Egypt court sends 75 to death, 47 to life over 2013 protest
AP, Cairo
An Egyptian court has sentenced 75 people to death, including top leaders of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, for their involvement in a 2013 sit-in protest.
In a case involving 739 defendants facing charges ranging from murder to damaging property, the court Saturday also sentenced to life in prison the head of the Brotherhood, Mohammed Badie, and 46 others.
Yemen peace talks collapse in Geneva
Reuters, Geneva
Yemen’s Houthi movement failed to attend peace talks, but the U.N. Special Envoy said on Saturday that it did not represent a “fundamental blockage in the process” and that he would meet soon with their representatives in Sanaa and in Muscat, Oman.
“They would have like to get here, we didn’t make conditions sufficiently correct to get them here”, U.N. envoy Martin Griffiths told a news conference, declining to elaborate.
Death toll in Iraq’s Basra protests climbs to 12
AFP, Basra
At least 12 people have been killed in several days of protests over the lack of public services in Iraq’s southern city of Basra, the health ministry said on Saturday.
Basra has seen a surge in protests since Tuesday, with demonstrators torching the Iranian consulate, government buildings as well as offices of political parties and militias considered close to Tehran.
Japan quake death toll rises to 30
AFP, Tokyo
The death toll from a powerful quake that triggered landslides in northern Japan rose to 30 Saturday, as tens of thousands of rescue workers raked through the mud for survivors.
The majority of the dead are from the small rural town of Atsuma, where a cluster of dwellings were wrecked when a hillside collapsed from the force of the 6.6-magnitude quake, causing deep brown scars in the landscape.
5 killed in Nepal copter crash
AFP, Kathmandu
A helicopter crashed into a hillside in central Nepal on Saturday, killing five on board, including a Japanese tourist, officials said.
One woman survived the crash with injuries but another passenger is still missing. Rescuers travelled on foot to reach the chopper’s wreckage spotted on a forested hillside in neighbouring Nuwakot district. Officials had earlier said that the helicopter went down in Dhadhing, an adjoining district.
14 killed in Indonesia bus crash
AFP, Bandung
At least 14 people died and several others were injured when a bus carrying domestic tourists crashed and plunged into a ravine on the Indonesian island of Java, police said Saturday.
The crash happened when the bus with at least 30 people on board was heading to a holiday spot in Sukabumi region, West Java.
