Monday, December 2, 2013

Police in the West Midlands in England today said nearly 200 kilograms worth of drugs with value possibly as great as £30 million (about US$49 million or €36 million) has been seized from a unit in the town of Brownhills. In what an officer described as “one of the largest [seizures] in the force’s 39 year history”, West Midlands Police reported recovering six big cellophane-wrapped cardboard boxes containing cannabis, cocaine, and MDMA (“ecstasy”) in a police raid operation on the Maybrook Industrial Estate in the town on Wednesday.

The seized boxes, which had been loaded onto five freight pallets, contained 120 one-kilogram bags of cannabis, 50 one-kilogram bags of MDMA, and five one-kilogram bricks of cocaine. In a press release, West Midlands Police described what happened after officers found the drugs as they were being unloaded in the operation. “When officers opened the boxes they discovered a deep layer of protective foam chips beneath which the drugs were carefully layered”, the force said. “All the drugs were wrapped in thick plastic bags taped closed with the cannabis vacuum packed to prevent its distinctive pungent aroma from drawing unwanted attention.” Police moved the drugs via forklift truck to a flatbed lorry to remove them.

Detective Sergeant Carl Russell of West Midlands Police’s Force CID said the seizure was the largest he had ever made in the 24 years he has been in West Midlands Police and one of the biggest seizures the force has made since its formation in 1974. “The impact this seizure will have on drug dealing in the region and the UK as a whole cannot be underestimated”, he said. “The drugs had almost certainly been packed to order ready for shipping within Britain but possibly even further afield. Our operation will have a national effect and we are working closely with a range of law enforcement agencies to identify those involved in this crime at whatever level.”

Expert testing on the drugs is ongoing. Estimates described as “conservative” suggest the value of the drugs amounts to £10 million (about US$16.4 million or €12 million), although they could be worth as much as £30 million, subject to purity tests, police said.

Police arrested three men at the unit on suspicion of supplying a controlled drug. The men, a 50-year-old from Brownhills, a 51-year-old from the Norton area of Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire, and one aged 53 from Brownhills, have been released on bail as police investigations to “hunt those responsible” continue. West Midlands Police told Wikinews no person has yet been charged in connection with the seizure. Supplying a controlled drug is an imprisonable offence in England, although length of jail sentences vary according to the class and quantity of drugs and the significance of offenders’ roles in committing the crime.

Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Vietnamese officials have reported that at least 22 people were killed by Typhoon Ketsana, which brought torrential rainfalls and heavy flooding to the central areas of the country.

“According to our official count as of Tuesday afternoon from the local authorities, the typhoon killed 22 people,” said an unnamed official from the country’s national flood and storm committee.

170,000 people were evacuated ahead of the typhoon, which brought peak winds of 90 miles per hour (144 kilometres per hour). Typhoon Ketsana had earlier battered the Philippines, killing over two hundred people there.

Ketsana made landfall in the afternoon on Tuesday, 37 miles south of Danang, the National Weather Center reported.

Flights departing and arriving at the Hue and Danang airports were cancelled due to inclement weather, and fishing boats were ordered to return to shore.

Several of the casualties from the storm were due to falling trees and power lines. Truong Ngoc Nhi, the vice governor of the Quang Ngai province, south of Danang, said that “there’s a blackout across our entire province. Streets are strewn with fallen trees and utility poles. It looks like a battlefield.”

Provincial disaster official Nhuyen Minh Tuan said that “the rivers are rising and many homes are flooded, and several mountainous districts have been isolated by mudslides.”

Tuesday, April 27, 2021

On Saturday, the Indonesian Navy announced its submarine KRI Nanggala 402, which had lost contact early morning 4:30 am local time on Wednesday, had sunk and cracked off in the Bali Strait during a training exercise. The Navy also declared the submarine’s crew of 53 dead, and said the wreckage was found.

According to Air Marshall Hadi Tjahjanto, pictures received were of the parts of the submarine such as the rear vertical rudder, anchors, outer pressure body, and embossed dive rudder.

The Navy stated on Saturday, the submarine was now considered sunk, not merely missing, having previously said that the oxygen supply would have run out by Saturday morning.

Per reports, items were found from the submarine that included a bottle of grease, prayer mats and a piece of metal pipe. The ones found near the last location of the submarine were parts of the submarine itself, and would not have gotten out unless there was water pressure, Tjahjanto said.

Tjahjanto also said there was an oil spill in the area and the debris were indications the submarine had a leakage due to diving too deep, or released the oil while rising to the surface.

The search team focused on determining the exact location of the submarine, but authorities warned it would be hard to do any salvage operation because of the deep waters.

The Singapore Navy’s MV Swift Rescue submarine rescue ship helped in the effort and deployed a robot which took the images. Other countries including Malaysia, the United States, India and Australia aided search for potential rescue. KRI Rigel, an Indonesian ship, scanned the area where the submarine was presumed to have sunk using multi-beam sonar and a magnetometer.

According to military chief Yudo Margono, the scan determined the submarine to be at a depth of 850 metres. According to Al Jazeera, it was well below its survivable limit of 500 metres. “The cracks happened gradually in some parts when it went down”, Margono said.

Sunday, May 18, 2008

An HIV-positive man was sentenced to 35 years in prison Wednesday, one day after being convicted of harassment of a public servant for spitting into the eye and open mouth of a Dallas, Texas police officer in May 2006. The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says that no one has ever contracted HIV from saliva, and a gay-rights and AIDS advocacy group called the sentence excessive.

A Dallas County jury concluded that Willie Campbell’s act of spitting on policeman Dan Waller in 2006 constituted the use of his saliva as a deadly weapon. The incident occurred while Campbell, 42, was resisting arrest while being taken into custody for public intoxication.

“He turns and spits. He hits me in the eye and mouth. Then he told me he has AIDS. I immediately began looking for something to flush my eyes with,” said Waller to The Dallas Morning News.

Officer Waller responded after a bystander reported seeing an unconscious male lying outside a building. Dallas County prosecutors stated that Campbell attempted to fight paramedics and kicked the police officer who arrested him for public intoxication.

Prosecutors said that Campbell yelled that he was innocent during the trial, and claimed a police officer was lying. Campbell’s lawyer Russell Heinrichs said that because he had a history of convictions including similarly attacking two other police officers, biting inmates, and other offenses, he was indicted under a habitual offender statute. The statute increased his minimum sentence to 25 years in prison. Because the jury ruled that Campbell’s saliva was used as a deadly weapon, he will not be eligible for parole until completing at least half his sentence.

The organization Lambda Legal (Lambda Legal Defense and Education Fund), which advocates for individuals living with HIV, says that saliva should not be considered a deadly weapon. Bebe Anderson, the HIV projects director at Lambda Legal, spoke with The Dallas Morning News about the sentence. “It’s been 25 years since the virus was identified, but there are still lots of fears,” said Anderson.

The Dallas County prosecutor who handled the trial, Jenni Morse, said that the deadly weapon finding was justified. “No matter how minuscule, there is some risk. That means there is the possibility of causing serious bodily injury or death,” said Morse. Dallas County District Attorney Craig Watkins stated: “If you look at the facts of this case, it was clear that the defendant intended to cause serious bodily injury.”

A page at the CDC’s website, HIV and Its Transmission, states: “HIV has been found in saliva and tears in very low quantities from some AIDS patients.” The subsection “Saliva, Tears, and Sweat” concludes that: “Contact with saliva, tears, or sweat has never been shown to result in transmission of HIV.” On Friday the Dallas County Health Department released a statement explaining that HIV is most commonly spread through sexual contact, sharing needles, or transfusion from an infected blood product.

Thursday, September 16, 2010

A man shot a faculty physician as well as his own mother before killing himself at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. The shooting occurred on the eighth floor of the Nelson Building, the hospital’s main building. Baltimore police found the suspected shooter, who had been barricaded inside his mother’s hospital room for several hours before killing himself and his mother.

At around 11:15 a.m. EDT (1515 UTC), an unnamed doctor was shot in the chest at a patient area of the Nelson Building’s thoracic center. All major hospital facilities were placed under a lockdown, and some medical personnel were evacuated from the Nelson Building. The doctor was sent to surgery at the hospital, and police spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi said that the doctor will likely survive the incident. He was not aware of any connections between the suspect and the doctor, who was in critical condition.

A nurse at the hospital told The Baltimore Sun that the shooter was dissatisfied with how his mother had been treated and even said that he was going to jump out of a window. The nurse said that, upon hearing gunshots, she ran.

Earlier, Baltimore area police said that they were “in the process of a tactical operation” to capture the gunman, who was holed up on the eighth floor. A spokesperson for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) said that it had been assisting local police in the incident. A Johns Hopkins spokesperson had previously said that authorities had taken the shooter into custody, but police said that the report was incorrect.

The suspect, who had not taken any hostages, was described as a black man in his thirties. After a standoff lasting for three hours, law enforcement officers moved into his mother’s hospital room, and found both him and his mother dead from gunshot wounds to their heads. The suspect was first identified as 50-year-old Warren Davis, and his mother as Jean Davis. Police later said that “Warren Davis” was an alias and that his real name was not known.

Baltimore Police Commissioner Frederick Bealefeld, who said that the department is “treating this case as a murder-suicide,” said that no officers reported hearing the shots that killed the two. Police had previously said that the gunman had been shot and killed by police, but police later said that that report was incorrect.

Tuesday, September 26, 2006

Safia Ahmed-jan, the director of the Afghan Ministry of Women’s Affairs for the Khandahar province and an advocate of women’s rights and a strong critic of the Taliban‘s repression of those rights, was shot dead by unidentified gunmen outside her home in Khandahar city in southern Afghanistan on Monday.

Safia Ama-jan, as she was known locally, is the first woman official to be targeted by the Taliban-led insurgency since it was deposed in 2001.

Safia Ahmed-jan taught at a girls’ school and was a high-school principal in Khandahar prior to the Taliban’s 1996 rise to power in Afghanistan. When the Taliban regime banned education for girls and forbade women from working outside the home, she ran an underground school for girls at her home, said her son Naqibullah, speaking to the Associated Press.

After the Taliban government was overthrown in 2001, Ahmed-jan became the provincial chief for women’s affairs in 2002, when the ministry was established and has since then held that position, worked for women’s rights and particularly, championed the cause of educating girls. Her secretary, Abdullah Khan told Associated Press that among her most successful projects were the vocational training schools she opened in Khandahar, where almost 1000 women were taught baking, tailoring and other skills.

Ahmed-jan has also been fiercely critical of the repression of women during the Taliban rule, in a region that has remained conservative and emerged as a hotbed of the Taliban’s insurgent activity. Her requests for personal security guards and transport went unheeded by the government, according to local media reports, though her nephew, Muhammad Asif told the New York Times that Ahmed-jan preferred to keep a low profile and used a taxi or public transport even though her office maintained cars and drivers.

Ahmed-jan was shot dead outside her house at about 7:30 a.m. local time (UTC+4:30) on Monday, as she left for work in a taxi. The gunmen are believed to have left scene on a motorcycle, and tyre marks have been found by the police, said the provincial governor Asadullah Khaled, who visited the scene of the attack.

Ahmed-jan was shot four times with a pistol, Muhammad Haidar, who worked in her office told the New York Times. Mohammad Nader, the head nurse at Khandahar’s main hospital where Ahmed-jan was taken to, confirmed to the Chicago Tribune that she was shot four times, including once in the head.

She was about 65 years old.

Accounts of the shooting are sketchy, several reports suggesting no one witnessed it. However, one man, identified as Allaudin told Al Jazeera that he saw two men on motorcycles waiting on the road, who attacked Ahmed-jan as she left her house.

A spokesman for the Khandahar governor, Daud Ahmadi confirmed the death and said that Ahmed-jan had died on the spot. An investigation into the attack has begun, and local officials have blamed the Taliban.

Hundreds of men and women, including the Governor Asadullah Khaled were present at Ahmed-jan’s funeral on Monday evening, which took place in Khandahar’s main Shia mosque.

The killing has been strongly condemned by the Afghan President Hamid Karzai as well as aid and human rights organisations in Afghanistan.

Aleem Siddique, a spokesman for the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), said that UNAMA was “appalled at the senseless murder” of a woman who was working to ensure a full and equal part in the future of Afghanistan for its women. He added, “We share the sentiment of the majority of Afghan people who are appalled at this killing.”

Abdul Quadar Noorzai, head of the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC) for the Khandahar region told IRIN News that Ahmed-jan’s death will have a “serious impact on women’s activities in the south where women are already suffering from … the deteriorating security and conservative traditions,”.

Fariba Ahmedi, a woman MP from Khandahar who was present at Ahmed-jan’s funeral told the Associated Press, “The enemy of Afghanistan killed her, but they should know it will not derail women from the path we are on. We will continue on our way,”.

Sonja Bachmann, a U.N. political officer who knew Ahmed-jan well told the New York Times that Ahmed-jan “did a good job, she worked in a very low-key way and worked hard to raise awareness about women’s issues.”

Reuters and Associated Press received phone calls, claiming responsibility for the attacks on behalf of Mullah Sadullah, a regional Taliban commander, but no confirmation of the claim has been possible.

Another caller, who identified himself as Taliban commander Mullah Hayat Khan told Al Jazeera that Ahmed-jan was killed because she worked for the government.

The Taliban-led insurgency has stepped up attacks in recent months, killing hundreds of people this year.

Last week, 19 Afghans working for reconstruction projects in the region were killed after their bus was ambushed.The Governor of Paktia province, a close associate of President Karzai, was killed in a suicide bombing on September 10.

Attacks on schools have also been stepped up. According to the Afghan education ministry, there have been 158 attacks on schools this year, compared to 146 last year. The attacks on schools are believed to be due partly to the Taliban’s opposition to educating girls, as well as a way to undermine the Afghan government and it’s reconstruction efforts.

Twelve suspected militants and two Afghan police officers were reported killed on Monday in separate incidents which also left eight others and a U.S. soldier wounded.

“People are scared, of course,” Ahmad-jan’s co-worker Haidar said, “How can we feel secure when the head of our department is killed in front of her house?”

Thursday, August 16, 2007

The name Robert Cailliau may not ring a bell to the general public, but his invention is the reason why you are reading this: Dr. Cailliau together with his colleague Sir Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web, making the internet accessible so it could grow from an academic tool to a mass communication medium. Last January Dr. Cailliau retired from CERN, the European particle physics lab where the WWW emerged.

Wikinews offered the engineer a virtual beer from his native country Belgium, and conducted an e-mail interview with him (which started about three weeks ago) about the history and the future of the web and his life and work.

Wikinews: At the start of this interview, we would like to offer you a fresh pint on a terrace, but since this is an e-mail interview, we will limit ourselves to a virtual beer, which you can enjoy here.

Robert Cailliau: Yes, I myself once (at the 2nd international WWW Conference, Chicago) said that there is no such thing as a virtual beer: people will still want to sit together. Anyway, here we go.