The latest deaths in the Aegean Sea came as Athens angrily defended its handling of the mounting refugee crisis in Europe.
Four babies and 10 young children — five boys and five girls — were among the 112 people on the stricken boat when it sank off the southern Aegean island of Farmakonisi, Athens News Agency reported.
Eight of the victims were found by coastguard frogmen in the hold of the boat.
Another 68 people were plucked alive from the sea while a further 29 managed to swim to safety on a beach on the island, the coastguard said.
The coastguard was also still searching for four children missing after another boat capsized on Saturday off Samos, a Greek island just off the Turkish coast.
The latest tragedies follow the death of a Syrian toddler whose lifeless body was photographed washed up on a Turkish beach, becoming a heartwrenching symbol of the plight of refugees fleeing war.
The International Organisation for Migration has said more than 430,000 migrants and refugees had crossed the Mediterranean to Europe so far in 2015, with 2,748 dying or going missing en route.
Interim Prime Minister Vassiliki Thanou on Sunday branded criticism of Greece, which has been on the frontline of the surge of migrants trying to reach Europe, as “unacceptable”.
“Greece is strictly applying European and international treaties without ignoring the humanity of the situation,” she said on a visit to Lesbos, an island which has been struggling with the massive influx.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Saturday called on Athens, already grappling with a deep economic crisis, to make more effort to protect the EU’s external borders.
“We have a second external border, that’s between Greece and Turkey, where we need protection. And this protection is at the moment not being guaranteed,” she said.
“Greece needs to take its responsibility… we will also speak with Turkey.”
Super Mario series creator Shigeru Miyamoto and video game music composer Koji Kondo are due to join as guests, while fans, many of whom are expected to appear in Mario’s blue overalls, red cap and moustache, will watch a live performance of the most well-known Mario music.
Since Mario first hit the screens under his own name on September 13, 1985, Nintendo has sold more than 310 million units featuring the plucky plumber’s adventures fighting off Goombas and Koopa Troopas as he races to save Princess Peach.
The character had earlier made an appearance in the Nintendo arcade game “Donkey Kong”, but under the name Jumpman.
With his distinctive uniform and moustache, the hyperactive little plumber is instantly recognisable, a rare quality in the games market.
“Mario now has a status in popular culture equal to Mickey Mouse,” Florent Gorges, the French author of a book on Nintendo’s history, told AFP.
In his best-known adventures, Mario comes to the rescue of Princess Peach, but our hero has also been inserted into formats featuring football, golf or karting.
The games have often been accompanied by technological advances, such as the fully three-dimensional format introduced by “Super Mario 64” in 1996.
To mark the three-decade milestone, Nintendo is releasing “Super MarioMaker” on the WiiU console, which allows players to create their own worlds forMario, or use those created by other players and shared through the Internet.
Nintendo is also eyeing the booming smartphone games market — a long awaited departure from its consoles-only policy.
The Kyoto-based company said in March it would create games based on its host of popular characters, but did not release any details about which characters would be made available to play on smartphones or tablets.
The company hopes to offset weakening demand for its 3DS portable game system by tapping into smartphone games market.
The ceremony, which gave out technical achievement prizes, came just eight days before the main Emmy awards show.
“Game of Thrones,” which has achieved cult series status, collected eight prizes in categories including special visual effects, casting and sound editing.
The fantasy saga has the most nominations going into the September 20 main Emmys ceremony, with 24 in total.
“American Horror Show: Freak Show,” starring Jessica Lange, followed next in Saturday’s awards with five prizes.
Alex Gibney’s “Going Clear” documentary and “The Jinx: The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst,” about the reclusive real estate figure suspected of murder, also fared well.
Sturgeon said her pro-independence Scottish National Party (SNP) would set out a timescale for a referendum in its manifesto ahead of regional elections next year.
“Our manifesto will set out what we consider are the circumstances and the timescale on which a second referendum might be appropriate,” Sturgeon told the Press Association news agency.
The manifesto is due to be unveiled at the SNP’s annual conference next month.
The party, which won 56 of Scotland’s 59 seats in May’s general election, pushed for a vote last year in which Scots voted by a margin of 55 percent to 45 percent against independence.
Sturgeon said it would be up to Scots to vote for or against the party manifesto and the referendum could be held “in five years or 10 years”.
A poll by Ipsos Mori for Scottish television channel STV showed 55 percent of voters in Scotland would back independence if there was another referendum.
“It doesn’t surprise me in the slightest that support for independence has risen in the past year,” Sturgeon said.
She said Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron’s government had reneged on a promise to grant Scotland sweeping new powers and had pursued harsh budget austerity policies.
Sturgeon said that pressure for a vote would also grow because of “scaremongering” about Britain’s membership of the European Union ahead of an in-out referendum which Cameron is planning to hold by 2017 at the latest.
Pennetta became, at 33, the oldest first-time Grand Slam women’s champion in the Open era with the 93-minute triumph.
“It’s a dream come true,” Pennetta said.
But only moments after accepting the trophy, she said she had decided to retire after her ultimate victory.
“This is the way I would like to say goodbye to tennis,” Pennetta said. “I’m really happy.”
The only other Italian woman to win a major singles title was Francesca Schiavone, who captured the 2010 French Open and set the former oldest first-timer age mark at 29.
“I’m really happy right now,” said Pennetta, a 150-1 longshot to win the title when the Flushing Meadows fortnight began.
“Before this tournament I never think to be so far. I never think to be a champion. When things come like this it’s a big surprise to me.”
Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi was among 23,771 in Arthur Ashe Stadium watching the first all-Italian women’s Grand Slam final of the Open Era.
Pennetta took the top prize of $3.3 million (2.9 million euros), while runner-up Vinci received $1.6 million.
Pennetta previously had won only $712,401 this year while Vinci’s 2015 prize money before Sunday was $422,158.
The breakthrough win came in Pennetta’s 49th Grand Slam appearance, the most needed for any women’s major champion, two more than France’s Marion Bartoli when she won at Wimbledon in 2013.
“Always when I was younger I was thinking to be number one,” Pennetta said. “I was also thinking to win Rome but I think Grand Slam may be a little better.”
Pennetta, ranked 26th, and Vinci, ranked 43rd, each played in her first Grand Slam final after pulling a semi-final shocker.
Vinci shattered the hopes of Serena Williams to achieve the first calendar Slam since 1988 with a semi-final win over the top-ranked defending champion whilePennetta dispatched Romania’s second-ranked Simona Halep.
“It was tough,” Vinci said of returning after the emotional drain of ousting Williams.
“I passed the 24 hours with a lot of things on my mind. I was really tired especially in the first set, but I was in the US Open final so I was really happy.”
Friends since childhood in southern Italy, Vinci, 32, and Pennetta had the oldest combined ages of any Open Era Grand Slam final duo, beating the former mark of just under 64 years from when Virginia Wade beat Betty Stove in the 1977 Wimbledon final.
“It’s tough to play against one player you know from a long time,” Vinci said. “Was tough today but I tried to do my best. Flavia played unbelievable today. Great match.”
Pennetta, who took a 6-4 lead in the career rivalry, leaped to a career-best eighth in the rankings with her 11th career title, the first since last year at Indian Wells.
The first US Open women’s championship match between Grand Slam finalist debutantes saw Pennetta force seven break points against Vinci before breaking through for a 3-2 edge in the first set.
Vinci hit a backhand crosscourt winner to earn her first break point in the eighth game and Pennetta netted a backhand to pull Vinci even at 4-4 on the way to a tie-break.
Pennetta won five of the last seven points in the decider, the last on a service winner to claim the opening set after an hour.
Pennetta broke Vinci for a 2-0 lead and moved ahead 4-0 when Vinci netted a backhand to surrender another break.
Vinci broke back in the fifth game, a Pennetta drop shot leading to a Vinci overhead smash, and held but Pennetta regained momentum with a lob winner to hold and grab a 5-2 edge, then broke for the win.
The death toll rose rapidly from an initial count of 20 after rescuers recovered dozens more bodies from the debris of the destroyed restaurant and neighbouring structures in the town of Petlawad in Jhabua district.
“Earlier we thought it was 104 based on various reports coming to us but now our own official information says 85 confirmed deaths,” M. L. Gond, an inspector in charge of Jhabua’s police control room, told AFP.
Arun Kumar Sharma, chief medical officer of Jhabua district, told AFP by phone from the local hospital that about 100 people were injured in the blast, 20 of them seriously.
The blast occurred at around 8:30 am local time (0300 GMT) at the restaurant where many office workers and schoolchildren were having breakfast, senior district police official Seema Alava said.
Television footage showed scores of people and rescue workers using their bare hands to shift mangled heaps of steel and concrete of the ruined buildings while police cordoned off the area.
Bodies covered in dust and ash lay in the streets alongside the twisted wreckage of burned vehicles.
Authorities suspect the intensity of the explosion may have been compounded by detonators and gelatin sticks, an explosive material used in mining, being stored either in the restaurant building or the neighbouring one.
“It looks like someone had stored those explosives, the ones used in mining, in one of the buildings. But only further investigation will reveal the exact details,” Alava told AFP from the site.
She added that the blast knocked down a neighbouring building and damaged several others.
Another district police official, Anurag Mishra, cited the restaurant’s proximity to a busy bus stand as a reason for the high number of casualties.
Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan took to Twitter to express his sadness at the loss of life.
“The Jhabua tragedy is heart wrenching. I offer my condolences to the families of the victims and pray for the speedy recovery of those injured,” Chouhan said.
He offered compensation of 200,000 rupees ($3,020) to the families of the dead and 50,000 rupees ($755) to help the injured victims.
Chouhan has also ordered an inquiry into the matter.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi followed suit and conveyed his condolences on the micro-blogging site.
“Extremely pained at the loss of lives due to the cylinder blast in Jhabua,” Modi said.
Domestic gas cylinder explosions are common in India, where safety standards are relatively poor.
But although reports of fatal accidents from cylinder blasts are frequent, mass casualties are unusual.
The 66-year-old socialist, whose policies have been compared to those of Greece’s Syriza and Spain’s Podemos, was named leader after clinching 59.5 percent of the 422,664 votes cast by Labour party members and supporters.
The newly-elected leader condemned “grotesque levels of inequality” and “an unfair welfare system” in his victory speech to party members in central London.
The veteran campaigner also called for Britain’s Conservative government to show more “compassion” in dealing with the Syrian refugee crisis and said he would attend a demonstration planned in London later on Saturday.
He said Labour was “united and absolutely determined in our quest for a decent and better society that is possible for all”.
North Islington MP Corbyn has electrified Labour’s leadership race, which was triggered by the resignation of Ed Miliband after he lost May’s general election to David Cameron’s right-wing pro-austerity Conservatives.
“The fightback now of our party gathers speed and gathers pace,” Corbyn added in his speech.
‘Jez we did’
The veteran MP comfortably beat the three other more centrist candidates in the race — Yvette Cooper, Andy Burnham and Liz Kendall — who all had far stronger support from fellow Labour MPs.
“Jez we did!” his delighted supporters chanted in the conference room in reaction to the decisive outcome.
Corbyn has spent a total of 32 years on Labour’s backbenches and only won a handful of votes from his own MPs — but was swept to victory on a wave of enthusiasm from Labour supporters following the end of the Miliband era.
The stunning result has however sparked talk of a deep split within Labour — which was thrown into turmoil by Cameron’s shock election win in May.
Corbyn’s triumph echoed anti-austerity sentiment across Europe because of his rhetoric about ending austerity cuts and taxing the rich.
His policies include spending more on public services like schools and hospitals, scrapping nuclear weapons, renationalising industries like the railways and involving Islamist groups Hamas and Hezbollah in Middle East peace talks.
“Jeremy Corbyn has won more than 50 percent of the votes in this round and I am therefore delighted to declare Jeremy Corbyn elected as leader of the Labourparty,” said Jim Kennedy, chair of Labour’s National Executive Committee, unveiling the result.
Cheering supporters welcomed the news wearing red “Team Corbyn” T-shirts reading and waving signs saying “I Voted For A New Kind of Politics”.
Corbyn drew strong support from students who had never voted before to older people disillusioned with Labour since it moved to the centre-ground of British politics under Tony Blair in the 1990s and led the country into the controversial 2003 Iraq war.
The result was widely anticipated with bookmakers having slashed the odds of a Corbyn victory from 100/1 outsider to 1/7 favourite.
The bearded, grey-haired vegetarian has crammed in 99 campaign appearances, eschewing soundbites and usually wearing sandals and carrying a cup of tea.
The MP was plastered over Saturday’s newspapers wearing a stripey cream T-shirt and navy blue shorts, alongside trainers and socks.
In a positive omen for Corbyn, lawmaker Sadiq Khan — who nominated the veteran left-winger for the Labour leadership — was elected as the party’s 2016 London mayoral candidate on Friday.
Sadiq Khan
Khan, who did not actually vote for Corbyn, comfortably beat Blairite former Olympics minister Tessa Jowell, boosting media speculation over a landslide for the Islington North MP.
Back to 1980s?
Popular right-wing tabloid The Sun described Khan’s “shock victory” as part of the “Jeremy Corbyn revolution” — but warned the victory could spark a deep split in the party ousted from power in 2010.
“A victory threatens to plunge Labour back to the 1980s, given his hard-left views on nationalisation, nuclear weapons, tax and business,” it wrote.
The left-wing Guardian also warned that some frontbenchers were unlikely to serve on Corbyn’s team due to “fundamental” differences that would “destabiliseLabour policies”.
But former mayor of London Ken Livingstone described Corbyn as a “consensual” politician who wanted proper discussions about the direction of the Labour party on key issues ahead of the next general election in 2020.
“It will work if Jeremy starts to connect with people,” Livingstone said.
Despite the “Corbynmania” of his grassroots campaign, Tony Blair — Labour’s most electorally successful leader who is now deeply unpopular over Iraq — has warned that his victory would split Labour and consign the party to electoral oblivion.
The clashes erupted when unknown gunmen fired at a police van patrolling the suburbs of Peshawar.
“One policeman was killed while four others were wounded in exchange of fire with militants. Two militants were also killed in the fight,” Rana Omer, a senior police official in Peshawar, told AFP.
“The militants fired at our mobile team which was on a routine patrol in Pushtakhara area at night. We responded to the gunfire and killed two attackers while one escaped after being wounded,” he said.
Another senior police official, Mubarak Zeb, confirmed the incident.
Peshawar has suffered numerous Taliban attacks but it was not immediately clear that who was behind this ambush.
The city suffered the worst terror attack in Pakistani history in December when Taliban gunmen massacred more than 150 people, most of them children, at an army-run school.
But recently then there has been a lull in violence. The last deadly attack in the city came in February when three heavily armed Taliban militants stormed a Shiite mosque, killing 21 people.
Pakistan has been waging a major offensive against insurgent hideouts in the tribal northwest for over a year in a bid to quell an Islamist insurgency that has raged for more than a decade.
Officials say nearly 3,000 militants have been killed since the launch of the latest offensive.
Camels will not be allowed to enter the holy sites of Makkah and Medina, the Permanent Committee for Fatwa said in a statement carried by the official Saudi Press Agency.
Hundreds of thousands of faithful from around the world have begun to gather for the annual Hajj, which is expected to begin on September 21.
“The Permanent Committee for Fatwa stressed no slaughter of the camels inside the holy sites due to emergence of corona virus,” the committee said.
Only sheep and cows will be allowed.
As part of the Hajj rituals, pilgrims traditionally slaughter animals and give the meat to the needy.
The World Health Organization has cited the preliminary results of studies indicating that people working with camels are at increased risk of infection from the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV).
Saudi Arabia is the worst-affected of more than 20 countries where MERS has appeared.
The Ministry of Health on Friday reported three new cases, bringing to 1,231 the number of infections since MERS was first identified in the kingdom in 2012.
There have been 521 deaths, including 19 in one week during late August.
MERS is considered a deadlier but less infectious cousin of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) virus that appeared in Asia in 2003 and killed hundreds of people, mostly in China.
MERS symptoms can include fever, coughing and shortness of breath.
“Flight 45 from Anchorage, Alaska, was met by local authorities upon arrival into Portland at 4:26 this morning following an incident involving an intoxicated customer,” the airline said in a statement.
Portland police said 26-year-old Jeff Rubin spent several hours in jail before being released. He faces charges of second-degree criminal mischief and offensive littering.
Crew and passengers on board the flight told police that the suspect slept through most of the three-hour flight but woke up shortly before landing and began relieving himself.
“Approximately 30 minutes prior to landing he stood up and began urinating through the cracks of the seat onto the passengers seated in front of him,” said the police report obtained by AFP.
“At some point Jeff Rubin lost his balance causing him to fall backwards and urinate upwards which got on the passengers and seats next to him as well as some other passenger’s personal belongings.”
