Tianjin, the world’s third-largest port in terms of total cargo volume, was hit on Aug 12 by blasts that damaged a large industrial area and sent shockwaves across several kilometres.
Insurance companies including Zurich Insurance Group AG and Allianz SE said they had received claims from clients that had been affected by the disaster but could not provide any estimate of the potential losses.
“Based on the available information, we do not anticipate major financial claims to arise from this incident, but we continue to assess the situation,” Allianz, Europe’s largest insurer, said in a statement.
Chinese insurers are also expected to be affected.
“It is still very early to determine the level of insured losses, but the event is likely to be large with initial insured loss estimates of $1-$1.5bn and a large number of insurance companies affected,” analyst Arjan van Veen said on Monday in a note, in which he compiled estimates from a range of Chinese media reports.
Credit Suisse said those affected would be mostly Chinese insurance companies as well as international groups that either insure multinationals or provide re-insurance coverage.
As of Monday evening, global automakers had confirmed 4,950 cars were damaged in the blast, with most saying the vehicles were insured but declining to provide additional details.
Bencic needed nearly two hours and 30 minutes on a sweltering centre court to see off a determined Halep 7-6(5) 6-7(4) 3-0 and claim the biggest title of her young career, putting down a marker as a player to watch at the upcoming U.S. Open.
The 18-year-old’s Rogers Cup debut was a memorable one as Bencic’s drive to the title included a stunning semi-final upset of world number one Williams and two former number ones in fourth seed Caroline Wozniacki and fifth seed Ana Ivanovic.
“I’m really sorry it had to end like this, I am really sorry for Simona, I hope she will be fine for the next tournament,” said Bencic, the first Swiss woman to reach the final of the Rogers Cup since her mentor Martina Hingis in 2006.
“For me it has been an incredible week, I cannot believe it. A win is a win and I had to fight really hard today.”
It was Bencic’s second title in two months, following her breakthrough win at the Aegon International on grass in England in June. She arrived in Toronto ranked 20th in the world.
Halep produced a gutsy effort but the Romanian appeared in trouble right from the start as she struggled with the heat and a sore left thigh that required treatment throughout the match, including a medical time out when medical staff checked her blood pressure.
“In the first set I felt a little bit muscle and then it was going to the knee and in the second set I felt bad, like stomach cramps and dizzy and stuff like that,” explained Halep. “I was thinking that I need a miracle to finish the match.
“I tried just to finish the match, but at 3-0 I said it is no sense to continue, and I stopped.”
Down 5-3 in the second and with Bencic serving for the match, the 23-year-old Halep dug deep into her reserves and forced the set to a tiebreak which she won to thundering applause from the sun-baked crowd.
But the effort to force a third set proved too much.
Trailing 3-0, Halep went to her chair during the changeover and then quickly rose and walked over to Bencic and shook hands, telling her she could not continue.
“I don’t know why I continued to play, maybe for the fans,” said Halep. “They were like screaming all the time to push me to still play.
“I have no idea why I still played the second set but I did great, and I’m happy that I could find the power to win the second set.”
Top seed Djokovic defeated unseeded Jeremy Chardy of France 6-4 6-4 in the earlier semi-final.
A three-time champion on the Canadian hardcourts, Djokovic has a 19-8 career record against Murray and has won their last eight meetings since the Scot beat Djokovic in the 2013 Wimbledon final. Murray has claimed two Canadian titles.
Djokovic, who received treatment on a sore right elbow several times during changeovers, showed no signs of distress on the court as he dismissed Chardy in a tidy one hour, 20 minutes to run his record to 10-0 against the Frenchman.
“I didn’t allow Jeremy to find his forehand too much; one break per set was enough to win the match, could have done some things better but a win is a win,” said Djokovic, who did not face a break point the entire match.
“It the (elbow trouble) comes and goes, now is not very pleasant.
“Every day is a new day, I try to bury the pain, play with the pain, it is part of what we do.”
He said it was par for the course for every athlete in professional sport to have “something troubling” him.
Chardy, who needed three hours and three tiebreaks to get past John Isner in the quarter-finals, got the match off to a shaky start when he handed Djokovic a break, with the help of a couple of double faults, to open the match.
That was all Djokovic would need with Chardy unable to apply kind of any pressure.
Djokovic got the only break of the second set in the fifth game and then held serve as Chardy again left the court without taking a set from the Serb.
It was a welcome low-stress match for the Serbian, who was pushed the brink of elimination in his Friday quarter-final, during which he survived two match points to beat 87th-ranked Latvian Ernests Gulbis.
In the late semi-final, Nishikori appeared to be fatigued in the second set as Murray won 12 of the final 13 points.
“I think I’m more tired,” the Japanese fourth seed said.
“Everything was sore these couple of days. Today it got a little bit worst so I couldn’t really move 100 per cent.
“Especially after the first set, I was feeling it more and more. At the beginning of the first set I was okay, but after that I wasn’t the same player.”
Compton, which the 50 year-old rapper has dedicated to his Californian birthplace of the same name, outperformed its nearest competitors by over 28,000 combined chart sales, the Official Charts Company said.
Puth’s second British Number 1 finished the week with sales of over 94,000 after entering the tally the week before, and it marked another success for Trainor whose debut single spent four weeks at Number 1 last October.
Calvin Harris and Disciples’ “How Deep Is Your Love” stayed firm at number two on the singles charts, having been streamed over 2.21 million times in the last seven days, and the Weeknd’s “Can’t Feel My Face” jumped five places to number three.
Former chart-toppers Little Mix’s “Black Magic” and Lost Frequencies’ “Are You With Me” rounded out the top five.
Dr Dre’s return comes after a successful stretch in the producer’s seat during which he fostered hip-hop artists such as Eminem, 50 Cent and Timbaland. He also became a successful entrepreneur and sold his headphone company Beats to Apple for 3 billion dollars in 2014.
Elsewhere in the album charts, British folk singer Frank Turner’s “Positive Songs For Negative People” was at number two and British singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran’s “x” at number three.
Trailing for most of the match after being all out on the opening day for 183, the hosts scythed through the Indian order with 37-year-old Herath adding six wickets to his overnight dismissal of opening batsman Lokesh Rahul for his 22nd five-wicket haul in tests.
Off-spinner Tharindu Kaushal, who took five wickets in the first innings, provided superb support by picking up three more in the second innings as India, who resumed the day on 23-1, were shot out for 112 an hour after lunch.
Ajinkya Rahane (36) was the only Indian batsman to provide some resistance but he too fell to Herath, edging the wily spinner to home captain Angelo Mathews at slip.
Sri Lanka looked dead and buried on 95-5 on Friday after conceding a first-innings lead of 192 but Dinesh Chandimal’s swashbuckling unbeaten 162 allowed them to stage a fightback and set India a victory target of 176.
The hosts, who lost their last test series at home to Pakistan, put immense pressure on India with tight bowling and some smart catches.
India failed to find scoring opportunities, with first-innings centurion Shikhar Dhawan, unbeaten on 13 overninght, taking 36 balls to score his first run in the morning.
That came from a streaky four with the ball narrowly missing the leg stump after taking an edge.
Herath, who has been off form lately and went wicketless in the first innings, struck with his first ball of the day, sending nightwatchman Ishant Sharma out leg before.
He also accounted for the wickets of Rohit Sharma, wicketkeeper Wriddhiman Saha, Harbhajan Singh and Ravichandran Ashwin, while Kaushal picked up India captain Virat Kohli and then took a sharp return catch to send back Dhawan.
Rohit Sharma looks dejected after being dismissedHarbhajan Singh was caught outSri Lankan team celebrate the dismissal of Virat Kohli
Amit Mishra was the final man out to Kaushal, sparking wild celebrations by the Sri Lankans.
The second test, the last for retiring Sri Lankan batting stalwart Kumar Sangakkara, will start on Thursday in Colombo.
Sri Lankan veteran Kumar Sangakkara being carried out in the field by his team mates
The White House on Friday released two music sets “hand-created” by the president of the United States for daytime and evening listening as part of the launch of a new channel on the popular music-streaming service. And there is more to come.
“You can expect to see the White House share playlists created by people in the White House, as well as playlists curated around events and issues to engage the public,” a White House official said in an email.
Obama, who is vacationing with his family on the Massachusetts island of Martha’s Vineyard and playing a lot of golf, is a music lover. He has made headlines on rare moments when he has grabbed a microphone in public and crooned.
His summer music selections contain a wide variety of artists from Beyoncé to Bob Dylan. The two playlists, provided by the White House, are listed below:
“Ain’t Too Proud to Beg” – The Temptations
“Live It Up” – The Isley Brothers
“Memories Live” – Talib Kweli & Hi Tek
“Tombstone Blues” – Bob Dylan
“So Much Trouble in the World – Bob Marley & The Wailers
“Paradise” – Coldplay
“Tengo Un Trato” (Remix) – Mala Rodriguez
“Wang Dang Doodle” – Howlin’ Wolf
“Another Star” – Stevie Wonder
“Hot Fun in the Summertime” – Sly & The Family Stone
Opening batsman David Warner will be Smith’s deputy in the test and one-day international formats, Cricket Australia said in a statement.
Clarke announced his decision to quit international cricket after England won the fourth test at Trent Bridge last week to regain the Ashes.
The 26-year-old Smith was expected to take the role having previously led the team when he replaced the injured Clarke as captain for three tests during the home series against India.
National selector Rod Marsh said Australia had no doubt that Smith was the right man for the job.
“We have had a clear succession plan in place for the captaincy with Steve Smith gaining valuable experience leading the Australian test team while Michael Clarke was recovering from injury last season,” Marsh said in the statement.
“When Michael made his decision to retire last week it was a very straight forward decision for us to nominate Steve as his successor.
“He has big shoes to fill but everything about him suggests he is the right man for the job. At 26, he is a fine young man with extraordinary talent, excellent leadership qualities and a terrific temperament.
“He is highly regarded by the selectors and we congratulate him on being appointed to the role on an ongoing basis. He should be incredibly proud.”
Smith has clearly been Australia’s best batsman in the last year but his team is certain to have a very different complexion when they embark on a two-test tour of Bangladesh in October.
Wicketkeeper Brad Haddin, Chris Rogers and Shane Watson are all expected to have played their last tests during their calamitous trip to England, while paceman Ryan Harris retired before the first Ashes test after suffering another knee injury.
Besides Smith, the diminutive Warner is expected to carry most of the burden of Australia’s batting.
Nicknamed ‘Bull’ and one of the cleanest hitters in the game, Warner, when on song, can take a game away from opponents but also relishes a verbal battle out in the middle and his sledging has drawn multiple code of conduct violations in the past.
However, Marsh felt the extra responsibility would help the left-handed batsman.
“We have reached a point in time where we’ve had to look at our leadership positions again with an eye to the future,” Marsh said.
“David has matured and developed into an important senior figure in the Australian team. He has come a long way.
“We believe that he will respond well to the added responsibility of leadership.”
The fifth Ashes test starts on Thursday at The Oval, London.
Photographers have followed George and his nanny around London parks, have pursued cars leaving royal homes, and police found one hidden in a blacked-out car outside a children’s play area visited by the prince, a statement said.
“In recent months, there have been an increasing number of incidents of paparazzi harassment of Prince George and the tactics being used are increasingly dangerous,” added the statement from the Kensington Palace residence of George’s parents Prince William and Kate Middleton.
William, second in line to the throne, and his wife have tangled with the media before over the paparazzi’s tactics and have said that they want their children to be able to play in public without being photographed.
“The vast majority of publications around the world – and all British publications – have refused to fuel the market for such photos,” the statement said.
But it added: “Despite this, paparazzi photographers are going to increasingly extreme lengths to observe and monitor Prince George’s movements and covertly capture images of him to sell to the handful of international media still willing to pay for them.
“A line has been crossed and any further escalation in tactics would represent a very real security risk.”
The issue of harassment by the paparazzi is particularly sensitive for William whose mother Princess Diana was killed with her lover Dodi al-Fayed in Paris in 1997 when her limousine crashed into the wall of a tunnel as they tried to flee a posse of chasing photographers.
He has been determined to protect his family from the press.
George, third in line to the throne, was born to a global media frenzy in July 2013 but has spent most of his life since then out of the spotlight, with only a handful of public appearances.
The royals also complained about harassment of Kate Middleton before the couple married in 2011. A year after their wedding, European magazines printed topless pictures of her taken while she was on holiday in France.
At least 700 people were injured, more than 71 seriously, the Tianjin government said on its Weibo microblog, and the official Xinhua news agency said two fires were still burning.
A man looks out from inside a damaged residential building near the site of the explosions at the Binhai new district, Tianjin
Wednesday night’s blasts, so large that they were seen by satellites in space, sent shockwaves through apartment blocks kilometers away in the port city of 15 million people. Internet videos showed fireballs shooting into the sky and the U.S. Geological Survey registered the blasts as seismic events.
Vehicles are seen burning after blasts at Binhai new district in Tianjin municipality, China
Vast areas of the port – the 10th largest in the world – were devastated, crumpled shipping containers were thrown around like match sticks, hundreds of new cars were torched and port buildings left as burnt-out shells, Reuters witnesses said.
Damaged vehicles are seen as smoke rises from the debris after the explosions at the Binhai new district in Tianjin, China
“I was sleeping when our windows and doors suddenly shook as we heard explosions outside. I first thought it was an earthquake,” Guan Xiang, who lives 7 km (4 miles) away from the explosion site, told Reuters by telephone.
Guan, 24, said he saw flames and a mushroom cloud in the sky as he and other residents scrambled to get out of the building.
Tianjin authorities said 12 firefighters were among the 44 killed.
Damaged vehicles are seen under bridges close to the site of the explosions at Binhai new district, Tianjin
The cause of the blasts was being investigated but Xinhua said several containers caught fire beforehand. Industrial accidents are not uncommon in China following three decades of breakneck economic growth. A blast at an auto parts factory in eastern China killed 75 people a year ago when a room filled with metal dust exploded.
The state-run Beijing News earlier cited Tianjin fire authorities as saying they had lost contact with 36 firefighters. By late afternoon, Xinhua reported 18 were missing, while 66 were among the hundreds of people being treated in nearby hospitals.
Xinhua said 1,000 firefighters and more than 140 fire engines were struggling to contain a blaze in a warehouse that held “dangerous goods”.
Damaged cars are seen as smoke rises from the debris after the explosions at the Binhai new district in Tianjin, China
“The volatility of the goods means the fire is especially unpredictable and dangerous to approach,” Xinhua said.
Several fire trucks had been destroyed and nearby firefighters wept as they worked to extinguish flames, the Beijing News reported.
President Xi Jinping demanded that authorities “make full effort to rescue and treat the injured and ensure the safety of people and their property”.
Xi said in a statement carried by official media that those responsible should be “severely handled”.
City officials had met recently with companies to discuss tightening safety standards on the handling of dangerous chemicals. The Tianjin Administration of Work Safety posted a notice about the meeting with companies at the port on its website a week ago.
Firefighters carry the body of a victim onto a van after explosions at Binhai new district in Tianjin, China
POTENTIALLY TOXIC SMOKE
Anxious residents rushed to hospitals to seek news about injured loved ones. Dozens of police guarded the entrance of the TEDA hospital, a Reuters witness said.
Pictures on Chinese media websites showed residents and workers, some bleeding, fleeing their homes. Xinhua said people had been hurt by broken glass and other flying debris. Authorities told reporters they expected the blasts to have forced 6,000 people from their homes by nightfall.
Grey clouds of smoke billowed above the blast site and several trucks carrying paramilitary police – wearing masks to protect them from potentially toxic smoke – headed to the area.
Firefighters work at the site as smoke and fire rise from the debris after the explosions at the Binhai new district in Tianjin
The blasts shattered windows in buildings and cars and knocked down walls in a 2-km radius around the site. Photographs on news websites showed burned-out cars inside a multi-storey car park at a logistics base at the port.
Video posted on YouTube from what appeared to be an apartment building some distance from the scene showed an initial blast followed by a second, much bigger, explosion. Shockwaves hit the building seconds later.
“Our building is shaking. Is this an atomic bomb?” said a frenzied voice inside. (here)
Despite the devastation, the port was operating normally, a port official said. Tianjin port is the gateway to northern China’s industrial belt.
Xinhua said the explosions, the first equivalent to 3 tonnes of TNT and the second to 21 tonnes of TNT, ripped through a warehouse.
Smoke rise from the site of the explosions at the Binhai new district, Tianjin
A team from the International Atomic Energy Agency’s Beijing environmental emergency response center, as well as 214 Chinese military nuclear and biochemical materials specialists, had gone to Tianjin, the news agency said.
It identified the owner of the warehouse as Tianjin Dongjiang Port Ruihai International Logistics. The company’s website said it was a government-approved firm specializing in handling “dangerous goods”. Company officials could not immediately be reached for comment.
A firefighter works at the site near damaged vehicles as smoke rises from the debris after the explosions at the Binhai new district in Tianjin, China
According to an assessment by government environmental inspectors published in 2014, the facility was designed to store several dangerous and toxic chemicals including butanone, an explosive industrial solvent, sodium cyanide and compressed natural gas.
CCTV said at least one person at a “relevant company” had been detained.
A worker cleans a highway near the site of the explosions at the Binhai new district, Tianjin
“We pledge our allegiance … (to the) commander of the faithful, Mullah Mohammad Akhtar Mansour, may God protect him,” said Ayman al-Zawahiri, believed to be hiding in a border area between Afghanistan and Pakistan that is a militant bastion.
The authenticity of the recording could not be immediately verified, but it had all the stamps of an al Qaeda video.
Divisions within the Taliban insurgent movement have emerged since the news last month of the death of Mullah Omar.
The swift announcement that Mansour, Omar’s longtime deputy, would be the new leader has riled many senior Taliban figures, and Omar’s family said this month that it did not endorse the move.
Mansour’s position could be shored up by the vote of confidence by al Qaeda, the global militant group that has maintained ties with the Taliban for almost two decades since the tenure of its founder and late leader Osama bin Laden.
“As leader of the al Qaeda organization for jihad, I offer our pledge of allegiance, renewing the path of Sheikh Osama and the devoted martyrs in their pledge to the commander of the faithful, the holy warrior Mullah Omar,” Zawahiri added.
Reiterating support for the Taliban is also a tacit rejection of Islamic State, the new ultra-radical Sunni Muslim movement that is ensconced in Iraq and Syria and has gained the support of a few Afghan insurgent commanders.
Al Qaeda is being challenged by Islamic State for leadership of the global jihadist movement, as determined backers of IS have cropped up in Libya and Yemen this year.
Al Qaeda was set up by Arab guerrillas who flocked to Afghanistan to fight Soviet occupation forces in the 1980s. It thrived under the Taliban’s 1996-2001 rule in Afghanistan before the U.S. invasion that followed Al Qaeda’s Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington drove both groups underground. – REUTERS
