Russia slams support for Ukraine opposition
MUNICH – Russia’s foreign minister slammed Western support of Ukraine’s opposition, suggesting Saturday that it is helping fuel the escalation of violence.
Ukraine has faced two months of major protests, starting after President Viktor Yanukovych backed off an agreement to deepen ties with the European Union in favor of relations with Moscow.
The protests had been mostly peaceful until mid-January, when demonstrators angered by new anti-protest laws launched violent clashes with police. Three protesters died in the clashes, two of them from gunshot wounds. Police insist they didn’t fire the fatal shots.
At a gathering of the world’s top diplomats and defense officials in Munich, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov took issue with what he said were “prominent European politicians actually encouraging such actions.
“What does incitement of increasingly violent street protests have to do with promoting democracy?” he said. “Why don’t we hear condemnations of those who seize and hold government buildings, burn, torch the police, use racist and anti-Semitic and Nazi slogans?”
Speaking before Lavrov, NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen blamed security forces in Ukraine for using excessive force and added, “Ukraine must have the freedom to choose its own path without external pressure.”
Activists: Syrian forces launch new strikes
BEIRUT – Syrian military helicopters dropped barrels packed with explosives in the government’s latest air raids on rebel-held areas of the northern city of Aleppo on Saturday, killing at least 23 people, including a family trapped in a burning car, activists said.
In neighboring Lebanon, a car bomb blew up near a gas station in a Shiite town, killing at least three people, in the latest attack linked to the war in neighboring Syria.
Footage on al-Manar television, associated with the Shiite group Hezbollah, showed a bright orange blaze as black silhouettes of people ran by the gas station in the northeastern town of Hermel that lies near the Syrian border. Blasts could be heard in the background. The Lebanese Red Cross said another 18 people were wounded. The organization initially reported that four people were killed but later revised the number downwards.
Indonesia volcano erupts again; kills 14
MOUNT SINABUNG, Indonesia – An Indonesian volcano rumbling for months unleashed a major eruption Saturday, killing 14 people just a day after authorities allowed thousands of villagers who had been evacuated to return to its slopes, saying activity was decreasing, officials said.
Among the dead on Mount Sinabung were a local television journalist and four high-school students and their teacher who were visiting the mountain to see the eruptions up close, said National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho. At least three other people were injured, and authorities feared the death toll would rise.
Sinabung, in western Sumatra, has been erupting for four months, sending lava and searing gas and rocks rolling down its southern slopes.
On Saturday, a series of huge blasts and eruptions thundered from the 8,530-foot-high volcano, sending lava and pyroclastic flows up to 2.8 miles away, Nugroho said. Television footage showed villages, farms and trees around the volcano covered in thick, gray ash.
Trial of Egypt’s ousted leader to resume
CAIRO – A lawyer for Egypt’s ousted president on Saturday told a Cairo court it lacked jurisdiction to try Mohammed Morsi, saying the Islamist leader remained Egypt’s legitimate president because there has been no official decree removing him from office.
The hearing, the third since the trial opened in November, was held amid continuing militant attacks and a relentless crackdown on Morsi’s supporters, expanding those targeted to include Islamists who use social media against the military-backed government.
The claims by Morsi’s lawyer, Mohammed Salim el-Awah, came as the trial of the ousted leader and 14 others on charges of inciting the killing of protesters in 2012 resumed amid tight security in a makeshift courtroom in the national police academy in an eastern Cairo suburb.
Morsi has insisted he remains president, part of the Brotherhood’s broader strategy of defying the authority of Egypt’s new government at every turn. He was held in a soundproof glass cage in Saturday’s hearing and could only address the court directly if the judge allowed it.
The trial is one of four Morsi and top Brotherhood leaders face. The charges levelled against them mostly carry the death penalty. Saturday’s hearing was adjourned until Tuesday to allow time for the examination by a panel of experts video footage presented by the prosecution as evidence. The defense challenged the authenticity of the videos in Saturday’s hearing.
Associated Press
