ALBUQUERQUE: An Afghan refugee convicted of first-degree murder in one of three fatal shootings in 2022 that shook Albuquerque’s Muslim community pleaded no contest Tuesday to two homicide charges stemming from the other killings.
Prosecutors said Muhammad Syed, 53, entered the pleas to two counts of second-degree murder for the deaths of Muhammad Afzaal Hussain, 27, and Naeem Hussain.
A jury had convicted Syed in March in the shooting death of Aftab Hussein, 41, in July 2022.
The three ambush-style killings happened over the course of several days, leaving authorities scrambling to determine if race or religion might have been behind the shootings. Investigators soon shifted away from possible hate crimes to what prosecutors called the “willful and very deliberate” actions of another member of the Muslim community.
Syed, who settled in the US with his family several years earlier, denied involvement in the killings after being stopped more than 100 miles (160 kilometers) from Albuquerque. He told authorities he was on his way to Texas to find a new home for his family, saying he was concerned about the killings in Albuquerque.
Bernalillo County prosecutors said Syed faces a life prison sentence in Aftab Hussein’s killings and will serve 30 years behind bars for the no-contest pleas. A sentencing date hasn’t been set.
Authorities said Afzaal Hussain, an urban planner, was gunned down Aug. 1, 2022, while taking his evening walk. Naeem Hussain was shot four days later as he sat in his vehicle outside a refugee resettlement agency on the city’s south side.
After Syed’s conviction in March, prosecutors acknowledged that no testimony during the trial nor any court filings addressed a possible motive. Prosecutors had described him as having a violent history, but his public defenders argued that previous allegations of domestic violence never resulted in convictions.
Afghan refugee pleads no contest to 2 murders in case that shocked Albuquerque’s Muslim community
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Afghan refugee pleads no contest to 2 murders in case that shocked Albuquerque’s Muslim community
- Muhammad Syed, 53, entered pleas to two counts of second-degree murder for the deaths of Muhammad Afzaal Hussain, 27, and Naeem Hussain
- Three ambush-style killings happened over the course of several days in 2022, leaving authorities scrambling to determine if race or religion was involved
Two dead in Mexico as Hurricane Erick moves on from Mexican coast
- Hurricane Erick killed at least two people as it swept through southern Mexico causing significant damage to coastal communities before weakening to a low-pressure system Thursday night
A man was electrocuted while helping with debris removal in the southern Oaxaca state, where Erick made landfall, after handling high-voltage cables near a stream, the state government said.
A child died in neighboring Guerrero state after being swept away by a swollen stream as his mother tried to carry him across in the town of San Marcos, civil protection authorities reported.
The US National Hurricane Center’s latest advisory at 0300 GMT said Erick had weakened overnight to a tropical storm located 95 miles (155 kilometers) from Acapulco port, with sustained winds of 30 mph (50 kmh) as it moved across southern Mexico on Thursday.
Coastal communities in Oaxaca including Lagunas de Chacahua, home to around 2,800 people, were directly hit by the storm, which destroyed thatched roofs and flooded streets.
“It was very strong, very ugly... the entire town is homeless, without clothes, we have no help,” Francisca Avila, a 45-year-old housewife, told AFP, as she surveyed the loss of most of her belongings.
In the tourist town of Puerto Escondido, residents and emergency personnel worked to drain flooded streets and clear debris left behind as the storm knocked over trees and street signs and buried boats under sand on the beach.
Much of the town of about 30,000 people was left without electricity or cellphone coverage.
The water “had never hit with this magnitude” in Puerto Escondido, 44-year-old merchant Luis Alberto Gil, whose shop was among those flooded, told AFP.
President Claudia Sheinbaum announced during her morning briefing that heavy rains are still expected in the southern states of Guerrero, Oaxaca, and Chiapas, as well as Veracruz and Puebla.
She thanked the population for following the authorities’ recommendations “very responsibly,” in a message shared on her social media. The president reported 15 road sections closed in the state of Oaxaca, as well as more than 123,000 users affected by power outages.
Mexico sees major storms every year, usually between May and November, on both its Pacific and Caribbean coasts.
In October 2023, Acapulco, a major port and beach resort in Guerrero, was pummeled by Hurricane Otis, a powerful Category 5 storm that killed dozens of people.
Hurricane John, another Category 3 storm that hit in September last year, caused about 15 deaths.
Sheinbaum had urged people to avoid going out and advised those living in low-lying areas or near rivers to move to shelters — some 2,000 of which had been set up in Chiapas, Guerrero and Oaxaca in anticipation.
“Since (Erick) just made landfall, we are in contact with the Defense (department) and the Navy, who are in the area, and we will be able to inform in a few hours what the effects are on these populations,” she said at her daily press conference Thursday morning.
Restaurants remained shuttered in Puerto Escondido even though some tourists insisted on staying and riding out the storm.
Around 250 miles (400 kilometers) north along the Pacific coast, Acapulco — a major port and resort city famous for its nightlife — was largely deserted Thursday as residents heeded calls to hunker down, with shops boarded up and tourist boats grounded.
Many had stocked up the day before on food, water and gasoline.
Chad hopes ‘green charcoal’ can save vanishing forests
- Chad has lost more than 90 percent of its forest cover since the 1970s, hit by climate change and overexploitation of trees for household uses such as cooking
N’DJAMENA: As they zigzagged from one machine to another in the searing African sun, the workers were covered in black soot.
But the charcoal they were making is known as “green,” and backers hope it can save impoverished Chad from rampant deforestation.
Chad, a vast, landlocked country of 19 million people perched at the crossroads of north and central Africa, is steadily turning to desert.
It has lost more than 90 percent of its forest cover since the 1970s, hit by climate change and overexploitation of trees for household uses such as cooking, officials say.
“Green charcoal” aims to protect what forest is left.
Made from discarded plant waste such as millet and sesame stalks or palm fronds, it is meant to save trees from being chopped down for cooking.
The product “releases less emissions than traditional charcoal, it doesn’t blacken your pots, it has high energy content and lasts up to three times longer than ordinary charcoal,” said Ousmane Alhadj Oumarou, technical director of the Raikina Association for Socioeconomic Development (Adser).
“Using one kilogramme of green charcoal saves six kilogrammes of wood.”
The group has installed a production facility in Pont Belile, just north of the capital, N’Djamena.
There, workers grind up burnt plant waste, then mix it with gum arabic, which helps it ignite, and clay, which makes it burn more slowly.
The resulting black nuggets look like ordinary charcoal.
Like the traditional kind, it emits CO2 when it burns — but less, said Souleymane Adam Adey, an ecologist at the University of N’Djamena.
And “it contributes to fighting deforestation, by ensuring the trees that aren’t cut down continue to capture and store carbon,” he said.
The conflict in neighboring Sudan, which is facing one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world, is adding to pressure on Chad, which has become home to more than 800,000 Sudanese refugees since 2023 — double the 400,000 it already hosted.
“Desertification has progressed in the regions that have been hosting Sudanese refugees for the past two years,” said Adser’s director, 45-year-old businessman Ismael Hamid.
Adser invested 200 million CFA francs (about $350,000) to launch the project, then won backing from the World Bank, which buys the charcoal for 750 CFA francs per kilogramme.
The United Nations refugee agency, UNHCR, distributes the charcoal in refugee camps in eastern Chad.
But Hamid said he hoped to expand production and slash prices to 350 to 500 CFA francs per kilo to make “green charcoal” available and affordable nationwide.
The plant currently produces seven to nine tons per day.
“If we want to meet the country’s needs, we have to increase our output by at least a factor of 10,” said Hamid, calling for subsidies to support the budding sector.
Environment Minister Hassan Bakhit Djamous told AFP the government was working on a policy to promote such projects.
“We need to bet on green charcoal as an energy source for the future of our country,” he said.
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Philippine Navy seizes $175 million meth haul at sea
- A pair of naval gunboats intercepted a fishing vessel carrying 1.5 tonnes of methamphetamine hydrochloride off the coast of main island Luzon just before dawn
MANILA: The Philippine Navy seized an illegal drug shipment worth $175 million (10 billion pesos) on Friday in one of the country’s biggest narcotics hauls on record, officials said.
A pair of naval gunboats intercepted a fishing vessel carrying 1.5 tonnes of methamphetamine hydrochloride off the coast of main island Luzon just before dawn, Commodore Edward de Sagon told a press conference.
Four people, including one foreigner, were arrested in the joint operation with the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency, according to de Sagon.
“We still don’t have the details of where (the drugs originated),” he said, saying they believed the haul had been transferred from a larger vessel to the fishing ship.
“That was when it was intercepted. There was information and (maneuvers) that made us suspicious,” de Sagon said.
Meth, known locally as shabu, is the most prevalent illegal drug in the Philippines.
“This is one of the largest illegal drug apprehensions in the history of the Philippine Navy,” navy spokesman John Percie Alcos said in a statement.
Earlier this month, a large volume of drugs was found adrift just north of the area where Wednesday’s arrests were made.
The Philippines’ biggest-ever drug seizure came in April last year when more than two tonnes of meth was seized at a police checkpoint on a road in Batangas province south of the capital, according to the presidential palace.
Rwanda arrests opposition leader, says investigative body
- Ingabire is now accused of “playing a role in creating a criminal organization and engaging in acts that incite public disorder” according to the Rwanda Investigations Bureau
KIGALI: Rwanda has arrested prominent opposition leader Victoire Ingabire, who is being held at a detention facility in the capital Kigali on charges of inciting the public and creating a criminal organization, a state investigative agency said.
Ingabire was freed in 2018 after serving six years of a 15-year jail sentence handed to her in 2012 following her conviction on charges related to conspiring to form an armed group and seeking to minimize the 1994 genocide.
She is now accused of “playing a role in creating a criminal organization and engaging in acts that incite public disorder,” the Rwanda Investigations Bureau said in a statement late on Thursday.
It did not say when she would be charged in court.
Ingabire, who heads unregistered opposition party DALFA–Umurinzi, returned from exile in the Netherlands to contest a presidential election in 2010, but was barred from standing after being accused of genocide denial.
Last year President Paul Kagame, in power for a quarter of a century, won re-election after securing 99.18 percent of the vote, according to the electoral body.
Kagame is lauded for transforming Rwanda from the ruins of the 1994 genocide to a thriving economy but his reputation has also been tainted by longstanding accusations of rights abuses and supporting rebels in neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo.
He denies the allegations.
Taiwan detects 50 Chinese military aircraft around island
- China insists democratic, self-ruled Taiwan is part of its territory and has threatened to use force to bring the island under its control
- Beijing has ramped up the deployment of fighter jets and naval vessels around Taiwan in recent years to press its claim of sovereignty
TAIPEI: Taiwan detected 50 Chinese military aircraft around the island, the defense ministry said Friday, days after a British naval vessel sailed through the sensitive Taiwan Strait.
China insists democratic, self-ruled Taiwan is part of its territory and has threatened to use force to bring the island under its control.
Beijing has ramped up the deployment of fighter jets and naval vessels around Taiwan in recent years to press its claim of sovereignty, which Taipei rejects.
Taiwan also accuses China of using espionage, cyberattacks and disinformation to weaken its defenses.
Along with the 50 aircraft, six Chinese naval vessels were also detected in the 24 hours to 6:00 a.m. (2200 GMT Thursday), the defense ministry said.
It said in a separate statement that an additional 24 Chinese aircraft including fighters and drones were spotted since 08:50 am Friday.
Among them, 15 crossed the median line of the Taiwan Strait in conducting air-sea joint training with Chinese naval vessels, the ministry said, adding it “monitored the situation and responded accordingly.”
The latest incursion came after British Royal Navy patrol vessel HMS Spey sailed through the Taiwan Strait on June 18, Taiwan’s foreign ministry said Thursday.
The United States and other countries view the 180-kilometer Taiwan Strait as international waters that should be open to all vessels.
The last time a British Navy ship transited the Taiwan Strait was in 2021, when the HMS Richmond, a frigate deployed with Britain’s aircraft carrier strike group, sailed through from Japan to Vietnam.
China strongly condemned Britain at the time and deployed its military to follow the vessel.
In April, Taiwan detected 76 Chinese aircraft and 15 naval vessels around the island, when Beijing conducted live-fire exercises that included simulated strikes aimed at the island’s key ports and energy sites.
The highest number of Chinese aircraft recorded was 153 on October 15, after China staged large-scale military drills in response to Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te’s National Day speech days earlier.
