Latest news with #massacre
Bloomberg
a day ago
- Politics
- Bloomberg
Nigeria Orders Crackdown After Dozens Killed in Key Farm Region
Nigerian President Bola Tinubu ordered security agencies to hunt down the perpetrators of a massacre in a key food-producing region that's highlighted growing insecurity in the West African nation. Unidentified assailants killed more than 100 people in an attack in the southeastern state of Benue that began on the night of June 13 and lasted several hours, with homes set on fire and people shot, according to the police. Thousands of people have died in a yearslong conflict over access to land and water in Benue between nomadic herders and mostly sedentary farmers.
Daily Mail
11-06-2025
- Daily Mail
Austrian school shooter sent his mother a farewell video telling her his plan but tragic twist meant she was unable to warn police in time - as girl, 15, is first victim to be pictured
A 'bullied' drop-out who turned his former school into a bloodbath on Tuesday as he massacred 10 students in a gun rampage had sent his mother a farewell video just moments before he opened fire. Investigators found the message yesterday when they searched the home of the 21-year-old shooter who took his life after his attack at BORG Dreierschützengasse high school in the city of Graz. Cops did not elaborate on investigators' findings in a brief post on social network X. But a senior official who acknowledged that the letter had been found on Tuesday night said it hadn't allowed them to draw conclusions. 'A farewell letter in analogue and digital form was found,' Franz Ruf, the public security director at Austria's Interior Ministry, told ORF public television. 'He says goodbye to his parents. But no motive can be inferred from the farewell letter, and that is a matter for further investigations.' Alarmed by his confusing message, his mother immediately notified police, Austrian news outlet Heute reports. But despite her efforts to stop a tragedy from happening, it was too late, as she opened the video message 24 minutes after receiving it, and by then her son had already stormed into two classrooms. Ten people were killed and more than a dozen others were wounded as shots and screams rang out when a shooter stormed into his old classroom and gunned down students and teachers. Pictured: Special forces officer evacuates the school following the deadly shooting in Graz Asked whether the assailant had attacked victims randomly or targeted them specifically, Ruf said that is also under investigation and he didn't want to speculate. He said that wounded people were found on various levels of the school and, in one case, in front of the building. A 15-year-old Kosovan girl named Lea is the first of his victim's to be pictured. Mourning the teen in a Facebook post, her heartbroken aunt wrote: 'Today, my niece Lea tragically lost her life in the attack in Graz. We pray for her soul and express our gratitude to all those who share our pain during these difficult times.' More than a dozen others were wounded as shots and screams rang out when the shooter - named locally as 'Artur A' - stormed into his old classroom blasting a shotgun and a pistol which he legally owned. In the country's worst mass school shooting, terror-stricken pupils pretended to be dead as they cowered in corridors and two classrooms or ran for their lives. Chilling video captured the sound of shots followed by screams as the gunman picked off his victims. Pupils and teachers were said to be among the dead. Six female and three male victims died quickly, with one adult said to be among them. The tenth victim, a woman, succumbed to her injuries in hospital last night. The former pupil ended his deadly rampage when he turned a gun on himself in a toilet cubicle. Police later found a suicide note at his home nearby, which said he had 'felt bullied' at the school, according to Austria's Krone Zeitung newspaper, although authorities said only that he was an ex-pupil who had quit before completing his studies. Detectives are scouring data on his mobile phone and computers to build a picture of his recent movements and search for clues as to his motivation. Austria was plunged into a state of shock, with Chancellor Christian Stocker flying to Graz and declaring a 'dark day in the history of our country' as he announced three days of national mourning. More than 300 police and special forces descended on the school after 'screams and gunshots' were heard by emergency service workers during frantic calls at 10am local time. Armed Cobra police commandos charged into the four-storey building as part of an emergency response that included 65 ambulances, at least two air ambulances and 158 paramedics. Terrified pupils filmed themselves as gunshots rang out, and later as they fled down corridors as armed officers helped evacuate them from the 400-pupil school. Two schoolgirls were shown clinging on to each other as they ran from the school building. One teacher described being barricaded inside a classroom with pupils as they heard the gunshots. A distressing video showed victims lined up on stretchers outside of the school while dozens of paramedics tended to them. Some were covered by white sheets. Helicopter ambulances airlifted the most severely injured straight to Graz Regional Hospital. Desperate parents raced to the school as word of the massacre spread, with police reuniting them with evacuated survivors at a local hall. One father told how his son had survived by pretending to be dead. The man, named as Farag, told television channel Puls 24: 'Out of fear, he lay down to pretend that he was killed so that he wouldn't be targeted any more.' He added: 'Who did this? What kind of problem did he have?' One mother said: 'My son called me to say he was in school and that he was being shot at, and that he thinks he is going to die. I've only found out now, two hours later, that he's still alive.' Metin Ozden, who was in his kebab restaurant near the school, said: 'I've never seen so many emergency services in my entire life.' He said parents passing his restaurant were crying as they rushed to the school. Police commander Franz Ruff said 'at least' a dozen people had been injured in addition to those killed. Krone Zeitung newspaper previously reported that 28 people were taken to hospital, with at least two of them in an 'extremely critical condition'. Seven required emergency surgery. Some victims had reportedly been shot in the head. The numbers have not been officially verified. Police confirmed the killer had legally owned the weapons, with the Salzburger Nachrichten newspaper reporting he had purchased one of the guns just days ago. Attacks in public are rare in the nation of almost 9.2 million people, which ranks among the ten safest countries in the world, according to the Global Peace Index. Last night the country's Chancellor said: 'A school... is a space of trust, of security, of the future. The fact that this safe space was shattered by such an act of violence leaves us speechless.' Austria's foreign minister Beate Meinl-Reisinger said: 'As a mother of three children, my heart is breaking.' The local state governor Mario Kunasek said 'the green heart of Austria is crying', while president Alexander van der Bellen said: 'This horror cannot be captured in words.' Leaders from across Europe sent their condolences including Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelensky who said he was 'deeply saddened'. French education minister Elisabeth Borne said that one of those who died was a 'young fellow citizen' of France. At a news conference earlier in the day, Austria's interior minister Gerhard Karner refused to be drawn on 'speculation' in the case, saying it was the job of the criminal office to investigate. Police did confirm the killer was not 'known' to authorities before the attack. Last night Graz Cathedral held a service of reflection and the city's main square became a 'sea of lights' as candles were lit for the victims. In a nearby parish church, prayers were said for victims including one called Leo. 'We are lighting a light for Leo,' said Father Pesendorfer, who was in tears. Today, a nationwide minute's silence will be held at 10am local time. Flags on the Hofburg Palace in Vienna, where the president has his office, will fly at half mast. Yesterday afternoon long queues formed outside a blood donation centre in Graz. Johanna, 30, said: 'I'm here because I wanted to do something. I felt helpless.' Austria has one of the highest rates of gun ownership in Europe, with roughly 370,000 Austrians legally owning 1.5 million registered firearms, according to the interior ministry. Wild hunting is popular in the country and more than half of Austria's registered firearms fall under the category of weapons that can be owned by any adult without a licence.
The Guardian
04-06-2025
- General
- The Guardian
World won't forget Tiananmen Square, US and Taiwan say on 36th anniversary of massacre
The world will never forget the Tiananmen Square massacre, the US secretary of state and Taiwan president have said on the 36th anniversary of the crackdown, which China's government still tries to erase from domestic memory. There is no official death toll but activists believe hundreds, possibly thousands, were killed by China's People's Liberation Army in the streets around Tiananmen Square, Beijing's central plaza, on 4 June 1989. 'Today we commemorate the bravery of the Chinese people who were killed as they tried to exercise their fundamental freedoms, as well as those who continue to suffer persecution as they seek accountability and justice for the events of June 4, 1989,' said Marco Rubio, the US's top diplomat, in a statement. 'The [Chinese Communist party] actively tries to censor the facts, but the world will never forget.' In a Facebook post, Taiwan's president, Lai Ching-te, also praised the bravery of the protesters. 'Authoritarian governments often choose to silence and forget history, while democratic societies choose to preserve the truth and refuse to forget those who gave their lives – and their dreams – to the idea of human rights,' Lai said. Ahead of the 1989 massacre protesters had been gathering for weeks in the square to call for democratic reforms to the CCP. The student-led movement attracted worldwide attention, which turned to horror as tanks rolled into the square to clear the encampment. Several protesters were also killed at a smaller demonstration in Chengdu, a city in south-west China. The date of 4 June remains one of China's strictest taboos, and the Chinese government employs extensive and increasingly sophisticated resources to censor any discussion or acknowledgment of it inside China. Internet censors scrub even the most obscure references to the date from online spaces, and activists in China are often put under increased surveillance or sent on enforced 'holidays' away from Beijing. New research from human rights workers has found that the sensitive date also sees heightened transnational repression of Chinese government critics overseas by the government and its proxies. The report published on Wednesday by Article 19, a human rights research and advocacy group, said that the Chinese government 'has engaged in a systematic international campaign of transnational repression targeting protesters critical of the Chinese Communist party,' with Uyghurs, Tibetans and Hongkongers particularly likely to be affected. The report cited Freedom House research in 2023, which found that China had been responsible for about 30% all recorded acts of physical transnational repression since 2014. 'Protesters targeted by [transnational repression] frequently live in fear of surveillance; targeting; abduction and forced repatriation, especially around embassies and consulates; and 'collective punishment' retaliation against relatives still in China, which also leads people to cut ties with their family,' the report said. The Article 19 researchers found that, with Tiananmen Square vigils snuffed out in China, pro-CCP agents appear to be targeting commemorations in other parts of the world. In 2022, a replica of a statue known as the 'Pillar of Shame', by Danish artist Jens Galschiøt, was vandalised in Taipei. The statue is designed to memorialise the people who died on 4 June 1989. The original was on display at the University of Hong Kong for 23 years before it was removed by university authorities in 2021. For many years, Hong Kong, and to a lesser extent Macau, were the only places on Chinese territory where the event could be commemorated. But since the 2019 pro-democracy protests and the ensuing crackdown on civil liberties in Hong Kong, the annual 4 June vigil in Victoria Park has been banned. In recent years some high profile activists have been prosecuted over attempts to mark the day. For the last three years a government-sponsored food carnival has been held on the site during the week of the anniversary. On Tuesday there was a heavy police presence in Causeway Bay, near the park, Hong Kong Free Press reported. A performance artist, Chan Mei-tung, was stopped and searched, and later escorted from the area by police. She was standing on the road chewing gum, according to the outlet. In 2022 Chan was arrested on after she stood in the same area peeling a potato. On Tuesday Hong Kong's chief executive, John Lee, warned that any activity conducted on Wednesday must be 'lawful', but was not specific. A key criticism of Hong Kong's national security laws are that they are broad and the proscribed crimes are ill-defined. One of the few groups of people in China who are still outspoken about the events of 36 years ago are the rapidly ageing 'Tiananmen Mothers', parents of young people killed in the massacre, who have called for an official reckoning. One of the founding members, 88-year-old Zhang Xianling, gave a rare interview this year with Radio Free Asia, saying that she still lives under close surveillance. Zhang said: 'I don't know why they are so afraid of me. I am 88 years old and I have to use a wheelchair if I can't walk 200 metres. Am I that scary?' Earlier this week Li Xiaoming, an ex-PLA officer who has lived in Australia for 25 years, gave an interview to Taiwan media, about his involvement at the Tiananmen crackdown as a junior soldier. Li said he was compelled to talk 'as a warning to the world', and also to Taiwan which is facing the threat of Chinese annexation. 'Although the CCP leadership sees the 4 June incident as something shameful, what they learned from it is the need for strict control – eliminating any sign of unrest early on, controlling and blocking public opinion, and brainwashing to people. They work to crush all instability at the earliest stage,' he said according to CNA's translation.
The Independent
04-06-2025
- Business
- The Independent
Tiananmen massacre: It's time to wake up and stand up to the butchers of Beijing
On this day, 36 years ago, thousands of peaceful protesters were gunned down in Beijing's Tiananmen Square and in the streets and alleyways of China's capital during a brutal crackdown on student-led pro-democracy protests. Thousands more were massacred in cities across China. British diplomatic cables revealed that the death toll may have been as high as 10,000. Last week, a group known as the Tiananmen Mothers – whose sons and daughters were killed, injured or jailed in 1989 – issued a statement calling for an independent investigation into the massacre. 'The bereaved will never forget,' they wrote. 'This atrocity, engineered entirely by the government of the time, remains one of the darkest chapters in human history. The pain it has caused has never left – it is a nightmare that time cannot fade.' Yet, as far as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is concerned, nothing happened on 4 June 1989. This was a day erased from history – no commemoration has ever been possible in mainland China. Even in Hong Kong, the one city in China where memorials used to be held, candlelight vigils have been banned over the past five years. Hong Kong's Catholic Church, which used to hold commemorative masses, has not done so for the past three years. Simply lighting a candle on this day can land you in jail for years. Thirty-six years on, one might ask the question: what did the student movement in 1989 achieve? On the surface, nothing, except bloodshed, death and repression. Over the past three decades, despite brief periods of relative relaxation and apparent opening, the rule of the CCP regime has become more repressive, and authoritarianism in China has intensified. Over the past 13 years of Xi Jinping's rule, in particular, China has been plunged into a new dark age of repression – in which we have seen the dismantling of Hong Kong's once-celebrated and vibrant civil society, genocide of the Uyghurs, an acceleration of persecution of Christians and Falun Gong practitioners, and increased repression in Tibet. In addition, we have seen more aggression towards Taiwan and more transnational repression against Beijing's critics abroad, with China operating clandestine security outposts in places like New York and London to monitor and threaten Chinese activists abroad. For too long, the free world has emboldened and facilitated the CCP's repression. The decision by the US to award China 'permanent normal trading status' (PNTR) and later 'Most-Favoured Nation' (MFN) status in 2000, just over a decade after the slaughter, was wrong-headed. Turning to the present day, there is a need for a wake-up call. We should not have normal trading relations with a genocidal regime committing crimes against humanity and dire repression. Such a regime cannot be trusted. Few sane voices would say we should disengage or stop all trade – that is not possible with such a vast market and such a strong power. No, the question before us is not whether to engage, but how – and on whose terms? We should impose targeted sanctions on those responsible for the Uyghur genocide, but also for the dismantling of Hong Kong's freedoms in violation of an international treaty, the Sino-British Joint Declaration, in which Beijing promised to uphold Hong Kong's autonomy and liberty at least until 2047. We should also demand the release of political prisoners. Any trade deals with China should be contingent on the release of media entrepreneur and British citizen Jimmy Lai, barrister Chow Hang-tung and all Hong Kong political prisoners. Ms Chow was jailed for organising candlelight vigils to commemorate the Tiananmen massacre (Chow had her conviction overturned, but is still behind bars over a separate subversion case) and one of the multiple charges against Lai was the crime of lighting a candle and saying a prayer at such a vigil, so their cases are symbolic on this anniversary. But the international community must also step up efforts to demand the release citizen journalist Zhang Zhan, Christian pastor Wang Yi, Uyghur medical doctor Gulshan Abbas, dissident Dr Wang Bingzhang, who has been held for 23 years after being abducted from Vietnam, Tibet's Panchen Lama and his relatives, and the thousands of prisoners of conscience across China. On the surface, Beijing's leaders seem emboldened. Even though China's economic miracle appears to have waned, with its property bubble bursting and the opportunities for young people to find good jobs declining, nevertheless it appears on track to hit 5 per cent growth this year. With its Belt and Road Initiative, despite failures and frustrations, China appears to have successfully entrapped many developing countries in its orbit, building an alliance of authoritarianism to counter the free world. The turbulence over Donald Trump's tariffs so far does not appear to have dented Xi Jinping's grip on power – and may even have strengthened his hand in the short term. Yet, there are two important things that the protesters in Tiananmen Square 36 years ago achieved, which we forget at our peril. First, they showed that, when given the chance, the people of China want freedom – and many have made enormous personal sacrifices towards that goal. They are not beholden to the CCP. Even today, when I speak with Chinese friends privately, many of them indicate their desire to be free. And protests in recent years – notably the White Paper movement of 2022 – show that the lamp of freedom in China has not dimmed and will, periodically, emerge again. Second, by peacefully protesting, the students in Tiananmen Square and around the country illustrated the stark contrast between their cause and character and the regime's. Faced with peaceful protestors, the CCP sent in tanks and soldiers. They met placards and hunger strikers with guns and bullets. In so doing, they exposed to the world – not for the first time, and not for the last – their true nature. Thirty-six years on, the regime has not changed. It continues its repression, cruelty, inhumanity, barbarity and criminality. The question is not whether China has changed. It is whether the free world has the courage to change its approach to China. Will we put morals before mammon? Will we, who believe in freedom and human rights, finally wake up and stand up to the butchers of Beijing?
The Independent
28-05-2025
- Politics
- The Independent
‘Game of Thrones-style families' behind 2,000-year-old Dorset massacre
Game of Thrones -like barons in England were responsible for the brutal massacre of dozens of people 2,000 years ago, research has revealed. The 62 skeletons, found with skulls ' smashed to oblivion ', were unearthed in 1936 at a mass burial site in Maiden Castle, Dorset. Researchers at the time blamed the Roman invasion of Britain in AD43 for their deaths - something that resonated with British fears of a Nazi invasion in the 1930s. But Bournemouth University archaeologist Dr Miles Russell revealed the bones actually dated to around the first century AD, by using modern dating techniques. 'They died violently and with overkill. These were Game of Thrones-like barons with one dynasty wiping out another,' Dr Russell told The Independent. 'Their skulls have been repeatedly smashed to oblivion with swords and other weapons. People were dragged up there and put to death.' Dr Russell said those killed were an aristocratic elite murdered and buried with honour, something that would not have been done for common criminals. 'They could have been competing for a throne or power, and it was important to finish them off and destroy the blood line,' he added. Sir Mortimer Wheeler led excavations of the Iron Age hill fort in the 1930s, and popularised the idea that the remains belonged to English people slain by 'barbaric' pillaging Romans. Because the site was still occupied in AD43, Sir Mortimer was convinced the skeletons were evidence of a Roman campaign against native Britons, according to Historic England. Dr Russell said this was a reasonable assumption to make at the time without access to modern carbon dating systems used today. He said this dramatic explanation for the burial site would have helped attract funding for archaeological digs, something that was in short supply in the 1930s. 'They were thugs with resources and private armies. The hill fort dominated the horizon, and these people were done to death publicly,' Dr Russell added. Maiden Castle is one of the largest Iron Age hill forts in Europe, around the size of 50 football pitches, according to Historic England. The castle's ramparts were constructed around 2,400 years ago and protected hundreds of residents. Within a few decades of the arrival of the Romans, the hill fort was abandoned, Historic England added. The Romans then built the town of Dorchester to the north-east as the regional capital of the Durotriges.
