JAKARTA, Indonesia: Indonesia has identified the suspected location of an overcrowded passenger ferry that sank last week in a deep volcanic crater lake but will need international help to recover the wreckage, the chief of the national search and rescue agency said Monday.
The ferry had some 200 people on board, about five times over capacity, but only 18 people including the boat’s captain survived the sinking in rough weather June 17 on Lake Toba.
The rescue agency said in a statement Sunday an object that was possibly the ferry was at a depth of 490 meters (1,607 feet). Few bodies have been recovered and officials have said many of the dead are likely trapped inside the vessel.
Syaugi, who uses one name, said in a television interview that Indonesia needs international help to recover the wreckage.
Sonar equipment from Indonesia’s navy was deployed on Friday. Divers could reach depths of only 50 meters (164 feet) in the lake’s cold and dark waters.
Anguished relatives have criticized the search effort but Syaugi denied it, saying there had been an “all out” effort.
“We will do our best to salvage this wreck,” he said. “Because we do not have robots, we are trying to find from other countries, but most of them have tools to lift a vessel from just 100 meters depth and the wreck must be cut first.”
“For us, the most important thing is to get as many victims as possible,” Syaugi said.
Ferry tragedies are common in Indonesia, an archipelago of more than 17,000 islands, with weak enforcement of safety regulations often to blame.
Lake Toba, formed out of an ancient super volcano, is a popular sightseeing destination on the island of Sumatra and among the destinations that Indonesia’s government is promoting as a magnet for domestic and foreign tourists.
Indonesia identifies location of ferry that sank in volcano crater lake
Indonesia identifies location of ferry that sank in volcano crater lake
Patients dying in corridors as UK hospital standards ‘collapse’
LONDON: UK patients are “coming to harm” with hospitals so overwhelmed people are dying in corridors awaiting treatment amid a “collapse in care standards,” a report said Thursday.
In the latest indictment of Britain’s beleaguered state-funded National Health Service, nine in 10 NHS nurses surveyed by the country’s nurses union said “patient safety is being compromised.”
Nearly seven in 10 (66.8 percent) said they were delivering care in “overcrowded or unsuitable places” on a “daily basis,” including in corridors, converted cupboards, car parks and even bereavement rooms.
“The experiences of over 5,000 nursing staff across the UK highlight a devastating collapse in care standards, with patients routinely coming to harm,” said the Royal College of Nursing.
The report condemned the “normalization” of so-called “corridor care,” with nurses unable to access lifesaving equipment in cramped spaces.
One nurse in east England said corridor care in their hospital trust was “not an exception, it’s the rule.”
FASTFACT
The report condemned the ‘normalization’ of so-called ‘corridor care,’ with nurses unable to access lifesaving equipment in cramped spaces.
Last month, some 54,000 patients in emergency departments in England had to wait over 12 hours until a hospital bed was available, up 23 percent from December 2023.
The report is a result of a Royal College of Nursing request at the end of December, asking members to fill out a short survey.
The report includes “the raw, unedited and often heart-breaking comments” of the thousands of nursing staff working across the UK who responded, the RCN said.
There are some 7.5 million people on the NHS waiting list, with more than 3 million having faced delays longer than 18 weeks for treatment.
Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who was elected in July on a ticket which included fixing the NHS, rolled out a plan at the start of the year which included expanding community health centers to reduce pressure on hospitals.
Health Secretary Wes Streeting on Wednesday said corridor care was “unsafe” and “undignified” but it would “take time to undo the damage” to the NHS.
German Christmas market attack suspect held ‘anti-Islam, far-right’ views
- Suspect was “massively Islamophobic and close to right-wing extremist ideologies,” German interior minister said
- Lack of oversight was among factors that kept authorities from intervening early to stop the attack, she said
BERLIN: The suspect in a deadly car ramming attack on a German Christmas market was mentally unwell, “massively Islamophobic and close to right-wing extremist ideologies,” Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said Thursday.
His erratic behavior over the years had come to the attention of law enforcement on at least 105 occasions without triggering a response, Faeser added.
The figure, compiled after the December 20 attack, showed the need for “better data management by the federal and state security authorities,” Faeser said.
“Police data must be centrally and securely bundled” to identify threats, she told journalists at an event to commemorate the victims in the eastern city of Magdeburg.
The suspect, 50-year-old Saudi psychiatrist Taleb Al-Abdulmohsen, who lived in Germany, was arrested at the scene of the ramming, which left six people dead and over 200 wounded.
Investigators had pieced together the profile of a perpetrator who suffered “psychological issues” and was “influenced by incoherent conspiracy theories,” Faeser said.
The suspect was “massively Islamophobic and close to right-wing extremist ideologies,” she added, and “His hatred is directed against both the German state and against individuals.”
A large amount of information on the suspect had been available before the attack, including a slew of social media posts, Faeser said.
However, “no one had all of the facts,” she said.
The lack of oversight was among the factors that kept authorities from intervening early to stop the attack, she said.
As well as centralising data from different federal and regional authorities, “large amounts of data must also be able to be analyzed using AI” in future, she said.
“We also need new, more precise criteria and action plans to assess the danger posed by people who do not fit the existing mold.”
The attack in Magdeburg came almost eight years to the day after another at a Christmas market in 2016, when a lorry plowed into a crowd in Berlin.
The previous attack, which left 13 people dead, was carried out by an extremist Tunisian and claimed by Daesh.
Pope Francis hurts his right arm after falling for the second time in just over a month
- Francis didn’t break his arm, but a sling was put on as a precaution
- On Dec. 7, the pope whacked his chin on his nightstand in an apparent fall
ROME: Pope Francis fell Thursday and hurt his right arm, the Vatican said, just weeks after another apparent fall resulted in a bad bruise on his chin.
Francis didn’t break his arm, but a sling was put on as a precaution, the Vatican spokesman said in a statement
On Dec. 7, the pope whacked his chin on his nightstand in an apparent fall that resulted in a bad bruise.
The 88-year-old pope, who has battled health problems including long bouts of bronchitis, often has to use a wheelchair because of bad knees. He uses a walker or cane when moving around his apartment in the Vatican’s Santa Marta hotel.
The Vatican said that Thursday’s fall also occurred at Santa Marta, and the pope was later seen in audiences with his right arm in a sling. At one of the meetings, Francis apologetically offered his left hand for a handshake when he greeted the head of the UN fund for agricultural development, Alvaro Lario.
“This morning, due to a fall at the Casa Santa Marta, Pope Francis suffered a contusion to his right forearm, without fracture. The arm was immobilized as a precautionary measure,” the statement said.
Speculation about Francis’ health is a constant in Vatican circles, especially after Pope Benedict XVI broke 600 years of tradition and resigned from the papacy in 2013. Benedict’s aides have attributed the decision to a nighttime fall that he suffered during a 2012 trip to Mexico, after which he determined he couldn’t keep up with the globe-trotting demands of the papacy.
Francis has said that he has no plans to resign anytime soon, even if Benedict “opened the door” to the possibility. In his autobiography “Hope” released this week, Francis said that he hadn’t considered resigning even when he had major intestinal surgery.
WHO appeals for $1.5 billion to tackle ‘unprecedented’ global health crisis
- The UN health agency estimated that health crises would leave 305 million people in need
- “WHO is seeking $1.5 billion to support our life-saving work for the emergencies,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said
GENEVA: The World Health Organization appealed Thursday for $1.5 billion for emergency operations this year, warning that conflict, climate change, epidemics and displacement had converged to create an “unprecedented global health crisis.”
The UN health agency estimated that health crises would leave 305 million people in need of urgent humanitarian assistance this year.
“WHO is seeking $1.5 billion to support our life-saving work for the emergencies we know about and to react swiftly to new crises,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said as he launched the appeal.
The agency’s emergency request, which was for the same amount as last year’s ask, outlined the critical priorities and resources needed to address 42 ongoing health emergencies.
“Conflicts, outbreaks, climate-related disasters and other health emergencies are no longer isolated or occasional — they are relentless, overlapping and intensifying,” Tedros said in a statement.
He pointed to the emergency health assistance provided in conflict zones ranging from the occupied Palestinian territories to the Democratic Republic of Congo to Sudan, as well as its work conducting vaccination campaigns, treating malnutrition and helping control outbreaks of diseases like cholera.
“Without adequate and sustainable funding, we face the impossible task of deciding who will receive care and who will not this year,” Tedros said at Thursday’s event.
“Your support helps to ensure that WHO remains a lifeline, bridging the gap between sickness and health, despair and hope, life and death for millions of people worldwide.”
Dozens of migrants may have drowned in attempt to cross to Spain, NGO says
- Moroccan authorities rescued 36 people on Wednesday from a boat that had left Mauritania
- Forty-four of those presumed to have drowned were from Pakistan, Walking Borders CEO Helena Maleno said on X
MADRID: As many as 50 migrants, many of them Pakistanis, may have drowned in the latest deadly wreck involving people trying to make the crossing from West Africa to Spain’s Canary Islands, migrant rights group Walking Borders said on Thursday.
Moroccan authorities rescued 36 people on Wednesday from a boat that had left Mauritania on Jan. 2 with 86 migrants, including 66 Pakistanis, on board, the group said.
Forty-four of those presumed to have drowned were from Pakistan, Walking Borders CEO Helena Maleno said on X.
“They spent 13 days of anguish on the crossing without anyone coming to rescue them,” she said.
The boat capsized off the coast of the disputed region of Western Sahara and several of the survivors, which included some Pakistanis, were taken to a camp near the port of Dakhla, Pakistan’s Foreign Affairs Ministry said in a post on X.
Pakistan said the boat was carrying 80 passengers.
Asked about what warnings it had received from NGOs regarding a missing boat, Spain’s maritime rescue service said it had learned on Jan. 10 about a vessel that had left Nouakchott in Mauritania and was experiencing problems but it could not confirm if it was the same boat.
The service said it had carried out air searches without success and had warned nearby ships.
Walking Borders said it had alerted authorities from all countries involved six days ago about the missing boat. Alarm Phone, an NGO that provides an emergency phone line for migrants lost at sea, also said it had alerted Spain’s maritime rescue service on Jan. 12 about a boat in distress.
A record 10,457 migrants, or 30 people a day, died trying to reach Spain in 2024, most while attempting to cross the Atlantic route from West African countries such as Mauritania and Senegal to the Canary islands, according to Walking Borders.
Citing the Walking Borders’ post on X, the Canary Islands’ regional leader Fernando Clavijo expressed his sorrow for the victims of the latest wreck and urged Spain and Europe to act to prevent further tragedies.
“The Atlantic cannot continue to be the graveyard of Africa,” Clavijo said on X. “They cannot continue to turn their backs on this humanitarian drama.”
