World

Multan (Pakistan), October 17 Police were investigating after a fire overnight in eastern Pakistan killed seven family members, a rescue official said Sunday. The fire broke out at a house in the Ali Pur area of Muzaffar Garh district in Punjab province, said rescue service chief Dr Hussain Mian. He said firefighters retrieved the charred bodies of a 65-year-old man, two women ages 35 and 19, three boys ages 3, 10 and 12 and a 2-month-old infant. Mian said the bodies have been sent for autopsy and forensic examination. Police said the cause of the fire was being investigated and investigators want to know why none of the family members woke up when the fire erupted. — AP

Moscow, October 17 A Soyuz space capsule carrying a cosmonaut and two Russian filmmakers has landed after a 3 1/2-hour trip from the International Space Station. The capsule, descending under a red-and-white striped parachute after entering Earth's atmosphere, landed upright in the steppes of Kazakhstan on schedule at 0435 GMT Sunday with Oleg Novitskiy, Yulia Peresild and Klim Shipenko aboard. Actress Peresild and film director Shipenko rocketed to the space station on October 5 for a 12-day stint to film segments of a movie titled "Challenge," in which a surgeon played by Peresild rushes to the space station to save a crew member who needs an urgent operation in orbit. Novitskiy, who spent more than six months aboard the space station, is to star as the ailing cosmonaut in the movie....

Colombo, October 17 Sri Lanka has sought a USD 500 million credit line from India to pay for its crude oil purchases amid a severe foreign exchange crisis in the island nation. The move came few days after energy minister Udaya Gammanpila warned that the current availability of fuel in the country can be guaranteed only till next January. The state-run Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) owes nearly USD 3.3 billion to the two main government banks—Bank of Ceylon and People's Bank. The state oil distributors imports crude from the Middle East and refined products from other areas, including Singapore. "We are currently engaged with the Indian High Commission here to obtain the facility (USD 500 million credit line) under the India-Sri Lanka economic partnership arrangement," CPC Chairman...

October 17 As many as 17 American Christian missionaries and their families, including children, were kidnapped on Saturday by gang members in Haiti's capital of Port-au-Prince, the New York Times reported, citing security officials there. The kidnapping happened as the missionaries were leaving an orphanage in the crisis-engulfed Caribbean nation, the Times said. They were abducted from a bus headed to the airport to drop off some members of the group before continuing to another destination in Haiti, the report added, citing local officials. Jennifer Viau, a spokeswoman for the US State Department in Washington, said by email that "we're looking into this." The US Embassy in Haiti did not respond to a request for comment outside business hours. A spokeswoman for the Haitian police s...

October 17 As many as 17 American Christian missionaries and their families, including children, were kidnapped on Saturday by gang members in Haiti's capital of Port-au-Prince, the New York Times reported, citing security officials there. The kidnapping happened as the missionaries were leaving an orphanage in the crisis-engulfed Caribbean nation, the Times said. They were abducted from a bus headed to the airport to drop off some members of the group before continuing to another destination in Haiti, the report added, citing local officials. Jennifer Viau, a spokeswoman for the US State Department in Washington, said by email that "we're looking into this." The US Embassy in Haiti did not respond to a request for comment outside business hours. A spokeswoman for the Haitian police s...

London, October 16 Scotland Yard on Saturday said the killing of Conservative MP David Amess was being treated as a terrorist attack and it was probing a potential Islamist terrorism link to the fatal stabbing, an incident that has shocked the country and prompted calls for a review of security measures for lawmakers. Johnson visits site Leigh-on-Sea: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Saturday laid flowers outside the church where a lawmaker was stabbed to death a day earlier, in what police say was a terrorist attack probably linked to Islamist extremism. Johnson, interior minister Priti Patel, and Labour Party leader Keir Starmer were among those to lay flowers in tribute to Amess at the scene of the murder. "To the memory of Sir David Amess MP, a fine parliamentarian and a mu...

New York, October 16 Mask rules, vaccination mandates and business shutdowns have all landed in the courts during the Covid-19 outbreak, confronting judges with questions of science and government authority. Now they are increasingly being asked to weigh in on the deworming drug ivermectin. Russia sees 1,000 daily covid deaths Moscow: Russia's daily death toll from Covid-19 has exceeded 1,000 for the first time as the country faces a sustained wave of rising infections. The national Covid task force on Saturday reported 1,002 deaths in the previous day, up from 999 on Friday, along with 33,208 new confirmed cases. AP At least two dozen lawsuits have been filed in recent weeks by people seeking to force hospitals to give their Covid-stricken loved ones ivermectin, a drug for parasit...

Tehran, October 16 An Iranian appeals court has upheld a verdict sentencing an Iranian-British woman long held in Tehran to another year in prison, her lawyer said Saturday. Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has already served a five-year prison sentence in the Islamic Republic. 'Propaganda against system' Zaghari-Ratcliffe participated in a protest in front of Iranian Embassy in London in 2009 She was sentenced for allegedly spreading "propaganda against the system" Was taken into custody at Tehran airport in April 2016 as she was returning to Britain Her lawyer Hojjat Kermani said the appeals court upheld a verdict issued earlier this year sentencing her to another year. The verdict additionally includes a one-year travel ban abroad, meaning she cannot leave Iran to join her family...

Tribune News Service New Delhi, October 16 The head of US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC), David Marchick, will travel to South Africa and India to promote vaccine production in these countries. To reach on October 24 Both India and South Africa insisted on the suspension of patents on Covid vaccines to enable developing countries to manufacture them at a low cost After initial enthusiasm for the proposal, Washington seems to have aligned with Western European nations in alternate proposals that allow their pharma companies to remain as the major suppliers Arriving in India on October 24, US International Development Finance Corporation chief David Marchick and his team will visit the offices of Biological E to participate in a signing ceremony for a new fac...

Orange (US), October 17 Former US President Bill Clinton will spend one more night at a Southern California hospital where he is recovering from an infection, a spokesman said on Saturday. "President Clinton has continued to make excellent progress over the past 24 hours," spokesman Angel Urena said in a statement. Clinton will remain overnight at University of California Irvine Medical Center "to receive IV antibiotics before an expected discharge tomorrow," the statement said. Hillary Clinton has been with her husband at the hospital southeast of Los Angeles. She returned Saturday with her daughter Chelsea Clinton around 8 am Saturday in an SUV accompanied by secret service agents. President Joe Biden said Friday night that he had spoken to Bill Clinton and the former President "sen...