Month: August 2022

MEXICO CITY -- Relatives of some of Mexico’s over 100,000 missing people marched through downtown Mexico City Tuesday to demand authorities find their sons, daughters, parents and siblings. The protesters carried photos of the disappeared hanging from their necks, and chanted “Where are they? Our Children, Where are they?" Many claimed that, rather than investigating the abductions, authorities are quick to assume that disappeared people might have been involved in illicit activities. ”Frequently, there are no investigations, re-victimizations. We continually face negligence and inaction,” said Miriam Jaqueline Palmeros, whose daughter Jael Monserrat Uribe disappeared two years ago and has never been seen since. To mark the International Day of the Disappeared, family members mounted a...

MOSCOW -- Before Mikhail Gorbachev came along, the Soviet Union seemed an immovable superpower in perpetual antagonism to the United States. With a breathtaking series of reforms, Gorbachev changed all that — and re-directed the course of the 20th century. Alongside Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, Gorbachev was a key protagonist in a global drama that many thought impossible and, for those who lived through it, seemed almost surreal. Under Gorbachev, the Berlin Wall crumbled, thousands of political prisoners were released and millions of people who had known only communism got their first real taste of freedom. But he was unable to control the forces he unleashed — and ultimately waged a losing battle to salvage a crumbling empire. Gorbachev died Tuesday at a Moscow hospital at 91....

BEIRUT -- Satellite imagery showed widespread destruction at a giant military facility in western Syria targeted in a recent Israeli airstrike, and the head of a Syrian opposition war monitor said Sunday the strike targeted a depot housing hundreds of middle-range missiles for Iran-backed fighters. Syrian state media reported after the Thursday night attack near the cities of Tartus and Hama that two people were wounded and fires were sparked in nearby forests. It added that the missiles were fired from over the Mediterranean and most of them were shot down. Syrian opposition activists at the time said the strike targeted an arms depot and a scientific research center near the central town of Masyaf, a government stronghold. Masyaf is almost half way between the coastal city of Tartus an...

ROME -- Italian authorities scrambled on Sunday to relieve overcrowding in shelters after scores of boats carrying a total of about 1,000 migrants reached Italy’s southern shores and two of its tiny islands over the weekend. Nearly 50 boats arrived between Friday night and Saturday on Lampedusa island off Sicily, according to state radio and other Italian media. Other boats carrying migrants reached Pantelleria, another tiny island favored by vacationers. Hundreds of migrants stepped ashore from the virtual flotilla of smugglers' vessels on those islands. Several of the vessels launched by migrant smugglers held as few as eight passengers. But others had around 100 passengers aboard, many of them from Tunisia, according to the reports. Other boats reached the shores of the Italian mainl...

PARIS -- Fisticuffs in the cockpit, leaving a leaky engine running while cruising over Africa -- Air France pilots are under scrutiny after recent incidents that have prompted French investigators to call for tougher safety protocols. Two Air France pilots were suspended after physically fighting in the cockpit on a Geneva-Paris flight in June, an Air France official said Sunday. The flight continued and landed safely, and the dispute didn't affect the rest of the flight, the official said, stressing the airline’s commitment to safety. Switzerland’s La Tribune reported that the pilot and co-pilot had a dispute shortly after takeoff, and grabbed each other by their collars after one apparently hit the other. Cabin crew intervened and one crew member spent the flight in the cockpit with th...

Although thousands of Americans have tested positive for monkeypox since the outbreak began, this past spring, only a handful of pediatric monkeypox cases have been identified across the U.S. Across the country, at least 18 children in 10 states have now tested positive for monkeypox, according to state and local health officials, and little is known about most of these cases, due to concerns over patient privacy. One of these cases has been identified in King County, Washington, where local officials recently confirmed that an infant in their community had tested positive for the monkeypox virus. The child has been hospitalized and receiving treatment for the virus in recent days after being exposed to monkeypox through an infected family member, officials said. The child did not becom...