week 9-Shanghai new year stampede

Thirty-six killed in Shanghai stampede

Fri, Jan 02, 2015

People unable to contact friends and relatives streamed into Shanghai’s hospitals yesterday, anxious for information after a stampede during New Year’s celebrations in the city’s historic waterfront area killed 36 people in the worst disaster to hit one of China’s showcase cities in recent years.

The Shanghai government said 47 others received hospital treatment, including 13 who were seriously injured, after the chaos about a half an hour before midnight. Seven of the injured people had left hospitals by yesterday afternoon.

The Shanghai government information office said one Taiwanese was among the dead, and two Taiwanese and one Malaysian were among the injured.

The three Taiwanese work for the same accounting firm and were visiting China, Taiwan’s Straits Exchange Foundation said.

One sustained minor injuries, while the other was still hospitalized for further observation, foundation spokesperson Maa Shaw-chang (馬紹章) said.

The foundation contacted China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits and the Shanghai City Government’s Taiwan Affairs Office yesterday morning when it learned of the incident, Maa said.

Taiwan hopes the Shanghai government will look into the situation and offer aid as soon as possible if it receives any more reports of Taiwanese being injured, Maa said.

The deaths and injuries occurred at Chen Yi Square in Shanghai’s popular riverfront Bund area, an avenue lined with art deco buildings from the 1920s and 1930s when the city was home to international banks and trading houses. The area is often jammed with people during major events.

At one of the hospitals where the injured were being treated, police brought out photos of unidentified dead victims, causing dozens of waiting relatives to crowd around. Not everyone could see, and young women who looked at the photos broke into tears when they recognized someone.

A saleswoman in her 20s who declined to give her name said she had been celebrating with three friends.

“I heard people screaming, someone fell, people shouted: ‘Don’t rush,”’ she said. “There were so many people and I couldn’t stand properly.”

Xinhua news agency quoted a woman with the surname Yin who was caught with her 12-year-old son in the middle of crowds of people pushing to go up and down steps leading from the square.

“Then people started to fall down, row by row,” Yin said.

Shanghai No. 1 People’s Hospital vice president Xia Shujie told reporters that some of the victims had suffocated.

Relatives desperately seeking information earlier tried to push past hospital guards, who used a bench to hold them back. Police later allowed family members into the hospital.

CCTV America, the US version of state broadcaster China Central Television, posted a video of Shanghai streets after the stampede showing piles of discarded shoes amid the debris.

Yesterday morning, dozens of police officers were in the area and tourists continued to wander by the square, a small patch of grass dominated by a statue of Chen Yi, the city’s first communist mayor.

Steps lead down from the square to a road across from several buildings.

“We were down the stairs and wanted to move up and those who were upstairs wanted to move down, so we were pushed down by the people coming from upstairs,” an injured man told Shanghai TV.

“All those trying to move up fell down on the stairs,” the man said.

Xinhua quoted witness Wu Tao as saying some people had scrambled for coupons that looked like dollar bills bearing the name of a bar that were being thrown out of a third-floor window. It said the cause of the stampede was still under investigation.

Structure of the Lead：

Who - 36 Shanghai’s people

Where -  Shanghai

When - 31th, Dec, 2014

What - 36 people were killed

Why - Not given

How - Not given

Keywords：
stampede 踩踏
waterfront area  濱水區
jammed 卡住

week 8-Sydney cafe hostage

Inquest describes Sydney hostage crisis

Fri, Jan 30, 2015

Ricochets from police gunfire killed one of the two hostages who died in a 16-hour siege at a central Sydney cafe last month, an inquest into the deadly standoff heard yesterday.

Barrister and mother-of-three Katrina Dawson, 38, died along with cafe manager Tori Johnson, 34, and Iranian-born gunman Man Haron Monis, 50, when police stormed the financial district cafe in the early hours of Dec. 16 last year.

“Ms Dawson was struck by six fragments of a police bullet or bullets which ricocheted from hard surfaces into her body,” counsel assisting the coroner’s inquest Jeremy Gormly said.

“I will not detail the damage done to Ms Dawson other than to say that one fragment struck a major blood vessel,” he said. “She lost consciousness quickly and died shortly afterwards.”

Seventeen hostages were holed up in the Lindt Chocolate cafe, with the New South Wales Coroners’ Court likely to call on those who survived to give evidence during the inquest, Gormly said.

“Difficult as it may be for them, it seems unavoidable that they will be asked to give evidence,” he said. “They are our eyes and ears and memory of what happened during those hours inside the Lindt cafe.”

The inquest is set to outline what happened, hear about the hostages’ experiences, investigate how New South Wales Police managed the siege, and delve into Monis’ background and motivations.

A separate investigation commissioned by the Australian and New South Wales governments is set to submit a report in the next few days. The inquest will review the report’s findings.

The standoff shocked Australians, with thousands laying bouquets at a large makeshift memorial near the cafe.

Gormly said Johnson was shot in the back of the head by Monis with a sawn-off shotgun just moments after several hostages escaped.

“Johnson was made by Mr Monis to kneel on the floor of the cafe. After a short lapse of time, Mr Monis simply shot him — without further notice or warning — in the back of the head,” he said.

“The end of the barrel was about 75cm from Mr Johnson’s head at the moment of discharge.”

Outside the court, one of the hostages who escaped in the first few hours, 82-year-old John O’Brien, told news.com.au it was “upsetting” to hear about Johnson’s final minutes.

Gormly said the killing was witnessed by a police marksman, which led to the order for police “tactical operatives” to storm the cafe.

About 22 shots were fired by the officers after 11 flash bangs were thrown into the room, while Monis fired two shots, the hearing was told.

“Bullets and fragments of bullets hit Mr Monis, who was, it seems, killed instantly,” Gormly said. “At least two bullets — police bullets or bullet fragments — hit Mr Monis in the head and 11 other bullets — police bullets or fragments — hit him in the body.”

During the standoff, Monis fired a total of five rounds from his shotgun, which he took into the cafe on Dec. 15 last year at 8:33am.

None of the rounds struck anyone apart from Johnson, “although he appears to have been trying to do so,” Gormly added.

The inquest is to look into Monis’ claims that his actions were an attack on Australia by the Islamic State group — formerly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant — and whether he had any terrorist associations.

However, Gormly said that “at present it seems he had not established any contact” with the militant organization.Australia raised its threat level to high in September last year and carried out a series of counterterrorism raids following a flow of its nationals to Iraq and Syria to fight with the Islamic State and other extremist groups.

Structure of the Lead：

Who - one of the two hostages who died in a 16-hour siege at a central Sydney cafe last month

Where -  Not given

When - last month

What -  one of the two hostages who died

Why - Ms Dawson was struck by six fragments of a police bullet or bullets which ricocheted from hard surfaces into her body

How - Not given

Keywords：
inquest 審訊
stormed 衝
standoff 對峙
witness 目擊
terrorist associations 恐怖組織
militant 激進
extremist 極端

week 7-Mexico.missing students dead

Mexico ‘certain’ missing students dead: minister

Authorities in Mexico can now say with “legal certainty” that 43 students who went missing in September last year were murdered by hitmen working for a drug gang, Mexican Minister of Justice Jesus Murillo Karam said on Tuesday.

However, parents of the students in a case that convulsed the nation and countries abroad insisted the case not be closed.

The disappearance of the men — all aspiring teachers attending classes at a training college in Guerrero State — sparked nationwide protests and a crisis for the government of Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto.

Officials said the students vanished after gang-linked police attacked their buses in the city of Iguala, allegedly under orders from the mayor and his wife in a night of terror that left six other people dead.

The police then delivered the young men to members of the Guerreros Unidos drug gang, who told investigators they took them in two trucks to a landfill, killed them, burned their bodies and dumped them in a river.

The investigation “gives us the legal certainty that the student teachers were killed in the circumstances that have been described,” Murillo Karam said at a press conference.

Witness and expert testimony “have allowed us to ... come to the conclusion beyond a doubt that the students were abducted and killed, before being incinerated and thrown into the San Juan River, in that order,” he said.

“It is the historic truth,” he said.

He played a video with testimony from detainees and footage from the investigation.

Until now, authorities had still officially considered the students to be missing.

Relatives of the victims, who marched on Monday with several thousand people in Mexico City to mark the four-month mark since their disappearance, have refused to accept the official explanation of events.

For now, only one of the students has been positively identified from charred remains, which leaves little hope of finding the 42 others.

“We the parents repudiate the way in which today the attorney general has sought to close the investigation,” said Felipe de la Cruz, a spokesman for the relatives.

“We are not going to allow them to conclude or close the investigation,” he added, surrounded by activists and desperate parents.

The latter are clinging to the belief that the students remain alive and are in the custody of Mexican security forces.

De la Cruz said his people do not want the probe to be closed because so far only one set of remains corresponds to those of the missing students.

The investigation has determined that a man named Felipe Rodriguez, arrested on Jan. 15, gave key testimony to the effect that the students were identified as members of Los Rojos, rivals of the Guerreros Unidos.

Detainees in the crime said there were at least three from Los Rojos infiltrated among the students. However, prosecutors have no proof of this.

Prosecutors say Rodriquez was the head of the Guerreros Unidos hitmen squad and gave the order to kill the students. He and other suspects will be charged with murder.

The detained former mayor of Iguala, Jose Luis Abarca, accused of giving the initial order to attack the students, is allegedly one of the leaders of the Guerreros Unidos.

Structure of the Lead：

Who - 43 students

Where - Mexico

When - In September last

What - 43 students who went missing in September last year were murdered by hitmen working for a drug gang

Why - Not given

How - Not given

Keywords：
convulse 震撼
aspiring 有抱負
terror 恐怖
incinerate 焚燒
testimony  證詞
charred 燒焦的

week6 - Canadian Parliament. Ottawa. shooting. gunman

Footage shows man’s parliament attack

Sat, Oct 25, 2014 

Canadian police have released dramatic surveillance footage showing the moment a gunman suspected of planning to travel to Syria to fight alongside Islamic militants breached security at parliament after shooting dead a soldier.

The footage emerged on Thursday as officials said they had found no evidence of a wider plot following another deadly attack on Monday — also by a young Canadian convert to Islam who had sought to leave for Syria.

Canadian authorities were scrambling to probe the background of the young men, the first of whom ran his car over a soldier, killing him, and another who shot a soldier at a war memorial before storming parliament and being gunned down.

“These are difficult threats to detect,” Royal Canadian Mounted Police Commissioner Bob Paulson said. “There is no way of knowing where or when such an attack could take place.”

Paulson said the gunman in Wednesday’s attack on parliament, identified as 32-year-old Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, had been in Ottawa applying for a passport to travel to war-torn Syria.

It remained unclear whether Zehaf-Bibeau “received any support in the planning of his attack,” he added.

His comments came as video surveillance footage showed how the gunman took less than four minutes to gun down army reservist Corporal Nathan Cirillo and make his way into parliament, where he exchanged fire with police and parliamentary security.

In the House of Commons on Thursday, members applauded Sergeant-at-Arms Kevin Vickers, who fired the shot that stopped Zehaf-Bibeau.

Vickers, a veteran of the Royal Canadian Mountain Police appointed to lead the parliamentary security team and wield the ceremonial mace, has become an inspiration to Canadians struggling to comprehend how two of their countrymen could turn against their homeland.

“The objective of these attacks was to instill fear and panic in our country and to interrupt the business of government,” Prime Minister Stephen Harper told the chamber as business resumed. “Well, members, as I said yesterday, Canadians will not be intimidated. We will be vigilant but we will not run scared.”

“We will be prudent, but we will not panic and as for the business of government, well, here we are, in our seats, in our chamber in the very heart of our democracy and our work,” he added.

Harper then crossed the floor to shake Vickers’ hand and to hug opposition leaders.

Wednesday’s attack on parliament came two days after 25-year-old Martin Couture-Rouleau ran over two soldiers in a Quebec parking lot, killing one of them, before being shot dead by police.

Both assailants had sought to travel to Syria where they might have joined Islamist extremists waging war abroad, officials have said.

Police chief Paulson insisted that Zehaf-Bibeau acted alone and investigators have so far not uncovered any connection between the two attackers.

“Our investigation has not revealed any link between Zehaf-Bibeau and Martin Couture-Rouleau,” Paulson told reporters.

Canada has never before been hit by Muslim militant violence, but it has been threatened in militant broadcasts over its role in US-led air strikes in Iraq targeting the Islamic State (IS), formerly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.

Some Canadians are thought to have traveled to the Middle East to join the group, and others are thought to have developed radical ideas at home, living among Canada’s Muslim minority.

Harper on Thursday placed a bouquet of flowers at the war memorial in the Canadian capital to honor Cirillo, an unarmed soldier on ceremonial guard at a war memorial on Parliament Hill in downtown Ottawa.

A large crowd had gathered at the site, still cordoned off with yellow police ribbon, to pay their respects.

Canada’s Muslim community is nervous that the attacks will stir animosity against it, and its leaders were quick to denounce the violence and vow to keep a closer eye on troubled believers.

Imam Sikander Hasni of the Kanata association, who works at the capital’s mosque, said he and his colleagues had worked closely with police and had tipped them off to an earlier plot.

“Something needs to be done, but at the same time, I think there’s a realization that sometimes there is not very much that can be done,” he said.

Structure of the Lead：

Who - A gunman suspected of planning to travel to Syria to fight alongside Islamic militants

Where - At parliament

When - Not given

What - Shoot dead a soldier

Why - Not given

How - Not given

Keywords：

surveillance footage 監控錄像

breached security 繞過安檢

scramble 爭奪

storm 強攻

instill 灌輸

assailants 襲擊者

cordoned off 封鎖

denounce 聲討

tipped off 通風報信

week5 - Japan volcano eruption Mount Ontake

Volcanic eruption strands 250 in Japan

Sun, Sep 28, 2014

A Japanese volcano erupted yesterday, spewing ash and small rocks into the air and leaving seven people unconscious, eight seriously injured and more than 250 stranded on the mountain, officials and media said.

A thick, rolling, gray cloud of ash rose into the sky above Mount Ontake close to where TV footage showed hikers taking pictures. Trekkers and residents were warned of falling rock and ash within a 4km radius.

“It was like thunder,” a woman told broadcaster NHK of the first eruption at the volcano in seven years. “I heard ‘boom, boom,’ then everything went dark.”

Japan’s Meteorological Agency said the volcano, which straddles Nagano and Gifu prefectures 200km west of Tokyo, erupted just before midday and sent ash pouring down the mountain’s south slope for more than 3km.

There was no sign of lava from the TV footage.

The eruption forced aircraft to divert their routes, but officials at Tokyo’s Haneda airport and Japan Airlines said there were no disruptions to flights in and out of the capital.

NHK quoted a Nagano prefectural official as telling a government meeting that seven people were unconscious and eight others seriously wounded.

Police said that more than 250 hikers were stranded on the mountain, which is 3,067m high and last erupted in 2007.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who returned from the US yesterday, said he had issued instructions to mobilize the military to help in the rescue effort.

“Nearly 200 people are in the process of descending the mountain, but we are still trying to figure out details. I instructed to do all we can to rescue the people affected and secure the safety of the trekkers,” Abe told reporters.

Nagano police sent a team of 80 to the mountain to assist the climbers who were making their way down, while Kiso Prefectural Hospital, near the mountain, said it had dispatched a medical emergency team.

“We expect a lot of injured people so we are now getting ready for their arrival,” an official at the hospital said.

More than five hours after the initial eruption, the thick ash cloud showed no signs of abating, NHK TV showed.

“It’s all white outside, looks like it has snowed. There is very bad visibility and we can’t see the top of the mountain,” Mari Tezuka, who works at a mountain hut for trekkers, told reporters. “All we can do now is shut up the hut and then we are planning on coming down.”

Structure of the Lead：

Who - A Japanese volcano

Where - In Japan

When - Saturday, Sep 27, 2014

What - A Japanese volcano erupted

Why - Not given 

How - Not given

Keywords：

erupt 爆發

spew 噴

unconscious 昏迷

slope 坡

lava 岩漿

dispatch 派遣

abating 減弱

week 5-Ebola

No US Ebola warning, CDC says

2014-10-02  03:00

The Centers for Disease Control （CDC） yesterday said that it currently does not plan to raise the travel warning for the US, which saw its first imported case of Ebola confirmed on Tuesday.

“Judging from the quality and standards of the US’ public health and medical systems, the centers do not see the need to raise the travel notice for the country at the moment,” CDC Deputy Director-General Chou Jih-haw （周志浩） said.

Chou said that the infected patient has been kept in isolation and the possibility of the highly contagious disease spreading across the US seems rather low, adding that the centers would only consider issuing a travel warning if US-based Taiwanese or Taiwanese visitors to the country were at risk of contracting Ebola.

According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the patient was confirmed to have Ebola through laboratory tests after he traveled to Dallas, Texas, from Liberia, where an outbreak of the virus has killed about 1,830 people.

The person developed symptoms about four days after arriving in the US on Sept. 20, before seeking medical care at the Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital of Dallas on Friday last week and being admitted on Sunday.

The US agency does not advise people on the same flight as the ill person to undergo monitoring, as Ebola is only contagious when an infected person is exhibiting active symptoms.

The WHO statistics show that as of Monday, a total of 6,572 cases of Ebola have been reported, including 3,459 in Liberia, 2,021 in Sierra Leone, 1,071 in Guinea, 20 in Nigeria and one in Senegal.

In response to the quickly spreading outbreak, Taiwan’s CDC set up an emergency task force on Aug. 8. It has also issued a level-3 warning against travel to Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea, as well as a level-2 alert for Nigeria.

Structure of the Lead：

Who -The Centers for Disease Control （CDC）

Where-Not given

When -2014-10-01

What - It currently does not plan to raise the travel warning for the US, which saw its first imported case of Ebola confirmed on Tuesday.

Why - Judging from the quality and standards of the US’ public health and medical systems, the centers do not see the need to raise the travel notice for the country at the moment

How - Not given

Keywords：
confirm 證實
raise 提出
infect 感染
contagious 傳染
contract 感染
outbreak 爆發
symptoms 症狀

‘Ice Bucket’ gives ALS group boost

Sun, Aug 24, 2014

The Ice Bucket Challenge that recently spread from the US to Taiwan has raised large sums of money for local amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) patients within a short period of time, with many attributing the campaign’s success to the power of viral marketing.

Between last Sunday and Thursday, the Taiwan Motor Neuron Disease Association received a total of NT$13 million (US$433,091) in donations, it said.

That is about 43 percent of the about NT$30 million that the association typically receives in donations over an entire year, association head Liu Yen-chu said.

Liu said the association will use the money to provide better long-term care for people with ALS — also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease — and improve the financial conditions of the patients’ families.

The Ice Bucket Challenge went viral on social media in the middle of the year, and from July 29 to Sunday last week, the US-based ALS Association received US$53.3 million in donations, it has said.

Many Taiwanese public figures have taken on the task, which involves pouring ice water over the head or donating money — or both — and challenged more to participate.

Taiwan Foundation for Rare Disorders deputy chief executive Yang Yung-Shiang said the challenge has raised public awareness of rare disorders in the nation and has been a big encouragement for people working in that sector.

Local academic institutions lack funding to study rare diseases, said Liu Ho-chien , CEO of the Spinal Cord Injury Foundation and former secretary-general of the Taiwan Spinocerebellar Ataxia Association.

There are 201 diseases classified as rare in the nation, 70 percent of which are not treatable, Yang said.

While the National Health Insurance Administration covers some of these patients’ medical needs, other costs, such as for care and assistance, are still a huge burden for the patients’ families, he added.

Liu and Yang urged the public to continue donating to and helping raise awareness of patients with rare disorders, and not allow the Ice Bucket Challenge to be just another Internet fad.
Structure of the Lead：

Who - Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) patients
When - Not given
What - Ice Bucket Challenge
Why - Raise large sums of money for local ALS patients
Where - From the US to Taiwan
How - With many attributing the campaign’s success to the power of viral marketing

Keywords：
viral 病毒
donations 捐贈
executive 執行