Новости за 19.05.2023

Nigerian police said Friday that officers had arrested seven suspects in connection with the massacre of dozens of villagers in central Plateau state. State police spokesperson Alfred Alabo said security operatives had restored calm to the affected Kubwat and Fungzai villages in the remote Mangu district. He said police would continue to monitor the area to try to prevent more attacks. Witnesses said gunmen invaded Mangu early Tuesday morning and opened fire on villagers. They also burned many houses before security forces arrived. Читать дальше...

VOA Mandarin's Hai Lun, Mo Yu and Ning Lu and VOA Spanish's Victor Hugo Castillo traveled to Mexican and Texas border cities to talk to Chinese migrants who had come from South America. VOA's Elizabeth Lee tells the story. Cameras: Hai Lun, Ning Lu, Victor Hugo Castillo, Oscar Cavadia.

Two U.S. mission employees missing since a Tuesday attack on a U.S. convoy in Nigeria's southeastern Anambra state, have been recovered alive and are under the protection of Nigerian authorities, the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria reported Friday. According to the U.S. State Department, the two employees went missing Tuesday after unknown assailants attacked a convoy of two U.S. government vehicles in the Ogbaru local government area of Anambra state. In a statement, the State Department said the convoy was carrying nine Nigerian nationals... Читать дальше...

The midwestern city of Chicago is struggling to accommodate a wave of migrants, many from Central and South America, transported to the city after entering the U.S. at America’s southern border. VOA's Kane Farabaugh reports on how the city and aid agencies are mobilizing to tend to asylum-seekers’ critical needs.

Authorities in Zimbabwe Friday started releasing 4,270 prison inmates who were granted amnesty by President Emmerson Mnangagwa earlier this month ahead of general elections. The development is welcomed because it decongests Zimbabwe's overcrowded prisons. Pardoned inmates leaving Harare Central Prison Friday did not speak, but joy was written all over many of the prisoners' faces. Shepherd Mpofu, the acting head of the Zimbabwe Prisons and Correctional Service, is grateful to President Emmerson... Читать дальше...

The U.S. space agency NASA announced Friday it has awarded the Jeff Bezos-owned aerospace company Blue Origin a contract to build a second lunar lander for the Artemis V moon mission, aiming to land a crew on the moon by 2029. At a Washington news conference, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said under the $3.4 billion contract, Blue Origin will design, develop, test and verify its Blue Moon lander to meet NASA's human landing system requirements for recurring astronaut expeditions to the lunar surface... Читать дальше...

The U.N. children’s agency UNICEF says it needs $88 million to address food insecurity for millions of people in Malawi. The agency warns that hundreds of thousands of children in the southern African country are at risk for malnutrition because of the impact of Cyclone Freddy in March. In the new appeal Friday, UNICEF said Cyclone Freddy displaced 659,000 people in Malawi and has significantly increased many challenges in recent months. Among the challenges is acute food insecurity, affecting... Читать дальше...

Neris Arruaz held her 2-year-old in one arm and a small red bag on the other with a few diapers inside. She has come to the social service organization Ayudándoles A Triunfar, in the border city of Matamoros, Mexico, to ask for a few more. Arruaz, her husband and two small children are from Cuba. They arrived at the U.S.-Mexico border in April and are not sure when they will be able to present themselves at a port of entry. In Cuba, she was an accountant and her husband was a veterinarian. As Cubans... Читать дальше...

As Greece gears up for uncertain parliamentary elections Sunday, the country's media landscape is as polarized as ever and press freedom remains in crisis, experts say. Against a backdrop of political tension and hemorrhaging media freedom, Greeks will vote May 21 to fill all of parliament's 300 seats for the next four years. The election — which analysts say is unlikely to bring about an outright winning party in the first round — is among the country's most unpredictable in years. This election... Читать дальше...

The nationalities of the migrants seeking to enter the United States at the U.S.-Mexico border have shifted over the past few months. From the Rio Grande Valley area in Texas, VOA's immigration correspondent Aline Barros reports. Camera: Henry Hernandez, VOA's Mandarin Service Produced by: Henry Hernandez

Officials in Cameroon have shut down markets in an attempt to stop a wave of cholera infections spreading through all 10 regions of the central African state. The government says more than 20,000 people have been infected, but the figures may be higher as a majority of the country's 26 million people do not go to hospitals for treatment. Some hospitals are overwhelmed with cholera patients. Sanitation workers on Friday washed and disinfected toilets, pits and septic tanks at Acacia market in Yaounde's Sixth district. Читать дальше...

The U.S. Geological Survey says a 7.7 magnitude earthquake struck Friday in the south Pacific, prompting tsunami warnings that were later lifted for the Loyalty Islands of New Caledonia and Vanuatu. The USGS says the quake happened at 02:57 Universal Time 334 kilometers east of the city of Vao on New Caledonia, or 436 kilometers southwest of Vanuatu.  Another large quake – a magnitude 5.9 – was recorded in the same area about 10 minutes later. The quake zone is southwest of Fiji, north of New Zealand and east of Australia... Читать дальше...

Internships help students build their resumes and learn real world skills that can help secure job offers after graduation. Yet many opportunities are unpaid, and only the best-off students can afford to work for free. Now, state universities in Wisconsin and New York are using their budgets to pay students who complete internships in their communities. Johanna Alonso of Inside Higher Ed reports on the promising outcomes of these programs. (May 2023)

On May 17th a VOA reporter on Chad’s border with Sudan heard gunfire and explosions and witnessed bodies, casualties, and even stray bullets coming across the border from the town of Tendelti, Sudan, about 900 meters away. Observers say concerns are growing that the intense violence in Sudan’s Western Darfur region could spread to neighboring countries. Meanwhile, Chad's police chief told VOA he is urging citizens to remain calm. Henry Wilkins reports from Koufroun in Chad. Warning: This report contains graphic and disturbing images. Читать дальше...

Iranian authorities on Friday executed three men convicted of violence against the Islamic republic's security forces during protests triggered by Mahsa Amini's death in custody last year, the judiciary said. Majid Kazemi, Saleh Mirhashemi and Saeed Yaghoubi were convicted of "moharebeh," or "war against God," for drawing a gun during a demonstration in the central city of Isfahan, leading to the deaths of three members of the security forces, the judiciary's Mizan Online news website said. Iran... Читать дальше...

A Hong Kong court on Friday dismissed an attempt by jailed media tycoon Jimmy Lai to challenge a decision by security officials to effectively bar his British lawyer from representing him in a landmark national security trial. Lai's legal team filed a judicial review after Hong Kong's National Security Committee (NSC), headed by senior Hong Kong and Chinese officials, ruled that the admission of senior British barrister Timothy Owen could harm national security and advised Hong Kong authorities to reject his visa. Читать дальше...

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is in Saudi Arabia on Friday to attend an Arab summit where he will rub shoulders with leaders who shunned him for years in a major policy shift opposed by the United States and other Western powers. Ostracized by most Arab states following the crackdown on protests against his rule in 2011 and the ensuing civil war that killed 350,000 people, his government's readmission to the bloc is a signal that Assad's isolation is ending. A beaming Assad was received by... Читать дальше...

Despite accusing Pakistan's powerful army chief of being involved his political troubles, former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan now says he has no problem with the army chief but alleges that the head of the military has a problem with him. Khan's dramatic arrest May 9 from a court complex in the capital Islamabad led to three days of violent nationwide protests. From his family home in Lahore, Khan spoke via Skype on Thursday with VOA Pakistan Bureau Chief Sarah Zaman at the VOA bureau... Читать дальше...

More than half of the world's large lakes and reservoirs have shrunk since the early 1990s, chiefly because of climate change, intensifying concerns about water for agriculture, hydropower and human consumption, a study published Thursday found. An international team of researchers reported that some of the world's most important water sources — from the Caspian Sea between Europe and Asia to South America's Lake Titicaca — lost water at a cumulative rate of about 22 gigatonnes per year for nearly three decades. Читать дальше...

A pair of alumni from the University of Pennsylvania have donated $10 million to support international students, reported the student newspaper, The Daily Pennsylvanian. The funds are intended to help international students in the School of Arts & Sciences. (May 2023)

An Australian doctor held captive by al-Qaida-linked extremists for more than seven years in West Africa has been released, the Australian government said Friday. Kenneth Elliott, 88, is safe and well and has been reunited with his wife, Jocelyn, and their children, Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong said. The couple were seized in January 2016 from Djibo, near Burkina Faso's border with Mali, where they had operated a 120-bed clinic for more than 40 years. Jocelyn Elliott was freed after three weeks. Читать дальше...

Rescue crews worked Thursday to reach towns and villages in northern Italy isolated by heavy rains and flooding, as the death toll rose to 13 and authorities began mapping out cleanup and reconstruction plans. The extreme weather behind this week's disaster — a prolonged drought punctuated by 36 hours of intense rainfall, two weeks after another downpour — led to two dozen rivers and tributaries bursting their banks. The force of water sent torrents of mud tearing through entire towns in the Emilia-Romagna region... Читать дальше...

Mexican authorities said Thursday that they were trying to locate several hundred people, including U.S. nationals, potentially at risk of developing fungal meningitis after medical treatment near the border. The announcement came a day after the United States warned that suspected fungal infections had led to severe illness and even death among U.S. residents returning from the Mexican city of Matamoros. Around 400 people were being traced, including roughly 80 from the United States, according to the health minister of Tamaulipas state... Читать дальше...

Somalia's National Intelligence Agency (NISA) said Thursday that it had seized two illicit shipments of military hardware and explosive materials that were apparently bound for the al-Shabab militant group. At a news conference in Mogadishu, Somalia's State Minister of Defense Mohamed Ali Haga said the agency found the arms at Mogadishu's port and airport. "At the port of Mogadishu, NISA personnel discovered a shipment of military hardware and explosive materials concealed within containers posing as authorized business imports," Haga said.