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‘They watch us burn’: Sudanese refugees recount Darfur violence

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‘They watch us burn’: Sudanese refugees recount Darfur violence

Thousands of Sudanese flock to Chad as UN calls for access to western Sudan to deliver much-needed aid amid humanitarian crisis.

Thousands of people continue to pour into Chad fleeing escalating violence in Sudan’s West Darfur state, with a United Nations official seeking access to provide urgent medical supplies, food aid and other assistance to the war-ravaged region amid a worsening humanitarian crisis.

“Darfur is an area we have not been able to access and there is significant fighting [there],” Clementine Nkweta-Salami, the UN’s humanitarian coordinator for Sudan, told Al Jazeera on Saturday.

“We need to be able to bring in staff. We need to be able to get agreements so that we can move along the routes [and] our trucks that are presently in parts of the country can make their way to Darfur,” she said, calling for a security agreement for the safe movement of aid.

In the two months since the Darfur city of el-Geneina has been under siege, Adam Mohd Yousef has lost 22 members of his family – 15 of them children.

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“The Sudanese government didn’t help us. They see what is happening and just watch us burn,” he told Al Jazeera, bursting into tears.

Yousef is among the thousands of Sudanese refugees crossing into Chad to escape violence in the continuing war between Sudan’s army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), with the situation in Darfur particularly catastrophic according to humanitarian groups and international actors.

“The UNHCR is here assessing the situation and they say it has never – in the past two months of war – ever, been this bad, certainly not at this border check post in Adre,” said Al Jazeera’s Zein Basravi, from the Chadian city on the border with Sudan.

The UNCHR says there is not enough international interest in the crisis and that they are underfunded, Basravi said.

At least 1,000 people have been killed in el-Geneina in particular, where there have been new waves of attacks by Arab nomadic tribes with ties to the RSF. The fighting has also sent more than 270,000 refugees across the border to Chad.

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The refugees at the Adre checkpoint told Al Jazeera their city of el-Geneina no longer exists, as thousands turn up each day to the border crossing, tired, desperate, and in fear for their lives and future. Many of those crossing are also unaccompanied children who are picked up by strangers along the way.

“I don’t know where my children are. I had to leave them behind,” a sobbing woman told Al Jazeera, before falling down in exhaustion.

While UN agencies like the World Food Programme (WFP) have been able to get aid in other fighting strongholds like the capital, Khartoum, they have been unable to provide relief in Darfur.

On Thursday, the United States and UN said the situation there could herald a repeat of past mass atrocities.

Events in the region are “an ominous reminder of the horrific events that led the United States to determine in 2004 that genocide had been committed in Darfur,” the US State Department said in a statement.

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“Darfur is rapidly spiraling into a humanitarian calamity. The world cannot allow this to happen. Not again,” UN aid chief Martin Griffiths also said in a statement.

On Wednesday, the killing of West Darfur state Governor Khamis Abakar after he publicly blamed the deaths of civilians on the RSF marked a new escalation in the conflict.

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He’s fast, feisty and could play Quidditch. Meet the bat that won a beauty contest

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He’s fast, feisty and could play Quidditch. Meet the bat that won a beauty contest

ASHLAND, Ore. (AP) — A winged creature from Oregon was crowned this year’s winner Thursday in an annual bat beauty contest put on by the Bureau of Land Management.

On Halloween, which was also the last day of International Bat Week, a hoary bat with a feisty personality named “Hoary Potter” defeated “Lestat”, the western small-footed bat from Idaho, in the final round of the contest. It also bested a Townsend’s big-eared bat named “Sir Flaps-A-Lot” from Utah, among others.

The victory marks the third year in a row that a bat from Oregon has taken first place in the contest. Last year, “William ShakespEAR,” a female Townsend’s big-eared bat from southern Oregon took the title. In 2022, a canyon bat named “Barbara” also from southern Oregon was declared the winner.

The federal agency has held the competition since 2019 to raise awareness about the animal’s ecological importance. The bats are part of wild populations living on public lands, and are photographed by agency staff. BLM posted the photos on its Facebook and Instagram accounts, and asked people to vote for the cutest one.

Hoary bats are known for swift flight and wrapping themselves in their own tails to mimic leaves and to hide from predators, the agency said. Because of this attribute, it estimated Hoary Potter would be “the perfect candidate for seeker on this year’s Quidditch team,” referring to the game in Harry Potter that is played on flying brooms.

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Emma Busk, the BLM wildlife technician who photographed Hoary Potter, said bats play a key role in the environment by eating insects and pollinating flowers and fruits. But they’re increasingly facing the threats of habitat loss, disease and light pollution, and are often misunderstood as scary disease carriers, she said.

“Less than 1% of all bat populations actually carry rabies, and the bat-to-human disease transmission is actually really low,” she said.

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Busk said she hopes the event inspires more love for the only flying mammal.

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Spain searches for bodies after unprecedented flooding claims at least 158 lives

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Spain searches for bodies after unprecedented flooding claims at least 158 lives

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Crews searched for bodies in stranded cars and sodden buildings Thursday as residents salvaged what they could from their ruined homes following monstrous flash floods in Spain that claimed at least 158 lives, with 155 deaths confirmed in the eastern Valencia region alone.

More horrors emerged Thursday from the debris and ubiquitous layers of mud left by the walls of water that produced Spain’s deadliest natural disaster in living memory. The damage recalled the aftermath of a tsunami, with survivors left to pick up the pieces as they mourn their loved ones.

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AT LEAST 63 DEAD IN DEVASTATING FLASH FLOODS ACROSS EASTERN SPAIN, OFFICIALS SAY

Cars were piled on one another like fallen dominoes, uprooted trees, downed power lines and household items all mired in mud that covered streets in dozens of communities in Valencia, a region south of Barcelona on the Mediterranean coast.

An unknown number of people are still missing and more victims could be found.

“Unfortunately, there are dead people inside some vehicles,” Spain’s Transport Minister Óscar Puente said early Thursday before the death toll spiked from 95 on Wednesday night.

Rushing water turned narrow streets into death traps and spawned rivers that tore through homes and businesses, sweeping away cars, people and everything else in its path. The floods demolished bridges and left roads unrecognizable.

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Luís Sánchez, a welder, said he saved several people who were trapped in their cars on the flooded V-31 highway south of Valencia city. The road rapidly became a floating graveyard strewn with hundreds of vehicles.

“I saw bodies floating past. I called out, but nothing,” Sánchez said. “The firefighters took the elderly first, when they could get in. I am from nearby so I tried to help and rescue people. People were crying all over, they were trapped.”

Regional authorities said late Wednesday that rescuers in helicopters saved some 70 people stranded on rooftops and in cars, but ground crews were far from done.

Vehicles are seen piled up after being swept away by floods in Valencia, Spain, Thursday, Oct. 31, 2024.  (AP Photo/Alberto Saiz)

“Our priority is to find the victims and the missing so we can help end the suffering of their families,” Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said after meeting with officials and emergency services in Valencia on Thursday, the first of three official days of mourning.

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An ‘extraordinary’ deluge

Spain’s Mediterranean coast is used to autumn storms that can cause flooding, but this was the most powerful flash flood event in recent memory. Scientists link it to climate change, which is also behind increasingly high temperatures and droughts in Spain and the heating up of the Mediterranean Sea.

Human-caused climate change has doubled the likelihood of a storm like this week’s deluge in Valencia, according to a rapid but partial analysis Thursday by World Weather Attribution, comprising dozens of international scientists who study global warming’s role in extreme weather.

Spain has been suffering from an almost two-year drought, meaning that when the deluge happened late Tuesday and early Wednesday, the ground was so hard that it could not absorb the rain, leading to flash floods.

The violent weather event surprised regional government officials. Spain’s national weather service said it rained more in eight hours in the Valencian town of Chiva than it had in the preceding 20 months, calling the deluge “extraordinary.”

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In Paiporta, a community of 25,000 next to Valencia city where mayor Maribel Albalat said Thursday that not fewer than 62 people had perished.

“(Paiporta) never has floods, we never have this kind of problem. And we found a lot of elderly people in the town center,” Albalat told national broadcaster RTVE. “There were also a lot of people who came to get their cars out of their garages … it was a real trap.’

Farms damaged

While the most suffering was inflicted on municipalities near the city of Valencia, the storms unleashed their fury over huge swaths of the south and eastern coast of the Iberian peninsula. Two fatalities were confirmed in the neighboring Castilla La Mancha region and one in southern Andalusia.

Greenhouses and farms across southern Spain, known as Europe’s garden for its exported produce, were also ruined by heavy rains and flooding. The storms spawned a freak tornado in Valencia and a hail storm that punched holes in cars in Andalusia. Homes were left without water as far southwest as Malaga in Andalusia.

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Heavy rains continued Thursday farther north as the Spanish weather agency issued alerts for several counties in Castellón, in the eastern Valencia region, and for Tarragona in Catalonia, as well as southwest Cadiz.

“This storm front is still with us,” the prime minister said. “Stay home and heed the official recommendation and you will help save lives.”

The search goes on amid the destruction

Over 1,000 soldiers from Spain’s emergency rescue units joined regional and local emergency workers in the search for bodies and survivors.

“We are searching house by house,” Ángel Martínez, with a military emergency unit, told Spain’s national radio RNE from the town of Utiel, where at least six people died.

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An Associated Press journalist saw rescuers remove seven body bags from an underground garage in Barrio de la Torre on Thursday.

Many residents in both towns had to walk long distances in sticky mud to find food and water. Many of their cars had been destroyed and the mud, destruction and debris left by the storm made some roads unpassable. Some pushed shopping carts along sodden streets while others carried their children to keep them out of the muck.

Valencia regional President Carlos Mazón on Thursday asked if Spain’s army could assist with distributing basic goods to the population.

The National Police arrest 39 people for looting on Wednesday. The Civil Guard deployed officers to stop further thefts from homes, cars and shopping malls.

Some 150,000 people in Valencia were without electricity on Wednesday, but roughly half had power by Thursday, Spanish news agency EFE reported. An unknown number did not have running water and were relying on whatever bottled water they could find.

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The region remained partly isolated with several roads cut off and train lines interrupted, including the high-speed service to Madrid. Officials said it will take two to three weeks to repair that damaged line.

A man wept as he showed a reporter from national broadcaster RTVE the shell of what was once the ground floor of his home in Catarroja, south of Valencia. It looked as though a bomb had detonated inside, obliterating furniture and belongings, and stripping the paint off some walls.

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Orbán's meeting with FPÖ leaders in Vienna sparks controversy

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Orbán's meeting with FPÖ leaders in Vienna sparks controversy

The Hungarian prime minister arrived in Vienna on Thursday, where he was received by parliamentary president Walter Rosenkranz in a meeting condemned by several Austrian political parties.

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Despite criticism from other political parties, Austria’s newly elected parliament president, Walter Rosenkranz of the far-right Freedom Party (FPÖ), hosted Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán in Vienna as his first official guest. 

The controversial visit took place in the Austrian parliament’s reception room, with the entire leadership of the FPÖ, including leader Herbert Kickl, reportedly in attendance. 

After the meeting concluded, Orbán had a separate, private meeting with Kickl. However, nothing was initially revealed about the content of their conversation.

Rosenkranz said the meeting had been arranged before he took office.

Other Austrian parties, including the Greens and Social Democrats, had resisted Orbán’s visit. Green party parliamentary leader Sigrid Maurer said the FPÖ views Orbán as a role model, which should be considered “an absolute warning signal.” 

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FPÖ finished first in the recent Austrian parliamentary elections, garnering 29.2% of the vote in the country’s first far-right election win since World War II.

Experts say the party managed to tap into Austrian anxiety on housing and healthcare, as well as often successfully blaming migration for a host of other issues. 

As is customary within Austria, the group with the highest number of votes appoints the President of Parliament – hence Rosenkranz being elected to the second-highest state office in the country last week. 

Orbán will reportedly not meet with Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer during the visit.

Far-right alliance in Europe

Austria’s Freedom Party and Orbán’s Fidesz party both belong to the new European far-right group Patriots for Europe.  

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The party shares a deep aversion to the Green Deal, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen’s flagship initiative to achieve climate neutrality by 2050, and have challenged the project of European integration as well as the power granted to EU institutions.  

Patriots for Europe are also opposed to providing Ukraine with military equipment, question the efficiency of Western sanctions against Moscow and want to maintain close relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin and his government. 

It is the third-largest group in the European Parliament, boasting dozens of MEPs from countries like France, Italy and the Netherlands. 

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