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Quake strikes New Zealand, thousands flee homes as tsunami hits

By Charlotte Greenfield | WELLINGTON
A 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck central New Zealand just after midnight, the U.S. Geological Survey said, causing widespread damage and generating a tsunami.
Thousands of people along New Zealand's east coast fled their homes to head for higher ground as emergency services warned of destructive waves of up to five meters (yards) in some areas.
"The first waves have arrived but we know that it is too early to say what the impact has been," said Sarah Stuart-Black, national controller at the Ministry of Civil Defence. "Our concern is what is coming. Future waves are coming may be bigger than what has come before."
St. John Ambulance said it was sending helicopters carrying medical and rescue personnel to near the epicenter of the quake, 91 km (57 miles) north-northeast of Christchurch, where a 6.3 quake in 2011 killed 185 people, on New Zealand's South Island.
"We are starting to get reports of injuries from the earthquake area, including Culverden area and Kaikoura," Dion Rosario, St John Incident Controller, said in a statement. "However, at this stage we do not have specifics."
Police said they were investigating reports of a collapsed building in the coastal tourist town of Kaikoura.
The first tremor and a series of aftershocks were felt throughout most of New Zealand. There were no immediate reports of deaths.
"The whole house rolled like a serpent and some things smashed, the power went out," a woman, who gave her name as Elizabeth, told Radio New Zealand from her home in Takaka, near the top of the South Island.
In Wellington, there was gridlock on the roads to Mount Victoria, a hill with a lookout overlooking the low-lying coastal city.
"I'm just sort of parked by the side of the road and I think people are trying to go to sleep the same as I am," Wellington resident Howard Warner told Reuters after evacuating his seaside house.
Richard Maclean, a spokesman for the Wellington City Council, said there was structural damage to several buildings.
"We've got reports of broken water pipes and lots and lots of things off desks and shelves," he told Radio New Zealand.
Other residents reported glass had fallen from buildings into the streets and hotels and apartment buildings had been evacuated.

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A spokeswoman for the city council of Christchurch, where tsunami sirens rent the air, said its "emergency operations center" was active.
Several roads around the South Island were closed and damage to power and phone networks was reported.
Pictures shared on social media showed buckled roads, smashed glass and goods toppled from shelves in shops in Wellington and the upper South Island.
New Zealand's Geonet revised up its estimated magnitude of the quake to 7.5, from 6.6 earlier.

(Additional reporting by Colin Packham, Byron Kaye, Jane Wardell in Sydney; Writing by Lincoln Feast; Editing by Neil Fullick)
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Africa------ 14 militants killed in security raids in Egypt's Sinai





CAIRO, Nov. 13 (Xinhua) -- As many as 14 militant extremists were killed during military raids in Egypt's restive North Sinai province's two cities of Rafah and Sheikh Zuweid, the Egyptian military spokesman said in a statement on Sunday.
"The anti-terrorist military operations destroyed five hideouts of the militants and also defused ten explosive devices that were planted to target security men," Military Spokesman Mohamed Samir said in the statement.
Since the beginning of November, similar raids in the northern part of the peninsula left 26 militants dead while the security forces ruined nearly 100 explosive devices.
Meanwhile on Nov. 4, a military brigadier general who served in Sinai, was assassinated, outside his home in Cairo. Earlier in mid-October, at least 20 soldiers were killed in two-day blasts.
Egypt has been facing a wave of anti-security terrorist attacks, mainly centered in North Sinai, since the army-led removal of former Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in 2013 in response to mass protests against his one-year rule.
Hundreds of police and military men were killed in revenge attacks, with a Sinai-based Islamic State affiliate group claiming responsibility for most of them.
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Indians run out of patience as banks & ATMs run out of cash, post-demonetisation



NEW DELHI, Nov. 13 (Xinhua) -- India's sudden move of scrapping currency notes of higher denominations to curb the menace of black money seems to be a nightmare for the country's poor and the middle class.
Long queues of people stayed outside banks and automated teller machines (ATMs) for depositing as well as swapping with new notes the scrapped notes of 500 Indian rupees (7.5 U.S. dollars) and 1,000 Indian rupees (15 U.S. dollars) to run their lives.
Anger is brewing with the queues getting longer with each passing day, and the banks and ATMs are running out of cash and limits of daily cash withdrawals make matters worse.
"I stood in a queue for over three hours and when I reached the ATM counter, I came to know that it's out of cash. Weekends are a time to relax but my Sunday is ruined due to improper arrangement by the banks. I have no valid cash in my purse," said Sanjay Singh, an IT professional in Delhi.
Local TV channels reported stories of desperate people trying to scramble to get rid of black money by burning sacks of ill-gotten cash as well as throwing currency notes away in garbage dumps as well as rivers across the country.
On the other hand, there are stories of people facing harrowing time as they are unable to pay for cremations and hospital admissions.
"I am left at the mercy of the hospital authorities who are refusing to admit my wife who had sustained injuries in a road accident," said Ram Lal, a laborer.
Some people welcomed the Indian government's move, but blamed it for lack of proper planning and execution to save the common men from having a harrowing time.
"No doubt the move is aimed at tackling corruption and tax evasion. But many low-income Indians, traders and ordinary savers who rely on the cash economy have been badly hit. Moreover, there are not enough cash at ATMs and there is a limit daily cash withdrawals," said Sunita, a housewife.
With ATMs running out of cash and people out of patience, Indian Finance Minister Arun Jaitley Saturday evening addressed the nation to try to douse people's anger.
He regretted inconvenience caused to the people, adding that the "long-term advantages of this are to the overall economy".
"ATMs had not been adjusted to handle new currency notes prior to the announcement in order to keep it under wraps. Recalibration of ATMs will be completed within two weeks," he said, trying to justify the government's sudden move.
While Prime Minister Narendra Modi has said that the currency ban is the "biggest cleanliness drive" against black money hoarders, opposition parties tried to exploit the situation by pointing out the inconvinience caused to the general people.
Delhi's Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has called it a "huge scam"
However, experts have welcomed the government's "bold move", saying though consumer spending would likely to dip in the short term, the decision would boost India's gross domestic product in the long run.
The government banned currency notes 500 rupees and 1,000 rupees Tuesday and asked people to exchange the old notes by December 30.
Withdrawals from banks have also been limited to Rs 10,000 (150 U.S. dollars) a day and in ATMs, there is also a withdrawal restriction.
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Iraqi forces drive IS from Nimrud

(1 of 3) A Nineveh Plain Protection Units, or NPU, fighter inspects the interior of a church damaged by Islamic State fighters during their occupation of Qaraqosh, east of Mosul, Iraq, Saturday, Nov. 12, 2016. Qaraqosh, the biggest Christian town on the Nineveh plains in Iraq's north, fell to the Islamic State group in 2014 and was recently retaken by Iraqi government forces.

The Commander of the Mosul Operation, Lt. Gen. Abdul-Amir Raheed Yar Allah, says the troops took the town after heavy fighting. He says in a statement that "the 9th division of the Iraqi army has liberated the town of Nimrud completely and raised the Iraqi flag over its buildings after the enemy suffered heavy casualties."
The town is near the famed ruins of an ancient Assyrian capital that dates back to the 9th century B.C. The Iraqi government said last year that the militants destroyed the site using heavy military vehicles. It was not immediately clear if Iraqi forces had retaken the archaeological site.
Noon
Iraqi forces trying to advance further into Mosul are battling waves of car bombs sent by the Islamic State group.
Iraqi special forces Maj. Gen. Sami al-Aridi said Sunday that "there are so many civilian cars and any one of them could be a bomb."
Iraqi forces say they have cleared the neighborhoods of Qadisiya and Zahra and are now planning to move deeper into the city. They are building sand berms and road blocks to prevent car bombs from breaching the front lines.
Iraqi forces pushed into Mosul earlier this month but have struggled to advance in the face of heavy resistance from militants in neighborhoods still populated by civilians.
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Human Rights Watch is accusing the security forces of Iraq's regional Kurdish government of destroying Arab homes and even some villages in areas retaken from the Islamic State group.
The Sunday report says that between September 2014 and May 2016, Kurdish forces advancing against IS destroyed Arab homes in disputed areas of Kirkuk and Nineveh governorates, while Kurdish homes were left intact.
It says the demolitions took place in disputed areas seized from IS by Kurdish forces known as peshmerga. The Kurds say the areas are historically Kurdish and that they intend to incorporate them into the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region.
All sides fighting in the battle for the northern city of Mosul, Iraq's second-largest, are accused of committing human rights abuses, with the worst allegations focusing on IS
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France marks Paris attacks anniversary with somber silence

(1 of 16) French President Francois Hollande and Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo stand at attention after unveiling a commemorative plaque near the Petit Cambodge and Carillon cafes in Paris, France, during a ceremony held for the victims of last year's Paris attacks which targeted the Bataclan concert hall as well as a series of bars and killed 130 people, Sunday, Nov. 13, 2016. (Christophe Petit Tesson/Pool Photo via AP)

Michael Dias lauded the lessons his father Manuel, an immigrant from Portugal, taught him so youth can integrate instead of turning themselves into "cannon fodder." Under heavy security, President Francois Hollande unveiled a plaque outside the Stade de France "in memory of Manuel Dias," pulling away a French flag covering it on a wall at one of the entrances to the French national stadium, where Dias was killed on Nov. 13, 2015, by a suicide bomber.
Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo joined the president six other sites where crowds ate, drank or reveled in music at the Bataclan concert hall. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attacks .
Three teams of extremists coming from neighboring Belgium targeted six bars and eateries, turning scenes of Friday night fun into bloodbaths. At the Stade de France, on the northern edge of Paris, Michael Dias said his father Manuel was "living proof that integration is possible, necessary" to end the madness of violence carried out by those who felt excluded.
Learning to live again after extremists killed his father was "a personal challenge, but it concerns us all," Dias said, crediting his father, who came to France at 18, with life lessons like the need for education.
"It is by knowledge, by intelligence that the children of tomorrow can stop humiliating themselves as cannon fodder in the service of criminal, mafia-style interests ... as is the case today. (They are) incapable of reflection, thinking about the world and expressing the unease and social exclusion they feel."
The final stop, the Bataclan concert hall — which reopened Saturday night with a concert by British pop star Sting — was the site of the bloodiest and longest attack. There, 90 people were killed by three attackers who also took a group of people hostage. The youngest and oldest victims of the night of horror were a 17-year-old and a 68 year-old — both killed at the Bataclan.
Families of victims, security and rescue forces and some still trying to heal were among those present at the ceremonies. Jesse Holmes of the Eagles of Death Metal, the California band whose concert that night ended in a bloodbath, paid respects at the Bataclan ceremony, placing his hand on his heart as he departed.
In addition to those killed, nine people remain hospitalized from the attacks and others are paralyzed. The government says more than 600 people are still receiving psychological treatment after the attacks.
A sign scrawled and posted near the Bataclan, "Love for all, hate for no one," captured the sense of defiance shared by many — but not all. Some residents of the lively neighborhood where most of the attacks occurred are still trying to heal.
"We always have this fear that weighs heavily in our hearts. We always try to be careful. And every time we pass by here, we think of them," Sabrina Nedjadi said. Soubida Arhoui said fear is now part of her life.
"I am afraid for my children, when they take the Metro. When my son goes to work, I am afraid. When I get into a Metro I am afraid." "This anniversary is a further reminder of the volatile terrorist threat faced in Europe today," said a statement by Europol, the European police agency.
The remembrances come after the Sting concert Saturday night that reopened the refurbished Bataclan concert hall. Sting, in a T-shirt with a guitar slung over his shoulder, asked concert-goers in fluent French to observe a minute of silence as he opened the show.
"We've got two important things to do tonight," the 65-year-old singer said. "First, to remember and honor those who lost their lives in the attacks a year ago ... and to celebrate the life and the music of this historic venue. ... We shall not forget them."
He then strummed out a string of hits, including "Fragile" and "Message in a Bottle." Elodie Suigo, who lost six friends in the attack, said it was a hard night. "It was difficult going through that door. I don't think I was the only one... We cannot say it was a magical moment because of everything that changed in our lives. But (Sting) is a really great man," she said.
With more than 400 rounds fired within 10 minutes at the restaurants, the coordinated attacks were a wake-up call for France and for Europe. They followed the January 2015 newsroom massacre at the satiric newspaper Charlie Hebdo in Paris and a Kosher grocery store that left 17 dead. But the complex planning behind the Nov. 13 attacks and the high number of deaths revealed a degree of French vulnerability not previously suspected by authorities.
Neighboring Belgium, the starting point of the attacks in Paris, was hit a few months later on March 22 with attacks on its airport and a metro station that killed 32 people. France declared a state of emergency after the Nov. 13 attacks. It is still in effect, and Prime Minister Manuel Valls told the BBC that it would likely be extended. Still, that failed to prevent the killing of a police couple in their home last June, the July 14 Bastille Day truck attack in Nice that killed 86 revelers and the slaying of a priest at the altar of his Normandy church in July.
Valls warned earlier this weekend that "Yes, terrorism will strike us again." But, he contended, "we have all the resources to resist and all the strength to win."
Philippe Sotto, Jeffrey Schaeffer and Thomas Adamson contributed to this report.
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