17 Venezuela clubgoers die in stampede
CARACAS, Venezuela — Seventeen people were killed at a crowded nightclub in Venezuela’s capital Saturday after a tear-gas device exploded during a brawl and triggered a stampede among hundreds gathered for a graduation celebration, government officials said.
Interior Minister Nestor Reverol said the incident at the Los Cotorros club in the middle-class neighborhood of El Paraiso left eight minors dead and five injured. Eight people have been detained, including two teens believed to have set off the tear gas.
“The establishment has been ordered closed, and we are investigating in coordination with the public ministry, which is directing the criminal investigation,” he said.
More than 500 people were believed to be inside the club when the fight broke out.
Jesus Armas, an opposition councilman who lives in the neighborhood, said the Interior Ministry should explain how a civilian was able to obtain tear-gas canisters that should only be utilized by state security forces. He also urged authorities to investigate whether the club had permission to hold several hundred people inside.
“That’s not a big space and that should not be authorized,” he said.
Pope equates abortion to Nazi eugenics
VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis denounced abortion on Saturday as the “white glove” equivalent of the Nazi-era eugenics program and urged families to accept the children that God gives them.
Francis spoke off the cuff to a meeting of an Italian family association. He lamented how some couples choose not to have any children, while others resort to prenatal testing to see if the babies have any malformations or genetic problems.
Francis recalled that as a child he was horrified to hear stories from his teacher about children “thrown from the mountain” if they were born with malformations.
“Today we do the same thing,” he said.
“Last century, the whole world was scandalized by what the Nazis did to purify the race. Today, we do the same thing but with white gloves,” Francis said.
The pope urged families to accept children “as God gives them to us.”
Austria asks Germany about spy reports
VIENNA — Austria on Saturday demanded clarification from neighboring Germany of reports that its spy agency snooped for several years on nearly 2,000 targets in the Alpine nation, including companies and ministries.
Austrian President Alexander Van der Bellen said “spying among friendly states is not just unusual and unwanted. It is unacceptable.”
He and Chancellor Sebastian Kurz were responding to reports in the Der Standard newspaper and the Profil magazine about a list of alleged targets in Austria of Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service between 1999 and 2006.
Kurz noted there were suspicions a few years ago of German intelligence activity in Austria. He acknowledged that an Austrian investigation at the time didn’t reach any conclusions, but said prosecutors will revisit the matter now “if there is new information.”
Kurz said Austria has contacted German authorities and is asking who was spied on and when the surveillance ended.
Storm Carlotta drenching Mexico coast
MEXICO CITY — Heavy rains from Tropical Storm Carlotta pounded Mexico’s Pacific coast southeast of Acapulco ahead of its expected landfall late Saturday or early today.
Carlotta, the third named storm of the Pacific hurricane season, was meandering just off Mexico’s coast, according to the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
It said that, as of 10 p.m., Carlotta had maximum sustained winds of 65 mph, and its center was about 20 miles south of Acapulco. The storm was moving northwest Saturday evening at 6 mph.
The hurricane center said the storm threatens torrential rains for the coastline of the southern states of Guerrero and Oaxaca, with up to 10 inches possible in some areas. Flash flooding and mudslides are possible.
On Friday, the Mexican Interior Department reported that there were no deaths in the resort cities of Los Cabos from former Tropical Storm Bud.
Bud’s remnants were expected to take heavy rain to northwestern Mexico and the southwestern United States.