Erie (United States) (AFP) – Salman Rushdie, who spent years in hiding after an Iranian fatwa ordered his killing, is on a ventilator and could lose an eye following a stabbing attack at a literary event in New York state.
Kabul (AFP) – Taliban fighters fired into the air Saturday to disperse a rare women’s protest in the Afghan capital, days ahead of the first anniversary of the hardline Islamists’ return to power. About 40 women — chanting “Bread, work and freedom” — marched in front of the education ministry before a group of Taliban fighters dispersed them by firing their guns into the air. IMAGES
Corigliano Calabro (Italy) (AFP) – Intense thunderstorms hit Scilla, on the Calabria coast in southern Italy.
Rome (AFP) – An Italian man is rescued after becoming trapped in a collapsed tunnel near the Vatican. Firefighters dig him out from under a road in the west of Rome, before he is finally freed and taken to hospital. According to police the man is suspected of being part of a gang burrowing its way to a nearby bank.
Varanasi (India) (AFP) – Hindus make up the overwhelming majority of India’s 1.4 billion people but when Mahatma Gandhi secured its independence from Britain in 1947 it was a secular, multicultural state. Now right-wing calls for the country to be declared a Hindu nation and Hindu supremacy to be enshrined in law are growing rapidly louder, making its 210-million-odd Muslims increasingly anxious about their future.
Pyongyang (AFP) – North Korean leader Kim Jong Un declares victory over the coronavirus outbreak in North Korea, at the “National Meeting of Reviewing the Emergency Anti-Epidemic Work” on August 10, 2022.
Lefkara (Cyprus) (AFP) – In the small Cypriot village of Lefkara, the local style of embroidery has been officially recognised by UNESCO. But it is now in danger of disappearing due to a lack of young people learning the unique lace-making craft. “When the old women die, the embroidery will vanish”, laments Toulla Rouvis, who owns her own lace shop in the mountainous village.
Serra da Estrela Natural Park (Portugal) (AFP) – Fires continue to rage for the fifth consecutive day in the forest massif of the Serra da Estrela Natural Park, in central Portugal. The mega-fire has already ravaged 10,000 hectares in the region.
Kharkiv (Ukraine) (AFP) – Residents look at the damage and clean debris after Russian shelling hit the center of Kharkiv, northeast of Ukraine, leaving a crater in the courtyard of an apartment building.
Seoul (AFP) – Scenes of devastation in a basement flat in Seoul where three tenants, including a disabled woman and a teenager, drowned in floods triggered by record-breaking rains. South Korea’s capital has moved to ban the cramped basement flats, made famous by Oscar-winning movie “Parasite”, after four people drowned in subterranean dwellings this week.
