplane."Smith, along with Nunavut's Department of Environment, collected samples."Investigations into the cause and extent of the die-off and health of the deceased caribou is ongoing," reads a statement from a department spokesperson.-Caribou 'stronghold'-One of the reasons Smith chose Prince Charles Island to build a research station was because of its abundance of wildlife.An aerial survey by the territorial government in the winter of 2014 estimated a third of all Baffin caribou were found on Prince Charles Island.The survey estimated there were between 3,462 to 6,250 caribou, down from an estimated 100,000 from 1985."To come there and find all of these dead caribou suggesting this large die-off is troubling," said Smith, noting that he also saw 11 live caribou on the island."This is supposed to be the stronghold of this herd."
Bold wolf prompts tent camping ban in Banff National Park-[CBC]-August 3, 2016-YAHOONEWS
More than 200 campers staying in tents had to be relocated from Two Jack Main and Lakeside campgrounds in Banff National Park due to the bold behaviour of a wolf.A female yearling wolf from the Bow Valley pack has been entering campgrounds looking for food over the last several days and nights, said Greg Danchuk, manager of visitor experience for Banff National Park."She's moving from campsite to campsite, sniffing at and pawing at fire pits, under tables, anything that she can come to," he said. "Even Rubbermaid bins people might have something in, which could be food that is not supposed to be left out. When our wildlife experts are trying to adversely condition her, she doesn't seem to be very fazed by that, chalk balls and noise and these kinds of things."Danchuk said officials will continue to monitor the wolf's behaviour.-Campgrounds full-With most campgrounds full during the summer season, finding places to put people was difficult, said Danchuk."We've put people onto the ring road at Tunnel Mountain Campground, there's the group camping at Johnston Creek Canyon and other locations," he said."We've filled every available site we possibly could within the park."Failing to keep a campsite clean can result in a fine of up to $25,000.The Banff area is currently full for camping and officials are asking walk-up campers to go to Lake Louise, Yoho or Kootenay National Parks.All wolf sightings should be reported to Banff Dispatch at 403-762-1470.
AP Exclusive: North Korea hopes to plant flag on the moon-[The Canadian Press]-August 4, 2016-YAHOONEWS
PYONGYANG, Korea, Democratic People's Republic Of — North Korean space officials are hard at work on a five-year plan to put more advanced satellites into orbit by 2020, and don't intend to stop there: They're also aiming for the moon, and beyond.In an interview with The Associated Press, a senior official at North Korea's version of NASA said international sanctions won't stop the country from launching more satellites by 2020, and that he hopes to see the North Korean flag on the moon within the next 10 years."Even though the U.S. and its allies try to block our space development, our aerospace scientists will conquer space and definitely plant the flag of the DPRK on the moon," said Hyon Kwang Il, director of the scientific research department of North Korea's National Aerospace Development Administration.North Korea's official name is the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.An unmanned, no-frills North Korean moon mission in the not-too-distant future isn't as far-fetched as it might seem. Outside experts say it's ambitious, but conceivable. While the U.S. is the only country to have conducted manned lunar missions, other nations have sent unmanned spacecraft there and have in that sense planted their flags."It would be a significant increase in technology, not one that is beyond them, but you have to debug each bit," Jonathan McDowell, an astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics who maintains an exhaustive blog on international satellites and satellite launches, said in an email to the AP.Hyon said the current five-year plan, at the order of leader Kim Jong Un, focuses on launching more Earth observation satellites and what would be its first geostationary communications satellite — which, technologically, would be a major step forward. He said universities are also expanding programs to train rocket scientists."We are planning to develop the Earth observation satellites and to solve communications problems by developing geostationary satellites. All of this work will be the basis for the flight to the moon," Hyon said on July 28, adding that he personally would like to see that happen "within 10 years' time."North Korea has marked a number of successes in its space program — and, of course, in its development of ever-more-sophisticated long-range missiles for military use. On Wednesday, it test-fired what was believed to be a medium-range ballistic missile into the seas off Japan, the fourth reported weapons launch it has carried out in about two weeks.It launched its latest satellite — the Kwangmyongsong 4, or Brilliant Star 4 — into orbit on Feb. 7, just one month after conducting what it claims was its first H-bomb test.That brought new sanctions because nuclear tests and rocket launches, which can have military applications, are banned under United Nations resolutions.Hyon said the sanctions are "ridiculous.""Our country has started to accomplish our plan and we have started to gain a lot of successes," he said. "No matter what anyone thinks, our country will launch more satellites."He said North Korea's long-term target is to use its satellites to provide data for crop and forestry assessments and improved communications. It also intends "to do manned spaceflight and scientific experiments in space, make a flight to the moon and moon exploration and also exploration to other planets."The U.S. made its first lunar flyby in 1959, only six months after its first satellite, Explorer 1, though it took eight more years and several failed attempts to succeed with a lunar orbiter. The USSR made its first moon shot after only three successful Sputnik satellites. Its probe — just a year and a half after Sputnik 1 — reached the moon, but missed its orbit."So it's not ridiculous to attempt a moon mission early in your space program," McDowell said."Given their low flight rate of one mission every few years, I think it is hard to see them succeeding in this in the next five years, but possible to see them attempting it," he said.North Korea currently has two satellites in orbit, KMS-3-2 and KMS-4. It put its first satellite in orbit in 2012, a feat few other countries have achieved. Rival South Korea, for example, has yet to do so.Hyon said that as of July 27, KMS-4 had completed 2,513 orbits, and that within one day after its launch it transmitted 700 photographic images back to Earth. He said it is still working properly and sending data whenever it passes over North Korea, which is four times a day.Foreign experts have yet to confirm any communications from the satellite."There's been no independent evidence that KMS-4 sent data back, but no evidence that it didn't, either," McDowell said.German analyst Markus Schiller, one of the world's foremost experts on North Korea's missiles and rockets, said a geostationary satellite might be a more ambitious goal for the country than a lunar flyby or crash-landing."Hitting the moon hard would require less performance — power, rocket size — than getting into GEO (geostationary equatorial orbit), but it will still be quite a challenge," he said in an email from Munich, where he is based."Judging from what I have seen so far with their space program, it will take North Korea about a decade or more to get to lunar orbit at best — if they really pursue this mission," he said. "My personal guess, however, is that they might try but they will fail, and we will not see a successful North Korea lunar orbiter for at least two decades, if ever."Hyon said claims that North Korea's space plan is a military program in disguise are hypocritical, considering the history of space exploration. The U.S., Russia and China all built their space programs out of military technology. Many of the rockets they use today were initially developed as ICBMs."It is the U.S. that militarized space," he said.He said the North Korean military has already succeeded in developing long-range missiles that can reach anywhere on Earth, "especially to American territory," and so "there is no need for our state to use the space program for ballistic missile development."That argument isn't likely to sway sanctions advocates in Washington or Seoul. But Schiller said the claim is plausible, given the advances in weaponry North Korea has displayed through its overtly military missile tests and the specific designs of the Unha rockets that are used to launch its satellites."I agree they (the military) will not learn any essential new things from launching another Unha rocket," he said. "Of course, there are lessons learned that you can also apply for the missile program. But the whole missile program shows so many different characteristics that they seem to be separated to a certain degree."Eric Talmadge, The Associated Press.
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