Train passengers were stuck for six hours in a tunnel outside Paris on Tuesday after their high-speed service suffered a power cut just minutes after departure, leaving them in sweltering heat, without electricity or working toilets.
The train bound for Barcelona became trapped in the tunnel in the Yerres area outside Paris. French rail operator SNCF said the power failure lasted only 10 or 15 minutes but the train was unable to restart because of its position.
A new train was sent in to shunt the stalled carriages along, but without success.
Passengers were relocated through the tunnel to the working train in front accompanied by SNCF staff, firefighters and police, according to an AFP journalist, who said two passengers were looked after by emergency workers.
One tourist, 68-year-old Australian Heather Manton, expressed concern over her reservations in Barcelona and described the experience as "horrible".
The passengers were finally on the move by late afternoon.

Passengers trapped for 6 hours in Paris tunnel on high-speed train

PTI Automatic

An internal audit conducted by carmakers Renault and Nissan identified 11 million euros of questionable expenses at their Dutch subsidiary linked to Carlos Ghosn, the ousted boss of the French-Japanese group, the Renault board said Tuesday.
Board members, who were meeting Tuesday to discuss a proposed merger with Fiat Chrysler, heard of the suspicious spending at RNBV from auditors Mazars and said they think Renault with Nissan should consider taking possible "legal action" in the Netherlands, a statement from the group said.
"The conclusions confirmed the deficiencies at RNBV with regard to financial transparency and control procedures for spending," the board said, noting that the auditors had initially spotted the problem in early April.
The suspicious expenses came to 11 million euros ($12.4 million),  including "certain spending by Mr Ghosn," and over-charging for his plane travel, it said.
The holding Renault-Nissan BV, equally owned by the two automakers, was created by ...

Renault ex-boss linked to 11mn euros of suspicious spending: board

Sudan's protest movement called Tuesday for fresh rallies and rejected the military rulers' election plan after more than 35 people were killed in what demonstrators called a "bloody massacre" by security forces.
Protest leaders called on their supporters to take part in "total civil disobedience" to topple the ruling military council following the deadly dispersal Monday of a weeks-long sit-in outside the army headquarters in Khartoum.
The Transitional Military Council ousted veteran president Omar al-Bashir in April after months of protests against his authoritarian rule and had agreed a three-year transition period to a civilian administration.
But army ruler General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan announced in a televised statement the plan had been ditched and an election would take place under "regional and international supervision".
"The military council decides on the following: cancelling what was agreed on and stopping negotiating with the Alliance for Freedom and Change, and to ...

Sudan protesters reject army election plan after deadly crackdown

Completed scoreboard in the World Cup match between Afghanistan and Sri Lanka in Cardiff on Tuesday:
Sri Lanka
D. Karunaratne c Najibullah b Nabi
30
K. Perera c Shahzad b Rashid
78
L. Thirimanne b Nabi
25
K. Mendis c Rahmat b Nabi
2
A. Mathews c Rahmat b Nabi
0
D. de Silva c Shahzad b Hamid
0
T. Perera run out (Hashmatullah/Shahzad)
2
I. Udana b Dawlat
10
S. Lakmal not out
15
L. Malinga b Dawlat
4
N. Pradeep b Rashid
0
Extras (lb10, nb3, w22)
35
Total (all out, 36.5 overs)
201
Fall of wickets: 1-92 (Karunaratne), 2-144 (Thirimanne), 3-146 (Mendis), 4-146 (Mathews), 5-149 (De Silva), 6-159 (Perera), 7-178 (Udana), 8-180 (Perera), 9-199 (Malinga), 10-201 (Pradeep) Bowling: Dawlat 6-0-34-2 (3w); Hamid 7-0-53-1 (2w); Mujeeb 3-0-19-0 (1w); Nabi 9-0-30-4 (1w); Gulbadin 4-0-38-0 (3nb, 2w); Rashid 7.5-1-17-2 (1w)
Afghanistan (revised target 187 in 41 overs)
Mohammad Shahzad c Karunratne b Malinga
7
Hazratullah Zazai c Perera b Pradeep
30
Rahmat Shah c Mathews b Udana
2
Hashmatullah Shahidi c .

Cricket-WC-2019-AFG-SRI SCORES

At least 10 people were killed in a crash between a bus and a truck in northern Senegal, authorities said Tuesday, at a time when many Muslim faithful are on the move as the holy month of Ramadan ends.
According to the local fire service chief, the accident happened around 20 kilometres (12 miles) outside Saint-Louis, the main city in northern Senegal near the Mauritanian border.
It left 10 dead and 17 injured, "five of them seriously", fire chief Bobo Diallo told AFP.
Medical sources in Saint-Louis suggested the toll could be higher, putting the number of dead at 11, including a two-year-old child.
Local media said that the bus was carrying merchants who were travelling to Saint-Louis to stock up for the Eid al-Fitr festival, which follows the end of the fasting month of Ramadan.
The reports said the bus collided with a truck transporting onions.
Some 90 percent of Senegal's population are Muslims, predominantly following moderate Sufi brotherhoods, and the West African country is ...

Ten dead in Senegal road crash as Ramadan ends

Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Tuesday that Donald Trump's presidency shows the United States is in "decline", as the Islamic republic marked 30 years since the death of its founder.
"The fate of more than 300 million humans is in the hands of a person with such characteristics, this is a sign of America's political decline," Khamenei said in a speech broadcast live on state television.
"In America itself there is so much discussion on his mental and moral stability," he said, attending a ceremony at the mausoleum of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
"When such a person is the president of a country, this shows the political and moral decline of that country."
Iran and US leaders have ratcheted up the barbs and insults ever since Trump was elected as president in 2016.
Living up to his campaign promises, Trump withdrew the US in May 2018 from the landmark 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and major world powers and reimposed sanctions.
The war of words intensified after ...

Iran leader says Trump presidency sign of US 'decline'

Jihadists killed five soldiers at a northeast Nigerian army base hit in a string of weekend attacks, the military said Tuesday as IS-linked Boko Haram claimed responsibility for the multi-pronged assault.
A military source said five troops were killed at a base in Marte in Borno state.
"We lost five soldiers in the Marte encounter but I don't have any details on human losses in the other camps," said the source, who asked not to be named.
"We have to wait for the final assessment on the incidents to have a definite toll on casualties."
The Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), the IS-linked faction of Boko Haram, said in an online statement its fighters attacked five bases in Borno at the weekend, destroying vehicles and carting away weapons, according to SITE Intelligence which monitors jihadist activities worldwide.
ISWAP claimed its assault on bases in the towns of Marte, Kirenowa and Dikwa killed 14 troops, but AFP could not independently verify the toll.
The group also ...

Jihadists kill Nigerian soldiers in string of attacks: military

Hungarian police confirmed Tuesday the discovery of two more South Korean victims of a sightseeing vessel which sank in Budapest last week, raising the toll to eleven tourists killed with 17 still missing.
"A (male) body was found in the window of the boat wreck and brought to the surface," said a statement by Hungarian counterterror police TEK, who are leading the search operation.
Later, police confirmed a male body found in the Kulcs area some 70 kilometres south of the accident scene was also a victim.
The Mermaid boat carrying mainly South Korean tourists overturned and sank last Wednesday seconds after colliding with the Viking Sigyn cruise ship on a busy stretch of the river in the heart of the Hungarian capital.
Only seven of the 35 people on board have survived so far, leaving 17 missing with the prospect of finding any more passengers alive seen as practically zero.
Those missing include a six-year-old girl as well as the Mermaid's Hungarian captain and a crew member.
Divers 

Hungary tourist boat disaster death toll reaches 11

Opposition politicians and campaign groups in Senegal on Tuesday accused the government of secrecy after the BBC reported that a brother of the president had benefited from lucrative dealings in the gas sector.
The BBC report on Sunday, which the brother has denied, delved into contracts deriving from the discovery of major oil and gas reserves off the coast of the poor West African state.
It said that in 2012, newly-elected president Macky Sall confirmed a decision taken by his predecessor Abdoulaye Wade, to award exploitation rights for two fields to the Timis Corporation, controlled by an Australian-Romanian businessman, Frank Timis.
The BBC, in a report broadcast on its Panorama and Africa Eye programmes, said that two years later Timis Corporation secretly paid a "bonus" of USD 250,000 (222,000 euros) to Agritrans, a company controlled by Sall's younger brother, Aliou Sall.
Aliou Sall was also employed by the Timis group after his brother became president, receiving a salary of ..

Outcry in Senegal after BBC probe into gas contract

UN investigators on Tuesday urged authorities in the Democratic Republic of Congo to "step up the pace" and broaden their efforts to ensure accountability for serious violations in the restive Kasai region.
In a fresh report, the experts warned that Kinshasa is moving too slowly to investigate and prosecute a wide range of suspected war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Kasai in 2016-17.
"The military justice authorities must... step up the pace," said the report, which will be presented during the next session of the UN Human Rights Council (June 24- July 12).
It pointed out that in the past three years, only a single case has proceeded so far that "it is ready to be tried".
"The passage of time works against the criminal justice system by weakening the reliability of testimony, which is often the only evidence available, and making it more difficult to identify and preserve physical evidence, such as mass graves," the report warned.
Kasai was plunged into violence in ..

UN probe urges DR Congo to 'step up' fight against impunity

Neymar's mother has urged her Brazilian football star son to "forgive" the woman who accused him of rape and "return to Jesus," in a message published Tuesday on Instagram.
Nadine Goncalves' plea, which featured a photo of herself with Neymar and his sister Rafaela, comes after lawyers for the accuser reportedly stopped representing her because of contradictions in her story.
Neymar has vehemently denied the allegations and his father has claimed the Saint-Germain player was the victim of a blackmail attempt.
"My son ... now that the truth of God is coming out, it is time to learn from all this and return to Jesus Christ, your first love," Goncalves wrote to Neymar, the world's most expensive footballer.
"Focus on what you love most in life, playing football," she said, as Neymar prepares with his teammates for this month's Copa America tournament in Brazil.
"We are Christians, forgive that girl. Me and your sister, as women, can guarantee that she does not represent us."
Neymar ...

Neymar's mother urges son to 'forgive' rape accuser

Real Madrid said Tuesday they have signed 21-year-old Serbia striker Luka Jovic from German side Eintracht Frankfurt on a six-year deal for an undisclosed fee.
"Real Madrid and Eintracht Frankfurt have agreed the transfer of Luka Jovic, subject to a medical," Real said in a statement.
"The player will be tied to the club for the next six seasons, until the 30th of June 2025," it added.
Jovic scored 27 goals in all competitions this season, helping Frankfurt to the Europa League semi-finals and seventh place in the Bundesliga. He also made four appearances for Serbia, scoring one goal.
His dazzling form put him on the radar of Europe's top clubs, with Spanish media quoting a price tag of 60 million euros ($67 million) while German media said Real will have paid out 70 million euros.
Frankfurt's sporting director Fredi Bobic disclosed no financial details but suggested the size of the Madrid offer was just too big to resist.
"In sporting terms, Luka Jovic is a big loss for us," he said .

Real Madrid snap up Serb starlet Jovic in transfer coup

Thirty years after Poland's election that heralded the peaceful demise of the entire Soviet bloc, anti-communist icon Lech Walesa on Tuesday warned against the dangers of demagoguery, populism and income inequality in capitalist societies today.
"Neither communism nor the current capitalism suits the 21st century. The people will not accept the kind of distribution of wealth that we have today and which is at risk of continuing," the Nobel Peace laureate told a crowd of 10,000 in the Baltic port city of Gdansk.
"So some sort of October Revolution may take place, unless we sit down at a table (and negotiate) with those who hold these riches," the former Polish president added, surrounded by other protagonists of the fall of communism.
Three decades ago, "our generation succeeded at something incredible: we offered the world a new chance, and we did it without starting a nuclear war," said the former leader of the freedom-fighting Solidarity trade union.
On June 4, 1989, after so-called 

Poland marks 30 years since election of first non-communist govt

The Palestinians will begin the Eid festivities on a different day to Saudi Arabia for the first time since at least 1994 due to differences in the sighting of the moon, leading some to question why.
Some Palestinians even suggested on social media the decision could be related to politics ahead of the unveiling of the US plan for Israeli-Palestinian peace.
Saudi Arabia has close ties with US President Donald Trump's administration.
Palestinian officials flatly denied the claim related to the Eid al-Fitr festival that follows the end of the fasting month of Ramadan.
Others joked about the different dates, with one social media comment proposing Palestinians fast for a half-day on Tuesday to bridge the division.
A statement by the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and the Palestinian territories carried on official media Monday night confirmed Eid al-Fitr would begin on Wednesday, a day later than Saudi Arabia.
The end of Ramadan is based on the new moon but regional rivals Saudi Arabia and ...

Palestinians break with Saudi Eid date for first time in years

South Africa cricketers Hashim Amla and Imran Tahir attended Eid prayers at a Southampton mosque on Tuesday ahead of their team's crucial World Cup clash against India.
The two players were warmly greeted by fellow worshippers, with selfie-seekers making a beeline to grab a photo with them.
Both players are veterans in the South Africa side, who have lost their two opening matches at the World Cup in England and Wales.
The 40-year-old Tahir, a Pakistan-born leg-spinner, is set to quit one-day-internationals after the tournament.
Top-order batsman Amla, 36, missed the team's second World Cup game against Bangladesh on Sunday after being hit on the head by a bouncer in the tournament opener against England.
Pakistani umpire Aleem Dar, who is standing at the World Cup, also accompanied the South Africa duo for Eid prayers.
Pakistan players visited a Nottingham mosque a day after their dramatic 14-run victory over tournament hosts England as fans gathered to congratulate them.
The ...

World Cup players attend Eid prayers

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani pledged Tuesday to release nearly 900 inmates from prisons across Afghanistan.
During an address to the nation for Eid -- the festival marking the end of Ramadan -- Ghani said 887 inmates would be set free.
The president did not say what offences the prisoners had committed or whether they were members of the Taliban.
During a peace conference in April, Ghani said he would release 175 Taliban prisoners as a gesture of "goodwill".
It was not clear if those insurgent prisoners were included in the number Ghani gave on Tuesday.
Ghani had proposed a nationwide ceasefire at the start of Ramadan early last month, but the Taliban rejected the offer.
Last year, the Taliban observed a three-day ceasefire but there has been no reduction in violence this year.
Ghani also said he had accepted an invitation from Pakistan's Prime Minister Imran Khan to visit Pakistan later this month.

Afghan president pledges to release nearly 900 prisoners

France's prime minister on Tuesday announced a crackdown on the destruction of unsold or returned consumer products that will affect online retailers such as Amazon and luxury goods brands.
Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said that a ban on destroying non-food goods -- such as clothes, electrical items, hygiene products and cosmetics -- would come into force within the next four years.
The announcement came after Green parties surged across Europe in last month's European elections, not least in France where the EELV party came third with 13.5 per cent of the vote.
According to the French premier's office, over 650 million euros (USD 730 million) worth of new consumer products are thrown away or destroyed every year, five times more than donations of the same products.
The measure would make it compulsory to hand in the products for re-use or recycling.
"It is a waste that shocks, that is shocking to common sense. It's a scandal," said Philippe, as he launched the measure at a ...

France to ban destroying unsold goods, targeting Amazon, luxury brands

Ten people were killed and 20 wounded Saturday in a suicide car bomb attack in Raqa, a former stronghold of the Islamic State group (IS) in north Syria, a rights watchdog said.
The explosion claimed the lives of five civilians and five soldiers of the Syrian Democratic Forces  (SDF), a Kurdish-Arab alliance backed by Washington which wrested the city from IS in October 2017, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR).
The attack, for which no one has claimed responsibility, was preceded by a bomb explosion that left several people wounded in another part of the city frequently targeted by the Islamic State group, said the SOHR.
"The car bomb attack was targeting an SDF position," SOHR director Rami Abdel Rahmane told AFP. The explosion took place at the al-Naim square where IS had carried out beheadings when it was in control of the city.
On April 9, a double bombing claimed by IS killed 13 people, mostly civilians, in the jihadist group's former bastion.
IS jihadists 

10 dead in suicide car bomb attack in Raqa, Syria: NGO

Mohamed Salah was off injured within 30 minutes of last year's Champions League final but celebrating inside two minutes of this one.
The last props of the opening ceremony were not even down the tunnel when Salah lashed his penalty past Hugo Lloris before lingering to show his joy in front of the Tottenham fans, long after his team-mates had trundled away.
Salah has history with Spurs supporters, largely on account of being the main threat to Harry Kane winning the Golden Boot in recent seasons, but perhaps there was more to why he wanted to hang on the moment.
After all, it was on this stage last year, with club football's biggest prize in sight, that Salah saw his final ended early by a tug from Sergio Ramos and a tumble on his shoulder.
"Of course it was a big moment in the game," Jurgen Klopp said last year. "It was like wrestling. The shock of the boys was obvious." Taken off after half an hour, Salah lay in hospital, helpless while Liverpool were beaten 3-1 by Real Madrid and ..

Redemption for Salah as Liverpool beat Tottenham to win Champions League

One person was killed and 10 wounded in the Sudanese capital Khartoum on Saturday when shots were fired near the site of a protest sit-in, a doctors' committee close to demonstrators said.
"After regular forces opened fire, there were casualties on Nile Street near the sit-in site," the Central Committee of Sudanese Doctors said in a statement.
The committee did not specify which forces opened fire or identify those killed or wounded.
A man died "who was hit with live rounds in the head," the committee said.
Soldiers and security forces blocked off the city's Nile Street on Saturday afternoon, while gunfire could be heard in the distance, an AFP reporter said. It was unclear who was firing.
The doctors' committee said three people were wounded by gunfire and most of the other casualties were hit with rifle butts and steel bars, without elaborating.
The military ousted president Omar al-Bashir in April after months of protests against his authoritarian rule.
Protesters have remained ...

One dead, 10 wounded as shots fired in Sudan capital

Tunisian authorities were on Saturday stopping 75 migrants saved at sea from coming ashore, according to a rights group and the captain of the ship which rescued them.
The migrants were adrift in international waters in a boat with a broken engine when an Egyptian tug boat brought them aboard, the captain said on condition of anonymity.
After notifying authorities in Italy and Malta, the crew headed for the southern Tunisian port of Zarzis where authorities refused to allow the ship to dock.
"We're in a critical situation, we're nearly 100 on board and we don't have more than two days of supplies of water and food," the captain told AFP by phone.
Tunisian rights organisation FTDES said the regional governor demanded government support before accepting the migrants, following an increase in new arrivals from neighbouring Libya in recent months.
Tunisian authorities did not respond to AFP's requests for comment.
The crew of the tug boat rescued 64 Bangladeshis, nine Egyptians, one ...

AFP

AFP

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