Stowaway's body falls on London garden
LONDON -- A stowaway fell from the undercarriage of a jet as it approached Heathrow Airport after a 9-hour flight from Nairobi, and the body landed in a south London garden, police and airline officials said Monday.
The Metropolitan Police force said the body of a man was found in a residential garden in south London's Clapham area on Sunday, and it's believed to have fallen from a plane. The body has not yet been identified. Police said a post-mortem would be held to determine the cause of death.
Kenya Airways said police traced the body to its Nairobi-London flight. A bag, water and food were discovered in the plane's landing-gear compartment after it landed. The airline called the death "unfortunate" and said it was cooperating with British and Kenyan authorities.
Stowing away in a plane's undercarriage is exceptionally dangerous. Experts believe roughly three-quarters of stowaways do not survive because of the extreme cold and lack of oxygen as the plane reaches cruising altitude.
Sea-Watch captain kept on house arrest
ROME -- The German captain who defied Italian authorities and rammed her migrant rescue ship into a border police motorboat while docking remained under house arrest after questioning Monday before a judge in Sicily who will decide if she can regain her liberty.
Sea-Watch, the German humanitarian group that operates the rescue vessel Sea-Watch 3, said in a tweet that the judge will announce her ruling today. Captain Carola Rackete's closed hearing before Judge Alessandra Vella in Agrigento, Sicily, lasted about three hours.
Rackete has become a kind of cause celebre for some in her homeland for defying Italy's anti-migrant Interior Minister Matteo Salvini, who has vowed not to let any charity rescue boat disembark migrants on Italian shores. Salvini contends such rescues essentially help human traffickers who launch unseaworthy boats, crowded with migrants, from Libyan shores. After Monday's hearing ended, Salvini said that however it goes, "we are always ready to expel the rich German outlaw," the Italian news agency ANSA quoted him as saying.
Prosecutors have opened an investigation against Rackete over accusations she resisted a war ship and used violence against it, a reference to the damaged boat of the border police, which is considered a military force under Italian law. If charged and convicted, Rackete risks up to 10 years in prison.
The five officers aboard the police motorboat blocking her path to port on the tiny Italian island of Lampedusa off Sicily in the early hours of Saturday escaped injury, but the side of their boat was damaged when the much larger rescue boat plowed into it.
Italian Premier Giuseppe Conte told reporters on Monday that German Chancellor Angela Merkel asked him about Rackete at a summit of European Union leaders in Brussels. He said he replied that her fate was in the hands of the Italian justice system. A day earlier, Germany's president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier had questioned Italy's handling of the situation.
35 people die in Indian minibus wreck
SRINAGAR, India -- An overcrowded minibus crashed into a gorge in Indian-controlled Kashmir on Monday, killing at least 35 people and injuring 17 others, officials said.
The bus plunged off the Himalayan mountain road as its driver negotiated a curve, then rolled down into a 500-foot-deep gorge along a rocky stream in the southern Kishtwar area, said civil administrator Angrez Singh Rana. He said officials were investigating whether it was a mechanical failure or the driver's negligence.
Rescue teams evacuated the injured to hospitals, where all were in critical condition. Rana said 10 of the injured were airlifted in two helicopters to Jammu city for specialized treatment. He said more helicopters were being pressed into service.
On Thursday, a minibus carrying students to a picnic crashed into a gorge along another Himalayan road in Kashmir, killing at least 11 and injuring seven others. India has the world's deadliest roads, with about 150,000 killed and 470,000 injured annually.
Libyan force releases Turkish detainees
ANKARA, Turkey -- A Turkish official said six Turkish nationals who were held by a Libyan force have been released.
A Foreign Ministry official said the six crewmembers of a ship were released Monday, a day after Turkey vowed it would consider Field Marshal Khalifa Hifter's forces as "legitimate targets" if the Turkish nationals remained in detention.
The official spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations.
Hifter's self-styled Libyan National Army had earlier called Turkish assets in Libya "legitimate targets," accusing Turkey of helping rival militias allied with the U.N.-supported government. Hifter's forces have received aid from Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Russia and France.
Hifter's group controls much of eastern and southern Libya. In April it began an offensive against Tripoli, where a weak, U.N.-aligned government is based.
-- Compiled by Democrat-Gazette staff from wire reports
A Section on 07/02/2019