The World in Brief

People cross the floodwaters Friday in Ashighar village in India’s Assam state, where officials said the homes of about 900,000 people have been submerged.
People cross the floodwaters Friday in Ashighar village in India’s Assam state, where officials said the homes of about 900,000 people have been submerged.

Flooding in India kills at least 12 people

GAUHATI, India -- Rain-triggered floods and mudslides have left a trail of destruction across northeastern India, killing at least a dozen people and affecting over a million, officials said Saturday.

Two schoolchildren were killed and several others injured earlier in the week near the town of Tawang when a wall from their boarding school collapsed as they were sleeping. Tawang, located in Arunachal Pradesh state, is perched at an altitude of 9,500 feet.

Also in Arunachal Pradesh, a 36-year-old woman was swept away and three other people were killed when their car skidded and fell into a gorge. Six others were killed in neighboring Assam state.

"My appeal to people is to be on alert and those living in lowlands should move to safer higher grounds," said Pema Khandu, chief minister of Arunachal Pradesh, the state closest to China's Tibet region.

Assam's State Disaster Response Authority said around 900,000 people spread over 21 of the state's 33 districts have had their homes submerged. Several thousands are living in government-run relief camps in the state.

Floods and mudslides have also hit some other northeastern states, including Meghalaya, Sikkim and Mizoram. In Mizoram, floods have submerged about 400 homes in the small town of Tlabung, police said.

U.S. service member killed by Taliban

KABUL, Afghanistan -- An American service member was killed in action in Afghanistan, the U.S. military said Saturday without offering details about the service member's identity or the circumstances surrounding the death.

In a telephone interview, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahed said the militant group was behind the killing, even as U.S. peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad has been holding talks with the Taliban in recent weeks to try and negotiate an end to the war in Afghanistan. The current conflict began in 2001 with the U.S.-led invasion to unseat the Taliban and hunt down al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden. After nearly 18 years, it is America's longest war, in which over 2,400 American service members have died.

Mujahed said two U.S. service personnel were killed when Taliban militants attacked a tank in Sayed Abad district of central Wardak province, barely 40 miles south of the Afghan capital, Kabul. The discrepancy between the number of fatalities could not immediately be explained.

Separately, a gunbattle in the capital of Badghis province in the country's northwest left three police dead, provincial governor Abdul Ghafur Malikzai said. Militants attacked a government compound in the provincial capital, Qala-e-Naw, from a position in a nearby hotel. The number of wounded rose to 20, Malikzai said. It wasn't known who was behind the attack.

Russian telescope leaves Earth's orbit

MOSCOW -- A Russian Proton-M rocket successfully delivered a cutting-edge space telescope into orbit Saturday after days of launch delays, Russia's space agency said.

Roscosmos said the telescope, named Spektr-RG, was delivered into a parking orbit before a final burn Saturday that kicked the spacecraft out of Earth's orbit and on to its final destination: the L2 Lagrange point.

Lagrange points are unique positions in the solar system where objects can maintain their position relative to the sun and the planets that orbit it. Located 0.93 million miles from Earth, L2 is particularly ideal for telescopes such as Spektr-RG.

If all goes well, the telescope will arrive at its designated position in three months, becoming the first Russian spacecraft to operate beyond Earth's orbit since the Soviet era. The telescope aims to conduct a complete X-ray survey of the sky by 2025, the first space telescope to do so.

Work on the Spektr-RG telescope began in the 1980s but was scrapped in the 1990s. Spektr-RG was revived in 2005 and redesigned to be smaller, simpler and cheaper.

In its modern form, the project is a close collaboration between Russian and German scientists.

5.5 quake rocks town in the Philippines

MANILA, Philippines -- A moderately strong earthquake struck in the southern Philippines as people slept before dawn Saturday, injuring at least 25 villagers and damaging several houses, two churches, a public market and a fire station, officials said.

The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology said the magnitude-5.5 quake struck about 4 miles southeast of Carrascal town in Surigao del Sur province and was felt in outlying provinces. Aftershocks have been detected.

The National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council said a Catholic church's ceiling crumbled in Surigao del Sur's Carmen town and another church in Lanuza town sustained "major damage," while several houses reported cracks and damage.

A public market was damaged in Carmen and a small fire station collapsed in Madrid town, damaging a firetruck and a police car. A small Surigao hospital also was damaged, officials said.

Disaster-response teams have been deployed to help affected residents and assess possible damage in interior towns.

-- Compiled by Democrat-Gazette staff from wire reports

photo

AP/DMITRI LOVETSKY

People gather at a Neva River embankment Saturday during Baltic Yacht Week festivities in St. Petersburg, Russia.

A Section on 07/14/2019

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