As Malala Yousafzai spent her 17th birthday in Nigeria meeting with families of the girls kidnapped by Boko Haram, the terrorist group released a new video declaring victory for its recent attacks. The attacks included the dual bombing of fuel depots in the Nigerian city of Lagos.

It would be the first reported bombing by Boko Haram in Lagos—Nigeria's commercial capital, an Atlantic port and city of some 20 million people. At least four people died in the June 25 blasts, including an alleged female suicide bomber.

The group's leader, Abubakar Shekau, also called on the government to exchange its captured members for the abducted girls.

Speaking of her meetings with the parents of the schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Harem, Malala, who escaped assassination by the Pakistani Taliban, offered this:

I could see tears in their eyes. They were hopeless. But they seem to have this hope in their hearts ... and they were asking that: Is it possible that they could meet the president."

In a telling move, Malala waited until after she met with the families to be received by Nigeria President Goodluck Jonathan. The Nigerian premier has avoided meeting with the families, but frequently travels to rallies in support of their release. During their session, Jonathan promised Malala that he would the girls would be returned "as soon as possible."

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Boko Haram Brags About Bombing as Malala Comforts Nigerian Families

During the meeting, Malala, who also had a poignant opinion piece in the Washington Post this morning, said "My birthday wish this year is 'Bring Back Our Girls' now and alive."

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This article was originally published athttp://www.thewire.com/global/2014/07/boko-haram-brags-about-bombing-as-malala-comforts-nigerian-families/374404/

Manila (AFP) - Thousands of people fled their homes and ships sheltered from heavy seas in the Philippines on Tuesday as the first major storm of the rainy season strengthened into a typhoon.

Typhoon Rammasun was set to strike the Bicol region in the east of the country at 6:00pm (1000 GMT), with Manila and other heavily populated areas also expected to be hit early Wednesday, the state weather service said.

"We are preparing for the worst... it is critical now that we finish the evacuations," said Rafaelito Alejandro, civil defence chief of Bicol, an impoverished farming and fishing region of 5.4 million people.

About 6,000 residents had already moved to evacuation centres, with authorities aiming to have another 39,000 take shelter before the typhoon hits, he said.

"If we can finish the evacuation, then it's just a waiting game to see what happens," Alejandro told AFP by telephone.

The Philippines is hit by about 20 major storms a year, many of them deadly. The Southeast Asian archipelago is often the first major landmass to be hit after the storms build above the warm Pacific Ocean waters.

In November last year, Super Typhoon Haiyan brought the strongest winds ever recorded on land to the central Philippines, killing up to 7,300 people in one of the nation's worst ever natural disasters.

Rammasun will be the first to make landfall since this year's rainy season began in June, and authorities as well as local media were seeking to ensure all potentially impacted communities were well informed and prepared.

The state weather service upgraded Rammasun overnight Monday from a tropical storm into a typhoon as its wind speeds built over the Pacific.

Rammasun, which is Thai for "God of Thunder", is expected to have gusts of up to 180 kilometres (114 miles) an hour when it makes landfall, according to the US military's Joint Typhoon Warning Center.

Its eye was about 190 kilometres southeast of Legazpi, Bicol's largest city, at 9:00am (0100 GMT), the Philippine weather service said.

After Bicol it is forecast to pass over Manila, around 350 kilometres northwest of Legazpi, and its more than 12 million residents on Wednesday morning, according to the weather service.

The government cancelled most classes in Manila and Bicol on Tuesday, while dozens of domestic flights were also grounded.

The coastguard also shut down domestic shipping across Bicol, leaving more than 1,600 ferry passengers stranded, coastguard operations officer Hernani Aldeola told AFP from Legazpi.

The militant group dismisses an Egyptian proposal for a cease-fire in Gaza after a week of hostilities.
192 Palestinians killed

By Fred Weir, Correspondent JULY 14, 2014

MOSCOW — A day after Ukrainian forces allegedly shelled a Russian border village, killing one person, the Kremlin appears to be preparing a tough response.

But "surgical strikes" against Ukrainian military forces deemed responsible for the attacks, as claimed by an anonymous Kremlin official in the majorMoscow daily Kommersant? That's "nonsense," Vladimir Putin's spokesman said on Monday.

Experts say the conflicting signals coming out of the Kremlin show just how at odds it is with itself over what to do in eastern Ukraine, as conditions deteriorate and ferocious fighting bumps up against the long and relatively open border with Russia.

Recommended: How much do you know about Ukraine? Take our quiz!

One faction, they say, advocates direct Russian action to support east Ukraine's beleaguered rebels – either by imposing a no-fly zone over the embattled region, or through pinpoint attacks on Ukrainian artillery units that are accused of firing on Ukrainian civilians and, occasionally, Russian ones too.

"When Israel reacts to provocations with an all-out attack on Gaza, the world is quite understanding about that," says Vladimir Zharikhin, deputy director of the Kremlin-funded Institute of the Commonwealth of Independent States in Moscow. "But Russia is supposed to sit back and take it? Our investigators have found shell fragments in the village that was attacked, and we know that only Ukrainian forces have artillery of this caliber. Russia is a great power, and it doesn't have to put up with this sort of thing in its backyard."

The other Kremlin faction, which appears to have the upper hand at the moment, favors caution. They argue that direct Russian intervention would only give Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko the rallying point he wants, and a winning argument for greater Western assistance. Instead, they say, Russia holds most of the cards in any long-term settlement for Ukraine. Moscow can afford to wait as the Poroshenko government muddles through what promises to be a long and bloody counter-insurgency in the country's east, even as Ukraine careens toward economic implosion.

"The Kremlin does not have a master plan for what to do in Ukraine; it's mostly reacting to events," says Andrei Kortunov, director of the Russian International Affairs Council, a think tank with strong connections to the Russian Foreign Ministry. "The dominant view right now is that we should let Poroshenko reap the consequences of the military campaign he chose to embark on. It's easy to start a conflict like this, very hard to finish it up."

Mr. Kortunov says that Russia needs to stress its role as a diplomatic player, and as the huge neighbor Ukraine needs to rebuild its shattered economy and reconcile with embittered eastern Ukrainians.

"The pendulum will swing back in Ukraine, perhaps in unexpected ways. Russia can afford to wait," he says.

Kiev denies that its forces shelled the Russian border village Sunday and insists that it was the work of pro-Russian rebels. Ukrainian defense officials warn that Russia is stepping up "provocations" on the frontier, and has been allowing ever more pro-rebel volunteers and military equipment to cross into the embattled territory from Russia. Ukraine's best-known military expert, Dmitry Tymchuk, predicted on his Facebook page todaythat all signs point to a full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine on Tuesday.

"Opinion in Russia is badly split over what to do about this. But so far, despite all the growing pressures, it seems that Putin has decided that the long-term price of intervening directly is too high," says Dmitry Polikanov, vice president of the PIR Center, an independent security think tank in Moscow.

"It's not just that our relations with the West would be greatly aggravated, it's also that we can't really afford the costs of peace-building in eastern Ukraine afterwards," Mr. Polikanov says. "Our best option now is to strengthen the border, and wait to see what will happen next. The ball is in Poroshenko's court."

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — A suicide bomber blew up a car packed with explosives near a busy market and a mosque in eastern Afghanistan on Tuesday, killing 89 people and wounding more than 40 in one of the deadliest attacks since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.

The attack in the town of Urgun in Paktika province brutally underscored the country's instability as foreign troops prepare to leave by the end of the year and feuding politicians in Kabul work to form a new government after a disputed presidential election.

Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi, the Defense Ministry spokesman, said the bomber detonated his explosives-laden vehicle as he drove by the crowded market in the remote town in Urgun district, close to the border with Pakistan.

The military was providing helicopters and ambulances to transport the victims to the provincial capital, Sharan, and so far 42 wounded have been moved to hospitals there, he said, adding that the explosion destroyed more than 20 shops and dozens of vehicles.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, and the Taliban sent a statement to media denying involvement, saying they "strongly condemn attacks on local people."

Many of the victims were buried under the rubble, said Mohammad Reza Kharoti, the administrative chief of Urgun district.

"It was a very brutal suicide attack against poor civilians," he said. "There was no military base nearby."

The bombing was also the first major attack since a weekend deal between the two Afghan presidential contenders brokered by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry averted a dangerous rift in the country's troubled democracy following last month's disputed runoff.

One of the two, former Finance Minister Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, told The Associated Press on Monday that he would meet his rival, former Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah, on Tuesday to begin working out the framework for the next government, with participation from both camps and all ethnic and religious communities.

But the election and the weekend deal between the two rivals have had no visible impact on the security situation in the country, which sees near-daily attacks.

Hours before the Paktika blast, a roadside bomb in eastern Kabul ripped through a minivan carrying seven employees of the media office of the presidential palace, killing two of the passengers.

The explosion struck as the vehicle was taking the palace staffers to work, said Gul Agha Hashimi, the chief of criminal investigations with the Kabul police.

Five other people, including the driver, were wounded, said Hashimi, speaking to reporters at the site of the blast. He added that one passenger was unharmed.

Kabul police spokesman Hashmat Stanikzai said it was a remotely detonated device planted along the median of a main road.

Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid claimed responsibility for that attack in a statement sent to reporters.

In a separate incident, seven police officers, including a district counter-terrorism director, and six border guards were killed when Taliban insurgents attacked a post on the border with Pakistan in the eastern Khost province, said Mubariz Mohammad Zadran, spokesman for the provincial governor.

Zadran said the attack set off an hours-long gunbattle that left 34 insurgents and a local man dead. "The majority of the insurgents killed in the clash are Pakistani citizens," Zadran said.

Elsewhere in the country, two police officers were killed by a bomb concealed on a parked motorbike inside the southern city of Kandahar, said Zia Durani, spokesman for the Kandahar police chief.

Roadside bombings are a major threat to both Afghan security forces and civilians across the country. Such attacks have escalated as the Taliban intensify their campaign ahead of the U.S.-led foreign forces' withdrawal by the end of the year.

Dozens killed, wounded in Afghan explosion

Police say a suicide bomber detonated an explosives-packed car near a crowded market and mosque.
At least 20 shops destroyed