LITTLE ROCK — QUOTE OF THE DAY “It was offensive. It was hateful.” President Barack Obama, on Iran President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s statement that most of the world thinks the U.S. was behind the
Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to benefit Israel Article, this pageCentral Americans flee tropical storm
TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras - Honduras and Nicaragua evacuated thousands of people from the path of Tropical Storm Matthew on Friday as it drenched Central America’s Caribbean coast and impoverished areas prone to disastrous flooding.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said Matthew could bring 6 to 10 inches of rain to Nicaragua and Honduras, with the possibility of flash floods and mudslides.
Some parts of Nicaragua already were coping with flooding from earlier rains.
The center said the storm, centered at latitude 15.2 north and longitude 85.0 west, was moving inland over Honduras late Friday and was heading northwest toward Guatemala with maximum sustained winds of 50 mph.
Nicaraguan authorities said they ordered the evacuation of 10,000 people.
The storm first hit land Friday afternoon over northeastern Nicaragua. A tropical storm watch also was in effect for the coast of Belize.
Meanwhile, far out over the Atlantic, Lisa became the seventh hurricane of the season and was drifting slowly north with maximum sustained winds near 75 mph.
4th mayor in northern Mexico killed
MONTERREY, Mexico - Gunmen killed a town mayor near the drug-plagued industrial city of Monterrey, authorities said Friday, the fourth mayor in northern Mexico to be murdered in little more than a month.
Prisciliano Rodriguez Salinas was gunned down late Thursday as he was leaving his house with a personal employee in the town of Doctor Gonzalez, about 30 miles east of Monterrey, the Nuevo Leon state attorney general’s office said.
The employee, Eliseo Lopez Riojas, who was picking up equipment from the mayor’s house, was also killed when gunmen in a white car waiting outside started firing. Investigators found 19 shells from two different weapons at the scene. The mayor was shot seven times.
Three other small-town mayors in northeastern Mexico had been killed in the past month - the latest Thursday. On Friday, the mayor-elect of Gran Morelos, a town in the border state of Chihuahua, was shot and critically wounded.
Opened Nigeria dams displace 2 million
LAGOS, Nigeria - Nigerian authorities opened the gates at two swollen dams Friday in the country’s rain-soaked north, sending a flood into a neighboring state that has displaced 2 million people.
The torrent of water from the Challawa and Tiga dams swept through rural Jigawa state, bordering the nation of Niger, said Umar Kyari, a spokesman for the state governor.
Kyari said the rushing waters affected about 5,000 villages in the typically arid region approaching the Sahara Desert.
It wasn’t immediately clear whether residents received a warning or if anyone was injured or disappeared in the flooding. Officials typically open dams seasonally in the region, but it appears far more water flowed out than residents expected.
State information commissioner Aminu Mohammed said local officials had begun putting displaced families in rural schoolhouses and other government buildings out of the reach of the floodwaters. However, Mohammed said, the water had coursed across to the border with neighboring Yobe state.
Officials with the agency in charge of the dam in neighboring Kano state could not be immediately reached for comment Friday night.
Japan releases Chinese boat captain
BEIJING - China demanded an apology and compensation from Japan today after it released a Chinese fishing boat captain held more than two weeks after a collision near disputed islands that has triggered the worst spat between the Asian neighbors in years.
Japanese authorities released Zhan Qixiong, 41, early this morning and he was flown home by chartered plane to Fuzhou, the capital of China’s southeastern Fujian province, China’s official Xinhua News Agency reported.
The diplomatic spat was sparked when Japan arrested the captain after his trawler collided with two Japanese patrol boats near islands in the East China Sea claimed by both countries.
China’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement repeating its “strong protest” that the boat crew had been detained and sought an apology from Japan.
Zhan’s release came after intense pressure from China, which suspended ministerial-level dialogue with Tokyo and postponed talks on developing disputed undersea gas fields. Earlier this week, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao had sternly threatened “further action” against Japan if it did not immediately release the captain.
Front Section, Pages 6 on 09/25/2010