Briefly

FRANCE

Knifeman kills two during lockdown

A man wielding a knife attacked residents of a French town while they ventured out to shop amid a nationwide coronavirus lockdown on Saturday, killing two people and wounding five others in an act that led authorities to open a terrorism inquiry. France's counterterrorism prosecutor's office said the assailant was arrested near the scene of the attack in the town of Romanssur-Isere, south of Lyon. Prosecutors did not identify the suspect. They said he had no identifying documents but claimed to be Sudanese and to have been born in 1987. Another man stabbed one person fatally and wounded two others in Paris suburb two days earlier.

SAUDI ARABIA

Meeting delayed as oil price row continues

Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and Russia have postponed a Monday online meeting to discuss oil output cuts until Thursday, as a dispute between Russia and Saudi Arabia over who is to blame for plunging crude prices intensified, sources said on Sunday. Oil prices hit an 18-year low on March 30 due to a slump in demand caused by lockdowns to contain the coronavirus outbreak and the failure of OPEC and other producers to extend a deal on output curbs that expired on March 31. OPEC is working on a deal to cut the production of oil equivalent by about 10% of world supply, or 10 million barrels per day.

MEXICO

19 killed in shootout in northern state

At least 19 people have died in a shootout between suspected gangsters in the northern Mexico state of Chihuahua, local authorities said on Saturday, in one of the worst outbreaks of gang violence to hit the country this year. Security forces found eighteen bodies on Friday evening at the site of the gunfight in the municipality of Madera, and a wounded man picked up at the scene later died of his injuries, the state attorney general's office said in a statement.

INDONESIA

3 die as landslide hits eastern Indonesia

A landslide hit Botong hamlet in Tana Toraja, South Sulawesi province of Indonesia early on Sunday, killing three people and destroying a house, the Indonesian National Disaster Management Agency reported. The three people belonging to a family were buried inside their house located on a slope in the hamlet where downpours have been occurring over the past few days. More than 200 families in the area have evacuated following the disaster, according to the agency's spokesman Agus Wibowo.

Agencies - Xinhua