Uprooted by Brazil floods, foreign refugees start all over again”
Porto Alegre, Brazil Reuters Tens of thousands of Haitians and Venezuelans who found refuge in southern Brazil after escaping hunger, violence and natural disasters are being forced once more to rebuild lives now wrecked by record flooding in Rio Grande do Sul state. Reginald Descilong left Haiti after he lost family and friends in the […]
Anger, anxiety, acrimony: Slovaks weigh what led to Fico shooting
Hanlova/Bratislava, Slovakia Reuters Slovak opposition party leader Michal Simecka, who described an assassination attempt on Prime Minister Robert Fico this week as an attack on democracy, said on Friday he that his wife and child had received death threats. His experience is not uncommon, a measure of the extreme political and personal animosities in Slovakia […]
Thousands mark Family Purity in Georgia as anti-government protests simmer
Tbilisi, Georgia Reuters Thousands of Georgians led by Orthodox Christian clerics marked “Family Purity Day” on Friday, marching down the same central avenue in Tbilisi that has been the scene of some of the fiercest anti-government protests in the country’s history. The contrasting groups staging the marches – pro-Orthodox and conservative on one side and […]
Four deaths confirmed from severe storm that ravaged Houston
Reuters A severe storm packing hurricane-force winds pummelled Houston on Thursday, killing at least four people, blowing windows out of high-rise buildings and leaving some 800,000 homes without power as much of the city was plunged into darkness, the Mayor said. Much of downtown Houston and its commercial district were littered with fallen power lines […]
Kenyan floods: Churches step in to help survivors amid “massive” displacement
TONNY ONYULO reports from Kenya on the devastating impact of floods and how churches are helping in the aftermath…
Vatican issues new norms to rein in supernatural phenomena
Vatican City RNS Weeping Madonnas, bleeding hosts and saintly apparitions will have to be approved by the Vatican’s doctrinal office, according to a new document issued by the same office on Friday, at a time when social media spreads reports of supernatural occurrences well beyond diocesan borders and away from church oversight. The new norms […]
Hundreds more French police start deploying to secure New Caledonia
Sydney, Australia/Paris, France Reuters French police reinforcements began arriving in New Caledonia on Friday in a massive push to regain control of the capital, the top French official in the Pacific island territory said, after rioting in which four people were killed and hundreds arrested. After three nights of upheaval, Thursday night was relatively quiet […]
Fierce fighting in northern Gaza as aid starts to roll off US-built pier
Cairo, Egypt Reuters Israeli forces battled Hamas fighters in the narrow alleyways of Jabalia in northern Gaza on Friday in some of the fiercest engagements since they returned to the area a week ago, while in the south militants attacked tanks massing around Rafah. Residents said Israeli armour had thrust as far as the market […]
Updated: Ukraine braces for “heavy battles” as Putin says Russia carving out Kharkiv buffer zone
Updated: 10am (AEST) Kyiv, Ukraine Reuters Ukraine’s top commander warned on Friday of “heavy battles” looming on the war’s new front in the northeastern Kharkiv region as Russian President Vladimir Putin said Moscow was carving out a “buffer zone” in the area. Russian forces attacked the Kharkiv region’s north last Friday, making inroads of up […]