174 dead after fans stampede to exit Indonesian soccer match
MALANG, Indonesia (AP) — Panic and a chaotic run for exits after police fired tear gas at an Indonesian soccer match to drive away rioting fans left at least 174 dead, most of whom were trampled upon or suffocated, making it one of the deadliest sports events in the world.
Attention immediately focused on the police use of tear gas, which is banned at soccer stadiums by FIFA. The president of the world soccer body called the deaths at the stadium “a dark day for all involved in football and a tragedy beyond comprehension,” while President Joko Widodo ordered an investigation of security procedures.
Riots broke out after the game ended Saturday evening with host Arema FC of East Java’s Malang city losing to Persebaya of Surabaya 3-2.
Disappointed with their team’s loss, thousands of supporters of Arema, known as “Aremania,” reacted by throwing bottles and other objects at players and soccer officials. Witnesses said fans flooded the Kanjuruhan Stadium pitch and demanded that Arema management explain why, after 23 years of undefeated home matches against rival Persebaya, this one ended in a loss.
The violence spread outside the stadium where at least five police vehicles were toppled and set ablaze. Riot police responded by firing tear gas, including toward the stadium's stands, causing panic among the crowd.
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Ukraine presses counteroffensive after Russian setback
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Russia attacked the Ukrainian president’s hometown with suicide drones on Sunday, and Ukraine pushed ahead with its counteroffensive after taking back control of a strategic eastern city.
Russia’s loss of Lyman, which it had been using as a transport and logistics hub, is a new blow to the Kremlin as it seeks to escalate the war by illegally annexing four regions of Ukraine.
“The Ukrainian flag is already in Lyman," Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly address. “Over the past week, there have been more Ukrainian flags in the Donbas. In a week there will be even more."
In southern Ukraine, Zelenskyy's hometown Krivyi Rih came under Russian attack by a suicide drone that struck a school early Sunday and destroyed two stories of it, said Valentyn Reznichenko, the governor of Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region.
A fire sparked by the drone attack has been put out, he said.
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Allies aim for risky Russian oil price cap as winter nears
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. officials celebrated in early September when top allies agreed to back an audacious, never-before-tried plan to clamp down on Vladimir Putin’s access to cash as he wages war on Ukraine.
The idea sounded simple enough: The countries would pay only cut-rate prices for Russian oil. That would deprive Putin of money to keep prosecuting his war in Ukraine, but also ensure that oil continued to flow out of Russia and helped to keep global prices low.
A month later, the Group of Seven, representing some of the world’s leading economies, is still figuring out how to execute the plan — a far more complex task than it might seem at first blush — and the Dec. 5 deadline to marshal participants is fast approaching.
In the meantime, the war grinds on. The Kremlin is mobilizing 300,000 more troops to join the invasion of Ukraine and Putin has annexed four Ukrainian regions after Kremlin-orchestrated referendums that the West denounced as shams.
And while the U.S. and European countries have levied thousands of financial and diplomatic sanctions on Russia, including recently announced penalties, Treasury leaders say a price cap on oil could deliver the most effective blow to Russia’s economy, undermining its greatest revenue source.
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Florida deaths rise to 47 amid struggle to recover from Ian
FORT MYERS, Fla. (AP) — Rescuers evacuated stunned survivors on a large barrier island cut off by Hurricane Ian and Florida's death toll climbed sharply, as hundreds of thousands of people were still sweltering without power days after the monster storm rampaged from the state's southwestern coast up to the Carolinas.
Florida, with nearly four dozen reported dead, was hit hardest by the Category 4 hurricane, one of the strongest to make landfall in the United States. Flooded roadways and washed-out bridges to barrier islands left many people isolated, amid limited cellphone service and a lack of basic amenities such as water, electricity and the internet.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis said Saturday that multibillionaire businessman Elon Musk was providing some 120 Starlink satellites to “help bridge some of the communication issues.” Starlink, a satellite-based internet system created by Musk's SpaceX, will provide high-speed connectivity.
Florida utilities were working to restore power. As of Saturday night, nearly 1 million homes and businesses were still without electricity, down from a peak of 2.67 million.
At least 54 people were confirmed dead: 47 in Florida, four in North Carolina and three in Cuba.
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Chinese billionaire Richard Liu settles US rape allegation
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Chinese billionaire and JD.com founder Richard Liu agreed to settle a lawsuit filed by a former University of Minnesota student who alleged he raped her in her Minneapolis apartment after a night of dinner and drinks with wealthy Chinese executives in 2018, attorneys for both sides announced late Saturday.
A settlement amount was not disclosed.
Richard Liu, who stepped down as the CEO of Beijing-based e-commerce company JD.com this year amid increased government scrutiny of China’s technology industry, has denied raping the woman, Jingyao Liu, and prosecutors never filed criminal charges. A joint statement from attorneys for both sides called the encounter “a misunderstanding.”
“The incident between Ms. Jingyao Liu and Mr. Richard Liu in Minnesota in 2018 resulted in a misunderstanding that has consumed substantial public attention and brought profound suffering to the parties and their families," the joint statement said. "Today, the parties agreed to set aside their differences, and settle their legal dispute in order to avoid further pain and suffering caused by the lawsuit.”
The settlement was announced just two days before the civil trial was set to begin Monday in a Minneapolis courtroom. On Friday, a jury of seven men and five women were picked to hear the case.
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Pine Island residents recount horror, fear as Ian bore down
PINE ISLAND, Fla. (AP) — Paramedics and volunteers with a group that rescues people after natural disasters went door to door Saturday on Florida's devastated Pine Island, offering to evacuate residents who spoke of the terror of riding out Hurricane Ian in flooded homes and howling winds.
The largest barrier island off Florida’s Gulf Coast, Pine Island has been largely cut off from the outside world. Ian heavily damaged the only bridge to the island, leaving it only reachable by boat or air. For many, the volunteers from the non-profit Medic Corps were the first people they have seen from outside the island in days.
Residents described the horror of being trapped in their homes as water kept rising. Joe Conforti became emotional as he recounted what happened, saying the water rose at least 8 to 10 feet (2.4-3 meters), and there were 4-foot (1.2-meter) waves in the streets.
“The water just kept pounding the house and we watched, boats, houses — we watched everything just go flying by,” he said, as he fought back tears. “We’ve lost so much at this point.”
Conforti said if it wasn't for his wife, Dawn Conforti, he wouldn't have made it. He said: “I started to lose sensibility, because when the water’s at your door and it’s splashing on the door and you’re seeing how fast it’s moving, there’s no way you’re going to survive that.”
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Rebel violence in eastern Congo causes hunger to soar
NYIRAGONGO, Congo (AP) — The last thing Pasika Bagerimana remembers before her sons died were their cries of hunger. But the 25-year-old mother had nothing to feed them.
“'Mom, I need to eat. Can you give me food?'” they pleaded with her. Daniel, 2, and Bonane, 5, died just weeks apart in July after fleeing violence in their village in eastern Congo between M23 rebels and government forces.
Bagerimana worries her remaining two children might be next. “Hunger is killing people,” she says, seated in a cramped room she now shares with dozens of other displaced people.
Hunger is soaring across parts of Congo’s war-torn North Kivu province where the fighting between M23 rebels and government soldiers has been raging since November, according to aid workers, civilians and health workers.
Despite being the most fertile region in eastern Congo, nearly 260,000 people are facing extreme food insecurity in Nyiragongo and Rutshuru territories, according to an internal draft assessment by aid groups seen by The Associated Press.
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S. Korean activists clash with police over anti-Kim balloons
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korean activists say they clashed with police while launching balloons carrying anti-Pyongyang propaganda materials across the North Korean border, ignoring their government’s plea to stop such activities since the North has threatened to respond with “deadly” retaliation.
Park Sang-hak, a North Korean defector-turned-activist, said he his group had launched about eight balloons from an area in the South Korean border town of Paju Saturday night when police officers arrived at the scene and prevented them from sending their 12 remaining balloons. Park said police confiscated some of their materials and detained him and three other members of his group over mild scuffles with officers before releasing them after questioning.
Officials at the Paju police and the northern Gyeonggi provincial police agencies didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment Sunday.
The balloons flown toward North Korea carried masks, Tylenol and Vitamin C tablets along with propaganda materials, including booklets praising South Korea’s economic wealth and democratic society and hundreds of USB sticks containing videos of U.S. Congress members denouncing the North’s human rights record, Park said.
One of the balloons carried a placard that read, “Entire humanity denounces Kim Jong Un who threatens to preemptively strike (South Korea) with nuclear missiles,” referring to the North Korean leader’s escalatory nuclear doctrine that’s raising tensions with neighbors.
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Brazil holds historic election with Lula against Bolsonaro
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — More than 120 million Brazilians will vote Sunday in a highly polarized election that could determine if the country returns a leftist to the helm of the world’s fourth-largest democracy or keeps the far-right incumbent in office for another four years.
With polls opening at 8 a.m. Brasilia time, the race pits incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro against his political nemesis, former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. There are nine other candidates, but their support pales to that for Bolsonaro and da Silva.
Recent opinion polls have given da Silva a commanding lead — the last Datafolha survey published Saturday found that 50% of respondents who intend to vote for a candidate said they would vote for da Silva, against 36% for Bolsonaro. The polling institute interviewed 12,800 people, with a margin of error of plus or minus two percentage points.
Bolsonaro’s administration has been marked by incendiary speech, his testing of democratic institutions, his widely criticized handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and the worst deforestation in the Amazon rainforest in 15 years.
But he has built a devoted base by defending traditional family values, rebuffing political correctness and presenting himself as protecting the nation from leftist policies that infringe on personal liberties and produce economic turmoil.
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AP PHOTOS: Ukraine bakery supplies bread for the front lines
KOSTIANTYNIVKA, Ukraine (AP) — Seemingly abandoned during the day, the damaged factory building in eastern Ukraine comes to life at night, when the smell of fresh bread emanates from its broken windows.
It’s one of two large-scale bakeries left in operation in the Ukrainian-held part of the Donetsk region, most of which is under Russian occupation. The others had to close because they were damaged by fighting or because their electricity and gas were cut.
The bakery in Kostiantynivka adjusted its working hours according to the rhythm of the war.
Employees at the factory come to work at 7 p.m. to start kneading the dough. By dawn, truck drivers arrive to pick up fresh loaves of bread for delivery to towns and villages where the grocery stores are typically open only in the morning, when, on most days, there is a lull in Russian shelling.
“We bake more bread at night so we can distribute it to stores in the morning,” bakery director Oleksandr Milov says.
© 2022 The Canadian Press. All rights reserved., source Canadian Press DataFile
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