The world in brief

Students hurl stones on the University of the Witwatersrand campus in Johannesburg, South Africa, on Monday.
Students hurl stones on the University of the Witwatersrand campus in Johannesburg, South Africa, on Monday.

S. Africa college students, police clash

photo

AP

A policeman clashes with a student Monday on the University of the Witwatersrand campus in Johannesburg, South Africa. Students protested at the university over a national dispute for free education.

photo

AP

Flames rise after an explosive hits a government building Monday where suspected militants took refuge during a gunbattle in Pampore, on the outskirts of Srinagar, Indian-controlled Kashmir.

JOHANNESBURG — One of South Africa’s top universities descended into violence Monday, with police firing tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannons at stone-throwing students who are locked in a national dispute with school and government officials over demands for free education.

Stun grenades boomed and gunshots crackled as police cleared protesters at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, the most prominent site of a student movement that recently shut other universities and prompted official warnings that badly needed medics, engineers and other skilled workers might not be able to graduate this year.

“Hell broke out,” said Jo Seoka, an Anglican bishop who described the pandemonium as students hurled rocks at security guards blocking the entrance to the Great Hall, prompting police vehicles to rumble forward. Seoka, who joined an earlier student march, said police had “militarized” the campus, and he criticized them for not wearing IDs on their uniforms that would make them accountable.

At least 27 students were arrested Monday at other demonstrations at schools around the country. Several people, including two police officers pelted with rocks, were injured.

Colombia, rebels to revive peace talks

BOGOTA, Colombia — Colombia’s government and rebels from the National Liberation Army have agreed to revive a stalled peace effort, providing a boost to President Juan Manuel Santos as he tries to recover from voters’ rejection of a deal with the much-larger Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia guerrilla group.

The rebels and government officials said Monday that formal peace talks would begin Oct. 27 in Ecuador. In a brief statement from Venezuela, whose socialist government is co-sponsoring the peace process, the National Liberation Army committed itself to freeing two captives it has been holding for months before the talks begin.

In March, the National Liberation Army and the government announced they would start formal peace negotiations. But the effort never got off the ground after the government demanded the National Liberation Army renounce kidnapping and free a prominent politician who turned himself over to the rebels to secure his brother’s release.

Earlier Monday, the group handed over to the International Red Cross a rice farmer, Nelson Alarcon, it had held captive for months.

S. Sudan suspends airdrops of food aid

JUBA, South Sudan — The World Food Program said South Sudan’s government has suspended “lifesaving airdrops of food assistance.”

The halt of airdrops is due to a “misunderstanding regarding flight clearances,” and the issue is likely temporary, World Food Program spokesman Challiss McDonough said. The U.N. agency has seen its airdrops briefly suspended in South Sudan before.

This East African country, the world’s youngest nation, faces one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. Civil war that began in late 2013 made widespread hunger problems worse. The government says food prices in some areas are 10 times higher than a year ago.

The World Food Program says more than four million people in the country face food insecurity. The country’s population has been estimated at more than 12 million, though thousands of people continue to flee to neighboring states.

Since fighting in the capital, Juba, killed hundreds of people in July, South Sudan has seen clashes across the country, and restrictions on humanitarian access have sharply increased.

Thousands arrested in India crackdown

SRINAGAR, India — Indian forces, anxious to quell anti-India protests in Kashmir, are carrying out their most severe crackdown in more than two decades against civilian protesters, with more than 8,000 arrested this summer across the disputed Himalayan territory, police said Monday.

That includes 450 or so civilians being held, possibly for up to six months without trial, under a security law criticized as a human-rights violation. India has said the separatist rebels — and civilians who help them — are undermining the country’s territorial integrity and forcing authorities to keep the India-controlled portion of Kashmir under tight control.

“This is, so far, the biggest crackdown against miscreants,” said a senior police officer, requesting anonymity because he was not authorized to share details of the crackdown.

For weeks, Indian authorities have carried out nighttime raids, rolling curfews and stops at roadblocks, but have failed to stop the rebel attacks and public rallies.

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