Tuesday, July 28, 2009 BAUCHI: Nigeria's security forces on Monday fought gun battles with radical Islamists who went on a rampage torching churches, police posts and government buildings in four northern states. Police put the number of dead from the weekend religious clashes at 55 in two states of Bauchi and Yobe, as of early Monday morning. In Borno state, heavily armed Islamist rebels torched a police headquarters, a church and a customs office in the border town of Gamboru-Ngala overnight before moving to the state capital Maiduguri where battles ran into the afternoon. A Nigerian Islamist sect styled on Afghanistan's Taliban burnt down a central prison in Maiduguri, two police stations, several churches, a government primary school and offices of a state unemployment bureau. "The situation has degenerated into big battles between the Taliban ... and the soldiers and police. Since morning, you can hear nothing but gunfire all over the city," resident Sanisu Ahamad told media by telephone as sound of gunfire could be heard in the background."Many government buildings have been burnt including the central prison and several churches. Streets are deserted. People are in their homes," he said. Several telecommunications masts have been burnt cutting off many parts of the city. Maiduguri is the Nigerian Taliban birthplace and stronghold and some neighbourhoods there are seen as Taliban enclaves.
Friday, August 14, 2009 MUMBAI: A 26-year-old woman died Thursday of H1N1 swine flu in the southern city of Bangalore, raising India's death toll from the virus to 20, authorities said.The death was the first reported in India's information technology capital, the Press Trust of India reported.Meanwhile in Pune, the worst-affected in India, two more victims of the virus died Thursday, raising the death toll in that western city near Mumbai to 12, the report said. The victims were an 11-month-old boy and a 75-year-old old woman.US media reported movie halls, schools and colleges were ordered closed Thursday for three days to a week in Mumbai, the commercial and financial capital of the country, as fear of the pandemic spread.Prajakata Lavangare, a spokeswoman for the government of Maharashtra state of which Mumbai is the capital, said similar orders were issued in Pune, which is also located in the state.The woman who died in Bangalore was identified only as Roopa, a teacher in...
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