Groups: 5,000 were killed in Aug. in Syria

Groups: 5,000 were killed in Aug. in Syria

beirut

Activist groups said Sunday that about 5,000 people were killed in Syria’s civil war in August, the highest figure ever reported in more than 17 months of fighting as President Bashar Assad’s regime unleashed crushing air power against the revolt for the first time.

The U.N. children’s fund UNICEF put the death toll for last week alone at 1,600, the largest weekly figure for the entire uprising.

The civil war witnessed a major turning point in August when Assad’s forces began widely using air power for the first time to try to put down the revolt. The fighting also reached Syria’s largest city, Aleppo, which had been relatively quiet for most of the uprising.

Police: Acid thrown in daughter’s face

new york

A man hurled acid in his daughter’s face in a gruesome attack that sent her into a street screaming for help as her skin peeled and her clothes disintegrated, police and witnesses said.

As his 49-year-old daughter sat on his couch in Brooklyn on Saturday afternoon, Jerome Lynch abruptly left the room, returned with a cup of what she thought was water and doused her with it, she later told a cousin, according to the Daily News.

Then the corrosive burning started, and Darlene Lynch ran outside as her clothes disintegrated and her skin fell from her face, witnesses said.

Bystanders poured water on Lynch, helped pull away her clothes and covered her with a sheet, witnesses said. She was taken to a hospital in critical condition, police said. The hospital declined to give an update on her condition Sunday.

Her 69-year-old father was arrested on an assault charge. Information on his arraignment and lawyer weren’t immediately available Sunday.

Drone kills suspected oil-tanker attacker

sanaa, yemen

A U.S. drone strike Sunday killed a top al-Qaida militant wanted for reportedly masterminding a 2002 attack on a French oil tanker, Yemeni military officials said.

In a separate incident, Yemeni warplanes killed 14 civilians in an errant airstrike, officials said.

The Defense Ministry said in a statement on that Khaled Batis, wanted in connection with the attack on the Limburg off the coast of Yemen that killed one person, was among five militants riding a vehicle struck by a drone Friday in the southern city of Hadramawt.

Military officials said the drone was American.

S. Africa to withdraw murder charges

johannesburg

South Africa’s top prosecutor announced Sunday that she is withdrawing controversial murder charges against 270 miners for the killings of 34 striking co-workers shot dead by police.

The National Union of Metal Workers meanwhile demanded the suspension of the officers responsible for the shootings.

Sunday’s announcement follows a barrage of criticism from political parties, trade unions, civil society and legal experts.

Isaac effects linger

new orleans

Much of Plaquemines Parish southeast of New Orleans was still covered withSFlbfloodwater Sunday, and more than 200,000 people across Louisiana didn’t have any power, five days after Isaac ravaged the state. Thousands of evacuees remained at shelters or bunked with friends or relatives.

At least seven people were killed in the storm in the U.S. — five in Louisiana and two in Mississippi.

Associated Press