Guatemalan communities flee volcano
GUATEMALA CITY -- About 4,000 residents fled Guatemala's Volcano of Fire on Monday as red-hot rock and ash spewed into the sky and cascaded down the slopes toward an area devastated by a deadly eruption earlier this year.
Guatemala's volcanology unit said that explosions from the 12,300-foot high mountain shook homes with "constant sounds similar to a train locomotive."
Incandescent material burst as high as 3,200 feet above the crater and flows of hot rock and ash extended nearly 2 miles down one flank of the volcano. Hot blasts of pyroclastic material pushed down canyons on the slopes, while a column of ash rose nearly 23,000 feet above sea level and drifted toward Guatemala City to the east.
Hundreds of families heeded the call of disaster coordination authorities to evacuate 10 communities, piling into school buses for trips to shelters. The national disaster commission said 3,925 people had been evacuated by early Monday.
The Volcano of Fire is one of the most active in Central America and an eruption in June killed 194 people. Another 234 are officially missing, although organizations supporting the communities have insisted there are thousands of missing persons.
Syrian troops retake ISIS-held region
DAMASCUS, Syria -- Syrian government forces captured a southern region from the Islamic State extremist group on Monday after weeks of fighting that left scores dead on both sides, a government-linked media outlet reported.
Syrian Central Military Media said the army retook the rugged Tulul al-Safa region, the last pocket of territory held by the extremists in the country's south. It said troops are now clearing away explosives and booby-traps left behind by the militants.
President Bashar Assad's forces have been steadily advancing on all fronts in recent years with help from Russia and Iran. The Islamic State group has lost virtually all the territory it once controlled in Syria and neighboring Iraq, but still carries out attacks in both countries.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a war monitoring group, reported that government forces captured the area on Saturday.
It said scores of fighters were allowed to move into the nearby Homs province in recent days, while those who refused to leave were crushed by government forces.
The Suwayda 24, an activist collective, said Islamic State fighters withdrew through the desert to hideouts in Homs province and other areas south of the capital, Damascus. Most of the fighters had earlier moved to the Tulul al-Safa region as part of an evacuation deal with the government when it retook the Palestinian refugee camp of Yarmouk and other southern Damascus neighborhoods in May.
Paramedic, 3 officers killed in Mexico
MEXICO CITY -- A Red Cross paramedic was killed and six others wounded in a rare attack by a gang of young gunmen on a Red Cross aid distribution event in southern Mexico.
Three police officers providing security at the event also died in the attack Sunday in the township of Taxco, in the southern state of Guerrero.
State security spokesman Roberto Alvarez said Monday that the attack involved 20 men aged between 18 and 20.
Alvarez said the attackers, wearing fake military-style uniforms, arrived in five pickups and SUVs and opened fire indiscriminately on families, police and Red Cross volunteers. A police officer and two residents were also wounded in the attack.
While gangs have sometimes attacked ambulances to finish off wounded rivals, direct attacks on paramedics are rare in Mexico.
The attack occurred as the Red Cross personnel were distributing blankets, jackets and aid packages to help poor families make it through the winter.
Guerrero Gov. Hector Astudillo said Sunday the nature of the event and the victims suggested the attack "is an irrational act that verges on terrorism."
Turkish coast guard rescues migrants
ISTANBUL -- Turkey's coast guard said Monday it rescued 44 migrants stuck on an island after they attempted the crossing to Greece.
The coast guard said in a statement that it dispatched two helicopters and one boat after a rescue request call by a migrant. Aerial footage showed groups of people on an island off the coast of the western province of Balikesir.
Videos showed coast guard officers helping women and children to board its ship. The statement did not specify the nationalities of the migrants but said they included 13 children.
Hundreds of thousands of migrants have set out from Turkey's coasts in the past few years to try to reach neighboring Greece, which is a member of the European Union. A deal with the EU in 2016 to send those migrants back to Turkey significantly curbed the number of border crossings, but many desperate migrants still attempt the journey.
The Turkish coast guard has intercepted more than 23,500 people this year.
-- COMPILED BY DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE STAFF FROM WIRE REPORTS
A Section on 11/20/2018