Tag Archives: killed

At least 19 killed in blast at Ariana Grande concert in British arena

Two women wrapped in thermal blankets stand near the Manchester Arena, where U.S. singer Ariana Grande had been performing, in Manchester, northern England, Britain, May 23, 2017.

By Jon Super

MANCHESTER, England (Reuters) – At least 19 people were killed in a blast at a concert in the English city of Manchester on Monday where U.S. singer Ariana Grande had been performing and two U.S. officials said a suicide bomber was suspected in the explosion.

British police said the incident, in which at least 50 people were injured, was being treated as a terrorist incident.    Police carried out a controlled explosion on a suspect device several hours after the blast.

Police said they responded to reports of an explosion shortly after 10:35 pm (2135 GMT) at the arena, which has a capacity for 21,000 people, and where the U.S. singer had been performing to an audience that included many children.

If confirmed as a terrorism incident, it would be the deadliest attack in Britain by militants since four British Muslims killed 52 people in suicide bombings on London’s transport system in July 2005.

The blast also came two and half weeks ahead of an election in which Prime Minister Theresa May is predicted by opinion polls to win a large majority.

A witness who attended the concert said she felt a huge blast as she was leaving the arena, followed by screaming and a rush by thousands of people trying to escape the building. A video posted on Twitter showed fans, many of them young, running from the venue.

“We were making our way out and when we were right by the door there was a massive explosion and everybody was screaming,” concert-goer Catherine Macfarlane told Reuters.

“It was a huge explosion – you could feel it in your chest. It was chaotic. Everybody was running and screaming and just trying to get out.”

A spokesman for Ariana Grande, 23, said the singer was “okay”.

Manchester Arena, the largest indoor arena in Europe, opened in 1995 and is a popular concert and sporting venue.

Britain is on its second-highest alert level of “severe” meaning an attack by militants is considered highly likely.

British counter-terrorism police have said they are making on average an arrest every day in connection with suspected terrorism.

In March, a British-born convert to Islam plowed a car into pedestrians on London’s Westminster Bridge, killing four people, before stabbing to death a police officer who was on the grounds of parliament. He was shot dead at the scene.

(Reporting by Alistair Smout; Writing by Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Sandra Maler, Toni Reinhold)

U.S. law enforcement line-of-duty deaths hit five-year high in 2016

A Dallas police sergeant wears a mourning band and flower on his badge during a prayer vigil, one day after a lone gunman ambushed and killed five police officers at a protest decrying police shootings of black men, in Dallas, Texas, U.S.,

By Jon Herskovitz

AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) – Law enforcement fatalities hit a five-year high in 2016 with 135 officers killed in the line of duty, including eight killed in ambush attacks in Dallas and Louisiana in July that raised nationwide concerns, a study released on Thursday said.

So far this year, 21 officers were killed in ambush-style attacks, the highest figure in two decades, according to the study from the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund, which tracks data on the incidents.

This included five police officers gunned down in Dallas in July by a deranged U.S. Army Reserve veteran, 25-year-old Micah X. Johnson, who said he aimed to avenge the shootings of black men by police nationwide.

A woman lights a candle at a makeshift memorial at Dallas Police Headquarters,

File Photo: A woman lights a candle at a makeshift memorial at Dallas Police Headquarters, one day after a lone gunman ambushed and killed five police officers at a protest decrying police shootings of black men, in Dallas, Texas, U.S., July 8, 2016. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton/File Photo

“Public safety is a partnership and, too often, the service and sacrifice of our law enforcement professionals is taken for granted,” said Craig Floyd, president of the fund.

Firearms-related incidents were the number one cause of death, with 64 officers fatally shot, the survey said. Traffic-related incidents accounted for 53 deaths.

Among the officers killed were local and state police officers, federal border agents and corrections officers. The study did not break out the number of police officers killed.

The average age of the officers who died on duty this year was 40 and the average length of service was 13 years. Texas had the most fatalities, at 17, followed by California with 10 and Louisiana with 9, including three who were killed in July in Baton Rouge, the survey said.

A black Iraq war veteran fatally shot the three police officers and wounded three others in Baton Rouge in an ambush.

The Dallas and Baton Rouge attacks, less than two weeks apart, followed fatal shootings by police officers of black men in Minnesota and Louisiana.

There were protests nationwide this year over the killings by police of unarmed black men, incidents that raised questions of racial bias in U.S. policing.

The number of officers who died in the line of duty in 2016 was up 10 percent from the previous year of 123, the survey said.

“As we begin the new year, let us all resolve to respect, honor, and remember those who have served us so well and sacrificed so much in the name of public safety,” Floyd said.

(Reporting by Jon Herskovitz; Editing by Leslie Adler)

Boko Haram video claims to show missing Nigerian school girls

A still image from a video posted by Nigerian Islamist militant group Boko Haram on social media,

By Ardo Hazzad

BAUCHI, Nigeria (Reuters) – Nigerian militant group Boko Haram has published a video apparently showing recent footage of dozens of school girls kidnapped two years ago, and saying some of them have been killed in air strikes.

Boko Haram seized more than 270 girls from their school in Chibok, northeast Nigeria, in April 2014, part of a seven-year-old insurgency to set up an Islamic state in the north that has killed some 15,000 people and displaced more than two million.

Dozens of the girls managed to flee to safety in the initial melee, but more than 200 are still missing.

In the video published on social media, which was seen by Reuters on Sunday, a masked man stands behind dozens of girls.

“We want to send this message first to the parents of these girls for them to know that these girls are still with us, some of them, and secondly they should tell the Federal Government of Nigeria, to with immediate effect, release our imprisoned brothers,” the man said.

“Some of the girls, about forty of them with God’s permission have been married, some of them have died as a result of bombing by the infidels,” he said.

One veiled girl could be seen holding a baby. Parents have accused Boko Haram of having married off some of the girls against their will.

At the end of the video unidentified bodies could be seen on the ground.

“Military jets have killed some of the girls,” said one of the girls, who was identified by her father, Yakubu Kabu, as his daughter called Dorcas.

“When I heard her voice, I realize she is my daughter,” he told reporters in Abuja. “we are pleading with the government to help…The children are suffering. Some of them could be very sick‎.”

Information Minister Lai Mohammed said in a statement the government “was on top of the situation” to free the girls.

“Since this is not the first time we have been contacted over the issue, we want to be doubly sure that those we are in touch with are who they claim to be,” he said.

Army spokesman Rabe Abubakar was quoted as saying by PR Nigeria, an official government agency, that the military disputed the claims that the air force had hit the girls.

“We are nevertheless studying the video clips to examine if the victims died from other causes rather (than) from the allegation of airstrike,” he said.

Authorities said in May that one of the missing girls had been found and President Muhammadu Buhari vowed to rescue the others.

Boko Haram, which last year pledged loyalty to the militant group Islamic State, has kidnapped hundreds of men, women and children.

Under Buhari’s command and aided by Nigeria’s neighbors, the army has recaptured most territory once lost to Boko Haram, but the group still regularly stages suicide bombings.

Boko Haram has apparently split with Islamic State naming Abu Musab al-Barnawi two weeks ago as the group’s leader for West Africa in a two-page interview in its weekly magazine.

But the previous figurehead Abubakar Shekau appears to have rejected the new role in another video published after Barnawi’s appointment.

(Reporting by Camillus Eboh, Sharon Ogunleye, Ardo Hazzad, Felix Onuah and Ulf Laessing; Editing by Helen Popper and Stephen Powell)