Russian missile strike on resto in Ukraine kills 12

KRAMATORSK, Ukraine—The toll from a Russian missile strike on a restaurant in eastern Ukraine rose to 12 dead and at least 60 wounded on Thursday morning, including children, as the Kremlin insisted Russian forces only hit military-linked targets.

The latest tragedy came as US President Joe Biden denounced Vladimir Putin as a “pariah” while German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said the Russian president had been weakened by mercenary group Wagner’s aborted rebellion.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky meanwhile called the Kramatorsk strike a “terrorist attack” and in his Wednesday evening address announced the arrest of an individual who had coordinated Russian fire.

In the Ukrainian-controlled town, where Russian strikes also hit homes, shops, a post office and other buildings, “rescue workers removed another body” on Thursday morning, bringing the death toll to 12, according to Kyiv’s Interior Minister Igor Klymenko.

Three children were among the dead but the count of the wounded differed, with Klymenko putting the figure at 65 and emergency services counting 60.

The latter also said 11 people had been rescued from the Ria Pizza restaurant, an eatery popular with soldiers, aid workers and journalists.

‘Horrible and very sad’

Galyna, a military doctor, said she was near the restaurant when it was struck.

“We were in an apartment and we heard an explosion,” she said, adding there were numerous wounded inside.

“It’s horrible and very sad, but I am not surprised that a missile arrived here.

It was a place where you could come and have a delicious lunch and coffee.

“I myself have sat there more than once.”

Colombian President Gustavo Petro said that three Colombians were injured in the strike: decorated writer Hector Abad Faciolince, former Colombian peace negotiator Sergio Jaramillo and journalist Catalina Gomez.

He said on Wednesday that Bogota would be sending a note of diplomatic protest to Russia over the incident.

According to Ukrainian police, Russia fired two S-300 missiles—surfaceto-air devices that it also uses for ground strikes —at Kramatorsk, which had a population of 150,000 before the war.

Moscow maintains that it only targets military facilities in Ukraine.

“Strikes are only carried out on objects that are in one way or another linked to military infrastructure,” said Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov.

“The Russian Federation does not carry out strikes on civilian infrastructure,” he added.

‘Pariah around the world’

Days after Wagner head Yevgeny Prigozhin’s aborted rebellion—widely seen as the biggest threat to Kremlin authority in decades—Germany’s Scholz said it would “surely have long-term consequences in Russia.” AFP

FRENCH RAGE. Firefighters work to put out a burning car on the sidelines of a demonstration in Nanterre, west of Paris, on June 27 after French police killed a teenager who refused to stop for a traffic check in the city. The event has prompted expressions of shock and questions over the readiness of security forces to pull the trigger. AFP

Unrest erupts, France rages over teen shooting

PARIS—Violent protests broke out in France in the early hours of Thursday as anger grows over the police killing of a teenager, with security forces arresting 150 people in the chaos that saw balaclava-clad protesters burning cars and setting off fireworks.

Nahel M., 17, was shot in the chest at point-blank range on Tuesday morning in an incident that has reignited debate in France about police tactics long criticised by rights groups over the treatment of people in low-income suburbs, particularly ethnic minorities.

The teenager’s mother called for a march on Thursday afternoon in the Paris suburb of Nanterre where he was killed, in tribute to her only child.

In a sign of the seriousness of the situation, President Emmanuel Macron called an early morning crisis meeting of his ministers, the Elysee announced.

There had already been clashes the pre- vious evening and while Wednesday night began calmly, unrest erupted in other French cities, including Toulouse, Dijon and Lyon before violence after midnight hit the Paris region, where around 2,000 riot police had been deployed.

“A night of intolerable violence against symbols of the republic, with town halls, schools and police stations set on fire or attacked,” Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin wrote on Twitter as he announced the 150 arrests figure. He expressed support for police but added in an apparent swipe at the hard-left:

“Shame on those who did not call for calm.”

‘Justice for Nahel’

In the region around Nanterre, masked demonstrators dressed in black launched fireworks and firecrackers at security forces.

A thick column of smoke billowed above the area where AFP journalists saw more than a dozen cars and garbage cans set ablaze and barriers blocking off roads. Graffiti sprayed on the walls of one building called for “justice for Nahel” and said, “police kill”.

In the working-class 18th and 19th districts of northeastern Paris, police fired flashballs to disperse protesters burning rubbish, but instead of leaving, the crowd responded by throwing bottles.

“We are sick of being treated like this. This is for Nahel, we are Nahel,” said two young men calling themselves “Avengers” as they wheeled rubbish bins from a nearby estate to add to a burning barricade.

One said his family had lived in France for three generations but “they are never going to accept us”.

In the Essonne region south of the capital, a group set a bus on fire after forcing all the passengers off, police said, while in Clamart a tram was set on fire. AFP

USCG: ‘Presumed human remains’ discovered in Titan sub wreckage

BRUSSELS—Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko could betray Russian mercenary boss Yevgeny Prigozhin, despite offering him refuge after his aborted mutiny, exiled Belarus opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskaya said.

“They’re not allies. They cannot trust each other,” Tikhanovskaya told AFP in an interview in Brussels on Wednesday.

“At any moment Lukashenko can betray Prigozhin, Prigozhin can betray Lukashenko.”

Lukashenko on Tuesday said Prigozhin had jetted into Belarus under a deal he mediated to end an armed rebellion by the Wagner mercenary group that posed the greatest challenge yet to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s rule.

Tikhanovskaya, who claimed victory against Lukashenko in 2020 presidential elections, said much remained unclear about the agreement. AFP

MEET THE PRESS. US President Joe Biden speaks to the press as he departs from

WASHINGTON—Experts have recovered presumed human remains from what is left of the Titan sub that imploded during a dive to the Titanic wreck, with the death of five people, the US Coast Guard said Wednesday.

“United States medical professionals will conduct a formal analysis of presumed human remains that have been carefully recovered,” the agency said.

On board were British explorer Hamish Harding, French submarine expert PaulHenri Nargeolet, Pakistani-British tycoon Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman, and Stockton Rush, CEO of the sub’s operator OceanGate Expeditions.

They presumably died instantly when the Titan sub, about the size of an SUV car, imploded under the crushing pressure of the North Atlantic at a depth of more than two miles.

Guard, gunman dead in shooting at US Saudi consulate

JEDDAH—Saudi authorities were investigating Thursday after an assailant and a security guard were killed in an exchange of gunfire outside the US consulate in Jeddah, the gateway city for the massive hajj pilgrimage taking place in Mecca.

The gunman and a Nepalese security guard both died after the exchange of fire outside the consulate on Wednesday evening, officials said, giving no possible motive for the incident.

“At 6:45 pm (1545 GMT), a man stopped in a car in front of the consulate building and got out with a weapon in his hand,” the official Saudi Press Agency quoted a police spokesman as saying.

“Security forces reacted... resulting in an exchange of fire that killed the assailant,” it said, adding that the Nepalese guard later died of his wounds.

The shooting coincided with the final day of the hajj at nearby Mecca. More than 1.6 million foreign pilgrims arriving on planes and boats have streamed through coastal Jeddah en route to the rituals.

“Security investigations are still underway to ascertain the circumstances” of the incident, the police spokesman said.

The gunman’s nationality has not been revealed. US officials said no Americans were hurt and that the consulate had been secured.

“We offer our sincere condolences to the family and loved ones of the deceased local guards member,” the State Department said in a statement in Washington.

“The consulate was appropriately locked down and no Americans were harmed in the attack,” it said.

The United States was in touch with the kingdom as it starts its investigation, the statement added. AFP

Iraq denounces ‘racist, irresponsible’ Koran burning in Sweden

BAGHDAD—Iraq has condemned as “racist” and “irresponsible” the burning of a copy of the Koran by an Iraqi living in Sweden during a protest authorized by the police.

Under a heavy police presence, Salwan Momika, a 37-year-old who fled to Sweden several years ago, on Wednesday stomped on the Koran before setting several pages alight in front of Stockholm’s largest mosque.

Police had granted him a permit for the protest in line with free-speech protections, but said later it had opened an investigation into the Koran burning which sparked anger across the Muslim world.

The incident occurred as Muslims around the world marked the Eid al-Adha holiday.

The Iraqi government in a statement issued late Wednesday strongly condemned “the repeated acts of burning copies of the holy Koran by individuals with extremist and disturbed minds”.

“These acts demonstrate a hateful and aggressive spirit that goes against the principles of freedom of expression,” it said. AFP

Mangled debris recovered from the small submersible was offloaded earlier in the day in eastern Canada, bringing to an end a difficult search-and-recovery operation. That debris will now be taken aboard a US Coast Guard cutter to a US port for further analysis, the organization said.

“There is still a substantial amount of work to be done to understand the factors that led to the catastrophic loss of the Titan and help ensure a similar tragedy does not occur again,” said the leader of the US probe into the tragedy, Captain Jason Neubauer. Television images showed what appeared to be the Titan sub’s nose cone and a side panel with electronics and wires hanging out being hoisted from a ship onto a flatbed truck at a Canadian Coast Guard terminal in St. John’s, Newfoundland. AFP

Iran takes Canada to ICC over terror compensation

THE HAGUE—Iran has taken Canada to the International Court of Justice for allowing victims of alleged terror attacks to claim damages from Tehran, the UN’s top tribunal said on Wednesday.

Tehran’s case claims that Ottawa, which listed the Islamic Republic as a sponsor of terrorism in 2012, had violated Iran’s state immunity.

Iran asked the Hague-based ICJ to make Canada overturn a law passed in the same year that allows victims to collect damages from state terror sponsors in Canadian civil courts.

“Canada has adopted and implemented a series of legislative, executive, and judicial measures against Iran and its property in breach of its international obligations,” Iran said in its filing to the court.

Tehran also demanded compensation from Canada.

Iran’s application cites a Canadian court judgment in 2022 that awarded more than $80 million in compensation to the families of six people who died when Iran shot down a Ukrainian airliner almost two years ago.

Ukraine International Airlines flight PS752 was downed shortly after take-off from Tehran on January 8, 2020, killing all 176 people aboard —including 85 Canadian citizens and permanent residents. AFP