Month: December 2016

Disgraced former FIFA president Sepp Blatter accused his successor Gianni Infantino of showing a lack of respect for him in an interview with the BBC.
The 80-year-old — who on Monday lost his appeal at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) over a six year ban from football for a two million Swiss franc ($2 million/1.8 million euro) payment to then UEFA boss Michel Platini — said Infantino had dropped by his house once since he was elected in February and Blatter had raised matters he thought should be dealt with.
“I am definitely not a happy man (with) what happened with FIFA,” Blatter told the BBC.
“I have never seen in any company that the new president… was not paying respect to the old president.
“After his election we had a very good contact and he stopped at my house and we had a chat. I told him I have a list of questions that should be solved in Fifa which has not been solved before.
“(Infantino) said ‘I will work on that’ and he never came back.”
Blatter said Infantino, who was UEFA secretary-general under Platini, had not returned his phone calls since that meeting.
“I have asked him, I have sent him a letter and I have his personal number and I was told that it’s still correct. Never never an answer – never,” said Blatter.
Blatter, who served as FIFA president for 18 years but was subject to withering criticism during his tenure, claims he is too trusting and as a result he and his team never expected the FBI investigation that exposed massive corruption involving senior FIFA members.
“I think people are good, and they are not good,” said Blatter.
The Swiss, who served as the faithful secretary-general under his similarly disgraced predecessor as FIFA president the late Joao Havelange, also claims he came perilously close to death late last year.
An unusually dishevelled and unshaven Blatter had alluded to this when he held a press conference last December but he went further with the BBC.
“It was 1 November 2015. I was at the cemetery in my home village — where we have a family grave. And I was there? very, very weak, I couldn’t move,” he said.
“They brought me immediately to a hospital in Zurich and they thought I was going to die in the next hours. Seriously.
“It was a lady doctor there and she (asked) me: ‘Who should I phone?’ And I said: ‘No, no, no, I will go home tonight.’ And she said: ‘Oh no.’
“They brought another doctor and he said: ‘OK calm down, calm down.’
“I had time enough in the hospital to think that life is (more) than only football.”

India were 62 for one at tea on the second day of the fourth Test against England after the tourists posted 400 in their first innings on Friday.
Murali Vijay was batting on 31 while Cheteshwar Pujara was on seven at Mumbai’s Wankhede Stadium, after Moeen Ali grabbed the wicket of Indian opener Lokesh Rahul.
The right-arm off-spinner clean-bowled Rahul for 24, giving England an early breakthrough after Jos Buttler’s 76 had steered the visitors to a competitive opening total.
Buttler started the day on 18 and neatly played his way to 64 as England put on 385-8 at lunch in a Test that they must win to keep the five-Test series alive.
England began the morning session on 288-5 but Ben Stokes soon became Ravichandran Ashwin’s fifth scalp of the innings when India successfully appealed a not out decision.
The left-hander was dismissed for 31 when the TV umpire ruled that the ball had nicked his bat before dropping into the hands of Virat Kohli.
Stokes looked unhappy, believing that the noise picked up by the Decision Review System’s (DRS) “Snickometer” had been that of his bat hitting the ground.
Ashwin’s fellow spinner Ravindra Jadeja then grabbed the wickets of Chris Woakes (11), who was caught behind by wicketkeeper Parthiv Patel, and Adil Rashid.
Rashid made only four runs before misjudging and leaving a straight delivery from Jadeja, only for it to remove the off bail.
Ashwin took his wicket haul to six when Jake Ball was caught on 31.
Jadeja then grabbed his fourth wicket of the innings by bowling Buttler to leave England all out for 400.

South Korean lawmakers on Friday voted to impeach President Park Geun-Hye, stripping away her sweeping executive powers over a corruption scandal and opening a new period of national uncertainty.
The National Assembly ballot immediately transferred Park’s authority to the prime minister, pending a decision by the Constitutional Court on whether to ratify the decision and permanently remove the president from office.
A ruling could take up to six months, during which time Park will remain in the presidential Blue House — a leader in name only.
The situation leaves South Korea facing an extended stretch of political anxiety and policy paralysis at a time of slowing economic growth, rising unemployment and elevated military tensions with nuclear-armed North Korea.
“I am so sorry for all South Koreans that I created this national chaos with my carelessness,” Park said in a televised statement after the vote.
“But we should not let our guard down for a single minute, given the grave situation we face at home and abroad from our economy to the national defence.
“In this time of uncertainty, the lives of our people should never be disregarded,” she said calling on the government to unite and minimise any fallout from the resulting power vacuum.
The motion to impeach was adopted by 234 votes to 56, easily securing the required two-thirds majority in the 300-seat chamber and triggering wild celebrations among hundreds of anti-Park activists gathered outside the National Assembly.
It was a startling fall from grace for a politician who had run for the Blue House as an incorruptible candidate, declaring herself beholden to nobody and “married to the nation”.
After just under four years in power, she now faces the prospect of going down in history as the first democratically-elected South Korean president to be kicked out of office.
The impeachment motion had accused Park of constitutional and criminal violations ranging from a failure to protect people’s lives to bribery and abuse of power.
Supported by all 171 opposition and independent lawmakers, its adoption was made possible by an anti-Park faction within the president’s Saenuri party.
The result means Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-Ahn, a former prosecutor who has never held elected office, suddenly finds himself in charge of Asia’s fourth largest economy and supreme commander of its armed forces.
Just minutes after the vote, Hwang urged the defence minister to tighten the national security posture.
“North Korea is likely to stage some provocations to stir chaos in the South at such a grave time,” Hwang was quoted as saying by a ministry spokesman.
The push for impeachment was driven by massive protests that have seen millions take to the streets of Seoul and other cities in recent weeks, demanding Park’s ouster.
“This has been an honorable civil revolution in which our people defeated an incompetent leader,” the president of the main opposition Democratic Party said after the vote.
The scandal that felled Park focused on her friendship with long-time confidante Choi Soon-Sil.
Choi is awaiting trial on charges of meddling in state affairs and using her Blue House connections to force dozens of conglomerates to donate around $70 million to two foundations she controlled.
In a first for a sitting South Korean president, Park has been named a “suspect” by prosecutors investigating the case.
The power vacuum left by Park’s ouster could be a lengthy one.
The Constitutional Court is expected to validate the impeachment, starting the clock running on a 60-day window for holding fresh presidential elections — an event neither the ruling or opposition parties are particularly prepared for.
“This is the first step towards putting the country back on a normal track but there is a long road ahead,” said Park Kie-Duck, a political science researcher at the Sejong Institute think-tank in Seoul.
High-level corruption has long been a stain on South Korea’s democratic credentials and the presidential Blue House is no stranger to allegations of cronyism.
Since South Korea’s first free and fair election in 1987, every president has faced graft investigations after leaving office and one — Roh Moo-Hyun — committed suicide as a corruption probe closed in on his family.

Willy M Tuva and Honorable Mwaura are amongst the dignitaries’ to host the Cancer Patients at the Texas Cancer Center today.
 
From 9am till 5pm, The Texas Cancer center will be open to the public for a chance to visit and interact with cancer patients.
This is actually the first time that celebrities will come in numbers, TV personalities, media influencers alongside honorable people in the government, and folks to gather together to give back to the society by encouraging the patients .
 
 
Rapdamu and the Pacho crew
Thanks to Avril who also did not forget to send her Wishes together with Susanne Owiyo and Wyre who all will be in Kisumu for a big show

US moonwalker Buzz Aldrin was discharged from a New Zealand hospital Friday, a week after he was evacuated from the South Pole after a health scare.
“Bye bye New Zealand! Hope to see you again,” his manager Christina Korp tweeted with a photo of a relaxed Aldrin sitting in an aircraft.
Aldrin, 86, the second man to walk on the moon, became the oldest person to reach the South Pole before he was evacuated to a hospital in the New Zealand city of Christchurch.
He was told by doctors he would not be discharged until congestion on his lungs cleared and Korp tweeted earlier they hoped to be back in the United States by the weekend.
Earlier Friday, Aldrin paid tribute from his hospital bed to former astronaut John Glenn who died in Ohio aged 95.
“I feel fortunate to be recovering from my own illness, but saddened that we lost another space pioneer and world icon,” he said.

Ghana opposition leader Nana Akufo-Addo has come under fire after claiming to have won a tense presidential election, even though local media put him slightly ahead on Friday.
Akufo-Addo is running against incumbent John Mahama in a nail-biting election seen as a test for a country generally viewed as a beacon of stability in west Africa.
However, tensions were rising in Ghana as anxious citizens awaited the results of Wednesday’s elections that were tainted by sporadic incidents of violence.
In a statement issued late Thursday, the Coalition of Domestic Election Observers “condemned” Akufo-Addo after the challenger said he was “quietly confident” he had beaten Mahama.
The deputy general secretary of Mahama’s New Democratic Congress (NDC) also dismissed Akufo-Addo’s claim as “ridiculous.”
However, the “polling and counting processes were generally credible,” said the coalition of election observers, urging “all political parties and citizens to be law abiding and to allow the electoral commission to complete its work.”
The count is proceeding at a slow pace and the electoral agency said it needed 72 hours from the polls closing — on Wednesday — to publish the final official results.
“Please be patient,” commission head Charlotte Osei told reporters on Thursday. “Accuracy is more important than speed.”
While election day itself was relatively peaceful, there are fears that the delay in declaring the result could stoke tensions.
After doing their own calculations from publicly available constituency results, local media reported that Akufo-Addo had the lead.
PeaceFM put Akufo-Addo in the lead with 53.65 percent of the vote calculated from 210 of the 275 constituencies.
CitiFM also gave the opposition leader the edge with 56.45 percent of the vote calculated from 187 constituencies.
Charismatic Mahama, 58, is running for a second term. The leader of the ruling NDC party has urged voters to “stay the course”, promising to deliver more infrastructure projects.
Akufo-Addo, 72, is making his third and likely final bid for the highest office.
His New Patriotic Party (NPP) has blasted Ghana’s poor economic growth estimated at 3.3 percent in 2016 — the slowest rate in two decades — and outlined how to get the economy back on track.

Opener David Warner smashed his second straight hundred to spearhead Australia’s 264 for eight in the third Chappell-Hadlee Trophy one-dayer in Melbourne on Friday.
The destructive left-hander was run out on the last ball of the innings for 156 off 128 balls with 13 fours and four sixes.
It follows Warner’s 119 off 115 balls against the Black Caps in Canberra on Tuesday.
The Australian vice-captain raised his 11th ODI century and seventh for the year when he tickled Mitchell Santner to the fine-leg boundary in the 38th over, bringing up his hundred off 95 balls.
Only Indian great Sachin Tendulkar, with nine in 1998, has hit more ODI centuries in a calendar year.
Warner was the difference after New Zealand had made early inroads into the Australian batting.
He was involved in partnerships with George Bailey (62) and Travis Head (105) which helped Australia fight back from 11 for two and 73 for four.
Warner gave a tough chance on 18 when he pulled Lockie Ferguson to deep mid-wicket, where a diving Henry Nicholls couldn’t take a difficult low catch.
Aaron Finch lasted just eight balls for his three in yet another batting failure, when he cut Trent Boult to Nicholls at square leg, bringing skipper Steve Smith to the crease in the second over.
The Black Caps had a plan and it came off after seven balls when Smith was caught for a duck by Nicholls leaping high at square leg off Boult, leaving the home side 11 for two.
Bailey revived the innings with Warner before spooning a catch to Santner at mid-wicket off Colin de Grandhomme for 23.
Two balls later Mitchell Marsh was out in bizarre fashion when he inside-edged off his back pad and onto his stumps for a duck, after his power-hitting 76 off 40 balls in Canberra.
Head maintained his consistent series with a fighting 37 off 70 balls before he was bowled by spinner Santner, after scores of 52 in Sydney and 57 in Canberra.
Matt Wade chipped in with 14 and James Faulkner 13 before Warner was the last man out attempting a single off the final ball only to be run out by Boult, who finished with three for 49.
New Zealand made two changes with Nicholls replacing the injured Jimmy Neesham, who was struck on the forearm by Mitchell Starc in the last game, and young paceman Ferguson coming in for Matt Henry. Australia were unchanged.

When he makes promises, he pretty much keeps them. And when he goes out of his way to make a difference in the lives of women, especially the marginalized and the poor, Joe Kariuki has proven that he can be the most reliable tool of social change.
A few days ago, the multi-talented business star and music impresario decided to throw a gauntlet – asked single women all across the Country to join him for Christmas. And he wasn’t bluffing.
This was after he encountered a single mother of two named Susan Owuor who not only singlehandedly raises her two sons but also has adopted some other 28 young children whom she not only raises as her own but also lives with and caters for.
Susan, a woman with little the means and not much money, raises her huge brood by the sheer will of God and sporadic instances of help from kindhearted well-wishers.
Moved by her plight and touched by her remarkable kindness, Joe decided to not only buy her an entire Christmas gift bag but also invited all of the 28 homeless children she adopted into his office and gave them an early, thrilling Christmas too.
And to go with it, Joe actually decided to cast his net further and stretch the hand of kindness even further across the country.
Joe said.
The Christmas gift seems to have already arrived.
And the #NoOneEatsAlone social media campaign was born.
Now, ten women have already been handpicked to not only have the time of their lives but also have it with their kids as well.
Rhoda, a Bopit Kenya publicist says.
Here are the lucky girls who now have been sponsored for a fully-paid Christmas trip to Malindi. This is going to be one hell of a fun holiday!
 
Esther is a Nairobi-based beautician and small scale business woman. She’s also the mother of two boys, Tim and Jim and she lives in Kahawa Wendani. She plans to bring along her two precious boys for the trip.
Doreen sells car spare parts in Roysambu, Thika Road. She lives in Kasarani and lives with her four year old boy Precious who she considers her everything. Doreen has been living by herself for years now and raises her son alone as her baby daddy has been largely out of her life. Doreen also says that she’s not been to Mombasa before and can’t wait for the trip.
Mwende is current jobless and relies on her parents to educate her seven year old girl Mwende. A resident of Chogoria, Catherine is delighted that she will not only be in Mombasa this month but also be there with her girl who has always craved for a trip to the city of sand and beaches. “It’s a dream come true for my daughter” she says.
Martha bore Ada with her Nigerian boyfriend who has since been deported and cut all communication with her. She’s also currently dating a teacher but she’s yet to take things seriously with him. Martha herself is a primary school teacher as well and her son Ada schools in the same school she teaches at.
Betty a mother of two boys, lives in Kariobangi South and runs a small kiosk around the neighborhood. Betty didn’t initially have any Christmas plans and this surprise trip to the Coast has totally thrown her off her seat. “My kids are still in disbelief. It seems like a joke!”
Nancy, a city business woman who imports stuff from China has been raising her son Brandon alone for five years now. Even after suing her baby daddy, nothing has yet to come out of that. Nancy is excited to join her fellow single mothers to a trip to the Coast as one of them,Martha, is actually her friend and that makes the trip even more worthwhile.
Frida and Giselle, her two year old girl, are inseparable. After downloading the Bopit App, Frida made one of the most convincing reasons why she deserved the trip. And then she was shortlisted. “I did it for Giselle…” she says. Lucky girl!
Emily is the oldest of them and she can not be prouder. A farmer who lives in Thika and rears chicken and rabbits, Emily says that the trip to the Coast is the culmination of her best tear yet. A mother of four, Emily says she won’t be taking all her kids to the Coast though since some of them are big enough to be left home or go to their village.
Elizabeth and her two kids Lyla and Byron live in Umoja One. A secretary at a city law firm, Elizabeth has been more than blessed to not only take her Angel Lyla to the Coast this holiday but also do it free of charge. “I don’t know Joe but God bless him mightily! This is huge for us ” she says.
Rose has raised her two kids (a boy and a girl) alone ever since she bore them. For the same man who has since left her. A chips vendor in Kahawa West, Rose is overjoyed that the most precious time of the Year is being spent not just with her two precious rocks but also in a foreign city with everything catered for. It’s like a dream, she says.
Have a blast guys! To be eligible for more Bopit Kenya Christmas travel treats, download the Bopit App and follow isntructions.

Syrian government artillery bombarded the fast-shrinking rebel enclave in the heart of Aleppo on Friday despite its ally Russia’s announcement of a new humanitarian pause, a monitor said.
Air strikes halted on Thursday evening following Moscow’s announcement but shelling continued throughout the night and into the morning, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
An AFP correspondent in the rebel-held enclave reported hearing the boom of artillery through the night.
“There was heavy shelling of several besieged districts and fierce fighting, particularly in Bustan al-Qasr,” one of the biggest districts still in rebel hands after the army’s blistering three-week offensive, Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman told AFP.
After talks with US Secretary of State John Kerry in the German city of Hamburg on Thursday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced a pause in the army’s assault to allow for the evacuation of some of the tens of thousands of civilians trapped in the now tiny rebel enclave.
The army has recaptured 85 percent of the eastern sector of the city which the rebels had held since summer 2012.
“I can tell you that today combat operations by the Syrian army have been halted in eastern Aleppo because there is a large operation under way to evacuate civilians,” Lavrov said. “There is going to be to a column of 8,000 evacuees.”
In Washington, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Lavrov’s announcement was “an indication that something positive could happen”.
The army’s bombardment of rebel-held districts killed at least 18 civilians on Thursday, according to the Observatory, a Britain-based monitoring group which has a wide network of sources on the ground.

The San Antonio Spurs suffered their first road loss of the season, as the Chicago Bulls led wire-to-wire en route to a 95-91 victory that snapped a three-game skid.
The Spurs needed just one more road win to tie the NBA record of 14 straight road victories to start a season, set by the Golden State Warriors last season.
But they failed to fire against a struggling team and coach Gregg Popovich was livid that they couldn’t deliver in front of a crowd of 21,400 at United Center arena.
“I don’t remember playing tonight. The guys get a lot of money to get ready to play,” said Popovich of the Spurs.
“No Knute Rockne speeches. It is your job. If you are a plumber and you don’t do your job, then you don’t get any work. If you are a doctor and you botch operations you are not a doctor anymore.
“If you are a basketball player you come ready.”
Veteran Dwayne Wade, who left Miami in the offseason to return home to Chicago after the Heat gave up on him, led the Bulls Thursday with 19 points.
Rajon Rondo finished an assist short of a triple-double with 12 points, 10 rebounds and nine assists. Jimmy Butler, who’d scored at least 20 points in his previous 15 games, added 13 — all in the second half.
Taj Gibson and Robin Lopez each had 12 for the Bulls, who led by as much as 18 points in the third quarter and fended off strong San Antonio comeback attempt in the fourth.
“We needed a win,” said Wade. “When you’re out there playing, you’re not thinking about how this team’s on a roll on the road. You’re just thinking about getting the win.
“That’s a very good team, of course, but tonight was about us finding a way to get a win here at home.”
Kawhi Leonard led the Spurs and all scorers with 24 points, Patty Mills added 16 points and Pau Gasol had a double-double (13 points, 10 rebounds) in his return to Chicago after leaving via free agency in the offseason.
“Because of our talent and quality of play, we are able to make up ground. Tonight we were down (18) and were able to make up some ground, but in the end it wasn’t enough,” said Gasol.
In New Orleans, Dario Saric scored eight consecutive points in a decisive fourth-quarter charge and Ersan Ilyasova had a team-high 23 points as the Philadelphia 76ers snapped a 23-game road losing streak with a 99-88 win over the New Orleans Pelicans.
The Sixers entered the game with the NBA’s worst record, but they had five players in double figures, comprising Ilyasova, guard Sergio Rodriquez (16), Joel Embiid (14) and Nik Stauskas (14), and Saric with 13.
The Pelicans lost their fourth straight game despite Anthony Davis’ 26 points and 11 rebounds.
Guard Langston Galloway also scored in double figures for the Pelicans with 19 points.
In Salt Lake City, Stephen Curry scored 26 points and Kevin Durant added 21, including 11 in fourth quarter, to help Golden State hold off a late rally and defeat the Utah Jazz 106-99.

We have seen her rock about fashionable maternity outfits during her pregnancy, something kmany new mum’s find hard to do. Anyway, with all the anticipation to see her baby, you could easily think that she’s been pregnant for over a year now. But, you would be mistaken, because the baby hasn’t fully ripened yet (that was gross, we’re sorry).
However, the mum to be has revealed a HUGE detail about her future celeb spawn, revealing that her and her beau George Ngugi are having a boy.
The businesslady cum gospel show hostrevealed this in a long instagram post she shared on her social media pages. She also talked of her fears which include understanding her baby as a mother and her role as a wife to Ngugi.  She wrote to say,

India’s only surviving opera house has been restored to its colonial-era glory, reopening to the public more than two decades after it closed in disrepair.
Once the place to be seen for Mumbai’s great and good it was forced to close in the 1990s after years of financial struggles.
But a painstaking seven-year project has transformed the century-old building in Mumbai from a crumbling wreck in danger of collapse to an ornate replica of its 1916 glory days, albeit with some important updates.
“One of the biggest challenges was bringing in modern acoustics, sound, lighting and air conditioning, all the requirements of a 21st century theatre, while ensuring it didn’t jar with restoring a listed interior,” architect Abha Narain Lambah told AFP.
The Royal Opera House was built in a Baroque style complete with Italian balustrades, marble statues, crystal chandeliers and a gold ceiling. It was inaugurated by Britain’s King George V in 1911 and completed in 1916.
Only operas were performed on stage for its first two decades — entertainment for the Indian elite and British administrators involved in the running of the empire.
When films started to become popular, the venue, which lies near the popular Girgaum Chowpatty beach in the city’s south, was altered to double-up as a cinema.
As Bollywood captured popular imagination, it soon became the place for the city’s wealthy to watch the latest hit. It could also have inspired a generation of actors — superstar Amitabh Bachchan fondly recalls watching movies there as a child.
It showcased productions from talent such as actor Prithviraj Kapoor and Marathi star Bal Gandharva.
The property was bought by the Maharaja of Gondal, a royal family from nearby Gujarat, in the early 1950s, a few years after India gained its independence from Britain.
And yet it could not maintain its appeal — by the 1980s the venture was struggling financially and the building was in urgent need of repairs.
“The Indian cinema industry was going through one of its worst phases due to video piracy. People literally stopped going to cinema halls to watch movies.
“Most theatres shut down as there was no income to even meet daily costs. So there was no scope for any upgradation,” the opera house’s director, Ashish Doshi, told AFP.
It closed in 1993, and sat crumbling for years. It was put on the World Monuments Fund list of endangered buildings. The royal family of Gondal decided they would rather see it brought back to life than consigned to history.
In 2009 they commissioned Lambah, an Indian architect specialising in conservation, to lead the mammoth restoration project. It took her team two years just to stabilise the structure.
“You had these amazing steel girders that had corroded to a level where they were flaking off with a nail. The jack arches were structurally unstable and there were sections of the basement that were verging on collapse.
“The first priority was making sure the building was safe, that the overhanging balconies weren’t leaning any more, that the cracks were stitched,” Lambah explained.
Over the years the Baroque interiors had been replaced to give the venue an Art Deco feel with balconies dismantled and original colours painted over, posing another challenge for Lambah.
She sifted through old photos, watched video clips and listened to audio recordings to piece together exactly how the building looked in 1916.
Chandeliers, stain-glass windows, old ceramic British Minton tiles, and a domed ceiling with paintings of famous writers have all been exquisitely restored.
The cosy 574-seater venue held its first event in 23 years in October, hosting the opening ceremony of the Mumbai film festival with Bollywood star Bachchan in attendance.
December will see the start of regular events with opera, music, theatre and panel discussions planned.
“It’s a magical space. It’s for everyone to enjoy, not just the chosen few,” Asad Lalljee, the opera house’s curator, told AFP.

Mexico’s defense minister has complained about his troops having to take part in the country’s war on drug trafficking — a rare expression of criticism about the controversial, decade-old deployment.
Speaking at a news conference, Salvador Cienfuegos insisted the military was not suited for the job.
“We didn’t ask to be here. We don’t like it. We didn’t study how to chase criminals,” he said.
“Our function is something else and it’s been made into something unnatural. We are doing things that don’t correspond to our training because there’s no one else to do them,” the minister said.
Sunday is the 10th anniversary of an order by Felipe Calderon, the conservative president in office from 2006 to 2012, that harnessed the military as the pillar of a federal anti-drug operation.
His action drew harsh criticism from the opposition and civil society organizations.
But until now, top-level military officials have not publicly expressed much about the anti-drug operation amid documented human-rights abuses.
Cienfuegos insisted the wave of criminal violence cannot be stopped “by bullets” and that he would be the first to lift “not one but both hands” to get the army back to its original mission.
Calderon initially involved the army in the anti-drug war with a deployment of 5,000 troops to his home state of Michoacan in western Mexico, where the local police were overwhelmed by drug-cartel violence.
Weighing as a possible solution professionalizing the police to allow for a gradual withdrawal of the military in the drug war, Cienfuegos pointed out that police currently lack sufficient training to fulfil their obligation to fight crime.
According to data from the National Commission on Human Rights, in the past decade more than 12,000 complaints were filed about alleged violations by the military, most of them in the anti-drug operation.
The most frequent complaints are arbitrary detentions, excessive use of force, torture, break-ins, robbery and false accusations.
Last April, a video emerged showing two soldiers and a police officer torturing a woman, leading Cienfuegos to offer an apology.
The government says that since 2006 more than 170,000 people have been killed and more than 28,000 have been reported missing. The data does not indicate which cases are related to organized crime.

US Masters champion Danny Willett roared back to form at the Hong Kong Open Friday after hitting a four under par 66 in the second round to challenge for the leadership at the halfway stage.
The Englishman admitted he was relieved with his performance in the opening tournament of the 2017 European Tour, following an end-of-season slump that saw him drop out of the top 10 world rankings.
After shooting a two under in the first round he moved up the leaderboard Friday despite starting with a bogey, hitting a series of birdies.
“It’s nice to be in this position after the last few months,” Willett said.
The 29-year-old has also been struggling with a bad back, which saw him pull out of the World Cup of Golf in Melbourne last month.
He also missed the British Masters in October with the injury.
“After DP World (DP World Tour Championship) we obviously took a couple of weeks off because of the back and rested it well,” he said.
“I came out here probably as fresh as I’ve been for a month and a half.”
He added: “It’s probably showed mentally more than anything. The frustrations — even when I hit bad shots I’ve not let it get to me as much as I probably did in the previous couple of months.”
Sizeable crowds followed Willett round the Fanling course Friday but his compatriot Justin Rose, the biggest draw at the $2 million tournament, did not enjoy such a strong morning.
The Olympic gold medallist and defending champion ended the day on one under par and said he had been worried about missing the cut until he rolled in birdies on holes three, seven and eight.
“I was on plus one halfway through the back nine. From that point, you’re aware of the cut line and it was nice just to get it I think … to get comfortable, making the cut.”
Last year’s cut at Fanling was set at even-par.
He almost hit a hole in one on the eighth, after his tee shot rolled to within a foot of the flag.
“Fooch (caddie Mark Futcher), pulled a good club for once, so that was good,” he joked.
Rose is low on match practice, having pulled out of the Hero World Challenge last week with a sore back.
The tournament was meant to have been his comeback event after taking a seven-week break to recover from the injury.
He told reporters he was moving more freely on the course Friday after admitting he had trouble retrieving the balls from the holes on Thursday — but said he was still missing some putts.
The 36-year-old added the tournament was in danger of slipping out of reach and he needed to hit two good rounds over the weekend.
“I set myself a mini-goal of finishing the day three under which I felt would keep me in touch. I’m going to be there or thereabouts, but it’s going to require a couple of low ones now,” he said.

The Kansas City Chiefs won the battle for supremacy in the AFC West with a 21-13 victory over the first-place Oakland Raiders.
The Chiefs scored all their points in the second quarter then held on for the win as they cooled off the red-hot Raiders on a frigid evening in front of a crowd of 64,100 at Arrowhead Stadium.
“This is a big, big rivalry and we knew it was going to come down to the end like this,” said Chiefs quarterback Alex Smith. “It is doing the little things. To get this win is pretty special.”
In chilly conditions that featured temperatures around minus-10 Celsius (12 degrees Fahrenheit) with the wind chill, the Chiefs’ tight end Travis Kelce posted his fourth consecutive game with 100-plus yards receiving. He finished with five catches for 101 yards.
“It feels good but we have got to maintain it,” said Kelce. “I am just making plays for Alex and for the team.”
The Chiefs and Raiders now have an identical 10-3 record with Oakland. But more importantly they have also won the season series between the two when you factor in their 26-10 win in Oakland in October.
The Chiefs have now won seven of their last eight games and are an impressive 21-4 in their last 25 NFL regular season and playoff games.
Although they won the game, the Chiefs suffered a big loss as the defense’s leading tackler, inside linebacker Derrick Johnson, left the field with an injury to his left Achilles.
Johnson, 34, went down with five minutes to play in the first half and needed help getting off the field.
The first-round choice by Kansas City in the 2005 NFL draft, missed 15 games in the 2014 season with a torn right Achilles.
Oakland quarterback Derek Carr struggled Thursday but he didn’t get much help from his receivers who kept dropping the ball.
Carr completed just 41.5 percent of his throws (17-of-41) for the Raiders, who had their six-game winning streak snapped.
The lone positive aspect of Oakland’s offense was the running game. Latavius Murray carried the ball 22 times for 103 yards.
The Chiefs controled the game in the second quarter, thanks to rookie receiver-returner Tyreek Hill.
He scored on a 36-yard touchdown pass from Smith and added a 78-yard punt return for a touchdown. Running back Charcandrick West also had a three-yard touchdown run.
In the second half, the Chiefs were in a generous mood, as Smith threw an interception and then was stripped of the ball on a sack by Oakland’s Khalil Mack.
But Oakland was unable to take advantage of the opportunities, settling for a 33-yard field goal from Sebastian Janikowski.

Cristiano Ronaldo will have little time for “cyber clones” or facial keepy-uppy when the Real Madrid superstar arrives in Japan next week for the Club World Cup.
The Portuguese pin-up met a life-size silicon Ronaldo complete with ripped abs, greased-back hair and twitching eyebrows on a commercial visit last year.
The world’s highest-paid athlete has also appeared in a Japanese commercial to promote a bizarre face-stretching gadget designed to enhance the user’s smile.
But Ronaldo, who rakes in nearly $90 million in salary and endorsements yearly according to Forbes, insisted he would be in Japan on a different kind of business as European champs Real chase a second Club World Cup in three years.
“It is a big tournament and I have been lucky enough to win it twice before,” he told Japan’s Nippon TV, referring to the 2014 tournament and his first personal triumph with previous club Manchester United in 2008.
“Of course I want to win it for a third time,” added the 31-year-old. “We are not going to Japan for a holiday. We go there with the sole aim of winning the title and to be crowned the best team in the world.”
Ronaldo, who touches down in Japan on Monday, has legions of female fans who swoon over his chiselled looks and muscular physique, which he regularly flaunts by removing his shirt to celebrate goals.
There is similar reaction when Ronaldo is wheeled out for Japanese television on his money-making trips as studio guests giddily poke and prod his stomach.
Japanese scientists unveiled a cyber clone of the player last year to promote an electric muscle stimulator for sculpting a washboard stomach, a device being advertised again during commercial breaks at this year’s Club World Cup.
Ronaldo, tipped to win his third Ballon d’Or trophy on Monday, gave the doppelganger the thumbs-up but drew the line at modelling the propeller-like face stretcher, which requires the user to nod excitedly while biting on a ball in the middle.
Zinedine Zidane’s table-topping Real face either Mexico’s Club America or South Korea’s Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors in the competition’s second semi-final in Yokohama next Thursday.
Barring an major upsets, the Spanish giants will face Libertadores Cup holders Atletico Nacional in the competition final on December 18.
The Colombians will have the hopes of a grieving continent on their shoulders after Copa Sudamericana final opponents Chapecoense were all but wiped out in a plane crash on November 29 that claimed the lives of 71 people.
Real will be without Gareth Bale as the Welshman recovers from ankle surgery, but have been boosted by the return of Toni Kroos after a metatarsal fracture.
“Lifting the title for a third time would be special for me,” said Kroos, who won the 2013 Club World Cup with Bayern Munich.
“It’s a long trip and it won’t be easy to acclimatise,” he added. “We have a lot of matches at this time of year and it will be tough but it’s a tournament that we take very seriously.”

Indonesian President Joko Widodo pledged Friday to help the people of Aceh rebuild as he toured areas worst-hit by a devastating earthquake that killed more than 100 people and left thousands homeless.
The shallow 6.5-magnitude quake Wednesday levelled hundreds of homes, mosques and businesses across Aceh province, one of the areas worst affected by the destructive 2004 tsunami.
Rescue crews have been searching the rubble with sniffer dogs while excavators clear the debris-strewn streets two days after the disaster.
Humanitarian assistance is reaching the hardest-hit district of Pidie Jaya, where many spent a second night sleeping in shelters and overcrowded field hospitals.
Pope Francis offered his prayers to the victims overnight, urging them strength in their toughest hour.
Widodo, who flew to Aceh Friday, met with victims in hospitals before visiting a local mosque damaged in the quake.
The earthquake struck at dawn as many in the predominantly Muslim region were preparing for prayers.
“We will rebuild this mosque as soon as possible,” he told the gathered crowd.
“We’ll work through this together.”
Among those who gathered to hear Widodo speak was Rahmawati, who lost her husband and two children in the quake.
“I am happy the president is willing to see those of us who are grieving,” she told AFP.
Aceh lies on the northern tip of Sumatra island, which is particularly prone to quakes.
A huge undersea earthquake in 2004 triggered a tsunami that engulfed several countries around the Indian Ocean, killing more than 170,000 people in Indonesia alone, the vast majority in Aceh.
Many parts of Indonesia experience frequent seismic and volcanic activity due to its position on the Pacific “Ring of Fire”, where tectonic plates collide.

Australian tennis authorities boosted measures to fight corruption Friday ahead of the opening Grand Slam of 2017 after a bombshell report this year alleging widespread match-fixing in the sport.
Tennis Australia said it had bolstered its National Integrity Unit by appointing two full-time investigators from law enforcement backgrounds, an information and intelligence officer and a safety and risk manager.
It would also have anti-corruption officers at all sanctioned events, a block on access to gambling websites via its public Wifi at tournaments, and increased prizemoney at lower levels of the game.
The move follows a series of corruption revelations during this year’s Australian Open, including that players who had reached the top 50 had been repeatedly suspected of fixing matches but had never faced action.
That sparked an independent review headed by Adam Lewis QC, a London-based leading expert on sports law aimed at shaking up tennis’s under-fire anti-corruption body — the Tennis Integrity Unit.
“Although we have no evidence of widespread corruption in Australian tennis, we have recognised that the potential to corrupt is there and as such we have taken extensive steps to safeguard our sport,? said Tennis Australia president Steve Healy.
“We made the decision to not just sit back and wait for the Independent Review Panel to hand down their findings but to take immediate action. Our sport needs strong measures implemented now and that’s exactly what we are doing.”
The 2017 Australian Open runs from January 16-29.

This was after the two lovebirds spent Valentine’s Day away from each other triggering the tasteless hashtag #poleAvril. A hashtag that came at a wrong time because at that point, Avril’s late dad had been admitted to the Intensive Care Unit (I.C.U.)
A few months after the hashtag Avril confirmed the break-up and disclosed that they had broken up since they had started getting distant after her father’s tragic passing.
But despite their relationship not making it to the aisle, Avril admits that Tinashe was a serious man and that is why she officially introduced him to the public. Unlike her other celebrity exes like DJ Crème and non-celebrity exes.
 
She said
 
Apart from her reserved nature Avril disclosed that Tinashe was introduced to the public because he gave her a ring, which symbolised something deeper.
She said in regards to her Kenyan exes , “I
This is because she didn’t want that awkward situation of introducing her boyfriend and yet he is a boyfriend to many other girls.
Check out her interview below:
 
 

DeMar DeRozan scored 27 points and Kyle Lowry tallied 25 points and 11 assists as the Toronto Raptors rallied to beat the Minnesota Timberwolves 124-110 in Andrew Wiggins’ homecoming game.
Wiggins scored 11 of his 25 points in the first quarter but the Timberwolves were no match for the offensive firepower of the Raptors at home.
Wiggins, who was the first overall draft pick in 2014, is from the Toronto area and receives plenty of attention each time he crosses the border to play.
Toronto’s Jonas Valanciunas added 20 points and 10 rebounds.
“We just picked it up,” DeRozan said. “We kicked in our experience of understanding how to win games.
“We can’t underestimate a team like that, that plays extremely hard. They jumped out on us and we had to fight back the whole game until the fourth quarter.”
Zach LaVine scored 29 points and Karl-Anthony Towns recorded 17 points and 11 rebounds for Minnesota.
The Timberwolves took a one-point lead into the fourth quarter but consecutive three-pointers by Lowry and Patrick Patterson had the Raptors ahead by 12 points with less than five minutes to play.
LaVine hit a three-point shot with 3:06 to play to cut Toronto’s lead to seven points but the Raptors march continued.
Cory Joseph came off the bench to score 12 points for the Raptors and DeMarre Carroll scored 10.
Gorgui Dieng finished with 10 points for Minnesota.
Wiggins scored 11 points in the first quarter on five-for-seven shooting to lead the Timberwolves to a 32-22 lead. The Raptors overcame a nine-point deficit to tie the game with 4:45 left in the quarter.
Wiggins led all first-half scorers with 15 points. Lowry led the Raptors with 12 points.
DeRozan needs 250 more points to equal forward Chris Bosh as the Raptors all-time leading scorer.

South Korean lawmakers began voting Friday on an impeachment motion to strip President Park Geun-Hye of her sweeping executive powers over a corruption scandal that has paralysed her administration and triggered massive street protests.
Members of the 300-seat national assembly cast anonymous, paper ballots that will be counted manually, with a two-thirds majority required for the motion to pass.
“We have to make a historic decision while the whole nation is watching,” opposition MP Kim Kwan-Young told the chamber as he introduced the motion.
“President Park forgot her calling as the president… and violated the power bestowed upon her by the people of this country,” Kim said
Adopting the motion would result in the immediate suspension of Park’s authority, with all powers transferred to her prime minister.
She would be allowed to retain her title pending a ruling by the Constitutional Court, which has up to six months to decide whether or not to ratify the impeachment and formally end her presidency.
Whichever way the vote goes, it marks a startling fall from grace for a politician who had run for the presidential Blue House as an incorruptible candidate, declaring herself beholden to nobody and “married to the nation”.
With more than a year of her term left to run, she now confronts the prospect of going down as the first democratically-elected South Korean president to be kicked out of office.
The opposition-sponsored impeachment motion accused Park of constitutional and criminal violations ranging from a failure to protect people’s lives to bribery and abuse of power.
It was filed last week with the 171 signatures of all opposition and independent lawmakers — leaving it 29 short of the two-thirds majority.
Its passage will depend on the backing of an anti-Park faction within the Saenuri party — more than 30 MPs who have shifted position several times but now look set to back Park’s ouster.
The entire opposition has threatened to resign their seats immediately if the motion is defeated.
“This impeachment is a road to salvation for the country and the people,” said Chu Mi-Ae, president of the main opposition Democratic Party.
The push for impeachment has been driven by huge protests that have seen millions take to the streets of Seoul and other cities in recent weeks, demanding that political parties remove Park if she refuses to step down.
As the lawmakers voted, hundred of protesters gathered outside the national assembly, holding banners that read: “Give our country back” and “Impeach Park”.
“It’s really hard to predict which way the vote will go,” Saenuri legislator Hong Moon-Jong told MBC radio.
“It may fall slightly short of 200 or just scrape over the line,” Hong said.
The scandal that has engulfed Park has focused on her friendship with long-time confidante Choi Soon-Sil.
Choi has been charged with meddling in state affairs and using her Blue House connections to force dozens of conglomerates to donate around $70 million to two foundations she controlled.
In a first for a sitting South Korean president, Park has been named a “suspect” by prosecutors investigating the case.
High-level corruption has long been a stain on South Korea’s democratic credentials and the presidential Blue House is no stranger to allegations of cronyism.
Since South Korea’s first free and fair election in 1987, every president has faced graft investigations after leaving office and one — Roh Moo-Hyun — committed suicide as a corruption probe closed in on his family.
Their cases often involved family members who were able to leverage links to the president in a society where political influence has traditionally had a very close and unhealthy rapport with business success.
Park, the daughter of military strongman Park Chung-Hee who led the country from 1961 to 1979, was meant to be different.
Both her parents were assassinated and, estranged from her two siblings, unmarried and childless, she promoted herself as invulnerable to nepotism.
“I have no family to look after nor children to inherit my property… I want to devote myself to the nation and the people,” she said in a speech during the 2012 presidential campaign.

World number one Lydia Ko was urged to look to the Kiwi guru who set her on the road to golf stardom on Friday after she split with high-profile coach David Leadbetter.
New Zealand’s World Golf Hall of Fame inductee Bob Charles said the 19-year-old prodigy needed to stop looking “outside her environment” and seek advice from her former coach, Guy Wilson.
“Please, please don’t go out looking for another David Leadbetter or whatever, just go back to Guy,” Charles told Fairfax Media.
“Just have casual conversations with him and I think she would be a lot happier. But forget about looking for people outside of her environment.”
New Zealand’s Ko was guided by Wilson for 11 years before she moved on in 2013 and joined the academy of Leadbetter, the renowned US-based British coach.
Leadbetter announced they were parting company in a statement on his website, Ko’s latest big change after she sacked her long-term caddie in October.
“It’s been particularly difficult the last few months,” Leadbetter told Radio Sport in New Zealand.
“Her father has got a little more involved, trying to throw some swing technique at her… Changing her caddy with less than three weeks (left in the season) was a crazy decision.”
Under Wilson, Ko was the world’s top-ranked amateur for 130 weeks, won two LPGA tour events and never missed a cut in 25 professional tournaments.
After joining Leadbetter, she won 12 titles including two majors on the LPGA tour and an Olympic silver medal.
She won three times early this year but has faltered in the latter part of the season, with just one top-five finish in her last nine starts.
Ko blossomed early in her time with Leadbetter but began to strike problems following advice to change her swing, a move Charles was totally opposed to.
“She’s enjoyed a lot of success without making a lot of swing changes and I don’t see why she needs to make any major adjustments to her swing,” he said.
“I’m a great believer in self-reliance and that you don’t rely on a coach. They can offer advice and perhaps give you a few swing thoughts but to stand there with you week after week, I think that tends to confuse the mind.
“The less swing thoughts you have in hitting a golf ball the better.”
Charles, the first left-hander to win a major, said Ko should look no further than Wilson if she feels she needs advice.
“Lydia gives the impression outwardly of not taking the game too seriously,” he said.
“She’s relaxed on the golf course, unlike Tiger Woods who looks the exact opposite. She looks pretty relaxed and to me that’s the best way to play the game.”

Separated from his mother shortly after birth, Manno the chimpanzee was smuggled to Iraq and spent his days smoking cigarettes handed to him by amused zoo visitors and posing for pictures.
The four-year-old would also be dressed as a child and fed soda and sweets — giving him near permanent diarrhoea — before being locked in a small cage every night in a private zoo in the Kurdish city of Dohuk.
Then came help from several conservation groups, and Manno’s days as a spectacle — and smoker — are now over after arriving at a chimpanzee sanctuary in Kenya a week ago.
“On the trip between Dohuk and Erbil airport, the convoy carrying him was, at the closest, about 20 kilometres (12 miles) from Mosul,” where fierce battles are under way between the Iraqi army and the Islamic State group, said Daniel Stiles of the Project to End Great Ape Slavery (PEGAS).
After several days travelling in a small wooden box, Manno arrived on November 30 at the chimpanzee sanctuary within the Ol Pejeta conservancy at the foot of Mount Kenya, which has been taking in endangered chimpanzees since 1993.
“Before joining the other chimpanzees, he has to remain in quarantine for a while,” to ensure that Manno does not have any diseases that could be transmitted to the reserve’s 36 other residents, said Stephen Ngulu, a veterinarian and the chimp sanctuary’s director.
To avoid unsettling the delicate balance within the troop, and the creation of deadly rivalries, Manno will be slowly introduced to the other chimps before joining them in their one square kilometre of fenced territory.
Manno, who is believed to have been born in a zoo in the Syrian capital of Damascus, has not had any contact with his own kind since at least the end of 2013 when he was illegally sold to the Dohuk zoo for $15,000 (14,000 euros).
In the meantime, Manno happily swings on ropes and plays with stuffed animals and balls in his room.
“He plays, he moves around constantly, he is very excited by what we give him,” said Ngulu. “He doesn’t seem to be depressed.”
Unfortunately for many of the other chimps in the sanctuary, that is not the case.
Many of them have been traumatised after experiences that make it impossible to return them to their natural habitat of tropical forests in the Congo basin and west Africa.
Poco, 36, one of the oldest males in the sanctuary, was rescued from a cage of less than one cubic meter in a garage in Burundi. Another called George was a pet in South Africa whose owners could no longer handle as the chimp grew older.
Others were seized in airports while being smuggled from one place to another.
The sanctuary “is not a natural environment, but it’s a whole lot better than what those chimps experienced in the first part of their lives,” said Richard Vigne, Ol Pejeta’s director.
He sees the existence of the chimp sanctuary as a sign of “conservation failure” regarding the species, whose current population is estimated to be no more than 250,000. Chimpanzees are listed as in danger of extinction by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
The main threat to chimpanzees, whose genes are 98.8 percent similar to those of humans, is poaching and the destruction of their habitat.
“Adult chimps are killed for their meat in places like central Africa, and infant chimps are (captured) with the view to their being sold on,” said Vigne.
He said that while in the past chimps were mainly captured for medical testing, they have more recently become sought after as pets in the Middle and Far East, and “objects of amusement to make cash for their owners.”
“When they are young… they are very cute and people like them. Then they grow up and they — particularly if they’re male — start to become more aggressive and difficult to handle.
“That is the time they’re closed in small cages because no one knows what to do with them.”
It cost $10,000 (9,300 euros) to bring Manno to his new life in Kenya.
Vigne said that helping a chimpanzee in a country at war does not mean one is insensitive to human suffering.
“Others have taken the responsibility to help these people. We do what we do, with money given for that purpose.
“There are thousands of chimps across the Middle East and the Far East in the same position as Manno, and by rescuing one chimp we draw attention to the issue.”

Donald Trump only wants to make America great again, but one Japanese firm hopes that painting his face on a traditional good luck charm will make the whole planet a better place in 2017.
The billionaire property magnate is among a string of celebrity faces adorning the special collection of hagoita racquets, which are designed to — metaphorically — smash away bad luck and evil spirits before the new year.
The rectangular wooden paddles, once used in a badminton-like game called hanetsuki, are usually painted with the faces of famous actors in Japan’s Kabuki opera.
They’re found in many households as a good luck charm.
Kyugetsu, which also specialises in making traditional dolls, decided to include US president-elect Trump on the skateboard-sized paddles this year.
Among the other 18 luminaries are British leader Theresa May, some Japanese athletes who won gold medals at the Rio Olympics, Tokyo governor Yuriko Koike and this year’s Nobel Medicine Prize winner Yoshinori Ohsumi.
“Mr Trump is very popular ahead of his inauguration next year,” said the firm’s executive manager Hisatoshi Yokoyama.
“We want him to hit back the bad luck and make the world great.”
Trump’s paddle features a plentiful mound of blonde hair.
“I was really careful to make sure the faces resembled each person, and I tried especially hard to make the complexion and shape of their faces realistic,” designer Yukari Suga said.
Another Japanese firm, Ogawa Studios, the country’s top rubber mask maker, has seen surging demand for its version of Trump since his shock November 8 win.

A 75-year-old California man was charged with the chilling 1978 murder of a young British couple who had been sailing on his boat in the Caribbean Sea.
Silas Duane Boston allegedly beat and bound Christopher Farmer and his girlfriend Peta Frampton, attaching weights to their bindings and covering their heads with plastic bags before dumping them alive overboard in a fit of rage.
The murders took place between June and July 1978 and their corpses were found on about July 8 floating at sea off the coast of Guatemala.
A probe into their murders went cold even though Boston was interviewed a number of times by investigators about disappearances.
The case, worthy of a crime novel or horror movie, was relaunched thanks to an investigation into the 1968 disappearance of Boston’s former wife, Mary Lou Boston.
Boston allegedly also killed her, according to the criminal complaint.
He was arrested last week at a convalescent home in the town of Paradise, in northern California.
He appeared in federal court on Thursday in a wheelchair and entered a not guilty plea.
Farmer and Frampton, both from Manchester, England, at the time of their murders, were fresh university graduates in their mid-20s — he from medical school and she from law school — and had decided to take a year off to travel.
They first went to Australia before setting off to the Americas, and throughout their journey had remained in close contact with their families.
They informed their parents in a letter that they had met Boston while in Belize and they had chartered his boat to take them to Mexico.
Frampton in a letter dated June 29 indicated it was not always smooth sailing on the boat as Boston’s two young sons, who were also on board, squabbled frequently and he had a short temper.
Their families became concerned when they failed to hear from them for several weeks and alerted authorities who eventually connected two bodies found off the coast of Guatemala to the couple.
Boston’s two sons, Russell and Vince, have implicated him in the brutal killings, according to the criminal complaint.
Vince, who was 13 at the time, told investigators that he had seen his father beat Farmer with a billy club and then attempt to stab him with a fillet knife that broke.
He said Boston bound both of his victims before dumping them overboard.
Boston allegedly later bragged about the killings, telling a former friend how he had tied the couple, put bags over their heads and dumped them overboard.
“Boston said the female on the boat heard the splash of the male victim entering the water and started calling her boyfriend’s name and after a couple of minutes Boston threw the female into the water,” the friend told investigators, according to the complaint.
Both Boston’s sons and the friend had apparently failed to come forward out of fear he would come after them.
“Russell stated he recalls Boston being intoxicated after the murders of Farmer and Frampton and he threatened to kill the boys,” the complaint states.
Both Russell and Vincent also told investigators that their father had bragged about killing their mother and several other people.
He allegedly took his wife to an undisclosed location and then ordered her to run before shooting her.
Boston faces life in prison if convicted in the murders of Frampton and Farmer.
Federal prosecutor Phillip Talbert on Thursday said the persistent efforts of investigators, notably the FBI and the police in Sacramento, had allowed the case to go forward.
“Nothing would have happened if the Sacramento Police Department had not thought to consult with this office about what could be done with a 38-year-old homicide in the Caribbean sea,” he said.

Clad in white at a Berlin church, asylum seekers Saeed, Veronica, Farida and Matin were just about to become Christians on a recent Sunday.
“Do you believe from the bottom of your heart that Jesus Christ is your Lord and saviour, and will you follow him every day of your life?” Pastor Matthias Linke asked them. “If so, say yes.”
All four replied with a frank “Ja”, to the enthusiastic applause of the faithful at the Free Evangelical Church, and were plunged head-to-toe into a baptism basin.
“I am very, very happy, I feel… how to say?”, said 20-year-old Iran native Matin right after his baptism, placing his hand on his chest.
Muslim refugees have recently been taking the same step throughout Germany, where nearly 900,000 asylum seekers arrived in 2015.
Church leaders have confirmed a notable, though not huge, trend upward, but have not provided statistics.
“In our diocese, there are several groups of refugees who are preparing for baptism, and there are more and more requests,” said Felix Goldinger, a Catholic priest in Speyer, southwestern Germany.
Many come from Iran and Afghanistan, some from Syria or Eritrea, he said.
“I am currently handling a group of 20 people but I do not know how many will go through until baptism,” he told AFP.
Over the course of their preparations, which last nearly a year in Goldinger’s diocese, potential converts are encouraged to weigh their own motivations.
“During this period, it is important that they examine their original religion, Islam, and the reasons why they want to change it,” he said.
“We are obviously pleased that people want to be baptised, but it is very important for us that they are sure of their decision.”
Goldinger said that “many people recall what they have experienced in their country”, including “terrorist acts committed in the name of religion. They see Christianity as a religion of love and respect for life.”
In Iran, said Linke, many had been in contact with unrecognised churches in the Islamic republic, where conversion is prohibited, and then had to flee.
Other refugees met Christians on their journey to Europe.
This was the case for Saeed, a 31-year-old aeronautical engineer who spent four months in Turkey with a Christian and then became interested in his religion. Like fellow new convert Veronica, Saeed is from Afghanistan.
Reading the Bible “helped in times of trouble,” he says.
It was in Greece, recalled Matin, that he first came in touch with the Christian faith. After he arrived in Germany, he approached the Free Evangelical Church through his German friends.
His sister Farida followed him and they began preparations — in German and Farsi — for baptism.
Farida said she “was looking for a church” and wanted to choose her religion “in complete freedom”.
“This is a very important reason to become a Christian,” said Linke.
Among refugees who adopt Germany’s dominant religion, he said, “there is a strong desire to decide for themselves, in a free and personal way, the direction of their lives”.
Churches concede that some conversions are motivated by a desire to integrate into German society, or even by the belief that they will increase their chances of gaining political asylum.
Countries that send Muslim converts to Christianity back to their homelands put them potentially at great risk.
Apostasy or blasphemy can be punished with jail or death sentences in some Muslim countries, among them Iran, Mauritania, Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan.
For jihadist groups such as the Islamic State, conversion is also a punishable sin.
“There are refugees who think that if they convert, it will be easier for them to stay here, but it is not systematic,” Goldinger said.
“Do they change religion in order to be able to stay in Germany? This is an important issue for the authorities,” said Linke, who is often consulted by the state Office for Migration and Refugees.
“I have no guarantees, I can only ask them: ‘do you really believe with all your heart?’ After their baptism, most of them live as Christians and come to church,” he added.
Outside their new community, the converts nonetheless usually try to remain discreet.
“They may face difficult situations in refugee homes, where the majority are Muslims,” said Thomas Klammt, in charge of migration issues at the Union of Free German Evangelical Churches.
“They may also be afraid for their families left behind in their country of origin.”
Matin said he stays in contact with relatives back home — especially his mother, who had “accepted” his willingness to convert.
“She calls me every Sunday to ask if I have been to mass,” he said, laughing.

Business has never been busier for undertaker Alejandro Ormeneta but, after five months on the frontlines of the Philippines’ brutal drug war, he just wants the killings to stop.
Ormeneta and his colleagues at one funeral parlour in Manila say they are retrieving an average of five corpses a night, mostly from slums, and his grisly new routine has left him questioning the savage forces unleashed by President Rodrigo Duterte’s crackdown on crime.
“This shouldn’t happen, they are people, not animals,” Ormeneta, 47, told AFP as he recalled taking out three nails hammered into the skull of an alleged drug trafficker.
“I think he was still alive when they hammered the nails. They tied him up first, put tape around his head, then hammered the nails in… that must have been so painful. I felt so sorry for him.”
On a typical night recently, Ormeneta walked down a narrow slum alleyway into a shanty where masked assailants had shot a man dead, the victim’s body still smelling of alcohol that he must have been drinking shortly before being killed.
The victim’s sister wailed as police turned over his body on the concrete floor soaked in blood and revealed multiple gunshots to his head and body.
Police later told AFP that Danilo Bolante, 47, had sold shabu, the cheap crystal methamphetamine that Duterte says is ruining society and must be eradicated.
But his sister, Chona Balina, insisted he had stopped and had even reported himself to police as part of Duterte’s campaign to pressure drug traffickers and users into surrendering, known as Tokhang.
“Why launch Tokhang if that’s what they are going to do with people who are already changing,” Balina said.
Duterte won presidential elections this year in a landslide after promising an unprecedented war on drugs in which tens of thousands of people would be killed.
Part of his stump speech on the campaign trail was jocular business advice for people to set up funeral homes in preparation for the killings.
“The funeral parlours will be packed… I’ll supply the dead bodies,” he said, to cheers and laughter at one campaign rally.
Duterte has been true to his word with police reporting killing more than 2,000 people they accused of being drug suspects and another 3,000 people murdered by unknown gunmen, triggering fears of widespread extrajudicial killings.
The deaths look certain to continue with Duterte saying in September he would be “happy to slaughter” three million addicts and repeatedly vowing no let-up until the illegal drug trade has been eliminated.
While there are vocal critics of the drug war at home and abroad, surveys show an overwhelming majority of Filipinos support Duterte’s crusade.
Still, funeral parlours, while busy, are not necessarily making lots of money, with relatives of many victims often too poor to be able to pay for a funeral.
“I don’t know how we can afford this because I have no job,” Balina said after agreeing to a funeral package worth 62,000 pesos ($1,250) with Veronica Memorial Chapels for services that include embalming, a casket and the wake.
Funeral director Rico Teodocio said prices ranged from 18,000 to 400,000 pesos ($360 to $8,000).
However Teodocio said he often gave discounts, especially for families of alleged drug users, some of whom paid in coins or raised money from gambling at wakes. He said some also begged cemeteries for free caskets.
“I don’t know if pathetic is the right term to use but you really pity them. We suffer too because we give our lowest price,” he said.
Veronica and other funeral parlours AFP visited also reported that bodies were frequently left unclaimed because relatives of the victims did not know about the death, were afraid of being linked to drugs or were simply too poor.
In these situations, the bodies are kept for two to three months then buried in public cemeteries, at the expense of funeral homes.
“It’s sad. They die without anyone coming for them,” Ormeneta said, pointing to black corpses at the back of the morgue.
Another barrier to funeral parlour success is corruption, with some policemen taking commissions for informing funeral parlours of people who have been killed.
Duterte openly joked about the graft during the campaign.
“These policemen are naughty. It’s true they have a contract. They call the funeral home: ‘There’s a body. Claim it here… I’ll just drop by for the commission tomorrow’,” he said.
Two funeral parlour owners told AFP on condition of anonymity that it was the victims’ families who shouldered the burden of this long-running practice.
“How do you recoup that cost? You have to add it on to the price,” said an executive who has been in the funeral industry for decades.
But while some undertakers treat the profession as just a business, Ormeneta, a father of four and Catholic who has been in the industry for 18 years, has been emotionally impacted by the drug war.
He said he often thought about the person with nails in his skull, and had a firm conviction small-time traffickers did not deserve to die.
“They are victims of drugs. They needed to stave off hunger, perhaps for their children. They should have been given a chance to change,” he said.
“Isn’t that written in the Bible? Thou shalt not kill.”

The UN has urged Myanmar’s de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi to visit northern Rakhine state, where the army is accused of carrying out a brutal crackdown on the Muslim Rohingya minority.
The Nobel peace prize winner has faced growing international criticism for not stopping the military’s campaign, which has pushed more than 20,000 Rohingya over the border to Bangladesh, bringing tales of mass rape, murder and arson.
The crackdown was launched in response to deadly raids on police posts in October.
Malaysia has accused the army of “genocide” — charges Myanmar officials have vehemently denied.
Suu Kyi has described the situation as “under control” and asked the international community to stop stoking the “fires of resentment”.
In a statement released in New York on Thursday, UN special adviser on Myanmar Vijay Nambiar appealed directly to the peace icon to intervene.
“The adoption of a generally defensive rather than proactive approach to providing security to the local population, have caused frustration locally and disappointment internationally,” he said.
“I also appeal to Daw Suu to visit Maungdaw and Buthidaung and reassure the civilian population there that they will be protected,” he added, referring to the locked down area in Rakhine.
The bloodshed presents the biggest challenge to Suu Kyi since her party won Myanmar’s first democratic elections in a generation last year.
It has galvanised Muslim nations around the region, with protesters decrying the latest crackdown as the culmination of years discrimination and abuse suffered by the stateless Rohingya.
On Sunday Malaysia’s Prime Minister Najib Razak taunted Suu Kyi, who the former junta kept under house arrest for almost 20 years, before a crowd of some 5,000 protesters in Kuala Lumpur.
“What’s the use of Aung San Suu Kyi having a Nobel prize?” he asked the protesters.
“The world cannot sit and watch genocide taking place.”
Activists say Buddhist-majority Myanmar’s stateless Muslim Rohingya minority are among the most persecuted in the world.
More than 120,000 have been trapped in squalid displacement camps since the last major outbreak of violence erupted in Rakhine in 2012.

The Nicosia derby between AC Omonia and APOEL FC is the biggest event on Cyprus’s sporting calendar but it’s more than just a football game on an island divided by politics.
Passions run high when the island’s two most decorated teams come up against each other as they did this week when APOEL won 4-1 in a match that deepened the feud between clubs representing opposing political ideologies.
Omonia sees itself as the ‘team of the people’ whose supporters are associated with the left, especially the communist party.
On the other side of town fans of APOEL are linked to the right and the ruling conservatives DISY, as well as extremist factions who associate themselves with the club.
For good or ill, football in Cyprus is intertwined with the politics of an island’s 42-year division into a Turkish-held north and Greek Cypriot south.
“In Cyprus when it comes to the big teams — they have their own (political) colour, they are either left or right, you can know someone’s politics from the team they support,” psychologist and sociologist Antonis Raftis told AFP.
The derby used to be ‘the fixture’ that usually decided who would be crowned champions of Cyprus, but Omonia is not the power it once was while APOEL have been serial winners for more than a decade.
“As a player you saw it as the biggest game because it was always the game where you could win or lose the title,” former APOEL forward Ara Petrosian, 49, told AFP.
“In those days Omonia had the biggest fan base, but APOEL have caught up because they are winning.”
In the 1970s and 1980s, Omonia were the undisputed number one club securing 20 league titles and 14 cups in all. But they last won the championship in 2010.
APOEL are now the most decorated Cypriot team winning 25 league titles and 21 cups.
Bad feeling lingers between the two clubs since Omonia members and players split from APOEL in 1948 over politics.
“In my day APOEL players never went to Omonia or an Omonia player went to APOEL. It still doesn’t happen that often,” said Petrosian who played over a 100 times for APOEL from 1985-1992.
The latest derby triggered a war of words between the two sides after Omnia — reduced to 10 men following a sending off — accused match officials of siding with their rivals.
Following Saturday’s clash APOEL are third in the championship with Omnia fourth.
As Omonia’s fortunes waned over the years APOEL created history by becoming the first Cypriot team to reach the quarter-finals of the Champion League (2012). They are the only local team to reach the group stage three times.
APOEL’s European exploits have generated millions in revenue while Omonia have struggled financially, even appealing to fans to make contributions.
Sporting glory apart, sociologist Nicos Peristianis says the rivals represent two ‘historical blocks’ in Cyprus society — nationalists (APOEL) and anti-nationalists (Omonia).
“APOEL is Helloncentric and espouses Greek identity and ideas while Omonia focuses on Cyprus and its people including Turkish Cypriots,” Peristianis told AFP.
“Today you will see fans waving different flags in the stadium, Omonia fans with their Cyprus flags and Che Guevara t-shirts and APOEL fans with their Greek flags,” he added.
Omonia won their last league title when the communist party was in power, supported by then president and unabashed Omonia fan Demetris Christofias.
A former friend and Omonia chairman told a court recently that Christofias encouraged him to go on a spending spree that helped win the title in 2009-10 but crippled the club financially.
Omonia’s success came at a time when the right was discredited as they were blamed for the 1974 Turkish invasion which was triggered by a Greek-engineered coup to unite the island with Greece.
And some might argue that APOEL has risen to the top as the right gained favour in Cyprus politics.
“There are two parallel contests going on, a political contest and a football contest and people want to be winners in both,” said Peristianis.

In an endless cacophony of car horns, Mostafa Ekram each day confronts the frenzy of Cairo’s traffic jams: pedestrians darting out into the street, swerving tuk-tuks and even donkey carts.
At the wheel of his SUV, in the heart of Egypt’s bustling capital, he doesn’t bat an eyelid as he narrowly dodges a black tuk-tuk, a three-wheeled vehicle, driving in the wrong direction.
It’s an everyday occurrence in Cairo, a sprawling metropolis of 20 million inhabitants where traffic laws are rarely respected and traffic jams can grind on well into the night.
“I feel like a prisoner in a car looking for an escape,” says Ekram, a young sales manager. “Traffic jams use up your energy and your time.”
If a stretch of road is clear, drivers, often with a mobile phone in one hand, race in the streets, competing for speed, in the general absence of traffic lights and pedestrian crossings.
Two years ago, Egyptian authorities adopted an ambitious plan to instal cameras at all intersections — 80 percent completed so far — and radars on roads most prone to accidents.
The cause of the chaos on the roads of Cairo is clear to traffic police official Emad Hammad.
“The main problem is the citizens’ attitude,” he says, giving the common example of parking in no-parking areas that contributes to the congestion.
With complete disregard for other motorists, drivers will often slow down to ask directions or to greet a friend, to exchange cigarettes or money.
According to official figures, 3.3 million cars ply the roads of Cairo. In spite of a ring road, intertwining highways and flyovers, the bottlenecks persist.
Congestion cost Egypt around $8 billion (7.5 billion euros), or 3.6 percent of GDP, in 2011, according to the World Bank, which estimates the figure will more than double by 2030.
The high economic losses were calculated on the basis of delayed deliveries and fuel wasted in traffic jams.
Ossama Okail, a university professor specialising in traffic, doubts that the measures proposed by the authorities will bring an end to the jams.
“The best remedy is high-quality public transport… to convince people to use them instead of using their cars,” Okail says.
Regardless of the costs, those with the means still opt to drive their own car or take a taxi rather than use public transport.
“A bus can transport 50 passengers, which would normally take 40 cars to do,” says Okail.
The authorities also plan to extend the Cairo metro, whose three existing lines are used by as many as 3.5 million commuters a day.
Most public buses, in contrast to the relatively new metro, are worn out, rickety, uncomfortable and always crowded.
“If public transport were better origanised… I would have abandoned my car,” says engineer Mohamed Mohamed. Still, “when I can, I take the subway”.
And while waiting for change, Heba Essam, an employee of a multinational corporation, has found another solution to escape the traffic jams: she works two days a week from home.
Driving to work and back takes four hours.
“I’m already tired by the time I arrive at work in the morning,” says the 36-year-old, who always drives in fear of accidents on Cairo’s roads.
In 2015, some 14,500 accidents blighted Egypt’s roads, resulting in 6,000 deaths and 19,000 injuries, with an average of 17 deaths per day.
More and more Cairo residents are turning to motorcycles to weave their way through traffic and cut journey times, such as Mohamed Abdel-Wahed, 34.
“Now I get home in 45 minutes, I can sleep a bit before working out or going to meet friends,” Abdel-Wahed, who owns an import-export company, says with a smile.

Germany has pledged to spend 150 million euros ($189 million) helping migrants return home, the minister of development said in an interview published Friday.
The aid fund will benefit both failed asylum seekers and migrants who choose to return to their home countries.
“For the next three years, we will put aside 50 million euros a year for this return programme,” minister Gerd Mueller told Augsburger Allgemeine daily.
The funds will be made available to Iraqis, Afghans and migrants from the Balkans.
The aid will help those migrants “make a new start” in their home countries, Mueller said.
“We can offer them education, professional training, employment and social benefits.”
Since receiving 900,000 asylum requests in 2015, Germany has tightened up its borders and regulations for would be migrants.
Under pressure from her Christian Democratic Union party, Chancellor Angela Merkel has got tougher on immigration ahead of her bid to win a fourth term in next year’s elections, vowing never again to allow such a wave of arrivals from Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan.
Her previous “open door” policy towards refugees has drawn increasing criticism, in part due to a number of high profile crimes committed by recently-arrived migrants.
Last week a teenage Afghan asylum seeker was arrested on suspicion of the rape and murder of a German student.
Last month, German police arrested seven Afghan asylum seekers on suspicion of repeatedly raping an Iranian teenager in a refugee camp.

The last of four boys who discovered the Lascaux cave paintings, a stunning display of prehistoric art in southwest France, will visit a new replica of the site Saturday.
Simon Coencas, now 89, will join President Francois Hollande for the inauguration of the display at a visitors’ centre in Montignac, a village at the foot of the hills where he discovered the cave as a teenager.
More than seven decades after he got his first look at the site, Coencas will — health permitting — revisit a complete copy of the caves.
The tale of how he and three friends discovered the site, in the Dordogne region in southwestern France, is like something out of a children’s adventure book.
On September 14, 1940, with World War II raging and the Nazis already in Paris, a friend of Coencas enlisted him and the other boys to explore a hole in the ground in the hills above the village that his dog had found a few days earlier.
One of the boys had to carve out a space with his knife so they could get into the cave and continue their search by the light of a paraffin lamp.
“With my pals, we climbed down to explore a hole, we advanced bit by bit and at some point we came up upon the chamber of the bulls,” he told AFP.
It was by that light that they first saw the paintings: horses, bulls and deer jumping out of the walls of the cave.
The spectacular cave of prehistoric art is thought to be 18,000 years old. Such is its importance that it has been on UNESCO’s list of world heritage sites since 1979.
But tourists have been kept away from the original site since 1963 because the carbon dioxide they exhaled was damaging the paintings, playing havoc with the cave’s fragile ecosystem.
And the early work preparing the site for visitors also disturbed its environment more than the authorities foresaw.
Lascaux 2, an earlier copy of the site, opened in 1983, but it reproduced only 90 percent of the cave’s wall art.
Lascaux 3 is a travelling exhibition showing highlights from the site.
Lascaux 4, the latest version which will be inaugurated on Saturday and open to visitors the following week, was the logical next step.
“It’s the first time that we’ve reconstructed the entire Lascaux cave,” said Jean-Pierre Chadelle, an archaeologist working with the Dordogne regional authority.
The new reproduction of the site took a team of 30 workers four years to complete at a cost of 66 million euros ($70 million).
One problem with Lascaux 2 was that it is up the hill and too close to the original site, given the volume of visitors and traffic.
The new site, located in the village, will take the pressure off the hillside site.
As for the original site, even experts in the field have had their access to the original site severely restricted.
Yves Coppens, the palaeontologist who leads the scientists charged with preserving the original cave, insisted the measures were necessary.
But after years of problems, they had finally managed to stabilise the site’s environment, he added.
“That said, we remain extremely vigilant. The cave remains fragile.”
Coppens, 82, also has vivid memories of his first visit to the site, as a 13-year-old boy.
“I got goosebumps,” he recalled. “It was a sanctuary. We were in a religious world.”
Coencas moved away from the village soon after the discovery as his family returned to Paris.
From a family of Jews, he barely escaped deportation to the wartime death camps. His parents were not so lucky.
After the war, he rebuilt his life back in Paris, but in 1986 he returned to his old haunts to meet up with his three boyhood friends, who have all since died.
He still has fond memories of the games his gang played hunting for treasure.
“We were hoping to find a treasure. We found one, but not the one we thought we would,” he said with a smile.

Donald Trump vigorously defended his incoming cabinet against uproar from Democrats, green activists and workers unions who said his nominees for the environment and labor signalled a sharp shift to the right.
The 70-year-old president-elect, who has never previously held elective office, on Thursday announced Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, a climate skeptic, as environment chief and fast food executive Andy Puzder as labor secretary.
More than half his cabinet positions have now been filled, 43 days before the Republican is sworn in as the 45th president of the United States, the oldest man ever inaugurated into the office.
“I believe we’re in the process of putting together one of the great cabinets that has ever been assembled in the history of our nation,” Trump told a victory rally in Des Moines, Iowa.
It was the third of his unorthodox “thank you” rallies feting his shock electoral defeat of Hillary Clinton in key swing states that have propelled him into the leadership of the most powerful democracy on earth.
“In filling my cabinet I’m looking for people who fully understand the meaning of service and who are committed to advancing the common good,” he added, defending his appointment of a string of billionaires and millionaires.
His nominees, he said, had given up fortunes “to make one dollar a year,” hailing them as “talented people, smart people.”
The incoming president triggered criticism by tapping a fossil fuel industry ally to head the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) — outraging many who fear that he will reverse President Barack Obama’s efforts to combat climate change.
“We’re going to end the EPA intrusion into your lives,” he told the Iowa crowd.
In announcing the nomination of Pruitt — who will need Senate approval — Trump complained that “for too long,” the EPA had spent “taxpayer dollars on an out-of-control anti-energy agenda that has destroyed millions of jobs.”
Steny Hoyer, the number two Democrat in the House of Representatives, said Pruitt had spent years “fighting tooth and nail to help polluters erase or circumvent the critical environmental protections our nation has put in place.”
Ken Kimmell, president of the Union of Concerned Scientists, described Pruitt as someone “on the outer extreme edge, and putting him in charge of EPA could really have devastating consequences.”
The appointment was made despite Trump’s meeting this week with former Democratic vice president-turned-climate campaigner Al Gore and actor Leonardo DiCaprio, who is an active environmentalist.
There was similar uproar over his nomination of Andy Puzder, CEO of CKE Restaurants which owns fast food chain Hardees, as secretary of labor.
Puzder opposes a Democratic Party push to raise the minimum wage to $15. In a Wall Street Journal op-ed this year he backed increasing use of automated technology instead of workers to keep down labor costs, complaining about the $15 wage, mandatory paid sick leave and the burden of Obamacare for employers.
“The president-elect believes, as do I, the right government policies can result in more jobs and better wages for the American worker,” he said Thursday.
“Trump has once again shown how out-of-touch he is with what working Americans need,” hit back Service Employees International Union head Mary Kay Henry, whose organization has two million members.
“We will stay in the streets to fight back against anti-worker extremism.”
In a move that fanned concerns about his conflict of interest as a business tycoon, Trump is to stay on as executive producer on NBC’s “Celebrity Apprentice” when it returns after a two-year absence, the show confirmed.
The real estate tycoon has promised to set out a plan next week to put aside his “great business in total,” although he has not revealed who will take over his multi-billion-dollar global property and luxury branding interests.
In Iowa he invited onto the stage Governor Terry Branstad, a long-time Trump supporter and personal friend of Chinese President Xi Jinping who has been nominated to serve as ambassador to Beijing.
“One of the most important relations we must improve and we have to improve, is our relationship with China,” Trump said.
He flew in from Ohio, another state which helped secure his victory, to meet privately with victims and first responders of an apparent jihadist-inspired November 28 attack at Ohio State University.
The assailant, Abdul Razak Ali Artan, was shot and killed by police after driving into a crowd and then slashing several people with a knife. Officials said 11 people were treated for injuries.
“This horrific assault is yet one more tragic reminder that immigration security is now national security,” he said later in Iowa.
Last week he tweeted that Artan, who migrated from Somalia, should not have been in the country.
At least one of the victims refused to attend. Professor William Clark told CNN that he didn’t feel the need from a “healing standpoint” and that he was “frankly a little put off” by Trump’s initial reaction in blaming immigration.

Moonwalker Buzz Aldrin paid tribute Friday to pioneer astronaut John Glenn, describing the first American to orbit the Earth as a world icon.
Glenn, who died in Ohio on Thursday aged 95, was “one of the most influential officers” in the US Marine Corps, Aldrin said from his hospital bed in New Zealand where he is recovering from a health scare on a trip to the South Pole.
“I feel fortunate to be recovering from my own illness, but saddened that we lost another space pioneer and world icon,” said Aldrin, 86, who has been told he can only return to the United States when congestion on his lungs clears.
“I was very saddened to hear that John was ill over the past year. Since he was the last remaining Mercury astronaut, I was always lobbying him to encourage the Apollo guys to do regular reunions annually since we?re not getting any younger.
“With the news today I’m saddened again to hear that we have lost the pioneer of space flight for the United States, second only to Yuri Gagarin, and he will always go down in history as certainly one of the most influential officers in the Marine Corps.”
Aldrin and Glenn first met in 1953 when they were fighter pilots in South Korea and later re-united when Aldrin joined Glenn as a NASA astronaut in 1963.

Angola is expected to formally announce the end of President Jose Eduardo Dos Santos’ controversial 37-year rule Saturday, and name a successor to lead the ailing African oil-producing country.
News of the veteran leader’s impending retirement, announced on state radio on December 2, has made front page news in Angolan newspapers all week.
But the ruling Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA), in power since 1975, has officially remained silent on the matter.
On Saturday, on the 60th anniversary of its founding, the party is expected to confirm that Dos Santos, 74, will not seek another term as president in the 2017 party elections.
It will also likely announce that he will be succeeded as head of the party by his current defence minister, Joao Lourenco, 62.
Angola does not directly elect a president, but rather the leader of the winning party automatically becomes head of state.
In all likelihood, the retired general Lourenco will succeed Dos Santos -? one of the longest ruling leaders in Africa -? after the party elections next August.
The departure, announced in a closed-door meeting of the MPLA’s central committee last week, does not come as a complete surprise.
Dos Santos himself announced in March his intention to end his political career.
“President Dos Santos had been planning to step down in 2018,” said Alex Vines, Africa program director at the British think tank Chatham House.
“But I think a combination of Angola’s economic conditions and less good health brought his plans forward.”
After years of spectacular growth thanks to an oil boom, like many crude-producing nations Angola has suffered a sudden downturn in the last two years due to a prolonged drop in oil prices.
Last week, national oil company Sonangol, managed by Dos Santos’ daughter Isabel, announced it would not be paying out dividends to the state this year -? a first for the country’s main source of foreign currency.
While it will be a new page in the history of Angola, the departure of the former Marxist guerrilla fighter is unlikely to shake up the running of the country.
This is to the chagrin of critics who have been denouncing Dos Santos’ “dictatorship” for years.
“Nothing will change with people who, when they could have, didn’t dare ?- whether out of fear or self-interest -? to make a difference,” said journalist William Tonnet, a critic of Dos Santos.
Expected successor Lourenco is an ex-artillery general who was trained in the former Soviet Union. He is seen as a true son of his party, as is interior minister Bornito de Sousa, who is expected to become his deputy.
“These are two apparatchiks, two pure products of the party who remain under its control,” said Benjamin Auge of the French Institute of International Relations.
“The room to manoeuvre will be extremely limited. They will defend the president’s record, without starting a revolution.”
However, Angola-watchers notice both men do not have ties to the oil industry, a sector considered to be closely guarded by the president’s family.
“Joao Lourenco is one of those rare leaders in the MPLA who hasn’t dirtied his hands in this corruption business,” said activist Nuno Alvaro Dala, who was recently convicted and then pardoned for an alleged coup attempt.
Some have suggested that Dos Santos’s retirement was purposefully instigated by a hostile faction within the MPLA.
The announcement could be “the expression of discontent within the party, particularly over the position of the president’s children,” said Didier Peclard, a professor at the University of Geneva.
“If that were the case, then hypothetically it could be a way of precipitating a transition.”
Award-winning journalist and writer Rafael Marques refuses to believe this, and disputes the idea of a more palatable faction within the inner circle of the MPLA.
“Angolans will move from one dictator to the next,” he said. “Change is not coming tomorrow.”

International doping sleuth Richard McLaren is to release a new report Friday on performance-enhancing drugs in Russian sport that will pile more pressure on Russia and the Olympic movement.
While the contents of the investigation have been kept under wraps, International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach acknowledged Thursday that McLaren’s new work would pose an “immediate challenge” to global sports.
Russia has consistently rejected McLaren’s earlier accusations of “state-sponsored” doping.
But the IOC has already acted to extend provisional sanctions against Russia and the World Anti-Doping Agency has warned that it is a long way off rejoining the body.
McLaren’s first report, released in July, led to more than 110 Russian athletes being banned from the Rio Olympics but also caused a major rift between the IOC and WADA.
The international agency had wanted all Russian competitors excluded from the Games.
The first report said there was a “state-dictated failsafe system” of doping cheating by Russia at the Sochi Winter Olympics which it hosted in 2014.
McLaren was given more time to finish his investigation into the exchange of tainted samples for clean ones and more general aspects of doping in Russian sport.
On top of the accusations of the use of intelligence officers to swap doping samples in Sochi, Russia is already battling to get back into the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) because of an earlier inquiry.
Russia has said the earlier McLaren report lacked detail and needed more investigation.
New Sports Minister Pavel Kolobkov, a former Olympic champion fencer, said Thursday that the country had “declared war” against doping. There are many doubters over Russian efforts however.
The IAAF and WADA are keeping to their suspension of Russia, meaning the country may not be able to compete at the world athletics championships in August.
Some key figures believe Russia is in denial.
“There are ongoing statements that there is no state involvement, there are threats to put anybody who reports otherwise in jail,” WADA founder Dick Pound told AFP last week.
“It’s not a good sign.”
The IOC barred former sports minister Vitaly Mutko from the Rio Olympics. He has since been promoted to deputy prime minister.
WADA president Craig Reedie said last month that Russia was a long way off returning to the global body.
Anti-doping officials have complained about a lack of access to closed cities where athletes are training and also to a Moscow laboratory where samples sought by international sporting federations are kept.
Athletes from Russia and other East European states have dominated the list of cheats caught in new tests on 1,243 samples taken at the 2008 Beijing and 2012 London Olympics.
Tennis star Maria Sharapova has been among a host of Russians ordered banned because of doping failures over the past 18 months.
IOC medical director Richard Budgett said Wednesday that there is more bad news to come from the London tests which are not yet finished.
“There will be many more to come in the coming weeks and months,” Budgett warned without saying which countries were involved.
US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) chief Travis Tygart told AFP this week that the international doping campaign faces a “defining moment” in handling Russia.
“Clean athletes are watching. They are very frustrated and even angry at what has occurred in a powerful country that has had tremendous success in international competitions, that could be running a doping program at the extent as it did,” he said.
IOC president Bach acknowledged the high stakes.
“For the IOC, the challenges are obvious. We we will have an immediate challenge tomorrow with the final McLaren report,” he said.

Chad le Clos, rebounding from what he considered a disappointing Rio Olympics, won his second gold of the Short Course Swimming World Championships with a world record-setting victory in the 100m butterfly.
The South African’s time of 48.08sec improved his own world record of 48.44, set at the previous edition of the championships in Doha in 2014.
Le Clos, denied a 200m fly Olympic repeat in Rio, added another gold to the 200m fly title he captured on Tuesday when the championships kicked off in Windsor, Canada.
American Tom Shields was second in 49.04 and Australian David Morgan claimed bronze in 49.31.
Hungary’s one-woman wrecking crew of Katinka Hosszu, a treble gold medallist in Rio, picked up her fourth individual gold of the championships in the 200m backstroke.
It was another convincing win for the “Iron Lady,” who was in control from the 50m mark and steadily built her lead to win in 2:00.79 — more than a second in front of runner-up Daryna Zevina of Ukraine (2:02.24). Australian Emily Seebohm took bronze in 2:02.65.
Hosszu, winner of the 200m butterfly, 100m back and 400m individual medley earlier in the meeting, also topped the semi-final times in the 100m individual medley.
But she wasn’t a factor as she capped her night with an eighth-place finish in the 800m freestyle won by American Leah Smith.
Smith, the 400m free bronze medallist in Rio, led all the way to head a US one-two in 8:10.17. Ashley Twichell was second in 8:11.95 and Australian Kiah Melverton was earned bronze in 8:16.51.
The 800 free field was missing reigning champion and world record-holder Mireia Belmonte of Spain, who pulled out of the event after a disappointing showing in the 400m medley on Tuesday.
Germany’s Marco Koch further soothed the disappointment of Rio with a victory in the 200m breaststroke, adding a second gold to the 100m breast title he captured on Wednesday.
Koch, the reigning long course world champion who was relegated to seventh in the 200m breast at the Olympics, clocked a championship record of 2:01.21 for a comfortable win over Britain’s Andrew Willis (2:02.71) with Russia’s Mikhail Dorinov third in 2:03.09.
Australian Brittany Elmslie, a relay gold medallist in Rio, snatched victory in the women’s 100m freestyle, earning her first short course world title in 51.81.
Silver went to 2012 double Olympic sprint gold medallist Ranomi Kromowidjojo of the Netherlands, who was second in 51.92, while Canadian teenager Penny Oleksiak, who shared 100m free gold with American Simone Manuel in Rio, took bronze in 52.01.
The United States capped the night with a victory in the mixed 4x50m medley relay. Michael Chadwick, swimming the final freestyle leg, hit the water in seventh place but stormed home to complete the victory in 1:37.22.
The win gave breaststroker Lilly King her third gold of the championships, after an individual triumph in the 50m breast and her swim on America’s world record-setting women’s 4x50m medley relay.

The Dallas Cowboys aim to avenge their lone defeat of the season and clinch the NFC East title on Sunday when they clash with a New York Giants team whose pursuit of an NFL playoff spot has been slowed by a suddenly sputtering offense.
The 11-1 Cowboys, led by the dynamic rookie duo of quarterback Dak Prescott and running back Ezekiel Elliott, have already become the first team to secure a post-season berth.
Prescott says he’s learned a lot since the Cowboys’ 20-19 loss to the Giants in week one, and he’s eager to turn the tables.
“I watched back the tape, and I shake my head sometimes at the things I did or the throws I didn’t make because I wasn’t trusting it,” Prescott said of his of his first NFL game, which came two weeks after the Cowboys lost Tony Romo with a broken bone in his back.
Now Prescott is the NFL’s third-ranked passer with 19 touchdown tosses and two interceptions and he’s looking forward to another shot at the Giants.
“They’re the only blemish on our record right now. And just to be able to go up there at their place and be able to do what they did to us the first game, we’re excited for the opportunity.”
The Giants have struggled to fulfill the promise of that opening victory. Although they still have a slim chance of catching the Cowboys for the division crown, they must win their last four games and hope the Cowboys lose another.
“This is a playoff game for us, in my mind and so are the rest of them,” Giants receiver Odell Beckham jr said of the pressure on the Giants in the final stretch of the season.
A 24-14 defeat to the Pittsburgh Steelers last week dropped New York to 8-4. The additions of rookie receiver Sterling Shepard and the return of receiver Victor Cruz have failed to yield expected improvements in offense.
Quarterback Eli Manning ranks 22nd in passer rating and in addition to 22 touchdowns has thrown 12 interceptions.
Nevertheless, Manning was bullish on the Giants’ chances this week.
“Hey, we’re the only team to beat Dallas,” Manning said on his radio show.
“And we’re going against them at home now, and we’ve been playing great at home. So this is a chance to prove that we are a good team and we are a playoff team.”
Elsewhere in week 14, the Houston Texans seek to stop the rot in a key AFC South clash with the Colts in Indianapolis.
Three straight defeats have dropped the Texans to 6-6, the same record as the Colts and Tennessee Titans — although the Texans still hold a tie-breaker edge should the division come down to that.
The Colts, meanwhile, are on the rise, having won three of their last four.
“We know what situation we’re in,” Colts running back Frank Gore said. “We just want to go out there and try to get a win. Get a win and put us in a better situation.”
With time running out for Cleveland to avert a winless season, the Browns will have Robert Griffin III starting at quarterback after an 11-game absence recovering from a shoulder injury.
Quarterback Colin Kaepernick will get the starting nod for San Francisco against the New York Jets, even after 49ers benched him in a dismal 26-6 loss to the Bears last Sunday in Chicago — where Kaepernick was sacked five times and completed just one pass.
Super Bowl champions Denver could have quarterback Trevor Siemian back against the Titans as his sprained left foot continues to improve.
“You want to play, you want to play well,” Siemian told reporters after taking practice snaps on Thursday. “(I’m) trying not to be stupid about it.”