Guatemala picks ex-judge as president

Guatemala’s congress has sworn in a former judge as president while his predecessor has appeared in court over corruption allegations just hours after resigning.
Alejandro Maldonado, a 79-year-old conservative who only became vice president in May, will serve out the rest of Otto Perez Molina’s term, handing over on January 14.
Separately on Thursday, a judge – citing a flight risk – ordered Perez to be held in prison while hearings over his alleged role in a customs-corruption scandal continue.
Al Jazeera’s Daniel Schweimler, reporting from Guatemala City, said the developments show “how fast and how far Perez has fallen. In the meantime, things have been moving very very quickly here.”
The attorney general’s office has said it plans to bring charges against Perez for illicit association, taking bribes and customs fraud, though he has not yet been formally charged. The hearing will continue on Friday.

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Guatemala will hold elections on Sunday to choose Perez’s successor, in a climate of widespread outrage over the corruption scandal and broad rejection of the traditional political elite.
Speaking after taking the oath of office, Maldonado, a former judge on the Constitutional Court, said: “The new government must emerge from the need to inspire citizens’ confidence, opening a space in public service for mature and experienced people but also young professionals and social activists.”
Congress had earlier voted unanimously to accept Perez’s resignation, which he submitted just before midnight on Wednesday after politicians stripped him of his presidential immunity.


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Islamic State blows up ancient tower tombs in Palmyra

The Islamic State  group has blown up three tower tombs in the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra that were built between the years 44 and 103 AD, the country’s antiquities chief Maamoun Abdulkarim said on Friday.
Abdulkarim told Reuters that sources in Palmyra had confirmed the destruction of three tombs including that of Elahbel, built in 103 AD, which he said was four storeys high and had an underground floor.
IS group militants have blown up two other temples over the past few weeks in Palmyra, a UNESCO World Heritage site, which it has controlled since capturing the city from the Syrian government in May. The group considers the buildings sacriligeous.

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Dead Syrian boy’s father returns home to bury son

The father of a three-year-old Syrian boy whose body was washed up on a Turkish beach in an image that shocked the world returned to his hometown Kobane on Friday to bury his family, an AFP photographer reported.
Abdullah Kurdi arrived at the Turkish border town of Suruc with the funeral caskets of his son and other family members who also drowned while trying to get to Europe, and headed towards the flashpoint Syrian town with family members and Turkish security forces.
The long convoy was stopped from entering Kobane.



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China to arraign Jackie Chan’s son over drugs

Chinese prosecutors have indicted the son of
Hong Kong film star Jackie Chan on drug
offences, more than four months after he was first
detained.
The announcement on Monday did not mention
when a trial would be held but if convicted,
singer-actor Jaycee Chan could face up to three
years in jail.
Beijing police detained the younger Chan at his
Beijing apartment in August along with Taiwanese
movie star Ko Kai. Police said Chan and Ko both
tested positive for marijuana and admitted using
the drug.
Jaycee Chan’s detention has been particularly
embarrassing for his father, who was named by
Beijing as an anti-drug ambassador in 2009.
Chan has never publicly contested the charge, and
his father has openly apologised over his
detention.
“Regarding this issue with my son Jaycee, I feel
very angry and very shocked,” Jackie Chan wrote
on his microblog in August. “As a public figure,
I’m very ashamed. As a father, I’m heartbroken.”
In June, Chinese President Xi Jinping declared
that illegal drugs should be wiped out and that
offenders should be severely punished. The
crackdown has snared more than 7,800 people in
Beijing alone, according to police, and celebrities
were targeted because of their influence over the
public.

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Ebola Fever: Indian Prostitutes Have Been Warned To Stay Off Africans

The disease is transmitted through contact with the
bodily fluids of an infected person…
Indian s*x workers NL Ebola Fever: Indian Prostitutes
Commercial s*x workers in India have been warned to
stay away from African clients due to the Ebola virus
which is currently plaguing some countries in the
Western part of the continent.
The directive was given to prostitutes operating in
India’s largest city, Kolkata, Sonagachi.
Durbar Mahila Samanwaya Committee, an Indian NGO
informed a gathering of 130,000 s*x workers about
the risks involved if contact was made with an Ebola
patient.
The DMSC also provided training for different classes
of s*x workers to enable them know if a person had
been infected with Ebola.

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Austria Says Briton Did Not Die Of Ebola

 

A 48-year-old British woman who collapsed and died in Austria following a trip to Nigeria did not die from the Ebola Virus Disease.

Head of the regional health board in Austria, Franz Katzgraber, said tests had ruled out the Ebola virus but the cause of death remained unknown.
The woman had travelled from Nigeria to Germany where she then flew back to Austria to her home at Vomp, a town in the Austrian state of Tyrol.
An autopsy would be carried out to confirm the cause of death.
The W.H.O declared the West African Ebola outbreak a ‘public health emergency of international concern’ on August 8, triggering global alarm as countries stepped up precautions and testing.
The W.H.O said that the death toll had now risen to 1,229 from among the 2,240 reported cases in Guinea, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone.
The latest figures include 84 additional deaths from 113 new cases reported between August 14 and 16.

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Ebola: Liberian President Imposes Night Time Curfew

The Liberian President, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, has imposed a night- time curfew and quarantined two affected neighbourhoods in a bid to stop the Ebola epidemic rampaging through West Africa.

The new quarantine areas include Monrovia’s West Point slum.
The President said that the commencement of the curfew would start on Wednesday, August 20, from 9:00 pm to 6:00am daily.
“Commencing on Wednesday, August 20, there will be a curfew from 9:00pm to 6:00am.
“All entertainment centres are to be closed. All video centres are to be closed at 6:00 pm,” she ordered.
Since the beginning of the year, more than 1,200 people have died of the virus in four West African countries.
In Nigeria, a top Lagos doctor, who attended to the Liberian-American man, Patrick Sawyer, that brought the Virus to Nigeria died of the virus on Tuesday. That brings the number of people who have died of Ebola in Nigeria to five, the health ministry said.
Colleagues said consultant Stella Ameyo Adadevoh was the first medical practitioner to order that a sick patient from Liberia be tested for Ebola when he was admitted in July.
The Chief Medical Director at Lagos University Teaching Hospital, Akin Osibogun, said that late Stella Adadevoh was a hero who contained the late Sawyer from leaving the hospital when he was tested positive to the virus, helping to contain the spread of the disease.
“We owe her a lot. She managed the situation like a thorough professional that she was. She had helped Nigeria to contain the epidemic in her own way.”
Government authorities had said five people have recovered from the virus in Nigeria and have been discharged from hospital in Lagos after they were confirmed fit and without the virus. Two are still being treated.
The outbreak in West africa has claimed at least 1,200 lives and it had started affecting travellers in the region, as several airlines have stopped flights.

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The Obamas Go On A Healthy Vacation:PHOTOS

For many, it may be shopping in Dubai or Paris, for others, it may just be a quick trip to visit loved ones, but when the world’s most powerful family decides to take time off, they do it the healthy way.
President Barack Obama, the first lady Michelle Obama and daughter Malia Obama are currently on vacation in Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, USA.
With crisis in Israel, and the protest of the killing of African-American teen Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, the man who is on the seat of world power decided to straighten out the wrinkles on his face with a much needed vacay.

He was photographed on Friday 15th August 2014, cycling with his family.
This comes as no surprise as the first lady is all about tackling obesity in America and encourages children to work out. o security agents
Check out the photos!

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U.S. To Establish Health Centres For Ebola In Nigeria

 
The American government has promised to collaborate with Nigeria in containing the spread of the deadly Ebola Virus Disease.

The U.S. Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr James Entwistle, told reporters in Abuja on Monday, after a close door meeting with Nigeria’s Minister of Health, Professor Onyebuchi Chukwu, that his government would partner with Nigeria in providing and managing Ebola emergency treatment centres across the country.
The Ambassador was, however, not specific as to whether or not, the American government would supply the experimental drug, which is currently being used in the United state, to Nigeria.
Meanwhile, Professor Chukwu said the Nano Silver experimental drug for Ebola, which was provided by a Nigerian scientist was not used on the Nigerian medical doctor that survived the virus.
According to him, the use of the Nano Silver drug had been temporarily suspended for now.
Last week, the World Health Organization (WHO) gave approval for the use of untested drugs in the treatment of Ebola patient, in an attempt to contain the disease it said was vastly underestimated. It said: “It is a public health emergency of international concern”.
WHO also said that extraordinary measures were needed to contain the disease that has claimed over 1100 lives in West Africa since it broke out this year.
The Nigerian President, Goodluck Jonathan, declared the outbreak of the disease a National Emergency and had approved an intervention fund of 1.9 billion Naira for the contain the spread.
Ebola Virus was first detected in a Liberian-American man, Patrick Sawyer, who flew into Lagos, Nigeria and died on July 25.
Since his death, three more deaths have been recorded, all of which were persons that had primary contact with Late Sawyer before his death.

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Ukraine Crisis: Refugee Convoy Hit by Rockets And Mortars

 

Vehicles carrying refugees from the Luhansk area of Eastern Ukraine were hit by rockets and mortar, killing scores of people.

Ukraine has blamed pro-Russian rebels but they have denied carrying out the attack, near the village of Novosvitlivka.
Another military spokesman said that people had been burned alive inside their vehicles but a spokesman for the rebel self-proclaimed “Donetsk People’s Republic”, Andrei Purgin, denied that rebel forces had attacked the convoy.
Ukrainian forces have moved into the outskirts of rebel-held Luhansk where basic supplies are running out.
There has been sustained artillery shelling of the city of Luhansk, where civilians are suffering chronic shortages of water, food and electricity.
Hundreds of civilians are fleeing the city every day as Ukrainian forces edge into Luhansk.

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Iraqi Troops Claim They Have Retaken Mosul Dam From Militants

 

There are conflicting reports about whether Kurdish Peshmerga fighters and Iraqi troops have fully retaken Mosul dam from Islamic state (IS) militants.

Militants from the Islamic State group had seized the Mosul Dam on August 7, giving them access and control of enormous power and water reserves and threatening to deny those resources to much of Iraq
The militants’ battlefield victories brought U.S. forces back into the conflict for the first time since it withdrew its troops in 2011 and reflected the growing international concern about the Sunni extremist group.
Washington launched attacks from its warplanes and drones on August 8.
Iraqi military spokesman, Lt-Gen Qassim Atta, told state TV that the dam had been “fully cleansed”.
He also said troops had been backed by a joint air patrol, but did not specify if there had been any US air strikes.
However, journalists in the area say fighting is still going on there and that jihadists had remained in control of the main gate.
An Islamic state statement also contradicted the military’s claim, saying it had repelled Kurdish fighters and inflicted heavy losses
It also said that the claim of the Iraqi government was a “mere propaganda war.”

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Liberia Locates All 17 Runaway Ebola Patients

Liberia said that it has found all 17 suspected Ebola patients who fled a quarantine centre in Monrovia at the weekend and transferred them to another clinic.

“We are glad to confirm that all of the 17 individuals have been accounted for and have now been transferred to JFK Ebola specialist treatment centre,” the Liberian information minister, Lewis Brown, said on  Tuesday .
He also said that three infected African doctors who had received the experimental Ebola drug Zmapp were showing “remarkable signs of improvement”, quoting an assessment by the doctor overseeing their treatment.
The 17 went missing after the treatment facility was attacked and looted by a gang, who themselves may be at risk from some of the items they stole.

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