World
US: White man fatally shoots three Black people at Florida store
The attack on a shopping centre in a predominately Black neighbourhood is expected to evoke fears of past shootings targeting Black Americans. Ten people were killed by a white gunman in Buffalo, New York, in 2022 while nine people were slain at a Methodist church in South Carolina in 2015
A masked white man fatally shot three Black people inside a general store in Jacksonville, Florida, in a predominately African-American neighbourhood on Saturday.
The attacker used a gun painted with a swastika, officials said. The shooter, who had also posted racist writings, then killed himself.
Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters told a news conference that the attack that left two men and one woman dead was definitely “racially motivated.”
“He hated Black people,” Waters said after reviewing the man’s writings, which were sent to federal law enforcement officials and at least one media outlet shortly before the attack. He added that the gunman acted alone and “there is absolutely no evidence the shooter is part of any larger group.”
Waters said the shooter, who was in his 20s, used a Glock handgun and an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle with at least one of them painted with a swastika. He was wearing a bullet-resistant vest. He said the shooter had once been involved in a 2016 domestic violence incident and was once involuntarily committed to a mental hospital for examination. He did not provide further details on those incidents.
Officials didn’t immediately release the names of the victims or the shooter.
The sheriff said the gunman had left behind in his writings evidence that leads investigators to believe that he committed the shooting because it was the fifth anniversary of when another gunman opened fire during a video game tournament in Jacksonville, killing two people before fatally shooting himself.
The shooting happened just before 2 pm approximately one kilometre from Edward Waters University, a small historically Black institution.
In a statement, the university said that shortly before the shooting, one of its security officers saw the man near the school’s library and asked him to identify himself. When he refused, he was asked to leave. The man returned to his car.
Sheriff Waters said the man was spotted putting on his vest and mask before leaving. He said it is unknown if he had originally planned to attack the school.
“I can’t tell you what his mindset was while he was there, but he did go there,” the sheriff said.
Edward Waters students were locked down in their dorms for several hours after the shooting. No students or faculty are believed involved, the school said.
The shooter had driven to Jacksonville from neighbouring Clay County, where he lived with his parents, the sheriff said. That house was being searched late Saturday.
Shortly before the attack, the shooter sent his father a text message telling him to check his computer. The father found the writings and the family notified 911, but the shooting had already begun, Sheriff Waters said.
“This is a dark day in Jacksonville’s history. There is no place for hate in this community,” the sheriff said. “I am sickened by this cowardly shooter’s personal ideology.” He said the investigation will continue. The FBI was helping the sheriff’s office and said it had opened a hate crime investigation.
Mayor Donna Deegan said she is “heartbroken.”
“This is a community that has suffered again and again. So many times this is where we end up,” Deegan said. “This is something that should not and must not continue to happen in our community.”
Governor Ron DeSantis, after speaking by phone with the sheriff, called the shooter a “scumbag” and denounced his racist motivation.
“This guy killed himself rather than face the music and accept responsibility for his actions. He took the coward’s way out,” said DeSantis, who was in Iowa campaigning for the Republican presidential nomination.
Both President Joe Biden and Attorney General Merrick Garland were briefed on the shooting, officials said.
The shooting took place within hours of the conclusion of a commemorative March on Washington in the nation’s capital, where organisers drew attention to the growing threat of hate-motivated violence against people of colour.
World
Video: How Internet Access Is Transforming Life in This Amazon Tribe
Since September, the Marubo, an isolated Amazon tribe, were connected to high-speed internet through Elon Musk’s Starlink. Jack Nicas, The New York Times’s Brazil bureau chief, visited the tribe’s remote Indigenous villages to see what the internet has changed for them.
World
Russia not 'bluffing' with nuclear threats as Biden greenlights limited military strikes, Medvedev says
A senior ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin says Russia is not bluffing about using tactical nuclear weapons against Ukraine and warned that the conflict could spill over into other countries.
Dmitry Medvedev, the deputy chair of the Security Council of Russia, made the comments after President Biden quietly authorized Kyiv to launch U.S.-supplied weapons at military targets just over the border in Russia that are supporting an offensive against the northeastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv.
“This is, alas, neither intimidation nor bluffing,” Medvedev said Friday, speaking on the potential to use strategic nuclear weapons, per Reuters.
UKRAINE SEEKS TO STRIKE RUSSIAN TARGETS WITH WESTERN WEAPONS, ZELENSKYY SAYS
Russia has been using staging locations just across the border to enable its attacks against Ukraine and Biden has given Ukraine the go-ahead to use American weaponry to hit back at Russian forces hitting them or preparing to hit them. Germany has also backed the move.
The White House says the policy is limited and prohibits the use of army tactical missile systems (ATACMS) or long-range strikes inside Russia.
In March, the U.S. quietly delivered long-range ATACMS to Ukraine for the first time – which the Ukrainians have since deployed against Russian military forces inside Ukraine.
Medvedev said Friday that “Russia regards all long-range weapons used by Ukraine as already being directly controlled by servicemen from NATO countries.”
“This is no military assistance, this is participation in a war against us. And such actions could well become a casus belli (an act that provokes a war),” Medvedev said Friday, per Reuters.
Medvedev, who served as Russian president from 2008 and 2012, said that the West’s ongoing support of Ukraine could lead to an escalation of the 27-month-old full-scale invasion.
“The current military conflict with the West is developing according to the worst possible scenario. There is a constant escalation when it comes to the firepower of NATO weapons being used. Therefore, nobody today can rule out the conflict’s transition to its final stage,” Medvedev said.
KYIV’S FORCES ARE UP AGAINST A CONCERTED RUSSIAN PUSH IN EASTERN UKRAINE, A MILITARY OFFICIAL SAYS
The comments come as depleted Ukrainian troops are losing ground in the war – and just weeks after the U.S. agreed to send an extra $60 billion in aid to the war-torn country. In the border region of Kharkiv, Ukraine has endured a Russian onslaught this month that has stretched Kyiv’s outgunned and outmanned forces.
The White House says that Russia’s forward progress has stalled and that Russia will not be able to capture Kharkiv.
Russia has only moved forward by a few kilometers and its forces are under relentless barrage by the Ukrainians and suffering at an extraordinary cost, the White House tells Fox News.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Friday that it’s only a matter of time before Ukraine utilizes the Western weaponry to strike Russian territory.
The developments and threats of escalation came just weeks after Gen. Charles Brown, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said NATO military trainers will eventually be sent to Ukraine, according to a report in the New York Times.
Ukrainian officials have asked their U.S. and NATO counterparts to help train 150,000 new recruits closer to the front line for faster deployment, per the report.
Rep. Eli Crane, R-Ariz., told Fox News Digital at the time that deploying military trainers would lead to a wider war in the region.
Friday’s comments by Medvedev are not the first time he has taken a hardline stance against the West. In January, he warned the U.K. that putting boots on the ground in Ukraine would amount to a declaration of war against Russia.
In January, he also raised the prospect of nuclear war, warning NATO allies that a defeat for Russia in Ukraine could provoke a nuclear war.
“The loss of a nuclear power in a conventional war can provoke the beginning of a nuclear war,” he said in a Telegram post.
“Nuclear powers have [never] lost major conflicts on which their fate depends,” the Kremlin official added.
Fox News’ Jennifer Griffin, as well as Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
World
Businesswoman Halla Tomasdottir set to become Iceland’s next president
Tomasdottir wins 34.6 percent of the votes to become the Nordic country’s second female president.
Halla Tomasdottir, a businesswoman and investor, has won Iceland’s presidential election, topping a crowded field of candidates in which the top three finishers were women, the country’s national broadcast service reports.
Tomasdottir, 55, was elected to the largely ceremonial post with 34.3 percent of the vote, defeating former Prime Minister Katrin Jakobsdottir, with 25.2 percent, and Halla Hrund Logadottir, with 15.5 percent, RUV said on Sunday.
Tomasdottir is currently on leave as chief executive of The B Team, a global nonprofit co-founded by UK business tycoon Richard Branson to promote business practices focused on humanity and the climate, and has offices in New York and London.
Iceland’s president holds a largely ceremonial position in the parliamentary republic, acting as a guarantor of the constitution and national unity. He or she, however, has the power to veto a legislation or submit it to a referendum.
Tomasdottir campaigned as someone who was above party politics and could help open discussions on fundamental issues such as the effect of social media on the mental health of young people, Iceland’s development as a tourist destination and the role of artificial intelligence.
She will replace President Gudni Th Johannesson, who did not seek re-election after two four-year terms. Tomasdottir will take office on August 1.
Iceland’s second woman president
Iceland, a Nordic island nation located in the North Atlantic, has a long tradition of electing women to high office.
Vigdis Finnbogadottir was the first democratically elected female president of any nation when she became Iceland’s head of state in 1980.
The country has also seen two women serve as prime minister in recent years, providing stability during years of political turmoil.
Johanna Sigurdardottir led the government from 2009 to 2013, after the global financial crisis ravaged Iceland’s economy.
Jakobsdottir, 48, became prime minister in 2017, leading a broad coalition that ended the cycle of crises that had triggered three elections in four years. She resigned in April to run for president.
In the country of 380,000 people, any citizen gathering 1,500 signatures can run for office.
While Jakobsdottir was at times seen as the favourite, political observers had suggested that her background as prime minister could weigh against her.
Among the other main candidates in the field of 13 were a political science professor, a comedian, and an Arctic and energy scholar.
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