In India Kashmir area, Al-Qaida says
SRINAGAR, India — Al-Qaida said for the first time that it is active in the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir, announcing that a militant from an indigenous rebel group would lead a new outfit of fighters opposing Indian rule in the disputed region.
The announcement was made Thursday by the Global Islamic Media Front, which said Kashmiri militant Zakir Musa will head al-Qaida-linked Ansar Ghawzat-ul-Hind. He recently left Kashmir’s largest indigenous rebel group, Hizbul Mujahideen, and is believed to have been joined by fewer than a dozen others.
Previously, no global jihadi groups have openly operated in Kashmir, a territory divided between India and Pakistan but claimed by both.
The propaganda network said the new group will “repel the aggression of tyrant Indian invaders, and through jihad, and with the aid of Allah … we will liberate our homeland Kashmir.”
High-rise groups’ fire culpability studied
LONDON — British police said Thursday that they have “reasonable grounds” to suspect that local authorities may have committed corporate manslaughter in a deadly highrise fire in London.
The Metropolitan Police force said it has officially informed the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, which owns the Grenfell Tower public housing block, and the management group, the Kensington and Chelsea Tenant Management Association, that they are under suspicion.
The news arrived in a letter that police sent to residents of the building. The letter said a senior representative of each body will be interviewed about the fire as part of the police investigation.
Police have said for weeks that their investigation will consider whether anyone should be charged with a crime. Police said Thursday that they were “considering the full range of offenses, from corporate manslaughter to regulatory breaches.”
At least 80 people died June 14 when an early morning fire store through the west London high-rise. It was the deadliest fire in Britain in more than a century.
Attention has focused on the building’s new aluminum cladding, installed during a recent renovation. Thousands of other buildings in the country have the same cladding.
Greece to get migrant-influx aid funds
ATHENS, Greece — The European Commission on Thursday announced a new emergency support package for Greece to help it deal with the influx of tens of thousands of migrants and refugees.
The roughly $244 million package includes an about $176 million program to help those families rent accommodations in Greek cities and provide them with money to help them move out of refugee camps, EU officials said during a visit to Athens.
The commission said the new funding more than doubles the emergency support extended to Greece for the refugee crisis, raising it to a total of about $468 million. The rental project is in cooperation with the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees and will provide 22,000 rental places with the goal of increasing the number of refugees living in rented apartments to 30,000 by the end of the year, including 2,000 places on Greek islands.
A parallel plan at a cost of about $67.3 million will provide refugees and asylum seekers with monthly cash stipends distributed through cash-cards for expenses such as transport, food and medication.
French fire tamed, evacuees can return
BORMES-LES-MIMOSAS, France — More than 12,000 evacuated residents and tourists in the south of France were told they could return to their homes and holiday places after firefighters tamed one of the fiercest blazes to break out during four days of wildfires.
The fire in the seaside town of Bormes-les-Mimosas in the southern Var region calmed Thursday because of a drop in the wind — but still marked the skyline with clouds of black smoke that were visible for miles.
Local authorities said that while it was safe for people to return to places they’d evacuated in the Bormes-les-Mimosas area, the fire risk remained at its highest level in other parts of the Var region.
Before they were allowed to go back to their homes and campsites, evacuees were housed in makeshift shelters. A sailing club near Bormes-les-Mimosas hosted 200 people, including tourists, who were evacuated Wednesday night.