Nigerian Police Search for More Than 30 Travelers Abducted in Southwest

Police in Nigeria’s southwest Ondo state are searching for more than 30 people abducted Saturday as they were returning home from a funeral. The mass abduction came just a day after gunmen seized scores of worshippers at a mosque during Friday prayers in northwest Zamfara state. The almost weekly attacks have Nigerian authorities under intense criticism for the country’s worsening insecurity.

The police spokesperson in Ondo State, Funmilayo Odunlami, told Lagos-based Channels Television that the state has sent security agents into the forest to search for the hostages.  

Odunlami said one of the victims had been rescued and was aiding security officials with details of the attack. 

Gunmen intercepted two vehicles carrying travelers on the Benin-Owo expressway on Saturday evening. The travelers were returning home from a funeral in nearby Edo State. 

It’s unclear whether the kidnappers have contacted families of the victims. Odunlami did not respond to several calls from VOA for comment. 

A militia in Ondo state known as Amotekun has also deployed its men to search for the abductees. 

The kidnapping comes amid growing criticism of the government for failing to address security issues across the country. Authorities are trying stop kidnap-for-ransom gangs while also battling Islamist insurgent groups in the Northeast. 

Ondo State resident Goke Oluwole said fear is running high.

“Two vehicles, they were 32 in number including drivers and conductors. Thirty-two is an alarming number. The thing has been regular, there’s no day they don’t kidnap.” 

Last Friday, gunmen disguised as worshippers invaded a mosque in northwest Zamfara State and abducted dozens of worshippers. 

In early June, gunmen invaded a Catholic Church in Owo State and killed 40 worshippers and injured almost 90 others. 

Over the weekend, security analyst Senator Ireogbu told VOA that the government has not been proactive in addressing insecurities.

“I feel most of the responses have been reactionary and ad hoc in nature,” Ireogbu said. “There has to be a holistic definition of what is actually happening.”

Another security analyst, Kabiru Adamu, says there has been some progress. 

“Security is best deployed in layers, have layers of protection around these areas using technologies, especially surveillance capability,” said Adamu. “But it must be mentioned that in the last few months we’ve seen an increase in both the clearance and operations by the Nigerian security forces, creating huge blows in the capacity and efficiency of the non-state actors to carry out attacks.”

Last month, Nigerian authorities said military airstrikes neutralized more than 50 members of a kidnapping gang in the northwest and central regions. 

On Monday, a counter-insurgency expert in the Lake Chad region, Zagazola Makama, said military airstrikes killed 200 insurgents including five commanders. VOA could not immediately verify the claims. 

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Truss to Become Britain’s New Prime Minister    

Liz Truss is set to become Britain’s new prime minister Tuesday, replacing Boris Johnson at a time of economic upheaval and escalating energy bills.

Johnson is expected to formally tender his resignation to Queen Elizabeth II at her Balmoral estate in Scotland, after which the queen is expected to appoint Truss as prime minister.

The 47-year-old Truss will become the third woman to lead the country and Britain’s fourth prime minister in six years.

She prevailed in an intraparty vote, defeating former Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak.

After her victory was announced, Truss told a party gathering, “I campaigned as a Conservative, and I will govern as a Conservative.”

“I will deliver a bold plan to cut taxes and grow our economy,” she said. “Dealing with people’s energy bills but also dealing with the long-term issues we have on energy supply.”

Truss, once an opponent of pulling Britain from the European Union but now a staunch supporter of Brexit, holds hawkish foreign policy views and is expected, like Johnson, to remain a steadfast link in the Western alliance sending aid to Ukraine in its fight against Russia’s six-month-old invasion.

Truss will immediately face severe economic problems, including a recession, labor turmoil, surging energy bills for British households and possible fuel shortages this coming winter.

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press and Agence France-Presse.

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IAEA to Report on Nuclear Situation in Ukraine  

The head of the United Nation’s nuclear watchdog is set to release a report Tuesday about the nuclear safety and security situation in Ukraine after his team’s visit to examine the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in southern Ukraine. 

International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Grossi will also brief the U.N. Security Council on his team’s findings, the IAEA said. 

The IAEA inspectors arrived at the Zaporizhzhia plant Sept. 1 and spent days evaluating damage at the site, how well safety and security systems are working, and conditions for the Ukrainian staff at the plant that has been under Russian control since the early days of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

Both Russia and Ukraine have accused the other side of being responsible for shelling in the area of the power plant. The attacks have raised international concern about the prospect of a nuclear disaster. 

The IAEA said two of its experts remain at the power plant to “observe the situation there and provide independent assessments.” 

Ukraine’s state-run nuclear company said Monday the Zaporizhzhia plant was disconnected from the electricity grid due to Russian shelling.    

“Today, as a result of a fire caused by shelling, the (last working) transmission line was disconnected,” Energoatom said in a statement on Telegram.   

Ukrainian Energy Minister German Galushchenko said on Facebook that Energoatom was not able to make repairs while fighting raged around the facility.      

The IAEA said Ukraine informed the agency that the backup power line itself was not damaged and that Ukrainian experts plan to reconnect power in the coming days.  

‘A step away from a radiation catastrophe’

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly video message Monday that the nuclear plant has again been put in a situation where it is “a step away from a radiation catastrophe.” 

In other developments Monday, Russia blamed Western sanctions on Moscow for its stoppages of natural gas to Europe.        

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that Western sanctions were “causing chaos” for maintenance of the Nord Stream 1 pipeline, which Russian energy giant Gazprom shut down last week after saying it detected an oil leak.    

Western officials and engineers have disputed Russia’s claim of mechanical problems with the pipeline. Europe accuses Russia of using its leverage over gas supplies to retaliate against European sanctions.     

The energy battles between Europe and Russia led European markets to drop sharply Monday while natural gas prices surged.   

Nuclear power on standby

Germany announced Monday that it would keep two of its three remaining nuclear power stations on standby beyond the end of the year as the country suffers a gas crunch.  

German Economy Minister Robert Habeck said in a statement on Monday that the two nuclear plants would “remain available until mid-April 2023 in case needed.”   

He said the move does not mean that Germany is going back on its long-standing promise to exit nuclear energy and said it remains “extremely unlikely” the country would face an energy crisis in which the power stations would be needed.      

Ukraine advocated Monday for “maximum support” for its efforts to defeat Russia in order to blunt economic effects on European allies.       

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said Russia’s “military aggression against Ukrainians, energy blackmail against EU citizens” were to blame for “rising prices and utility bills in EU countries.”     

“Solution: maximum support to Ukraine so that we defeat Putin sooner and he does not harm Europe anymore,” Kuleba tweeted, referring to Russian President Vladimir Putin.    

The Group of Seven nations has proposed capping the price on Russian oil exports to limit Russian profits that help fund Moscows war efforts in Ukraine.    

Russia, in turn, said it would not sell oil to any countries that implement such a cap.    

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters. 

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35 Civilians Killed When Vehicle Hits Explosive Device in Northern Burkina Faso

At least 35 civilians were killed and 37 were injured in northern Burkina Faso on Monday, when a vehicle in a convoy hit an improvised explosive device (IED), the interim government said in a statement. 

The escorted supply convoy heading to the capital of Ouagadougou hit the IED between the northern towns of Djibo and Bourzanga, an area where Islamist militants have escalated attacks on villages, police and military outposts since 2015. 

“Escorts rapidly secured the perimeter and took measures to assist the victims,” the military government said in a statement. 

Insecurity has risen across West Africa’s Sahel over the past decade as groups with links to al-Qaida and Islamic State have gained ground, killing thousands and displacing more than a million people despite the presence of foreign troops and United Nations peacekeepers. 

Frustrations about spiraling attacks spurred a military coup against Burkina Faso’s ex-President Roch Kabore in January. 

But levels of violence have remained high. 

Nearly one in 10 people in Burkina Faso has been displaced by conflict and severe food insecurity has almost doubled compared to 2021 as fields and livestock are abandoned, according to the Norwegian Refugee Council. 

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Zimbabwe Says Measles Outbreak Has Killed 700 Children

The death toll from a measles outbreak in Zimbabwe has risen to almost 700 children, the country’s health ministry has said.

Some are calling for the enactment of legislation to make vaccination mandatory in a country where anti-modern medicine religious sects hold sway on large swathes of the population of 15 million people.

The southern African country’s health ministry announced at the weekend that 698 children have died from measles since the outbreak started in April.

The ministry said 37 of the deaths occurred on a single day on Sept. 1. The health ministry said it had recorded 6,291 cases by Sept. 4.

The latest figures are more than four times the number of deaths announced about two weeks ago when the ministry said 157 children, most of whom were unvaccinated due to their family’s religious beliefs, had succumbed to the disease.

Dr. Johannes Marisa, the president of the Medical and Dental Private Practitioners of Zimbabwe Association, told The Associated Press on Monday that the government should escalate an ongoing mass vaccination campaign and embark on awareness programs targeted especially at anti-vaccine religious groups.

“Because of the resistance, education may not be enough so the government should also consider using coercive measures to ensure that no one is allowed to refuse vaccination for their children,” said Marisa. He urged the government to “consider enacting legislation that makes vaccination against killer diseases such as measles mandatory.”

UNICEF on Monday said it “is deeply concerned” with the number of cases and deaths among children due to measles. The agency said it is assisting the government to combat the outbreak through immunization programs.

The measles outbreak was first reported in the eastern Manicaland province in early April and has since spread to all parts of the country.

Many of the deaths have been of children who were not vaccinated, Information Minister Monica Mutsvangwa said in August.

Zimbabwe’s Cabinet has invoked a law used to respond to disasters to deal with the outbreak.

The government has embarked on a mass vaccination campaign targeting children aged between 6 months and 15 years old and is engaging traditional and faith leaders to support the drive.

Zimbabwe continued vaccinating children against measles even during the height of the coronavirus pandemic, but the drive has been hampered by religious groups that preach against vaccines.

The Christian sects are against modern medicine and tell their members to rely on self-proclaimed prophets for healing.

Church gatherings that have resumed following the easing of COVID-19 restrictions have “led to the spread of measles to previously unaffected areas,” said the health ministry in a statement last week.

Measles is among the most infectious diseases in the world and mostly spreads in the air by coughing, sneezing or close contact.

Symptoms include coughing, fever and a skin rash, while the risk of severe measles or dying from complications is high among unvaccinated children.

Outbreaks in unvaccinated and malnourished populations have been known to kill thousands. Scientists estimate that more than 90% of the population needs to be immunized to prevent measles outbreaks.

The World Health Organization in April warned of an increase in measles in vulnerable countries as a result of a disruption of services due to COVID-19.

In July, the United Nations children’s agency, UNICEF, said about 25 million children worldwide have missed out on routine immunizations against common childhood diseases, calling it a “red alert” for child health.

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Tiafoe Ends Nadal’s 22-Match Slam Streak in US Open 4th Round

Frances Tiafoe ended Rafael Nadal’s 22-match winning streak at Grand Slam tournaments by beating the 22-time major champion 6-4, 4-6, 6-4, 6-3 in the U.S. Open’s fourth round Monday.

Tiafoe is a 24-year-old from Maryland who is seeded 22nd at Flushing Meadows and reached the second major quarterfinal of his career.

He is the youngest American man to get that far at the U.S. Open since Andy Roddick in 2006, but this was not a case of a one-sided crowd backing one of its own. Nadal is about as popular as can be in tennis and heard plenty of support in Arthur Ashe Stadium as the volume rose after the retractable roof was shut during the fourth set.

“I don’t even know what to say right now. I’m beyond happy. I can’t believe it,” said Tiafoe, who faces No. 9 seed Andrey Rublev next. “He’s one of the greatest of all time. I played unbelievable tennis today, but I don’t even know what happened.”

Here’s what happened: Tiafoe served better than No. 2 seed Nadal. More surprisingly, he returned better, too. And he kept his cool, remained in the moment and never let the stakes or the opponent get to him. The 36-year-old from Spain had won both of their previous matches, and every set they played, too.

“Well, the difference is easy: I played a bad match, and he played a good match,” Nadal said. “At the end that’s it.”

This surprise came a day after one of Tiafoe’s pals, Nick Kyrgios, eliminated the No. 1 seed and defending champion Daniil Medvedev. That makes this the first U.S. Open without either of the top two seeded men reaching the quarterfinals since 2000, when No. 1 Andre Agassi exited in the second round and No. 2 Gustavo Kuerten in the first.

That was before Nadal, Novak Djokovic, who has 21 Grand Slam titles, and Roger Federer, who has 20, began dominating men’s tennis. Djokovic, who is 35, did not enter this U.S. Open because is not vaccinated against COVID-19 and was not allowed to enter the United States; Federer, 41, has undergone a series of operations on his right knee and has not played since Wimbledon last year.

Now come the inevitable questions about whether their era of excellence is wrapping up.

“It signifies that the years go on,” Nadal said. “It’s the natural cycle of life.”

Either Tiafoe or Rublev will advance to a first major semifinal. Rublev, who is 0-5 in Slam quarterfinals, beat No. 7 Cam Norrie 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 earlier Monday.

The No. 1 woman, Iga Swiatek, covered her head with a white towel during one changeover after falling behind by a set and a break in her fourth-round match. She kept making mistakes, then rolling her eyes or glaring in the direction of her guest box.

Eventually, Swiatek got her strokes straightened out and moved into her first quarterfinal at Flushing Meadows by coming back to beat Jule Niemeier 2-6, 6-4, 6-0.

“I’m just proud,” Swiatek said, “that I didn’t lose hope.”

The 21-year-old from Poland will face another first-time U.S. Open quarterfinalist next. That’s No. 8 seed Jessica Pegula, the highest-ranked American woman, who advanced with a 6-3, 6-2 victory over two-time Wimbledon winner Petra Kvitova.

Nadal won the Australian Open in January and the French Open in June. Then he made it to the semifinals at Wimbledon in July before withdrawing from that tournament because of a torn abdominal muscle; that does not go into the books as a loss, because he pulled out before the match.

Nadal competed only once in the 1½ months between leaving the All England Club and arriving in New York while recovering from that injury. His play has not been up to his usual standards at the U.S. Open, which he has won four times.

The match ended when one last backhand by Nadal found the net. Tiafoe put his hands on his headm then he sat in his sideline chair with his face buried in a towel.

“When I first came on the scene, a lot of people had limitations on what I would do. … I wasn’t ‘ready for it mentally.’ I wasn’t ‘mature,’” Tiafoe said. But these days, he added, “I’m able to just do me and do it my way and enjoy the game I love.”

This represents the latest significant step forward for Tiafoe, whose only previous trip to a Grand Slam quarterfinal came at the 2019 Australian Open — and ended with a loss to Nadal.

Tiafoe thanked a long list of folks who were in the stands, including his parents — they emigrated from Sierra Leone in West Africa and his dad worked as a maintenance man at a tennis facility near the U.S. capital — his girlfriend and Washington Wizards All-Star guard Bradley Beal.

“To have them see what I did today means more than anything,” Tiafoe said. “Today’s an unbelievable day and I’m going to soak this one in, for sure.”

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UN Official Warns Southern Somalia Is Close to Famine

United Nations humanitarian chief Martin Griffiths has warned that Somalia is on the brink of famine following the worst drought in four decades.  

During a news conference in Mogadishu, Griffiths said he has “concrete indications” that famine may occur in the southern Bay region by the end of the year. 

Griffiths was in Somalia over the past week to assess the impact of the drought and speak with affected individuals. 

His visit to Mogadishu, where most of the drought-affected Somalians live, was followed by a visit to Baidoa, one of two southern towns where many people are at risk of starvation. 

During his stay in Baidoa, Griffiths visited camps for internally displaced people and hospitals treating malnourished children. 

“I have been shocked to my core these past few days by the level of pain and suffering we see so many Somalis enduring,” he said. “Famine is at the door and today we are sending the final warning.”  

Griffiths warned that Baidoa and nearby Burhakaba will be at the epicenter of famine if no action is taken to prevent it.   

“The Somalia Food Security and Nutrition analysis report, being released today, shows concrete indications that famine will occur in two areas in the Bay region in South-Central Somalia between October and December of this year,” he said. “The impending famine is similar to the famine that occurred in the country from 2010 to 2011.”  

The famine that struck Somalia in 2011 resulted in the deaths of nearly 260,000 Somalis, half of whom were children.   

Currently, the situation in the Bay region falls just short of a formal declaration of famine. But thousands there are under threat of starvation. 

Overall, the United Nations and Somali government say 7.8 million people nationwide are in desperate need of humanitarian assistance as the drought drags on and the food situation gets worse.   

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has contributed to the crisis in Somalia, which is suffering from a shortage of humanitarian aid as international donors focus on Europe.  

Somalia received at least 90% of its wheat from Russia and Ukraine before the war and has been hit hard by scarcity and the sharp rise in food prices.     

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US B-52 Bombers Fly Over Middle East Amid Tensions With Iran

The United States military said Monday it flew a pair of nuclear-capable B-52 long-distance bombers over the Middle East in a show of force, the latest such mission in the region as tensions remain high between Washington and Tehran.

The bombers took off from the Royal Air Force base at Fairford, England, and flew over the eastern Mediterranean, the Arabian Peninsula and the Red Sea Sunday in training missions together with Kuwaiti and Saudi warplanes, before departing the region.

“Threats to the U.S. and our partners will not go unanswered,” Lt. Gen. Alexus Grynkewich, the top U.S. Air Force officer in the Middle East said in a statement. “Missions like this … showcase our ability to combine forces to deter and, if necessary, defeat our adversaries.”

Although the U.S. military’s Central Command did not mention Iran, Washington has frequently dispatched B-52 bombers to the region as hostilities simmered between the U.S. and Iran. The last such flyover was in June.

Iran’s regional foe, Israel, also joined in the multinational mission. Though unacknowledged by the U.S., three Israeli F-16 fighter jets accompanied the American bombers “through Israel’s skies on their way to the (Persian) Gulf,” the Israeli military said, describing the country’s cooperation with the U.S. military as key to “maintaining aerial security in Israel and the Middle East.”

Central Command was expanded last year to include Israel, a move seen to encourage regional cooperation against Iran under former President Donald Trump.

Trump’s decision four years ago to withdraw the U.S. from Tehran’s landmark nuclear deal with world powers sparked a series of escalating incidents in the region.

Even as diplomats now wrangle over a possible revival of the nuclear accord, Iran’s navy seized two American sea drones in the Red Sea last week.

That capture came just days after the country’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard towed another sea drone before releasing it as an American warship trailed it. The U.S. Navy has been deploying ultra-endurance aerial surveillance drones to monitor threats in the crucial waterways, which have witnessed repeated maritime attacks.

Tensions also remain high after recent confrontations between U.S. forces and Iranian-backed militias in the region. Washington last month carried out airstrikes in eastern Syria that targeted areas used by militias backed by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, prompting a response from Iranian-backed fighters.

U.S. and Iranian negotiators in Vienna have been attempting to revive the 2015 nuclear deal, which imposed sharp limits on Iran’s atomic program in exchange for international sanctions relief. Last week, the State Department described Iran’s latest negotiating position as “not constructive.”

Meanwhile, Iran now enriches uranium up to 60% purity — a level it never reached before that is a short, technical step away from 90%. While Iran long has maintained its program is peaceful, nonproliferation experts warn Tehran has enough 60%-enriched uranium to reprocess into fuel for at least one nuclear bomb.

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French Trial Opens Over 2016 Nice Massacre

Eight suspects went on trial Monday over the harrowing July 2016 attack in the Mediterranean city of Nice, where an Islamist extremist killed 86 people by driving a truck into thousands of locals and tourists celebrating France’s national day.

The attacker, a 31-year-old Tunisian named Mohamed Lahouaiej-Bouhlel, was shot and killed by police after a four-minute rampage down the seaside embankment of the Promenade des Anglais.

The seven men and one woman standing trial in Paris are accused of crimes ranging from being aware of his intentions to providing logistical support and supplying weapons.

Only one suspect, Ramzi Kevin Arefa, faces the maximum penalty of life imprisonment if convicted as a repeat offender. The others risk between five and 20 years in prison.

The trial, which is set to last until December 16, is the latest legal process over the wave of Islamist attacks that have struck France since 2015.

On June 29, a Paris court convicted all 20 suspects in the trial over the November 2015 attacks in the French capital that left 130 dead.

The Nice trial is taking place at the historic Palais de Justice in Paris, in the same purpose-built courtroom that hosted the November 2015 attacks hearings. A special venue has also been set up in Nice to allow victims to follow proceedings via a live broadcast.

“We’re waited six years for this,” Seloua Mensi, whose sister, aged 42, was killed in the attack, told AFP in Nice. “The trial is going to be very difficult for us, but it’s important to be able to speak about what we went through.

“Confronting the accused, seeing them and understanding what happened, will allow us to rebuild our lives,” she said.

The extremist Islamic State (IS) group rapidly claimed responsibility for the Nice attack, though French investigators ultimately did not find any links between the attacker and the jihadist organization that at the time controlled swathes of Iraq and Syria.

Of the accused, three suspects are charged with association in a terrorist conspiracy and the five others with association in a criminal conspiracy and violating arms laws.

The attack, which saw 15 children and adolescents among the dead and more than 450 wounded, was the second most deadly postwar atrocity on French soil after the November 2015 Paris attacks.

Six years after the attack, “the fact that the sole perpetrator is not there will create frustration. There will be many questions that no one will be able to answer,” said Eric Morain, a lawyer for a victims’ association that is taking part in the trial.

“We are trying to prepare them for the fact that the sentences may not be commensurate with their suffering,” said Antoine Casubolo-Ferro, another lawyer for the victims.

French Justice Minister Eric Dupond-Moretti commented: “I understand this frustration, it is human. But there will be a legal response. We respond to this barbarism through the law.”

Of the accused, only seven will appear in court after one suspect, Brahim Tritrou, being tried in absentia, fled judicial supervision to Tunisia where he is now believed to be under arrest.

Just three of the accused are currently under arrest with one held in connection with another case. The defendants are a mix of Tunisians, French Tunisians and Albanians.

Some 30,000 people had gathered on the seafront to watch a fireworks display celebrating France’s annual Bastille Day holiday on July 14 when Lahouaiej-Bouhlel began his rampage.

Nice was struck again in October 2020 when a Tunisian Islamist radical stabbed three people to death at a church.

Nice’s mayor, Christian Estrosi, said, “This wound will never heal, whatever the outcome of the trial. This wound is too deep.”

According to French and Tunisian news reports, the body of Lahouaiej-Bouhlel was repatriated to Tunisia in 2017 and buried in his hometown of M’saken, south of Tunis. This has never been confirmed by the Tunisian authorities.

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US Judge Approves Independent Review of Documents Found at Trump Estate

A U.S. federal judge Monday approved former President Donald Trump’s request to have an independent special master appointed to review thousands of pages of national security documents and other materials seized from his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida to determine whether some of them should be returned to him.

U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon in Florida authorized the appointment of the special master over the objections of the Justice Department, which told her last week it had already completed a review of the highly classified documents and other papers it took from Trump’s wintertime oceanside retreat in a court-authorized search August 8.

The Justice Department said that out of the 11,000 pages it had seized, it found about 500 pages of potentially privileged materials that possibly should be returned to Trump, which the Florida judge said in her ruling included medical documents, accounting information and tax-related correspondence.

Cannon ordered lawyers for the Justice Department and Trump to give her a list by Friday of names of potential candidates who could perform the independent review of the documents seized from Mar-a-Lago. She also said they should negotiate “the duties and limitations” for the eventual appointee and propose a timetable for completion of the review.

The judge also ordered the Justice Department, “pending completion of the special master’s review” or a new court order, to halt its criminal investigation into why Trump took highly classified documents with him to Florida when his White House term ended in January 2021 rather than turn them over to the National Archives as required by U.S. law.

But she said even with the delay in the criminal investigation, government intelligence experts could continue to review whether the country’s national security interests were harmed by Trump keeping the documents at Mar-a-Lago, where hundreds of people frequent the facility’s dining room and stay in its hotel.

In a court filing last week, the Justice Department said it only sought and won approval for the search of a basement storage room, Trump’s office and other rooms at Mar-a-Lago after it came to suspect that documents were “likely concealed and removed” from the storage area and “efforts were likely taken to obstruct the government’s investigation.”

Trump had earlier turned over hundreds of documents in January and June. But Attorney General Merrick Garland authorized the search last month and federal Magistrate Judge Bruce Reinhart approved it after prosecutors said they had learned from inside sources that there still were more documents at Mar-a-Lago, even though a Trump lawyer, Christina Bobb, had signed a statement in June saying that a “diligent search” showed there was nothing more to be found.

The Justice Department included a picture in its court filing of an array of highly classified documents it had found in Trump’s office during the search and laid out on a carpet at Mar-a-Lago.

Trump’s lawyers countered that “simply put, the notion that Presidential records would contain sensitive information should have never been cause for alarm.”

Trump has disparaged the court-authorized search for the documents. He wrote on social media, “Terrible the way the FBI, during the Raid of Mar-a-Lago threw documents haphazardly all over the floor (perhaps pretending it was me that did it!), and then started taking pictures of them for the public to see.”

Trump again claimed he had declassified the documents, although he has not produced any evidence that he did so before leaving office January 20, 2021, when his authority to do that expired.

Cannon, a Trump appointee, said in her order that the special master needed to be appointed in “the interest in ensuring the integrity of an orderly process amidst swirling allegations of bias and media leaks.”

The judge said Trump “faces an unquantifiable potential harm by way of improper disclosure of sensitive information to the public.”

Cannon said that because Trump is a former president, “the stigma” of the seizure of material that should be returned to him rather than retained by the government “is in a league of its own. A future indictment, based to any degree on property that ought to be returned, would result in reputational harm of a decidedly different order of magnitude.”

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Germany Sticks to Nuclear Power Deadline but Leaves Loophole

Germany is sticking to its long-held plan of shutting down the country’s three remaining nuclear power plants this year but keeping the option of reactivating two of them in case of an energy shortage in the coming months, officials said Monday.

The announcement follows the publication of a much-anticipated stress test that examined how Germany’s power grid will cope with a possible electricity squeeze due to the energy crisis Europe is facing.

Like other European countries, Germany is scrambling to ensure the lights stay on and homes stay warm this winter despite the reduction in natural gas flows from Russia amid the war in Ukraine.

The government has already announced numerous measures including the import of liquefied natural gas from other suppliers, while urging citizens to conserve as much energy as possible.

But there were concerns that Germany’s power grid, which is central to the European network, could be heavily strained if consumers switch to electric heaters in the winter and strong demand from neighboring countries means energy exports rise.

Germany’s opposition parties have called for the country’s nuclear plants to be kept online, with some lawmakers also suggesting shuttered ones be reopened and new reactors built. Some members of a small pro-business party that’s part of the governing coalition have argued in favor of running all three remaining reactors for as long as possible.

Economy and Energy Minister Robert Habeck, a member of the environmentalist Greens party that has long been opposed to nuclear power, acknowledged that several factors could come together to place a severe strain on the continent’s grid this winter. These include problems with France’s nuclear power plants, drought hampering hydropower generation in the Alps and Norway, and problems shipping coal across Europe due to low water levels in rivers.

“We can’t rely securely on there being enough power plants available to stabilize the electricity network in the short term if there are grid shortages in our neighboring countries,” he said.

Grid operators examined what would occur in a worst-case scenario, where a harsh winter coincides with an unexpected shutdown of French nuclear plants and a sharp rise in electricity demand. The projected result was hours-long blackouts for millions of Germans as transmission lines struggle to cope with required electricity flows.

To help prevent this from happening, Germany will keep two reactors — Isar 2 in Bavaria and Neckarwestheim north of Stuttgart — on standby until mid-April next year, Habeck said. A third plant, Emsland near the Dutch border, will be powered down as planned in December.

Opposition lawmaker Jens Spahn of the center-right Christian Democrats accused Habeck of being driven by anti-nuclear ideology, noting that the Emsland plant is located in a state that’s holding regional elections next month.

Environmentalists, meanwhile, warned the government not to renege on its promise to phase out nuclear power by leaving the door open for an extension of the plants’ operating life.

Habeck insisted there would be no long-term reversal in Germany’s commitment to end nuclear power.

“The nuclear plants won’t be equipped with new fuel rods,” he said. “There will be no decision to build new atomic power plants. That would be absurd because this technology — look to France — is part of the problem.”

Habeck also said Russian gas is no longer a factor in Germany’s energy calculations, and that it was no surprise Russia’s state-controlled energy giant Gazprom didn’t resume supplies through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline after halting them for maintenance last week.

“The only thing one can rely on from Russia is lies,” he said.

Measures taken by the government in recent months, including the painful decision to reactivate some coal-fired power plants, would ensure Germany has enough energy to get through the winter, said Habeck.

“Maybe not all of those in positions of responsibility can do so, but the German population can sleep deeply and easily,” he said.

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Israeli Army: ‘High Possibility’ Soldier Killed Reporter

The Israeli army said Monday there was a “high possibility” that a soldier killed a well-known Al Jazeera journalist in the occupied West Bank last May, as it announced the results of its investigation into the killing.

In a briefing to reporters, a senior military official said a soldier opened fire after mistakenly identifying Shireen Abu Akleh as a militant. But he provided no evidence to back up the Israeli claim that Palestinian gunmen were present in the area and said no one would be punished. He also did not address video evidence showing the area to be quiet before Abu Akleh was shot.

The conclusions were the closest Israel has come to taking responsibility for her death and followed a series of investigations by media organizations and the United States that concluded Israel either fired, or most likely had fired, the deadly shot. But they were unlikely to put the matter to rest.

“He misidentified her,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity under military briefing guidelines. “His reports in real time…absolutely point to a misidentification.”

Abu Akleh was wearing a helmet and a vest identifying her as press when she was killed in May while covering Israeli military raids in the occupied West Bank.

The Israeli human rights group B’Tselem accused the army of carrying out a whitewash.

“It was no mistake. It’s policy,” the group said.

Al Jazeera’s local bureau chief, Walid Al-Omari, accused the army of trying to escape responsibility. “This is clearly an attempt to circumvent the opening of a criminal investigation,” he told The Associated Press.

The 51-year-old Palestinian-American had covered the West Bank for two decades and was a well-known face across the Arab world. The Palestinians, and Abu Akleh’s family, have accused Israel of intentionally killing her, and her death remains a major point of contention between the sides.

The official said the military could not conclusively determine where the fire emanated from, saying there may have been Palestinian gunmen in the same area as the Israeli soldier. But he said the soldier shot the journalist “with very high likelihood” and did so by mistake.

The official did not explain why witness accounts and videos showed no militant activity in the area, as well as no gunfire in the vicinity until the barrage that struck Abu Akleh and wounded another reporter.

He also did not say why the investigation had taken some four months, though he said the Israeli military chief asked for more information after an initial probe. The official said the investigation had been shared with the military’s independent prosecutor, who had decided not to launch a criminal probe. That means no one will be charged in the shooting.

Abu Akleh’s family criticized the investigation, saying the army “tried to obscure the truth and avoid responsibility” for the killing.

“Our family is not surprised by this outcome since it’s obvious to anyone that Israeli war criminals cannot investigate their own crimes. However, we remain deeply hurt, frustrated and disappointed,” they said in a statement. The family also reiterated its call for an independent U.S. investigation and a probe by the International Criminal Court.

Rights groups say Israeli investigations of the shooting deaths of Palestinians often languish for months or years before being quietly closed and that soldiers are rarely held accountable.

Israel has said she was killed during a complex battle with Palestinian militants and that only a forensic analysis of the bullet could confirm whether it was fired by an Israeli soldier or a Palestinian militant. However, a U.S.-led analysis of the bullet last July was inconclusive as investigators said the bullet had been badly damaged.

An Associated Press reconstruction of her killing lent support to witness accounts that she was killed by Israeli forces. Subsequent investigations by CNN, the New York Times and the Washington Post reached similar conclusions, as did monitoring by the office of the U.N. human rights chief.

Abu Akleh rose to fame two decades ago during the second Palestinian intifada, or uprising, against Israeli rule. She documented the harsh realities of life under Israeli military rule — now well into its sixth decade with no end in sight — for viewers across the Arab world.

Israeli police drew widespread criticism from around the world when they beat mourners and pallbearers at her funeral in Jerusalem on May 14. An Israeli newspaper reported that a police investigation found wrongdoing by some of its officers, but said those who supervised the event will not be seriously punished.

Jenin has long been a bastion of Palestinian militants, and several recent deadly attacks inside Israel have been carried out by young men from in and around the town. Israel frequently carries out military raids in Jenin, which it says are aimed at arresting militants and preventing more attacks.

Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 Mideast war and has built settlements where nearly 500,000 Israelis live alongside nearly 3 million Palestinians. The Palestinians want the territory to form the main part of a future state.

 

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Exiled Belarusian Opposition Leader Tsikhanouskaya to Attend UNGA in Person

Exiled Belarusian opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya plans to attend United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) meetings in person for the first time since the disputed Belarusian presidential election in August 2020, according to diplomatic sources close to her.

The sources say Tsikhanouskaya and her delegation will address ongoing political repression by Belarusian authorities under the rule of President Alexander Lukashenko and call for the immediate release of all political prisoners.

They say Lukashenko’s facilitation of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine would also be discussed during Tsikhanouskaya’s participation in UNGA events from September 18-22.

The Belarusian opposition leader spoke to a virtual informal session of the U.N. Security Council two years ago.

Tsikhanouskaya fled Belarus two days after the August 9, 2020 election, after police detained her for several hours. Lukashenko was declared the winner despite claims by opposition leaders that the vote was rigged.

Security officials cracked down on pro-democracy protests, arresting opposition leaders and journalists. Currently there are more than 1,200 political prisoners in Belarus, according to the State Department.

The United States has imposed sanctions and visa restrictions against Lukashenko’s regime for what U.S. officials call “destabilizing behavior and human rights abuses.” In return, Belarusian authorities requested that Washington reduce its embassy staff in Minsk, denying a visa to the U.S. envoy to Belarus.

U.S. President Joe Biden met with Tsikhanouskaya on July 28, 2021, at the White House, where he expressed support for the Belarusian people’s quest for democracy and universal human rights.

In April of this year, Tsikhanouskaya met with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman. The top U.S. diplomats said Lukashenka’s regime should be held accountable for its “complicity” in Russia’s war against Ukraine.

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Kenya’s Top Court Dismisses Challenges to Presidential Election

President-elect William Ruto said he will work to deliver for the Kenyan population, speaking after the country’s Supreme Court upheld his recent election win. The court unanimously dismissed claims by petitioners, including runner-up and former Prime Minister Raila Odinga, that the vote was rigged. 

President-elect William Ruto welcomed Monday’s decision, pledging to serve the Kenyan people.

“We are truly grateful and I want to say to the people of Kenya and to those who have made efforts to get us here that we will not let you down, we will work hard and we will not let you down,” he said.

The seven-judge court ruled that results of the August 9 presidential election were valid under the constitution and electoral law.

The judges also said they found no significant irregularities or illegalities. 

Chief Justice Martha Koome read the ruling on behalf of the other six judges. She dismissed eight petitions challenging the outcome, including the one from former Prime Minister Raila Odinga.

“The presidential election petition E005 of 2022 as consolidated with the presidential petition numbers E001, 2, 3, 4, 7 and 8 of 2022 are hereby dismissed. As a consequence, we declare the election of the first respondent as president-elect to be valid under Article 143 of the constitution,” said Koome. 

The court found that the electoral commission deployed technology that correctly identified voters, transmitted results and was not disrupted.

The court also said the polling station results were not tampered with and found that Ruto attained more than 50 percent of the vote, the standard required for the leading candidate to avoid a run-off.

Koome said there were some problems with the election but none that would call for the election to be invalidated.

“Although the petitioners have provided numerous environments pointing to possible irregularities and illegalities marked by failure of technology, arrange voter suppression, … ill preparation by the IEBC and its chairperson, commission indiscretions, transposition anomalies, agent absence and many others, we are of the view that the pointed irregularities and illegalities were not of such magnitude as to affect the final result of the presidential election,” said the chief justice.

The IEBC is the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission.

Odinga said in a statement that he would respect the court’s ruling. He said, quoting here, “We have always stood for the rule of law and the constitution. In this regard, we respect the opinion of the court although we vehemently disagree with their decision today.”

His running mate, Martha Karua, said on Twitter that the court had spoken but that she disagreed with the findings.

One of the lawyers representing Odinga, James Orengo, also objected to the ruling.

“The rule of law should prevail; the court normally has the last word in making a statement as to what’s the law of the land, but as citizens who are sovereign, we are entitled to disagree and disagree very vehemently,” he said.

Ruto will be sworn in next week and become the fifth president of the republic of Kenya, succeeding Uhuru Kenyatta.

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Britain’s Liz Truss Wins Conservative Party Vote to Become New Prime Minister     

Britain’s Foreign Secretary Liz Truss has won the Conservative Party vote to be its new leader and will become the country’s new prime minister, replacing Boris Johnson at a time of economic upheaval and escalating energy bills.     

The 47-year-old Truss, who will become the third woman to lead the country, defeated former Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak, Britain’s treasury secretary, in a vote of about 140,000 dues-paying members of the Conservative Party, a mere 0.2% of the United Kingdom’s population of 67 million.   

The intraparty vote, rather than a general election, was held because Conservatives still hold a majority in parliament and could pick the new prime minister of their choosing. Truss will be the 15th leader of the United Kingdom during the long reign of its monarch, Queen Elizabeth. The Conservative Party announced the Truss victory Monday.   

The vote took place over recent weeks after Johnson announced in July he would step down.  The outgoing prime minister was engulfed in a series of scandals, including ignoring the government’s own rules against public gatherings during the height of the coronavirus pandemic.   

Truss is expected to take over the government Tuesday after both she and Johnson visit Queen Elizabeth at her summer home, Balmoral Castle in Scotland, and the queen formally invites her to form a new government.    

Later, Truss is expected to address the country from her new home, the prime minister’s residence at 10 Downing Street in London.   

Truss, once an opponent of pulling Britain from the European Union but now a staunch supporter of Brexit, holds hawkish foreign policy views and is expected, like Johnson, to remain a steadfast link in the Western alliance sending aid to Ukraine in its fight against Russia’s six-month-old invasion.   

She will be Britain’s fourth prime minister in six years and third female leader, after Margaret Thatcher and Theresa May.   

Truss will immediately face severe economic problems, including a recession, labor turmoil, surging energy bills for British households and possible fuel shortages this coming winter.   

After her victory was announced, Truss told a party gathering, “I campaigned as a Conservative, and I will govern as a Conservative.”   

“I will deliver a bold plan to cut taxes and grow our economy,” she said. “Dealing with people’s energy bills but also dealing with the long-term issues we have on energy supply.”   

Truss served in Johnson’s cabinet but was not part of the Tory attacks on Johnson that led to his eventual ouster as the party’s leader and the end of his three years as prime minister.  

Truss was not the first choice among Conservatives to lead the party but emerged in the intraparty voting in the House of Commons to be one of the two finalists in the vote among party members.   

She defeated Sunak by a final count of 81,326 to 60,399. 

 

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Biden to Highlight ‘Dignity of American Workers’ at Labor Day Events 

U.S. President Joe Biden is traveling Monday to Wisconsin and Pennsylvania to take part in celebrations for the annual Labor Day holiday. 

The White House said Biden will use speeches in both Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to highlight the “dignity of American workers.” 

Labor Secretary Marty Walsh is joining Biden for the events. 

The president on Sunday expressed his support for a California state measure that would give agricultural workers expanded ways to vote in union elections. 

“Government should work to remove — not erect — barriers to workers organizing. But ultimately workers must make the choice whether to organize a union,” Biden said. 

California’s legislature has approved the bill, which would let workers cast union ballots by mail.  But California Governor Gavin Newsom has opposed the measure in its current form, with a spokesperson citing concerns about the system being untested and lacking necessary steps to protect election integrity. 

Monday’s holiday honoring workers in the United States was first celebrated in 1894, and it includes parades and other events in cities across the country. 

Labor Day also represents an unofficial end to summer with a last busy long weekend for travelers and many children set to begin their school year. 

Some information for this story came from The Associated Press.

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Big Reveal: Biden to Help Unveil Obama White House Portrait

It’s been more than a decade since President Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, welcomed back George W. Bush and his wife, Laura, for the unveiling of their White House portraits, part of a beloved Washington tradition that for decades managed to transcend partisan politics.

President Joe Biden and his wife, Jill, are set to revive that ritual — after an awkward and anomalous gap in the Trump years — when they host the Obamas on Wednesday for the big reveal of their portraits in front of scores of friends, family and staff.

The Obama paintings will not look like any in the White House portrait to which they will be added. They were America’s first Black president and first lady.

The ceremony will also mark Michelle Obama’s first visit to the White House since Obama’s presidency ended in January 2017, and only the second visit for Barack Obama. He was at the White House in April to mark the 12th anniversary of the health care law he signed in 2010.

Portrait ceremonies often give past presidents an opportunity to showcase their comedic timing.

“I am pleased that my portrait brings an interesting symmetry to the White House collection. It now starts and ends with a George W,” Bush quipped at his ceremony in 2012.

Bill Clinton joked in 2004 that “most of the time, till you get your picture hung like this, the only artists that draw you are cartoonists.”

Recent tradition, no matter the party affiliation, has had the current president genially hosting his immediate predecessor for the unveiling — as Clinton did for George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush did for Clinton and Obama did for the younger Bush.

Then there was an unexplained pause when Donald Trump did not host Obama.

Two spokespeople for Trump did not respond to emailed requests for comment on the lack of a ceremony for Obama, and whether artists are working on portraits of Trump and former first lady Melania Trump.

The White House portrait collection starts with George Washington, America’s first president. Congress bought his portrait.

Other portraits of early presidents and first ladies often came to the White House as gifts. Since the 1960s, the White House Historical Association has paid for most of the paintings.

The first portraits financed by the association were of Lyndon Johnson and Lady Bird Johnson, and John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Kennedy, said Stewart McLaurin, president of the private, nonprofit organization established by first lady Kennedy.

Before presidents and first ladies leave office, the association explains the portrait process. The former president and first lady choose the artist or artists, and they offer guidance on how they want to be portrayed.

“It really involves how that president and first lady see themselves,” McLaurin said in an interview with The Associated Press.

The collection includes an iconic, full-length portrait of Washington that adorns the East Room. It is the only item still in the White House that was in the executive mansion in November 1800 when John Adams and Abigail Adams became the first president and first lady to live in the White House.

Years later, first lady Dolley Madison saved Gilbert Stuart’s portrait of Washington from almost certain ruin. She had White House staff take it out of the city before advancing British forces burned the mansion in 1814. The painting was held in storage until the White House was rebuilt.

President and first lady portraits are seen by millions of White House visitors, though not all are on display. Some are undergoing conservation or are in storage.

Those that are on display line hallways and rooms in public areas of the mansion, such as the Ground Floor and its Vermeil and China Rooms, and the State Floor one level above, which has the famous Green, Blue and Red Rooms, the East Room and State Dining Room.

Portraits of Mamie Eisenhower, Pat Nixon, Lady Bird Johnson and Lou Henry Hoover grace the Vermeil Room, along with a full-length image of Jacqueline Kennedy. Michelle Obama’s portrait likely will join Barbara Bush, Hillary Clinton and Laura Bush along the Ground Floor hallway.

The State Floor hallway one floor above features recent presidents: John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. Gerald Ford’s portrait and the likeness of Richard Nixon — the only president to resign from office — are on view on the Grand Staircase leading to the private living quarters on the second floor.

Past presidents’ images move around the White House, depending on their standing with the current occupants. Ronald Reagan, for example, moved Thomas Jefferson and Harry S. Truman out of the Cabinet Room and swapped in Dwight Eisenhower and Calvin Coolidge.

In the Clinton era, portraits of Richard Nixon and Reagan, idols of the Republican Party, lost their showcase spot in the Grand Foyer and were replaced with pictures of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Truman, heroes of the Democrats. Nancy Reagan temporarily moved Eleanor Roosevelt to a place of prominence in the East Room in 1984 to mark the centennial of her birth.

One of the most prominent spots for a portrait is above the mantle in the State Dining Room and it has been occupied for decades by a painting of a seated Abraham Lincoln, hand supporting his chin. It was placed there by Franklin Roosevelt.

Bill Clinton’s and George W. Bush’s portraits hang on opposing walls in the Grand Foyer.

Clinton’s portrait would be relocated to make room for Barack Obama’s if the White House sticks to tradition and keeps the two most recent Oval Office occupants there, McLaurin said.

“That’s up to the White House, to the curators,” he said.

The association, which is funded through private donations and the sale of books and an annual White House Christmas ornament, keeps the portrait price well below market value because of the “extraordinary honor” an artist derives from having “their work of art hanging perpetually in the White House,” McLaurin said.

Details about the Obamas’ portraits will stay under wraps until Wednesday.

Biden will be the rare president to host a former boss for the unveiling; he was Obama’s vice president. George H.W. Bush, who held Ronald Reagan’s ceremony, was Reagan’s No. 2.

Betty Monkman, a former White House curator, said during a 2017 podcast for the White House Historical Association that the ceremony is a “statement of generosity” by the president and first lady. “It’s a very warm, lovely moment.”

The White House portraits are one of two sets of portraits of presidents and first ladies. The National Portrait Gallery, a Smithsonian museum, maintains its own collection and those portraits are unveiled before the White House pair. The Obamas unveiled their museum portraits in February 2018.

Linda St. Thomas, chief spokesperson for the Smithsonian Institution, said in an email that a $650,000 donation in July from Save America, Trump’s political action committee, was earmarked for the couple’s museum portraits. Two artists have been commissioned, one for each painting, and work has begun, St. Thomas said.

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Sheriff: 2 Dead in Northern California Wildfire

Two people have died in a blaze that ripped through a Northern California town, said Siskiyou County Sheriff Jeremiah LaRue.

LaRue shared the news of the fatalities Sunday afternoon during a community meeting held at an elementary school north of Weed, the rural Northern California community charred by one of California’s latest wildfires. He did not immediately provide names or other details including age or gender of the two people who died.

“There’s no easy way of putting it,” he said before calling for a moment of silence.

Both LaRue and other officials acknowledged uncertainties facing the community, such as when people would be allowed back into their homes and power would be restored. About 1,000 people were still under evacuation orders Sunday as firefighters worked to contain the blaze that had sparked out of control Friday at the start of the holiday weekend.

The blaze, known as the Mill Fire, hadn’t expanded since Saturday morning, covering about 6.6 square miles (17 square kilometers) with 25% containment, according to Cal Fire. But the nearby Mountain Fire grew in size Sunday, officials said. It also started Friday, though in a less populated area. More than 300 people were under evacuation orders.

Power outages, smoky skies and uncertainty about what the day would bring left a feeling of emptiness around the town of Weed the morning after evacuation orders were lifted for thousands of other residents.

“It’s eerily quiet,” said Susan Tavalero, a city councilor who was driving to a meeting with fire officials.

She was joined by Mayor Kim Greene, and the two hoped to get more details on how many homes had been lost. A total of 132 structures were destroyed or damaged, fire officials said Sunday, though it wasn’t clear whether they were homes, businesses or other buildings.

Three people were injured, according to Cal Fire, but no other details were available. Two people were brought to Mercy Medical Center Mount Shasta, Cal Fire Siskiyou Unit Chief Phil Anzo said Saturday. One was in stable condition and the other was transferred to UC Davis Medical Center, which has a burn unit. It’s unclear if these injuries were related to the deaths reported Sunday.

Weed, home to fewer than 3,000 people about 280 miles (451 kilometers) northeast of San Francisco, has long been seen by passersby as a whimsical spot to stop along Interstate 5. But the town, nestled in the shadow of Mount Shasta, is no stranger to wildfires.

Anzo, Cal Fire’s Siskiyou Unit Chief, acknowledged the toll fires have taken on the rural region in recent years.

“Unfortunately, we’ve seen lots of fires in this community, we’ve seen lots of fires in this county, and we’ve suffered lots of devastation,” Anzo said.

Dominique Mathes, 37, said he’s had some close calls with wildfires since he has lived in Weed. Though fire dangers are becoming more frequent, he’s not interested in leaving.

“It’s a beautiful place,” he said. “Everybody has risks everywhere, like Florida’s got hurricanes and floods, Louisiana has got tornadoes and all that stuff. So, it happens everywhere. Unfortunately here, it’s fires.”

The winds make Weed and the surrounding area a perilous place for wildfires, whipping small flames into a frenzy. Weed has seen three major fires since 2014, a period of extreme drought that has prompted the largest and most destructive fires in California history.

That drought persists as California heads into what traditionally is the worst of the fire season. Scientists say climate change has made the West warmer and drier over the last three decades and will continue to make weather more extreme and wildfires more frequent and destructive.

Crews battled flames while much of the state baked in a Labor Day weekend heat wave, with temperatures expected to top 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius) in Los Angeles, exceptionally warm weather for Southern California. Temperatures were expected to be even hotter through the Central Valley up to the capital of Sacramento.

The California Independent System Operator issued its fifth “flex alert,” a plea for people to use their air conditioners and other appliances sparingly from 4 to 9 p.m. to protect the power grid.

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Swedish Leader Tackles Crime, Energy Fears on Campaign Trail

Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson on Sunday was on the campaign trail a week before Sweden’s national election to tackle fears over gang violence and rising electricity bills.

Andersson traveled by bus to communities near Stockholm to try to reassure voters. The election on Sept. 11 comes amid a sense of rising insecurity, with a spate of shootings in Sweden making crime a key campaign issue.

Russia’s war against Ukraine led Sweden, along with Finland, to take the historic step of applying to join NATO. That step has reassured many and is so uncontested it hasn’t been an issue in the campaign before the election.

But Andersson said that Russia’s energy “warfare” against Europe, including a cutoff of gas through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline to Germany, has become an issue that voters keep raising with her as she campaigns for her left-wing Swedish Democratic party.

“Many people are concerned with their electricity bills given Putin’s warfare on energy,” the 55-year-old leader said in comments to The Associated Press after a visit at a senior community center in Norrtalje, a town north of Stockholm.

“I mean he has a military invasion in Ukraine, but he also has energy warfare against Europe, so people are very concerned with electricity bills but also with criminality and climate.”

Her government pledged Saturday to provide $23 billion in liquidity guarantees to electricity companies, a step that followed the cutoff to Nord Stream 1, and was meant to prevent a financial crisis.

Another concern for Andersson is the rising popularity of a populist far-right party with its historical roots in the Nazi movement, the Sweden Democrats.

The party, which has worked to mainstream its image, is closer to power than it has ever been, causing many Swedish voters to fear that it could end up with a key position of power in a right-wing coalition. The anti-migrant party has gained in popularity as the country has struggled to integrate large numbers of migrants. Critics fear its roots in the extreme far right make it a threat to the county’s democratic foundations.

Polls show that a right-wing coalition including the Sweden Democrats has a chance at winning power, though the race is expected to be close.

Andersson told the AP she is concerned, noting that an employee of the right-wing party sent out an email last week inviting people to celebrate the Nazi invasion of Poland 83 years ago.

“That kind of invitation would never happen in any other parties in Sweden. Having said that, many of the voters of the Sweden Democratic party, they are decent people that are disappointed with the development,” she said.

Against the backdrop of shootings and the challenge from the right, the Social Democrats have been toughening up their stance in recent years. In this campaign, the party has been promising tougher measures to fight crime along with promises to preserve the Scandinavian country’s famous welfare protections.

Andersson and her party said she believes the problems can be tackled together, and that the welfare system is one of the best weapons for fighting crime.

Andersson told the AP that her solution to crime involves building up the police force and putting more of the criminals behind bars, while also tackling the social roots of the problem.

“We also have to work harder to prevent new generations from choosing a criminal life. And I think the only way to do that is to stop the segregation that we have in Sweden,” she said.

Andersson traveled in a large red bus emblazoned with the words “our Sweden can do better.” After leaving the senior center, she headed to a fair on park grounds in Botkyrka where party campaigners wore T-shirts saying, “I vote for Magdalena” and where families from multicultural immigrant backgrounds lined up for pony rides and other attractions.

Andersson is Sweden’s first-ever female prime minister. She took the job last November after her predecessor, Stefan Lofven, resigned after leading the party and country since 2014.

While she has to fight the perception that her party hasn’t managed to stem the gang violence ailing the country. In her favor is a reputation for being a steady and competent hand who has governed with a thin majority and through a time of geopolitical upheaval.

At the party fair, Annelie Gustafsson, a 45-year-old mother carrying her daughter on her shoulders, wouldn’t say who she was voting for. But she made clear her vote was meant to keep the Sweden Democrats out of power. She opposes their unwelcoming stance toward migrants.

“This year it was about which party I don’t want to see running the country, and that’s really important for me,” she said. “I’m proud of being Swedish, I’m proud of the people here, and that we help other people. … So, closing the country, that’s not for me.”

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California Temperatures Soar to Record Highs, Adding Strain to Power Grid

Record high temperatures were expected in California’s Central Valley from Sacramento to outside of Los Angeles on Sunday, with officials warning that the dangerous heat wave could afflict the state through the end of the week and test the limits of the electric grid.

State officials Sunday were urging residents to limit their power usage for the fifth day in a row as energy demand spiked and temperatures were still on the rise.

The worst of the heat was concentrated in the Central Valley Sunday, where temperatures could climb to 109 degrees Fahrenheit. The thermometer could hit 115 degrees by midweek, the National Weather Service said, warning residents to stay indoors to avoid heat-related illness.

“The heat wave begins in earnest today with dangerous temperatures now forecast to extend through the end of the week,” National Weather Service Sacramento wrote on Twitter Sunday.

The Southern California city of San Diego, which set a record temperature Saturday of 95 degrees, could set another record Sunday, National Weather Service forecaster Tony Fracasso said, although a chance of afternoon thunderstorms could offer some relief.

The California Independent System Operator (ISO), which oversees the state’s electric grid, extended a “flex alert” to a fifth day, asking state residents to set their thermostats to 78 degrees or higher, avoid using major appliances, and turn off lights in order to conserve energy.

“Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday in particular are shaping up to be the most difficult of this heat wave,” the agency said in a news release.

It added that the state’s ongoing wildfires and potential new blazes could further strain the power grid by crippling lines and generators. More than two decades of drought and rising temperatures, exacerbated by climate change, have made California more vulnerable than ever to wildfires.

In Northern California’s Siskiyou County, where firefighters were battling the fast-moving Mill Fire that prompted thousands to evacuate their homes, the high temperature forecast for Sunday was 95 degrees. Temperatures were expected to top 100 degrees in the coming days. The fire had burned more than 4,000 acres and was 25% contained as of Sunday morning, according to the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.

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US Ambassador to Russia Leaves Post as Ukraine War Drags On

The U.S. ambassador to Russia, John Sullivan, ended his tenure as America’s top diplomat in Moscow on Sunday after nearly three years, spanning the Trump and Biden administrations, and will retire from a lengthy career in government service.

His departure, which comes in the midst of an increasingly serious crisis over Russia’s war in Ukraine as well as disputes over detained Americans in Russia, had been expected this fall as he reached the usual length of time for U.S. ambassadors. But it was sped up due to family medical issues, according to people familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the private nature of the situation.

“Ambassador Sullivan’s departure is planned and part of a normal diplomatic rotation,” the State Department said. “He has served a full tenure as U.S. ambassador to Russia, managing one of the most critical bilateral relationships in the world during unprecedented times.”

The department added, “The U.S. will continue to condemn unequivocally the Kremlin’s aggressive war against Ukraine and remain steadfast in our commitment to supporting Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February, the war has slowed to a grind with both sides trading combat strikes and small advances in the east and south. Both Russian and Ukraine have seen thousands of troops killed and injured, and Russia’s bombardment of cities has killed countless innocent civilians.

Elizabeth Rood, the deputy chief of mission to Russia, will be the top U.S. diplomat in Moscow until a successor nominated by President Joe Biden replaces Sullivan.

A Boston native and big ice hockey fan who brought his skates and equipment when he left for Russia, Sullivan had returned to Moscow from a summer break just last week and had attended former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev’s memorial service on Saturday.

Sullivan took the helm of the Moscow embassy at a particularly difficult time in U.S.-Russia relations, which have only grown worse. He struggled to hold together a diplomatic mission dramatically reduced in staff as Washington and Moscow carried out an increasingly severe series of tit-for-tat expulsions.

Sullivan spoke frequently of his frustrations about deteriorating conditions for U.S. diplomats in Moscow, especially after Russian restrictions on American and local personnel forced major reductions in staffing.

His four-decade public service career included postings in Republican administrations as deputy secretary of state and senior positions in the departments of Justice, Defense and Commerce.

Sullivan was deputy secretary of state when he was nominated by President Donald Trump and confirmed by the Senate with unusually strong bipartisan support to be ambassador to Russia in December 2019. Biden asked him to remain in the post when Biden took office last year.

He had been the lead U.S. official in talks with Russia on counterterrorism and strategic security and testified in his Senate confirmation hearing that Russian efforts to undermine democracies must be combated.

Sullivan told senators that he would be “relentless” in confronting Russia over election interference, hostile moves against neighbors such as Georgia and Ukraine, human rights abuses and violations of arms control agreements.

His time as the State Department’s No. 2 official was not without controversy.

Sullivan was the one who delivered the news to Marie Yovanovitch, the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, that Trump had lost confidence in her and that she was being recalled early from the post.

Sullivan told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that he was given no other explanation for Yovanovitch’s removal and told her that he did not believe she had done anything to warrant her recall.

Asked why he did not oppose Yovanovitch’s ouster or speak out publicly on her behalf at the time, Sullivan said ambassadors serve at the pleasure of the president and can be removed with or without cause. He noted that his uncle, a former U.S. ambassador to Iran, had been recalled early from Tehran by the Carter administration for what the family believed to be unfair political reasons.

“When the president loses confidence in the ambassador, right or wrong, the ambassador goes,” Sullivan said.

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Mali Releases 3 Ivorian Soldiers; 46 Others Still Detained

Three female Ivorian soldiers arrived home late Saturday after being detained for nearly two months in Mali, while 46 others remain jailed in a case that has heightened tensions between the West African neighbors.

Togolese Foreign Affairs Minister Robert Dusse, whose country has been mediating talks, said the three women were “released as a humanitarian gesture” by Mali’s leader, Col. Assimi Goita.

“We are sad because our friends are still there and we hope to be able to retrieve them very soon,” said one of the soldiers, Sita Bamba, who was released along with Awa Bakayoko and Kangah Badou Adele Bledou.

The Ivorian soldiers were sent to Mali in July to work for Sahelian Aviation Services, a private company contracted by the United Nations.

However, Mali’s government said it considered the Ivorians to be mercenaries because they were not directly employed by the U.N. mission and charged them with undermining state security. Malian authorities said the aviation company should “henceforth entrust its security to the Malian defense and security forces.”

In a statement, Malian Prosecutor Samba Sissoko gave no update about the 46 Ivorians who are still detained, other than to say that “investigations are ongoing.” The Togolese foreign affairs minister indicated discussions about the remaining detainees continue.

The detention of the Ivorian soldiers marked the latest sign of tension between Mali’s leader and the international community. Goita has faced growing isolation after he seized power in a coup two years ago and then failed to meet an international deadline for organizing new democratic elections.

In June, Malian authorities said they would not authorize the U.N. mission to investigate human rights violations in Mali, including the deaths of more than 300 civilians earlier this year. Human rights groups have accused the Malian army of carrying out the killings.

France, the one-time colonial power that had fought Islamic extremism for nine years in Mali, completed its troop withdrawal from the country last month.

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What is Behind the Violence in Ethiopia’s ‘Other’ Conflict?

In Ethiopia’s Gambella region, a June attack on the capital by the rebel group, the Oromo Liberation Army, has raised fears of more civil war spreading in the country. Reporter Henry Wilkins spoke to local officials and analysts about what’s behind the violence and what it could mean for Ethiopia’s security.

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Tory Front-Runner Truss Vows Fast Action on Cost of Living 

Liz Truss, who is widely expected to become Britain’s new prime minister this week, has pledged to act within a week to tackle a cost-of-living crisis fueled by soaring energy bills linked to the war in Ukraine.

But Truss, speaking to the BBC Sunday, refused to provide any details on the actions she would take, suggesting it would be wrong to discuss specific policies until she takes the top post. She stressed, however, that she understands the magnitude of the problems facing Britain.

The government has been unable to address soaring inflation, labor strife and strains on the nation’s creaking health care system since early July, when Johnson announced his intention to resign and triggered a contest to choose his successor. The ruling Conservative Party will announce the winner Monday.

“I want to reassure people that I am absolutely determined to sort out this issue as well as, within a month, present a full plan for how we are going to reduce taxes, how we’re going to get the British economy going, and how we are going to find our way out of these difficult times,’’ said Truss, who has been foreign secretary for the past year.

Truss is facing Rishi Sunak, the government’s former Treasury chief, in the contest to become Conservative Party leader and so prime minister. Only dues-paying party members were allowed to vote in the election, putting the choice of Britain’s next leader in the hands of about 180,000 party activists.

During the campaign, Truss promised to increase defense spending, cut taxes and boost energy supplies, but she refused to provide specifics on how she would respond to the cost-of-living crisis.

With household energy bills set to increase by 80% next month, charities warn that as many as one in three households will face fuel poverty this winter, leaving millions fearful of how they will pay to heat their homes.

The Bank of England has forecast that inflation will reach a 42-year high of 13.3% in October, threatening to push Britain into a prolonged recession. Goldman Sachs has estimated that inflation could soar to 22% by next year unless something is done to mitigate high energy prices.

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