Shares in British private security giant G4S plunged on the London stock market today after it emerged that Omar Mateen, the gunman behind the massacre in a Florida gay nightclub, was one of its employees.
	The share price was down 5.71 per cent at 176.70 pence at around 0330 IST and the company published a statement on the London Stock Exchange website reiterating details about Mateen's employment.
	"Mateen was subject to detailed company screening when he was recruited in 2007," the group said in a statement to the London Stock Exchange.
	Mateen was "re-screened in 2013 with no adverse findings. He was also subject to checks by a US law enforcement agency with no findings reported to G4S," the statement said.
	That followed an FBI statement yesterday saying it had interviewed Mateen three times in 2013 and 2014.
	"G4S is deeply shocked by the tragic events in Orlando this weekend and the thoughts of everyone at G4S are with the victims and their families," the statement said, adding 

Shares in G4S security firm plunge after Orlando massacre

PTI Automatic

The Islamic State group today claimed responsibility for the Orlando shooting that killed 50 people, saying in a radio bulletin that it was carried out by "one of the soldiers of the caliphate".
	"God allowed Omar Mateen, one of the soldiers of the caliphate in America, to carry out an attack entering a crusader gathering in a night club... In Orlando in Florida, killing and wounding more than 100 of them," a bulletin from Al-Bayan radio said.
	The jihadist group declared its "caliphate" in Syria and Iraq in 2014.
	The IS-linked news agency Amaq said yesterday that the attack on the gay night club had been "carried out by an Islamic State fighter".
	US media reported that the gunman, identified as Omar Mateen, a 29-year old American citizen, had pledged allegiance to the jihadist group IS.
	The FBI has admitted that Mateen - who was born to Afghan parents in New York - had previously been investigated, but cleared, for ties to a US suicide bomber.
	The worst mass shooting in US ...

IS claims Orlando shooting in radio bulletin

Pope Francis today hit out at the "brazen" free circulation of arms worldwide, a day after a gunman used an assault rifle to kill 50 people in an Orlando gay nightclub.
	On a visit to the headquarters of the World Food Programme (WFP), the pontiff contrasted the ease of obtaining lethal weapons with the bureaucratic obstacles often encountered by organisations trying to deliver humanitarian aid.
	"Whereas forms of aid and development projects are obstructed by involved and comprehensible political decisions, skewed ideological visions and impenetrable customs barriers, weaponry is not," Francis said.
	"It makes no difference where arms come from; they circulate with brazen and virtually absolute freedom in many parts of the world."
	"As a result, wars are fed, not people."
	Francis did not explicitly refer to the Orlando shooting in his speech at the UN agency. Yesterday, he condemned the killings as an act of "homicidal folly and senseless hatred."
	Global hunger and opposition to ...

Pope hits out at 'brazen' free circulation of arms

Kuwait's public prosecutor has asked an appeals court to increase a sentence handed out to three royals for insulting authorities in the Gulf state from five years to 29, according to remarks published today.
	Dherar al-Asoussi said he had petitioned the court to also convict the men of using social media to insult the ruling Al-Sabah family.
	A lower court last month sentenced the three royals, including a ruler's nephew, and two others to five years in jail for insulting top judges online.
	The court also sentenced a sixth man to a one-year term and a another for 10 years in absentia. It acquitted six others.
	 All the men were acquitted of a charge of insulting the emir.
	But Asoussi told Al-Qabas newspaper that he has challenged the rulings and demanded that all 13 defendants be given harsher jail terms of 29 years each for insulting the emir, judges and spreading false news about Kuwait.
	The appeals court has not yet set a date for the hearing. Its rulings must be verified by ...

Kuwait prosecutor wants 29-year sentence for convicted royals

Car sales in China, the world's top auto market, increased at a faster pace in May than the previous month, an industry group reported today, despite continued woes in the country's economy.
	A total of 2.09 million vehicles were sold in China last month, up 9.8 per cent from a year ago, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) said in a statement.
	The numbers were an increase on the 6.3 per cent gain posted in April.
	The pickup came despite protracted weakness in the world's second-largest economy, where growth slowed to 6.7 per cent in the January-March period, the worst quarterly expansion in seven years.
	Key economic indicators further deteriorated in May, with official figures released this week showing the increase in fixed-asset investment, a main gauge of infrastructure spending, has slowed to its weakest pace in 16 years.
	Some economists have predicted China's expansion will slow further in the second quarter.
	Auto sales in the country reached 24.6 ...

China auto sales increase in May: industry group

Scandinavian airline SAS cancelled today a majority of its Swedish and European flights after pilots rejected an improved pay offer and their strike pushed into a fourth day.
	SAS said some 230 flights and 27,000 passengers would be affected by today's action, adding to the 50,000 travellers who have been stranded since Swedish pilots walked out on Friday.
	Flights between Stockholm and Athens, Brussels, Dublin, Frankfurt, Geneva, London and Paris were cancelled today.
	The strike began after Swedish pilots based in Stockholm rejected the airline's offer of a 2.2 per cent wage increase, insisting on a hike of 3.5 per cent, and attempts by a mediator to broker a deal yesterday failed.
	"The Swedish pilot union has turned down a second bid by the mediator, which SAS accepted," said the airline.
	The walkout comes during peak travel season, and has hit charter groups hard.
	SAS, which is 50-per cent owned by the Swedish, Danish and Norwegian states, has said it has not calculated how ...

Striking Swedish pilots ground majority of SAS flights

There's no matador, betting or blood when bulls lock horns in the Gulf emirate of Fujairah, but a winning beast in the popular sport can still earn its owner a fortune.
	Bullfights are a weekly event at a ring close to the beach on the east coast of the United Arab Emirates.
	Organisers admit the sport is rough but insist it is animal-friendly, and they ensure the bull is never killed.
	While it's believed 16th century Portuguese invaders introduced bullfighting to the Gulf, Fujairah's version pits two bulls against one another instead of man against beast.
	And unlike at bull-on-bull tournaments in Southeast Asia, spectators place no bets - Islamic tradition and Emirati laws forbid it.
	A fight lasts just minutes, ending when one of the bulls gives up or is pushed back by its rival to the roar of a commentator's voice over loudspeakers.
	Upon his word, more than a dozen barefooted handlers use ropes to pull the bulls apart before the next bout kicks off.
	"Dr Thomas and Jackson," ...

Bloodless bullfights earn Gulf owners big bucks

Thai budget airline carrier Nok Air apologised today after one of its pilots joked about crashing a plane carrying ousted premier Yingluck Shinawatra.
	The gaffe highlights how hatred towards the Shinawatra political clan still runs deep two years after Yingluck's administration was toppled by a military coup.
	The pilot's comments were made in a social media chat group used by Nok Air pilots that was later leaked.
	In it a pilot posted a picture of Yingluck about to board their Nok Air flight over the weekend. One chat member responded with "We have prey on board". Another then added "CFIT".
	CFIT is an aviation acronym for "controlled flight into terrain", a term used to describe when a pilot unintentionally crashes a plane that has no technical problems.
	Panthongtae Shinawatra -- the son of Yingluck's brother Thaksin Shinawatra, who was toppled as premier by a 2006 coup -- posted the leaked chat on his Facebook.
	"Even if the messages about passengers were just kidding, they count 

Thai pilot jokes about crashing plane carrying ousted PM

The people of Orlando grieved and remembered the dead after a gunman murdered 50 people at a gay nightclub in the Florida city, but there was also defiance in the face of tragedy.
	Yesterday evening many relatives kept anxious vigils at the bedsides of wounded loved ones at Orlando Regional Medical Center.
	Angel Colon emerged from the hospital thankful to have found his son Angel Jr, 26, alive and in stable condition despite three gunshot wounds, including a bullet that went through his thigh.
	Knocked to the ground by the bullets and with his leg broken, Angel was unable to flee Pulse, the popular nightspot that turned into a bloody shooting gallery just before closing time early yesterday.
	Colon said a girl fell to the ground next to his son, and they held hands as the gunman moved around the room methodically pumping bullets into people on the ground.
	"Then he shot the girl he was holding hands with," Colon said. "It looks like she didn't make it."
	"When I saw him, I held him," 

Grief mixes with defiance as shaken Orlando deals with attack

A man fired shots with an air rifle at a refugee shelter in western Germany, leaving a five-year-old girl and an 18-year-old lightly wounded, police said today.
	The 21-year-old man targeted the shelter from his third-floor apartment just 40 metres away in the shooting on yesterday, police said in a statement.
	The mother of the Macedonian girl had noticed that her child was hurt in the leg but initially thought someone had thrown stones or sand at her.
	But shortly after, a witness saw the suspect shooting from his apartment, wounding an 18-year-old Syrian in the leg.
	Police searched the man's apartment and removed an air rifle and munition.
	The suspect was however not detained as "there were no grounds for arrest", a police spokesman told AFP.
	"It is unclear if the act was politically motivated," added police, adding that investigations were ongoing.
	Hate crimes and attacks against migrants have exploded since arrivals spiked to 1.1 million in 2015, mostly from the Middle East ..

Child, teen hit by air gun shots at German refugee home

North Korean hackers managed to steal thousands of records from private firms and state agencies in the South including defence industry information and files from Korean Air, Seoul police said today.
	The hacking originated from 16 servers based in the North's capital Pyongyang, police said, adding the North had stolen more than 42,000 internal records.
	The North gained access to the internal systems of the firms and agencies at some point after hacking in 2014 into computer management software developed by a Seoul IT firm, according to the police.
	The breach was discovered earlier this year.
	The hackers also planted 33 types of malicious code into the computers in an apparent bid to use them as "zombie" machines to launch future cyberattacks on other organisations in the South, it said.
	The companies that were hacked include South Korea's flagship air carrier Korean Air and SK Networks, a sister company of South Korea's top wireless operator, SK Telecom, Yonhap news agency ...

N Korean hackers steal defence files from South

Some 150 suspected Russian football hooligans escaped arrest for Euro 2016 fan violence, while another 10 supporters from Britain, France and Austria will face trial, the Marseille prosecutor said.
     On Saturday, 35 mostly British supporters were injured, three seriously, in the worst violence at an international tournament since the 1998 World Cup in France.
     An England football supporter seriously injured in the violence remains in a "critical but stable" condition, prosecutor Brice Robin told a news conference.
     "His attackers have not been identified," Robin said.
     Six Britons, one Austrian and three French spectators will be tried Monday for the violence in Marseille, he said.
     He described the Russians who evaded arrest as "extremely well-trained".
     Robin said the prosecution would request jail sentences for the defendants as well as a ban on entering French territory.

10 fans to face trial; 150 Russians escape arrest: prosecutor

IS claims Orlando shooter as 'soldier of caliphate' in

Filipino protesters said today that Chinese coastguard ships blocked and sprayed them with water as they sailed to a disputed South China Sea shoal to plant a Philippine flag for independence day.
	China claims most of the strategic and resources-rich sea and has controlled Scarborough Shoal, just 230 kilometres (145 miles) off the main Philippine island of Luzon, since a 2012 standoff with the Philippine Navy.
	The Kalayaan Atin Ito (Freedom This is Ours) group said 16 of its members arrived near the shoal early yesterday, Philippine independence day, and their boat was promptly blocked by two Chinese coastguard vessels.
	"Five of us attempted to swim to the rock to plant the Philippine flag and the UN flag but they harassed us," the group's coordinator Vera Joy Ban-eg, told AFP via text message.
	"They chased us with their two speed boats and blocked our path, sprayed water on us. Two of the swimmers however were able to reach the ring of the shoal and raised the Philippine ...

Philippine protesters say harassed by Chinese during flag stunt

Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards have killed five Kurdish rebels near the country's northwestern border with Iraq, an official statement said today.
	"A team of five from the PJAK terrorist splinter group... has been identified and destroyed in the Sardasht region" on the Iraqi border, a Guards statement said on its official website.
	It said the group was responsible for the death of three members of Iran's Basij militia more than a month ago.
	No further details were provided about the operation.
	The last reported clashes between Kurdish rebels and the Revolutionary Guards were in September, when two rebels and two Iranian soldiers were killed.
	PJAK -- the Party of Free Life of Kurdistan -- is an Iranian Kurdish party with close links to the Turkish Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
	Kurdish rebels periodically attack Iranian armed forces near the border with Iraq's Kurdish region.

Iran's Revolutionary Guards kill five Kurdish rebels

Two people were killed and at least six others seriously wounded in Mexico when armed men opened fire on players and spectators at an amateur baseball game, authorities said.
	The attorney general's office in the state of Puebla said the attack occurred yesterday in the town of Acatzingo, 170 kilometers (105 miles) from Mexico City.
	"According to witnesses, three vehicles arrived, the occupants dismounted and opened fire. They opened fire equally against players and the public," said Jesus Jimenez, Acatzingo's Director of Security.
	Jimenez said both of the dead were players, one of whom died on the playing field and the other as he was being rushed to the hospital.
	The attorney general's office said six were injured, but Jimenez said there were 11 wounded in the attack, including a 12-year-old boy.
	Two local teams -- Reyes de Juarez and Felipe Angeles -- were playing against each other in the finals of an amateur league.
	Puebla is one of the Mexican states that has largely been ..

Gunmen kill two, wound six at Mexico baseball game

The United Nations said today it will try to resettle a record 170,000 refugees urgently in need of a new home next year as it grapples with an unprecedented displacment crisis.
	The projected resettlement figure from the UN refugee agency represents an increase of nearly 30,000 people compared with this year.
	But it is still less than 15 per cent of the 1.19 million refugees worldwide who will be "in need of resettlement" in 2017, the UNHCR acknowledged in a report released today.
	That group mainly consists of refugees who the UN believes will not be able to return home or integrate in their current host country.
	But resettling 1.19 million people over a 12-month period is not feasible based on recent trends, UNHCR spokesman Leo Dobbs told AFP.
	The agency therefore expects to recommend that the 170,000 people most in need of resettlement should be moved to third countries.
	Dobbs noted that the final decision in each case rests with prospective host countries, but in recent years 

Record number of refugees need to be resettled: UN

South Africa's Paralympic athlete Oscar Pistorius appeared in court today for a sentencing hearing set to send him back to jail for murdering his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp three years ago.
	The double-amputee killed Steenkamp, a model and law graduate, in the early hours of Valentine's Day in 2013, saying he mistook her for an intruder when he fired four times through the door of his bedroom toilet.
	Wearing a dark suit, white shirt and black tie, Pistorius attended the hearing along with members of his family.
	A lawyer close to the case said the sentencing could take place on Friday.
	Steenkamp's relatives, including mother and father, were also present as proceedings opened in the High Court in Pretoria.
	In March, Pistorius's lawyers failed in their legal bid to reverse a Supreme Court of Appeal judgement that upgraded his original conviction from culpable homicide -- the equivalent of manslaughter -- to murder.
	The original trial judge Thokozile Masipa is expected to pass a new 

Pistorius in court for murder sentencing

Bastian Schweinsteiger had time for three touches of the ball and scored with one as world champions Germany started their European Championship campaign with a 2-0 win over Ukraine.
     The 31-year-old Manchester United midfielder came on in the 90th minute and quickly put away a perfect pass from Mesut Ozil for the deciding goal.
     With fan violence again tainting the tournament, Germany's win followed 1-0 victories for Poland over Northern Ireland and Croatia over Turkey.
     Schweinsteiger is coming back from a three  month knee ligament layoff and the the joy of his first international goal in five years apparently took a toll.
     "I ran so hard in the celebrations that I'm a bit out of breath still.
     "It was amazing for that to happen, it's the kind of thing you can only wish for, but the most important thing is the team wins," he said of his quickfire goal in the Group C match.
     Defender Shkodran Mustafi headed the opener in the first half but goalkeeper Manuel ..

Schweinsteiger is back as Germany start with win

Cristiano Ronaldo-led Portugal open their Euro 2016 campaign tomorrow eager to avoid slipping-up against minnows Iceland and aiming to emulate their run to the European Championship semi-finals four years ago.
     Portugal lost to eventual winners Spain on penalties in the semi-finals of Euro 2012 and have arrived in France determined to win Group F and book their place in the knock-out stages.
     First they must negotiate their way past surprise-package Iceland, who beat the Netherlands home and away in qualifying as the Dutch failed to reach Euro 2016.
     The tiny North Atlantic island nation of 330,000 people is making their debut at a major tournament and is the smallest country by population ever to feature at a European Championship.
     Former Chelsea and Barcelona forward Eidur Gudjohnsen, 37, has come out of retirement to be part of the Icelandic squad.
     Now plying his trade in Norway with Molde, the veteran said it will be a "dream come true" when Iceland face ...

Minnows Iceland out to shock Ronaldo's Portugal

UEFA threatened to kick Russia and England out of the European Championship finals over fan violence but admitted there were stadium security flaws.
     Meanwhile, French authorities said they had detained 63 people linked to violence since the start of Euro 2016 and gave police new powers to ban alcohol around stadiums.
     European football's governing body UEFA issued the warning as German hooligans became the latest to join street battles that have marred the tournament, following three days of clashes in Marseille between Russian and English fans.
     Tensions between supporters of the two countries came to a head inside the Stade Velodrome after Saturday's 1-1 England-Russia draw.
     Thirty-five people were injured in the worst violence at an international tournament since the 1998 World Cup in France, with three still in a serious condition.
     With more high-risk matches looming, the UEFA executive committee expressed "disgust" at the clashes.
     UEFA has laid charges 

AFP

AFP

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