France has reiterated its strong support to Cyprus as regards its sovereign rights in its Exclusive Economic Ζone, the government said on Wednesday.

According to a written statement issued by government spokesman Nikos Christodoulides, French President Francois Hollande has sent a letter of reply to President Nicos Anastasiades in which he reiterates his country’s firm and clear position on the issue.

“The Cyprus government welcomes the strong and clear positions of France with regard to the right of the Republic of Cyprus to exploit its natural resources as well as for the principles that must govern a solution to the Cyprus problem, positions that have been expressed in the most explicit and official manner by the President of the country Mr. Francois Hollande,” the statement says.

In his letter, Hollande emphasised that “the position of France with regard to the right of Cyprus to exploit freely the natural resources within its Exclusive Economic Zone is clear and firm,”adding that “international law, and specifically the Law of the Sea, must be respected by all states including Turkey.”

The government noted with satisfaction Hollande’s reference that “France will remind the importance of refraining from any action that is contrary to the Law by anyone.”

Hollande also said that “only a solution through negotiations will allow the sharing of the natural resources of Cyprus for the benefit of both communities. This is also the meaning of the messages we address to the Turkish authorities.”

The letter by the French President was sent in response to a letter by Anastasiades dated October 7, on the issue of the Turkish violations in Cyprus’ EEZ.

Anastasiades pulled out of reunification talks after Turkey dispatched a research vessel to carry out a seismic survey in Cyprus’ EEZ.

There was no doubt the exclusive economic zone and the continental shelf belonged to the Republic of Cyprus, Greek Foreign Minister Evangelos Venizelos said on Wednesday, and hydrocarbons were an additional incentive for a settlement that will benefit all Cypriots.

Speaking after a meeting with President Nicos Anastasiades, Venizelos said there was no dispute between Cyprus and Turkey over the EEZ and the continental shelf in the area in question.

“Turkey is not claiming its own EEZ there,” he said. “There is no doubt this is the EEZ and continental shelf of the Republic of Cyprus.”

Turkey has violated Cyprus’ EEZ by sending its own research vessel in the area off the island’s southern coast, prompting Anastasiades to pull out of reunification talks.

It claims that it is protecting Turkish Cypriot interests.

Venizelos said Turkey was not invoking its own sovereign rights but an agreement with the Turkish Cypriot breakaway state in the north.

“In my view, hydrocarbons are an additional incentive for a solution that will be beneficial to all Cypriots, both communities,” Venizelos said.

The Greek foreign minister said he discussed Turkey’s actions, “the obvious violation of international law,” with Anastasiades.

To Greece, he said, the existence, sovereign rights, and international personality of the Republic of Cyprus was a basis for a “viable and fair solution for the benefit of both communities … and this should be fully understood by the Turkish side.”

Asked if Greece was sending warships to the area, the Greek diplomat said his country was a member of the UN, the EU and NATO, and as such it participated in international missions.

Greece is currently taking part in the UN mission for Lebanon and a NATO operation in the Mediterranean, he said.

“ Greece has a constant naval presence in the greater area. This is done for the reasons I said and it is a reality that everyone must take into account,” he said.

A frigate could be in the area as part of the UN operation while a Greek submarine is taking part in the NATO mission.

Earlier, Anastasiades met with Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry, in Cyprus, along with Venizelos, for a tripartite meeting with their Cypriot counterpart Ioannis Kasoulides.

Shoukry and Anastasiades discussed bilateral relations and ways of strengthening co-operation between the two countries, especially “in the economic field.”

He said they also discussed the trilateral relationship “with our Greek brothers and friends, and we also discussed various regional problems related to the situation in Libya and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the developments in Iraq and our mutual participation in the coalition against Da’ish (ISIS)”

The three ministers will also prepare the ground for a summit that will be held on November 8 in Cairo.

The central government generated a €207.6 million surplus in the first three quarters of the year on a cash basis or 1.3 per cent of the economy compared with a fiscal deficit of €411.8 million a year before, mainly on reduced spending, the finance ministry said on Wednesday.

The primary surplus between January to September was €601.1 million compared with a €67.7 million primary surplus a year before, the ministry said in a statement on its website.

The primary balance is the difference between overall government revenue and spending excluding the servicing of public debt.

Total spending fell 7.2 per cent to €4.6 billion compared to a year before, mainly on a 10 per cent drop in other current transfers to €946.3 million and a 18 per cent drop in interest payment to €393.5 million, the statement said.

Public revenue rose 5.8 per cent to €4.8 million mainly on an annual 7.5 per cent increase in direct tax earnings to €1.6 billion, according to the finance ministry.

Finance minister Harris Georgiades told lawmakers on October 18, that he expected fiscal deficit to be close to 2.5 per cent of the economy this year and a primary surplus of 0.5 per cent.

By Shihar Aneez and Ranga Sirilal

A landslide in hilly south-central Sri Lanka is believed to have killed more than 100 people on Wednesday as it buried scores of houses, a government minister said, and the toll is likely to rise.

The landslide hit a village in the tea-growing area of Sri Lanka after days of heavy monsoon rain, with more than 300 people listed as missing.

“More than 100 people are believed to have died,” Disaster Management Minister Mahinda Amaraweera told Reuters from the disaster site in the village of Haldummulla, 190 km inland from the capital, Colombo.

“We have suspended the rescue operations because of darkness and inclement weather. There is also a threat of further landslides.”

Children who left for school in the morning returned to find their clay and cement houses had been buried. Nearly 300 children were gathered at a nearby school as night fell amid further landslide threats.

The Disaster Management Centre said 10 bodies had been found so far, at least 300 people were missing and 150 houses buried in the village, which lies south of a popular national park.

Amaraweera said the landslide was at least 3 km (2 miles) long. Villagers had been advised in 2005 and 2012 to move away because of the threat of landslides, but many did not heed the warning, he said.

“I was under the rubble and some people took me out … my mother and aunt have died,” a woman who was being treated for injuries told media.

There have been a number of landslides since the start of heavy rains in mid-September resulting in damage to roads, but there had been no casualties until Wednesday.

Some roads in the central districts of Kandy, Nuwara Eliya, and Badulla were blocked on Wednesday due to landslides, limiting public transport.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa tweeted that military heavy machinery had been deployed to speed up search and rescue operations.

The people living in the affected hilly area are mostly of Indian Tamil origin, descendants of workers brought to Sri Lanka from South India under British rule as cheap labour to work on tea, rubber and coffee plantations.

By Sam Holden

After going six weeks without a goal Mario Balotelli was mightily relieved to “finally” regain his scoring touch against Swansea City and save Liverpool from a League Cup fourth-round exit.

The Italy striker, who had previously netted once in 11 appearances for the Anfield club, came off the bench to equalise with four minutes remaining at Anfield on Tuesday night.

The goal helped Liverpool turn the tide and Dejan Lovren grabbed a stoppage-time winner to secure a 2-1 victory and a place in the quarter-finals.

Balotelli is now hoping his strike against Swansea will prompt a change of fortune, having cut an increasingly frustrated figure during a series of brooding performances since his 16 million pound move from AC Milan in the close season.

“Finally!,” the 24-year-old tweeted after Tuesday’s game, relieved at finding the net for the first time since scoring his opening

Liverpool goal in a home win against Bulgarians Ludogorets in the Champions League in September.
Assistant manager Colin Pascoe said Balotelli’s Anfield intervention almost didn’t happen because he tweaked his knee while warming up on the sidelines.

“He twisted his studs in the ground and was sent to see the physio to see if he was all right or not,” Pascoe told reporters. “He felt something in his knee but he came on and his knee looked all right.
“I didn’t know until the end of the game but, with the way he was moving about, I don’t think there was much wrong with his knee.
“Mario is working hard and he got his just rewards by coming on and getting the goal – it was great for him and something to build on.”

Balotelli’s Anfield future has been called into question in recent weeks and he was dropped from the starting XI on Tuesday after Liverpool were held at the weekend to a 0-0 home draw in the Premier League by Hull City.

In the dying moments of that match he failed to connect with a cross with the goal gaping and manager Brendan Rodgers subsequently decided to leave him out against Swansea.

Liverpool defender Kolo Toure, though, is expecting the League Cup goal to open the floodgates for his team mate.
“For strikers goals are like food,” Toure told the Liverpool Echo newspaper. “Mario needs to feed himself by scoring goals. Now he’s got that one he will do that now, definitely.

“Getting that goal will be fantastic for his confidence. He is a great player, he has just been lacking goals. Mario is my mate and I’ve tried to help him like Stevie (Gerrard), the manager and everyone else in the dressing room.
“We all know he’s a top player. I always tell him ‘you need to get out there and show you are one of the best players in the world’. He is one of the best. He has just been missing goals but they will come now,” said Toure.

By Ian Simpson and Irene Klotz

Authorities on Wednesday started investigating what made an unmanned US supply rocket explode in a fireball moments after lifting off from a launch pad in Virginia, destroying supplies and equipment bound for the International Space Station.

The 14-story Antares rocket, built and launched by Orbital Sciences Corp, blasted off from the NASA Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island at 6:22 p.m. (2222 GMT) on Tuesday but burst into flames moments later. It was the first disaster since the National Aeronautics and Space Administration turned to private operators to run cargo to the space station.

Shares of Orbital, which agreed to buy Alliant Techsystems Inc’s aerospace and defense business in April, fell as low as $25.02 and were last down 15.7 per cent at $25.60.

The explosion is unlikely to unravel the deal, sources familiar with the situation said. The transaction, which is expected to close this year, was touted by the companies as a $5 billion merger of equals when it was announced.

An Orbital spokesman said the company would issue a statement shortly but declined to give details. Officials of Alliant, better known as ATK, could not be immediately reached for comment.

The rocket that exploded on Tuesday was carrying a Cygnus cargo ship with a 2,273 kg payload for the station, a $100 billion research laboratory owned and operated by 15 nations that orbits about 418 km above Earth.

The loss of the supply vessel posed no immediate problem for the orbiting station’s six crew: two from NASA, one from the European Space Agency and three Russians, officials said.

“There was no cargo that was absolutely critical to us that was lost on that flight. The crew is in no danger,” NASA Associate Administrator William Gerstenmaier said.

Russia’s Roskosmos space agency said it was ready to help ferry extra US cargo to the space station if NASA requested. The station is overseen by Russia and the United States, whose relations are at a low ebb over the Ukraine crisis.

The unmanned Russian Progress supply vehicle launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan hours after the explosion and the capsule, carrying more than 5,000 pounds of food, fuel and supplies, reached the station at 9:08 a.m. (1308 GMT).

No one was hurt in the U.S. accident but witnesses said the explosion shook buildings for miles around and described a massive ball of fire lighting up the evening sky.

In the control room, reaction was a mix of “shock and professionalism,” said Frank Culbertson, Orbital Executive Vice President and mission director.

In a few days investigators would have a good idea of where the failure began but “what exactly caused it may take a little bit longer and corrective action probably will take some time, from weeks to months,” he added.

The area around the launch facility was cordoned off on Wednesday and a helicopter circled overhead.

The Cygnus mission was non-military but the company’s Antares program manager, Mike Pinkston, said the craft included “some classified cryptographic equipment, so we do need to maintain the area around the debris in a secure manner”.

The Cygnus carried a prototype satellite owned by Redmond, Washington-based startup Planetary Resources Inc., which is developing technology to mine asteroids.

RUSSIAN ROCKET ENGINES

The Antares is powered by the AJ-26 engine built by GenCorp Inc division Aerojet Rocketdyne. In May, an AJ-26 exploded during a ground test at NASA’s Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. GenCorp shares on Wednesday lost 6.6 percent to $16.04.

The accident also renewed questions about the use of Russian engines in US rockets. Congress has been concerned about Russian-made RD-180 engines that power United Launch Alliance’s Atlas 5 rockets, used primarily to fly US military satellites.

The RD-180 has had no technical problems but Russia has threatened to suspend exports in response to U.S. trade sanctions prompted by Moscow’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea region. United Launch Alliance is a partnership of Lockheed Martin and Boeing.

The rocket and the cargo ship it carried were valued at $200 million, Culbertson said.

It was unclear how much Tuesday’s explosion would cost Orbital. The rocket was insured for around $40 million to $50 million of losses, insurance sources said. One source pinned the loss at $48 million.

A London spokesman for US insurance broker Willis Group Holdings Plc confirmed it was the broker for the insurance risk but declined to comment on the insured loss.

Dulles, Virginia-based Orbital Sciences is one of two companies NASA has hired to fly cargo to the station after NASA’s space shuttles were retired. Tuesday’s flight was to be the third of eight under the company’s $1.9 billion contract with NASA. Its next launch had been slated for April 2015, according to internal NASA schedules.

The second US supply line to the station is run by privately owned Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, which is preparing its fourth flight under a separate $1.6 billion NASA contract, slated for Dec. 9.

By George Psyllides

TAX cheat and former Central Bank governor Christodoulos Christodoulou will return to prison after medical tests showed that he could not remain in hospital where he was admitted shortly after he was sentenced to five months in jail on Monday.

Christodoulou was sentenced to five months in prison after he failed to pay taxes on a €1.0m payment he received from a Greek ship-owner.

He complained of being ill upon arrival at the central prison and was taken to Nicosia general hospital.

The move sparked anger among the public who has seen several prominent individuals falling ill when they run into trouble with the law.

Health Minister Philippos Patsalis had said in an earlier statement that a medical board was scheduled to convene on Wednesday or Thursday at the latest, to decide whether Christodoulou’s stay in hospital was justified.

The board was set up in July in a bid to stamp out the phenomenon of suspects or convicts citing health issues to stay out of prison.

“This proposal was approved and we kept it in the drawers for whenever necessary,” the minister said.

The board was used for the first time when well-known developer Theodoros Aristodemou fell ill when he was arrested in connection with a suspicious land zoning case in Paphos.

The board judged that Aristodemou could be held in police custody without any problems.

“We respect the medical issues that Mr. Christodoulou has, and that is why the state hospitals were providing him with all the necessary tests,” the minister said.

Christodoulou is the latest in a number of officials invoking health problems when they run into trouble with the law.

Former defence minister Costas Papacostas, sentenced to five years in jail in 2013 for his role in the naval base disaster where 13 people were killed, has not spent a day in jail.

The health minister said in Papacostas’ case, the medical data justified him remaining in hospital for the time being.

Christodoulou, who led the Cypriot central bank for five years prior to his departure in 2007, had pleaded guilty to failing to declare revenue of a consultancy he jointly owned with his daughter.

He was charged with failing to report in a timely manner a revenue of €1.0m from Greek businessman Michalis Zolotas. He said the sum was an up-front payment for consultancy services, and tax on the amount was later paid following a formal investigation.

By Dasha Afanasieva and Alexander Dziadosz

A convoy of Iraqi peshmerga fighters and weaponry made its way across southeastern Turkey on Wednesday en route for the Syrian town of Kobani to try to help fellow Kurds break an Islamic State siege which has defied US-led air strikes.

Kobani, on the border with Turkey, has been under assault from Islamic State militants for more than a month and its fate has become a test of the US-led coalition’s ability to combat the Sunni insurgents.

Weeks of air strikes on Islamic State positions around Kobani and the deaths of hundreds of their fighters have failed to break the siege. The Kurds and their international allies hope the arrival of the peshmerga, along with heavier weapons, can turn the tide.

Thousands of people took to the streets of the Turkish border town of Suruc, descending on its tree-lined main square and spilling into side streets, some with faces painted in the colours of the Kurdish flag, waiting to cheer on the convoy.

“All the Kurds are together. We want them to go and fight in Kobani and liberate it,” said Issa Ahamd, an 18-year-old high school student among the almost 200,000 Syrian Kurds who have fled to Turkey since the assault on Kobani began.

An initial group of between 90 and 100 peshmerga fighters arrived by plane amid tight security in the southeastern Turkish city of Sanliurfa overnight, according to Adham Basho, a member of the Syrian Kurdish National Council from Kobani.

A Kurdish television channel meanwhile showed footage of what it said was the convoy of peshmerga vehicles laden with weapons. The trucks have been snaking their way through southern Turkey towards Kobani after crossing from northern Iraq.

Saleh Moslem, co-chair of the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), said the peshmerga were expected to bring heavy arms to Kobani — known as Ayn al-Arab in Arabic.

“It’s mainly artillery, or anti-armour, anti-tank weapons,” he said. The lightly armed Syrian Kurds have said such weaponry is crucial to driving back Islamic State insurgents, who have used armoured vehicles and tanks in their assault.

Kurdistan’s Minister of Peshmerga, Mustafa Sayyid Qader, told local media on Tuesday that no limits had been set to how long the forces would remain in Kobani. The Kurdistan Regional Government has said the fighters would not engage in direct combat in Kobani but rather provide artillery support.

RADICAL ISLAM

Islamic State has caused international alarm by capturing large expanses of Iraq and Syria, declaring an Islamic “caliphate” erasing borders between the two, and slaughtering or driving away Shi’ite Muslims, Christians and other communities who do not share their ultra-radical brand of Sunni Islam.

Fighters from the Nusra Front, al Qaeda’s official affiliate in the Syrian civil war, have meanwhile seized territory from moderate rebels in recent days, expanding their control into one of the few areas of northern Syria not already held by hardline Islamists.

Nearly 10 million people have been displaced by Syria’s war and close to 200,000 killed, according to the United Nations. A Syrian army helicopter dropped two barrel bombs on a displaced persons camp in the northern province of Idlib on Wednesday, killing many, camp residents said.

In Iraq, security forces said they had advanced to within 2 km of the city of Baiji on Wednesday in a new offensive to retake the country’s biggest oil refinery that has been besieged since June by Islamic State.

Islamic State has threatened to massacre Kobani’s defenders, triggering a call to arms from Kurds across the region.

The US military conducted 14 air strikes on Tuesday and Wednesday against Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, according to a statement from US Central Command, which said eight of the raids destroyed Islamic State targets near Kobani.

At least a dozen shells fired by Islamic State fighters fell on the town overnight as clashes with the main Syrian Kurdish armed group, the YPG, continued, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

It said preparations were being made at a border gate which Islamic State fighters have repeatedly tried to capture for the arrival of the peshmerga, while YPG and Islamic State forces exchanged fire in gun battles on the southern edge of the town.

The Observatory also said 50 Syrian fighters had entered Kobani from Turkey with their weapons, though it was unclear which group they belonged to. Turkey has pushed for moderate Syrian rebels fighting President Bashar al-Assad to join the battle against Islamic State in Kobani.

Rebel commander Abdul Jabbar al-Oqaidi said he had led 200 Free Syrian Army fighters into Kobani but there was no independent confirmation of this. The FSA describes dozens of armed groups fighting Assad but with little or no central command and widely outgunned by Islamist insurgents.

DELICATE PARTNERSHIP

The Iraqi Kurdish region’s parliament voted last week to deploy some peshmerga to Syria and, under pressure from Western allies, Turkey agreed to let peshmerga forces from Iraq traverse its territory to reach Kobani.

“We’ve advocated and been discussing the importance of allowing the peshmerga across the border … (it’s) important to have a partner on the ground to work with,” US State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in Washington on Tuesday.

The United States and its allies in the coalition have made clear they do not plan to send troops to fight Islamic State in Syria or Iraq, but they need fighters on the ground to capitalise on their air strikes.

“What does Kobani show? That determined resistance on the ground with American air power can push ISIS back,” Henri Barkey, a former State Department official who now teaches at Lehigh University, told Reuters.

“They want to carry this to Iraq so that the peshmerga and Iraqi army get their act together. They really need to win … They realised this was an opportunity for them because you have a real fighting force on the ground … That’s the model.”

Syrian Kurds have called for the international community to provide them with heavier weapons and munitions and they have received an air drop from the United States.

But Turkey accuses Kurdish groups in Kobani of links to the militant Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has fought a decades-long insurgency against the Turkish state and is seen as a terrorist group by Ankara, Washington and the European Union.

That has complicated efforts to provide aid.

A Syrian Kurdish official in Paris said on Wednesday that France, which has taken part in air strikes in Iraq and given Iraqi peshmerga fighters weapons and training, had yet to fulfil a pledge to give support to Kurds in Syria.

“France has said it was ready to help the Kurds, but we haven’t been received by the French authorities. There has been no direct or indirect contact,” Khaled Eissa, representative in France of the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), said.

French officials confirmed there had been no meetings in large part due to concern about historic links to the PKK.

Ankara fears Syria’s Kurds will exploit the chaos by following their brethren in Iraq and seeking to carve out an independent state in northern Syria, emboldening PKK militants in Turkey and derailing a fragile peace process.

The stance has enraged Turkey’s own Kurdish minority — about a fifth of the population and half of all Kurds across the region. Kurds suspect Ankara, which has refused to send in its forces to relieve Kobani, would rather see Islamic State jihadists extend their territorial gains than allow Kurdish insurgents to consolidate local power.

By Tom Miles and Stephanie Nebehay

Liberia, the country worst-hit by the Ebola epidemic, may be seeing a decline in the spread of the virus, although the battle to contain the outbreak is far from won, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday.

WHO Assistant Director General Bruce Aylward told a news conference the number of burials and new admissions had fallen and there was a plateau in laboratory-confirmed cases.

“All the data point in the same direction,” he said. “Do we feel confident that the response is now getting an upper hand on the virus? Yes, we are seeing slowing rate of new cases, very definitely”

Aylward cautioned against overly optimistic conclusions but said: “We’re seeing a reversal of that rapid rate of increase to the point that there seems to be a decline right now.”

Liberian President Ellen Johnson told Reuters on Oct 8 that there were early signs the outbreak might be “in decline”.

Aylward, asked his assessment of the latest trends, said: “It appears that the trend is real in Liberia, and there may indeed be a slowing of the epidemic there. The government is looking at that information and will come out I believe more definitely in the coming days,” he said.

But the information could be attributed to the wrong factors and misunderstood, he said. “Getting a slight decrease in the number of cases on a day-to-day basis versus getting this thing closed out is a completely different ball game.”

In Liberia, the National Christian Ebola Task Force, a group of different Christian denominations, began three days of prayer and dawn-to-dusk fasting on Wednesday to seek salvation from the “curse” of the epidemic, which has killed 2,705 people and infected 4,665 more in the West African country.

“Ebola is a virus from the devil. It’s killing us because we have turned our back to God,” said Reverend David G. Benitoe of the Task Force. “We have traded the worship of God with the worship of demons and witchcraft, and evil stuff is now happening in this country.”

CALL TO NATO

Aylward said there had been 13,703 Ebola cases in eight countries and the reported death toll, to be published later on Wednesday, was likely to be over 5,000.

A jump of more than 3,000 in the number of cases reported since Saturday was largely due to the data being updated with old cases rather than new cases, he added.

Both Senegal and Nigeria have been declared Ebola-free, after passing two incubation periods of a total of 42 days. Cases have also been confirmed in Spain and the United States.

Aylward said he would be “terrified” if his statement was understood to mean Ebola was under control.

“It’s like saying your pet tiger is under control,” he said.

“This is a very, very dangerous disease … A couple of burials go wrong, it can start a whole new set of transmission chains and the disease starts trending upward again.”

But if current trends continued, Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone should be able to “comfortably” meet a target to scale up Ebola-containment measures by Dec. 1, he said.

Last week Mali became the sixth West African country to report a case of the disease. A two-year-old girl died after travelling by bus from Guinea with her grandmother, with at least one stopover, in the capital Bamako.

Aylward said the Mali government was working hard to track people who had contact with the girl, with 84 people being monitored and none showing symptoms as of early on Wednesday.

The goal is to set up 56 Ebola treatment centres across the 3 worst-hit countries, for a total of 4,700 beds, Aylward said.

Only 15 centres with 1,047 beds are fully functional now, he said. There are commitments to build and staff 22 centres, but foreign staff are still needed to manage the final 19 centres.

In neighbouring Sierra Leone, the second worst hit country, the number of cases was continuing to increase in some areas, including the capital Freetown, he said.

“We’re still seeing this thing burning quite hot in parts of Sierra Leone right now,” Aylward said.

Separately, 40 senior European political, diplomatic and military figures on Wednesday urged the NATO alliance to deploy staff, ships and aircraft to help fight Ebola in West Africa.

Signatories including two former NATO secretaries-general and three ex-prime ministers said in two open letters the WHO and United Nations should ask for help from NATO, whose “unique capabilities … could make a difference in this situation.”

The letters to NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and WHO Director-General Margaret Chan were drafted by the European Leadership Network think tank in London.

By Chris Mfula

Zambia’s Guy Scott became Africa’s first white head of state in 20 years on Wednesday after the president, “King Cobra” Michael Sata, died in a London hospital aged 77.

Scott, a Cambridge-educated economist born to Scottish parents, had been Sata’s vice president. He will be interim leader until an election in three months, making him the first white African leader since South Africa’s F.W. de Klerk lost to Nelson Mandela in the 1994 election that ended apartheid.

Scott, 70, is ineligible to run for the presidency in the election because of citizenship restrictions, leaving defence minister Edgar Lungu and finance minister Alexander Chikwanda the most likely contenders for the ruling Patriotic Front party’s ticket, analysts say.

“Elections for the office of president will take place within 90 days. In the interim I am acting president,” Scott said in a brief televised address.

“The period of national mourning will start today. We will miss our beloved president and comrade.”

Many Zambians welcomed Scott’s interim appointment.

Scott is a lively character who has caused diplomatic controversy in the past, describing South Africans as “backward” in an interview with Britain’s Guardian newspaper last year.

“I like a lot of South Africans but they really think they’re the bees’ knees and actually they’ve been the cause of so much trouble in this part of the world,” he said.

“He is a black man in a white man’s skin,” said Nathan Phiri, a bus driver. “The very fact we accepted him as vice-president shows that we consider him as one of us.”

Sata, who was nicknamed “King Cobra” because of his sharp tongue, died on Tuesday, the government said earlier. He had been president of Zambia, Africa’s second-largest copper producer, since 2011.

The cause of death was not immediately disclosed, but Sata had been ill for some time. He was at London’s King Edward VII hospital when he died, the website Zambian Watchdog reported.

“As you are aware, the president was receiving medical attention in London,” cabinet secretary Roland Msiska announced on state television. “The head of state passed away on October 28. President Sata’s demise is deeply regretted.”

“DIVISIVE FIGURE”

Sata, whose populist platform included defending workers’ rights, was often fiercely critical of the foreign mining companies operating in Zambia’s copper belt. Analysts said his death could prompt a rise in investment in the country.

“President Sata has been a divisive figure for Zambia on the economic front, espousing increasingly authoritarian and ad hoc policy measures against the crucial mining sector in recent years, which has hampered investment,” South African consultancy ETM said.

“The president’s passing could make way for a more reformist administration and help to remove broader policy uncertainties.”

Sata, whose varied CV included stints as a policeman, car assembly worker, trade unionist and platform sweeper at London’s Victoria station, had left Zambia on Oct. 19 for medical treatment, accompanied by his wife and family members.

Defence Minister Lungu, secretary general of Sata’s Patriotic Front party, had to lead celebrations last week of the 50th anniversary of Zambia’s independence from Britain.

Concern over Sata’s health had been mounting since June, when he disappeared from the public eye without explanation and was then reported to be receiving medical treatment in Israel.

He missed a scheduled speech at the U.N. General Assembly in September amid reports that he had fallen ill in his New York hotel. A few days before that, he had attended the opening of parliament in Lusaka, joking: “I am not dead.”

It was a typically no-nonsense denial from a politician not known for diplomatic niceties.

“I haven’t bloody lost so don’t waste my time,” he barked at a BBC reporter in 2008 after results showed he had indeed lost an election to his main rival, Rupiah Banda, by a narrow margin.

His nationalist, anti-Chinese rhetoric finally helped him oust Banda in a 2011 election.

A year ago, he threatened to remove the mining licence of Konkola Copper mines, Zambia’s biggest private employer, because of plans to lay off 1,500 workers. During the row, the company’s foreign chief executive had his work permit revoked.

The Zambian kwacha fell 2 percent against the dollar after Sata’s death was announced. Traders said it was unlikely to suffer any prolonged weakness because of the underlying health of an economy expected to grow 7 percent this year.

“Obviously, there will be a sentimental temptation to go long on dollars, but I’m also quite confident the central bank will do everything it can to protect the currency,” one Lusaka-based trader said.

“In terms of the economy, everything should still be on track.”

By Jamie Spencer

Fans love a player with pace that can tear up a defence. The Premier League is full of them, but there is always a debate about who is actually the quickest.

Liverpool fans will tell you it’s Raheem Sterling, but Manchester United fans will back Angel Di Maria. If Theo Walcott had played any time recently Arsenal fans might back him, but they’d probably settle for Alexis Sanchez.
But now the Daily Mail newspaper, in conjunction with EA Sports who record all the vital statistics for the Premier League, have revealed who really is the fastest around.

Here’s a look at the top five fastest players of this season, proven by the numbers. However, you may be in for a bit of a shock.

5. Connor Wickham
Connor Wickham helped save Sunderland’s season in 2013/14, but to look at him the striker has more of a ‘lumbering target man’ look than that of a speedster.
However, going full pelt the 21-year-old has managed to get up to 35.8km/h. Shocking really.

4. Steven N’Zonzi
The role of the holding midfielder is not exactly synonymous with speed. A graveyard for ageing and/or failed strikers, Stoke’s Steven N’Zonzi would appear to be an exception to the ‘slow’ tag.
Clocking up a maximum velocity of 35.82km/h, he’ll catch up to you, make a tackle and give the ball away all in a flash.

3. Joe Ledley
He may not look like he has the best aerodynamic qualities, but Joe Ledley’s beard certainly hasn’t held the Crystal Palace man back in the speed stakes so far this season.
With a top speed of 35.91km/h, opposing midfielders take time on the ball at their peril against the Premier League’s third fastest player.

2. Ritchie de Laet
Regardless of the fact they scored five against Manchester United, Leicester have struggled keeping goals out this season.
Likely running hell for leather back towards his own goal, Foxes full-back Ritchie de Laet has been recorded at 35.94km/h, the second fastest of anyone in the league.

1. Phil Jagielka
It’s official, the fastest player in the Premier League is not Angel Di Maria, Raheem Sterling or Alexis Sanchez. It’s … Phil Jagielka?
Believe it because apparently it’s true. No player has been clocked at a higher speed than the Everton man who reached 35.99km/h, on the very first day of the season no less.

For more articles and the latest soccer news, check out FTBpro.com

A police officer in Paphos is under investigation for allegedly defrauding the state, following reports that he filed overtime pay applications without actually working, police said.

According to police spokesman Andreas Angelides, the officer pocketed hundreds of euros in overtime pay over the last year.

The officer was said to have falsified log reports to make it appear that he was working on Sundays and holidays, without actually ever reporting for duty. The false logs were filed from January 1, 2014 to February 28, 2014. The officer applied for overtime pay by presenting the logs at the police district accounting department.

Angelides made clear that this was not a disciplinary investigation. “We are handling this as a criminal investigation. The officer is under investigation for corruption, abusing authority, falsifying reports and obtaining money under false pretences,” he said.

He said the officer wasn’t the only one under investigation. “The logs were supposed to be verified by a higher ranking officer. We are looking into whose responsibility was to check the logs and if need be launch an official disciplinary investigation,” said Angelides.

By Angelos Anastasiou

Russian President Vladimir Putin has invited President Nicos Anastasiades to Moscow, it emerged on Thursday.

Speaking after a meeting at the presidential palace, Russian ambassador Stanislav Osadchiy said that although the visit has been agreed, no date has been set yet.

“We spoke in general about the possibility of visiting as soon as possible,” the ambassador said.

Osadchiy said they also discussed various other matters with Anastasiades, including developments in the region and bilateral relations.

The Cypriot president and Putin had a discussion during dinner at the Asia-Europe summit earlier this month.

“What is happening in the [Middle East] area was the issue of the discussion, which will be continued in Moscow,” Osadchiy said.

Anastasiades has received political flak for pursuing closer ties with the West, with detractors claiming these come at the expense of Cyprus’ traditional good relations with Russia.

A “one-dimensional” policy of rapprochement with the United States has been the main charge against the government, mainly by opposition parties AKEL and DIKO, who call for a “multi-dimensional” policy that would allow Cyprus to avoid picking sides in the international relations arena and be on good terms with more than one of the major players.

In addition, they argue that the US being among Turkey’s closest allies means that Cyprus could never matter enough to make a difference in efforts to solve the Cyprus problem.

The government has consistently rejected such criticism, arguing that relations with Russia remain as close as ever, and made a big fuss over informal discussion between Anastasiades and Putin during the ASEM dinner in Milan in a bid to score points on “multi-dimensionality.”

Relations between the two countries were strained considerably in the last 18 months, after a desperate Cyprus failed to secure a loan from Russia during the days between the Eurogroup decisions that led to the closing of the island’s second-largest bank – Laiki Bank – and the conversion of approximately half uninsured deposits at the Bank of Cyprus, the island’s largest bank, into equity.

In turn, that many of the depositors that suffered from the conversion of deposits – or ‘haircut’ – were Russians did not bode well with the Russian government, and prompted speculation that Russian deposits had been the real target.

Adding insult to injury, in an interview last March Osadchiy issued a thinly-veiled threat against Cyprus – which had consented to EU sanctions against Russia over Ukraine.

And in August, the Russian embassy in Cyprus issued a scathing statement against journalist and researcher Makarios Droushiotis – employed at the Presidential Palace as an advisor to the President – for a book he wrote, arguing that Russia’s political support to Cyprus, particularly as regards the Cyprus problem, is little more than a well-concocted myth.

As a result of the undiplomatic statement, Anastasiades had been forced to distance himself from Droushiotis’ book.

By George Psyllides

Legislation making it compulsory for users of prepaid phone cards to provide identification as a means of reducing crime, is expected to be put to the vote in two weeks after several years’ delay, it emerged on Thursday.

The bill, tabled by DIKO, requires users to provide their identity when the cards are activated. The move aims at curbing crime by eliminating anonymity. Current users of prepaid cards will be given time to register. Not doing so would mean deactivation of their number.

Main opposition AKEL expressed opposition to the proposal, suggesting it would turn Cyprus into a police state.

Personal data commissioner Yiannis Danielides said it would violate the principle of proportionality.

Justice Minister Ionas Nicolaou expressed satisfaction, reiterating that it was a necessary change to enable law enforcement to investigate criminal actions hiding behind the anonymity of prepaid cards.

Nicolaou said he respected the commissioner’s view but he must also weigh the gravity of the objectives the state wanted to achieve.

AKEL MP Andreas Fakontis said the aim would not be achieved. The proposal he said would lead to a police state and a big brother who would monitor every move.

Out of 28 countries in the EU, only nine had similar legislation, the MP said, and anyone wanting to acquire such cards could do so there, or via the Turkish-occupied north.

It would also lead to a loss of revenue for mobile telephony providers as many people and tourists would not bother to register.

The issue came to the fore after the office of a company belonging to the chairman of the Cyprus Football Association Costas Koutsokoumnis was bombed in November 2009.

According to Koutsokoumnis he had received a threatening call the day before but he did not report it to police as they had been unable to do anything about it on previous occasions.

Police, who want the law changed to oblige users to supply their identities, said it was impossible to track down perpetrators under the circumstances.

Two main mobile telephony providers, CyTA and MTN, raised objections in the past citing loss of business.

CyTA claimed at the time that it would lose €10m while MTN said its turnover would be halved.

In a pre-trial ruling, the Paphos district court on Thursday cleared of all charges two former prominent financiers of now-defunct Laiki Bank.

Andreas Vgenopoulos and Efthimios Bouloutas were facing charges related to mis-selling Laiki bonds in a private criminal case brought against them by a Paphos investor.

In its judgment, the court said the case as filed could not proceed due to multiplicity – more than one offence is now being alleged for all three charges on which the defendants would have stood trial.

This affects the defendants’ right to a fair trial, the court said, adding that the situation could not be remedied by merely amending the charge sheet.

Multiplicity is a legal principle that bars charging one offense in several counts. A multiplicitous indictment creates the risk that a defendant will be punished for more crimes than he actually committed.

As such the court ordered the charges against Vgenopoulos and Bouloutas dropped, and additionally cancelled the arrest warrants against the two.

The defendants, who reside in Greece, never showed up in the court room since the case began.

The plaintiff is considering his next move, including appealing the court’s decision with the Supreme Court.

A number of bondholders in the island’s major banks claim they were duped into investing high-yield bonds without being informed of the risks, and some have sued the banks because they were allegedly not properly informed of the risks.

Laiki stopped paying interest on the bonds after incurring losses from a Greek sovereign debt write-down in 2011. In some cases the bonds offered an attractive return of 7.0 per cent.

The total amount placed in securities across Cyprus’ banks is said to be about €1.4bn.

In March 2013 Laiki was shut down as part of the terms of a government bailout by international lenders.

THE government yesterday waved off claims by DIKO leader Nicholas Papadopoulos, who insisted chicanery was afoot in the coming shakeup at the Bank of Cyprus (BoC) board.

Papadopoulos asked why the only two persons slated to keep their post on the bank’s board are – as he claimed – clients of the President Anastasiades’ law firm.

Though not naming names, he was understood to be alluding to Vladimir Strzhalkovskiy, current vice chairman of the BoC board, who along with Ioannis Zographakis are expected to stay on.

The new shareholders of BoC – following a €1bn capital increase – have announced a list of candidates for the board ahead of the bank’s annual general meeting of shareholders, scheduled for November 20.

Strzhalkovskiy is believed to be a client of Nicos Chr. Anastasiades & Partners, a Limassol-based law firm founded by Anastasiades.

But a number of old directors, representing Russian depositors as well as local pension funds which received equity in the bank after their deposits were bailed-in, seem to be on the way out.

Papadopoulos claimed the government was pulling the strings at the bank, by using the indirect control it had – as he claimed – over legacy Laiki’s equity in BoC.

Legacy Laiki and its stock in BoC is under the control of an administrator.

“Are the clients of Mr. Anastasiades’ law firm more important that the pension funds and the representatives of the bailed-in depositors of Laiki?” the DIKO chief mused.

In another jibe he asked whether the Anastasiades administration would “maintain its hostile stance toward the Russian depositors of Bank of Cyprus, something which some MPs in the Russian parliament have alluded to?”

Hitting back, government spokesman Victoras Papadopoulos said this sounded like the pot calling the kettle black.

“It is high time that Mr Papadopoulos stopped invoking Russian depositors [as a smokescreen] to protect people who are closely associated with him on the board of Bank of Cyprus,” he said.

The spokesman was understood to be alluding to Marinos Yialelis, widely known to be a friend of the DIKO leader and one of the bank directors likely on their way out.

Far from Russian depositors being mistreated, he added, the funds these depositors lost in last year’s haircut at BoC were taken into account in the government’s cash-for-citizenship scheme.

What’s more, the spokesman said, Anastasiades cut off all ties to his law firm on taking office.

He also pointed out that the administrator of legacy Laiki is not answerable to the government, but rather to the Central Bank. Moreover, he added, BoC is a private concern and as such it is up to its shareholders to select their board directors.

“This is the last time the government deigns to address unfounded allegations from Mr Papadopoulos,” the spokesman added.

By Simon Johnson

The Swedish government officially recognised the state of Palestine on Thursday and said there were signs other European Union states would follow its lead.

Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallstrom told reporters her government hoped it would bring a new dynamic to efforts to end decades of Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“Our decision comes at a critical time because over the last year we have seen how the peace talks have stalled, how decisions over new settlements on occupied Palestinian land have complicated a two-state solution and how violence has returned to Gaza,” she said.

Israel recalled its ambassador for consultations, saying the move was counterproductive and would hurt prospects for future negotiations.

But Sweden’s decision drew praise from Palestinians who called on other countries to match it – a hope which Wallstrom said was likely to be fulfilled in time.

“There is an ongoing debate in many other EU member states and hopefully also a move in this direction,” she said. “There are clearly signs that this might happen in other member states as well”.

Palestinians seek statehood in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and the blockaded Gaza Strip, with East Jerusalem as their capital. The land was captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war, although Israeli soldiers and settlers pulled out of Gaza in 2005.

Years of efforts to forge a two-state solution have made little progress, with the last effort at negotiations collapsing in April. Palestinians now see little choice but to make a unilateral push for statehood.

A total of 135 countries already recognise Palestine, including several east European countries that did so before they joined the EU.

The move drew immediate criticism from Israel, with Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman calling it a “wretched decision” that would bolster extremist Palestinian elements.

“The Swedish government should understand that Middle East relations are more complex than a piece of self-assembled Ikea furniture, and the matter should be handled with responsibility and sensitivity,” Lieberman said in a statement.

A foreign ministry spokesman later said Israel had summoned home its ambassador for discussions.

The Palestinian leadership called on other countries to follow Sweden, saying that establishing an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital would strengthen the chances for peace.

“This decision is a message to Israel and is an answer to its continued occupation of Palestinian land,” said Nabeel Abu Rdeineh, spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Earlier this month the Palestinians’ chief peace negotiator said a resolution would be put to the United Nations Security Council calling for a November 2017 deadline for the establishment of two states based on the boundaries that existed before the 1967 war.

With Britain’s parliament having recognised Palestine in a non-binding vote earlier this month, and similar votes in the pipeline in Spain, France and Ireland, the Palestinians hope momentum in Europe is shifting.

Wallstrom said Sweden’s move aimed at supporting moderate Palestinians and making their status more equal with that of Israel in peace negotiations, as well as giving hope to young people on both sides.

The United States said earlier this month, when the Swedish move was in the works, that it believed international recognition of a Palestinian state would be premature. Statehood should come only through a negotiated outcome, it said.

The European Union said after the Swedish announcement that the EU’s objective was a two-state solution with an independent Palestinian state living side by side with Israel.

“In order to achieve this, what is important is direct negotiations resume as soon as possible.” European Commission spokesman Maya Kocijancic said. “As for the European Union position on recognition, the EU has said in the past that it would recognize a Palestinian state when appropriate.”

Some EU states, which are closer to the Israeli position, were irritated by the Swedish step, diplomats in Brussels said.

Nonetheless, the move showed growing international frustration at the lack of progress, with continued Israeli settlement building on occupied land a particular point of concern. The Gaza war of July and August also refocused attention on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The UN Under Secretary-General for political affairs, Jeffrey Feltman, said in New York on Wednesday that Israel’s decision to accelerate planning for some 1,000 new settler homes in East Jerusalem raises serious doubts about the Israeli commitment to peace with the Palestinians.

The UN General Assembly approved the de facto recognition of the state of Palestine in 2012, but the European Union and most EU countries have yet to give official recognition.

By Joseph Ax and Jeff Mason

A nurse who treated Ebola patients in Sierra Leone but has tested negative for the virus ventured out of her home in Maine and took a bike ride on Thursday, defying a quarantine order and setting up a legal collision with state authorities.

Attorneys for Kaci Hickox, 33, said they had not yet been served with a court order to enforce a 21-day quarantine – matching the virus’s maximum incubation period – but remained prepared to fight such an order if necessary.

Hickox left her home in the small Maine town of Fort Kent, along the Canadian border, and television news images showed her taking a morning bicycle ride with her boyfriend. Hickox has given the state a deadline of Thursday to lift an order that she remain at home until Nov. 10, or she will go to court.

“It’s a beautiful day for a bike ride,” said Hickox, dressed in bike gear including a helmet as she headed out for a 5 km ride while police stationed outside her house stood by without trying to stop her, according to local media.

Maine Governor Paul LePage, a Republican locked in a tough re-election battle, said he is seeking legal authority to keep Hickox isolated at home.

President Barack Obama, who has criticized state mandatory quarantine policies for returning medical workers like Hickox, was scheduled to arrive in Maine later on Thursday to campaign for Democratic candidates including Mike Michaud, who is trying to unseat LePage in Tuesday’s mid-term elections.

Norman Siegel, one of Hickox’s lawyers, defended her decision to go for a bike ride as a public statement but noted that she avoided the center of town so as not to “freak people out.”

“Since there’s no court order, she can be out in public,” Siegel said. “Even if people disagree with her position, I would hope they respect the fact that she’s taking into account the fear, which is based on misinformation about the way the disease is transmitted.”

Medical professionals say Ebola is difficult to catch and is spread through direct contact with bodily fluids from an infected person and is not transmitted by asymptomatic people. Ebola is not airborne.

Siegel also criticized LePage for stoking fear of Ebola rather than using his office to educate the public about the disease.

“People tell me politics isn’t involved in this?” Siegel said. “Give me a break.”

Concern about Ebola is high in the United States even though there is only one person in the country currently being treated for it, a New York doctor who cared for patients in West Africa. But with elections next Tuesday, Republicans aiming to take full control of the US Congress have made criticism of Obama’s response to Ebola – they call it inept and too weak – a part of their campaign message.

The nurse’s confrontation with Maine officials highlights how states have been struggling to protect their citizens from Ebola without resorting to overzealous, useless precautions or violating civil rights.

Hickox says she is completely healthy and has been monitoring her condition and taking her temperature twice a day.

Hickox tested negative for Ebola after returning from working with the humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders in Sierra Leone, one of the three impoverished countries at the heart of an outbreak that has killed about 5,000 people, all but a handful in West Africa. The disease causes fever, bleeding, vomiting and diarrhea.

Hickox previously blasted New Jersey Governor Chris Christie after she was taken from Newark’s airport and put in quarantine in a tent before being driven to Maine to spend the rest of her 21-day quarantine at home.

Her town is in Maine’s sparsely populated far north, more than 480 km from the state’s largest city, Portland, and further north than Quebec City in neighboring Canada.

‘CLEAR AND CONVINCING EVIDENCE’

Under Maine law, the state health department can seek an emergency court order placing an individual in its custody if it shows a judge “clear and convincing evidence” that the person must be held “to avoid a clear and immediate public health threat.”

If a judge grants the order, the patient is entitled to a hearing within 72 hours, not including weekends, to challenge the ruling.

Some U.S. states have imposed automatic 21-day quarantines on doctors and nurses returning from treating Ebola patients in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea. Obama and other critics say such steps may discourage American doctors and nurses desperately needed in West Africa from volunteering.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announced a program of financial incentives and other employment protections to encourage healthcare professionals to travel to West Africa to fight Ebola.

Cuomo is among the governors who has imposed 21-day quarantines for doctors and nurses returning from the three countries.

U.S. Representative Steve Cohen, a Tennessee Democrat, said the fight over Hickox and the larger battle over isolation policies have deteriorated into political posturing just days ahead of the elections.

“This is strictly driven by politics and fear-mongering,” Cohen told CNN.

By Raheem Salman

Islamic State militants executed at least 220 Iraqis in retaliation against a tribe’s opposition to their takeover of territory west of Baghdad, security sources and witnesses said.

Two mass graves were discovered on Thursday containing some of the 300 members of the Sunni Muslim Albu Nimr tribe that Islamic State had seized this week. The captives, men aged between 18 and 55, had been shot at close range, witnesses said.

The bodies of more than 70 Albu Nimr men were dumped near the town of Hit in the Sunni heartland Anbar province, according to witnesses who said most of the victims were members of the police or an anti-Islamic State militia called Sahwa (Awakening).

“Early this morning we found those corpses and we were told by some Islamic State militants that ‘those people are from Sahwa, who fought your brothers the Islamic State, and this is the punishment of anybody fighting Islamic State’,” a witness said.

The insurgents had ordered men from the tribe to leave their villages and go to Hit, 130 km west of Baghdad, promising them “safe passage”, tribal leaders said. They were then seized and shot.

A mass grave near the city of Ramadi, also in Anbar province, contained 150 members of the same tribe, security officials said.

The Awakening militia were established with the encouragement of the United States to fight al Qaeda during the US “surge” offensive of 2006-2007.

Washington, which no longer has ground forces in Iraq but is providing air support, hopes the government can rebuild the shaky alliance with Sunni tribes, particularly in Anbar which is now mostly under the control of Islamic State, a group that follows an ultra-hardline version of Sunni Islam.

But Sunni tribal leaders complain that Shi’ite Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has failed to deliver on promises of weapons to counter Islamic State’s machineguns, sniper rifles, rocket-propelled grenades and tanks.

Sheikh Naeem al-Ga’oud, one of the leaders of the Albu Nimir tribe, said: “The Americans are all talk and no action.”

Islamic State was on the march in Anbar this year even before it seized much of northern Iraq in June. As the government and fighters from the autonomous Kurdish region have begun to recapture territory in the north, Islamic State has pressed its advances in Anbar, coming ever closer to Baghdad.

REFINERY TOWN

In the north, government forces said they were closing in on the city of Baiji from two sides on Thursday in an attempt to break Islamic State’s siege of Iraq’s biggest oil refinery.

A member of the Iraqi security forces said they might enter the city in the next few hours but he acknowledged that roadside bombs and landmines were slowing the advance.

“Now we are close to the checkpoint of southern Baiji, which means less than 500 metres from the town,” he said, requesting anonymity. “We haven’t seen strong resistance by them (Islamic State) but we are stopping every kilometre to defuse landmines.”

His account could not be independently confirmed.

Islamic State fighters seized Baiji and surrounded the sprawling refinery in June during a lightning offensive through northern Iraq. The group also controls a swathe of territory in neighbouring Syria and has proclaimed a caliphate straddling both countries.

Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga fighters entered the Syrian town of Kobani on Thursday to help efforts to push back Islamic State militants who have besieged the town for the last 40 days.

Islamic State, an al Qaeda offshoot, has beheaded or shot dead anyone it captures who opposes its ideology. Its gunmen systematically executed about 600 inmates from Badoush Prison near the city of Mosul in June, Human Rights Watch said on Thursday.

Citing the accounts of 15 survivors, it said the group singled out Shi’ite prisoners, forced them to kneel along the edge of a nearby ravine and shot them with assault rifles and automatic weapons.

By Ranga Sirilal

Hopes of finding survivors under the mud and rubble of a landslide in Sri Lanka ran out on Thursday, though a government minister cut the estimated death toll to over 100 from 300 the previous night.

“I don’t think there could be any survivors,” Disaster Management Minister Mahinda Amaraweera told Reuters after visiting the disaster site in the tea-plantation village of Haldummulla, 190 km from the capital, Colombo.

“It is about 100 people who have been buried as there were some children and some estate workers who were not at their houses at the time of the disaster,” he added, explaining why the death toll could be lower than feared the day before.

Some uncertainty remained because population data was lost in Wednesday’s landslide, his Disaster Management Centre said.

The centre said 150 houses were buried in the landslide, which stretched 3 km and engulfed the village after days of heavy monsoon rains.

Children who left for school beforehand returned to find their clay and cement houses had been buried. Nearly 500 people, most of them children, spent the night at a nearby school after warnings of further landslides.

President Mahinda Rajapaksa visited the area on Thursday and ordered police to investigate if there had been any negligence by government officials in identifying the risks and informing local people before the disaster.

Dinesh Gunawardena, the government’s chief whip, said the state will take responsibility for 75 children who lost their parents in the landslide.

At the site, hundreds of soldiers and government officials conducted search and clearing operations, using three earth-moving machines that rumbled amid broken trees, blocks of concrete, tin roofing and muddied clothes.

Residents, many of them tea plantation workers, said that in addition to their homes, the area included a playground, a small shopping complex and a Hindu temple.

Many people in the hilly area are of Indian Tamil origin, descendants of workers brought to Sri Lanka under British rule as cheap labour to work on tea, rubber and coffee plantations.

STILL WAITING

In a nearby school, stunned survivors wept.

“I am still waiting for my daughter and her husband,” Ramalingam, 60, said, tears rolling down his cheeks.

“They were at their house in the 10th line and all the houses in that line are buried. Their son is alive because we took him to pre-school yesterday.”

Vansanthi Kumari, a mother of three, lost her six-year-old daughter.

“My daughter and eight-year-old son went together to school. My son survived in a tree, but I’ve lost my daughter,” she wailed. “We have found her body and it is in the hospital. I don’t have a place to keep her body.”

She said authorities had given no warning of a landslide threat though some officials had encouraged her family to leave the area three years ago, but had offered no alternative.

Kelum Senevirathne, a geologist with the National Building Research Organisation, said the area had been identified as landslide-prone and the villagers had been informed.

“Since the disaster, our officers have observed some cracks on the upper side of the land. So there is a risk of further landslides,” Senevirathne told Reuters.

Disaster Minister Amaraweera said villagers had been advised in 2005 and 2012 to move away but many did not listen.

Shanthi Jayasekara, Divisional Secretary of Haldummulla, told Reuters that officials have warned the residents of a possible landslide on Tuesday and the people were preparing to leave the houses after sending their children to school.

“But this has happened just before that,” she said.

There have been a number of landslides since the onset of heavy rains in mid-September resulting in damage to roads, but there had been no casualties until Wednesday.