AZTEC, New Mexico: Students hid in their classrooms, some behind locked doors or in closets, as a gunman opened fire Thursday inside a New Mexico high school, killing two classmates before he died.
Authorities in the small town of Aztec near the Colorado border have released few details other than to say the two victims — Casey J. Marquez and Francisco I. Fernandez — attended Aztec High School. The identity of the shooter has yet to be released.
No other injuries were reported, and it was not clear if the shooter died by suicide or was killed by police.
The San Juan County Sheriff’s Office in a post on social media asked for the community to pray for the families of Marquez and Fernandez.
Friends were sharing their condolences on Marquez’s Facebook page, which displayed photos of the teen in her cheerleading outfit. Fernandez’s friends posted on his page and wore T-shirts that memorialized him during a candlelight vigil that brought together hundreds of mourners late Thursday.
Authorities planned to release more information Friday.
Bryn Divine, a senior, said she was sitting at her desk in her history class when she heard gunshots erupt down the hall. At first, it sounded as if someone was swinging a metal baseball bat against the lockers.
Then she heard an announcer over the school intercom tell students: “This is not a drill.”
“I stayed in my desk, and I just prayed, ‘Please just let this be over as soon as possible.’ That was my first reaction,” she said.
Sophomore Garrett Parker told Albuquerque television station KOAT that he also heard what he thought was banging on the lockers. Then it got louder and closer.
“Thankfully our teacher always locks the door no matter what. So he kept that locked,” Parker said. “When they called over the intercom that it was not a drill, we went to the corner of the room out of sight from the door and just started hiding.”
Gov. Susana Martinez called the shooting a heinous and horrific act and told reporters that teachers, school staff and law enforcement jumped in quickly to prevent more deaths. She didn’t provide more details.
Police responded to the school less than a minute after getting the initial calls, which came shortly after the start of the first period. With the school in lockdown, they got inside through a window and a door.
Authorities checked each room and building at the school before the students were bused to another location where they were reunited with their parents.
The school remained cordoned off as people braved frigid temperatures for the vigil at a nearby park.
David Stone, 16, and Heaven Angelica Hughes, 15, huddled with friends in below-freezing temperatures to light candles and exchange stories. Both were in a classroom next to the shootings.
“I still can’t believe what happened,” Stone said. He said one of the victims was his cousin.
Aztec is a rural town of 6,500 people in the heart of northwestern New Mexico’s oil and gas country and near the Navajo Nation. Its main street is lined by old brick buildings that date back more than a century.
Local, state and federal authorities said at a news conference that they had a lot of evidence to process and many interviews to conduct. They also were asking any students who might have seen something to call police.
School Superintendent Kirk Carpenter choked up, describing it as a tough day.
“At schools, our primary role and our primary job is to educate students and keep them safe, and when you have something like this, it hits you in the heart,” he said.
Aztec school officials say schools across town that shut down Thursday will likely stay closed Friday.
Residents voiced disbelief on social media, while members of the New Mexico congressional delegation, state Attorney General Hector Balderas and other elected officials offered their condolences and other assistance.
‘Not a drill’: Students hide in classrooms as New Mexico shooter kills 2
‘Not a drill’: Students hide in classrooms as New Mexico shooter kills 2
End of Ukraine gas transit deal plunges Moldova's pro-Russian region into crisis
- Kyiv refuses to renew the deal, leaving the breakaway region of Transdniestria without gas
- With longer rolling blackouts, residents are left without heating, hot water
KYIV: The pro-Russian breakaway Moldovan region of Transdniestria, left without Russian gas supplies no longer transiting through neighboring Ukraine, faced longer periods of rolling power cuts on Saturday, local authorities said.
Flows of Russian gas via Ukraine to central and eastern Europe stopped on New Year’s Day after a transit deal expired between the warring countries and Kyiv refused to extend it.
Transdniestria, a mainly Russian-speaking enclave which has lived side-by-side with Moldova since breaking away from it in the last days of Soviet rule, received gas from Russian giant Gazprom through the pipeline crossing Ukraine.
The gas was used to operate a thermal plant which provided electricity locally and for much of Moldova under the control of the pro-European central government.
The region’s self-styled president, Vadim Krasnoselsky, writing on the Telegram messaging app, said rolling power cuts in various districts would be extended to four hours on Sunday.
Hour-long cuts were first imposed on Friday evening after heating and hot water supplies were curtailed. The cuts were then extended to three hours on Saturday.
“Yesterday’s introduction of rolling cuts was a test. And it confirmed that an hour-long break to keep the electrical supply system operating was insufficient,” Krasnoselsky wrote. “The power generated is not covering sharply rising demand.”
All industries except those producing food have been shut down. The official Telegram news channel of the region’s separatist authorities announced the official closure on Saturday of a steel mill and bakery in the town of Rybnitsa.
Regional officials announced new measures to help residents, especially the elderly, and warned that overnight temperatures would fall to -10 Celsius (+14 Fahrenheit). Residents were told not to put strain on the region’s mobile phone network.
Using firewood
The news channel warned against using heaters in disrepair after two residents died of carbon monoxide poisoning from a stove. Online pictures showed servicemen loading up trucks with firewood for distribution.
“Don’t put off gathering in firewood,” Krasnoselsky told residents. “It is better to ensure your supply in advance, especially since the weather is favorable so far.”
Moldova’s government blames Russia for the crisis and has called on Gazprom to ship gas through the Turkstream pipeline and then through Bulgaria and Romania.
Russia denies using gas as a weapon to coerce Moldova, and blames Kyiv for refusing to renew the gas transit deal.
The Transdniestria power cuts are a problem for Moldova particularly because the enclave is home to a power plant which provides most of the power for government-controlled areas of Moldova at a fixed and low price.
Prime Minister Dorin Recean said on Friday his country faced a security crisis after Transdniestria imposed the rolling blackouts, but he also said the Chisinau government had prepared alternative arrangements, with a mixture of domestic production and electricity imports from Romania.
Even before the halt of supplies via Ukraine, Gazprom had said it would suspend exports to Moldova on Jan. 1 because of what Russia says are unpaid Moldovan debts of $709 million. Moldova disputes that and put the figure at $8.6 million.
Mali’s army claims arrest of Daesh group leader
BAMAKO: Mali’s army said Saturday its forces had arrested two men, one of them a leading figure in the Sahel branch of the Daesh group.
The army announced they had also killed several of the group’s fighters during an operation in the north of the country.
A statement from the army said they had arrested “Mahamad Ould Erkehile alias Abu Rakia,” as well as “Abu Hash,” who they said was a leading figure in the group.
They blamed him for coordinating atrocities against people in the Menaka and Gao regions in the northeast of the country, as well as attacks against the army.
Mali has faced profound unrest since 2012 linked both to militants associated with Al-Qaeda and the Daesh group, and to local criminal gangs.
The country’s military rulers have broken ties with former colonial power France and turned, militarily and politically, to Russia.
Iran protests Afghan dam project in new water dispute
- The dam in Herat province will store approximately 54 million cubic meters of water, irrigate 13,000 hectares of agricultural land and generate two megawatts of electricity
TEHRAN: Iran’s foreign ministry said on Friday that an upstream dam being built by neighboring Afghanistan on the Harirud River restricts water flow and could be in violation of bilateral treaties.
Water rights have long been a source of friction in ties between the two countries, which share a more than 900-kilometer (560-mile) border.
Esmaeil Baqaei, spokesman for Tehran’s foreign ministry, voiced on Friday “strong protest and concern over the disproportionate restriction of water entering Iran” due to the Pashdan Dam project.
He said in a statement that the Iranian concerns had been communicated “in contact with relevant Afghan authorities.”
“Exploitation of water resources and basins cannot be carried out without respecting Iran’s rights in accordance with bilateral treaties or applicable customary principles and rules, as well as the important principle of good neighborliness and environmental considerations,” Baqaei added.
Abdul Ghani Baradar, Afghanistan’s deputy prime minister for economic affairs, said in a video statement last month that the Pashdan project was “nearing completion and water storage has commenced.”
According to the video, the dam in Herat province will store approximately 54 million cubic meters of water, irrigate 13,000 hectares of agricultural land and generate two megawatts of electricity.
In April, Baradar said the dam was a “vital and strategic project” for Herat province.
The foreign ministry statement on Friday follows remarks by an Iranian water official, similarly criticizing the dam construction.
“The situation has led to social and environmental issues, particularly affecting the drinking water supply for the holy city of Mashhad,” Iran’s second-largest and home to a revered Shiite Muslim shrine near the Afghan border, national water industry spokesman Issa Bozorgzadeh was quoted as saying on Monday by official news agency IRNA.
Harirud River, also known as Hari and Tejen, flows from the mountains of central Afghanistan to Turkmenistan, passing along Iran’s borders with both countries.
In his statement, Baqaei said Iran expects “Afghanistan... to cooperate in continuing the flow of water from border rivers” and to “remove the obstacles created” along their path.
In May 2023, Iran issued a stern warning to Afghan officials over another dam project, on the Helmand River, saying that it violates the water rights of residents of Sistan-Baluchistan, a drought-hit province in southeastern Iran.
Series of Ethiopia earthquakes trigger evacuations
- The earthquakes have damaged houses and threatened to trigger a volcanic eruption of the previously dormant Mount Dofan, near Segento in the northeast Afar region
ADDIS ABABA: Evacuations were underway in Ethiopia Saturday after a series of earthquakes, the strongest of which, a 5.8-magnitude jolt, rocked the remote north of the Horn of Africa nation.
The quakes were centered on the largely rural Afar, Oromia and Amhara regions after months of intense seismic activity.
No casualties have been reported so far.
Ethiopia’s government Communication Service said around 80,000 people were living in the affected regions and the most vulnerable were being moved to temporary shelters.
“The earthquakes are increasing in terms of magnitude and recurrences,” it said in a statement, adding that experts had been dispatched to assess the damage.
The Ethiopian Disaster Risk Management Commission said 20,573 people had been evacuated to safer areas in Afar and Oromia, from a tally of over 51,000 “vulnerable” people.
Plans were underway to move more than 8,000 people in Oromia “in the coming days,” the agency said in a statement.
The latest shallow 4.7 magnitude quake hit just before 12:40 p.m. (0940 GMT) about 33 kilometers north of Metehara town in Oromia, according to the European-Mediterranean Seismological Center.
The earthquakes have damaged houses and threatened to trigger a volcanic eruption of the previously dormant Mount Dofan, near Segento in the northeast Afar region.
The crater has stopped releasing plumes of smoke, but nearby residents have left their homes in panic.
Earthquakes are common in Ethiopia due to its location along the Great Rift Valley, one of the world’s most seismically active areas.
Experts have said the tremors and eruptions are being caused by the expansion of tectonic plates under the Great Rift Valley.
Jimmy Carter’s 6-day funeral begins with a motorcade through south Georgia
- A motorcade with Carter’s flag-draped casket is heads to his hometown of Plains
- The 39th US president died at his home on Dec. 29 at the age of 100
PLAINS, Georgia: Jimmy Carter ‘s long public goodbye began Saturday in south Georgia where the 39th US president’s life began more than 100 years ago.
A motorcade with Carter’s flag-draped casket is heading to his hometown of Plains and past his boyhood home on the way to Atlanta. The procession began at the Phoebe Sumter Medical Center in Americus, where former Secret Service agents who protected the late president served as pallbearers. A mournful train whistle filled the clear air as the pallbearers turned to face the hearse for a final goodbye, their hands on their hearts.
The Carter family, including the former president’s four children and many grandchildren and great-grandchildren, are accompanying their patriarch as his six-day state funeral begins.
The longest-lived US president, Carter died at his home in Plains on Dec. 29 at the age of 100.
Families lined the procession route in downtown Plains, near the historic train depot where Carter headquartered his presidential campaign. Some carried bouquets of flowers or wore commemorative pins bearing Carter’s photo.
“We want to pay our respects,” said 12-year-old Will Porter Shelbrock, who was born more than three decades after Carter left the White House in 1981. “He was ahead of his time on what he tried to do and tried to accomplish.”
It was Shelbrock’s idea to make the trip to Plains from Gainesville, Florida, with his grandmother, Susan Cone, 66, so they could witness the start of Carter’s final journey. Shelbrock said he admires Carter for his humanitarian work building houses and waging peace, and for installing solar panels on the White House.
Carter and his late wife Rosalynn, who died in November 2023, were born in Plains and lived most of their lives in and around the town, with the exceptions of Jimmy’s Navy career and his terms as Georgia governor and president.
The procession will stop in front of Carter’s home on his family farm just outside of Plains. The National Park Service will ring the old farm bell 39 times to honor his place as the 39th president. Carter’s remains then will proceed to Atlanta for a moment of silence in front of the Georgia Capitol and a ceremony at the Carter Presidential Center.
There, he will lie in repose until Tuesday morning, when he will be transported to Washington to lie in state at the US Capitol. His state funeral is Thursday at 10 a.m. at Washington National Cathedral, followed by a return to Plains for an invitation-only funeral at Maranatha Baptist Church.
He will be buried near his home, next to Rosalynn Carter.
