Islamic State stones two for alleged indecent acts
The Islamic State has stoned to death two men it said committed homosexual acts – another first for the terrorist state. IS said it found video on a mobile phone of the first victim, a 20-year-old Syrian executed in the city of Mayadeen, “performing indecent acts on men“. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the second victim, an 18-year-old, was also stoned to death in Mayadeen, regional capital of the eastern Syrian province of Deir Ezzor, near the border with Iraq.
Pope Francis criticises EU for immigrant treatment
Pope Francis, addressing 700 European Union leaders in the French city of Strasbourg, said he believed the community had become “elderly and haggard”, valuing monetary gains over human rights. The Pope said Europe had lost many of the values that made it great: “The great ideas that once inspired Europe seem to have lost their attraction, only to be replaced by the bureaucratic technicalities of its institutions.” He also called on the EU to help Italy’s attempts to rescue refugees and migrants at risk of dying while crossing the Mediterranean to flee oppression in Africa, saying “We cannot allow the Mediterranean to become a vast graveyard”.
Sixty dead in two suicide attacks in Nigeria
The busy market of Maiduguri, capital of the Nigerian state of Borno, was attacked by two female suicide bombers. At least 60 people were reported dead. An Al Jazeera reporter, Rawya Rageh, said the explosions devastated the market place. “After the first explosion happened and people started to gather, a second explosion took place,” he reported. The city is operating in a state of emergency because Boko Haram Islamist separatists are active in the area.
Apartment block collapses in Cairo killing 17
The death toll in the collapse of an eight-story block of flats Cairo’s western suburb of Matariya is expected to rise, with at least 15 people believed still trapped under the rubble. Residents from four adjacent buildings have been evacuated by emergency services for fear of further collapses.
Lee Rigby murderers known to British intelligence
British intelligence services have revealed that it had conducted seven separate investigations into two men before they ran down a British soldier, Lee Rigby, then hacked him to death with machetes in a busy London street. But Sir Malcolm Rifkind, chairman of the UK Intelligence and Security Committee, said no evidence had been found that might have helped prevent the attack. Later, however, evidence of the planning of the attack was found in an online chat log. Sir Malcolm expressed concern that internet service providers were providing a vehicle through which terror groups could organise. “It is their social responsibility to act on this,” he said. – Brian Ennew
Top photo has previously appeared on the website Queer Landia.
About the author
