Thai officials said a soldier who went on a shooting rampage and killed at least 21 people and injured 42 others has been shot dead inside a mall in northeastern Thailand.Officials said the soldier angry over a financial dispute first killed two people and then went on a far bloodier rampage Saturday, shooting as he drove to a busy mall where shoppers fled in terror.This is a photo of a wanted poster released by Crime Suppression Division of The Royal Thai Police, Feb. 8, 2020, showing the suspect in a mass shooting in northeastern Thailand.Defense Ministry spokesman Lt. Gen. Kongcheep Tantrawanich said Sgt. Maj. Jakrapanth Thomma was behind the attack in Nakhon Ratchasima, a hub for Thailand’s relatively poorer and rural northeastern region. Much of the shooting took place at Terminal 21 Korat, an airport-themed mall filled with colorful Lego sculptures, a merry-go-round and huge replicas of landmarks from around the world.Video taken outside the mall showed people diving for cover as shots rang out midafternoon Saturday. Many were killed outside the mall, some in cars, others while walking.People flee in terrorNattaya Nganiem and her family had just finished eating and were driving away when she heard gunfire.”First I saw a woman run out from the mall hysterically,” said Nattaya, who shot video of the scene on her phone. “Then a motorcycle rider in front of her just ran and left his motorcycle there.”Hundreds of people were evacuated from the mall in small batches by police while they searched for the gunman.Nakhon Ratchasima”We were scared and ran to hide in toilets,” said Sumana Jeerawattanasuk, one of those rescued by police. She said seven or eight people hid in the same room as her.”I am so glad. I was so scared of getting hurt,” she said.Shortly before midnight, police announced they had secured the above-ground portion of the mall, but were still searching for the shooter. About 16 hours later, officials held a news conference outside the mall to announce the gunman was fatally shot.The officials did not release any details.First victim: commanding officerDefense Ministry spokesman Kongcheep told Thai media that the first person killed was the commanding officer of the 22nd Ammunition Battalion, in which the suspect also served. He said the gunman had fired at others at his base and took guns and ammunition before fleeing in an army Humvee.City and neighborhood police officers, who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to release information, said the man fired shots as he drove to the mall. Thai Rath television aired mall security camera footage showing a man with what appeared to be an assault rifle.The man also posted updates to his Facebook page during the rampage.”No one can escape death,” read one post. Another asked, “Should I give up?” In a later post, he wrote, “I have stopped already.”A photo circulated on social media that appeared to be taken from the Facebook page shows a man wearing a green camouflaged military helmet while a fireball and black smoke rage behind him. Jakrapanth’s profile picture shows him in a mask and dressed in military-style fatigues and armed with a pistol. The background image is of a handgun and bullets. The Facebook page was made inaccessible after the shooting began.A person runs from a shopping mall during a Thai soldier’s shooting rampage in the city of Nakhon Ratchasima, Thailand, Feb. 8, 2020, in this still image obtained from social media video.Airport-theme mallMall Terminal 21 Korat, a multilevel glass and steel mall is designed to resemble an airport terminal, complete with a mock control tower and departure gates. A large model passenger jet dangles from wires beside one of the main escalators.Each of its seven retail floors is decorated to represent a different country. A giant replica of Paris’ Eiffel Tower soars to the ceiling, while a model of London’s Big Ben dominates another area, and a massive model of California’s Golden Gate Bridge spans an open courtyard. A two-story golden Oscar statue towers over a food court.Many malls in Thailand, including Terminal 21’s namesake in Bangkok, have metal detectors and security cameras at entrances manned by uniformed but unarmed security guards. Checks on those entering are often cursory at best.Mass shootings rare in ThailandGun violence is not unheard of in Thailand. Firearms can be obtained legally, and many Thais own guns. Mass shootings are rare, though there are occasional gun battles in the far south of the country, where authorities have for years battled a long-running separatist insurgency.The incident in Korat comes just a month after another high-profile mall shooting, in the central Thai city of Lopburi. In that case, a masked gunman carrying a handgun with a silencer killed three people, including a 2-year-old boy, and wounded four others as he robbed a jewelry store. A suspect, a school director, was arrested less than two weeks later and reportedly confessed, saying he did not mean to shoot anyone.
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The death toll on mainland China from the coronavirus outbreak reached 811 by late Saturday, surpassing the number of deaths caused by the SARS pandemic of 2002-03, Chinese officials said early Sunday. Eighty-nine people died of the illness on Saturday, China’s National Health Commission said Sunday morning. Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) is believed to have killed more than 774 people and sickened nearly 8,100 in China and the special administrative region of Hong Kong. The commission reported that new infection cases dropped Saturday for the first time since February 1, to 2,656, for a total of 37,198. Joseph Eisenberg, professor of epidemiology at the School of Public Health at the University of Michigan, told Reuters news agency it was too early to say whether the epidemic was peaking because of the uncertainty in the number of cases. “Even if reported cases might be peaking, we don’t know what is happening with unreported cases,” he told Reuters. “This is especially an issue in some of the more rural areas.” Passengers queue to board a cargo plane, chartered by the U.S. State Department to evacuate Americans and Canadians from China because of the outbreak of a novel Coronavirus, at Wuhan Tianhe International Airport in Wuhan, China, Feb. 7, 2020. …Among the new fatalities were a U.S. citizen in Wuhan, China — the epicenter of the outbreak — officials at the American Embassy in Beijing said Saturday. The embassy said that the 60-year-old American died February 6.A Japanese citizen was also reported to have died in Wuhan of viral pneumonia, likely caused by the coronavirus, although that had not been confirmed. WHO teamWorld Health Organization Director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Saturday that the organization would send an international team of investigators to China on Monday or Tuesday. Tedros did not name the team members, saying the organization would “publicize everything as soon as we’re ready.” The WHO said Friday that it was too early to confirm one Chinese official’s belief that the outbreak was about to peak. But WHO public health specialist Mike Ryan said Saturday that the number of new cases in Hubei province, of which Wuhan is the capital, had stabilized over the last four days, “which may reflect the impact of control measures put in place.” Hong Kong began enforcing Saturday a 14-day quarantine for arrivals from mainland China after more than 2,000 medical workers walked off the job earlier this week.   An aerial view shows the cruise ship Diamond Princess sailing off Yokosuka, Japan, in this photo taken by Kyodo Feb. 8, 2020.On Saturday, Japan confirmed three new infectious cases aboard the Diamond Princess cruise ship, moored off Japan, raising the total to 64. The 3,700 passengers, who are confined aboard the ship, face a 14-day quarantine. Fourteen days is the virus’ incubation period. Japan Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said passengers aboard Holland America’s Westerdam wouldn’t be allowed into the country because officials believed some were sick with the virus. The ship, with more than 2,000 people aboard and sailing near Okinawa, was seeking another port. On Friday, the United States said it was offering up to $100 million to China and other countries affected by the coronavirus to combat its spread.  U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, in making the announcement, said, “This commitment — along with the hundreds of millions generously donated by the American private sector — demonstrates strong U.S. leadership in response to the outbreak.” Trump praises XiEarlier Friday, U.S. President Donald Trump praised Chinese President Xi Jinping’s efforts to combat the coronavirus as Xi faced mounting domestic criticism following the virus-related death of a physician who issued an early warning about the outbreak. After a Friday telephone conversation with Xi, Trump praised China’s response and said Xi was leading “what will be a very successful operation.” Trump continued to applaud Xi on Twitter Friday, describing him as “strong, sharp and powerfully focused.” The death of the Chinese doctor who was censored by Communist Party authorities after warning of the new, then-unidentified virus in December has triggered an outpouring of anger online at party authorities for its tight control on information about the crisis. FILE – Chinese coronavirus whistleblower Dr. Li Wenliang, whose death was confirmed on Feb. 7, is shown in his protective mask, at the Wuhan Central Hospital, China.Police had accused Dr. Li Wenliang, who died Friday morning local time at Wuhan Central Hospital, of “spreading rumors online” and “severely disrupting social order.”     However, Li was widely praised by many, including by China Center for Disease Control chief scientist Zeng Guang. ‘Immortal'”A hero who released information about Wuhan’s epidemic in the early stage, Dr. Li Wenliang is immortal,” Zeng wrote on the Sina Weibo microblog page.    The ruling Communist Party’s People’s Daily wrote on Twitter, “We deeply mourn the death of Wuhan doctor Li Wenliang. … After all-effort rescue, Li passed away.” In response to the uproar in China over the government’s treatment of Li, the Communist Party announced Friday that it would send a team to Wuhan to “fully investigate relevant issues raised by the public.” There were more than 320 confirmed cases in at least 25 other countries, including one death in the Philippines — the first outside China — and one death in Hong Kong. 
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U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is warning American governors of the risks of doing business with China, saying competition with China is happening on a federal, state and local level and it has consequences for U.S. foreign policy and national security. Pompeo spoke Saturday to a National Governors Association meeting in Washington, telling the governors he knew they had likely been approached by people from China who wanted to invest in their states. He said economic ties with China could be mutually beneficial, just like in the first part of the trade deal President Donald Trump signed with China last month.But he warned that China had strategically assessed U.S. vulnerabilities and was seeking to exploit the openness of the American system to gain advantage over the U.S. at all levels.’They labeled each one of you’Pompeo told the governors that last year, a Chinese government-backed research institution in Beijing produced a report that assessed all 50 of America’s governors on their attitudes toward China.“They labeled each one of you friendly, hardline or ambiguous. I’ll let you decide where you think you belong. Someone in China already has,” he said.Pompeo said the report referenced many of the governors in the room by name, and he told them the Chinese Communist Party was “working” them and the teams around them. He said economic ties with China could be great and powerful, but also sensitive to national security, warning: “What China does in Topeka and Sacramento reverberates in Washington and Beijing and far beyond.”FILE – President Donald Trump meets with Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the G-20 summit in Osaka, Japan, June 29, 2019.Pompeo warned that in recent years China has not turned into a liberal democracy as many had hoped after the end of the Cold War. He said that under President Xi Jinping, China has gone in the opposite direction — more unfair business practices, more repression at home and more aggression in its military policy.He asked the governors meeting in Washington to be aware that China is important but is following its own strategic interests, and said he would deliver a series of speeches on China.Coronavirus aidPompeo said the U.S. was cooperating with China on many fronts, had sent nearly 18 tons of medical supplies to help fight the coronavirus and had offered to provide an additional $100 million in aid to China and other countries impacted by the virus. The secretary offered his condolences to the loved ones of a U.S. citizen who died in Wuhan, China, this week.Last Monday, the Chinese government accused the U.S. of overreacting to the coronavirus and not providing “any substantial assistance.”On Friday, Trump praised Xi’s response to the coronavirus, saying he was “sharp, strong and powerfully focused” on leading the counterattack against the virus, and he predicted that Xi would succeed. 
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Five British nationals including a child have been diagnosed with the new coronavirus at a French mountain village, and health officials said they were checking who else might have been exposed, including at local schools. In total, 11 people, including the five who tested positive, have been hospitalized in southeastern France and were being examined, the French health ministry said  Saturday, adding that none was in serious condition. The group of Britons included holidaymakers and a family currently residing in the Alpine village and ski resort, Les Contamines-Montjoie. They shared neighboring apartments in a chalet and temporarily hosted a British man believed to have contracted the virus at a business congress in Singapore before his short visit to France in late January, the ministry added. Two schools will be shut next week for checks, regional health official Jean-Yves Grall said, after it emerged that the 9-year-old who tested positive had attended lessons and French classes in different establishments. Two other children were also part of the group of 11 now in hospitals in the cities of Lyon, Saint-Etienne and Grenoble, and they had been schooled in the area, too, according to Etienne Jacquet, mayor of Les Contamines-Montjoie. Some parents in the village, nestled in the mountains close to the Mont Blanc peak and the Swiss city of Geneva, said Saturday that they had received little information so far and were being cautious. “Our children were meant to go to a concert tonight. We took the decision not to take them to not expose other people,” said Beatrice Louvier, adding that her 10-year-old daughter was in the same classroom as one of the three British children. Peak ski seasonThe cases coincide with one of the busiest periods of the ski season for area resorts, as schools in the Paris region begin midterm holidays. British schools will also be on midterm break later this month. Health officials said they were trying to determine who had come into prolonged and close contact with the British group. Several tourists who had just arrived in Les Contamines-Montjoui brushed off the risks and said they would see through their holidays. “The percentage chance of getting infected is not really high,” said Frenchman Stanislas Des Courtis, who was visiting with his two teenage sons. “The ski area is big, and there are not so many places where [people] can gather here all together.” But local resident Catherine Davout, who helps manage flat rentals in the area, said she had already had several cancellations. Business meeting The new cases emerged after authorities began to retrace the travels of a British man who has been confirmed by Britain to have contracted the virus, French health officials said. They had formed “a cluster, a grouping around one original case,” according to Health Minister Agnes Buzyn, who identified the person as a Briton who had returned from Singapore and stayed in France between January 24 and 28. The French government said Singaporean authorities were looking into a business congress that took place in a hotel there on January 20-23 and was attended by 94 foreigners, including the British man at the center of the Alpine cases. As of Saturday, Singapore had 40 cases of the virus. Of the 11 total cases in France, earlier ones include an 80-year-old Chinese man in a serious condition, while the others have shown signs of improvement, according to medical officials. The epidemic began in Wuhan, China, and the vast majority of cases have been in China. 
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A suicide bomber detonated his explosive-laden car Saturday night in front of a police center in southern Afghanistan, killing at least six police officers.The attacker used a military Humvee vehicle and the blast rocked the Gereshk district of the restive Helmand province, Afghan officials there told VOA. “The suicide attacker target was Gereshk’s main bazaar. The attacker wanted to cause a bloody incident, but blew up his explosives right after being identified by police,” Ismael Khpalwak, the Gereshk district police chief, told VOA.     “Six of our police officers were killed and a bridge was partially damaged,” he said.No group has claimed responsibility for the attack but Taliban insurgents are active in the province and have taken responsibility for such attacks in the past.
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Syrian government forces captured new areas from insurgents in their efforts to control a key highway in the northwest Saturday, as Turkey sent more reinforcements into the war-torn country, state media and opposition activists said.The weekslong government offensive has created a humanitarian crisis with about 600,000 people fleeing their homes in Syria’s last rebel stronghold since the beginning of December, according to the United Nations.Rebels control much of Idlib province and parts of the neighboring Aleppo region that is home to some 3 million people — many of them displaced from other parts of Syria.The Syrian offensive appears aimed for now at securing a strategic highway in rebel-controlled territory, as opposed to an all-out campaign to retake the entire province, including the city of Idlib, the densely populated provincial capital.“Our aim is to clear the highway and evict terrorists from it,” a Syrian commander on the ground told state TV. He was referring to the M5 highway, which links the capital Damascus with the northern city of Aleppo.The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, said government forces still have 30 kilometers (18 miles) of the highway to clear before it comes under full control of the army for the first time since 2012.Syrian state TV reported Saturday that government forces captured four villages in Aleppo province near the highway. It added that Syrian troops and demining experts have cleared explosives and mines from the recently captured town of Saraqeb that sits on an intersection where the M5 meets with the M4 highway, linking Syria’s coast with the country’s east.Syrian state media and the Observatory later reported that government forces captured the village of al-Eis and its strategic hill just east of the M5.The new push came as Turkey, a main backer of the opposition, sent more reinforcements into Idlib, according to the Observatory and Idlib-based media activist Taher al-Omar who is embedded with militants.The Observatory said a convoy consisting of 430 vehicles entered Syria since Friday night, raising the number of vehicles that entered Syria since last weekend to well over 1,000.A rare clash on Feb. 3, between Turkish troops and Syrian soldiers left seven Turkish soldiers and a Turkish civilian dead as well as 13 Syrian troops.On Friday, Turkey’s Defense Ministry warned the army would respond “even more forcefully” to any attack on Turkish observation posts in the area, adding: “Our observation posts will continue carrying out duties.”The violence has also raised tensions between Russia and Turkey, which have been working together to secure cease-fires and political talks, despite backing opposite sides of the conflict.
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A powerful inquiry on Australia’s bushfire crisis will examine the impact of climate change on the nation’s ability to prevent, mitigate and respond to natural disasters. The Prime Minister Scott Morrison is finalising the terms of a royal commission into the unprecedented disaster.Scott Morrison, the prime minister, says Australia must learn the lessons from the bushfire emergency. More than 30 people have been killed in the disaster that began in September, and 3,000 homes have been destroyed. Millions of hectares of land have been scorched.Morrison says a royal commission, Australia’s highest form of inquiry, will examine the impact of global warming on the fires, as well as other factors, including land management.“These fires have been fueled by one of the worst droughts on record, changes in our climate and a build-up of fuel amongst other factors,” Morrison said. “Our summers are getting longer, drier and hotter. That’s what climate change does and that requires a new responsiveness, resilience and a reinvigorated focus on adaptation.”The prime minister, however, has been accused of ignoring the dangers of climate change. Australia is one of the world’s largest emitters per capita of greenhouse gases. Coal dominates electricity production, and earns billions of dollars in exports.Within the ranks of the center-right coalition government there are lawmakers who dispute climate science and believe hotter, drier conditions are part of a natural cycle.But Greg Mullins, an environmental campaigner and former New South Wales fire chief, commends the prime minister for allowing the bushfire royal commission to examine global warming.“It is really encouraging to hear the prime minister saying this,” Mullins said. “It is encouraging to see the coalition shifting, apart from a few people who still question fact. If those terms of reference do put climate change front and center, because Australians need to understand, as fire chiefs do, how things have shifted and how much more dangerous the environment is these days because of climate change, because of the burning of coal, oil and gas.”More details of the scope of the royal commission are likely to be released in the coming days. Some of these complex inquiries can last for years, but given the urgency the bushfire investigation is expected to report by August.
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The World Health Organization is scaling up measures to keep Africa free of the deadly coronavirus by shoring up the continent’s fragile health system and by increasing preparedness efforts to tackle the potential spread of the dangerous virus to the continent.    WHO reports 31,211 cases, including 637 deaths inside China, and 270 cases in 24 countries and two deaths outside mainland China.The novel coronavirus has been moving with breathtaking speed since it was first detected in China’s Wuhan city in December.  While this pneumonia-like illness has been expanding to more countries around the world, it so far has not penetrated Africa.  This is of little comfort to WHO Regional Director for Africa Matshidiso Moeti.  She tells VOA watching the virus reach other continents around the world is of great concern.  “We know that there is quite significant travel of people from China to Africa and back.  So, businesspeople, both Chinese people working in different African countries.  And, we have an intense travel of African businesspeople, particularly going to China.  So, we are concerned.” Moeti says her team has begun working with member states to help them get ready for the possible onset of the coronavirus.  She says WHO is providing overall guidance to ministers of health on how to manage possible cases and prevent further spread of the disease.She says the experience gained in tackling the Ebola epidemic in the Democratic Republic of the Congo can be applied to a possible outbreak of the coronavirus on the continent.“We recognize that our countries have invested quite a bit in preparedness on the ongoing Ebola outbreak in the DRC.  And, we are seeing that in some of the key areas, that readiness is being now deployed in relation to this coronavirus outbreak.” WHO has identified 13 top priority African countries, which either have direct links or a high volume of travel to China.   They include important hubs in countries such as Angola, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, and Zambia.  Moiti says screening methods developed to detect people who might carry the Ebola virus are now being deployed at airport points of entry to spot people who might be carriers of the coronavirus. 
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Sam Mewis scored a pair of goals to help lead a dominant United States to a 4-0 rout over Mexico Friday, clinching a spot in the 2020 Olympics.FIFA’s No. 1 ranked women’s team, the U.S. women played up to their lofty status as they blasted Mexico in the semi-finals of the CONCACAF women’s Olympic qualifying championship.The U.S. advanced to Sunday’s final against Canada, also Tokyo-bound after defeating Costa Rica 1-0 in a tight match earlier in the day.The Americans had no such challenge in their home tilt at Dignity Health Sports Park in Carson, California.Rose Lavelle gave the team an early advantage with a goal in the fifth minute, while Mewis netted her first in the 14th.Mexico could do little to make an impression as the U.S. controlled possession.Mewis added her second score in the 67th minute, and Christen Press completed the scoring six minutes later.The U.S., now on a 27-match unbeaten streak, are keen to make amends for a quarter-final at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.Canada defeats Costa RicaFor Canada, Jordyn Huitema’s second-half strike earned the win over Costa Rica.Canada dominated possession in a frustrating opening half but lacked inspiration in the attacking zone, managing a single shot on target.The Canadians continued to press after the break and were finally rewarded in the 72nd minute when Huitema hit the post from close range but then coolly slotted the rebound into the back of the net for her seventh of the tournament.“I think the first thing I said to the team was, that’s my luck for 2020,” said Huitema. “I said that’s all of it right there that it came off the post and right back to my foot.”Eighth-ranked Canada, bronze medal winners at the 2012 and 2016 Olympics, have won all four of their matches and head to Sunday’s final against the U.S. having yet to concede a goal.
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