Pakistan suicide blast kills 20 people
QUETTA, Pakistan -- A suicide bomber targeted an open-air market in the southwestern Pakistani city of Quetta, killing at least 20 people Friday and wounding dozens of others, police and hospital officials said.
Shortly after the bombing struck near a Shiite residential area, dozens of angry Shiite young people rallied in Quetta, demanding more security from the authorities and the arrest of those behind the attacks.
They also denounced the violence by Sunni extremists who have killed hundreds in similar attacks over the past years in Baluchistan province, where Quetta is the capital.
"It seems people from the [Shiite] Hazara community were the target," said senior police chief Abdur Razzaq Cheema, adding that some of the victims were in critical condition.
Mir Ziaullah Langau, the provincial home minister, said the suicide bomber had walked up to the marketplace and killed both Shiites and Sunnis.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, which took place in the Hazarganji neighborhood, but Sunni militant groups have claimed similar bombings in the past against Shiites, whom they view as apostates deserving of death.
Spain nabs Venezuelan in U.S. drug case
MADRID -- Venezuela's longtime spy chief was arrested Friday in Madrid by Spanish police acting on a United States warrant on charges of trafficking tons of cocaine.
Maj. Gen. Hugo Carvajal, who for more than a decade advised the late Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez and headed the country's security apparatus, recently became the most influential military figure to declare his loyalty to opposition leader Juan Guaido.
The opposition had hoped Carvajal's departure from the current Venezuelan government would encourage others to follow but the country's armed forces have remained largely loyal to President Nicolas Maduro.
A spokesman with Spain's National Court, which handles extradition cases, said that Carvajal would need to testify before Judge Alejandro Abascal today in Madrid.
The official, who wasn't authorized to be identified by name in media reports, said that U.S. authorities are requesting his extradition on charges of trafficking of 5.6 tons of cocaine.
The charges stem from previous indictments in the U.S., where authorities allege that Carvajal was one of several high-ranking military and law enforcement officials who provided a haven to major drug traffickers from neighboring Colombia.
Also known as "El Pollo," Carvajal is also accused of helping Colombian guerrillas export large amounts of U.S.-bound cocaine through Venezuela, according to indictments.
Europeans to take in rescued migrants
PARIS -- Germany and France said Friday that they are prepared to take in more than half of the rescued migrants on board a rescue ship in the Mediterranean that has been stranded at sea for nine days.
In a tweet, French Interior Minister Christophe Castaner said France, along with Germany and some other European countries that he didn't identify, had agreed to welcome migrants out of "solidarity" to allow them to disembark in Valletta, Malta.
France, he said, is ready to take in 20 of the migrants on board the Alan Kurdi.
Germany's Interior Ministry later tweeted that Germany was offering to take in up to 22 people. The German humanitarian aid group Sea-Eye had 64 rescued migrants in total on board the boat, including two women who were evacuated from the ship this week for medical reasons.
Maltese Prime Minister Joseph Muscat has said his country is refusing to allow port access to the ship, saying that the nongovernmental organization should have headed to Tunisia, the nearest safe port to the rescue spot. Italy also has refused entry.
2 Cuban doctors abducted in Kenya
NAIROBI, Kenya -- Suspected Islamist militants abducted two Cuban doctors in an ambush that killed a police bodyguard in northern Kenya near the Somali border, officials said Friday.
It was the second abduction of a foreigner in five months likely carried out by the al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab extremist group, which is based in Somalia.
The gunmen may have taken the doctors into Somalia, police spokesman Charles Owino said. He said the doctors' driver had been detained to help with investigations.
The doctors were ambushed as they headed to work, said David Ohito, communications director for the Mandera county government.
Gov. Ali Roba said the gunmen's vehicle blocked the doctors' vehicle "and opened fire at their bodyguards, killing one instantly." Al-Shabab was suspected, the governor said.
A police official identified the doctors as Assel Herrera Correa, a general physician, and Landy Rodriguez, a surgeon. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the press.
Cuba's Health Ministry said it had established channels of communication with Kenyan authorities and established a governmental working group to deal with the case.
-- Compiled by Democrat-Gazette staff from wire reports
A Section on 04/13/2019