© Flickr/ UNAMID
Al Bangura, 27, who played for Watford, described how he left his home in Sierra Leone at the age of 14 after refusing to become the leader of a secret society previously headed by his late father.
Society's Child
Al Bangura, 27, who played for Watford, described how he left his home in Sierra Leone at the age of 14 after refusing to become the leader of a secret society previously headed by his late father.
Speaking to reporters in Cairo by video conference, the UN's humanitarian coordinator for Yemen Johannes Van Der Klauww said that 830 of the dead were women and children. UN officials had earlier put the total number of civilians killed at more than 2,600.
As the death toll in the conflict pitting Saudi-led coalition forces against Shia Houthi rebels and their allies continues to rise, humanitarian conditions have only grown more dire, said the coordinator. 21.2 million people in the country - 82 percent of its entire population - are in need of some sort of humanitarian assistance.
"We currently estimate that over 14 million people lack sufficient access to healthcare," said Van Der Klauww. "3 million children and pregnant or lactating women require malnutrition treatment or preventative services and 1.8 million children have been out of school since mid-March."
320,000 children, he added, were acutely malnourished.
The UN's special envoy for Yemen, Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed, has announced that peace talks will take place in the coming weeks, but observers of Yemeni affairs regard the talks with skepticism. Meanwhile, fighting continues to rage, with neither side able to make a decisive breakthrough.
© cnn.com
Elise Labott
Elise Labott
Elise Labott, a CNN global affairs correspondent tweeted: "House passes bill that could limit Syrian refugees. Statue of Liberty bows head in anguish," upon learning that the House of Representatives had voted 289-137, with 47 Democrats joining 242 Republicans in suspending a program that would allow Syrian and Iraqi refugees into the US, until American security agencies find that they would not pose a security risk.
Hours after publishing the tweet, Labott issued an apology. "Everyone, It was wrong of me to editorialize. My tweet was inappropriate and disrespectful. I sincerely apologize," she wrote on Twitter.
CNN Worldwide President Jeff Zucker had previously mentioned that it was imperative that the channel should maintain a balanced viewpoint when reporting the news and that it should not appear to be biased.
Comment: CNN is setting an example by suspending her. Journalists have to take notice, if you have an opinion that goes against the US government's then you will be punished for expressing it. This isn't about remaining objective or being fair and balanced, it's about not saying anything that goes against the government's narratives. They don't want critical thinking journalists, they want sycophants and yes men who don't think for themselves.
© AP Photo
1:20 p.m.
French authorities say police have conducted 793 raids since last week's attacks on a rock concert, Parisian cafes and the national stadium. The new tally was announced Friday by the Interior Ministry. Last night alone, police reported performing 182 raids, detaining 17 people, and seizing 76 weapons plus drugs. After five nights of raids, authorities says police have detained 90 people and seized 174 weapons, including 18 military-style firearms, 84 rifles and 68 handguns.
In addition, 164 people have been placed under house arrest with new powers permitted under France's state of emergency. Police also seized 250,000 euros. The Senate is expected to vote Friday afternoon to extend the state of emergency for three more months.
Comment: France is clearly under siege by perverse and dangerous forces that can have dire consequences for those within the country and for all of Europe.
© Anonymous/Youtube
While Russia, French and US bombers are targeting Islamic State (formerly ISIS/ISIL) positions from the sky, Anonymous are carrying out their very own devastating campaign against the terrorist organization. They are using computer code rather than high-powered weapons and say the hacktivist group has built tools that "might be better than any world government's tools to combat ISIS online."
In a YouTube post on Wednesday, the group said: "More than 20,000 Twitter accounts belonging to ISIS were taken down by Anonymous." It added that they had provided a list of all the accounts that have been taken down. On Tuesday, the group had removed 5,500 ISIS accounts from the internet.
Comment: It's thoroughly laughable that with the advanced capabilities of the NSA, the FBI and the CIA we need Anonymous to do their job for them.
© Green Apple / YouTube
Comment: Wouldn't ya know it, French authorities are now saying Hasna was NOT the suicide bomber. We are not surprised.
French police continued to negotiate with Hasna Aitboulahcen, the peroxide-blonde 26-year-old would-be jihadist, until she detonated herself with a force so powerful it blew her head off and into the street, an amateur recording and a police account revealed.
As scores of France's RAID special police unit surrounded the house in the Paris suburb of Saint-Denis at dawn on Wednesday, Aitboulahcen was alongside her cousin Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the suspected mastermind behind last Friday's Paris attacks, which killed more than 130 people.
Comment: This woman has an interesting background that does not appear to fit the stereotype of a devout radical, but closely resembles that of the other Paris attackers. A French citizen and drug dealer known to police, we are told that just one month ago she converted to Islam.
© AP
Twenty guests, including three United Nations personnel workers, have been released, Olivier Salgado, a spokesman for the U.N. mission to Mali, told "Good Morning America" today.Salgado said a military operation was ongoing. Five crew members from Turkish Airlines have also been released, a company spokesman said.
"What I know is three people stormed the hotel with AK47s around 7 a.m. this morning," Salgado said. "Of course, immediately, the security forces from Mali were deployed around the hotel."
A screen capture of the bomb threat
The unnamed male teen from Mason, who admitted to making the bogus threat on social media to detectives and agents, was arrested on Thursday. The teen's parents cooperated with officials to confirm that there were no weapons or explosives in the home, according to the Jackson Sun. The teen is an 8th grader at Bright Middle School and is currently attending classes at Tipton County Alternative Learning Center, according to the Tipton County Sheriff's Office.
© Greg Pender, StarPhoenix
Brenda Pelletier (left) and Tracy Bannab
Brenda Pelletier (left) and Tracy Bannab
"They made it pretty clear they didn't want me discharged until my tubes were tied," said Brenda Pelletier, who had the procedure at Royal University Hospital in 2010.
"They bug you and bug you and bug you."
Pelletier, now 39, had just given birth to her seventh child when the hospital social worker came to her room and asked her to sign a consent form to have the procedure. She refused.
Her mother was raising her six older children in another community. Pelletier, who was and is a recovering addict in the methadone program and committed to a healthy life, was determined to raise her daughter herself.
© Nigel Roddis/Reuters
According to the report, which was published Thursday, Britain also suffers from huge levels of wealth inequality, with 9 percent of households having no assets at all while 5 percent are worth more than £1.2 million.
Those on the lowest incomes, the poorest 1 percent, have negative net wealth of £16,000, meaning their debts are higher than any assets they own.
Meanwhile the richest Brits, constituting the top 1 percent, have assets worth over £2.4 million. The report found that seven out of 10 households own their home outright or had secured them with a mortgage, while three out of 10 live in rented property.
Comment: The social contract has been broken by greedy psychopaths, for whom there is never enough.
- The impossibility of working your way through college
- Starving college students see the ugly truth behind the meritocratic social contract
- Greedy overlords: Over $41bn in student loan profits for US government
- Congress to double student loan interest rates
Comment: Given the Saudi support for the maniacal ISIL and Al Nusra in Syria, is it any surprise they are equally ruthless in a war they are directly prosecuting? It is astonishing that Saudi Arabia heads the UN 'human rights' council.