All parties must commit to Aleppo aid truce: UN
Reuters, United Nations
The United Nations is ready to deliver aid into Syria’s Aleppo, but needs commitments from all parties in the war – not just Russia – to abide by a 48-hour humanitarian truce, the U.N. aid chief, angered by lack of assistance to civilians, said on Monday.
Aleppo, Syria’s most populous pre-war city and its commercial hub, has become the focus of fighting in the five-year-old civil war. Up to 2 million people on both sides do not have clean water after infrastructure was damaged in bombing.
Virginia restores voting rights for 13,000 felons
AFP, Virginia
After the Virginia Supreme Court ruled in July that governors couldn’t restore the voting rights of felons en masse, Gov. Terry McAuliffe vowed the 13,000 felons that registered through the executive order he issued would be able to cast their ballots come November.
The Democratic governor made good on his promise Monday. His administration processed the paperwork of the each of the 13,000 persons over the last month, Governor McAuliffe said while standing in front of the Virginia Civil Rights Memorial.
Deaths from US lightning strikes this year highest since 2010
Reuters, New York
A pair of fatalities from lightning strikes over the weekend lifted the U.S. death toll from such accidents this year to 29, the most since 2010, the National Weather Service said on Monday.
The latest lightning-related deaths occurred in Colorado and Michigan on Friday, the NWS said in a report. With four months left in the year, the 2016 toll has already surpassed last year’s 27.
Eight people have died from lightning this month, making it the deadliest August since 2007. In July, typically the month with the most fatalities, 12 people were killed by lightning.
