IN BRIEF (Page 11)

LIBYA

Airstrike hits migrant detention center

At least 30 migrants were killed in an overnight strike on a Tripoli migrant detention center and dozens were injured, the United Nations refugee agency said on Wednesday. An airstrike late on Tuesday hit a detention center for mainly African migrants in the Tajoura suburb of the Libyan capital of Tripoli, killing at least 40 people and wounding 80, a Libyan health official said. A spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees could not confirm who launched the attack on the center which held nearly 600 people, but said that medical teams were on the ground. "While the rescue operation is ongoing, it may be that death toll rises higher," he said.

IRAN

Teheran to increase uranium enrichment

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani warned Europe on Wednesday that Teheran will "take the next step" in increasing its uranium enrichment this coming Sunday. The comments further increase pressure on European partners to salvage an unraveling 2015 nuclear deal following the US withdrawal from the accord last year. Rouhani said: "If you want to express regret and issue a statement, you can do it now." US President Donald Trump pulled the United States from the deal last year and restored crippling economic sanctions. Iran this week breached a low-enriched uranium stockpile limitation set by the deal and said by Sunday it would increase its enrichment of uranium closer to weapons-grade levels if Europe does not offer it a new deal.

UNITED STATES

SEAL acquitted of murder in trial

A US Navy SEAL platoon leader accused of war crimes in Iraq was acquitted by a military jury on Tuesday of murder and all other charges except for unlawfully posing with the corpse of a captive Islamic State group fighter. The seven-member jury deliberated for about nine hours before delivering its verdict in the court martial of Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher, a decorated career combat veteran whose case had drawn the interest of US President Donald Trump. The single offense of posing for unofficial pictures with a human casualty, in this case, the remains of the Iraqi man whom Gallagher was acquitted of killing, carries a maximum sentence of four months' imprisonment.

NORWAY

Arctic fox walks 4,000 km to Canada

An arctic fox walked more than 4,415 kilometers to travel from northern Norway to Canada's far north in four months, Norwegian researchers said. The Norwegian Polar Institute reported the young female fox left her birthplace on Norway's Svalbard archipelago on March 1, 2018, and reached Canada's Ellesmere Island by way of Greenland on July 1, 2018. The ground the small fox cumulatively covered over those four months was among the most ever recorded for an arctic fox seeking a place to settle down and breed, the institute said in a research article. During the walk to Canada, the roughly two-year-old fox moved at an average rate of 46.3 km per day, the Norwegian scientists said.

Agencies - Xinhua

(China Daily 07/04/2019 page11)