AMRITSAR (AFP) – A gas leak killed 11 people in India, an official said Sunday, in the latest deadly industrial accident in the vast developing economy of 1.4 billion people. The gas leak happened in Giaspura, an industrial area of Ludhiana in the northern state of Punjab. The official, who asked not to be named, said they had yet to ascertain what kind of gas leaked or the source of the leak. “Eleven dead and four in hospital. Rescue operation is on,” the official told AFP after the incident. Industrial gas leaks blamed on poor safety standards and insufficient checks are common in India. Last August, at least 112 women were hospitalized after a gas leak at an apparel manufacturing plant in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh. That followed a similar accident in June when around 200 women fell unconscious after a gas leak in the same area, broadcaster NDTV reported. In 2020, at least 15 people were killed and hundreds hospitalized after a gas leak at a chemical plant in Visakhapatnam, an industrial port city in the same state.

 

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LISBON (Reuters) – A man shot three people dead and then committed suicide on Sunday in the Portuguese city of Setubal, about 45 km (28 miles) south of the capital, CNN Portugal said. PSP police commissioner Joao Freire told Reuters that “there are four bodies, which were supposedly the result of a shooting, but the causes and details are not yet known”. The police criminal cases agency PJ was at the scene investigating, Freire said. CNN Portugal said the shooting took place at around 8 a.m. in a poor neighborhood of Setubal called Bairro Azul, and that the gunman committed suicide when police officers arrived on the scene.

 

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SEATTLE (ABC News) – Two people were shot and killed at Cal Anderson Park in Seattle late Saturday, with another person transferred to a hospital in critical condition, police said. Seattle Police Department officials said on Twitter at about 10:30 p.m. that they were investigating a shooting at the Capitol Hill Park. Officials arrived on the scene to find three people with gunshot injuries, according to a statement. “Despite lifesaving efforts by police and Seattle Fire, one man was pronounced dead at the scene,” police said. “Medics transported the two other victims to Harborview Medical Center where one man later died, while the other remains in critical condition.” Police said they were searching for another man “who was involved but left the scene before officers arrived.” Seattle CSI and Homicide detectives will lead an investigation.

 

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ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkey on Saturday closed its airspace to low-cost Armenian airline FlyOne Armenia, the domestic Armenpress news agency cited the carrier’s board chairman as saying. “Turkish aviation authorities cancelled the permission previously granted to the FlyOne Armenia airline to operate flights to Europe through Turkish airspace,” said Aram Ananyan, FlyOne’s chairman. “Turkish aviation authorities implemented the cancellation without prior notification, putting our airline and our passengers in an uncomfortable situation.” FlyOne Armenia, a subsidiary of Moldovan airline FlyOne, began operations in December 2021. In February 2023, Ananyan told Armenpress that the carrier had five Airbus aircraft and offered flights to 14 destinations in eight European and Middle Eastern nations.

 

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TASHKENT (AFP) – Voters across Central Asian Uzbekistan went to the polls Sunday in a constitutional referendum that could allow President Shavkat Mirziyoyev to remain in power until 2040. Mirziyoyev, 65, became president in 2016 after the death of Islam Karimov. He insists the overhaul of the constitution will improve governance and quality of life in the landlocked country of 35 million people. The constitutional changes would extend presidential terms from five to seven years, allowing him to serve two more terms and extend his time in power until 2040. Polling stations opened at 8:00 am (0300 GMT) and closed at 8:00 pm, according to the Uzbek Election Commission. Billboards around Tashkent, the biggest city in Central Asia, encourage people to vote. The campaign appeared to be working. “The new constitution will change my life,” Shamsiddin Zhurayev, a 40-year-old businessman, told AFP outside a Tashkent polling station.

 

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SEOUL (Xinhua) – South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol’s latest U.S. trip was “the most hostile, aggressive and provocative, dangerous trip for a nuclear war,” the state news agency of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) said Sunday. In a commentary, the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) voiced harsh criticism and a stern warning, lashing all out at the documents and rhetoric coming out of the recent U.S.-South Korea summit talks in Washington. The commentary began by putting the Washington Declaration, a signature document on upgrading “extended deterrence” against the DPRK, in its crosshairs, reprimanding it as “a typical product of the heinous hostile policy towards the DPRK,” designed to make “a nuclear war against the DPRK a fait accompli.” “There is no precedent that they (U.S. and South Korea) designated the DPRK as a target for a nuclear attack publicly to the world and nakedly stated regular and sustained deployment of strategic nuclear assets to the Korean Peninsula,” it added.