Wikipedia concludes a large-scale operation blocking hundreds of users centered on networks of for-pay edits violating the encyclopedia's guidelines. (BBC)(The Guardian)(Ars Technica)
The death toll from a Legionnaires' disease outbreak at a Quincy, Illinois veterans home rises to at least seven with more than the current number of 32 sickened expected since the incubation period for illness can be up to two weeks. (Reuters)
Thousands of refugees arrive in Germany'sMünchen Hauptbahnhof from Budapest. Police and firefighters on the scene provide them with food, water and medical aid even as more continue to arrive. (thelocal)
Eight people have been killed and over 30 injured in riots in the Indian state of Manipur since the passage of three controversial land bills on Monday. (IBN Live)
There have been 907 deaths last month in El Salvador as a result of gang violence, a death rate not seen since the Salvadoran Civil War of the 1980s. (BBC)
Bodies of Syrian refugees are found on a beach in Turkey, including a 3-year-old boy, pictures of whose body spread virally and prompt grave international concern. (Al Jazeera)
French prosecutors state that they believe "with certainty" that a piece of debris that had washed ashore on Reunion Island came from the missing plane. (BBC)
An explosion at an arms depot in Yemen kills 45 Emirati soldiers who were part of the Saudi led coalition. (Yahoo)
Five Bahraini soldiers are killed on the Saudi-Yemeni border while taking part in a military operation against Yemen-based Houthi militants. (Reuters)
Clashes in and around Tajikistan's capital Dushanbe kill at least 17 people. Government representatives blame the attacks against security forces on former Deputy Defense Minister Aduhalim Nazarzoda, who fought against government forces in the Tajikistan Civil War. (BBC)
Gunmen kill 13 minority Hazara men but spare the life of one woman among a traveling party in usually tranquil Balkh Province. No group claims responsibility. (AFP via Times of Oman)
In Tampa, Florida, former University of South Florida football player Elkino Watson is killed and Desmon Watson, another former player, is injured after an early morning stabbing after an argument broke out outside a nightclub in Ybor City. (WFLA)
In the second police officer shooting in the city in three days, a man ambushed a marked police SUV stopped at a traffic light in Las Vegas by walking up and firing multiple rounds, striking one officer in the hand. The shooter was arrested. (Fox News)
Crystal Cortes of Dallas, Texas is charged with capital murder of dentist Kendra Hatcher on September 2. Her borrowed Jeep Cherokee was seen entering a parking garage on video. She told police she conspired with an unidentified man who paid her to drive him to the garage with the intention of robbery. (WFAA)[permanent dead link]
Turkish jets strike PKK militant positions across south-east Turkey and northern Iraq and deploy special forces to the Iraqi border following a deadly PKK attack which left at least 16 Turkish soldiers dead. (Reuters)
Business and economy
The patent office in IndiarejectsPfizer's petition for a patent on an arthritis drug, tofacitinib, re-affirming their rejection of the same drug in 2011. The drug is a chemical reformulation of the active compound in the medicine and thus the Indian Patent Office says that the company would have to establish that the compound for which it is seeking a patent is therapeutically more effective than the active compound. (Reuters)
Disasters and accidents
Five people are killed as a small plane crashes in western Colorado. (USA Today)
Hundreds of people, tired of waiting for promised transportation, broke out from Hungary's first migrant holding center near the Serbian border, past police overwhelmed by their numbers, to start the march north toward Budapest. The asylum seekers / migrants, now accompanied by groups of police, advanced along the edge of the main highway to the capital. (AP via Global News)
In Cass County, Missouri, a family of four is fired upon after they passed a slower vehicle, which then pulls up alongside and opens fire, hitting the father and a 2-year-old girl. Police believe the motive may have been road rage after flashing headlights. (KCTV5)
In an education scandal in Egypt, a top student, Mariam Malak, says she's a victim of corruption and fraud with the school or the examination board purposefully swapping her final exam papers with another pupil, while she is thus assigned "Zero"-grade for each of the seven subjects. 40,000 online rally for her via a Facebook support page while another top student reporting the same complaint. (BBC)
U.K. Prime MinisterDavid Cameron confirms that two ISIS militants, UK citizens, Reyaad Khan and Ruhul Amin, were killed in Syria when a British drone attack hit their car on August 21, 2015. Both Khan and Amin had appeared in an ISIS recruitment video last year. They are alleged to have been plotting a terrorist attack on the UK. (BBC)(The Guardian)
New Zealand temporarily bans the sale or lending of the book Into the River by Ted Dawe, pending a review which could see the book restricted long-term. This is the first time in 22 years that a book has been restricted to this extent in New Zealand. (The Guardian)(Radio New Zealand Online)
Business and economy
German airline Lufthansa cancels 84 long-haul flights as pilots go on strike over a proposed restructure plan. (Bloomberg)
A massive sandstorm hits Lebanon and Syria as well as Jordan, Israel and Egypt. The Lebanese Health Ministry said the storm caused the deaths of two women, and sent hundreds to hospitals with breathing difficulties. Particularly hard hit were the 1.1 million Syrian refugees in Lebanon, many in flimsy tents in informal campsites. (Middle East Eye)(AP via CTV News)(Al Jazeera English Online)
During protests over a lack of mining jobs in South Africa's Limpopo province, demonstrators destroy 21 buses, a police station, and a municipal office as well as blocking roads from Lephalale to Marapong. (ENCA)
At least 30 people have been killed in the southeastern Turkish city of Cizre following clashes between Turkish security forces and pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) supporters. Locals say Cizre has been "under siege" since the military imposed a curfew. (BBC)
The United States Senate fails to pass a resolution blocking approval of the nuclear agreement with Iran, meaning it will be formally adopted on October 19. (New York Times)
Venezuelan opposition leader Leopoldo López is convicted and sentenced to 14 years imprisonment for allegedly inciting violence at anti-government rallies. (AP)
Burundi's army chief General Prime Niyongabo survives an assassination attempt after armed men attacked his motorcade on a busy road in the capital, Bujumbura. Six people are killed in the attack. (BBC), (The New York Times)
At least three people die, 27 are injured, and 26 people are missing, the majority of them in and around Jōsō city in Ibaraki Prefecture, as a result of floods and landslides in Japan after heavy rainfall caused by Tropical Storm Etau. (Reuters)(The Independent-UK)
U.S. District Judge Gary Feinerman sentences a Federal Aviation Administration contractor, Brian Howard, to 12 years in prison for willfully destroying a Chicago-area air navigation facility using a September 26, 2014, fire which caused $100 million in damage. (AP)
Chinese and Indian troops face-off in the Burtse region of northern Ladakh after Indian troops crossed the mutually-agreed patrolling line to dismantle a disputed watchtower the Chinese were building close to line. (Economic Times)
The Egyptian Armed Forces claim that an offensive against ISIS militants in northern Sinai over the past week has killed at least 164 insurgents with the loss of eight troops. (AFP via Sky News)
A PKK car bombing on a checkpoint kills two Turkish police officers and injures five others in south-eastern Turkey. Also, Turkish security forces impose a curfew in the region's largest city, Diyarbakır. (Reuters)
Japan's Fire and Disaster Management Agency (消防庁) advises 2.8 million people to evacuate due to heavy flooding in the eastern region of the country. (CNN)
Four inmates are killed and four more injured during violence that lasted a couple of minutes at a privately-operated prison in Cushing, Oklahoma (U.S.). (N.Y. Daily News), (The New York Times)
RussiancosmonautGennady Padalka's return from the ISS on Saturday sets a new record for time in space, breaking the one fellow countryman Sergei Krikalev set in 2005. Padalka totaled 879 days in space (2.41 years) over five flights. (NPR)
Health and medicine
Doctors at Salamanca University Hospital in Salamanca, Spain implant a 3-D printing-produced artificial titaniumsternum (breastbone), and a portion of the ribs (as opposed to the current standard, a non-customized, flat piece of titanium, which can loosen over time) in a patient who had numerous cancerous tumors in that area, the first use of 3D printing technology to take the place of these specific body parts. (Quartz, via MSN)
Ten people are killed, seven from the same family, in a Saudi-led coalition airstrike on a government building in a southern suburb of Sana'a, the Yemen capital. (Reuters)
Taliban insurgents storm a prison in the central Afghan province of Ghazni killing at least four prison officers and freeing about 350 prisoners. The deputy provincial governor of the Ghazni province says the attackers were well-organised and wearing military uniforms. (BBC)
A University of Notre Dame study finds significant correlation between substantial executive stock options and future product recalls. CEOs with abundant stock options get a huge payoff when the company performs well but endure minute consequences when it doesn’t. (Fortune)
Shannon Lamb, a professor at Delta State University who was suspected of two murders in the U.S. state of Mississippi—the woman he was living with in Gautier and a fellow professor at the Delta State campus in Cleveland—dies from a self-inflicted gunshot wound while being pursued by police. (Fox News)
In the U.S., Rowan County, Kentucky county clerk Kim Davis, involved in the litigation over same-sex marriage, states she will not block her deputies from issuing marriage licenses, but will not authorize them personally (her name will not appear on them, and they will state that they were given under a federal judicial order). (Reuters)
The first direct observation of gravitational waves was made on 14 September 2015 and was announced by the LIGO and Virgo collaborations on 11 February 2016. This was also the first observation of a binary black hole merger.
Health and medicine
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force issues a recommendation stating that, in consultation with their doctor and pharmacist, and provided the risk of gastrointestinal bleeding and the very rare risk of certain hemorrhagic strokes do not outweigh the benefits in individual cases, that people aged 50 to 70 (especially those aged 50-60 and with a 10 percent risk or higher of cardiovascular disease, or CVD; mindful that the risk of bleeding, which can be dangerous, goes up as one ages) should take low-dose aspirin, for a period of at least 10 years, for preventive benefits against CVD and heart attack, as well as colorectal cancer. The evidence is inconclusive for those not at very high risk who are over 70, and below 40, and there is only weak evidence for prevention of lung cancer, breast cancer, and prostate cancer. (U.S. Preventive Services), (NY Times Blogs)
Houthi militants backed by Yemeni troops reportedly seize control of al-Rabu’ah, a town in Saudi Arabia's southwestern Asir region near the Yemeni border, forcing Saudi forces to pull out of the area. (Press TV)
Hewlett-Packard, which has struggled for years in a declining PC market, will cut up to 33,300 jobs over the next three years, mostly in its enterprise business. (Reuters)
New York City Police and US federal agents arrest members of an international crime syndicate that have been selling cheap, but toxic, synthetic marijuana. In New York alone, 2,300 people have ended up in emergency rooms in the last two months. The seizure includes two warehouses full of synthetic drugs in the Bronx, one of the largest raids ever. (CBS News)
Arab Coalition warplanes bomb Yemen's capital Sana'a targeting a high-profile Houthi leader's house. At least nine civilians are killed in the attack. (Reuters)
American Airlines halts flights for 90 minutes at its major hubs in Chicago, Dallas, and Miami because of a computer glitch. The incident produces a cascading effect of delays throughout all US airlines. (UPI)
Brazil'sSupreme Court issues a decision that bans corporate money in elections. This ruling comes as a major investigation is underway in the country on a campaign financing bribery and corruption scandal. (Singapore Today Online), (AP via Fox News)
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency orders Volkswagen to fix nearly 500,000 VW and Audidiesel cars from model years 2009-2015 that include software that circumvents EPA emissions standards. The company's illegal use of so-called "defeat devices" threaten public health, in some cases releasing 40 times the pollution standard of nitrogen oxide emissions. The company faces possible U.S. fines of up to $37,500 per vehicle for the violations which could total more than $18 billion. (AP via Fox News), (EPA)
In India, about 2.3 million people respond to the state of Uttar Pradesh's announcement of 368 low-level government jobs openings that pay 16,000 rupees ($240) a month. At least 255 of the applicants had a doctorate and over 200,000 had master's degrees. (AP)
Governor of ArizonaDoug Ducey states that 21-year-old Leslie Allen Merritt Jr. is ballistically linked to four incidents and arrested in Glendale, Arizona after a SWAT raid. Merritt was previously charged twice in 2013, the first for failing to stop at the scene of a damaged vehicle, and the second for assault and criminal damage. Police state that he is known to hold anti-government and anti-police views. He is charged with four counts each of aggravated assault, criminal damage, disorderly conduct, discharging a firearm within city limits, carrying out a drive-by shooting, and intentional acts of terrorism; and his bail is set at $1 million. (ABC15), (KOB), (HEAVY), (ABC News), (Q13FOX), (AZ Central), (CNN), (Yahoo News), (NBC News)
A Saudi-led military coalition bombards government buildings and residential neighborhoods in the Yemeni capital, Sana'a, killing about 30 people, including civilians. Rescuers continue searching for other possible victims buried under the rubble. (AP via Orange County Register), (Xinhuanet)
Croatian prime minister Zoran Milanović says Croatia will 'force' Hungary to accept migrants by sending them to the Hungarian border. Hungary responded angrily calling Milanović "pathetic" and accused Croatia of human smuggling. (BBC)
After having arrived in Havana, Cuba, the day before, Pope Francis, in the third trip by an incumbent Pope to Cuba, presides over a Papal Mass in Havana's Plaza de la Revolución, and pleads for Colombia and the FARC rebels to make a final peace, also noting the better relations between the U.S., which he will visit next, and Cuba. He holds a meeting with Cuban President Raúl Castro, and meets for a talk and exchange of gifts with former Cuban President Fidel Castro. (ABC), (USA Today), (WSJ), (The New York Times)
At least 13 migrants died when a ferry and their inflatable dinghy collided off the northwestern Turkish port of Çanakkale. Twenty people were rescued while another 13 are still missing. (BBC), (i24 News)
U.S. Secretary of StateJohn Kerry says that the United States will accept 85,000 refugees from the world in 2016, up from this year's 70,000 refugees, and will increase to 100,000 refugees in 2017. (Washington Post)
Austrian officials report 11,000 migrants crossed into the country from Hungary on Saturday, and another 7,000 are expected today. Seven trains are scheduled to transport 3,500 of these travelers to Germany. (CBS News)
Government forces target al-Shaar neighborhood in eastern Aleppo city with surface-to-surface missiles, hitting a crowded public market, killing more than 30 civilians and dozens wounded. (Ara News)
U.S. officials say Russia has begun flying drones on surveillance missions over Syria in what would be Russia's first military air operations in the country since the recent military build-up at a Syrian airbase in Latakia. (Reuters)
Hungary's parliament passes a law allowing the Hungarian military to help handle the migrant crisis at its borders with Serbia and Croatia, including the right to use non-lethal force such as rubber bullets, pyrotechnical devices, tear gas grenades or net guns. (Reuters)
In Auckland, New Zealand, an extradition hearing for Kim Dotcom, former owner of a file sharing website, for alleged copyright infringement, racketeering, and money laundering begins, seeking to bring him to the U.S. (BBC)
At least eight people are killed and 45 wounded in shootings over the weekend across Chicago. (Fox Chicago)
A Denver, Coloradofederal jury convicts Harold Henthorn of murder in the death of his wife Toni Henthorn, who fell off a cliff as they hiked in Colorado's Rocky Mountain National Park to celebrate their wedding anniversary. His previous wife had also died in suspicious circumstances. (AP)
Peanut Corporation of America owner Stewart Parnell is sentenced to 28 years for Salmonella typhimurium-tainted peanut butter, the most severe punishment ever handed out to a producer in a foodborne illness case. In late 2008 and early 2009, nine people died and at least 714 people in 46 states, half of them children, fell ill. Parnell and his brother were convicted in September 2014 of 71 criminal counts. His brother Michael Parnell is sentenced to 20 years, and the plant's former quality control manager Mary Wilkerson is sentenced to five years. (LA Times), (USA Today)
Politics and elections
Political parties in Northern Ireland hold talks to save a power-sharing agreement following claims that Irish nationalist militants were involved in the murder of a former operative. (Reuters)
The coup leader General Gilbert Diendéré says that he is ready to hand over power to transitional authorities as the army marches on the capital Ouagadougou. (BBC)
Pope Francis arrives in the U.S. from his last stop in Cuba, Santiago de Cuba, at Joint Base Andrews (formerly, Andrews Air Force Base), near Washington D.C., to start his first tour of the United States. He is received by U.S. President Barack Obama, his wife, U.S. First Lady Michelle Obama, Malia and Sasha Obama, Marian Lois Robinson, U.S. Vice President Joseph R. Biden, his wife, U.S. Second Lady Dr. Jill Biden, two Biden granddaughters, the Apostolic Nuncio to the U.S. Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, military and base leaders, and Washington's Cardinal Donald Wuerl. He will be received tomorrow morning in a second arrival ceremony, at the White House, and will meet with the President there. (The Guardian)
Volkswagen says that 11 million vehicles could have suspect emission control software and it has set aside 6.5 billion euros ($7.2 billion US dollars) for possible fines, repairs, and litigation. (NBC News)
A tornado, with maximum sustained winds of 130 mph, strikes Johns Island, South Carolina with no deaths or injuries, but 75 homes are damaged, 10 heavily. (AP, via MSN)
Health
The BBC reports that Nigeria will be removed from the list of countries where polio is endemic. (BBC)
At least four Armenian soldiers are killed following an Azeri attack near the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region. Yesterday, Azerbaijan shelled several ethnic Armenian villages, leaving three civilians dead. (Reuters)
Armenia's Defense Ministry declares that it will "use artillery and missiles" to repel attacks by Azerbaijan following the deaths of four soldiers in the Nagorno-Karabakh region, raising fears of all-out war between the rival countries. (Fox News)
Tropical Storm Niala forms off the coast of the Hawaiian islands with the likelihood of heavy rain on the island of Hawaii (Big Island) over the weekend. (Accuweather)
Air-strikes by Saudi helicopter gunships on the Yemeni village of Bani Zela in Yemen's Red Sea border area with Saudi Arabia kill at least 25 people. (Euronews)
France says it has carried out its first air-strikes against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant within Syria, destroying a training camp in the east of the country. Previously, France had only carried out air-strikes in Iraq with consent of the Iraqi government. (Reuters)
An Arab coalition air-strike on a wedding party in Wahijah, a village near the Red Sea port city of Mocha in southern Yemen, reportedly leaves as many as 131 people dead, making it the deadliest coalition attack on Yemeni civilians in the conflict so far. The UN general secretary condemns the attack. (BBC), (USA TODAY)
Government forces backed by the Arab coalition capture Marib Dam, one of the Houthi militant’s remaining strongholds in Marib Governorate, opening the path to a key highway leading to Sana'a. (The National)
Royal Dutch Shell halts its drilling program for oil and gas off the coast of Alaska citing high costs and a challenging regulatory environment. (Bloomberg)
Separatists won a clear majority of seats in Catalonia's parliament (72 out of 135) in this weekend's election that saw a record turnout of 78 percent. The winners will seek to unilaterally declare independence within 18 months. Spain's constitution does not allow any region to break away. Spanish Prime MinisterMariano Rajoy vows to fight the separatist plan. (BBC), (AP via U.S. News & World Report)
The upper chamber of the Russian parliament approves a law allowing the use of the Russian Armed Forces outside its borders, following a request by Russian President Vladimir Putin. (The News Hub)
Russia begins airstrikes against anti-government targets in Syria following a request from PresidentBashar al-Assad. A U.S. official said the air attack struck near the Syrian city of Homs, where the official said ISIS currently does not have a major presence. (NPR), (ABC News), (Washington Post)
An Iranian fishing boat loaded with weapons, including rockets and anti-tank shells, is intercepted and seized in the Arabian Sea, 150 miles southeast of the Omani Port of Salalah, by Arab coalition forces. Saudi Arabia has previously accused Iran of supplying weapons to Houthi militants in Yemen. (BBC)
Hurricane Joaquin passes over ocean with temperatures near 86°F (30°C) - the warmest since record keeping began in 1880. (National Hurricane Center), (UPI), (Reuters)
Hurricane Joaquin reaches maximum sustained winds of 115 mph and becomes a Category 3 hurricane. The storm, with additional strengthening expected, should linger over the The Bahamas through October 2 before heading toward the U.S. (ABC News), (NHC)
The hurricane is expected to pass The Bahamas tomorrow, bringing tropical-storm-force winds, storm surges, coastal flooding, and 5-10 inches of rain. While the European forecast model suggests Joaquin will avoid the U.S. East Coast, the American model predicts it will ram into Virginia, Maryland, or North Carolina this weekend. (NBC News), (NHC)
