Gas tanker truck explodes outside Mexico City, kills 20

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - A gas tanker truck exploded on a highway north of Mexico City early Tuesday, killing at least 18 people and injuring 36 others, the minister of public security in the State of Mexico said.

Fifteen vehicles and 20 houses were hit by the early morning blast, the official, Salvador Neme, said via Twitter.

Television footage showed burned out vehicles and debris strewn all over the highway on the edge of the capital.

In January, a massive explosion at the headquarters of state oil giant Pemex in downtown Mexico City claimed dozens of lives.

(Reporting by Dave Graham; Editing by Doina Chiacu)

View the original article here

38 die in mental hospital fire outside Moscow

MOSCOW (AP) — At least 38 people have died in a fire in a psychiatric hospital outside Moscow.

The Russian Investigative Committee said Friday that 36 patients and two doctors died late Thursday night — only three nurses managed to escape.

Investigators are looking at poor fire regulations and short circuit as possible causes of the fire.

Deadly fires are common in Russia because of wide-spread violations of fire safety rules.

View the original article here

Egypt: Clashes outside Copt cathedral leave 1 dead

CAIRO (AP) — Christians angered by the killing of four Christians in weekend sectarian violence clashed Sunday with a mob throwing rocks and firebombs, killing one and turning Cairo's main Coptic cathedral into a battleground.

The clashes raised tempers in an already tense political atmosphere, as workers shut down the country's trains in a strike over wages and a dispute over the nation's chief prosecutor entered a new phase — all signs of two years of unending turmoil.

Reacting to Sunday's violence, the Muslim Brotherhood's political party blamed "dubious" attempts by unnamed parties to broaden instability in Egypt by igniting sectarian violence and spreading chaos.

A liberal opposition group, the Popular Current, said the clashes were symptomatic of the failure of the state to protect its citizens, calling on Islamist President Mohammed Morsi and his government to resign.

Morsi said in a statement late Sunday that he spoke to Pope Tawadros II by phone. He gave orders to authorities to guard the cathedral and citizens in the area, adding that protecting the lives of Muslims and Christians was a state responsibility.

"I consider any attack on the cathedral as an attack on me, personally," he said, according to the statement from his office.

The clashes at the St. Mark Coptic Orthodox Cathedral began just after hundreds of angry Christians left the complex to stage an anti-government march following the funeral for the four Christians killed in sectarian clashes Saturday.

A mob, described by witnesses as residents of the area, pelted them with rocks and firebombs and fired birdshot, forcing them back inside the complex. Few police were present.

By the time police arrived in larger numbers, the church was the scene of clashes between those locked inside and the mob outside, as the two sides exchanged rocks and firebombs. Police fired tear gas, and gas canisters landing inside church grounds caused a panic among women and children. People outside the church cheered.

Tawadros was not in the cathedral, his headquarters, during the funeral and the violence that followed. In a statement carried by the state news agency, said he was "regretful" of the violence and called for calm.

"There was no security outside the church for such a large funeral," said Emad Thabet, a Coptic Christian who was among those locked up in the church for hours. "There is no such thing as Egyptians in Egypt. There are only Muslims and Christians," he said. Copts have complained for decades that the Christian minority suffers from discrimination.

Coptic Christians make up about 10 percent of Egypt's estimated 90 million people. Attacks against Christians have increased since the ouster two years ago of autocrat Hosni Mubarak.

The clashes took place alongside a development in another of Egypt's many crises — questions surrounding the legitimacy of the country's top prosecutor. On Sunday, Egypt's highest judicial body urged him to step down less than five months after Morsi appointed him. A few days earlier, a court ruling declared his appointment void.

The statement from the Supreme Judiciary Council urged the chief prosecutor, Talaat Abdullah, "to express a wish" to return to his previous job as a judge for the sake of the unity of the judiciary.

There was no immediate comment from Abdullah. Officials in his office and in the government indicated before that he will appeal the court decision.

Abdullah's appointment in December set off demonstrations and protests by judges and fellow prosecutors. The protests forced him to tender his resignation, but then he withdrew it and stayed in office.

Removing Abdullah has been a key demand of the mostly liberal and secular opposition. Sunday's call by the council of the judiciary appeared aimed at offering him an honorable exit, a step toward ending the long-running crisis within the judiciary over the appointment.

During the past two weeks, Abdullah has issued summons against several media celebrities critical of Morsi, Egypt's first freely elected president. They included popular TV satirist Bassem Youssef, who was accused of insulting Morsi and Islam. The satirist was released on bail.

Alongside the sectarian and legal issues, the overriding economic crisis flared as Egypt's railway services came to a halt Sunday because of a strike by train drivers and conductors demanding better pay. The strike snarled inter-city transit, and thousands of angry passengers crowded train stations.

The most immediate issue was the specter of sectarian violence increasing and spreading to the rest of the country.

Sunday's clashes grew out of Khossous, a town north of Cairo, where five people, including a Muslim, were killed a day earlier. Renewed clashes erupted there later Sunday outside the local church, leaving 12 residents and one police officer injured.

At the cathedral on Sunday, witness Ibrahim Elsherif said the clashes began when angry Coptic protesters tried to stop traffic for an anti-government march. A street brawl turned quickly into an attack by local residents, who pelted the protesters with rocks from the roofs of nearby buildings, throwing firebombs and firing birdshot, he said. Some protesters smashed parked cars.

One Coptic Christian was killed in the violence, and at least 66 people were wounded, the Health Ministry said. Two local journalists were among those injured, one seriously, according to their newspapers.

Video aired live on the private ONTV network showed young men on the roof of a building next to the cathedral firing handguns toward the compound.

Inside the cathedral, several thousand mourners chanted slogans against Morsi, calling on the Egyptian leader to step down. They shouted "Leave!" and "This is our country, we will not leave."

View the original article here

No radiation at Berezovsky home, no sign of outside role in death

By Olivia Harris

ASCOT, England (Reuters) - Specialist police with nuclear and chemical training searched the British home of former Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky on Sunday, a day after the fervent critic of Russian President Vladimir Putin died in unclear circumstances.

The 67-year-old, a former powerbroker who helped Putin climb to the top of Russian politics before falling from grace, fled to Britain in 2000. His body was found at his house in Ascot, 25 miles (40 km) west of London.

Police said his death was "unexplained" and sent experts in radioactive, biological and chemical threats to the house as they tried to piece together Berezovsky's final hours.

Berezovsky had survived assassination attempts and said he feared for his life after he became one of Putin's fiercest critics, repeatedly calling for him to be forced from office.

He was also a friend of Alexander Litvinenko, the former Russian spy who was poisoned with radioactive material in London in 2006, a murder that strained diplomatic ties between Britain and Russia.

However, associates said the man who personified the ruthless world of post-Soviet politics may have committed suicide or had a heart attack after the stress of losing a $6 billion (4 billion pounds) court case to Chelsea Football Club owner Roman Abramovich.

Police cordoned off the area around his house and closed roads. Berezovsky's body remained at the scene on Sunday morning, police said.

"It is important we take all necessary measures to ensure a full and thorough investigation can be carried out," said Superintendent Stuart Greenfield, of Thames Valley Police.

"Specially trained officers are currently at the scene, including CBRN (chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear) trained officers, who are conducting a number of searches as a precaution."

Berezovsky - seen by Moscow as a criminal who should stand trial for fraud and tax evasion - was humiliated in 2012 when he lost a legal battle with former partner Abramovich, over shares in Russia's fourth biggest oil company.

Some associates said Berezovsky had struggled with the cost of losing the case, estimated at the time as more than $100 million. Berezovsky had kept a low profile since the defeat and was rarely seen in public.

"My sources say it was heart failure," said Alexei Venediktov, editor of Russia's Ekho Moskvy radio. "After his recent loss in court against Roman Abramovich he was in deep depression."

(Writing by Peter Griffiths and Guy Faulconbridge in London; Additional reporting by Steve Gutterman in Moscow; Editing by Louise Ireland)

View the original article here

No radiation at Berezovsky home, no sign of outside role in death

By Olivia Harris

ASCOT (Reuters) - British police searched for radiation and chemicals at former Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky's home near London on Sunday but found none, and said there was no evidence anyone else was involved in his still unexplained death.

The arrival of a team of investigators searching for radiation briefly evoked the death of Berezovsky's friend Alexander Litvinenko, a former Russian spy poisoned with radioactive material in London in 2006. However, police gave the all clear on Sunday morning, saying no radiation had been found.

A day after the 67-year-old Berezovsky's body was found in the locked bathroom of his imposing country mansion, police said it was still unclear how he had died.

"It would be wrong to speculate on the cause of death until the post mortem has been carried out," said Detective Chief Inspector Kevin Brown, deputy senior investigating officer. "We do not have any evidence at this stage to suggest third party involvement."

Once known as the "godfather of the Kremlin", the former billionaire powerbroker helped Vladimir Putin rise to the top before falling out of favor himself and fleeing in 2000 to Britain where he became one of the president's biggest critics.

Officers had called in radioactive, biological and chemical experts after a paramedic's personal radiation alarm was set off. However, searches found no dangerous substances and police quickly lifted a cordon from the house, unlike in Litvinenko's case when locations across London were shut for days.

The interior ministry will conduct an autopsy to try to establish the cause of death, although that is unlikely to take place on Sunday, police added.

ASSASSINATION PLOTS

Berezovsky had survived assassination attempts, including a bombing that decapitated his driver, and said he feared for his life after he repeatedly denounced Putin and called for him to be forced from office.

However, friends said Berezovsky, once the personification of the ruthless post-Soviet era of a small group obtaining massive wealth and political power, had been depressed, had lost his fortune and may have committed suicide.

The Russian edition of Forbes magazine quoted Berezovsky as saying less than 24 hours before he was found dead that he lamented his exile and had lost sight of the "point of life".

"I do not know what to do. I am 67 years old. And I do not know what to do next," it quoted him as saying in an interview in the Four Seasons restaurant, which it said it conducted off the record but was publishing anyway because of his death.

"I've ... lost the point," Berezovsky said.

"Of life?" asked the interviewer.

"The point of life," Berezovsky replied.

Police stood guard outside Berezovsky's mansion, a French-style property with a swimming pool and lake in Ascot, a few miles from Queen Elizabeth's Windsor Castle, 25 miles west of London. Inside, detectives were carrying out a thorough search of the house.

Giving the first official details of Berezovsky's final hours, police said a concerned employee called the ambulance service at 1523 GMT on Saturday because he was worried that he hadn't seen Berezovsky since around 2230 GMT on Friday.

"The employee said that he forced open the bathroom door which was locked from the inside and discovered the body of Mr Berezovsky on the floor," police said. No one else was in the house when the emergency services arrived.

Detectives are speaking to Berezovsky's family and friends to "gain a better understanding of his state of mind", the police statement added.

Berezovsky was under pressure after losing a $6 billion court case to Chelsea Football Club owner Roman Abramovich, a former business partner he sued in one of the most expensive cases in British legal history.

Putin's spokesman said Berezovsky, seen by Moscow as a criminal who should stand trial for fraud and tax evasion, had written to Putin asking for forgiveness - a suggestion dismissed by one of the oligarch's friends.

"Berezovsky sent Vladimir Putin a letter he wrote personally, in which he acknowledged that he had made many mistakes, asked Putin's forgiveness for these mistakes and appealed to Putin to help him return to his homeland," said Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov.

A friend of Berezovsky's in London, Andrei Sidelnikov, told Reuters the idea that the businessman would write a letter to Putin was "complete nonsense".

"He was a sane person and he understood that he would never be able to return under Putin's regime, for political reasons," Sidelnikov said.

A former mathematician, Berezovsky made millions running post-Soviet car dealerships and expanded his business empire in the 1990s to encompass the ticket revenue of the flagship airline Aeroflot and control of the one of the main state television stations, which he openly used for political aims.

He was one of a handful of politically savvy businessmen who became instant billionaires under former president Boris Yeltsin when the state arranged for them to buy giant oil companies for what quickly proved to be a fraction of their value.

As one of the central figures in Yeltsin's inner circle, he helped forge the career of Yeltsin's hand-picked successor Putin, a little-known official named prime minister in 1999 and acting president when Yeltsin resigned on millennium eve.

After Putin was confirmed in the presidency in an election in 2000, Berezovsky quickly fell out with him and left for Britain where he denounced his former ally as a corrupt "bandit" surrounded by former KGB agents.

Berezovsky was humiliated last year when he lost his legal battle with Abramovich over shares in Russia's fourth biggest oil company.

Some associates said he had struggled with the cost of losing, estimated at the time as more than $100 million. Berezovsky had kept a low profile since the defeat.

In another financial blow, he agreed to pay one of Britain's biggest-ever divorce settlements to his former wife Galina in 2011. Local media said the settlement was believed to be more than $100 million.

"He had no money, he had lost it all. He was unbelievably depressed," Tim Bell, a public relations executive who was one of his closest British advisers, told the Sunday Times newspaper. "It's all very sad."

(Writing by Peter Griffiths in London; Additional reporting by Maria Golovnina and Guy Faulconbridge in London and Thomas Grove, Maria Tsvetkova, Alexei Anishchuk in Moscow; Editing by Peter Graff)

View the original article here