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After a tragic shipwreck, no peace for the dead or living | CNN

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After a tragic shipwreck, no peace for the dead or living | CNN



CNN
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Two weeks after a ship full of migrants sank off the coast of southern Italy, there’s nonetheless no peace for the residing or the useless, and the lacking – largely youngsters – proceed to scrub up on the seashores.

The newest – a lady aged 5 – 6 – was found on Saturday morning, bringing the toll from when the ill-fated boat broke aside on the rocks on February 26 off the village of Cutro to 74. Almost half had been minors.

The native coroner’s workplace offered names for lots of the useless together with Torpekai Amarkhel, a 42-year-old feminine journalist from Afghanistan, who was killed alongside along with her husband and two of their three youngsters.

Her different youngster, a seven-year-old daughter, is among the many roughly 30 individuals nonetheless lacking, presumed useless, from the tragedy.

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Amarkhel had fled Afghanistan along with her household following the clampdown on girls, her sister Mida, who had emigrated to Rotterdam, instructed Unama Information radio, a United Nations challenge Amarkhel was concerned in.

Shahida Raza, who performed soccer and hockey for Pakistan’s nationwide staff, was additionally among the many useless. A pal stated she was touring within the hope of securing a greater future for her disabled son.

Initially, these discovered got alphanumeric code numbers, relatively than names. When first responders discovered the corpse of 28-year-old Abiden Jafari from Afghanistan, they recognized her solely as KR16D45 – KR for the close by metropolis of Crotone, 16 as a result of she was the sixteenth sufferer discovered, D for donna or lady, and 45, her estimated age.

However after taking her to the morgue, they found she was a girls’s rights activist who had been threatened by the Taliban, probably inflicting her to threat her life at sea.

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The physique of a six-year-old boy, first recognized as KR70M6, was named by his uncle as Hakef Taimoori.

The uncle had a household picture exhibiting the younger boy carrying the identical footwear as he had on when he washed up on the seashore. His dad and mom and two-year-old brother additionally died within the catastrophe. A 3rd brother stays among the many lacking.

The useless have additionally been caught in a wrestle between the Italian state and members of the family.

The Inside Ministry ordered that every one our bodies be transferred from Calabria the place the caskets have been on show in an auditorium, to the Islamic cemetery of Bologna for burial, in line with Italy’s protocol for irregular migrants who die trying to enter Italy.

Members of the family who both survived the wreck or got here from different components of Europe to assert their family members’ stays protested with makeshift indicators and a sit-in in entrance of the auditorium on Wednesday.

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After a tense negotiation, the Prefecture of Crotone confirmed to CNN that 25 households, largely Afghan and Syrian, agreed to have their family members buried in Bologna,.

All those that haven’t been recognized may even be buried in Bologna together with the stays of a Turkish nationwide who has been recognized as one of many human traffickers.

Pieces of wood wash up on a beach, two days after the boat carrying migrants sank off Italy's southern Calabria region.
Many of those who died will not be returned home to be buried.

The destiny of the remaining stays some extent of negotiation, however the mayor of Crotone Vincenzo Voce stated the Italian state would pay for any repatriations both to international locations of origin or to be buried with members of the family in different components of Italy.

The Italian Inside Ministry instructed CNN it couldn’t touch upon what would occur to the victims’ stays, however confirmed that previous protocol is to not pay for repatriating anybody who died trying to enter Italy as an irregular migrant however to make the nation of origin pay prices. Within the final decade, no repatriations have taken place, the ministry stated.

Of the 82 survivors, three Turkish residents and one Pakistan citizen have been arrested for human trafficking, and eight persons are nonetheless hospitalized.

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A lot of the survivors had been moved this week to a Crotone lodge after human rights advocates led by Italian leftist politician Franco Mari protested the situations during which they had been being saved, which included one shared rest room for males and one other for girls close to sleeping quarters that included solely benches and mattresses on the ground to sleep.

Mari, who visited the reception heart, tweeted that not one of the survivors had sheets, towels or pillows. Twelve others had been moved to a reception heart for unaccompanied minors.

In opposition to the backdrop of the saga about what to do with each the survivors and the victims, there’s a rising firestorm concerning the rescue itself.

A surveillance aircraft for European border management Frontex had recognized the ill-fated vessel the day earlier than it sank and had alerted the Italian Coast Guard.

The Coast Guard stated in a press release that the vessel was not recognized as a migrant boat, and that, at any price, it didn’t appear in misery.

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Warmth sensing surveillance photos launched by the Coast Guard present that just one particular person was seen on board the ship after they flew over it.

Survivors recounted to media and human rights teams that they had been locked within the hull of the ship and allowed to return up for air at intervals through the four-day journey from Turkey.

The Crotone public prosecutor’s workplace confirmed to CNN that it had opened a legal investigation into the circumstances of the failed rescue after greater than 40 human rights associations and NGOs signed a petition to demand all information be made public to find out if anybody failed to supply help to the boat in accordance with maritime legislation.

On Thursday, the Council of Ministers led by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni met on the catastrophe in Cutro and stated they might deal with focusing on trafficking rings and rising jail time for human traffickers to 30 years.

Protests broke out against Italy's government, who have made stopping migrant boats a priority.

Most of the authorities automobiles had been pummeled with stuffed animals by protesters in Cutro who held indicators that stated “not in my title” to protest in opposition to blocking migrants and refugees from getting into Europe via Italy.

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The ministers additionally mentioned “dashing up the mechanism for making use of for asylum” relatively than rising the quota, which stands at accepting 82,700 migrants who qualify for asylum in 2023. Thus far this yr, greater than 17,600 individuals have reached Italy by sea.

In 2022, 105,131 individuals entered the nation by sea. The method to use for asylum usually takes between three and 5 years, relying on the nation of origin. People who find themselves not from asylum-producing international locations, however are financial migrants, are repatriated again to their international locations of origin.

Italian President Sergio Mattarella stated the Afghanistan residents who survived can be prioritized for asylum. It’s but unclear if those that don’t qualify shall be repatriated to their international locations of origin.

Meloni’s right-leaning authorities has vowed to clamp down on human traffickers and NGO rescue vessels. However the boats preserve coming – a whole lot of migrants had been rescued this weekend – and indicators are that they arriving sooner than ever. This tragedy is unlikely to be the final.

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Menendez Brothers Resentenced to Life With Parole, Paving Way for Freedom

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Menendez Brothers Resentenced to Life With Parole, Paving Way for Freedom

Lyle and Erik Menendez were resentenced on Tuesday to life in prison with the possibility of parole, setting the stage for their possible release after more than three decades behind bars for killing their parents in their Beverly Hills mansion.

The decision, by Judge Michael V. Jesic of Los Angeles Superior Court, came after a day of testimony by family members, who said the brothers had turned their lives around inside prison through education and self-help groups. They urged the court to reduce the brothers’ sentences for the 1989 killings.

“This was an absolutely horrific crime,” Judge Jesic said as he delivered his ruling. But as shocking as the crime was, Judge Jesic said, he was also shocked by the number of corrections officials who wrote letters on behalf of the brothers, documented support that clearly swayed his decision.

“I’m not suggesting they should be released,” he said. “That’s not for me to decide.”

But, he continued: “I do believe they have done enough over the last 35 years to get that chance.” The brothers’ futures, he said, would now be in the hands of Gov. Gavin Newsom and state parole-board officials.

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While Judge Jesic’s decision was the most important legal step so far in the brothers’ long effort to win release, it is not the final step. In reducing the brothers’ sentences, the judge has allowed them to be immediately eligible for parole.

Now the attention will be on the state’s parole officials. The brothers were already scheduled to appear before the board on June 13 as part of Mr. Newsom’s consideration of clemency, a separate process that has unfolded in parallel to the resentencing effort.

It was unclear if the June hearing would address both the resentencing and clemency request. A spokesperson for Mr. Newsom said his office was reviewing the judge’s decision and determining next steps.

Lawyers for the brothers made only brief statements after the hearing, thanking supporters.

Anamaria Baralt, a cousin of the brothers who testified on Tuesday, faced the dozens of cameras assembled outside the courthouse. “I have been crying all day long. These are tears of joy, for sure,” she said.

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Nathan J. Hochman, the Los Angeles district attorney who has opposed resentencing for the brothers, did not provide statements after the ruling. He and his team have argued repeatedly that the brothers failed to demonstrate that they have “full insight” into their crimes. The brothers, they argued, never renounced their claim that they killed their parents because they feared their parents would kill them first, which prosecutors maintained was a lie.

The decision to resentence the brothers is a remarkable turn in a saga that has gripped the nation’s attention for decades. The brothers tried unsuccessfully to appeal their convictions for many years, and they had said that over time, their hopes of being released had diminished. As the years passed, the brothers evolved into cultural icons in their own right, amassing a loyal following as a series of docudramas and documentaries retold their stories for a younger audience.

In 1989, the story of sexual abuse and murder in one of America’s ritziest cities was irresistible to the media and public, and it foreshadowed an even greater obsession with another Los Angeles story — the murder case against O.J. Simpson.

The brothers said they burst into the den of their Beverly Hills mansion on a Sunday evening in 1989 and killed their parents with shotguns because they had endured years of sexual abuse from their father. They said they feared their parents would kill them to keep the abuse secret. At the time, Lyle was 21 and Erik, 18.

Now two middle-aged men, the brothers appeared remotely at the resentencing hearing on Tuesday from their prison near San Diego, sitting stoically in blue jumpsuits while witness after witness testified on their behalf.

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After Judge Jesic said that he would resentence the brothers — but before he said what the new sentence would be — the brothers made statements. Through a video feed, they took responsibility for the crimes and apologized to their relatives in the courtroom, who could be heard softly sobbing.

Lyle spoke first, saying that all the choices he made in August 1989 were his own, including “the choice to reload, return to the den and run up to my mother and shoot her in the head.” And he took responsibility, he said, for making a “mockery of the criminal legal system” by lying to the police and trying to solicit others to lie for him on the witness stand at trial.

He said that at the time, he was a young man “scared and filled with rage,” who was too ashamed of the sexual abuse happening in his house to find someone and ask for help.

Erik also took responsibility for the crimes and said he had spent a long time wondering what his parents must have been thinking the night they were murdered, and “the terror they must have felt when their own son fired a gun at them.”

Back then, the case played out as a sort of reckoning of the policies and culture of the 1990s: the tough-on-crime measures that left California’s prisons overcrowded; the societal attitudes about sexual abuse that eyed the brothers’ story with skepticism; the gavel-to-gavel televised trial coverage; and the late-night comics who regularly mocked the brothers as privileged dilettantes.

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Their first trial, in 1993, landed during a tumultuous time in Los Angeles. Officers in the beating of Rodney King had been acquitted of assault, catalyzing deadly riots.

After their first trial ended in mistrials — the brothers were tried together with separate juries — they went on trial a second time after Mr. Simpson’s acquittal.

This time, the brothers faced different rules in the courtroom. Cameras were banned, and the judge limited testimony and evidence about sexual abuse. The jury convicted the brothers of murder, and they were sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

In recent years, the brothers have drawn sympathy from many young people who were not alive at the time of the crimes. Learning about the case online, they have come to believe that the brothers were mistreated by the criminal justice system and the media, and have rallied to their cause on social media.

Laurel Rosenhall contributed reporting.

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Donald Trump lauds Saudi Arabia as he unveils AI and defence deals

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Donald Trump lauds Saudi Arabia as he unveils AI and defence deals

Donald Trump hailed the US’s relationship with Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, just hours after the White House unveiled what it said was $600bn worth of defence, artificial intelligence and other deals with the kingdom. 

The US president lauded the kingdom and its de facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, as he began the first leg of his dealmaking, three-nation tour of the oil-rich Gulf.

“He’s an incredible man, I’ve known him a long time now. There’s nobody like him,” Trump said to a packed auditorium in Riyadh. Among the guests were Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, private equity baron Stephen Schwarzman, Nvidia boss Jensen Huang and dozens of other US executives.

The US-Saudi relationship had been a “bedrock” of security and prosperity, Trump said. He added: “Today, we reaffirm the bond and take the next steps to make our relationship closer, stronger, more powerful than ever before . . . And it will remain that way.”

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In a press release before Trump’s speech, the White House had hailed “Saudi Arabia’s $600bn commitment to invest in the US” and “economic ties that will endure for generations to come”.

Prince Mohammed said the two countries would work over the coming months to increase the total to $1tn.

“We are working on partnership opportunities with the US worth $600bn, including agreements of more than $300bn announced today during this forum,” the crown prince said.

The deals unveiled by the White House included a commitment by Saudi Arabia’s new state-owned AI company, Humain, to build AI infrastructure in the kingdom using several “hundred thousands” of Nvidia’s most advanced chips over the next five years.

That would make it one of the biggest AI chip orders by a state company, underlining the scale of Prince Mohammed’s ambitions to position Saudi Arabia as a global AI hub and boosting Nvidia’s desire to build “sovereign AI” infrastructure around the world.

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The first phase of Humain’s investment would involve deploying 18,000 of Nvidia’s latest “Blackwell” servers, the chipmaker said. Based on the price of a single Nvidia graphics processing unit, estimated at $30,000-$40,000, the Saudi investment would run into multiple billions of dollars.

AMD, one of Nvidia’s main competitors in the AI chip market, is also co-investing up to $10bn with Humain to deploy its own infrastructure in the country. Amazon made a similar $5bn commitment covering data centre infrastructure.

Nvidia shares rose 5.6 per cent on Tuesday, while AMD’s gained 4 per cent. Amazon was 1.3 per cent higher.

Tesla chief and Trump adviser Elon Musk, left, and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang along with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman © Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images

Jimmy Goodrich, senior adviser for technology analysis to the Rand Corporation think-tank, said the “massive scale” of the Middle East AI announcements would “undoubtedly eat into future US data centre growth”.

“Instead of offshoring the future economic revolution to the Middle East, a better approach would be to channel Gulf state money into American re-industrialisation and energy dominance,” Goodrich said.

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The White House also cited on Tuesday what it said was a “nearly $142bn” agreement to provide Riyadh “with state-of-the-art warfighting equipment and services from over a dozen US defence firms”.

It added this would include air force and space capabilities, missile defence, maritime and border security, land forces modernisation and upgrades to communication systems.

The US also referred to plans by Saudi Arabian DataVolt to invest $20bn in AI data centres and energy infrastructure in the US.

Trump is looking to secure deals and investment pledges worth more than $1tn on his trip to the Gulf, which will also include stops in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.

The traditional US allies are among the biggest buyers of American weapons, boast sovereign wealth funds that collectively manage in excess of $3tn and have all stated their ambitions to invest heavily in AI. 

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Many of the US’s most powerful tech executives were also in Riyadh, including Musk, Huang and OpenAI’s Sam Altman as Saudi Arabia hosted a glitzy investment forum. Top financiers including Blackstone’s Schwarzman, BlackRock’s Larry Fink and Citigroup’s Jane Fraser also attended. 

US tech companies have been increasingly looking to the Gulf, which manages some of the world’s largest and most active sovereign wealth funds, to raise capital and lure investments. 

The Trump administration last week scrapped a Biden-era rule under which Saudi Arabia, along with dozens of other countries including India and Singapore, would have faced limitations on their purchases of the most powerful US-designed AI chips.

Riyadh launched Humain, which will be chaired by Prince Mohammed and owned by the Public Investment Fund, the $940bn sovereign wealth fund, to steer its strategy and investments in the sector on Monday, the day before Trump arrived. 

Just days after Trump’s inauguration in January, Prince Mohammed committed Saudi Arabia to investing $600bn in the US over the next four years — the same amount that was announced on Tuesday.

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The UAE followed up with a similar gesture in March, pledging to invest $1.4tn over the next 10 years. It is also seeking to establish itself as a leading AI hub and has taken a strategic decision to invest in US tech. 

Analysts question how the Gulf states will be able to deploy such a vast scale of capital in the timeframes announced, particularly Saudi Arabia as it grapples with lower oil prices, a widening budget deficit and the scale of its own domestic projects.

Additional reporting by Michael Acton in San Francisco

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Takeaways from Sean 'Diddy' Combs' ex-girlfriend Cassandra Ventura's testimony

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Takeaways from Sean 'Diddy' Combs' ex-girlfriend Cassandra Ventura's testimony
Madeline Halpert

BBC News in New York court

Reuters/Jane Rosenberg In a courtroom sktech, Sean "Diddy" Combs watches as his former girlfriend Casandra "Cassie" Ventura reacts during testimony to prosecutor Emily JohnsonReuters/Jane Rosenberg

Prosecutors’ star witness, Sean “Diddy” Combs’ ex-girlfriend Casandra Ventura, took the stand on Tuesday in the hip-hop mogul’s sex trafficking trial, accusing the rapper of controlling her life and coercing her into “humiliating” sex acts.

Mr Combs has pleaded not guilty to charges including racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, and transportation to engage in prostitution.

Family and friends have come to court in large numbers to support Mr Combs, whose legal team has not yet questioned Ms Ventura.

Ms Ventura, who is pregnant, told prosecutors about the alleged physical and emotional abuse she endured at the hands of the rapper during so-called “freak-offs”, or sexual encounters the couple had with male escorts.

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Here are some of the most notable parts of her first five hours of testimony.

Warning: This story contains details that some readers may find distressing.

Ms Ventura fell ‘in love’ with Mr Combs

Prosecutors began by questioning Ms Ventura – one of their two central witnesses in the case – about her 11-year, on-and-off relationship with Mr Combs.

Now 38 and pregnant in her third trimester with her third child, Ms Ventura met Mr Combs when she was a 19-year-old aspiring singer and he was 37. Mr Combs’ record label would later sign Ms Ventura as an artist, and shortly after, their romantic relationship began.

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Their relationship progressed over a series of several trips. At the time, she testified, she felt like they were in a monogamous relationship, though she knows now that he had other girlfriends.

She said she “fell in love” with the “larger than life entrepreneur and musician”. But it was not long before she noticed another side to him, she said.

REUTERS/Jane Rosenberg A court sketch shows as Sean "Diddy" Combs watches as his former girlfriend Casandra "Cassie" Ventura is sworn in as a prosecution witness
REUTERS/Jane Rosenberg

Mr Combs wanted to ‘control’ every part of her life, Ms Ventura says

Mr Combs wanted to “control” her life, Ms Ventura said. She said he paid for her home, her cars, her phone and other technology that he would sometimes take away to “punish” her.

“Control was everything, from the way that I looked … to what I was working on,” Ms Ventura said.

Eventually, she claimed, the control turned violent. Mr Combs would “bash on my head, knock me over, drag me and kick me” frequently, Ms Ventura testified, sometimes through tears.

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She alleged that she was left with swollen lips, black eyes and knots on her forehead.

Ms Ventura felt ‘humiliated’ by ‘freak-offs’

Prosecutors spent hours on Tuesday asking Ms Ventura about so-called “freak-offs”.

Ms Ventura told the court how Mr Combs introduced her to the sexual events during the first year of their relationship: They would hire a male escort or stripper to have sex with Ms Ventura while Mr Combs watched.

Ms Ventura told the court that she first tried the encounters to make Mr Combs “happy”. But she said they humiliated her, and sometimes lasted three to four days.

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“I felt pretty horrible about myself,” she told the court, wiping away tears. “It made me feel worthless.”

Ms Ventura told the court she never wanted to have sex with anyone but Mr Combs, and claimed she would take myriad drugs – marijuana, ecstasy and ketamine – to help her perform to Mr Combs’ satisfaction, but also to “disassociate”.

The drugs were “a way to not feel it for what it really was”, she said, “having sex with a stranger I didn’t really want to be having sex with”.

Mr Combs flew male escorts in for freak-offs, court hears

As prosecutors pressed Ms Ventura about the “freak-offs”, she told the court of how Mr Combs would direct her to find male escorts, strippers or dancers to have sex with while he watched.

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She alleged that Mr Combs would pay the men anywhere from $1,500 to $6,000 in cash, depending on their performance.

They found the men through stripper companies and sites like Craigslist. Some of their photos were displayed to the jurors, including Daniel Phillip, who finished his testimony earlier on Tuesday.

Ms Ventura and Mr Combs had the enounters in cities around the world, including Los Angeles, New York, Las Vegas and Ibiza, Spain, Ms Ventura testified.

Sometimes, men would be flown in during vacations, she alleged, and Mr Combs would direct her to ask staff to pay for and arrange their travel, calling them new employees.

Among other charges, prosecutors are trying to prove that Mr Combs engaged in sex trafficking – human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation – and transportation to engage in prostitution.

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Mr Combs ‘directed’, Ms Ventura says

As prosecutors pressed Ms Ventura for graphic details, one key element emerged: Ms Ventura claimed that Mr Combs controlled every part of the encounters.

He chose the outfits she wore – down to the extremely high heels she kept on for hours – as well as the sexual acts that transpired and the lighting, Ms Ventura told jurors.

“If Sean wanted something to happen, that was what was going to happen,” she said. “I couldn’t say no.”

Sometimes, Ms Ventura said, she would take the lead on which male escorts to hire because Mr Combs was “very busy”, but she only did so at his direction, she said.

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She said freak-offs had a very specific “pattern” of sexual acts each time.

“He was controlling the whole situation,” she alleged. “He was directing it.”

At times, Ms Ventura said, she tried to tell Mr Combs that she felt “horrible”. But when he dismissed her concerns, she said, she relented, worried he would get angry or question their relationship.

Ms Ventura is expected to continue her testimony on Wednesday, when she could also face cross-examination.

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