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A series of powerful explosions this Monday complicated efforts to put out the large fire that broke out on Friday at some fuel depots in Matanzas, western Cuba, in what authorities are already considering to be the worst industrial damage in the country’s history. The explosions with columns of fire several tens of meters created a thick curtain of black smoke, which made it impossible for experts to analyze the situation on the ground. The fire, which is now out of control, could continue for days, experts say, while the extent of damage to the third and fourth fuel tanks of the eight that make up the 50,000-cubic-meter supertanker base is still unknown.each.

“The high temperatures made the work very difficult and it turned into a chain reaction and it was practically impossible to achieve extinction,” said Alexander Ávalos Jorge, second head of the National Department of Corps Extermination, at a press conference on Monday the Cuban firefighters. According to Ávalos, the other four tanks at the base are also “compromised” by the high temperatures from the fire and the wind in the area. “We may still need days to put out the fire,” he added. On the other hand, as a result of the recent explosions and smoke on the ground, the deployment of a powerful hydraulic pump installed by the cooperation teams from Venezuela and Mexico, an important step in controlling the fire, was thwarted.

So far one death has been reported, 125 have been injured and 24 hospitalized. The preliminary number of missing has been revised down and now stands at 14. The missing are mainly firefighters, followed by one of the missing The first big explosions were a surprise. The Cuban government said the body would not be recovered until the flames had been extinguished. The number of evacuees remains above 4,000.

Early Monday, Cuban authorities confirmed the collapse of a third warehouse. They later qualified this version and clarified that it was in fact the collapse of the dome of the structure. The first information indicated that the contents of the second tank were spilled when the walls of the infrastructure broke, and only at the end of the afternoon was it confirmed that they had reached the fourth tank. The day’s hubbub included fear among Matanzas residents, who have been asked to use the mask indoors as the smoke, which has increased over the hours, is far from clearing.

As a side effect of the fire, the country can only cover 60% of its electricity needs during peak times this Monday. The state-owned company Unión Eléctrica de Cuba (UNE) indicated that this situation is due to the fact that, in addition to the difficulties that the national energy system has been going through for months, the forced shutdown of Antonio Guiteras’ thermoelectric power plant is becoming one of the largest in the country added for the accident. These facilities, 2.7 kilometers from the park of the fuel tanks in Matanzas that have been burning since Friday, have been closed due to a lack of water for cooling.

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Gaza – Just two hours separated the killing of 17-year-old Hamed Najim and three of his cousins ​​in the Jabalia refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip from the announcement of a ceasefire with Israel.

Israel and the Palestinian armed group Islamic Jihad declared a ceasefire late Sunday after three days of heavy Israeli bombing of the besieged Gaza Strip.

Despite a spate of Israeli airstrikes and Palestinian rocket launches up to the last minute, the ceasefire began at 23:30 local time (20:30 GMT) on Sunday and has so far held.

According to the Palestinian Health Ministry, 44 Palestinians, including 15 children, were killed and at least 350 civilians injured during Israel’s three-day “pre-emptive strike.”

Hamed and his cousins ​​- Jamil Najm al-Deen Naijm, 4, Jamil Ihab Najim, 13, and Mohammad, 17 – were killed by a missile that hit them while they were in the Fallujah cemetery opposite their home.

Hamed’s mother Diana was visibly shaken. She told Al Jazeera her son is very careful not to leave the house for fear of Israeli attacks.

“Just two hours before the truce was announced, he told me he was going out with his cousins ​​for five minutes,” she said. “Moments passed and then we heard a bomb attack. We ran out to find my son and his three cousins. They were all cut into pieces.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wD3cQ7WDeu8

“Our life is worthless”

Diana’s story is similar to many others in the besieged Gaza Strip after Israel launched repeated “surgical strikes” airstrikes against the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group in a three-day operation. according to to the Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations, Gilad Erdan.

“I was a mother of four children. Today my children turned three in no time. My son was very obedient, kind, and excellent in his studies despite our difficult circumstances,” she said.

“Why are we exposed to all this in Gaza? We can lose our children at any moment or minute as if our lives are worthless.”

Despite the loss of her son, Diana expressed her satisfaction with the truce. “Enough is enough. We can’t take it anymore and I don’t want other mothers in Gaza to see the bitterness of what I’m going through now,” she said, tears rolling down her cheeks.

Diana, Hamed Najim’s mother, cries at her son’s wake [Abdelhakim Abu Riash/Al Jazeera]

“Bombing until the last moment”

On Monday, large crowds gathered in the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip to mourn the loss of Yasser al-Nabaheen, 40, and his three children, who were killed in an Israeli bomb attack on their family home the night before.

The attack resulted in the deaths of the father and his two sons, Ahmed (13), Mohamed (9) and his daughter Dalia (13). His eldest son was injured and is recovering in hospital.

“I was sitting with my uncle Yasser on the small lot across from our house,” Ahmad, a family member, told Al Jazeera. “He moved forward a little when a missile fell into the space between us and directly above him and his children. They all crumbled in an instant.”

Ahmad said he couldn’t believe what was happening right before his eyes.

“I was screaming and calling for help and calling an ambulance. My uncle was a good person and loved by everyone. He had no political affiliation. We sat and his children played in front of him. A massacre happened within minutes,” he said.

The father and his children died half an hour before the ceasefire was agreed.

“It’s overwhelming and very difficult to understand. Israel bombed and killed people and civilians until the last moment,” Ahmad said.

The bodies of Yasser al-Nabaheen, 40, and his three children, who were killed Sunday night, are carried by mourners [Hosam Salem/Al Jazeera]

by Giuseppe Sarcina

The FBI searched Donald Trump’s home in Mar-a-Lago, Florida. That’s what the former president said. “We were not informed, it is a political persecution”

It was Donald Trump himself who broke the news. Sensational. The FBI searched the former President’s residence in Mar a Lago, Florida. At the moment there are no further details and not even official confirmations.

Trump also announced agents would break into a safe. And it’s the first time in history that police have broken into a former president’s home.

Trump is at the center of at least two separate strands of investigation. New York Attorney General Letitia James has been investigating Trump Holding’s financial affairs for months. The main suspicion: managers would have inflated assets to get easier bank financing. But of course Attorney General Merrick Garland’s initiative carries a different weight. It examines Trump’s maneuvers to overturn the outcome of the 2020 election and foment the attack on Capitol Hill on January 6, 2021. Finally, the denunciation of the state archives should also be remembered: Before leaving the White House, Trump would have done instead deposited documents disappear.

“My beautiful Mar-A-Lago home in Palm Beach, Fla. is currently being occupied by a group of FBI agents,” he said in a statement. And he goes on and attacks. “Having worked and cooperated with the appropriate government agencies, this unannounced raid on my home was neither necessary nor appropriate.” , who was in New York at the time of the search.

And today is an important day for Donald Trump from a legal point of view. Rudy Giuliani must appear before a special grand jury in Georgia. It’s investigating the possibility that he, along with others, attempted to interfere in the 2020 state election. And Donald Trump’s former attorney was trying to buy time. ABC News reports it. According to documents filed with the court, Giuliani produced a certificate from his doctor, which states that the man cannot fly on the plane due to a recent operation.

However, the Fulton County prosecutor opposed the postponement, responding that Giuliani had already traveled to Rome and Zurich after the operation and that in any case there were alternative means such as “bus or train”.

“Political Persecution” from “Third World Country”. In the lengthy communiqué that Donald Trump issued announcing the attack by FBI agents on his Florida resort, there is a harsh attack on Washington, the Democrats, the bureaucracy and, under the radar, the tone of someone who is now more than ever he is determined to run for the 2024 presidential election. “These are dark times for our nation as my beautiful home, Mar-A-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida is currently under siege by a large group of FBI agents. said the former president, who brought at least 15 packages of government documents to Florida after losing the 2020 presidential election. “Nothing like this has ever happened to a President of the United States – he added – after cooperating with government agencies, this unannounced raid on his home was neither necessary nor appropriate.” “A persecution – he continued – the exploitation of the justice system, an attack on the far-left Democrats who don’t want me running in the 2024 presidential election, especially after the recent polls, and who will do whatever it takes to stop the Republicans and the conservatives in the upcoming midterm elections ».

Aug 9, 2022 (Modified Aug 9, 2022 | 02:22)

© REPRODUCTION RESERVED

American authorities announced Monday, August 8, that they wanted to seize in Kazakhstan the Airbus A319 belonging to Russian oligarch and parliamentarian Andrei Skotch, which was targeted by American and European sanctions after the outbreak of war in Ukraine.

US justice has obtained an “arrest warrant” for the “seizure” of this private Airbus A319-100 belonging to Andrei Skotch, a Duma member accused of “connections to organized crime” and a string of sanctions Washington and Brussels is exposed. The press release from the Department of Justice, the Federal Police (FBI) and the Department of Commerce states that the plane has been in Kazakhstan since early March and values ​​the device at “more than $90 million.” Washington released a photo and aircraft registration.

Also readWar in Ukraine: Kyiv Says It Foiled Attempted Assassination of Defense Minister

“We will continue to use every legal remedy at our disposal to enforce our anti-money laundering laws and to prosecute those who attempt to use the American financial system to violate and evade sanctions,” the powerful prosecutor said Manhattan, Damien Williams. Andrei Skotch has been accused by the US Treasury Department since 2018 of having “longstanding ties to Russian organized crime groups”.

“task force”

US Attorney General Merrick Garland established a legal and financial department dedicated to prosecuting “corrupt Russian oligarchs” in March. This “task force,” dubbed “KleptoCapture,” includes more than 10 prosecutors, criminal defense attorneys, and national security experts, as well as investigators from the FBI, IRS, and Post Office. The cell operates out of the Manhattan Courthouse in New York, the largest federal prosecutor’s office in the United States.

The East Coast megalopolis, the financial lungs of the world, is also the haunt of many Russian businessmen, who in particular control huge apartments around Central Park, each worth tens of millions of dollars. “An oligarchy is defined as a form of government in which a small group exercises control for their own selfish and corrupt interests. Its members in Russia have long cloaked their illegal activities in US dollars,” said FBI Director Michael Driscoll.

At the end of June, the US Treasury Department and its allied governments (Germany, Australia, Canada, France, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the European Union) – united in the Repo “Task Force” – were responsible for tracing the legacy of Russian Elites (yachts, planes, cars, real estate…) – had frozen more than $330 billion in Russian assets since the start of the conflict in Ukraine at the end of February.

This content was published on August 09, 2022 – 01:14 August 09, 2022 – 01:14

Caracas, 8 August (EFE) .- The Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America – Peoples’ Trade Treaty (ALBA-TCP) this Monday condemned the “illegal” request made by the United States Department of Justice last week to confiscate the Venezuelan-Iranian plane that has been detained in Argentina since June.

“The member states of the (…) ALBA-TCP express their deepest condemnation of the unlawful request by the United States Department of Justice (…) to seize a Boeing 747 aircraft owned by Venezuelan Empresa de Transporte Aerocargo del Sur ( Emtrasur), a subsidiary of Venezuelan airline Conviasa based in Buenos Aires,” read a statement.

Last Tuesday, the US Department of Justice asked Argentina to allow it to seize the Venezuelan-Iranian plane that has been detained since June 6 over possible links to international terrorism.

According to the US, the US-made plane is subject to sanctions because its delivery by Iranian company Mahan Air to Emtrasur, a subsidiary of Venezuela’s Aerospace Industry and Air Services Consortium (Conviasa), violates the export laws of the North American nation.

The ALBA-TCP pointed out that this “illegitimate and unlawful seizure order” is “a consequence of the unilateral coercive measures taken by the United States government that threaten Venezuelan sovereignty” and “violate the fundamental principles of the United States Charter”. Nations and International Law”.

“The Alliance rejects support for unilateral coercive measures against the Venezuelan people and government and issues a renewed call to the international community to demand their immediate lifting,” the group said in a statement.

Likewise, the ALBA-TCP claimed that it supports the “legislative measures taken by the Venezuelan government to safeguard its assets”.

For his part, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro on Monday asked for the support of the social, trade union and political movements of “patriotic Argentina” and “Peronists” to recover the plane and release its crew. EFE

csm/hp/gcf

� EFE 2022. The retransmission and redistribution of all or part of the content of the EFE Services is expressly prohibited without the prior and express consent of Agencia EFE SA

Armed Secret Service agents stand in front of one of the entrances to Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida on August 8, 2022. TERRY RENNA / AP

Former US President Donald Trump announced Monday, August 8, that his famous Florida residence, Mar-a-Lago, had been “ransacked” by the Federal Police (FBI). “Our nation is living in dark times, my beautiful home, Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida is under siege and has been raided and occupied by numerous FBI agents,” he said in a statement, claiming to be the victim of the “political persecution”.

“Having worked and cooperated with the appropriate government agencies, this unannounced search of my home was neither necessary nor appropriate,” he said.

“They even broke into my safe!” ‘ Donald Trump said indignantly. The FBI has not yet confirmed this search. The Republican did not give the reasons for this police operation. It is directly or indirectly related to several ongoing legal proceedings.

The way the billionaire managed his official documents while he was in the White House is the focus of several investigations. The former president is accused of deliberately neglecting some of his files before their mandatory transmission to the US National Archives.

Presidential documents found at his home in February

According to several American media, this federal authority had asked the American judiciary to initiate an investigation into these facts. She had to recover fifteen boxes of documents Donald Trump took with him when he left Washington in January 2021 at the Mar-A-Lago residence in Florida.

Inside these boxes are letters from Barack Obama and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, a map of the United States that was the subject of a stormy exchange with the American Weather Service, but also, according to the Washington Post, several documents labeled “Secret Defense.” .

Donald Trump’s Mar-A-Lago home in Palm Beach, Fla. in 2017. WILFREDO LEE/AP

The National Archives assert that the Republican had no right to leave with those boxes: under a 1978 law, every American president must submit all his emails, letters, and other working documents to this agency, which is responsible for their preservation.

Another important case that could worry Donald Trump is a parliamentary committee trying to shed light on the role the billionaire played in the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol. That day, hundreds of his supporters had sowed violence and chaos at Congressional headquarters, delaying confirmation of Joe Biden’s election victory. The Justice Department is investigating the attack but has not yet filed charges against the former president.

Also read: Article reserved for our subscribers Donald Trump “lit the fuse” of the attack on the Capitol, according to the Commission of Inquiry

At the end of July, however, Attorney General Merrick Garland had not ruled out that possibility. “We intend to hold accountable those who are criminally responsible [son rôle dans] the events around January 6, in any attempt to disrupt the legal transfer of power from one government to another,” he said. Donald Trump, still hugely popular with Republicans, is increasingly flirting with the idea of ​​running for president in 2024.

Donald Trump press release, August 8, 2022. DONALDJTRUMP.COM

The world with AFP

Trying out Pfizer and BioNTech of the vaccine against omicron 5 it hasn’t even started yet. And who is waiting for what updated vaccine against the sub-variant, it will have to wait several weeks longer than the first predictions September. In fact, the two companies have announced that they will begin clinical trials of the vaccine matched against Omicron’s BA.4 and BA.5 variants in order to commercialize them. not before October. However, should this data also be too optimistic, the feared resurgence of infections after the summer would leave Italians (but not only) in the dark at this point for some time.

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The German company BioNTech today announced the financial results for the second quarter and the first half of 2022, taking stock of the programs it is implementing together with the American Pfizer in the field of Fight against Covid-19. In addition to the bivalent vaccine based on the original virus and on Omicron BA.1, for which the European Medicines Agency EMA has already received the green light, the two companies also want to start clinical studies this month on a targeted bivalent vaccine Omicron BA.4 and BA .5. For both products, “subject to regulatory approval, we expect to begin shipping Omicron-adapted vaccines as early as October,” BioNTech said.

Omicron on vacation Virologist Fazii: “Beware of parties and concerts, the winter will be very hard”

Sales figures BioNTech (down)

In the first half of 2022, the Mainz-based company recorded a 30% increase in sales to EUR 9.57 billion and a 37% increase in net profit to EUR 5.37 billion compared to the first 6 months of 2021. In the second quarter of the year, both revenue and net income show a decline of about 40% compared to the same period last year, to $3.2 billion and $1.67 billion, respectively. BioNTech attributes this to the “dynamic development of the pandemic, which is leading to a postponement of orders and thus to fluctuations in quarterly sales”. However, the group confirms the year-end targets with sales of Covid-19 vaccines between 13 and 17 billion euros.

The organization Canadian Network on Cuba (CNC) proposed in the call to conduct “a short and intensive campaign” to raise as much money as possible for Cubans “in these difficult times”, an initiative supported by a group in the city has already started from Calgary, Alberta.

Cuban firefighters are bringing all their skills and courage to put out the flames, but it is difficult and costly to counter this disaster, which has so far left one dead and 16 missing and injured at least 120 people, the CNC said in its publication .

The movement recognized the help of countries like Mexico and Venezuela, the offer of Russia and Bolivia and other nations, and the technical advice of the United States.

Other Canada-based solidarity organizations with Cuba are also preparing in-kind donations to support the island in the event of the incident at an industrial area in the western city of Matanzas, about 100 kilometers east of Havana.

The Association of Cuban Residents in Toronto, Juan Gualberto Gómez, assured that he is working to send several urgent supplies to the Caribbean country this week, and reiterated the importance of contributing to the purchase of certain medical supplies.

So did the Calixto García Solidarity Brigade, which joined the Calgary group to raise the funds needed to purchase medicines to be shipped from Toronto to Matanzas.

So far, Cuba has received 22 donations from governments, institutions and solidarity movements to deal with the disaster.

The major fire at Matanzas Super Tanker Base is currently in a very complicated situation and its smothering could take several days, according to Fire Brigade Chief Colonel Alexander Ávalos.

Since last Friday, when lightning struck one of the oil tanks, the eerie unleashed on a large scale that has so far left one dead, 14 missing and 122 injured. Of these, the last 101 have already been released.

or/avr