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Germany, Belgium floods: at least 100 dead, more than 1,000 missing

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(Last Updated On: July 16, 2021)

More than 1,000 people were missing and more houses were destroyed in flood-stricken regions in western Germany and Belgium on Friday where further flooding was feared with the death toll already over 100.

Entire communities lay in ruins after swollen rivers swept through towns and villages in the German states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate, Belgium and the Netherlands.

“It was terrible not to able to help the people. They were waving at us out of the windows. Houses were collapsing to the left and right of them and in the house between they were waving,” Frank Thel, a resident of Schuld, told Reuters in front of a pile of rubble in the town, where several buildings had collapsed. “We were lucky, we survived,” he said.

In Germany alone, more than 90 people have died in what is the country’s worst mass loss of life in years. That number was feared to rise further as more houses collapsed, while in Belgium media said the death toll was at least 14.

“The water had such enormous power! We were in the house, it blew the door open and I was thrown against the chimney- stove. That’s how much pressure the water had when filling the house,” Thel said of the shock in the night that changed everything for them.

“It just went so fast. We just couldn’t save anything. The water came so fast, I’ve never seen anything like that. We were on the bridge down there and I thought, this might be getting tight, and then it was over, the water rose and rose continually, and I realized, it’s useless now to try save anything. Car, gone, all gone, digger, gone, it was all gone.”

The Infrastructure has been destroyed completely, roads washed away, the sanitation system submerged and phone and internet networks are either completely down or instable, meaning lots of people cant be traced or accounted for.

“Here in Schuld the question today is: What can be cleared here now? Can we restore roads? Bridges have collapsed, making areas difficult to access. The infrastructure with water, electricity and the sanitation supply etc is difficult. We have to rebuild them. This has already happened here in Schuld. Downstream in Insul, people had to be evacuated yesterday and we still have to rebuild the infrastructure there,” firefighter Andreas Solheid, of the fire-fighter association of Adenau municipalities said.

In the neighbouring Ahrweiler district in North Rhine-Westphalia, around 1,300 people were missing the district government said on Facebook.

Mobile phone networks have collapsed in some of the flood-stricken regions, which means that family and friends are unable to track down their loved ones.

Further north, in Erftstadt near Cologne, several houses collapsed on Friday morning, and rescue crews were struggling to reach residents by boat. Roads around the town Erftstadt were impassable as they were washed out in the floods.

It was not clear whether there were any casualties as rescuers had to rely on walkie-talkies to relay information.

One dam close to the Belgian border, the Rurtalsperre, flooded, while another, the Steinbachtalsperre, was stabilised early on Friday. Some 4,500 people have been evacuated from communities downstream, and a stretch of the A61 motorway has been closed amid fears of a breach.

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IEA condemns Israel for confiscating 800 hectares of land in West Bank’s Jordan Valley

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(Last Updated On: March 29, 2024)

The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (IEA) strongly condemned on Thursday Israel’s decision to seize 800 hectares of land in the occupied West Bank’s Jordan Valley region.

In a statement, the Foreign Ministry said that the recent actions by “the Zionist regime demonstrate that it does not to adhere to international laws, especially international humanitarian law.”

“Continuation of such unilateral actions and ignoring the rights of Palestinian people will further deteriorate the situation,” the statement said.

“The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan expects international actors, particularly influential regional Muslim countries to fulfill their legitimate, human and moral responsibilities in supporting the oppressed people of Palestine and prevent the expansion of illegal settlements in the occupied territories,” it added.

Israeli media have reported that Israel seized 800 hectares of land in the Jordan Valley region of the occupied West Bank, claiming it as “state land.”

It is reported the seized land could be used for the construction of illegal Jewish settlements.

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ISIS-K leader reportedly living in Pakistan’s Baluchistan province

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(Last Updated On: March 28, 2024)

Sanaullah Ghaffari, also known as Shahab al-Muhajar, is reportedly the ISIS-Khorasan (Daesh) branch leader and is holed up in Pakistan, Reuters reports.

The 29-year-old took over as leader in 2020 and under his leadership the group has carried out extreme attacks as a means of recruiting, Reuters reported.

Reuters noted that little was known about Ghafari before the deadly 2021 ISIS attack on Kabul Airport, which killed 170 Afghan civilians and 13 American soldiers.

But after Friday’s deadly attack in a concert hall in Moscow, which left 139 people dead, Ghaffari’s group has come under intense scrutiny.

Reuters reports that Ghaffari is said to have been involved in several attacks in Afghanistan, Iran, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Pakistan.

Pakistani officials said months ago that Ghaffari had been killed in Kunar province in Afghanistan in June last year, but Reuters has reported that he did not die and instead fled to Pakistan and lives in the border province of Baluchistan.

Abdul Matin Qani, the spokesman of the Ministry of Interior of Afghanistan, says that Daesh has been suppressed in Afghanistan for more than two years and has lost its operational capacity.

The last attack carried out by Daesh in Afghanistan was the attack on the Kabul Bank office in Kandahar last week which left three dead and 12 wounded.

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IPL: Sunrisers thump MI in record breaking match

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(Last Updated On: March 28, 2024)

It was raining records at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad on Wednesday with the hosts Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) clinching a 31-run victory over Mumbai Indians (MI) in Match 8 of the Tata Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024.

Sunrisers’ batting rewrote the record books on a batting belter after the posted 277 for three.

SRH now have the highest team score in the history of the IPL – beating Royal Challengers Bangalore’s (RCB) 263 for five from the 2013 season.

In reply, MI made a spirited effort, and at one stage, were contenders to do the near impossible. In the slog overs, the enormity of the target proved a bit too much, and SRH clinched victory, but not without numerous nervous moments.

To put into perspective the carnage we witnessed – Heinrich Klaasen’s 23-ball half-century was the slowest fifty of the SRH innings.

Travis Head, playing his first match for SRH, raced to the milestone in 18 balls. Abhishek Sharma got there even faster – in 16 balls – to record the quickest fifty by an SRH batter in IPL history.

While Sunrisers notched up the highest total in the 16-year history of the IPL, just as incredibly, Mumbai Indians almost paid them back with the same coin, their batters coming out with a nothing-to-lose attitude.

The sixes kept rolling off the Mumbai bats too, helping them keep up with the asking rate for most of the chase, eventually however, they ran out of steam and finished on 246 for 5, the highest IPL total in a losing cause.

As ESPNcricinfo reported, never were more runs scored in a men’s T20 match (523). Never were most sixes hit in a men’s T20 (38). At the end of the close to four-hour six-fest, only two bowlers returned with an economy rate of under ten an over.

Thursday, March 28 : Match 9

Thursday’s match at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium in Jaipur sees Rajasthan Royals go up against Delhi Capitals.

Fans in Afghanistan can tune in to Ariana Television to watch the match live from 6.30pm. Alternatively the match can be screened live on arianatelevision.com

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