Russian activity in Syria worries U.S.
BEIRUT — Russia has sent a military advance team to Syria and is taking other steps the United States fears may signal that President Vladimir Putin is planning to vastly expand his military support for Syria President Bashar Assad, administration officials said Friday.
Russia’s moves include the recent transport of prefabricated housing units for hundreds of people to a Syrian airfield and the delivery of a portable air traffic control station there.
U.S. officials acknowledge that they are not certain of Russia’s intentions, but some say the temporary housing suggests that Russia could deploy as many as 1,000 advisers or other military personnel to the airfield, which serves Latakia, Syria’s principal port city.
On Friday, Putin dismissed news reports that Russia had sent ground troops to fight in Syria as “premature.”
Putin said Russia was supplying arms to the Assad government under contracts that go back five to seven years and suggested that the Syrian authorities be part of a new international alliance against terrorism.
4 Thais get life terms for ’14 rally attack
BANGKOK — A Thai court sentenced four men to life in prison Friday for a grenade attack on a political rally in Bangkok last year that killed three people, including two children, and injured 21 others.
The court originally issued death sentences to the men for murder and other offenses in the February 2014 attack on the anti-government rally, but reduced the penalty because they confessed. Relatives alleged the men were tortured into confessing after being taken into military custody in July last year, after an army coup that ousted an elected civilian government.
The attack and others on rallies held by the People’s Democratic Reform Committee, which sought to topple the government of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, were cited by the military as a reason for their takeover.
Sierra Leone Ebola survivor’s baby dies
FREETOWN, Sierra Leone — It was the new beginning that Sierra Leone’s first Ebola survivor, Victoria Yillia, had yearned for after losing 21 of her relatives to the disease: a newborn who would allow her and her husband to start a new family.
But only weeks after the baby they named Barnabas was born, he died of an infection that overwhelmed his tiny body. In the Ebola-ravaged community of Kenema, the baby was buried Thursday, a day after he died.
“Tears will never stop coming out of my eyes until the day I die, because that baby was everything in my life and a symbol for all my lost family members,” 21-year-old Yillia said in a telephone interview hours after her son’s funeral.
He was born on Aug. 9 and was discharged from Kenema’s hospital without any apparent health problems.
However, he recently developed a fever. Victoria and her husband, Anthony, rushed him back to the hospital on Monday. He died Wednesday.
Elizabeth B.M. Kamara, the head nurse matron at the Kenema hospital, said the cause of the baby’s death was an infection and was not believed to be related to Ebola.
Shiite cleric: Hunt ‘big’ corrupt Iraqis
BAGHDAD — Iraq’s top Shiite cleric said Friday that the government must start hunting the “big heads” as part of its anti-corruption drive, calling for “convincing and assuring steps” as proof of the government’s seriousness in implementing its highly touted reform plan.
Last month, Iraq’s Shiite-led government announced a package of policies after large rallies in Baghdad and other provinces protesting endemic corruption, sectarian politics and shabby basic services.
Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi’s plan was immediately approved by the parliament. But changes widely demanded by Iraqis have not yet materialized, such as trials for corrupt officials, rules and infrastructure improvements.
“One of the essential steps for reform is to hunt the big heads among the corrupt and hold them accountable, to retrieve all the stolen money,” Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani said in remarks delivered through a representative during the Friday sermon in the revered Shiite city of Karbala.
People “have long suffered from corruption” and they want “this mission to be implemented without procrastination and delay,” said the representative, Sheikh Ahmed al-Safi.