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Hundreds killed in Philippine typhoon
Stabilising Iraq
Car bombs rip Baghdad market, kill 51
Pak builds air defence missile carriers
Hezbollah besieges ‘Ali Baba’ govt
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Thai rebels torch two schools
Yala (Thailand), December 2 Suspected Islamic militants killed a Buddhist and torched two schools in Thailand’s Muslim-majority southern provinces, the police said today. The 34-year-old Buddhist was killed in a drive-by shooting on his way to work.
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Hundreds killed in Philippine typhoon
Daraga, Philippines, December 2 Durian moved into the South China Sea yesterday after affecting 800,000 people in the Philippines and was expected to weaken into a tropical storm before hitting Vietnam on Monday. Villages were engulfed on Thursday around Mount Mayon, an active volcano about 320 km south of Manila, when driving rain and winds of up to 225 kph dislodged tonnes of mud and boulders from the slopes. The Governor of Albay province, the worst-hit area, said a wall of water 6 feet high crashed down the volcano. “We lost everything,” Mr Fernando Gonzales told Reuters, adding 100 people had been killed by the torrent. The national disaster agency said a total of 296 people were confirmed dead, with 261 missing. The toll was rising sharply as rescue workers, some using their bare hands, pulled corpses and body parts from the mud. “Right now we are on retrieval operations. We do not believe there are any survivors,” Mr Cedric Daep, head of the provincial disaster coordinating council, said. Army commanders asked for dog teams to help with the grim search and sacks of lime to mask the stench of death. With roads blocked, soldiers hiked for hours to get to the disaster area. “The scene wrenched my heart,” Col Robert Morales said on the radio. “I could see bodies of women and children all over.” Thousands of survivors crammed into schools and churches as disaster agencies called for fresh water, food and medicine. Pope Benedict offered prayers for the mainly Roman Catholic country. Canada said it was giving C$1 million ($873,000) to the relief effort and Japan pledged $173,000. Piles of corpses
Nearly 45,000 people were left homeless and entire communities isolated after power lines and phone links were knocked out and bridges washed away. Livelihoods were lost as fruit trees were uprooted and rice paddies destroyed. In the town of Daraga, bordering Mount Mayon, more than 50 bodies were stacked in front of an overflowing funeral parlour. The undertaker estimated there were around 150 corpses in all. “My siblings, my mother, they are gone. My niece is dead and at the plaza there are so many dead people,” a woman sobbed.
— Reuters
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Global meeting illegal, says top Shia leader
Amman, December 2 Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, who is due to have a White House meeting with President Bush on Monday to discuss ways to end the Sunni-Shiite violence raging in Iraq, also played down fears that his country was facing civil war. Al-Hakim, leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, (or SCIRI), categorised the conflict in Iraq as “political” rather than sectarian. He said he opposed sectarian killings, for which the SCIRI-affiliated Badr Brigade militia is partially blamed. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said last week that an international conference on Iraq could be useful if the groundwork was carefully prepared and all political parties could be brought together somewhere outside Iraq. But al-Hakim said Iraq’s problems need to be solved at home. “It is unreasonable or incorrect to discuss issues related to the Iraqi people at international conferences. The proposal is unrealistic, incorrect and illegal,” he said at a press conference in Amman, Jordan. Arguing against the Annan proposal, he said only the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a fellow Shiite, was qualified to find a solution for the conflict in Iraq since it was democratically elected. — AP
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Car bombs rip Baghdad market, kill 51
Baghdad, December 2 Meanwhile, in Baghdad angry locals screamed in rage against Saddam Hussein’s Baath party. A resident spoke of three huge blasts going off in space of two or three minutes. Twelve cars and market stalls were charred. Sources at the police headquarters and the Interior Ministry said 51 persons were killed and 90 wounded. Mr Hakim today rejected a call by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan for an international summit on Iraq.
— Reuters
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Pak builds air defence missile carriers
Islamabad, December 2 “The government is determined to provide a credible defence with all possible means at its disposal,” Mr Haq said yesterday while speaking at the handing-over ceremony at Heavy Industries. He said the government was giving high priority to the operational preparedness of the armed forces and the Armed Forces Development Plan (AFDP) was a step in this direction.
— UNI
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Hezbollah besieges ‘Ali Baba’ govt
Beirut, December 2 Hundreds of thousands of people swamped central Beirut yesterday in a mass protest led by the Shiite Hezbollah, followed by die-hard demonstrators setting up camp around Prime Minister Siniora’s office to press for his western-backed government to quit. After darkness fell yesterday, Hezbollah-led protesters, temporarily blocked access roads to the Prime Minister’s heavily barricaded offices where he was holed up with a number of government ministers. The demonstrators said they would stay until the government gaves in, and threatened to escalate their stir in the next few days.
— AFP
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Thai rebels torch two schools
Yala (Thailand), December 2 In Narathiwat province, a school building was burned down late yesterday, allegedly by Islamic insurgents.
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Boy loses leg to shark Blind sentenced to library course 
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