"We stand in grief with the families and loved ones of these extraordinary 'Dogface Soldiers' during this unimaginable time."
"But
the search isn't finished until everyone is home. Words cannot express
our gratitude to those still working around the clock during these
extensive search and recovery efforts and your unwavering commitment
not to rest until all are found."
"This past week has been devastating. Though we
have received some closure, the world is darker without them."
“This loss is simply devastating. We are wrapping our arms around the families and
loved ones of our Soldiers [during this difficult time]."
Commander Maj.-Gen. Christopher Norrie, 3rd Infantry Division
"It has been truly amazing and very humbling to watch the incredible
recovery team from different commands, countries and continents come
together and give everything to recover our Soldiers."
"Thank you, Lithuania, Poland, Estonia, the U.S. Navy and the Army Corps
of Engineers."
"We are forever grateful."
Lt. Gen. Charles
Costanza, commanding general, V Corps
Military
personnel work at the site of a rescue operation for missing US soldiers
at Pabrade training ground, in Lithuania, on March 28. Petras Malukas/AFP/Getty Images
"Lithuania mourns together with the American nation."
"Please accept my
heartfelt condolences, as well as those of the Lithuanian people, to
you, the loved ones of those who lost their lives, and all the people of
the United States of America. "
"During this difficult time, our thoughts
and prayers are with you."
Lithuanian President Gitanas Nausėda
Under
NATO, to give reassurance to Eastern Europe, member-countries of the
military alliance were assigned to establish a Rapid Reaction Force as a
deterrent and a defence against Russian designs on its neighbours. With
a very real and demonstrated willingness to invade the borders of
neighbouring nations, the Russian Federation's ambitions of territorial
aggression and expansion gave birth to a renewed move by NATO to offer
protection to its members under duress of potential invasion.
Among
other member-nations the United States established a unit in Lithuania.
On March 25, an American armoured vehicle with four U.S. soldiers
aboard went astray in a marshy peat bog located at the huge General
Silvestras Zukauskas training ground nearby the town of Pabrade. A
search was undertaken and the location of the missing vehicle was found,
though no vehicle was in sight. The almost-70-ton behemoth had sunk
straight down, along with its personnel.
The U.S. Army search for four soldiers who went missing during a scheduled training exercise near Pabradė, Lithuania. U.S. Army
It
took six days in a massive effort by American, Polish and Lithuanian
armed forces to locate and dig the M88 Hercules vehicle out of the peat
bog. The search was widened when three of the missing men of the 1st
Armoured Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division were found dead, and
a fourth body of the missing soldiers evaded the search teams. On a
tactical training exercise, the soldiers were reported, along with their
vehicle to be missing early on Tuesday.
The
thick forests and swampy terrain around Pabrade, some ten kilometres
west of the border with Belarus saw hundreds of Lithuanian and American
soldiers and other rescuers searching, engaged in a rescue mission. On
Wednesday the armoured vehicle's whereabouts was finally discovered,
submerged in 4-1/2 metres of swamp water.
Military
helicopters, fixed-wing aircraft, unmanned aerial systems and search
and rescue personnel were provided by the Lithuanian armed forces.
Excavators, sluice and slurry pumps were brought to the site, along with
other heavy construction equipment along with technical experts and
several hundred tons of gravel and earth, all to help with the recovery
mission.
American navy divers manoeuvred through thick layers of mud, clay and sediment "with zero visibility" to
finally reach the 63-ton vehicle on Sunday evening. There they
established several points where steel cables could be attached to
enable the work involved in lifting the vehicle. During the effort of
dragging the vehicle out of its submerged position, they began to lose
traction, requiring more heavy dozers to provide additional grip. Two
hours later the vehicle was pulled free of its ghastly grave.
Sgt.
Edvin F. Franco, 25, of Glendale, California, Sgt. Jose Duenez, Jr.,
25, of Joliet, Illinois and Pfc. Dante D. Taitano, 21, of Dededo, Guam. U.S. Army
The
navy dive team's work was not over. They then turned to searching the
area with the use of radar for the presence of the still-missing fourth
soldier. And his body was ultimately found, to join that of his other
three comrades, to be returned to the United States and to their
families, for burial.
An
undated photo of Staff Sgt. Troy S. Knutson-Collins, 28, of Battle
Creek, Michigan, who died in a training mission in Lithuania. U.S. Army
"I can’t say enough about the support our Lithuanian Allies have
provided us. We have leaned on them, and they, alongside our Polish and
Estonian Allies — and our own Sailors, Airmen and experts from the Corps
of Engineers — have enabled us to find and bring home our Soldiers."
"This is a tragic event, but it
reinforces what it means to have Allies and friends."
Gen. Christopher Donahue, commander of U.S. Army Europe and Africa
"As
a Sukhoi Su-34 air force plane was flying over the city of Belgorod,
there was an accidental discharge of aviation ammunition."
Russian Defence Ministry
"The residents of Belgorod were faced with tough ordeals last night."
"Together, I think we will go through them."
"[Sappers examining the site of Thursday’s blast found and decided to
detonate an] explosive object [that was] in the immediate
vicinity of residential buildings."
"The bomb was removed from the residential area. Residents are being delivered back to their homes."
Governor of Belgorod province, Vyacheslav Gladkov
Damage after an explosion in the city in Belgorod, Russia, on Wednesday.Russian Mayor Valentin Demidov via Telegram / AFP via Getty Images
A
Russian city located fairly close to Russia's border with Ukraine had a
sudden surprise on Thursday evening when a bomb fell close to the city
centre. The first impression was that this was an attack by Ukrainian
forces, but it was not. In the annals of modern warfare such incidents
are now identified as 'friendly fire', the inadvertent attacks that take
place against one's own; in this instance a Russian supersonic warplane
dropped not one, but two bombs on a Russian city, mistaking it for a
Ukrainian city.
The training of Russian pilots may be missing some
critical points in observance and performance techniques. Three people
were injured, and the town now has a massive crater in what was an
ordinary-enough street. Piles of twisted metal and great chunks of
concrete scattered on the street can be seen from a video shot at the
scene. There were a number of damaged cars and nearby apartment
buildings suffered blasted windows and destroyed walls.
The blast
was sufficiently strong to flip a car skyward, landing it on a nearby
shop roof. In total 17 buildings suffered damages, while residents of a
nearby apartment block were evacuated until such time that damages can
be assessed and repairs undertaken. Some Russian war bloggers were
convinced this was a Ukraine military attack, urging the Russian
military to strike back, harder.
Antiwar Russian civilians on the
other hand, took to social media to classify the incident as an example
of a meme reflecting the Kremlin's tendency to oppose or attempt
harming the West with measures that invariably wind up harming its own
citizens instead.
Russian ground staff load a Sukhoi Su-34
fighter-bomber with weapons at the Hmeymim air base near Latakia, Syria,
in a handout photo released by Russia's Defense Ministry.
REUTERS/Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation/Handout
"The
FAB [glide bomb] exploded as normal; the fuse was set on delay, so
apparently the target was something underground: bunkers, cellars,
workshops and the like. Belgorod got lucky today", wrote a prominent Russian military blogger on the Telegram messaging
app, so popular with Russians. He was referring to a UMPK FAB-500M62
glide bomb whose wings failed to initiate, though it was not clear what
type of weapon had exploded in Belgorod.
"It
would all have been fine except for the chosen flight path over the
city, which at night glows like a huge lantern and it's impossible not
to see it", commented the blogger. "You can't make mistakes like that. This should never ever happen again."
Ukraine
had warned earlier in the month that Russia has brought guided bombs
into its arsenal, like the modified FAB-500 bomb. A type of bomb it has
used to target Ukrainian defences in Avdlivka in the Donetsk region. The
FAB-500 is a 500-kiilogram Soviet-made general-purpose bomb with a
highly explosive warhead.
A
frame grab taken from video released by Russia's Defense Ministry shows a Russian Su-34 fighter-bomber dropping a bomb in
the air over Syria.REUTERS/Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation/Handout
Recently,the Russian military has been using these bombs "from a distance that is unreachable for Ukrainian air defence",
pointed out Yurii Ihnat, spokesman for the Ukrainian air force. Russia,
he added, may be increasing production of these bombs, outfitting them
with wings and GPS navigation. Only recently has Russia adopted this
method of turning simple bombs into guided ones and speculation is that
this is Moscow's way of replenishing its depleted stockpiles of cruise
and ballistic missiles with relatively cheap and effective weapons.
"More
often, the enemy uses guided air bombs weighing 500 kg along the entire
front line. There are signs of preparation for the mass use of 1,500 kg
KABs."
"The
planes of the Russians do not enter the zone of damage of our air
defence, striking remotely at the front line and near-frontline cities", explained Mykola Oleschuk, commander of the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
Since
Russia invaded Ukraine over a year ago, the Belgorod region, its
capital city a few miles from the Ukrainian border, has served as one of
the key staging grounds for Russian troops. The drama of Thursday
night's accidental bombing in Belgorod came to a conclusion on Saturday,
when another explosive device was found at the site where the first one
exploded, resulting in seventeen apartment buildings being evacuated.
This
handout photo posted to the Telegram channel of Belgorod region
governor Vyacheslav Gladkov shows damaged apartments building near the
crater after an explosion in Belgorod, Russia, April 21, 2023, caused by
a Russian Su-34 warplane accidentally discharging ammunition over the
city.
Telegram/Vyacheslav Gladkov/AP
"She has to tell me how she did it because she’s gotta be our new
training officer for high angle, because it’s impressive. It was hard
enough for me to go up with ropes and the harnesses, and she
free-climbed that. It’s incredible." "Yeah, I was voluntold -- ‘You’re going up. I’ve been on (the job) 22 years, so I do a lot of rope work with trees
and so, yeah, I’m a bit of a monkey."
"She said, 'I just want to get down'. She was great. She was a brave girl, she helped me when I got there."
"You don’t want to bring up why they’re there. Let’s make light of it, talk about the view. It was
beautiful. We both wished we had cameras." "I have a tree job to do tomorrow and it’s not going to be nearly as high as that. It’s gonna be like climbing a bush, right?" Toronto firefighter Rob Wonfor
A woman is
rescued from a downtown Toronto crane early Wednesday, April 26, 2017.
Some streets in the downtown core were closed as dozens of construction
workers and commuters gazed skyward to watch police and firefighters try
to rescue a woman who got stuck atop a tall construction crane during
the night. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn
An old childhood friend of 23-year-old Marisa Lazo who evidently on a whim startled Toronto by climbing up a construction crane on Wednesday morning, to jauntily seat herself above a construction pit with rebar waiting below to impale anyone who had the great misfortune to fall, before Toronto firefighter Rob Wonfor rescued the woman, explained she was 'normal', she just enjoyed climbing. Speaking after the successful rescue, the firefighter had nothing but admiration for the young woman's calm demeanor, let alone the strength, agility and skill that allowed her to make that climb.
The young woman had been dressed for the street, in heeled black boots, no climbing gear, no gloves to protect her hands, just tight jeans and a denim jean jacket. It was theorized, before she had been closely questioned, that she had climbed the 50 metres to gain the top of the crane, where she slid down 14 metres on a greasy cable that led to the crane's hook. Across that hook was a bit of a plank and Marisa Lazo must have thought the plank would make a fine resting place. It's where she perched herself, awaiting notice.
If public notice for her stunt was her aim, she wasn't disappointed. Rush-hour traffic was snarled in the downtown and onlookers crowded below to watch in disbelief the drama that unfolding above. All together, she spent three hours perched on that bit of wood over the hook of the construction crane. And when firefighter Wonfor managed to reach her, she calmed him down by her quiet voice and calm exterior. He tried to be casual, not to focus on their shared existential dilemma. So he shouted out to her from the crane to where she sat on the wires-hung hook that he had a hockey game at 8:15 a.m. Tyler Anderson/NP
His plan was to climb to the top of the crane, and from there rappel down to where she sat. He had a harness with him which he planned to outfit her with. And when that was all set they would both be lowered mechanically to ground level. "It might be a bit longer", for the process to be completed, he informed her. "Did it take you this long? Because if you have any speed tips, I'll take them right now", he said to her. When he did reach her, he quickly determined she wasn't suicidal: "there was no way" she planned to jump, he concluded. "She was too calm."
What she imparted to him was her concern that she was in for legal trouble. "I'm gonna get a big fine for this". In fact, once they were down on terra firma she was arrested, charged with public mischief and taken off to hospital for a physical examination. Before that, when he had reached the young woman on her metre-long plank over the hook, she helped him to outfit her into the rescue harness. "She had some experience (with climbing gear)", he later observed.
Once that was done, rescuer and rescuee hugged one another while the crew in the construction crane's operation booth lowered them to ground level gradually. That was 8:30 a.m. And the firefighter missed his hockey game, but hurried on to be in time for the next one, he was anxious to play in. This fellow is super-charged, at age 52. A serendipitous match for the strength and endurance of the woman he rescued, facing six counts of mischief.
A woman is rescued from a downtown Toronto construction crane on Wednesday, April 26,2017...Frank Gunn/The Canadian Press
"A problem in Brazil is that there is no control of how many people are admitted in a building. They never are clearly stated, and nobody controls how many people enter these night clubs." Joao Daniel Nunes, civil engineer, Porto Alegre
In this photo released by Agencia Brasil, people gather outside the Kiss
nightclub as firefighters respond to a fire inside the club in Santa
Maria, Brazil, Sunday, Jan. 27, 2013. A fast-moving fire roared through
the crowded, windowless Kiss nightclub in this southern Brazilian city
early Sunday, killing more than 230 people. Many of the victims were
under 20 years old, including some minors. (AP Photo/Deivid Dutra,
Agencia Brasil)
The mayor of the city where the Kiss nightclub fire took 231 young lives informed Radio Gaucha that he, Jose Fortunati, knew of dozens of night spots that had been closed in the last year alone for their failure to meet norms. "At that time, we had lots of protest from those who frequented them, but I think that today people understand it better and that at times hard stands must be taken so that steps are taken to not put people's lives at risk."
Boastfully claiming that as mayor he has seen to it that clubs failing to respect safety and security guidelines are closed down, despite protests from those who frequent them, does not quite jive with the dreadful occurrence of a fire consuming a nightclub that had a single entrance and exit, no working fire extinguishers, no ceiling-mounted extinguishers nor fire alarms. Clearly, due diligence with regular inspections do not take place.
It has been reported that the establishment was not even in possession of a legal license to sell alcohol. Yet the sale of alcohol spells the financial success of the business. And the sale of alcohol among the two thousand young people - university students from the university town that Santa Maria represents - was responsible for personnel employed at the nightclub forcefully detaining young people desperate to escape the inferno, for not having paid their bar bills.
Why would it, to begin with, be legal for a band to use pyrotechnics within a confined area? Why was it possible that two thousand young people were crammed into this night spot? It is a proven formula for disaster. Other similar venues in other countries of the world have experienced their own tragic losses brought about by the use of fireworks to enliven live band performances, creating tragedies in the process.
Police Inspector Ranolfo Vieira Junior reported the arrest of four persons of interest one of whom the Brazilian newspaper Zero Hors has identified as Elissandro Sphor, a co-owner of the club, along with another co-owner. One of whom verified that the club's operating license had not been legally renewed.
There are over one hundred people still in hospital being treated for smoke inhalation, some of them in critical condition.The death toll, warns the national health minister, may yet rise dramatically, since 75 of those injured were in such critical condition they may not recover.
Creatures not in their very own natural habitat usually as a result have no natural enemies. All other things being equal, if those creatures find themselves in an atmosphere/environment that does not threaten their existence, they will thrive. They will discover what they can consume, and they will compete with the other creatures whose habitat the new environment is, for available food.
Sometimes the new creatures are of a size and voracious appetite as to triumph over native species in food choices; the more aggressive, the more adaptable, the more ravenous and insatiable the creature is, the more chances it will succeed in successfully challenging the life and life-cycle of native species. The native species may find themselves too challenged and begin an agonizing decline.
And the foreign invaders thrive at the expense of the native species. Amazingly, the Florida Everglades, a large swampy area, as a region of subtropical wetlands in the southern portion of the State of Florida comprises the southern half of a large watershed. It is home to a large number of native creatures from alligators to waterbirds. And snakes. Native species of snakes.
Everglades
However, it is the large exotic, non-native species that constitute a problem. And the problem is huge. Florida has become home to more exotic species of amphibians and reptiles than any other such area existing on the Globe. And most of them have been illegally introduced to the Everglades. Like the Burmese pythons. Whose enormous size and appetite introduce utter havoc to nature's order.
J Pat Carter/AP TV crews capture Capt. Jeff Fobb of the Miami-Dade Fire Rescue's Venom
Response Unit as he holds a python during the kick-off ceremonies
Saturday for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission's
month-long 'Python Challenge.'
In a desperate attempt to rid themselves of the presence of these serpents disrupting the environment, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and the state are offering cash prizes to those who capture the longest python, as well as those who collect the greatest numbers of pythons, in a "Python Challenge" competition that ends at midnight on February 10.
Sad for the pythons whose fault it is not that they have invaded a geography not their own. But the infestation is intolerably inimical to the natural structure of the Everglades and the native creatures that nature intended to inhabit it.
"The referendum is not the end game. It is only a battle in this long struggle for the future of Egypt. We will not allow a change to the identify of Egypt or the return of the age of tyranny." National Salvation Front
While the opposition battles the nascent government of Egypt, the country becomes mired ever deeper in economic collapse. The original reason behind the protests that began in Tahrir Square was to protest for relief from wide unemployment, from food scarcity and expense, from rising fuel prices, from the brutality of the police, from lack of opportunities for advancement on a personal level.
Tacked on to that fundamental list of basic needs was the political element of egalitarianism and freedom usually attached to democracy brought to the fore and eliciting interest from abroad, by the activities of young leftists, secularists, socialists, and Christians. There was no evidence in their midst of the presence of fundamentalist religious groups like the Muslim Brotherhood, much less the Salafists.
They came later, quietly slipping into the background, encouraging the activist youth, and pledging their assistance in the universal battle against the regime, seen as corrupt, autocratic, unjust. The Egypt that was then has been transformed into a manipulative, autocratic and threatening Islamist administration whose menace in imposing Sharia law and further marginalizing the already disenfranchised threatens the future.
The future is also horribly hampered by the financial situation Egypt now finds itself mired in. Setting aside for the time being the rising crime rate, the lack of security, the plight of Egyptian women and Egyptian Copts, unemployment has risen just as the state coffers have collapsed, and basic necessities of life have become scarcer and more unaffordable.
And in this setting of dysfunction a draft resolution for a new constitution, designed by a majority of Islamists has alarmed a hefty proportion of the population whose brief flirtation with celebration over the downfall of a corrupt, tyrannical regime has been replaced by disbelief over the ascension of a corrupt, tyrannical regime with sturdy religious overtones.
Egypt's finance ministry has revealed a budget deficit of $13 billion representing July to November. The International Monetary Fund has refused a loan to extricate Egypt from its perilous appointment with economic collapse, President Mohammed Morsi is now loathe to impose new taxes on a public already burdened with his administration's inability to begin to lift Egypt out of its financial mess.
The opposition paints the draft constitution as one meant to enshrine Islamist rule and monopolize power in the hands of the Muslim Brotherhood. No surprise there. The rights of women and minority groups are not assured, particularly given the direction that things are moving toward, enabling Muslim clerics to affect legislation.
The judiciary has denounced their new government's actions in attempting to dilute their power to challenge the Islamist-dominated parliament and the panel re-writing the constitution. Removing the prosecutor general, as an unwanted remnant of the old regime has gained the Muslim Brotherhood an antagonist it can ill afford to foster.
The opposition refuses to have any of its members nominated to the Shura Council. Doing so would give legitimacy to an administration it insists has risen to its place of prominence through illegal, corrupt manipulation of the electorate and the electoral process.
Reconciliation seems remote at this juncture, and the future of Egypt looks fairly frail from this complex perspective.
"There
exists in this country, sadly, a callous, corrupt and corrupting shadow
industry that sells and sows violence against its own people through
vicious, violent video games with names like Bullet Storm, Grand Theft
Auto, Mortal Combat and Splatterhouse." Wayne LaPierre, National Rifle Association executive vice-president
Not
surprisingly, anyone listening in on this address on the part of the
National Rifle Association, might have imagined it to be a mea-culpa, an
admission of responsibility -- at least half-way through the
declaration. Since many people consider the National Rifle Association
to be a callous, corrupt and corrupting shadow industry selling and
sowing violence.
The sententious outing of the video
industry is not without merit. But disclaiming any and all
responsibility for the proliferation and sanctification of the gun
culture in America as a reflection of its founding principles is an
exercise in perfidious dishonesty. The American gun fetish has been
groomed and enthusiastically supported by the gun lobby reflecting NRA
values.
That the NRA executive vice-president gave condemnatory voice to the media for having "demonized lawful gun owners" while at the same time it "rewards [mass shooters] with wall-to-wall attention"
is also not without a shadow of truth. Human beings have a deep
fascination with and interest in social malfunctions of this type; they
both horrify and mystify.
His pious declaration of the
moral superiority of the National Rifle Association is somewhat galling
and gagging, but true to form in his assertion that, while: "some have tried to exploit tragedy for political gain, we have remained respectfully silent".
Silent simply because at that juncture, fresh off the horrific events,
it was politically in their best interests to remain respectfully
silent.
"Politicians
pass laws for gun-free school zones. They issue press releases bragging
about them. They post signs advertising them. And, in doing so, they
tell every insane killer in America that schools are the safest place to
inflict maximum mayhem with minimum risk", he
scolded. This, then, is to become the new norm in America, that all
schools at every level of the education system must be in lock-down
mode, patrolled by armed marksmen.
This will represent
the ultimate values in a free democratic society that extolls its
virtues as a caring society prepared to launch itself into peace-keeping
action to ensure that other, less democratic and hugely conflicted
societies do not do huge harm to their civilian populations. "Will you at least admit it's possible that 26 little kids - that 26 innocent lives might have been spared that day?" had an armed guard been in place.
He
cannot even get the numbers right; twenty children, six adults, not
taking into account the mother of the killer and the demented killer
himself. New York's Mayor Michael Bloomberg got it right when he parsed the NRA statement:
"Instead of offering solutions to a problem they have helped create,
they offered a paranoid, dystopian vision of a more dangerous and
violent America where everyone is armed and no place is safe."
AP Photo/M. Spencer Green A rope dangles from a window on the back side of the Metropolitan Correctional Center Tuesday, Dec. 18, 2012, in Chicago.
There is now an advertised $50,000 reward for information leading to the return of two American bank robbers. Skilled escape artists, no less, scaling the walls of a forbidding, smooth-walled federal penitentiary located in Chicago. A high rise no less, built in downtown Chicago. Two convicted bank robbers who made their escape from a facility housing 700 inmates, a skyscraper prison.
They must be fearless of heights. They must be in awfully good physical condition. They appear, from the evidence, to have descended from a narrow window aperture, a bare half-foot wide on the flat south side of the prison. To reach the alley below. They are thought to have used bed sheets as a knotted rope to escape from that window.
A thought: that is some terrific height to rappel down. Where in the world would two inmates be able to gather all those sheets from in their bid for release from prison? The sheets, transformed into a rope, knotted at six-foot intervals was dangling from a window of the Metropolitan Correctional Center about 20 stories above the ground.
That's a long way up, it's a long way down, they would have needed a whole whack of linen to transform into a rope long enough, sturdy enough to take their weight for the prolonged period it would have taken for them to make their way down and to freedom. Crowds gathered after the escape, marvelling in disbelief that anyone could have made such an escape.
The prison is located a block or two from key federal court and office buildings. Very convenient for law enforcement and judicial arraignment. Not so convenient for escape considering the realities of methodology and the incorrigible fact that the prison is located in the heart of a heavily populated city where notice and apprehension might be considered to be of high potential.
Connecticut State Police Lieutenant Paul Vance addresses a press conference on Saturday Photo by EMMANUEL DUNAND/AFP/Getty Images
Initial reports said that Nancy Lanza was a teacher at Sandy Hook
Elementary, where Adam Lanza went on a shooting rampage and killed 20
children and six adults Friday. Now it isn’t clear whether that’s the
case and so far officials have failed to clarify the situation. A former
Newtown school board official told the Wall Street Journal that “no one has heard of her,” adding that “teachers don’t know her.” The Associated Press
reports that at least one parent identified Nancy Lanza as a substitute
teacher at the school but her name isn’t on a staff list and an
official said they have so far been unable to establish a connection
between her and the school.
The two semiautomatic pisols and .223-caliber Bushmaster rifle Lanza
used in the shooting were registered to his mother, whom several
witnesses identified as an avid gun collector. She apparently taught her
kids how to shoot the guns. The owner of a landscaping business who
recently decorated her yard for Christmas tells Reuters
she once showed him a “really nice, high-end rifle” that she purchased.
“She said she would often go target shooting with her kids.”
Meanwhile, authorities failed to release a list of victims Saturday
morning as had been widely expected, although they promised one would be
forthcoming. So far, officials have found “very good evidence in this
investigation that our investigators will be able to use in, hopefully,
painting the complete picture as to how—and more importantly why—this
occurred,” said state police Lt. Paul Vance. He also added that
investigators have determined Lanza forced his way into the school and
was not let inside by anyone.
In a speech following a night of violent protests, Egyptian President
Morsi invited opposition leaders to begin a dialogue on Saturday.
However, he did not give any indication that he is prepared to make
concessions to his opponents.
A
protester holding up his shoe chants slogans against Egyptian President
Mohamed Mursi in front of a barbed wire barricade guarded by a tank,
outside the presidential palace in Cairo Thursday.
REUTERS/Asmaa Waguih
CAIRO
An angry Mohammed Morsi refused Thursday to call off a referendum on a disputed constitution that has sparked Egypt's
worst political crisis in two years, drawing chants of "topple the
regime!" from protesters who waved their shoes in contempt.
The Egyptian president's uncompromising stand came a night after
thousands of his supporters and opponents fought pitched battles outside
his Cairo palace, leaving at least six dead and 700 injured.
Speaking in a nationally televised address, Morsi accused some in the opposition of serving remnants of Hosni Mubarak's authoritarian regime and vowed he would never tolerate anyone working for the overthrow of his "legitimate" government.
That
brought shouts of "the people want to topple the regime!" from the
crowd of 30,000 Morsi opponents — the same chant used in the protests
that brought down Mubarak.
Morsi also invited the opposition to a
"comprehensive and productive" dialogue starting Saturday at his
presidential palace, but gave no sign that he might offer any meaningful
concessions.
The opposition has already refused to
engage Morsi unless he first rescinds decrees giving him nearly
unrestricted powers and shelves the draft constitution hurriedly adopted
by his Islamist allies in a marathon session last week.
Morsi said
the referendum on the disputed charter would go ahead as scheduled on
Dec. 15. He also refused to rescind the Nov. 22 decrees.
Reading
from prepared notes, Morsi frequently broke off to improvise. He wore a
black tie in mourning for the six people killed in Wednesday's clashes.
The
statement Thursday night said that Obama told Morsi that he and other
political leaders in Egypt must make clear to their supporters that
violence is unacceptable. Obama welcomed Morsi's call for a dialogue
with opposition leaders in Egypt but stressed that such a dialogue
should occur without preconditions. The United States also has urged opposition leaders to join in talks without preconditions.
Earlier Thursday, Morsi's troubles grew when another of his
advisers quit to protest his handling of the crisis, raising to seven
the number of those in his 17-person inner circle who have abandoned
him. The only Christian in a group of four presidential assistants has
also quit.
Violence persisted into the night, with a group of protesters attacking the Cairo headquarters of Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood,
ransacking the ground floor. Another group of protesters attacked the
Brotherhood's offices in the Cairo district of Maadi. Outside the
president's house in his hometown of Zagazig, 50 miles north of Cairo,
police fired tear gas to disperse hundreds of protesters, security
officials said.
During his speech, Morsi repeated earlier
assertions that a conspiracy against the state was behind his move to
assume near unrestricted powers, but he did not reveal any details of
the plot.
"It is my duty ... to protect institutions of the
nation," he said. "I will always fulfill this role, no matter how much
pressure or what the situation."
Opposition protesters jeered and raised their shoes in contempt.
"We
have two simple demands: Cancel the decrees and change the draft
constitution. Other than that he can just go away," shouted one
protester, Osama El-Sayyed.
"I have no hope in this man" shouted another as thousands chanted "Erhal! Erhal!" — "Leave! Leave!" in Arabic.
Later,
a photograph of Morsi giving his speech was circulated on social
networking sites alongside one of Mubarak addressing the nation during
the 18-day uprising that toppled his 29-year rule in February 2011. Both
wore black ties and dark suits.
The opposition issued a statement
rejecting Morsi's offer of a dialogue, and spokesman Hussein
Abdel-Ghani dismissed Morsi's address.
"Tonight, he proved that he
is not a president for all Egyptians, but merely the representative of
the Muslim Brotherhood in the presidency," Abdel-Ghani said on state
television.
Earlier Thursday, the Egyptian army and elite
Republican Guard sealed off the presidential palace with tanks and
barbed wire, following the worst night of violence of the two-week
crisis.
Responding to a call to "protect" the presidential palace,
thousands of Brotherhood members and other Islamists descended on the
area Wednesday, beating and chasing away some 300 opposition protesters
who had been staging a peaceful sit-in there. Hours of street battles
followed.
"We raise Egypt's flag but they raise the Brotherhood
flag. This is the difference," Cairo protester Magdi Farag said as he
held the tri-colored national flag stained with blood from his friend's
injury in the clashes.
"Managers told us, 'Nothing happened. The fire alarm had just gone out of order. Go back to work.' But we quickly understood that there was a fire. As we again ran for the exit point we found it locked from outside, and it was too late." Mohammad Ripu, survivor of garment factory fire, Bangladesh
Mr. Ripu leaped from a second-floor window, suffering minor injuries, but managed to save himself. A dozen other desperate workers, attempting to escape the conflagration that swept through the eight-storey building that housed a Tazreen Fashions Ltd. factory that produces fashion wear for such enterprises as Ikea, WalMart, Carrefour were far less fortunate.
Although the fire alarm in the factory rang its warning, it was ignored by the factory managers. An exit door was locked. Fire extinguishers were not in working order. They were there to give a good impression to any inspectors and customers that might pass through the factory. And so, one hundred workers were trapped in the building and incinerated beyond recognition.
And a dozen workers who had thought to save themselves from the flames, leaping from the factory windows into the void, found death in their desperation to survive. The local fire department operations director said investigators suspect a short circuit caused the factory fire. Major Mahbub felt it was not the fire itself but the lack of any safety measures that created the deadly situation. "Had there been at least one emergency exit through outside the factory, the casualties would have been much lower." Bangladesh treated Tuesday as a day of national mourning.
And in Germany's Black Forest region a few days later, a fire consumed a modern, three-storey centre in which was located metalworking, woodworking and electrical installation workshops. The centre was operated by the Catholic Church's Caritas organization. It provided training and employment for disabled people.
One hundred firefighters responded to cope with the blaze that broke out at the complex in Titisee-Neustadt early Monday afternoon. The cause of that fire is not yet known. Fourteen peoople died in the blaze. "The biggerst problem this afternoon was the smoke situation" said a police spokesman. "It will take days to investigate what caused the fire", said another police spokesman. "The fire spread unusually fast", Baden-Wuerttemberg state's fire chief informed the public broadcaster. Two minutes after the automatic fire alert was heard, neighbours called, reporting smoke emitting from the building. The mayor of the town said the centre's buildings are quite new.
In a poverty-stricken, developing third-world country poor working conditions, lack of security and planning responsible for a devastating fire; in an technologically advanced country with all security systems in place another devastating fire.
Plans poorly pursued, plans well laid; man proposes, fortune and fate dispose in futility.
After
years of working for the newspaper of record in the US, you’d think
veteran newsman David Carr would know the difference between a
journalist and a propagandist.
Apparently not, judging by his impassioned defense of journalists “targeted” in last week’s conflict between Israel and Gaza.
Carr attended an event sponsored by the Committee to Protect Journalists last week, which put out a report claiming that a third of the journalists who were killed on the job last year were killed by government actions.
Carr then added a few more names to the list – Palestinians killed during the week of fighting between Israel and Hamas.
On the same day as the Waldorf
event, three employees of news organizations were killed in Gaza by
Israeli missiles. Rather than suggesting it was a mistake, or denying
responsibility, an Israeli Defense Forces spokeswoman, Lt. Col. Avital
Leibovich, told The Associated Press, “The targets are people who have
relevance to terror activity.”
So it has come to this:
killing members of the news media can be justified by a phrase as
amorphous as “relevance to terror activity.”
And who were these “members of the news media” Carr alludes
to? “Mahmoud al-Kumi and Hussam Salama worked as cameramen for Al-Aqsa
TV, which is run by Hamas and whose reporting frequently reflects that
affiliation,” Carr writes.
To refer to Al-Aqsa TV as a “news organization” that
“frequently” reflects the position of Hamas is to dangerously blur the
distinction between legitimate news and intentional disinformation.
Al-Aqsa TV is not a source of legitimate news. It belongs
to Hamas and serves as its mouthpiece. Those who make up the “news team”
are Hamas shills working to advance its terrorist agenda – which
included more than a thousand attacks on Israeli civilians over little
more than a week.
Of course, Carr wasn’t the only one to raise his voice
against Israel’s actions. Human Rights Watch and Reporters Without
Borders objected as well.
Those organizations, of course, have a long history of
knee-jerk condemnations of Israel. But one would have hoped Carr would
know better. After so many years in the news business, you’d think he’d
recognize the difference between a journalist and a phony trying to
exploit what little credibility the field has left to advance a
terrorist aim.
Of course, it’s possible Carr had no idea about the real
aims and operations of Al-Aqsa TV. Either way, he’s contributing to
turning the words “news media” into a meaningless and amorphous phrase.
This represents a general opinion site for its author. It also offers a space for the author to record her experiences and perceptions,both personal and public. This is rendered obvious by the content contained in the blog, but the space is here inviting me to write. And so I do.
