Indonesia receives foreign aid a week after powerful earthquake

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Indonesian military personnel unload relief aid from a Singapore Air Force cargo plane at the Mutiara Sis Al-Jufri airport in Palu, Central Sulawesi, on Oct. 4, 2018. (AP Photo/Tatan Syuflana)
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Indonesian military personnel distribute relief aid at the Mutiara Sis Al-Jufri airport to evacuate the earthquake and tsunami-damaged city of Palu, Central Sulawesi island, on Oct. 4, 2018. (AP Photo/Tatan Syuflana)
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Indonesian military personnel unload relief aid from a Singapore Air Force cargo plane at the Mutiara Sis Al-Jufri airport in Palu, Central Sulawesi, on Oct. 4, 2018. (AP Photo/Tatan Syuflana)
Updated 06 October 2018
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Indonesia receives foreign aid a week after powerful earthquake

JAKARTA: Foreign aid began pouring in on Friday to areas devastated by the 7.4 magnitude earthquake and the tsunami a week earlier in Indonesia’s Central Sulawesi province on the island of Sulawesi.

Indonesian officials have said that among the items they need most to distribute humanitarian aid to Palu — the provincial capital — and surrounding districts, is an aircraft that can land at Mutiara Sis Al Jufri airport where only 2,000 meters of runway remain intact.

Other items that Indonesia needs are water and sanitation, tents, power generators, field hospital and medical assistance.

The spokesman for the disaster mitigation agency said in a press conference that at least 10 Hercules aircraft from Singapore, Malaysia, Australia, India and New Zealand had taken part in deploying aid to Palu.

“There will be 12 planes from the US, Malaysia, China, South Korea, Japan and Thailand arriving soon,” Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said, adding that all foreign aid is arriving first in Balikpapan, the main city in East Kalimantan province across the Makassar Strait, before they are distributed to the disaster areas.

The Embassy of Japan said in a statement on Friday that a C-130 Hercules and 51 personnel of Japan’s disaster relief unit had arrived in Balikpapan and planned to begin air transport from Balikpapan to Palu on Saturday.

The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) has donated relief goods such as 500 tents, generators, water purifiers and flocculants with a total value of 3 billion Indonesian rupiah, which have arrived in Balikpapan and will be distributed in the affected areas immediately.

Rescuers have managed to pull out bodies and survivors from the eight-story Roa Roa Hotel in Palu, which had a high occupancy rate at the time of the quake.

Nugroho said on Thursday that rescuers had managed to extract eight bodies from the ruins of the hotel, including a South Korean who had been participating in a paragliding competition. The competition had completed by the time the quake struck at 6.02 p.m. local time and it was held as part of the Pesona Palu Nomoni Festival to celebrate Palu’s 40th anniversary.

Wahyu Yudha, head of FASI (Federasi Aero Sport Indonesia), confirmed the paraglider’s death in a statement and said that the body of Dong Jin Lee, who was based in Bali, was found under the hotel’s rubble at 2.45 p.m. on Thursday and had been identified by his family. Another paraglider from East Java and a member of the Indonesian Air Force, Fahmi Ruddo, was also found dead in the debris.

Tagor Siagian, spokesman for the Indonesia Paragliding & Hanggliding Association (FASI), said that there were 32 paragliders, including those from Palu who participated in the competition, but most of those who were not from Palu were able to leave the city a day after the quake.

“There were seven paragliders who had been staying at the Roa-Roa Hotel. Four of them had been found dead earlier on Monday and Tuesday,” Siagian told Arab News.




Earthquake-affected Indonesian residents queue outside a government building to get relief aid in Palu, Sulawesi island, on Oct.4, 2018. (AFP)

The confirmed death toll has soared to 1,571 with 1,352 from Palu and the rest from the neighboring districts of Parigi Moutong, Donggala, Pasangkayu and Sigi.

“Rescuers will continue to look for more bodies and survivors seven days since the earthquake and tsunami hit, with the possibility to extending it to another week,” Nugroho said.

At least 1,510 bodies have been buried, while the number of those badly injured is now 2,549, while 70,821 people have been displaced.

With the possibility of casualties continuing to rise, Nugroho said that those who couldn’t be found by the end of the emergency phase would be classified as missing instead of confirmed dead.

It is very likely the number of people missing could reach thousands from the current 113, given the scale of devastation caused by the second quake - triggered calamity that hit Palu — soil liquefaction, or when the soil becomes saturated and loses its density.

As many as 66,238 houses are damaged, with 1,700 houses in Balaroa residential complex badly damaged by the liquefaction that followed the quake. In Petobo, an entire village of 744 houses collapsed and was swallowed by the liquefying soil.  

Indonesia sits on the Pacific Ring of Fire, where active volcanoes are concentrated and tectonic plates meet and subduct, making it a disaster-prone area with frequent earthquakes. There are 127 active volcanoes that dot the Indonesian archipelago.

“So far, there have been 437 aftershocks, with decreasing intensity since the 7.4 magnitude quake. It will continue to happen as the faults are finding a balance,” Nugroho said.


Seven dead in small plane crash in western Mexico

Updated 2 sec ago
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Seven dead in small plane crash in western Mexico

  • The aircraft, a Cessna 207, was flying from La Parota in the neighboring state of Michoacan
MEXICO CITY: At least seven people died when a light aircraft crashed Sunday in a heavily forested area of Jalisco in western Mexico, local authorities reported.
The aircraft, a Cessna 207, was flying from La Parota in the neighboring state of Michoacan.
Jalisco Civil Protection said via its social media that the crash site was in an area that was difficult to access.
Initial authorities on the scene “reported a preliminary count of seven people dead,” who haven’t been identified yet, according to the agency.
“A fire was extinguished and risk mitigation was carried out to prevent possible additional damage,” it added.
Authorities said they were awaiting the arrival of forensic investigators to remove the bodies and rule out the presence of additional victims.

Canada’s Trudeau losing support within his party: MPs

Updated 35 min 7 sec ago
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Canada’s Trudeau losing support within his party: MPs

  • Ottawa area MP Chandra Arya: Dozens of Liberal MPs want the prime minister to go
  • Trudeau has huddled with advisers to contemplate his future ahead of elections set for October 2025

OTTAWA: Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s support within his own party appeared to falter further on Sunday, as former loyalists said growing numbers of Liberal caucus members wanted the premier to resign.
Trudeau has suffered a series of blows in recent days, spurred by the surprise resignation of Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland, who clashed with her boss over incoming US president Donald Trump’s threats to impose 25 percent tariffs on Canadian imports.
Freeland’s exit, after nearly a decade at Trudeau’s side, marked the first open dissent against the prime minister from within his cabinet and has emboldened critics.
Ottawa area MP Chandra Arya told the public broadcaster CBC on Sunday that dozens of Liberal MPs wanted Trudeau to go.
Arya was interviewed a day after Liberal MPs from the province of Ontario held a meeting that addressed Trudeau’s future.
Multiple outlets, including the CBC and Toronto Star, reported that more than 50 of the 75 Ontario Liberals in parliament declared in Saturday’s meeting that they no longer supported Trudeau.
Asked about those reports, Arya said a “majority of the caucus thinks it is time for the prime minister to step aside.”
Anthony Housefather, a Liberal member of parliament from the province of Quebec, told the CBC on Sunday that “the prime minister needs to go.”
“We’re in an impossible situation if he stays,” Housefather said, arguing the party would be hammered in an election that amounted to a referendum on Trudeau’s leadership.
Trudeau has huddled with advisers to contemplate his future ahead of elections set for October 2025 but expected much sooner. He changed a third of his cabinet on Friday.
Jagmeet Singh, the leader of the small leftist New Democratic Party in parliament, declared Friday that he would join with other opposition parties to topple Trudeau’s minority government early next year.
The NDP had previously opposed a series of non-confidence votes brought by the opposition Conservatives.
A change in the party’s position would almost certainly bring down Trudeau’s government if another non-confidence vote is held.
Trudeau swept to power in 2015 and led the Liberals to two more ballot box victories in 2019 and 2021.
But he now trails his main rival, Conservative Pierre Poilievre, by 20 points in public opinion polls.


Trump names former staffer Katie Miller to Musk-led DOGE panel

Updated 23 December 2024
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Trump names former staffer Katie Miller to Musk-led DOGE panel

  • Katie Miller will soon be joining DOGE! She has been a loyal supporter of mine for many years, and will bring her professional experience to Government Efficiency, Trump posts

WASHINGTON: President-elect Donald Trump on Sunday named Katie Miller, who served in Trump’s first administration and is the wife of his incoming deputy chief of staff, as one of the first members of an advisory board to be led by billionaire allies Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy that aims to drastically slash government spending, federal regulations and the federal workforce.
Miller, wife of Trump’s designated homeland security adviser Stephen Miller, will join Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), an informal advisory body that Trump has said will enable his administration to “slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies.”
“Katie Miller will soon be joining DOGE! She has been a loyal supporter of mine for many years, and will bring her professional experience to Government Efficiency,” Trump posted in a message on his social media platform Truth Social.
Musk and Ramaswamy recently revealed plans to wipe out scores of federal regulations crafted by what they say is an anti-democratic, unaccountable bureaucracy, but have yet to announce members of the DOGE team. Musk has said he wants to slash the number of federal agencies from over 400 to 99.
Katie Miller had served in the first Trump adminstration as deputy press secretary for the Department of Homeland Security and as press secretary for former Vice President Mike Pence.
She is currently a spokesperson for the transition team for Trump’s designated Health and Human Services secretary, Robert Kennedy Jr.


Panama rejects Trump’s threat to take control of Canal

Updated 23 December 2024
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Panama rejects Trump’s threat to take control of Canal

  • Trump also complained of China’s growing influence around the canal, a worrying trend for American interests as US businesses depend on the channel to move goods between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans

PANAMA CITY: Panama’s president Jose Raul Mulino on Sunday dismissed recent threats made by US President-elect Donald Trump to retake control of the Panama Canal over complaints of “unfair” treatment of American ships.
“Every square meter of the Panama Canal and its adjacent areas belongs to Panama and will continue belonging to Panama,” Mulino said in a video posted to X.
Mulino’s public comments, though never mentioning Trump by name, come a day after the president-elect complained about the canal on his Truth Social platform.
“Our Navy and Commerce have been treated in a very unfair and injudicious way. The fees being charged by Panama are ridiculous,” he said.
Trump also complained of China’s growing influence around the canal, a worrying trend for American interests as US businesses depend on the channel to move goods between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
“It was solely for Panama to manage, not China, or anyone else,” Trump said. “We would and will NEVER let it fall into the wrong hands!“
The Panama Canal, which was completed by the United States in 1914, was returned to the Central American country under a 1977 deal signed by Democratic president Jimmy Carter.
Panama took full control in 1999.
Trump said that if Panama could not ensure “the secure, efficient and reliable operation” of the channel, “then we will demand that the Panama Canal be returned to us, in full, and without question.”
Mulino rejected Trump’s claims in his video message, though he also said he hopes to have “a good and respectful relationship” with the incoming administration.
“The canal has no direct or indirect control from China, nor the European Union, nor the United States or any other power,” Mulino said. “As a Panamanian, I reject any manifestation that misrepresents this reality.”
Later on Sunday, Trump responded to Mulino’s dismissal, writing on Truth Social: “We’ll see about that!“
 

 


Musk, president? Trump says ‘not happening’

Updated 23 December 2024
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Musk, president? Trump says ‘not happening’

  • Trump: “He wasn’t born in this country”
WASHINGTON: Could Elon Musk, who holds major sway in the incoming Trump administration, one day become president? On Sunday, Donald Trump answered with a resounding no, pointing to US rules about being born in the country.
“He’s not gonna be president, that I can tell you,” Trump told a Republican conference in Phoenix, Arizona.
“You know why he can’t be? He wasn’t born in this country,” Trump said of the Tesla and SpaceX boss, who was born in South Africa.
The US Constitution requires that a president be a natural-born US citizen.
Trump was responding to criticism, particularly from the Democratic camp, portraying the tech billionaire and world’s richest person as “President Musk” for the outsized role he is playing in the incoming administration.
As per ceding the presidency to Musk, Trump also assured the crowd: “No, no that’s not happening.”
The influence of Musk, who will serve as Trump’s “efficiency czar,” has become a focus point for Democratic attacks, with questions raised over how an unelected citizen can wield so much power.
And there is even growing anger among Republicans after Musk trashed a government funding proposal this week in a blizzard of posts — many of them wildly inaccurate — to his more than 200 million followers on his social media platform X.
Alongside Trump, Musk ultimately helped pressure Republicans to renege on a funding bill they had painstakingly agreed upon with Democrats, pushing the United States to the brink of budgetary paralysis that would have resulted in a government shutdown just days before Christmas.
Congress ultimately reached an agreement overnight Friday to Saturday, avoiding massive halts to government services.