Month: October 2016

Venezuela’s government proposed talks to ease the country’s political crisis after Pope Francis intervened, but an opposition leader branded it a ploy by President Nicolas Maduro to cling to power.
The move had aimed to calm tensions after the opposition accused the socialist president of staging a “coup d’etat” by blocking its bid for a vote on removing him.
But the opposition said Maduro had jumped the gun by announcing the talks before terms had been agreed. One leader accused him of taking advantage of the pope’s “good faith.”
Months of tension that have included riots and looting threatened to boil over after authorities enraged the opposition last week by annulling its drive for a recall referendum.
Maduro had a private audience with the pope at the Vatican on Monday. He said afterwards that Francis had supported the opening of a “formal dialogue” between government and opposition.
Papal envoy Emil Paul Tscherrig said separately in Caracas that both sides had launched a “national dialogue.”
He said they aimed to formally open talks on October 30 on the Venezuelan island of Margarita.
The opposition MUD coalition later insisted it had not agreed to those terms, though it welcomed the Vatican’s efforts to help.
“What dialogue? No dialogue has been started in Venezuela,” said Henrique Capriles, a senior MUD figure, in an address broadcast online.
Maduro’s side “is trying to use Pope Francis’s good faith and the good faith of the Vatican envoy… to say: nothing has gone wrong here,” he alleged.
“Rest assured the opposition will never go along with that.”
The MUD said in a statement separately that it would only enter talks if the government respected the right to a referendum and freed political prisoners, among other demands.
Maduro has repeatedly refused to allow a referendum.
The MUD statement also said any talks should take place in the capital Caracas, “in the public eye.”
“A meeting in Margarita was never up for discussion,” said Capriles. “I heard about it on television.”
The opposition members who hold a majority in the legislature had vowed to debate on Tuesday whether to mount a “political trial” against the president.
They also vowed massive nationwide street protests on Wednesday.
Analysts have warned of an increased risk of violent unrest in Venezuela. Clashes at anti-government protests in 2014 left 43 people dead.
On Monday a students’ group said 27 people were injured in clashes with police at an anti-government protest in the western city of San Cristobal.
The local state governor Jose Vielma Mora said the students had been “violent” and blocked streets.
The opposition had earlier vowed to fight what it called Maduro’s “dictatorship.”
They accuse Maduro of driving Venezuela, once a booming oil giant, to the brink of collapse.
“Only dictatorships strip their citizens of their rights,” opposition spokesman Jesus Torrealba said Monday.
Hit by the fall of global oil prices, Venezuela’s economy has crashed, sparking protests and looting due to shortages of food, medicine and basic goods.
International non-government group Human Rights Watch says Venezuela is in a “profound humanitarian crisis.”
Maduro calls the economic crisis a capitalist conspiracy.
In recession since the beginning of 2014, Venezuela’s economy is facing a contraction of 10 percent this year and inflation of 475 percent, rising to 1,660 percent next year, the IMF forecasts.
Maduro’s public support has crumbled. A recent poll found more than 75 percent of Venezuelans disapprove of him.

Ivory Coast’s former first lady Simone Gbagbo on Tuesday refused to attend her trial for crimes against humanity due to a row with the court over the failure of high-profile witnesses to take the stand.
“This morning, when I sent security officers to fetch her, she told them she couldn’t come, in line with her lawyers’ decision to suspend their participation,” prosecutor Aly Yeo said.
The judge suspended the trial until November 3.
Gbagbo’s lawyers had announced their refusal to attend on Monday due to a no-show by witnesses they had called to testify, including a former premier, an ex general and a police chief.
“We are still demanding that our witnesses appear, that’s the principle of a trial. We haven’t heard the testimony of those involved,” said lawyer Ange Rodrigue Dadje.
Monday was supposed to be the first day of witnesses called by the defence, with Gbagbo’s lawyers calling figures including parliament speaker Guillaume Soro, former premier Jeannot Kouadio Ahoussou and former army chief Philippe Mangou.
“The process is biased, the court does not want a fair trial,” said Dohora Blede, one of the lawyers defending Gbagbo over post-election violence that left more than 3,000 dead in 2010-11.
“We see that our witnesses are not present — we have asked for a delay of four days to see these people, who are indispensable for demonstrating the truth.”
But the prosecution said witnesses were free to testify or not and that it was up to the defence to make sure they turned up.
“Now they have an extra week,” the prosecutor said.
Gbagbo has been on trial since the end of May, accused of involvement in the shelling of Abobo, a northern suburb of Abidjan which was a stronghold of Alassane Ouattara, who beat her husband Laurent in the 2010 election and is now president.
She is also accused of being a member of a “crisis cell” that allegedly coordinated pro-Gbagbo attacks by the armed forces and militias.
She is already serving a 20-year sentence for “endangering state security”.
Ivory Coast, the world’s top cocoa producer, was rocked by deadly violence for five months after Laurent Gbagbo refused to concede the 2010 election to Ouattara.
He is currently on trial before the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

Mexico detained more than 20,000 unaccompanied child migrants, mostly from Central America, in 2015, authorities said on Monday.
That was double the number of the year before and a sign of the worsening migration crisis in the region, where many pass through heading to seek refuge in the United States.
Mexico’s National Human Rights Commission said the minors were at risk of kidnapping and rape by criminal gangs or even by corrupt officials.
“The authorities are acting without considering the interests of the children and protecting them,” Luis Raul Gonzalez, president of the commission told a news conference, presenting the figures.
He said most of the minors were from the crime- and poverty-plagued Central American countries of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras.
“They are held in migrant centers instead of being immediately sent to reception centers where they can receive the assistance and protection they need in accordance with international standards,” he said.

The United Nations is struggling to raise $200 million to help the families of victims of a deadly outbreak of cholera in Haiti, a senior UN official said Monday.
The financial aid follows the United Nations’ admission that it had a moral responsibility to help Haiti deal with the epidemic that has been blamed on UN peacekeepers.
Almost 10,000 people have been killed and 700,000 affected since the outbreak in 2010. There are still 500 new cases of cholera reported every week.
UN envoy David Nabarro, who is leading negotiations with donors and with the Haitian government on the aid package, said drawing voluntary contributions was difficult.
“It is highly unlikely that we would be able to mobilize $200 million,” Nabarro said.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is due to announce later this month the aid package for the victims’ families and a separate fund also of $200 million to build up Haiti’s health infrastructure.
The envoy said it was “a reasonable amount of money, both for payments to families of individuals who died and for communities affected by cholera”, as well as a scholarship scheme for children.
The international drive to raise financial aid for Haiti’s cholera epidemic comes as a UN flash appeal for $120 million to help the country cope with the devastation of Hurricane Matthew is faltering.
Only 25 percent of the funding appeal has been raised so far, according to UN officials.
“The hurricane has created a new set of dangers because in the communities affected the risk of cholera is high,” said Nabarro who returned from a trip to Haiti to assess damage.
While the United Nations maintains that it has a moral responsibility to help Haiti, it rejects claims that it is also legally responsible for the damages from the health emergency.
Several lawsuits filed by victims in US courts have been rejected because of the immunity from prosecution accorded to UN missions.
Studies have traced the cholera outbreak to Nepalese peacekeepers who were dispatched to Haiti by the United Nations after the massive 2010 earthquake.

Manchester United’s players must behave like men in the wake of their humiliating 4-0 Premier League hammering by Chelsea, manager Jose Mourinho said on Monday.
The Portuguese coach — who sat helplessly as he endured his worst defeat in the Premier League against the club who sacked him last term — wants an immediate reaction against city rivals Manchester City in Wednesday’s League Cup clash.
“We are really, really sad, but again this is not for kids, this is for men and…we have to be men and work for the next one,” the 53-year-old told the club’s TV station MUTV.
Mourinho, whose side have won just once in their past six Premier League games, said he was sanguine about United’s recent results and took succour from the fact they would drop points when they play each other.
They trail the trio of table-toppers Manchester City, Arsenal and Liverpool by six points.
However, their haul of 14 points after nine matches is United’s second worst in their Premier League history — the team in 2014/15 garnering just 13.
“I would prefer to play (next) in the Premier League,” said Mourinho.
“It’s a bad feeling in the Premier League. With the combination of results the gap to the top is six points.
“We have had a very difficult period of matches.
“We lost points this week and, even in the match when we played phenomenal against Stoke, we lost points then. Now we need to win matches.
“I am not saying they are easy ones, but we have Burnley, we have Swansea, West Ham, Sunderland, Middlesbrough — matches that we need to win and the top four, the top five, they have to play between themselves like we did this week against Chelsea and Liverpool.
“They are going to lose points too, so we are in the run, but there is no way to hide because I think our faces speak by themselves.”

Colombia’s communist FARC rebels said Monday they were “close” to agreeing on new terms to rescue a peace accord that was rejected by voters in a referendum.
The force has resumed talks with the government to seek a new deal taking into account the demands of the “No” camp that rejected the accord in a referendum on October 2.
The sides are aiming to end a 52-year civil conflict that has killed 260,000 people.
FARC leader Timoleon “Timochenko” Jimenez said on Twitter that his side was “close to defining an accord addressing the concerns of everyone: those who abstained, the No camp and the Yes.”
The deal that was put to the vote was to see the FARC disarm and turn into a political party, with amnesties for some of its members.
Opponents of the deal said it made too many concessions to the FARC.

Atletico Madrid forward Antoine Griezmann was named La Liga player of the season for 2015/16 on Monday, ahead of the likes of star duo Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo.
Atletico’s Diego Simeone also took the coach of the season award while Barcelona’s Uruguay striker Luis Suarez was named the top non-EU player.
Curiously, though, Barca’s Argentina international Messi was recognised as the best forward at the award ceremony in Valencia.
Atletico dominated the awards as Jan Oblak was best goalkeeper, Diego Godin top defender and Frenchman Griezmann also claimed the fans’ award.
Real Madrid weren’t left empty-handed, though, as Luka Modric was named best midfielder.

Manchester City captain Vincent Kompany believes bitter rivals Manchester United have handed his team an advantage by playing down Wednesday’s League Cup local derby at Old Trafford.
The injury-plagued Belgium international defender started a game for the first time since April in Sunday’s 1-1 Premier League draw with Southampton and came through unscathed as City gained a point that put them top of the table on goal difference.
Now Kompany hopes to retain his place for the EFL Cup fourth-round tie, especially as United manager Jose Mourinho — beaten 4-0 at his old side Chelsea on Sunday — has described the competition as being fourth on his club’s list of priorities.
“It’s just physically impossible for me to play down a derby,” said Kompany, 30. “But the more they say this is the fourth competition, the better it is for us.
“Am I looking forward to Wednesday? Come on, always. The bigger the game, the better.
“That’s how I’ve always approached it in my career and I will for the rest of my career. Those games are what you play for.”
City hold the League Cup after beating Liverpool on penalties in a Wembley final in February, but they make the journey across Manchester on a run of five league and cup games without victory.
However, the return of a fully fit Kompany is a major boost for a City defence that appears determined to implode at least once a game.
Kompany, regarded as one of the top centre-backs in the Premier League, has suffered a mammoth 34 injuries in his eight years with the Blues.
The majority of his injury history relates to hamstring and, particularly, calf problems, although Kompany?s latest issue has concerned his groin.
“It’s hard to come back, obviously, but I know what I have to do to be back at my level,” said the City stalwart.
“I’m always confident. The last thing I want to do, when you’ve lived through your career as a footballer, is give up.
“If I give up then I know the outcome. But if I carry on, there’s always a chance that I’ll relive those moments. So my motivation can never be in doubt.
“God knows what would have happened if I’d never had those injuries but I need to get something that makes me stronger out of it, something different from other players, and that’s what I believe in.”
City manager Pep Guardiola is looking to end an unusually barren spell by his high standards and following City’s latest disappointment against Southampton he kept his players locked in the dressing room for nearly an hour.
Kompany declined to discuss specifically what was said during the inquest but accepts that the players should shoulder their share of criticism.
“We’re adults, we’re all highly ambitious and we realise that we have to move as a unit and behave as a team and I think anything in the dressing room stays in the dressing room,” he said.
“But I think it’s positive to have some sort of maturity in the team, to recognise we need to move forward, but to have a positive spirit and, as I said, these kind of results sometimes give you something extra — and that’s what we need to get out of it.”

“Today more than ever, there is a huge need for universal justice,” said Sidiki Kaba, president of the assembly of state parties to the ICC founding treaty, evoking “the tragedies which are happening in front of our eyes”.
Kaba, also Senegal’s justice minister, said it was necessary “to engage in dialogue with the nations which want to leave the ICC. For that we must listen to their concerns, their recriminations and their criticism”.
South Africa dealt a heavy blow to the troubled international court on Friday by announcing it was withdrawing from an institution set up to prosecute the world’s worst crimes.
The decision followed a dispute last year when Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir visited the country for an African Union summit despite facing an ICC arrest warrant over alleged war crimes.
And earlier this month, Burundian lawmakers overwhelmingly voted to withdraw from the ICC.
Rights organisations said Burundi’s government was trying to hide abuses from the eyes of the world.
Namibia and Kenya have also raised the possibility of leaving the ICC, which has often been accused of bias against African leaders.
Of the 10 ICC probes since 2002 when the court was established, nine have been into African countries and one into Georgia, although most ICC cases have been referred to the court by African governments themselves.
Kaba told reporters in Dakar that any formal withdrawal request would only take effect after a year.
He urged the members states considering such a move to “give dialogue a chance,” adding that the next general assembly in November would be a good forum for finding “a dynamic consensus”.
The Senegalese minister also called for national judicial systems to be reinforced to allow “Africans to judge Africans on the continent”.

South American football confederation CONMEBOL said on Monday it is suing American sponsorship partners ISM for $18 million in the continuing fall-out from a world football corruption scandal.
“CONMEBOL has opened a process with New York State to cancel its contract with International Soccer Marketing Inc. (ISM) for the exclusive management of Copa Libertadores sponsors and is claiming $18 million,” said CONMEBOL in a statement.
The move comes after an ISM chief admitted to American prosecutors that the company paid bribes to former CONMEBOL officials to gain the exclusive rights to manage those sponsorship contracts.
CONMEBOL said this would be the first of several cases brought.
When elected in January, CONMEBOL president Alejandro Dominguez said he would be suing companies that benefitted from corruption carried out by his predecessors.
The previous three CONMEBOL presidents, Uruguayan Eugenio Figueredo and Paraguayans Juan Angel Napout and Nicolas Leoz, are suspected of having accepted bribes from sports marketing companies when attributing television rights for major competitions.
All three are currently behind bars awaiting trial for their roles in the wide-ranging FIFA corruption scandal that brought down former president Sepp Blatter.
Since then, CONMEBOL has affected a widespread internal audit on all contracts signed by its tainted former leaders.

Ban said in a statement that he regretted the decision which followed a dispute over South Africa’s refusal to arrest Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir and hand him over for trial at the ICC for war crimes.
Pretoria last week presented a formal letter to the United Nations announcing its decision to pull out of the Rome statute, the founding treaty of the ICC.
The withdrawal will take effect one year after the letter was received, making South Africa the first country to pull out from the court.
Ban “hopes South Africa will reconsider its decision before its withdrawal takes effect,” his spokesman said.
The UN recalled that South Africa was among the first signatories of the treaty and stressed that the ICC is “central to global efforts to end impunity and prevent conflict.”
Established in 2002, the ICC is often accused of bias against Africa and has struggled with a lack of cooperation, including from the United States, which has signed the court’s treaty but never ratified it.
Ban said countries that have concerns about the functioning of the court should address them in the assembly of states that have signed the Rome statute.
UN officials meanwhile were working behind the scenes to try to persuade South Africa to reverse course and to prevent other countries from following suit.
UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric declined to give details, but said there were discussions “with some concerned member-states” and that “a letter withdrawing the withdrawal” would be sufficient to halt the pullout.
Earlier this month, Burundi said it would leave the ICC, while Namibia and Kenya have also raised the possibility.
The United Nations has yet to receive an official letter from Burundi notifying it of the withdrawal and a UN envoy was in Bujumbura for talks on Monday that were expected to touch on that decision.
Welcoming South Africa’s decision, Sudan last week urged other African member nations to follow suit.
“South Africa has made a profoundly negative decision for victims and the rule of law and it needs to reconsider, said Richard Dicker, director of Human Rights Watch’s international justice program.
“Other strong justice-supporting ICC states in Africa that helped create the court need to convey their views,” he told AFP.

The 330 Marines, to be stationed on rotation around 1,000 kilometres (600 miles) from the Russian border, will be engaged in training and manoeuvres in almost Arctic conditions, the Norwegian defence ministry said.
The announcement comes against a backdrop of increasing tensions between Russia and the West over Ukraine and the conflict in Syria, although Norway itself enjoys good relations with its giant neighbour.
The US already has vast amounts of military equipment positioned in NATO ally Norway — notably in tunnels dug into mountains — but no troops.
“This US-initiative is welcome and also fits well within ongoing processes in NATO to increase exercises, training and interoperability within the Alliance,” Norwegian Defence Minister Ine Eriksen Soreide said in the statement.
“The defence of Norway is dependent on allied reinforcements, and it is crucial for Norwegian security that our allies come here to gain knowledge of how to operate in Norway and with Norwegian forces,” she added.
Before joining NATO in 1949, Norway allayed Russian fears by pledging not to open its territory to foreign combat troops so long as Norway was not attacked or threatened with attack.
This pledge was later amended to allow foreign troops to conduct manoeuvres in Norway.
The deployment, which will begin in January, is a US initiative which Oslo is presenting as a trial to be evaluated during 2017.
Last week the Russian embassy in Oslo expressed surprise as the idea of stationing US troops in Norway was mooted.
“Taking into account multiple statements made by Norwegian officials about the absence of threat from Russia to Norway, we would like to understand why Norway is so much willing to increase its military potential, in particular through the stationing of American forces in Vaernes,” embassy spokesman Maxime Gourov said in an email sent to AFP on Friday.
Former senior Norwegian army officer Jacob Borresen said the planned deployment “sends negative signals eastwards”.
The big risk, he told broadcaster NRK, is that the move creates a Cold War-style “confrontation zone”.
In July, NATO announced it would deploy, also on a rotational basis, four multinational battalions to Poland and to Baltic states to deter any Russian incursion.

Second seed Tomas Berdych suffered a shock defeat to unheralded Georgian Nikoloz Basilashvili at the ATP Vienna Open on Monday.
World number 10 Berdych lost 6-4, 6-7 (5/7), 7-5 to a man ranked almost 100 places below him, after more than two and a half hours on court.
The defeat will hit Berdych’s hopes of reaching next month’s ATP Finals in London.
The Czech is currently ninth in the race to London, which pits the top eight players of the year against each other.
With world number seven Rafael Nadal injured and already out of the London showpiece, Berdych holds the final qualifying position, although with a slender 220-point lead over Belgium’s David Goffin, who is playing in Basel this week.

He succeeds another second-row forward, Lood de Jager, as winner of the major domestic rugby individual award.
After two injury-plagued seasons, Du Toit has been consistently impressive this year for Western Stormers in Super Rugby and South Africa in nine Tests.
Apart from his line-out skills, the 24-year-old from Cape Town has been a formidable runner in loose play with three Test tries to his credit in 17 appearances.
“I was an athlete at school and this helped develop my speed,” he told the audience at the annual awards function.
“Steering clear of injuries after two seasons in which I was constantly sidelined has been a highlight this year.”
Du Toit was part of the South Africa 2012 world junior championship-winning team and made his Springboks debut against Wales in Cardiff the following year.
He was an automatic choice for November’s tour of Europe that includes an exhibition match against the Barbarians and Tests in England, Italy and Wales.
Fellow Stormers and Springboks lock Eben Etzebeth, along with Golden Lions trio, winger Ruan Combrinck and loose forwards Jaco Kriel and Warren Whiteley, were the other Player of the Year finalists.
The Players’ Player of the Year award went to Sharks loose forward Jean-Luc du Preez, a son of former Springbok scrum-half Robert.
He is among four uncapped players picked by national coach Allister Coetzee for the end-of-season tour.
Lions gained recognition for finishing runners-up to Wellington Hurricanes of New Zealand in the 2016 Super Rugby championship.
Fly-half Elton Jantjies was voted the best South African player in the competition, Johan Ackermann received the coach of the year award and Lions took the team of the year prize.
Prop Ox Nche from champions Free State Cheetahs was named the Currie Cup player of the year.
South African Rugby, media, sponsors and provincial unions were involved in the voting process.

Colombia’s ELN rebels accused the government Monday of “torpedoing” peace talks due to open this week by insisting the leftist guerrillas free their last remaining hostage.
Three days out from the historic talks, tension flared when the government’s lead negotiator, Juan Camilo Restrepo, gave the National Liberation Army (ELN) an ultimatum: Free the hostage, or the talks are off.
The ELN, which has pledged to free all its hostages before the talks open Thursday, is still holding former congressman Odin Sanchez in the remote jungle region of Choco, along the Panamanian border.
He is believed to be the last hostage held by the guerrillas, who freed several others in the weeks leading up to the talks.
“If Odin Sanchez isn’t released safe and sound between now and Thursday, the conditions will not be in place to begin the public phase of the negotiations,” Restrepo said in an interview on Caracol Radio.
That drew a furious response from the ELN.
“J.C. Restrepo’s statement torpedoes the joint actions that must be taken by (Thursday),” the insurgent group wrote on Twitter.
The ELN is Colombia’s second-largest rebel group, after the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) — which is also holding peace talks with the government.
The ELN is estimated to be about one-fourth the size of the FARC, with some 1,500 fighters.
President Juan Manuel Santos is currently racing to save a peace deal with the FARC after voters rejected an initial version in a referendum.
The deal was the product of nearly four years of talks in the Cuban capital Havana.
Santos, who won this year’s Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts, has staked his legacy on ending half a century of conflict in Colombia.
The conflict has killed more than 260,000 people, left 45,000 missing and uprooted nearly seven million.
The ELN talks are due to be held in the Ecuadoran capital Quito.
Sanchez, the ELN’s last hostage, handed himself over to the group in April in exchange for the release of his brother, Patrocinio Sanchez, a former governor who had fallen ill after nearly three years in captivity.

Jon Lester will be the Chicago Cubs starting pitcher in their opening World Series assignment against the Cleveland Indians, the team confirmed Monday.
Lester, 32, is handed the pitching duties after a successful performance in the National League Championship Series win over the Los Angeles Dodgers, where he was named joint Most Valuable Player.
The veteran left-hander is unbeaten in three previous World Series starts which included two wins in 2013 for the Boston Red Sox against the St. Louis Cardinals.
Lester successfully stymied the Dodgers offense in two Cubs victories in the NLCS, restricting them to just two runs over 13 innings in Games 1 and 5.
Cleveland have named right-hander Corey Kluber to start in Tuesday’s opener.
“This is why they signed me, this is why they wanted me to come here, to win a World Series,” Lester said after the Cubs sealed a 4-2 series defeat of the Dodgers at Wrigley Field on Saturday.
“This is why I wanted to come here. I wanted to win a World Series for this city, for this organization, for this ownership and front office.
“It’s awesome to be a part of this organization and be where we’re at right now.”
The Cubs are bidding to end the longest title drought of any team in American sports history, having not won the World Series since 1908.
The perennial punchlines of Chicago sport had not even reached the best-of-seven World Series championship matchup since 1945.
Tuesday’s opener in Cleveland gets under way at 8:00 pm (0000 GMT).

Pakistan on Tuesday mourned the killing of at least 61 people in a brutal gun and suicide bomb assault on a police academy, the deadliest attack on a security installation in the country’s history.
Three masked gunmen burst into the sprawling academy in the southwest, pretending to be soldiers as they targeted sleeping quarters home to some 700 recruits, in a strike that sent terrified young men fleeing.
“They… knocked at the locked rooms and told the cadets that they were from the army, and when they opened the doors, they fired at them,” a 22-year-old cadet called Hikmatullah told AFP from his hospital bed, where he was recovering from a gunshot wound to the shoulder.
“They came in by jumping over the walls of the academy which are very low. I ran away from my room and was hit by a bullet, I still managed to flee.”
The attack on the Balochistan Police College, around 20 kilometres (12 miles) east of the provincial capital Quetta, began around 11:10 pm (1810 GMT) on Monday, with gunfire continuing to ring out at the site for several hours.
Sarfaraz Bugti, home minister of Balochistan province, told reporters the attackers first killed a tower sentry before accessing the grounds.
A morgue list seen by AFP detailed 61 people killed in the attack, while 118 were injured, according to a government spokesman.
Major General Sher Afgan, chief of the paramilitary Frontier Corps in Balochistan which led the counter-operation, blamed the attack on the Pakistani Taliban-affiliated Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) militant group, and said the counter-strike was over in three hours.
An emailed claim from the Pakistani Taliban, which shares close operational ties with LeJ, backed that assertion.
“This attack was carried (out on the instructions of) Mullah Daud Mansour, close ally of Hakimullah Mehsud and head of Pakistani Taliban in Karachi,” it said, adding that four fighters took part.
It said the attack was revenge for the deaths of its fighters “outside jails” in Punjab province, in an apparent reference to the recent surge in extrajudicial killings of LeJ fighters.
The Islamic State group also made a claim via Amaq, its affiliated news agency, and released a picture of what it said were the three attackers.
LeJ officially pledges allegiance to Al-Qaeda, the IS group’s major rival. But the dual claims could be evidence of new linkages that remain unofficial, analysts say.
“Lashkar-e-Jhangvi’s claim seems to carry more weightage but IS has released photographs of the militants and this link between LeJ and IS will be determined in the coming days,” said analyst Amir Rana, the director of the Pakistan Institute for Peace Studies, a thinktank.
Pakistan’s top military and intelligence command, including army chief Raheel Sharif, attended an official funeral ceremony for the victims, whose bodies were laid in coffins draped in white and borne by soldiers in dress uniform.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif later flew to Quetta to chair a high-level security meeting, while Washington condemned the “cowardly attack.”
“The United States stands with the people of Pakistan and reiterates our commitment to support the government of Pakistan in its efforts to end the scourge of terrorism and violent extremism and to promote peace, security and stability in the region,” said a White House spokesman.
It was the third-deadliest attack of the year in Pakistan, which has been racked by a homegrown Islamist insurgency since shortly after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.
The compound remained sealed to journalists while weeping relatives were sent to the main hospital, where citizens rushed to donate blood.
— Strife-hit province —
Mineral-rich but impoverished Balochistan, Pakistan’s largest province, is beset by sectarian strife, Islamist violence and an on-off separatist insurgency that has lasted for decades.
In August, a suicide bombing at a Quetta hospital claimed by the Islamic State group and the Jamaat-ul-Ahrar faction of the Pakistani Taliban killed 73 people.
Violence across the country has declined in recent years following a series of military offensives in the northwest border areas as well as concerted efforts to block the militants’ sources of funding.
But the remnants of militant groups are still able to carry out periodic bloody attacks, particularly in the northwest.

Thousands of Polish women on Monday demonstrated nationwide against new bids to tighten the staunchly Catholic country’s abortion law, which is already one of the most restrictive in Europe.
During this second edition of the “Women strike” campaign, black-clad protesters carrying umbrellas waved banners protesting against “Church interference in politics” and “the violation of women’s rights”.
“We’re fighting for a secular state, the right to contraception and equal pay among men and women among other things,” said an organiser, Kamila Majer, at the Warsaw protest.
“Right now the Church interferes in politics and the law. It blackmails political parties and meddles in things that shouldn’t concern it,” fellow organiser Bozena Przyluska told AFP.
The first edition of the strike took place on October 3 and saw 100,000 women take to the EU country’s streets to protest against a proposed near-total abortion ban.
The citizens’ initiative, which the governing Law and Justice (PiS) party had pushed ahead, would have allowed terminations only if the mother’s life was at risk and would have also made women who have abortions liable to prison terms.
Poland’s parliament wound up rejecting the controversial bill after the protest, though PiS leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski later said his party still hoped to limit abortion access.
“We will strive to ensure that even difficult pregnancies — when the child is sure to die, severely deformed — will result in birth so that the child can be baptised, buried and have a name,” he told the Polish news agency PAP.
Aleksandra Sekula, a women’s rights activist, spoke of the need to keep the protest going.
“We managed to have an absurd initiative killed, so tension fell across the country. But it’s precisely now that the government could benefit by passing a new law, maybe one that is less absurd but just as unacceptable,” she told AFP.
Passed in 1993, Poland’s current abortion law bans all terminations unless there was rape or incest, the pregnancy poses a health risk to the mother or the foetus is severely deformed.
A poll published earlier this month by the Newsweek Polska magazine showed that 74 percent of Poles want to keep the existing law.
An EU country of 38 million people, Poland sees fewer than 2,000 legal abortions a year, but women’s groups estimate that another 100,000-150,000 procedures are performed illegally or abroad.

Epsom and Irish Derby champion Harzand will not race next year after being retired to stand as a stallion at owner the Aga Khan’s Gilltown Stud in Ireland it was announced on Monday.
Harzand — whose last start was a disappointing ninth in the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe earlier this month — delivered top Irish trainer Dermot Weld his first ever win in the Epsom Derby in June.
Ridden by Pat Smullen it was a remarkable performance as he had been a doubtful starter up to an hour before the race having spread a plate (lost his shoe) on the flight over from Ireland.
However, he made light of the pre-race concerns to beat the favourite US Army Ranger by 1 1/2 lengths and give the Aga Khan a fifth win equalling his grandfather’s tally.
“He’s been a wonderful horse to train. I’ve enjoyed training him. He’s won two Derbies for us. He’s a beautifully-made colt, very sound,” Weld told At The Races.
“It’s been a team effort. It hasn’t been the easiest — when he spread the plate before Epsom it was nerve-racking — but it was his guts and courage that won the day.”
The Aga Khan bought back Gilltown Stud in 1992 — having sold it in 1974 — following the kidnapping of another of his Epsom Derby winners Shergar, who was taken in 1983 from Ballymany Stud, which he has since sold.

Arsenal hope Arsene Wenger remains their manager beyond the end of the season, but the London club said Monday there was no rush to hold fresh contract talks.
The 67-year-old recently celebrated his 20th anniversary as manager of Arsenal but the Frenchman’s contract is due to expire at the end of this campaign.
Arsenal chairman Chips Keswick, questioned about Wenger’s contractual arrangements during Arsenal’s Annual General Meeting on Monday, said: “We all recognise the fantastic contribution Arsene has made to the club in the last 20 years.
“We are confident about his ability to take us forward. We will sit down and discuss the future at the appropriate time but our focus is on maintaining the current run and competing for trophies.”
Wenger — linked to the England coaching job — had little to say on his position, other than to assure Arsenal fans he would not still be in charge in another 20 years’ time.
The Gunners boss has been on the receiving end of criticism at previous AGMs, with fans frustrated by Arsenal’s failure to win the Premier League since 2004.
But with Arsenal now level on points with Premier League leaders Manchester City, Wenger received a warm reception from shareholders on Monday.
“Yes, it’s 20 years. I’m sorry!” joked Wenger as he began his remarks to the AGM. “I would like to apologise for every minute I made you suffer in these 20 years — but you don’t look too bad for people who have suffered for 20 years.
“I am sorry for the boy who was born 20 years ago and has only known one manager. I would like to reassure him that when he is 40 he will know a few more.”
On a more serious note, Wenger said Arsenal were now well-placed to challenge for the title.
“Today we are in a much more competitive position to fight for the championship than five or six years ago,” he said. “I believe we have a competitive team in a very competitive league.
“I believe the team has the commitment, togetherness, hunger, desire and unity and we have a good chance to compete for the Premier League.”
Arsenal are at home to second-tier Reading in the fourth round of the EFL Cup on Tuesday.

New York Jets quarterback Geno Smith suffered a season-ending knee injury in his comeback game against the Baltimore Ravens, multiple US media outlets reported Monday.
Smith, who returned to the Jets line-up on Sunday in his first start since 2014, suffered a torn anterior cruciate ligament after wrenching his right knee in a second-quarter sack.
The quarterback had completed four out of eight passes for 95 yards and a touchdown before he left the game.
“Something just felt funny when I got up,” Smith said of the injury on Sunday, which allowed Ryan Fitzpatrick to come off the bench to guide the Jets to a 24-16 win and end a four-game losing streak.
Smith, 26, has been a polarizing figure for Jets fans in recent years. In 2015 he missed most of the season after suffering a broken jaw after a fracas with team-mate Ikemefuna Enemkpali.
New York Jets legend Joe Namath criticized Smith on Sunday after he failed to return to the game following his knee injury.
“If you’ve got a right knee injury keeping you out of the game why are you standing on the sideline the entire 2nd half? How bad can it be?,” Namath wrote on Twitter.
Smith later responded to Namath’s barb, writing: “Somebody tell Joe that the doctors have the final say on whether you can or cannot get back into the game…… and also that I love him!”

On a football field in the Haitian town of Jeremie, children gather to gape at a drone preparing to take off and document damage to the area caused by Hurricane Matthew.
The powerful storm, which crashed ashore on October 4 packing winds of 145 miles (230 kilometers) per hour, focused its fury on southwestern Haiti where this coastal city of some 31,000 is located.
At least 546 people were killed during the hurricane and more than 175,000 people lost their homes.
Many people in Jeremie are still waiting for help to arrive nearly three weeks later, but relief workers now have a powerful new tool to pinpoint where aide is needed.
Haitians with the group Potentiel 3.0 traveled to Jeremie with a flotilla of four drones to document the damage.
“Before, satellite images could be used” for this purpose, “but the resolution was not perfect,” said Presler Jean, who remotely controls one of the drones from his laptop.
“With the drones, one has absolutely all the details of the covered area,” he said.
Homes reduced to matchsticks, a building with a blown-off facade or a roof missing two or three shingles: no detail escapes the eye of the drone.
Drones can gather enough information to develop three-dimensional images with precision of four centimeters (1.6 inches) — a giant leap from the roughly 50-centimeter (19.7 inch) detail provided by satellites.
Thanks to drone imagery, engineers were able to quickly repair Jeremie’s storm damaged harbor, allowing the first aid ship to dock 72 hours after the hurricane hit, said Fred Moine, head of the volunteer group.
Within just a few hours, “Heavy machine operators knew exactly how much sand was needed” for harbor repairs, he said.
Faster and a lot cheaper to operate than helicopters, drones are piloted from the ground by Haitians like Presler, 30, who has been working with the devices since 2012.
Presler remembers the devastation caused by themassive earthquake that struck Haiti in January 2010 — and especially how much of the international aid that flooded in went to waste through mismanagement.
“Before the foreigners get here, we Haitians have time to produce images that they can use. This will allow the aid to flow a bit faster,” said Presler.
“And instead of resources wasted on evaluations and project studies, those funds can instead be used for durable buildings,” he said.
More than 200,000 people were killed in the earthquake, and only a fraction of the poorly coordinated international aid that poured in reached the victims.
The drones are also ideal for surveying the needs of isolated communities in mountainous regions that are hard to reach by land.
“There are plenty of competent Haitians, we no longer have to wait for the international community,” said Presler.
“We can use our skills together to provide a quick response for our country,” he added with pride.
Potentiel 3.0 hopes to train enough people so there can be two or three drone pilots for each of Haiti’s ten departments.
“That way, Haiti can finally respond with its own resources to disasters,” said Presler, as he turns to his laptop to guide the drone.
In addition to the destruction of countless homes and farms, Haitians in the worst-affected areas are dealing with a lack of potable water, which is contributing to the spread of cholera, which has claimed close to 10,000 lives since it first appeared in 2010.
Following the devastation caused by Hurricane Matthew, nearly 1.5 million people, of a total population of 10.3 million, need emergency humanitarian assistance, according to a United Nations estimate.

Five UN peacekeepers were among 14 people injured during the demonstrations called by a coalition of civil society groups to demand the withdrawal of the more than 10,000-strong MINUSCA force over alleged failures to stop the rise of armed militias.
The groups also organised a one-day strike in the capital to press demands for a pullout.
MINUSCA “intervened from the early hours of Monday in Bangui to dismantle the barricades erected by hostile demonstrators”, the UN force said in a statement.
The force said it “strongly condemns the incidents that struck several areas of the capital and regrets that they led to the death of four civilians and injured 14 people,” adding that five of the injured were peacekeepers.
UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric called for calm in the capital and said that patrols would be strengthened.
The MINUSCA statement rejected the protests as a “smear campaign” against the peacekeeping force, and threatened “international criminal prosecution” for those accused of violence against the mission.
Armed militias have been blamed for dozens of deaths in recent weeks.
Earlier this month, 30 people were killed and 57 wounded when fighters from the Muslim Seleka militia group staged an attack in the central town of Kaga Bandoro.
A few days later, 11 people were shot dead in a camp for displaced people in Ngakobo, northeast of Bangui.
The MINUSCA force is seeking to support the administration of President Faustin-Archange Touadera, who was elected in February.
Gervais Lakosso, the coordinator of the civil society coalition calling for the UN to withdraw, said Monday that “wherever the UN forces go there is violence”.
“Civil society believes MINUSCA has shown passivity and complicity,” he added.
One of the world’s poorest countries, the Central African Republic descended into sectarian bloodshed after the March 2013 ouster of president Francois Bozize, a Christian, by the Seleka rebel alliance.
This triggered revenge attacks and a spiral of atrocities between Christian and Muslim groups in which thousands were slaughtered and a tenth of the population displaced.

Venezuela’s government and opposition agreed Monday to launch talks in the hope of settling the political crisis in a volatile country stricken by food shortages.
The national dialogue aims to calm tensions after the opposition accused socialist President Nicolas Maduro of trampling on democracy by blocking their bid for a vote on removing him.
Months of tension were threatening to boil over after authorities enraged the opposition last week by annulling their drive for a recall referendum.
With the opposition vowing mass street protests as analysts warned of an increased risk of violent unrest, the Vatican stepped in on Monday.
Papal envoy Emil Paul Tscherrig joined a meeting in Caracas of government and opposition representatives and announced afterwards they had agreed to launch formal talks.
Maduro meanwhile received a private audience at the Vatican with Pope Francis.
“I thanked him in the name of Venezuela for all the support, so that at last, definitively, a formal dialogue could be started in Venezuela between the opposition and the legitimate Bolivarian government that I lead,” Maduro said in televised comments afterwards.
In Caracas, Tscherrig announced that the sides had agreed to launch formal talks on October 30 on the Venezuelan Caribbean island of Margarita.
That appeared to be the most significant gesture of appeasement by both sides since the opposition took control of the legislature in January following an election victory.
Monday’s preliminary meeting “took place in a respectful, cordial atmosphere of political will,” Tscherrig told a news conference.
The talks will seek “to improve the economic, social, political and institutional circumstances that are fundamental for democratic harmony.”
In a private audience with Maduro, the pope urged the parties “to show courage in pursuing the path of sincere and constructive dialogue, to alleviate the suffering of the people, particularly of the poor, and to promote renewed social cohesion,” a Vatican statement said.
Tscherrig’s announcement came as a surprise after a weekend of rising tension.
The opposition had earlier vowed to fight what it called Maduro’s “dictatorship” as it embarked on a new strategy to oust him.
It threatened to put him on trial and stage massive nationwide protests from Wednesday.
Maduro’s opponents were furious over a decision by electoral authorities last Thursday to block a referendum on cutting short the presidency of the man they accuse of driving Venezuela, once a booming oil giant, to the brink of collapse.
“Only dictatorships strip their citizens of their rights,” opposition spokesman Jesus Torrealba said Monday.
Holding a recall referendum — a right guaranteed under Venezuela’s constitution — was the opposition’s main strategy to get rid of Maduro.
But the National Electoral Council (CNE) last week indefinitely suspended the process, after criminal courts in five states ruled the opposition had committed fraud in an initial petition drive.
On Sunday, the opposition majority in the National Assembly passed a resolution declaring “the breakdown of constitutional order” and “a coup d’etat.”
But the assembly has struggled to impose its will over the past months of political conflict. The high court, which Maduro’s opponents say he controls, has repeatedly overruled the legislature.
Hit by the fall of global oil prices, Venezuela’s economy has crashed, sparking shortages of food, medicine and basic goods.
Maduro derides his opponents as elitists and calls the economic crisis a capitalist conspiracy.
In recession since the beginning of 2014, Venezuela’s economy is facing a contraction of 10 percent this year and inflation of 475 percent, rising to 1,660 percent next year, the IMF forecasts.
Before his Vatican visit, Maduro had spent the past few days touring Middle Eastern countries to push his plan for major oil producers to raise prices by cutting output.
His public support has crumbled, with a recent poll finding more than 75 percent of Venezuelans disapprove of him.
Argentina President Mauricio Macri said on Monday that Venezuela should not be a member of the key regional trade bloc Mercosur “because human rights are not being respected there.”

Major League Soccer attendances climbed to record levels for a third straight year this season, putting the US top flight above Italy’s Serie A and France’s Ligue 1 in average gates, figures showed Monday.
The 340 games of the 2016 regular season drew a total of 7,375,144 fans, an average of 21,692, figures released by MLS showed.
It was the third consecutive year that MLS crowd numbers have risen, up slightly from the 2015 total of 7,326,899, or 21,574 per game.
The average number places the MLS sixth in the ranks of the world’s best0attended football leagues, according to www.worldfootball.net.
Germany’s Bundesliga heads the list with an average of 41,969 fans per game, ahead of the English Premier League at 35,517 per match.
The MLS total compares favorably with other leagues in Europe, coming in sixth ahead of Serie A (21,069) and France’s top flight (19,697).
The best-supported team in the MLS remains the Seattle Sounders, who drew an average home gate of 42,636 for their 17 games at CenturyLink Field.
Florida’s Orlando City SC also posted impressive numbers, drawing an average of 31,324 to their home games.

Chinese forward-center Yi Jianlian has been waived by the Los Angeles Lakers after requesting to be released, the NBA club announced Monday.
Lakers general manager Mitch Kupchak said Yi had sought to be waived over concerns he would not get enough minutes on court.
“Yi was productive in practices and games with us, and was a consummate professional both on and off the court,” Kupchak said in a statement.
“However, he felt that the minutes and opportunities he’d be afforded here were not in line with his goals and ambitions, and that he’d be better off in a different situation.
“We appreciate his efforts and wish him great success as he goes forward with his career.”
Yi, who was chosen by the Milwaukee Bucks as the sixth overall pick in the 2007 NBA draft, had averaged three points and 2.5 rebounds per game for the Lakers during six pre-season contests.
The 28-year-old had targeted an NBA comeback after a four-year hiatus from the league.
Ye signed a one-year deal in August with the Lakers for $1.14 million (1.05 million euros) which could have been worth up to $8 million with incentives and bonuses.
The native Cantonese-speaking Yi played in China with the Guangdong Southern Tigers from 2012-2016 and was the cornerstone for the Chinese national team at the Rio Olympics.

Italy’s coastguard said Monday that another 16 people had died during operations in which 2,200 migrants were rescued off Libya, propelling both deaths at sea and the numbers arriving in Italy towards new highs.
On the day France began dismantling the Jungle camp in Calais, the coastguard in Rome said the 2,200 migrants and the corpses had been picked up in operations to help save 18 rubber dinghies and three small wooden boats from sinking.
The rescues follow weekend operations in which 17 bodies, including those of four children, were recovered and some 4,000 people were pulled to safety.
Those victims’ bodies arrived at Palermo on Monday, along with over 1,100 survivors who sang hymns, danced and clapped as they sailed into the Sicilian port.
Starting with the sick, women and children, several hundred of the mainly African group were disembarked from the Siem Pilot, a Norwegian ship working for the European borders agency Frontex’s Operation Triton.
The rest were to stay on board overnight to ease the pressure on pier-side staff processing the new arrivals.
The interior ministry, which only counts those who have been registered, said the latest arrivals lifted to more than 153,000 the total number of asylum-seekers and economic migrants who have arrived in Italy since the start of this year.
That equals 2015’s full-year tally with more than two months to spare and Monday’s rescuees and around 1,000 people due to disembark on Tuesday will lift the total further, suggesting the record of 170,000 set in 2014 could be broken.
This year has also seen crossing of the Mediterranean become more dangerous with some 3,700 people known to have died, the bulk of them on the Italy-Libya route, according to the UN.
The number of unaccompanied children has also risen sharply and pressure has grown on Italy’s overwhelmed reception centres as a result of the country’s neighbours tightening their border controls.
Among those arriving in Sicily were survivors of an incident on Friday morning when a rubber dinghy was attacked by men in a Libyan coastguard speedboat.
The attack, aimed at stealing or reclaiming the outboard engine of the dinghy, resulted in most of the passengers jumping into the water and the dinghy partially deflating. An unknown number, possibly as many as 25, drowned.
In a separate incident at least 10 people including four children drowned on Saturday morning during a rescue by the Doctors without Borders (MSF) charity’s boat, Dignity One.
Alhaji Kutubu Sankoh, from Sierra Leone, told an AFP reporter on the Siem Pilot that he had left his home and begun the perilous journey over land and sea to Europe after his father died of Ebola.
“People stigmatise us so much, our family,” he said while admitting that he would not advise anyone else to make the same journey.
“I wouldn’t allow any of my family to use this road… it’s very tough.”
An MSF psychological team waited on land to provide counselling for the survivors from the most traumatic incidents at sea. “Their stories give us nightmares,” the charity said in a tweet.
Exhaustion and hunger were the most pressing concerns for most on the Siem Pilot.
Despite the fatigue, they were still able to raise a great cheer when informed by the crew that they were within an hour of the Sicilian port.
Modoulamin Camara, 24, said he had left the Gambia in July and travelled by car to Senegal, then by bus through the vast expanses of Mali and Niger and on by pick-up truck to Tripoli, the Libyan capital.
In Tripoli he paid around $700 to get on a boat with more than 150 other people.
“We suffered a lot, there were women in pain who had to be carried off. We left at 7am in the morning and were rescued at 5pm. I thank God I’m alive because too much pain,” he said.
“I was beaten from Niger to Libya. I want to stay in Italy. I’m a carpenter but my dream is to play football professionally. I’m really good!”

To get to the top, professional tennis players know they have to make tough sacrifices. But at the WTA Finals on Monday, Russia’s Svetlana Kuznetsova took that concept to a new level, chopping off her hair in order to beat Agnieszka Radwanska.
Speaking at a post-match press conference in Singapore, Kuznetsova said her thick hair, which was put into a long braid, had been hitting her eye whenever she moved to hit a forehand.
“I thought, ‘Okay, what’s more important now, my hair which I can let grow or the match?’,” she said, adding that she decided to “go for it”.
Shortly after the third set started, Kuznetsova, who was emotional at moments, asked the umpire for “large scissors” during a break and started hacking at her braid.
“I was like just cutting, I was like, I cannot cut it because it’s so thick and wet… I don’t even now how much I cut there,” said Kuznetsova, who has yet to examine her handiwork.
Two games after the haircut, Kuznetsova was also seen sobbing into her towel during a side change.
Asked about it, she said: “I tried to behave and act like I’m professional athlete, professional player. I mean, sometimes it’s not easy, you know.”
The Russian edged into the competition late Saturday and sent Britain’s Johanna Konta packing. She eventually beat defending champion Radwanska 7-5 1-6 7-5.
The oldest player in the tournament, Kuznetsova has battled exhaustion after a long season, and jetted straight to Singapore after lifting the Kremlin Cup in Moscow.
Last November, Andy Murray also gave his fringe a trim courtside at the ATP World Tour finals, saying it was getting into his eyes.

Teodorin Obiang, 47, was not in court for the announcement, and his lawyer’s office did not accept a letter notifying them of Monday’s hearing.
Promoted by his father Teodoro Obiang Nguema to vice president in June, Teodorin Obiang is accused of using the proceeds of corruption and embezzlement to fund an array of purchases, from private jets and top properties to pop star Michael Jackson’s famous white glove.
The trial will be the first arising from a series of landmark investigations in France into the allegedly ill-gotten gains of a handful of African leaders.
With Obiang unlikely to attend the proceedings, the trial “may be symbolic more than anything,” a source close to the case said.
Prosecutors will show Obiang amassed French assets worth several tens of millions of euros between 2007 and 2011, “either directly or through front men or shell companies”, a source close to the investigation said.
Obiang was agriculture minister in the tiny central African nation at the time, earning a government salary of under $100,000 (89,000 euros) a year.
He will face charges of laundering the proceeds of corruption, embezzlement, misuse of public funds and breach of trust.
Equatorial Guinea has become sub-Saharan Africa’s third-biggest oil producer in recent years, with oil revenues accounting for more than 70 percent of national income, but the wealth has not trickled down.
Obiang’s father, who has ruled the former Spanish colony with an iron fist since 1979, is Africa’s longest-serving leader, extending his rule in April when he was re-elected with 93.7 percent of the vote.

Pope Francis on Monday granted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro a surprise private audience at the Vatican in the midst of a deep political crisis in the South American country.
A statement from the Holy See said Francis had met Maduro because the pontiff’s heart was with the Venezuelan people.
Maduro is accused by the opposition-majority legislature of committing a coup d’etat by blocking a referendum on removing him from power.
“The meeting took place in the context of the worrying situation of political, economic and social crisis which the country is going through and which has had severe repercussions on the daily life of the entire population,” the statement said after the encounter.
“In this way, the pope, who has the wellbeing of all Venezuelans in his heart, wanted to offer his contribution in support of constitutionality in the country and to every step that could help to resolve the open questions and create greater trust between the parties.
“He urged (the parties) to show courage in pursuing the path of sincere and constructive dialogue, to alleviate the suffering of the people, particularly of the poor, and to promote renewed social cohesion, which will allow the nation to look to the future with hope.”
Opposition lawmakers in Venezuela on Sunday passed a resolution declaring “the breakdown of constitutional order” and “a coup d’etat committed by the Nicolas Maduro regime”.
The measure came during an emergency session on the crisis gripping the resource-rich but recession-hit South American state.
Maduro visited the pope on his way back from the Middle East, where he was lobbying for cuts to oil production to help crude prices improve and stem the free-fall of his country’s economy.
The heir to Hugo Chavez, socialist Maduro has seen his political support crumble of late with a recent poll finding that 75 percent of Venezuelan voters disapprove of him.

President Uhuru Kenyatta on Monday, October 24, 2016  commuted all 2,747 death sentences in the country to life imprisonment.
The reprieve for the death row convicts 2,655 men and 92 women comes three days after the serving jail terms on petty offences during Mashujaa Day.
During the celebrations, Uhuru urged the new Chief Justice David Maraga to speed up cases on corruption to enable the culprits “fill the new spaces” in an apparent swipe at senior government officials.
The last commutation of death sentences to life imprisonment was made in 2009 by former President Mwai Kibaki.
Uhuru invoked the Power of Mercy provided for under Article 133 of the Constitution.
He at the same time signed a pardon warrant and released 102 long-term serving convicts.
The Power of Mercy is a prerogative power conferred on the President by the Constitution and entails granting pardon to reform and rehabilitated convicted criminal offenders deserving early release from prison.
The signing of the commutation documents was witnessed by Attorney General Githu Muigai, Interior Cabinet Secretary Joseph Nkaissery, Prisons Commissioner General Isaiah Osugo and Chief of Staff and Head of Public Service Joseph Kinyua.

Prime Minister Theresa May denied Monday that Britain was heading for a “hard Brexit” and insisted her hopes for immigration control were not incompatible with a good trade deal with the EU.
“He talks about the ‘hard Brexit’ that the government is going to take this country into. There is no suggestion of that whatsoever,” she said after a challenge by an opposition lawmaker in the House of Commons.
“That’s because the right honourable gentleman seems to think that all of these matters are binary decisions between either you’re able to control immigration, or you have some sort of decent trade arrangements.
“That is not the case. We are going to be ambitious for what we obtain for the United Kingdom, which means a good trade deal as well as control over immigration.”
EU leaders have insisted that access to Europe’s single market is dependent on the freedom of movement, something that May has promised to end after the issue of immigration dominated the EU referendum debate.
Businesses are pressing for continued access to the single market of 500 million people, warning that leaving it would result in the imposition of debilitating tariffs.
“For people who put this purely in terms of some variation of access to or membership of the single market, what matters is what the trading relationship is,” May said.
“If we bind ourselves by saying it has to be in this particular form at this stage, then it will not be open to us to negotiate the best possible deal.”
She added: “What matters is that we have the maximum possible ability to trade with and operate within the single European market and to do that across both goods and services.”

The news has been spreading like wild fire in most tabloids who are happy for Ciara and her husband of three months, William Russells.  
The couple has not confirmed whether the news is true but a close source to the family told E that  the two are excited about their baby and they can’t wait to meet the little angel.
“Ciara is pregnant and is excited to be a mom. Russell would like to have two to three children. They both would like a big family.”
This will be Russell’s first child but Ciara’s second baby as she already has a 2-year-old son with rapper Future.
If indeed the stories are true then Ciara’s husband has every reason to be excited as he seems to have some unconditional  love for Ciara and futures baby.

Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta on Monday commuted the sentences of 2,747 death row inmates, who will now serve life in prison.
Kenyatta signed documents commuting the sentences during a ceremony at his official residence and also pardoned 102 convicts who were serving long jail terms.
Amnesty International welcomed the move, and urged Kenya to officially abolish the death sentence. Kenya has not carried out an execution since 1987
“The decision to commute death sentences brings Kenya closer to the growing community of nations that have abolished this cruel and inhuman form of punishment,” said Muthoni Wanyeki, the rights group’s regional director.
In 2009, former president Mwai Kibaki commuted sentences of more than 4,000 prisoners on death row to life imprisonment.

Gildas Yihundimpundu was detained on Sunday alongside American freelancer Julia Steers, who was released shortly afterwards as she had official accreditation and has since returned to Nairobi where she lives.
He and the driver, whose name was only given as Pascal, were “released at around 14:00pm, free from prosecution and are doing well,” a colleague told AFP on condition of anonymity.
“Gildas tells me he and Pascal are physically unharmed, ‘just hungry’ … a very positive ending to a harrowing two days for them,” Steers wrote on Twitter after their release.
Police spokesman Pierre Nkurikiye said Sunday the pair were arrested on suspicion of “trying to destroy evidence of crimes by insurgents,” the term used by officials to designate those who opposed President Pierre Nkurunziza’s third term election bid, which sparked 18 months of crisis in the country.
The pair were the latest in a long line of journalists arrested by Burundi authorities in a crackdown on the media since the crisis erupted.
Marked by assassinations on both sides, attacks against the police and summary executions, the violence has left more than 500 people dead and forced more than 270,000 Burundians to flee the country, according to the UN.
Burundi’s government has silenced independent journalists at home and arrested several foreign reporters, accusing the international media of being part of a “conspiracy” to overthrow it.
The US-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) estimates 100 journalists have been forced into exile since the violence erupted.
The CPJ this week urged Burundi’s national intelligence service to release radio journalist Salvador Nahimana, detained since October 2.
Another journalist, Jean Bigirimana, of the independent Iwacu newspaper, has been missing since July 22.
Burundi, which has cut ties with the United Nation’s rights office as well as the International Criminal Court (ICC), on Monday banned five new organisations, including the Burundi Union of Journalists and the rights group SOS Torture.
They are considered to be “disturbing state order and security,” according to the interior ministry.

French presidential hopeful Jean-Francois Cope had a Marie Antoinette moment on Monday, when he said he had “no idea” of the cost of pain au chocolat, a French pastry favourite.
“I have no idea but… I think it must be around 10 or 15 centimes,” Cope said when asked by a viewer of French TV channel Europe 1 if he knew the price of the chocolate-filled pastry, which sell for around 10 times his estimate.
Cope’s comments recall a piece of 18th century French legend: when informed that the peasants had no bread to eat, the country’s last queen, Marie Antoinette, unaware of a raging famine, was said to have uttered the immortal words, “let them eat cake.”
“I admit I don’t buy them very often because… you have to be a little careful because of the calories,” said Cope, one of seven candidates vying for the conservative nomination ahead of next year’s election.
The Twittersphere was quick to jump on the gaffe with a mocking hashtag.
“Hey @jf_cope could you buy tea for my four kids please? A baguette and some sweet buns would be nice too. #painauchocolat,” tweeted Yves Bienvenu, together with a photo of a euro coin.
Above a picture of a large swimming pool, Mallis tweeted: “A pool like this costs 20 or 30 euros, tops! #painauchocolat.”
Like many on Twitter, Cedric Abdilla, made reference to the last queen of France’s famous suggestion.
“Row over the cost of pain au chocolat. @jf_cope is right, Why eat them. Let people eat cake.”

Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) leaders drawn from Nyanza have demanded an apology from President Kenyatta over the heroes’ list released last week.
Homa Bay Women Representative Gladys Wanga, Ugunja MP Opiyo Wandayi, Nyando MP Fred Outa and politician Richard Ogendo see the omission of Jaramogi Odinga, Raila Odinga and Tom Mboya as a deliberate attempt to humiliate the Luo leaders.
The MPs claim that the three played a major role in the first and the second liberation of Kenya.
At a press conference in Kisumu, the politicians said the Nyanza region would not taking the matter kindly and that they demand an unequivocal apology from the Head of State.
They demanded the President to treat all Kenyans fairly and stop regarding those from communities perceived to be an opposition stronghold with “disdain”.
Wandayi said.
Wanga later said in a post on social media.
The president, however, honoured among others Jomo Kenyatta, Achieng Oneko, Kenneth Matiba, Charles Rubia, Masinde Muliro, Dedan Kimathi and Paul Ngei.
Others who were included in the heroes’ list were the late Mutula Kilonzo, Martha Karua and James Orengo.

One person was killed and 18 others were wounded, some of them critically, when a bomb exploded outside a noodle shop in Thailand’s far south, police and witnesses said Monday.
The attack coincided with the anniversary of the death of dozens of local Muslims at the hands of Thai security forces, an event that kicked off the current insurgency more than a decade ago.
The bomb tore through a noodle shop around 7pm (1200 GMT) in downtown Pattani, a town in Thailand’s Malay-speaking Muslim south.
“One woman was killed, a Thai Buddhist and 18 were injured,” Yutthakarn Chitmanee, an officer at Muang Pattani police station told AFP.
An AFP photographer on the scene saw multiple casualties, some of them with what looked like life-threatening injuries.
The noodle shop was left a twisted wreck by the blast.
The kingdom’s Muslim-majority “deep south”, an area bordering Malaysia, has seen near daily bombings and shootings since the most recent wave of rebellion erupted in 2004.
On October 25 of that year 85 Thai Muslims were killed, most of them suffocating in over-crowded lorries after protests were suppressed by the military.
More than 6,600 people — mostly civilians — have since died in a conflict that pits ethnic Malay militants seeking greater autonomy against security forces from Thailand’s Buddhist-majority state.
Late October often sees a spike in attacks to mark the anniversary of the insurgency’s start.
Thailand’s ruling junta says it has tried to restart peace talks with the Muslim militants since it took power in 2014.
But the negotiations have failed to gain traction, while attacks continue to strike across the region, although the attrition rate is down on previous years.
The rebels are widely believed to be behind an unprecedented string of bomb blasts on tourist towns outside their conflict zone in August, killing four people and wounding dozens, including foreigners.
Thai police say the perpetrators are from the south. But they have so far publicly denied a link to the southern insurgency, fearful of a backlash on the crucial tourist trade.
Both sides have been accused of human rights violations and targeting civilians.
No member of the Thai security forces has ever been jailed for extrajudicial killings or torture in the restive ‘deep south’.

No comment could be immediately obtained from Turkish officials, but in the past Ankara has disputed accusations of civilian deaths in its campaign.
The “Euphrates Shield” operation was launched in northern Syria on August 24 to fight both the Islamic State jihadist group and a Kurdish militia that Ankara considers a “terrorist” group.
Since then, Turkish air strikes and shelling as part of the assault have killed 96 civilians, including 22 children, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
The Britain-based monitor said rebels involved in the assault were leading the fight on the ground with Turkey lending heavy firepower — mostly air strikes and artillery fired from Turkish soil.
“Ninety-two of the civilians, mostly Kurds, were killed in areas controlled by the Islamic State group,” said Observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman.
He said the remaining four were killed in areas held by the Syrian Democratic Forces, a Kurdish-Arab alliance of fighters dominated by the People’s Protection Units (YPG).
Turkey views the YPG and the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) as linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, which has been staging an insurgency in Turkey since 1984.
The PKK is proscribed as a terrorist organisation by the United States and European Union.
The Observatory in late August reported at least 40 civilians had been killed in Turkish shelling and air strikes, while Turkey’s state-run Anadolu reported the deaths of 25 Kurdish “terrorists.”
Ankara’s operation overran the IS stronghold of Jarabulus along the Turkish border on its first day, and went on to seize the symbolic town of Dabiq in mid-October.
The Turkish-backed fighters have already seized more than 1,000 square kilometres since the operation began, according to Anadolu.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said he wants to push further south to create a 5,000-square-kilometre (1,900 square-mile) safe zone in Syria.
IS, which seized control of large parts of Syria and Iraq in mid-2014 and declared an Islamic “caliphate”, has been dealt a series of military defeats this year and is now facing an assault on its key Iraqi stronghold Mosul.

Migrants at a camp on the Greek island of Lesbos on Monday hurled stones at police and torched temporary offices used by asylum officials in an hour-long protest over conditions.
Jose Carreira, executive director of the European Asylum Support Office (EASO), said at least four shipping containers where interviews were conducted were entirely destroyed, and three more were damaged.
“Incidents have occurred in the past but this is the most serious one,” Carreira told AFP.
“We are looking into ways of guaranteeing that this might not happen again,” said Carreira, who is in Athens for meetings with Greece’s immigration ministry.
No-one was hurt in the incident as the blaze was quickly brought under control by firefighters, but Carreira said it could be days before asylum interviews can resume.
Around 70 migrants took part in the protest, most of them from Pakistan and Bangladesh, a local police source said. Police made a dozen arrests.
The incident took place at the overcrowded Moria camp, one of five centres on Greek Aegean islands, which have borne the brunt of Europe’s migrant crisis.
More than 15,000 migrants are being held on the Aegean islands, pending their return to Turkey under an EU-Turkish agreement reached in March this year.
Processing has been held up because the vast majority have filed for political asylum.
Part of Moria, which has a capacity for 3,500 people but currently houses more than 5,000, was badly damaged in a fire during clashes last month between migrants and police.
Nearly 66,000 refugees and migrants are currently stranded in Greece, according to official figures.
In Bulgaria meanwhile, some 300 Afghan migrants protested on Monday in the country’s largest migrant reception centre, near the Turkish border, according to a human rights group.
“They protested against the fact that they are being kept in Bulgaria against their will and demanded to be able to leave towards Serbia and then (western) Europe,” said Iliana Savova, a spokeswoman for the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee for Human Rights, adding that around 300 migrants took part in the demonstration.
Bulgaria’s interior ministry confirmed “tensions” at the site, which is home to around 3,800 migrants — around half of whom are Afghans.
Some 13,000 illegal migrants remain stranded inside Bulgaria, after other transit countries along the western Balkan route shut their borders earlier this year.
And close to 50 migrants ended a brief hunger strike Monday in an immigration detention centre in Barcelona, police said, just days after a riot took place in a similar facility in Madrid.

“I plead guilty; that’s what she said,” an interpreter said as Uzbek national Gyulchekhra Bobokulova went on trial, Interfax news agency reported.
In a chilling case, Bobokulova was arrested in February as she waved the severed head of four-year-old Anastasia outside a Moscow metro station.
The girl’s headless body was later found in the family’s flat, which had been set on fire.
The prosecutor at Moscow’s Khoroshevsky district court read out the charges that 39-year-old Bobokulova had strangled Anastasia, who had cerebral palsy, and then beheaded her.
She then overturned an oil lamp that set the apartment ablaze and went outside carrying the child’s head.
Witnesses said that the nanny paced for around 20 minutes on the street dressed in black, waving the severed head and threatening to blow herself up.
Russia’s national television channels refused to cover the grisly killing in a controversial move that the Kremlin defended, saying the subject was “probably too monstrous to be shown on television.”
Her trial is being covered by state television, however.
In March, at her first court appearance following her arrest, Bobokulova said that “it was what Allah ordered,” speaking in broken Russian.
Bobokulova is being held in custody at a psychiatric hospital within Moscow’s ageing Butyrka jail.
She has been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and ruled not mentally capable. Prosecutors will ask for her to be incarcerated in a high-security psychiatric facility.
She is charged with the murder of a minor, which carries a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison, as well as arson and making a false report of an explosion.

A document signed by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev and published Monday on a government online portal confirmed the resignation of deputy sports minister Yury Nagornykh.
Nagornykh was suspended in July after the World Anti-Doping Agency’s bombshell McLaren report revealed evidence of state-run doping in Russia and called for the country to be banned from the Rio Olympics.
The McLaren report accused Nagornykh of holding “the chief responsibility” for the elaborate cover-up of positive doping tests at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, which also involved the secret service.
Four senior sports officials in addition to Nagornykh, including Natalia Zhelanova, the sports minister’s advisor on anti-doping issues, were also suspended over the report.
Medvedev formally dismissed Nagornykh on his request on October 20, according to the government site.
This was a day after sports minister Vitaly Mutko was promoted to the position of deputy prime minister in charge of sport, tourism and youth politics.
Mutko, who has emerged unscathed from scandals big and small in his eight years as sports minister, had been accused of complicity in the doping scandal, which saw Russia’s athletics team banned from Rio.
The McLaren report quoted Russian whistleblower Grigory Rodchenkov as saying it was “inconceivable” that Mutko did not know about the whole doping system.
And former WADA president Dick Pound, who headed an independent commission that probed doping in Russia, said last year it was “not possible” for Mutko to have been unaware of the vast rot in the system and “if he was aware of it, then he was complicit in it.”
Despite WADA’s claims, the Kremlin has insisted there is no hard proof of Mutko’s involvement in the scandal.
Former fencer Pavel Kolobkov, a six-time Olympic medalist, was appointed last week to take over as sports minister.
Russia narrowly escaped a blanket ban from the Rio Olympics when the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in July left it up to international sports federations to determine which Russians were eligible to compete while granting itself a final say.
But its athletes were slapped with a blanket ban from the Paralympic Games over the McLaren report’s allegations.

Svetlana Kuznetsova hacked off her own hair with a pair of scissors and burst into tears before saving a match point and beating the defending champion Agnieszka Radwanska 7-5 1-6 7-5 at the WTA Finals on Monday.
Despite appearing on the verge of exhaustion and close to breaking down, Kuznetsova somehow summoned up the energy to win her opening round-robin match in dramatic fashion, less than 48 hours after she qualified for the prestigious end-of-season championship.
Spectators at Singapore?s Indoor Stadium looked on in stunned disbelief when the Russian gave herself an impromptu haircut early in the deciding third set, asking the umpire to get her a large of pair scissors before proceeding to chop off the end of her ponytail and tossing the loose strands onto her seat.
“It was bothering me a lot. I was trying to put it behind my headband, but my hair is very thick and heavy,” Kuznetsova explained.
“When I was hitting the forehands every time I would hit a good shot…it would hit my eye every time and I had struggle.
“I thought, ‘ok, what’s more important now? My hair, which I can let grow, or the match? I thought, ‘okay, I’ve got to go for it right now’, and that’s it.”
Radwanska said she didn?t even realise her opponent had cut off her locks during the match.
“I didn’t even know that,” she told reporters. “Good thing she didn’t cut her anything else. I think hair is not very important.”
–‘Have to stay tough’–
Later, at the next change of ends, Kuznetsova returned to her seat and began to cry, sobbing into her towel before she regained her composure, wiping the tears from her cheeks and returning to the court to continue a gruelling contest which lasted almost three hours.
Her efforts looked to have been in vain when she dropped her serve to fall 5-4 behind and Radwanska got to match point but the Pole, who blew a 4-1 lead in the opening set, squandered her lone opportunity and Kuznetsova reeled off the last three games to register one of the bravest wins of her career.
“It’s what you have inside of you, something comes from the heart,” Kuznetsova said. “I always work very much and then being on the court, I knew I have to stay tough. You always have a chance to come back.
“I was trying as much, as hard as I can to fight and just be there.”
A two-time grand slam winner, Kuznetsova was appearing in the WTA Finals, restricted to the world?s top eight players, for the first time since 2009 but the physical and emotional effort of qualifying appeared to take its toll.
The 31-year-old needed to win the Kremlin Cup in Moscow on Saturday to leapfrog Britain?s Johanna Konta for the last spot in the field then had to fly straight to Southeast Asia just to be ready to play her opening match.
The Czech Republic’s Karolina Pliskova, appearing in the tournament for the first time after reaching the US Open final last month, also saved a match point in her 6-2 6-7 (4-7) 7-5 win over French Open champion Garbine Muguruza.
“I?m very happy I made it, this does not happen every day,” said Pliskova.
Pliskova trailed 5-2 in the deciding third set after Muguruza had come from a set and a service break down to get on top, but rediscovered her form in the nick of time and won the last five games on the trot to take the victory after two and a half hours.
“Obviously I had my opportunities at the match point but I didn’t play the best on that point,” Muguruza said. “I’m a little bit disappointed obviously because I had my chance but I will take it hopefully next time.”

This video set her Instagram handle on fire as her fans rushed to quickly compliment the eye catchy moves and the banging body.
Ray C has made an effort to acquire the same body she had a few years ago after suddenly gaining excess weight as a result of over indulgence in drugs.
She now weighs less than 60kgs and according to her posts she is hoping to shed off more weight in the near future. If all goes well Ray C is hoping to pick up her music career from where she left it from.
At the moment Ray C and her management are working on repairing her image that got ruined after she lost herself in a world filled with pleasure.
Her recent   however shows that she is on the right path to full recovery.