News In Brief

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Pakistan summons US envoy over deadly crash
AP, Islamabad
Pakistan summoned the American ambassador on Sunday to lodge a formal protest after a road crash involving a U.S. Embassy vehicle killed a Pakistani motorcyclist.
Ambassador David Hale was told that another man riding on the motorcycle was wounded in Saturday’s accident, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. It said “justice will take its course” in accordance with local and international laws.

Trump defends EPA chief
AFP, Washington
US President Donald Trump defended his embattled Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt against allegations of lavish spending on his security and travel in a tweet Saturday. “While Security spending was somewhat more than his predecessor, Scott Pruitt has received death threats because of his bold actions at EPA,” Trump said.

Ethiopia’s PM seeks end to violence
Reuters, Addis Ababa
Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed travelled on Saturday to a region where clashes have displaced nearly a million people, his first trip since being sworn in as premier five days ago.
Violence along the border of the Horn of Africa country’s Somali and Oromiya provinces first erupted in September last year, with both regions blaming the other for the unrest.

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Hungarians vote in keenly-watched poll
AFP, Budapest
Hungarians began voting Sunday in an election that is being keenly observed across Europe, which will determine whether firebrand nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban will win an expected third consecutive term. Orban has clashed with EU institutions over his moves to clamp down on civil society and his fiery anti-immigration rhetoric, but he has drawn plaudits from other nationalist politicians and those on the far-right who look to him as an inspiration.

2 killed in Karachi oil field explosion
Xinhua, Islamabad
At least two people were killed and eight others injured in an explosion occurred in an oil field in Pakistan’s southern port city of Karachi on Saturday, said an official.
Shiraz Nazeer, senior superintendent police in the city, said that the explosion happened in a private company’s storage tank for molasses near Shereen Jinnah Colony in Karachi, the provincial capital of the country’s southern Sindh province.

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