Syria ( More than " 100 died of starvation" in 2013 )

DAMASCUS, Syria: The chief of the United Nations relief agency supporting Palestinian refugees said Tuesday he is “deeply disturbed and shaken” by the despair and destruction he’d seen in a besieged camp in the Syrian capital.
The Yarmouk refugee camp, located in southern Damascus, is an opposition enclave under the tight blockade of forces loyal to President Bashar Assad. More than 100 people have died in Yarmouk since mid-2013 as a result of starvation and illnesses exacerbated by hunger or lack of medical aid, according to UN figures.



                                        (  Baby who died of hunger )

Filippo Grandi, the Commissioner General of UNRWA, was visiting Yarmouk as the relief agency resumed food distribution there. UNRWA shipments to the camp have been disrupted for months, sometimes cut off for weeks at a time, and Yarmouk has suffered from crippling shortages of food and medicine.
“I am deeply disturbed and shaken by what I observed,” Grandi said in a statement. Palestinian refugees to whom he spoke in Yarmouk Monday were “traumatized by what they have lived through.”
The extent of damage to the refugees’ homes was shocking, he also said, adding that many Palestinians in Yarmouk need immediate support, particularly food and medical treatment.
Yarmouk is the largest of nine Palestinian camps in Syria. Since the camp’s creation in 1957, it has evolved into a densely populated residential district just five miles (eight kilometers) from the center of Damascus. Several generations of Palestinian refugees have lived there.
About half of the camp’s 150,000 residents have fled since fighting erupted in mid-December 2012, according to estimates of UNRWA, which administers Palestinian camps in the Middle East. Some sought refuge in neighboring Lebanon, and others found shelter in UNRWA schools in Damascus and other Syrian cities.
When the uprising against Assad erupted in March 2011, most Palestinians stayed on the sidelines. As the revolt turned into a civil war that reached Yarmouk in December 2012, most residents backed the rebels and some even took up arms to fight Assad’s troops and pro-government Palestinian fighters.
Also on Tuesday, the leader of a powerful Al-Qaeda-linked jihadi group in Syria gave a rival Al-Qaeda breakaway group a five-day ultimatum to seek arbitration by leading clerics or be expelled from the region.
Abu Mohammed Al-Golani, leader of the Nusra Front, warned the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant that it would be driven both from Syria and “even from Iraq” if it rejected the results of arbitration “under God’s law.”
The threat came in an audio message produced by the Nusra Front media arm Al-Manara Al-Baydha and was posted on militant websites Tuesday.
Al-Golani’s ultimatum came two days after the killing of Abu Khaled Al-Suri who acts as Al-Qaeda chief Ayman Al-Zawahri’s representative in Syria. He was believed to be assassinated by two ISIL suicide bombers.

Whale News ( Girl gets " Slapped in the face by whale " ) Lol

Mexico ( Police Arrest 26 on Kidnapping Charges, Free 4 Captives in Mexico )

 

MEXICO CITY – The Federal Police arrested 26 people on kidnapping charges and freed four captives in operations carried out in three Mexican states, the Mexican National Security Commission said Tuesday.

Eleven suspected kidnappers were arrested in Mexico state, which surrounds the Federal District and forms part of the Mexico City metropolitan area, and a person kidnapped on Feb. 18 in Morelos state was freed, the commission said in a statement.

Federal Police officers arrested four people, including a Peruvian woman, and freed a captive during a raid on a house on the east side of Mexico City.

Officers seized two vehicles, 37 cell phones, clothing with police logos and other gear from the suspects, the commission said.

Five people linked to at least 10 kidnapping cases in the capital and Mexico state were arrested by the Federal Police.

Two vehicles, two firearms, 14 cell phones, documents and other items were seized from the suspects.

“Six suspected kidnappers were arrested and two victims were rescued” in the southeastern state of Tabasco, the National Security Commission said.

President Enrique Peña Nieto’s administration implemented a strategy in late January for fighting kidnapping, a crime that has been rising in recent months.

A total of 1,695 kidnappings were reported in Mexico last year, up 20 percent from the 2012 level, National Public Safety System figures show.

An unknown number of kidnappings, however, are never reported in Mexico.

Syria ( Syrian woman " Saves another woman " shot by Sniper ) Video

MOSCOW ( Russian riot police detained over a hundred protesters on Monday )

MOSCOW: Russian riot police detained over a hundred protesters on Monday at a Moscow courthouse where seven opponents of President Vladimir Putin were jailed from two and a half to four years over a demonstration that turned violent.


The protesters, who blame police for the violence in central Moscow in 2012, demanded the release of the defendants and shouted “shame” and “Maidan” — a reference to the Kiev square that has been the focus of protests that brought the overthrow of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich.
Among those detained were two members of the punk protest band Pussy Riot, released in December near the end of two-year sentences for their own anti-Putin protest in Moscow’s main cathedral in 2012. Alexei Navalny, who emerged from a wave of protests that year as the top opposition leader, was also held.
Relatives and lawyers of the seven said they believed the upheaval in neighboring Ukraine, where police were among the dead in a conflict the Kremlin blames on opposition leaders and the West, had prompted the court to impose prison sentences as a signal that such actions would not be tolerated in Russia.
A Russian state TV news show host linked the trial with the events in Ukraine in a broadcast on Sunday, saying the bloodshed that killed at least 82 people in Kiev last week had started with actions similar to the 2012 anti-Putin protest.
Defense lawyer Dmitry Agranovsky said he would appeal his client Yaroslav Belousov’s two-and-a-half-year prison sentence.
“These sentences are cruel and wrong. They were handed down because of the political situation...We hope our appeal will show that they made a mistake and the defendants won’t have to answer for the Maidan.” An eighth defendant was given a suspended sentence that allows her to avoid jail, but the rulings caused outrage among Kremlin critics who see the prisoners as victims of a clampdown on dissent during Putin’s third term as president.
Opposition activists said more than 230 people were detained by riot police grabbing protesters and dragging them to waiting buses. Police put the figure at more than 100.
The judge on Friday had found the defendants guilty of rioting and attacking police at a protest on May 6, 2012, the day before Putin, in power since 2000, returned to the presidency after a stint as prime minister.
The defendants — seven men and a woman, most of them in their 20s — blame police for the clashes that erupted and pleaded not guilty. The men have been in custody since 2012.

Pakistan ( Taliban rejected an offer to swap their guns for cricket bats and play a match )

MIRANSHAH: The Pakistani Taleban on Monday rejected an offer to swap their guns for cricket bats and play a match for peace, saying the sport was responsible for turning youth away from jihad.
The militant group were responding to a call made earlier in the day by a top Pakistani minister who offered to host a match with the militants to revive stalled peace talks in comments which provoked derision on social media.


Pakistan’s government entered into a formal dialogue with the Taleban earlier this month, but the process faltered after the militants executed 23 kidnapped soldiers.
The military has retaliated with a series of airstrikes in the tribal areas that border Afghanistan and are home to the Taleban’s top leadership, killing dozens.
With talks on a sticky wicket, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan said Monday that cricket could offer hope.
“I have information that the Taleban keep an interest in cricket. So if this message can go through to them, we can have a cricket match with them which can have a better result,” he told reporters in Islamabad following an exhibition game. “The Taleban follow the Pakistan cricket team with keen interest so this can be a platform.”
But speaking to AFP by telephone from an undisclosed location, Taleban spokesman Shahidullah Shahid said his group would refuse to play ball. “These secular people want to distance our youth from jihad and Islamic teachings through cricket. We are strongly against cricket and dislike it,” he said.
Reaction to the minister’s suggestion that the Taleban could be tempted into talks through cricket was also overwhelmingly negative on Twitter, which is used mainly by the country’s English-speaking elite. In a reference to bloody toll inflicted by the Taleban on Pakistan’s forces over the years, one user called @MidhatZ, said: “Cricket on a red pitch and may be they could bowl with our soldiers heads?”
Another user, @kursed suggested the minister “should invite the families of those beheaded” by the Taleban to the match.
Meanwhile, unknown gunmen killed a senior commander of the Pakistani Taleban who had a government bounty on his head on Monday.
Asmatullah Shaheen, who was believed to be in his mid-40s and was a former interim chief of Pakistan’s Taleban, had a ($95,000) bounty payable for his death.
“Unknown attackers opened fire on Asmatullah Shaheen’s car. He along with three associates died on the spot,” a security official in Miranshah told AFP on condition of anonymity.

Morocco ( A Snake Charmer in Marrakech Dies from Snakebite )

Saturday 22 February 2014 - 13:30             

          

Casablanca- Snakes are bewitching creatures to watch, but they can also be the cause of unforeseen tragedies. A snake charmer in Marrakech lost his life on Friday after he was bitten by one of his snakes.

A Moroccan snake charmer lost his life last Friday in Marrakech at Mamounia Hospital after he was bitten by a snake he was charming in the red city’s famous Jama El Fna Square.

The snake charmer had reportedly attempted to save himself traditionally by just trying to suck the poison out of his vein using his mouth. That method did not work eventually.

As the snake charmer felt acute dizziness, he asked his friend to take him on his motorcycle to Mamounia Hospital, where he died afterwards.

Trusted sources from Jama El Fna told MWN that the performer’s body would be autopsied to verify the cause of his death.

The sad incident has stirred a debate among Marrakech residents, as well as Moroccans from other cities who visit Jamaa El Fna especially to enjoy the memorizing performances of snake charmers.

To what extent are safety standards respected by all performers in Jamaa El Fnaa? Can we still enjoy traditional performances there without recalling incidents like these?

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