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Luis Miguel Goitizolo

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RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES?
5/19/2014 6:18:11 PM

Colombia church bus fire kills 31 children, one adult

Reuters



The charred remains of a bus, after a deadly fire, is seen in Fundacion, northern Colombia, May 18, 2014. REUTERS/Stringer

Colombian policemen stand alongside recovered bodies of children who died in a burned bus in Fundacion, northern Colombia, May 18, 2014. As many as 26 people, most believed to be children, were killed and others injured in northern Colombia when fire broke out on a bus taking them to a church event, local media reported. (REUTERS/Stringer)

Colombian policemen stand alongside recovered bodies of children who died in a burned bus in Fundacion, northern Colombia, May 18, 2014. As many as 26 people, most believed to be children, were killed and others injured in northern Colombia when fire broke out on a bus taking them to a church event, local media reported. (REUTERS/Stringer)

BOGOTA (Reuters) - Thirty-one children and one adult were killed in Colombia on Sunday when fuel exploded on a broken-down bus returning from a church event, an emergency response coordinator said.

The charred bodies of victims were being identified using dental records in Barranquilla, the nearest city to Fundacion town where the accident happened, said Major Eduardo Velez, coordinator of Magdalena province's emergency response corps.

Eighteen people managed to escape and were being treated at hospitals in the region.

"There was a canister of gasoline inside the vehicle. The fire spread very fast," Velez told Reuters.

He said the fire started after the driver attempted to start the faulty bus by pouring fuel into the engine which he accessed through the floor of the cabin. The driver escaped unharmed and was being questioned by police, he said.

The bus was owned by a private transport company and was used during the week to take children to and from school.

President Juan Manuel Santos was traveling to Fundacion to console relatives of the victims.

(Reporting by Peter Murphy; Editing by Cynthia Osterman and Robert Birsel)

(This story edits the headline, fixes grammar in the sixth paragraph)








A fuel explosion on a broken-down bus returning from a church event leaves 31 children and one adult dead.
18 people manage to escape



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Luis Miguel Goitizolo

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RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES?
5/19/2014 11:44:00 PM

China 'uses channels' to warn North Korea against nuclear test: sources

Reuters

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un walks with officials during an inspection of the Korean People's Army (KPA) Air and Anti-Air Force Unit 447, which has been honoured with the title of O Jung Hup-led 7th Regiment, in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in Pyongyang on May 14, 2014. (REUTERS/KCNA)

By Megha Rajagopalan

BEIJING (Reuters) - China has used diplomatic channels to warn North Korea against conducting a fourth nuclear test, multiple China-based diplomatic sources told Reuters, after the reclusive state renewed its threat of "counter-measures" against perceived U.S. hostility.

North Korea, which regularly threatens the South and the United States with destruction, is already under heavy sanctions imposed by several U.N. resolutions beginning in 2006 but has defied pressure to abandon its missile and nuclear programs.

It last conducted a nuclear test in February 2013.

"China has told North Korea that there is no justification for a new nuclear test and that they should not do it," said a Western diplomat who was briefed by Chinese officials.

The sources said China had used diplomatic channels in Beijing and Pyongyang to convey its anxiety about the possibility of a fourth test to the North.

China is North Korea's most important diplomatic and economic ally, though three nuclear tests and several rounds of saber rattling have tested Beijing's support.

But China had not threatened the North with explicit consequences, the sources said, and its message to the North had remained consistent.

"They are against another nuclear test - but it is a mistake to believe that China is getting more severe," said a second diplomatic source, adding that China had raised the issue with a special envoy appointed by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

The United States has said it hopes China will use its influence to coax the North to abandon its banned nuclear weapons program. In recent public statements, Chinese foreign ministry officials have repeatedly called on all parties to "exercise restraint" on the Korean peninsula, without pointing the finger at North Korea alone.

China signed on to tougher U.N. sanctions last year after the third nuclear test, but has come under criticism from western countries and independent experts for failing to properly implement them.

China's stability-obsessed government fears the continuing development of North Korea's nuclear program will unsettle the region. Foreign Minister Wang Yi said in March that denuclearization on the peninsula was the only road to peace, and that China would not permit war or instability on its doorstep.

North Korea's official Rodong Sinmun newspaper said this month the country was justified in using all available means at its disposal to counter aggressive challenges by the United States and South Korea aimed at stifling its sovereignty.

Zhang Liangui, a North Korea expert at China's Central Party School, said it was likely China would support another round of sanctions on the North if it went ahead with another test.

"It's very possible that China would support even tougher sanctions on North Korea," he said. "I think China should also think about adjusting the aid it provides.

(additional reporting by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Related video


China issues diplomatic warning to North Korea


Beijing, Pyongyang's most important ally, tries to dissuade it from conducting a nuclear test.
'No justification'


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Luis Miguel Goitizolo

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RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES?
5/19/2014 11:51:35 PM

Flood surge in Belgrade threatens power plant

Associated Press

In this Sunday, May 18. 2014 aerial photo, flooding waters cover the village of Gunja, eastern Croatia. Three months' worth of rain fell on the Balkan region in three days, producing the worst floods since rainfall measurements began 120 years ago. (AP Photo/Davor Javorovic, Pixsell)


BELGRADE, Serbia (AP) — Belgrade braced for a river surge Monday that threatened to inundate Serbia's main power plant and cause major power cuts in the crisis-stricken country as the Balkans struggle with the consequences of the worst flooding in southeastern Europe in more than a century.

At least 35 people have died in Serbia and Bosnia in the five days of flooding caused by unprecedented torrential rain, laying waste to entire towns and villages and sending tens of thousands of people out of their homes, authorities said.

But the death toll is expected to rise as floodwaters started to recede in some locations, laying bare the full scale of the damage after three months' worth of rain fell on the region in three days, producing the worst floods since rainfall measurements began 120 years ago.

Bosnian Foreign Minister Zlatko Lagumdzija compared the flood damage to the carnage during the 1990's war that killed at least 100,000 people and left millions homeless. He said about 100,000 houses, 230 schools and health institutions were destroyed in the floods in Bosnia and about a million people lack drinking water.

The damage is "immense," he said, adding: "the only difference from the war is that less people have died."

The coal-fired Nikola Tesla power plant supplies electricity for half of Serbia and most of Belgrade. It is located in Obrenovac, the worst flood-hit town near Belgrade where some 7,800 people have been evacuated from their homes, which were mostly completely submerged in water. Some 2,000 people are still believed trapped in higher floors of buildings, without power or phone lines.

Predrag Maric, a Serbian emergency official, said Monday that the situation in Obrenovac is still critical. He said that so far thousands of soldiers, policemen and volunteers have managed to "defend" the power plant from the surging Sava River waters by building high walls of sandbags.

Villages between Belgrade and Obrenovac were drenched in muddy waters Monday, as people tried to reach their houses to see what was left inside.

Wearing rubber boots and pants, a man waded through the water toward his house in the village of Kalnic. Nearby, two cows were tied to a bus stop, nibbling at hay, apparently brought there from flooded barns.

In recent days, surging water has coursed through towns and villages in Serbia and Bosnia and to a lesser extent in Croatia, flowing across streets and into homes, sweeping bridges off their moorings. Sodden hills crumbled into landslides. Hundreds of buses and cars were stranded on flooded roads.

The Sava flood wave, expected to reach Belgrade Monday and peak by Wednesday, originated in the upper segment of the river, which forms the border between Bosnia and Croatia.

In Orasje, a Bosnian border town, efforts were made to prevent further spilling of the Sava at the places the barriers had broken. Ideas included dropping old trucks from helicopters or covering the gaps with wire frames and then reinforcing with sandbags.

The emergency force commander in the town, Fahrudin Solak, said the decaying corpses of drowned farm animals now represent a major health risk for the region.

"We are sending out mobile incinerators and we have asked for international assistance, to send us more incinerators to prevent diseases," he said.

Floodwaters have also triggered more than 3,000 landslides across the Balkans. In Bosnia, the water surge disturbed land mines left over from the region's war, along with warning signs that marked location of the unexploded weapons.

____

Associated Press writers Sabina Niksic in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Jovana Gec in Obrenovac, Serbia, contributed.

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Flood surge threatens European power plant


The worst flooding in southeastern Europe in more than 100 years extends the Serbian crisis.
Nearly 1M without drinking water


"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)

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Luis Miguel Goitizolo

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RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES?
5/20/2014 12:03:06 AM

High gas levels apparently ignored at Turkish mine

Associated Press

Two dozen people, including company executives, have been detained as Turkish officials investigate the mining disaster that killed 301 people, a news agency reported Sunday. The Dogan news agency said Ramazan Dogru, general manager of the mine owned by Soma Holding, and its operations manager, Akin Celik, were among the 24 detained. It said prosecutors were weighing charges of negligence and contributing to the deaths of more than one person. They questioned five people Sunday, but Dogan did not specify whom. Government and company officials have insisted that the mine was inspected regularly and negligence wasn't a factor in Tuesday's tragedy. But reacting to widespread public anger, government officials promised to investigate and pledged that any mine officials found to be negligent would be punished.


SOMA, Turkey (AP) — Sensors noted high levels of toxic gas inside a coal mine days before the disaster that killed 301 workers in Turkey but company officials took no action, Turkish news reports said Monday.

Prosecutors, meanwhile, formally arrested two more people for the devastating mine fire in the western town of Soma, raising the number of suspects facing charges of negligent death to five. Those detained included executives and supervisors at mine owner Soma Komur Isletmeleri A.S., prosecutors say.

Chief prosecutor Bekir Sahiner said 25 people were initially detained as part of the probe, but several were released without charges while eight others were released but could be charged later. Authorities were still questioning others, including the company's CEO, Can Gurkan, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported.

The Hurriyet, HaberTurk and other Turkish newspapers said prosecutors and inspectors probing the worst mining disaster in Turkey's history had seized data from the mine that indicated sensors showed high gas levels inside the mine as early as two days before the May 13 disaster. The reports say company officials did not record these high levels on log books and took no precautionary actions.

The Turkish newspapers did not cite source for their reports. Sahiner did not answer calls and no one picked up telephones at the prosecutors' office in Soma or in the nearby city of Akhisar, which is leading the probe.

But miners who survived the disaster also told The Associated Press that supervisors ignored rising gas levels and failed to take precautionary measures. They have accused the company of failing to heed safety concerns and that government inspections has been superficial.

Sahiner said Saturday that a preliminary probe indicated that coal had been smoldering days before the disaster, causing the roof to collapse in one part of the mine and unleashing toxic gases that spread throughout.

Government and mining officials have both said that most victims died from toxic gases released by the fire. They have insisted, however, that the mine was inspected regularly, that safety standards were high and that negligence wasn't a factor in the fire.

Government officials have promised to investigate and pledged that any mine officials found to be negligent would be punished. Still the disaster has provoked anger at a critical time for Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, as he mulls running in August's presidential election.

Police have broken up protests denouncing poor mine safety in Soma and in Turkey's three largest cities of Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir.

Nearly 2,000 university students, some wearing hard-hats, called on the government to resign as they marched Monday in Ankara to commemorate the beginning of the Turkish War of Independence started on May 19, 1919.

Erdogan on Monday defended the government's response to the disaster and rejected accusations that the mining company had political ties to his ruling party.

"They say the boss is a party supporter," Erdogan said. "I saw him for the first time (in Soma). I don't know him... They (opponents) think they will gain from such slander."

Turkey's national soccer team visited Soma on Monday in a show of solidarity and prayed at the miners' graves.

__

Suzan Fraser reported from Ankara, Turkey.


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Sensors captured the data, but it was ignored before 301 workers died in Turkey, media reports say.
More arrests made



"Choose a job you love and you will not have to work a day in your life" (Confucius)

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Luis Miguel Goitizolo

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RE: ARE WE NOW IN THE END TIMES?
5/20/2014 12:17:40 AM
Polio menaces Pakistan; CIA ends fake vaccinations

After bin Laden backlash, CIA promises: No more vaccination campaigns for spying

Olivier Knox, Yahoo News
Yahoo News

A Pakistani health worker gives a polio vaccine to a child in Lahore, Pakistan, Monday, May 19, 2014. Pakistan will require all travelers leaving the country to obtain a polio vaccination from June 1, 2014, the health ministry said. (AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)


Amid a deadly backlash again vaccinations and a resurgence of polio in Pakistan, the White House has promised that the CIA will never again use an immunization campaign as a tool of spycraft.

“I wanted to inform you that the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) directed in August 2013 that the agency make no operational use of vaccination programs, which includes vaccination workers,” President Obama’s top counterterrorism and homeland security advisor, Lisa Monaco, wrote to deans of 12 schools of public health. Yahoo News obtained a copy of the May 16 letter.

“Similarly, the Agency will not seek to obtain or exploit DNA or other genetic material acquired through such programs,” Monaco wrote. “This CIA policy applies worldwide and to U.S. and non-U.S. persons alike.”

The Central Intelligence Agency had enlisted a Pakistani doctor, Shakil Afridi, to collect intelligence under the guise of an immunization effort in the city of Abbottabad as part of planning for the high-risk May 2011 raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound there.

The agency aimed to confirm intelligence that bin Laden was at the compound by comparing DNA obtained from children living there to a sample from the fugitive al-Qaida chief’s late sister, the Guardian newspaper reported in July 2011.

Even before those revelations, the Taliban in Pakistan had already opposed Western-backed vaccination campaigns, claiming that they were secret efforts to sterilize Muslim children. But the CIA’s actions helped fuelan armed backlash against immunization workers, reportedly killing 56 people between December 2012 and May 2014. The victims include not just medical workers but police officers assigned to guard them.

Another result of the CIA’s actions was to lead many Pakistani parents to forgo vaccinations for ailments like polio. The crippling and sometimes fatal illness has no known cure – but there are several safe and effective vaccines, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

Of the 77 documented new cases of polio worldwide in calendar year 2014, 61 were in Pakistan, mostly from the remote and restive Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) region, which serves as a Taliban stronghold.

Earlier this month, the World Health Organization imposed travel restrictions on anyone coming from Pakistan, one of just three countries in the world where polio is still endemic. The rules, to be implemented June 1, will require travelers leaving the country to have polio vaccination certificates.

Monaco’s letter came nearly a year and a half after the deans of 12 schools of public health wrote a letter to Obama saying that “as a general principle, public health programs should not be used as cover for covert operations.”

“While political and security agendas may by necessity induce collateral damage, we as an open society set boundaries on these damages, and we believe this sham vaccination campaign exceeded those boundaries,” they wrote, referring to the CIA’s hoax campaign.

Council on Foreign Relations senior fellow Laurie Garrett, a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer on emerging pandemics, was the first to reveal the existence of the letter on Twitter and her Facebook page.

White House & sent letter to deans of US schls pub hlth vowing never again us fake as did to track bin Laden.

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Lisa Monaco's letter is below.

Lisa Monaco's letter





The ruse the spy agency used before the raid that killed Osama bin Laden spawned a violent backlash.
Polio menaces Pakistan




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