IN BRIEF (Page 8)

Somalia

Al-Shabaab suicide bombing claims 29 lives

A gunbattle raged in Mogadishu on Friday between Somali soldiers and al-Shabaab fighters, holed up in a building next to a hotel they had hit with a suicide car bomb the previous evening. Heavy gunfire resounded across the Somali capital through the night and as dawn broke. The death toll from the bombing rose to 29 with 80 wounded, police said on Friday. Eyewitnesses saw frantic residents in the city searching for missing relatives through the night, making countless phone calls to find out if anyone had seen their family members. Somalia has been convulsed by lawlessness and violence since 1991. The al-Shabaab group is fighting to dislodge a Western-backed government protected by African Union-mandated peacekeepers.

Egypt

Six detained over deadly Cairo train crash

Egypt's public prosecutor on Thursday ordered the detention of six people for four days in connection with a locomotive that smashed through the buffers and burst into flames at Cairo's main train station on Wednesday. The train's driver, his assistant, another train driver and three other rail employees will be held for four days pending investigations into the incident, the public prosecutor said in a statement. Egypt's Health Minister Hala Zayed said on Thursday the death toll from the crash rose to 22. Egypt's public prosecutor said on Wednesday that a preliminary investigation indicated the driver stepped off the train to talk to another driver without pulling the hand brake, causing the unattended locomotive to speed off and hit a concrete platform.

United States

$1 million reward to find Bin Laden's son

The United States on Thursday offered a $1 million reward for information on a son of late al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, seeing him as an emerging face of extremism. The location of Hamza bin Laden, sometimes dubbed the "crown prince of jihad", has been the subject of speculation for years with reports of him living in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Syria or under house arrest in Iran. "Hamza bin Laden is the son of deceased former al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and is emerging as a leader in the al-Qaida franchise," a US State Department statement said. Hamza bin Laden, who according to the US is around 30, has threatened attacks against the US to avenge the 2011 killing of his father, who was living in hiding in the Pakistani garrison town of Abbottabad, by US special forces.

Belgium

Thousands protest for more climate action

Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg has led thousands of Belgian students in a climate change march - the second she has led in as many weeks to draw more attention to the topic. It was the eighth week in a row that school kids have skipped school to protest. Numbers have come down from the tens of thousands recorded earlier - there was one march of about 3,000 in Antwerp on Thursday, and several thousand in Brussels and provincial centers. Thunberg has become her generation's voice on climate change after inspiring students around the world to go on strike to express their anger and angst over global warming. Student leaders are planning another march next week.

Syria

Mass grave found in last bastion of IS group

A mass grave containing the bodies of dozens of people who may be Yazidis enslaved by the so-called Islamic State group has been found in territory recently seized by the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, an SDF official said on Thursday. Many of the bodies found in the Baghouz area were those of women. "They were slaughtered," SDF Commander Adnan Afrin said, adding that most of them had been decapitated. More than 3,000 other Yazidis were killed in an onslaught the United Nations later described as genocidal. Thousands more fled on foot and many of them remain displaced more than four years later.

Reuters - Ap - Afp

(China Daily 03/02/2019 page8)