The Fiji Times

Miner Vale quashed dam safety audit efforts before Brazil disaster: prosecutor

SAO PAULO (Reuters) – Executives at Vale SA, the world’s largest iron ore miner, quashed efforts by Brazilian authorities to audit one of the company’s mining dams months before it collapsed and killed over 300 people, a state prosecutor was quoted as saying by news website G1 on Wednesday. William Garcia, a prosecutor in Minas...

U.S. top court jeopardizes Google settlement in internet privacy case

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday put in jeopardy an $8.5 million settlement Google made with users to resolve a class action lawsuit accusing it of violating their privacy by sharing users’ search queries with other websites. The justices, in an unsigned opinion, threw out a ruling by the San Francisco-based 9th U.S....

Rescue teams race to save hundreds trapped by Mozambique cyclone

BEIRA, Mozambique (Reuters) – Aid workers rushed to save people trapped by floods around the Mozambican port city of Beira on Wednesday, after a powerful cyclone killed hundreds and left a trail of destruction across swathes of southeast Africa. Some survivors were still clinging onto trees or roofs, waiting for rescue teams almost a week...

Man sacked, deported from UAE for ‘celebrating’ New Zealand mosque shooting

DUBAI (Reuters) – A company in the United Arab Emirates said an employee was fired and deported after he allegedly celebrated the mass killing of Muslims in New Zealand last week. At least 50 people were killed and dozens wounded by a lone gunman at two mosques in Christchurch on Friday in what is the...

Italian parliament saves Salvini from migrant kidnapping probe

ROME (Reuters) – The Italian parliament on Wednesday blocked prosecutors from pursuing an investigation into Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini for abuse of power and kidnapping migrants. Salvini, who is interior minister and leader of the right-wing League party, has declared Italy’s ports closed to illegal migrants and asylum seekers since he formed a ruling...

Driver hijacks, sets ablaze school bus in Italy, children flee unharmed

MILAN (Reuters) – A bus full of schoolchildren was hijacked and set on fire by its own driver on Wednesday in an apparent protest against migrant drownings in the Mediterranean, Italian authorities said. All 51 children managed to escape unhurt before the bus was engulfed in flames on the outskirts of Milan, Italy’s business capital....

With 737 MAX grounded, airlines face daily scheduling challenges

CHICAGO/MONTREAL (Reuters) – U.S. and Canadian airlines that fly the roughly 175-seat aircraft face a logistical challenge: which flights to cancel and which to cover with other planes following the global grounding of Boeing Co’s 737 MAX jets. Southwest Airlines Co and American Airlines Group Inc, the two largest MAX operators in the United States,...

Disney closes $71 billion acquisition of Twenty-First Century Fox’s assets

(Reuters) – Walt Disney Co closed its $71 billion acquisition of Twenty-First Century Fox Inc’s film and television assets on Wednesday, giving its upcoming streaming service a range of popular content as it takes on Netflix Inc. The deal will expand Disney’s portfolio of some of the world’s most popular characters, uniting Mickey Mouse, Luke...

Bayer shares slide after latest Roundup cancer ruling

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Shares in Germany’s Bayer’s fell more than 12 percent on Wednesday after a second U.S. jury ruled its Roundup weed killer caused cancer. Tuesday’s unanimous jury decision in San Francisco federal court was not a finding of Bayer’s liability for the cancer of plaintiff Edwin Hardeman. Liability and damages will be decided...

Arctic black carbon work hampered by U.S. and Russia, says Finland

HELSINKI (Reuters) – The Arctic region’s co-operation in the battle against global warming by reducing black carbon emissions is being hampered by the United States and Russia, the Finnish foreign ministry said on Wednesday. Black carbon, the soot produced by burning fossil fuels and biomass, is an atmospheric pollutant that is particularly problematic in the...

Boeing, FAA officials called to testify in U.S. Senate on 737 MAX plane crashes

ADDIS ABABA/JAKARTA/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Boeing Co faced growing pressure in Washington on Wednesday with U.S. lawmakers calling for executives to testify about two crashed 737 MAX jets even as the world’s biggest planemaker works to overcome obstacles to returning the grounded fleet to the skies. The Senate hearing, at an unspecified date, would be the...

At least 10 migrants die when boat sinks off Libyan coast – official

TRIPOLI (Reuters) – At least 10 migrants died when their boat sank off the Libyan coast near the western town of Sabratha on Tuesday, a Libyan security official said. About 17 others were rescued, Aiman Dabbashi, Sabratha’s security operations spokesman, said. Libya’s western coast is a main departure point for migrants fleeing poverty and wars...

New Zealand begins funerals for mosque shooting victims, PM visits school

CHRISTCHURCH (Reuters) – The bodies of victims from New Zealand’s mosques mass shooting were carried in open caskets on the shoulders of mourners into a large tent at Christchurch’s Memorial Park Cemetery on Wednesday – the first burials of the 50 victims. The majority of victims from Friday’s attack in the South Island city were...

U.N. Court sentences Karadzic to life in prison on appeal

THE HAGUE (Reuters) – U.N. judges on Wednesday sentenced former Bosnian Serb political leader Radovan Karadzic to life in prison on appeal, ending one of the most momentous trials over massacres and other atrocities committed during the Balkan wars of the 1990s. Appeals judges upheld Karadzic’s conviction for the 1995 genocide at Srebrenica and ruled...

Stakes rise for Boeing as EU, Canada step up scrutiny of 737 MAX after crashes

ADDIS ABABA/PARIS/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Europe and Canada said they would seek their own guarantees over the safety of Boeing’s 737 MAX, further complicating plans to get the aircraft flying worldwide after they were grounded in the wake of two accidents killing more than 300 people. As the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) analyses Boeing’s plans...

Exclusive: Cockpit voice recorder of doomed Lion Air jet depicts pilots’ frantic search for fix – sources

JAKARTA/SINGAPORE/PARIS (Reuters) – The pilots of a doomed Lion Air Boeing 737 MAX scoured a handbook as they struggled to understand why the jet was lurching downwards, but ran out of time before it hit the water, three people with knowledge of the cockpit voice recorder contents said. The investigation into the crash, which killed...

Youngest captain, loving son: Ethiopian pilots honoured in death

ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) – The dreams of the two young men soared as high as the Ethiopian Airlines planes they proudly flew. Handsome, cosmopolitan Yared Getachew was to marry another plane captain this year. Studious, serious Ahmednur Mohammed rented his first apartment with his maiden paycheck in February. Their lives, along with 155 others, ended...

Going ‘Under’: Europe’s first underwater restaurant opens in Norway

BAALY, Norway (Reuters) – Europe’s first underwater restaurant opens in Norway on Wednesday with more than 7,000 customers booked in to eat among the fish. Situated on the southern tip of Norway, the restaurant looks like a large concrete tube partly submerged in the North Sea. It is called Under, which also means “wonder” in...

Canada cracks down on asylum seekers crossing U.S.-Canadian border

OTTAWA (Reuters) – Canada said on Tuesday it planned to spend an additional C$1.2 billion ($902 million) over five years to stem the flow of irregular migrants from the United States, which has become a political threat to the Liberal government ahead of an October election. Some 57,000 asylum seekers from Nigeria, El Salvador, Honduras...

Democrats seek probe of key FAA decisions on 737 MAX approval

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives transportation committee and another key Democrat asked the Transportation Department’s inspector general on Tuesday to examine key decisions made by the Federal Aviation Administration in certifying Boeing’s 737 MAX jet for use. The request follows the March 10 crash of a 737 MAX jet...

Radovan Karadzic faces final verdict in war crimes case

THE HAGUE (Reuters) – United Nations appeals judges on Wednesday hand down a final verdict in the case of former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic, a key figure in the Balkan wars who is serving a 40-year prison sentence for genocide. The ruling will likely bring to a close one of the highest profile trials...

Guatemalan judge orders arrest of former attorney general

GUATEMALA CITY (Reuters) – A Guatemalan judge has ordered the arrest of former attorney general and presidential candidate Thelma Aldana on charges including embezzlement, the police said on Tuesday, amid an escalating campaign on high-profile corruption and rights cases. Aldana, who helped lead investigations into top politicians, including the current president, is seeking the presidency...

‘I am your mother now’: NZ mosque shootings hit tight-knit Bangladesh community hard

CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand (Reuters) – Husna Ahmed was 19 when she arrived in New Zealand from Bangladesh on her wedding day. Waiting to meet her was Farid, the man she would marry in a few hours, as their families had agreed. A quarter of a century later, the life they had built together was torn...

Killed, orphaned, sold: Afghan war takes brutal toll on children

KABUL/BALKH, Afghanistan (Reuters) – After fighting forced Mohammad Khan, a villager from the northern Afghanistan province of Sar-e Pul, to move his family to the more secure province of Balkh last year, they quickly fell on harder times. Khan’s wife grew gravely ill, he could not find work, and struggled to feed their seven children....

U.S. transportation chief seeks audit of Boeing 737 MAX certification

(Reuters) – U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao said on Tuesday she had asked the department’s inspector general to audit the Federal Aviation Administration’s certification of the Boeing 737 MAX after two fatal crashes involving the jet since October. Chao said in her memo that the audit is to “assist the FAA in ensuring that its...

‘Interventionist’ speaker centre-stage in parliament’s Brexit drama

LONDON (Reuters) – With a wordy speech invoking a 17th-century precedent, and a cold stare aimed at stunned ministers, the grandiose Speaker of Britain’s parliament cast Prime Minister Theresa May’s Brexit strategy into chaos. Less than two weeks before Britain is due to leave the European Union, John Bercow warned on Monday that May would...

Factbox: What we know about Boeing 737 MAX crash and what comes next

(Reuters) – More than 300 Boeing 737 MAX 8 and MAX 9 passenger jets have been taken out of service worldwide after two fatal crashes over the past five months in Ethiopia and Indonesia killed almost 350 people. Investigators looking to uncover the causes must answer one of the biggest questions: Was the plane’s software...

Asylum seekers returned from Mexico plead to stay in U.S.

TIJUANA, Mexico/SAN DIEGO (Reuters) – Three asylum seekers due to be returned to Mexico after appearing in U.S. immigration court on Tuesday asked officials to let them stay in the United States because they feared for their safety while waiting out the process in Mexico. The requests are a new approach by migrants in response...

Death toll in Mozambique cyclone, flooding rises above 200: president

MAPUTO (Reuters) – The number of people killed after a powerful cyclone and flooding hit Mozambique has risen to above 200, President Filipe Nyusi said on Tuesday after a cabinet meeting on the disaster. Cyclone Idai tore through Mozambique and inland neighbors Malawi and Zimbabwe after making landfall last week, leaving a trail of destruction...

World

22nd March

Missouri River towns face deluge as floods move downstream