American to remain jailed in Moscow
MOSCOW -- A Russian court ruled Friday that a former U.S. Marine accused of spying will stay jailed in Moscow for another three months.
Michigan resident Paul Whelan was arrested at a hotel in the Russian capital at the end of December. Whelan's lawyer has said his client was handed a flash drive, and it had classified information he didn't know about on it.
Masked men escorted Whelan into court, where the American spent the detention hearing behind bars. Whelan has not been formally charged, and the Moscow court decided to keep him in pretrial custody.
A spying conviction in Russia carries a possible prison sentence of up to 20 years.
Whelan's brother David said in a statement that he was not surprised by the ruling.
"There was never any question that the false charges against Paul would mean his ongoing isolation while the [Federal Security Service] continues its attempts to concoct evidence," David Whelan said.
The Federal Security Service, the main successor to the Soviet Union's KGB, revealed on Dec. 31 that its officers arrested Paul Whelan a few days earlier. The action raised speculation that the Russian government was looking to swap him for a Russian held in the U.S.
Russia's Foreign Ministry rejected the idea of Whelan being part of a possible prisoner swap.
India using dams to punish Pakistan
NEW DELHI -- India says it is building dams to stop its share of water from flowing into Pakistan-controlled Kashmir as it seeks to punish its longtime rival for an attack on paramilitary soldiers last week that left 40 people dead.
Water Resources Minister Nitin Gadkari said India will harness its share of unused water from three rivers to help Indian states.
Pakistan, a country of 200 million people with a largely agriculture-based economy, fears that India may tamper with the 1960 Indus Water Treaty, brokered by the World Bank, which calls for the unimpeded flow of three other rivers through Kashmir and farther into Pakistan.
The treaty has worked despite three wars between the two countries since 1947, two of which were fought over Kashmir.
India is demanding that Pakistan stop training and arming insurgent groups fighting for Kashmir's independence or its merger with Pakistan.
Pakistan denies the charge and says it offers only moral and diplomatic support to insurgent groups. It accuses India of human-rights violations in the Indian portion of Kashmir, a region which both nations claim in its entirety.
5 youths die after eating at restaurant
KARACHI, Pakistan -- Pakistani police said Friday that five children from a single family died after dining at a restaurant in the sprawling port city of Karachi.
The children, ages 2-9, had dined with their family in Karachi's business district. Their mother and aunt were also hospitalized early Friday and remained in critical condition later in the day.
These and other recent deaths are sparking a nationwide outcry over public hygiene and the lax enforcement of food safety laws. In November, two brothers died in Karachi after consuming food from an upscale restaurant.
In the city of Multan in Punjab province, 15 people were hospitalized in January after eating food contaminated by lizards. In another incident last month, about 240 people suffered food poisoning at a wedding in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
Police said the family likely became ill after eating in Karachi, but that they were also investigating restaurants in towns of Baluchistan province, where the family had stopped for lunch and snacks as it traveled to Karachi on Thursday.
The Karachi restaurant where the family dined has been sealed, and police have detained its employees for questioning.
Teen protester killed at Gaza border
JERUSALEM -- Israeli gunfire killed a Palestinian teenager at a protest along the Gaza-Israel border fence, Gaza officials said Friday, as thousands of people in contested Jerusalem descended on a section of a flashpoint holy site that has been closed by Israeli court order for over a decade.
The Health Ministry said 15-year-old Youssef al-Dayya died at a hospital shortly after he was hit with a gunshot in the chest. The circumstances of his death were not immediately known.
The ministry added that 30 protesters were wounded by Israeli live fire in the weekly Gaza march.
The protests in Gaza are mostly against the Israeli-Egyptian blockade of the Hamas-ruled territory. Citing security concerns, Israel and Egypt imposed tight restrictions on movements of people and goods in and out of Gaza after the militant Hamas group wrested control of the territory in 2007.
Hamas has arranged weekly demonstrations since March to protest the blockade and demand the return of Palestinian refugees to land in what is now Israel.
Close to 190 Palestinians, mostly unarmed, have been killed by Israeli fire in the protests, and one Israeli soldier was killed by a Palestinian sniper last July. Israel says it is defending its frontier against breaches.
A Section on 02/23/2019