10 dead in Buffalo supermarket attack New York police call hate crime

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Police officers secure the scene after a shooting at TOPS supermarket in Buffalo, New York, on May 14, 2022. (REUTERS/Jeffrey T. Barnes)
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Updated 15 May 2022
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10 dead in Buffalo supermarket attack New York police call hate crime

  • The 18-year-old white gunman attacked the mostly Black shoppers and workers at Tops Friendly Market
  • New York state Gov. Kathy Hochul the gunman was a white supremacist and a sheriff described the attack as "pure evil"

BUFFALO, New York: A white 18-year-old wearing military gear and livestreaming with a helmet camera opened fire with a rifle at a supermarket in Buffalo, killing 10 people and wounding three others Saturday in what authorities described as “racially motived violent extremism.”
The gunman wore body armor and military-style clothing during the attack on mostly Black shoppers and workers at Tops Friendly Market. For at least two minutes, he broadcast the shooting live on the streaming platform Twitch before the service ended his transmission.
Police said he shot 11 Black victims and two who were white before surrendering to police. Later, he appeared before a judge in a paper medical gown and was arraigned on murder charges.
“It is my sincere hope that this individual, this white supremacist who just perpetrated a hate crime on an innocent community, will spend the rest of his days behind bars. And heaven help him in the next world as well,” said Gov. Kathy Hochul, speaking near the scene of the attack.
The suspected gunman was identified as Payton Gendron, of Conklin, New York, about 200 miles (320 kilometers) southeast of Buffalo.
It wasn’t immediately clear why Gendron traveled to Buffalo to stage the assault. A clip apparently from his Twitch feed, posted on social media, showed him arriving at the supermarket in his car.

 

The gunman shot four people outside the store, three fatally, said Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia. Inside the store, a security guard who was a retired Buffalo police officer fired multiple shots, but a bullet that hit the gunman’s bulletproof vest had no effect, Gramaglia added.
The gunman then killed the guard, the commissioner said, then stalked through the store shooting other victims.
“This is the worst nightmare that any community can face, and we are hurting and we are seething right now,” Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown said at the news conference. “The depth of pain that families are feeling and that all of us are feeling right now cannot even be explained.”
Police entered the store and confronted the gunman in the vestibule.
“At that point the suspect put the gun to his own neck,” Gramaglia said. Two officers talked him into dropping the gun, the commissioner said.
At the earlier news briefing, Erie County Sheriff John Garcia pointedly called the shooting a hate crime.
“This was pure evil. It was straight up racially motivated hate crime from somebody outside of our community, outside of the City of Good neighbors ... coming into our community and trying to inflict that evil upon us,” Garcia said.
Witnesses Braedyn Kephart and Shane Hill, both 20, pulled into the parking lot just as the shooter was exiting. They described a white male in his late teens or early twenties sporting full camo, a black helmet and what appeared to be a rifle.
“He was standing there with the gun to his chin. We were like what the heck is going on? Why does this kid have a gun to his face?” Kephart said. He dropped to his knees. “He ripped off his helmet, dropped his gun, and was tackled by the police.”
Tops Friendly Markets released a statement saying, “We are shocked and deeply saddened by this senseless act of violence and our thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their families.”
The shooting came little more than a year after a March 2021 attack at a King Soopers grocery in Boulder, Colorado, that killed 10 people. Investigators have not released any information about why they believe the man charged in that attack targeted the supermarket.
NAACP President Derrick Johnson issued a statement in which he called the Buffalo shooting “absolutely devastating.”
“Our hearts are with the community and all who have been impacted by this terrible tragedy. Hate and racism have no place in America. We are shattered, extremely angered and praying for the victims’ families and loved ones,” he added.
The Rev. Al Sharpton called on the White House to convene a meeting with Black, Jewish and Asian leaders “to underscore the Federal government (is) escalating its efforts against hate crimes.”
At the White House, Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said President Joe Biden was receiving regular updates on the shooting and the investigation and had offered prayers with the first lady for the victims and their loved ones.
“The president has been briefed by his Homeland Security adviser on the horrific shooting in Buffalo, N.Y., this afternoon. He will continue to receive updates throughout the evening and tomorrow as further information develops,” she said.
Attorney General Merrick Garland was briefed on the shooting, Justice Department spokesperson Anthony Coley said.
More than two hours after the shooting, Erica Pugh-Mathews was waiting outside the store, behind police tape.
“We would like to know the status of my aunt, my mother’s sister. She was in there with her fiancé, they separated and went to different aisles,” she said. “A bullet barely missed him. He was able to hide in a freezer but he was not able to get to my aunt and does not know where she is. We just would like word either way if she’s OK.”
 


Bangladesh’s Yunus seeks unity with fresh political talks

Updated 3 sec ago
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Bangladesh’s Yunus seeks unity with fresh political talks

  • The South Asian nation has been in political turmoil since former prime minister Sheikh Hasina was ousted in August 2024
  • There are 54 registered political parties in Bangladesh – not including the now-banned Awami League of fugitive former leader Hasina
DHAKA: Bangladesh’s interim leader will meet multiple parties on Sunday in marathon talks as he seeks to build unity and calm intense political power struggles, party leaders and officials said.
Muhammad Yunus, the 84-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner who leads the caretaker government as its chief adviser until elections are held, has called for rival parties to give him their full support.
The South Asian nation of around 170 million people has been in political turmoil since former prime minister Sheikh Hasina was ousted by a student-led revolt in August 2024, ending her iron-fisted rule of 15 years.
The talks come after meetings that stretched late into Saturday evening with major political parties, including those who have protested against the government this month.
“Chief adviser professor Muhammad Yunus will meet the leaders of several parties on Sunday,” his press secretary Shafiqul Alam said.
There are 54 registered political parties in Bangladesh – not including the now-banned Awami League of fugitive former leader Hasina.
Alam did not specify how many parties were invited to this round of talks.
Mamunul Haque, leader of the Islamist Khelafat-e-Majlish party, said he was attending discussions expected to focus on “the ongoing crisis.”
Zonayed Saki of the liberal Ganosamhati Andolon party said he was also attending.
After a week of escalation during which rival parties protested on the streets of the capital Dhaka, the government led by Yunus warned on Saturday that political power struggles risked jeopardizing gains that have been made.
“Broader unity is essential to maintain national stability, organize free and fair elections, justice, and reform, and permanently prevent the return of authoritarianism in the country,” it said in a statement.
Microfinance pioneer Yunus, who returned from exile at the behest of protesters in August 2024, says he has a duty to implement democratic reforms before elections he has vowed will take place by June 2026 at the latest.
The caretaker government has formed multiple reform commissions providing a long list of recommendations – and is now seeking the backing of political parties.
Yunus last held an all-party meeting – to discuss efforts to overhaul Bangladesh’s democratic system – on February 15, and some parties cited frustration at the lack of contact.
But on Saturday, the government warned that it had faced “unreasonable demands, deliberately provocative and jurisdictionally overreaching statements,” which it said had been “continuously obstructing” its work.
Sources in his office and a key political ally said on Thursday that Yunus had threatened to quit, but his cabinet said he would not step down early.
Yunus on Saturday met with the the key Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), seen as the election front-runners, who are pushing hard for polls to be held by December.
According to Bangladeshi media and military sources, army chief General Waker-Uz-Zaman also said this week that elections should be held by December, aligning with BNP demands.
Yunus also met with leaders of Jamaat-e-Islami, the Muslim-majority nation’s largest Islamist party, and the National Citizen Party (NCP) made up of many students who spearheaded the uprising that ended Hasina’s rule.
NCP leader Nahid Islam warned on Saturday that rival parties were pushing for swift elections to skip reforms and “assume power,” and that he believed there were “indications” that a “military-backed government could re-emerge.”

Opposition vows boycott as Venezuela holds new divisive vote

Updated 11 min 45 sec ago
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Opposition vows boycott as Venezuela holds new divisive vote

  • President Nicolas Maduro secures himself another term despite not producing detailed polling results
  • The opposition party published its own tally of results showing a win for Gonzalez Urrutia instead

CARACAS: Can Venezuelans be persuaded to return to the polls on Sunday, ten months after President Nicolas Maduro claimed a third term in elections marred by violence and allegations of fraud?
The issue of voter participation is the big unknown as the sanctions-hit Caribbean country returns to the polls to elect a new parliament and 24 state governors.
The main opposition led by Maria Corina Machado, an engineer and former MP, has urged Venezuelans not to legitimize what they see as yet another sham election by voting.
A small opposition faction led by two-time former presidential candidate Henrique Capriles rejected the boycott call, arguing that previous voter stayaways had merely allowed 62-year-old Maduro to expand his grip on power.
“We must vote as an act of resistance, of struggle,” Capriles, who is running for parliament, said.


Tensions were high in the run-up to the election.
More than 400,000 security agents were deployed to monitor the vote.
On Friday, a leading opposition member and close ally of Machado, Juan Pablo Guanipa, was arrested on charges of heading a “terrorist network” planning to attack Sunday’s vote.
Cabello linked Guanipa, a former MP, to a group of 50 people arrested earlier in the week on suspicion of being mercenaries in the pay of foreign powers.
Venezuela, which frequently alleges foreign-backed coup plots, said the suspects entered the country from Colombia and closed the busy border with its neighbor until after the election.
Guanipa is just the latest opposition leader to be targeted by the authorities.
Opposition presidential candidate Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia went into exile in Spain last year after a bounty was put on his head.
A message on Guanipa’s X account, shortly after his arrest, declared he had been “kidnapped by the forces of Nicolas Maduro’s regime” but would continue the “long fight against the dictatorship.”


Many opposition supporters in Venezuela lost any remaining faith they had in the electoral process after the July presidential election.
Maduro claimed to have won a third term, without producing detailed results to back his claim.
The opposition published its own tally of results from polling stations, which appeared to showed a convincing win for Gonzalez Urrutia.
A deadly crackdown on protests that erupted over Maduro’s victory claim cemented Venezuela’s pariah status on the world stage.
Only a handful of countries, including longtime allies Russia and Cuba, have recognized Maduro as the country’s rightful leader.
Sunday’s election comes as the country’s economy — once the envy of Latin America, now in tatters after years of mismanagement and sanctions — faces even further turmoil.
US President Donald Trump has revoked permission for oil giant Chevron to continue pumping Venezuelan crude, potentially depriving Maduro’s administration of its last lifeline.
Washington has also revoked deportation protection from 350,000 Venezuelan migrants in the United States and expelled hundreds of others to a brutal prison for gangsters in El Salvador.
The pressure has failed to sway Maduro, who continues to defy the world and spar with his neighbors.
On Sunday, Venezuela will for the first time hold elections for parliament and state governor in the disputed oil-rich region of Essequibo, on its border with Guyana.
Guyana has administered the region for decades but Caracas has threatened to partially annex it.


Bangladesh government calls for unity to prevent ‘return of authoritarianism’

Updated 20 min 43 sec ago
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Bangladesh government calls for unity to prevent ‘return of authoritarianism’

  • The South Asian nation of around 170 million people has been in political turmoil since ex-PM Hasina was ousted by student-led protests in 2024
  • Muhammad Yunus, the 84-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner who returned from exile at the behest of protesters, says he has a duty to implement reforms

DHAKA: Bangladesh’s interim government, which took over after a mass uprising last year, warned on Saturday that unity was needed to “prevent the return of authoritarianism.”

The South Asian nation of around 170 million people has been in political turmoil since former prime minister Sheikh Hasina was ousted by student-led protests in August 2024, ending her iron-fisted rule of 15 years.

After a week of escalation during which rival parties protested on the streets of the capital Dhaka, the government led by Muhammad Yunus said political power struggles risked jeopardizing gains that have been made and pleaded for people to give it their full support.

“Broader unity is essential to maintain national stability, organize free and fair elections, justice, and reform, and permanently prevent the return of authoritarianism in the country,” it said in a statement.

Yunus, the 84-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner who returned from exile at the behest of protesters last year, says he has a duty to implement democratic reforms before elections that are due by June 2026 at the latest.

However, the government warned that it had faced “unreasonable demands, deliberately provocative and jurisdictionally overreaching statements,” which it said had been “continuously obstructing” its work.

Sources in his office and a key political ally said on Thursday that microfinance pioneer Yunus had threatened to quit.

“If the government’s autonomy, reform efforts, justice process, fair election plan, and normal operations are obstructed to the point of making its duties unmanageable, it will, with the people, take the necessary steps,” Saturday’s statement said, without giving further details.

Wahiduddin Mahmud, who heads the finance and planning ministry, insisted that Yunus will not step down early.

“We are going to carry out the responsibilities assigned to us,” Mahmud told reporters on Saturday. “We can’t simply abandon our duties.”

Yunus held talks on Saturday evening with key political parties, including those who have protested against the government this month.

His press secretary Shafiqul Alam insisted that the parties all had “full trust” in Yunus, with an all-party meeting scheduled for Sunday.

Yunus met leaders of the powerful Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), seen as the election front-runners, who are pushing hard for polls to be held by December.

“Any excuse to delay the election may open the door for the return of dictatorship,” senior BNP leader Khandaker Mosharraf Hossain said after the meeting.

“The interim government and its allies will be held responsible for such a consequence.”

Yunus has said polls could be held as early as December but that holding them later — with the deadline of June — would give the government more time for reform.

But Hossain said that reforms, justice and elections were not “mutually exclusive goals.”

According to Bangladeshi media and military sources, army chief General Waker-Uz-Zaman also said this week that elections should be held by December, aligning with BNP demands.

Bangladesh has a long history of military coups, and the army retains a powerful role.

The upcoming elections will be the first since Hasina fled to India, where she remains in self-imposed exile in defiance of an arrest warrant to face trial for crimes against humanity related to last year’s police crackdown on protesters, during which at least 1,400 people were killed.

Shafiqur Rahman, the leader of Jamaat-e-Islami, the Muslim-majority nation’s largest religious party, said after his meeting with Yunus that he had asked for an election timetable — saying he was open to a later date if it allowed for reforms.

He also said he had sought “progress in the ongoing trials” of those from Hasina’s ousted regime.

Nahid Islam, leader of the National Citizen Party (NCP) made up of many students who spearheaded the uprising that ended Hasina’s rule, has said he wants later elections to allow time for “fundamental reforms.”

He fears rival parties want swift elections to “assume power.”

Speaking after meeting with Yunus, he said the NCP had “demanded a specific roadmap for reforms, trials, and the election of a constituent assembly.”

Islam, an ally of Yunus who previously served in his cabinet, speaking earlier on Saturday, warned that he had seen “indications” that a “military-backed government could re-emerge — one that is anti-democratic and anti-people.”


Trump defends block on foreign students at Harvard

Updated 49 min 7 sec ago
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Trump defends block on foreign students at Harvard

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump defended on Sunday his administration’s move to block foreign students at Harvard after a judge suspended the action, branded by the top university as unlawful.
“Why isn’t Harvard saying that almost 31 percent of their students are from FOREIGN LANDS, and yet those countries, some not at all friendly to the United States, pay NOTHING toward their student’s education, nor do they ever intend to,” Trump posted on his Truth Social platform.
“We want to know who those foreign students are, a reasonable request since we give Harvard BILLIONS OF DOLLARS, but Harvard isn’t exactly forthcoming.”
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on Thursday revoked Harvard’s ability to enroll foreign nationals, throwing the future of thousands of students and the lucrative income stream they provide into doubt.
She had threatened last month to block international students at the school unless it turned over records on visa holders’ “illegal and violent activities.”
But a judge quickly suspended the move after the university sued to “stop the government’s arbitrary, capricious, unlawful, and unconstitutional action.”
The White House is cracking down on US universities on several fronts, justified as a reaction to what the administration says is uncontrolled anti-Semitism and a need to reverse diversity programs aimed at addressing historical oppression of minorities.
It has also moved to revoke visas and deport foreign students involved in protests against the war in Gaza, accusing them of supporting Palestinian militant group Hamas.
At Harvard, the government has threatened to put $9 billion of funding under review, then went on to freeze a first tranche of $2.2 billion of grants and $60 million of official contracts. It has also targeted a Harvard Medical School researcher for deportation.
The loss of foreign nationals — more than a quarter of its student body — could prove costly to Harvard, which charges tens of thousands of dollars a year in tuition.
Harvard is the wealthiest US university with an endowment valued at $53.2 billion in 2024.


Russia and Ukraine swap hundreds more prisoners as another attack on Kyiv leaves 3 dead

Updated 25 May 2025
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Russia and Ukraine swap hundreds more prisoners as another attack on Kyiv leaves 3 dead

  • Hundreds more Ukrainian and Russian detainees were freed in a prisoner swap exchange
  • Russian president Vladimir Putin accused of delaying peace deal in a bid to capture more Ukrainian land

KYIV: Russia and Ukraine exchanged hundreds more prisoners Saturday as part of a major swap that amounted to a rare moment of cooperation in otherwise failed efforts to reach a ceasefire.
The exchange came hours after Kyiv came under a large-scale Russian drone and missile attack and authorities said another combined aerial attack that started Saturday night and stretched into Sunday morning had left three people dead in the “Kyiv region,” according to Mykola Kalashnyk, head of the Kyiv regional military administration.
Mayor Vitali Klitschko said “there are already 10 injured” is Kyiv as of 3 a.m. Sunday, adding that a student dormitory in Holosiivskyi district was hit a drone and the exterior of one of its walls was on fire.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and Russia’s defense ministry said each side brought home 307 more soldiers on Saturday, a day after each released a total of 390 combatants and civilians. Further releases expected over the weekend are set to make the swap the largest in more than three years of war.
“We expect more to come tomorrow,” Zelensky said on his official Telegram channel. Russia’s defense ministry also said it expected the exchange to be continued, though it did not give details.
Hours earlier, explosions and anti-aircraft fire were heard throughout Kyiv as many sought shelter in subway stations as Russian drones and missiles targeted the Ukrainian capital overnight.
In talks held in Istanbul earlier this month — the first time the two sides met face to face for peace talks since Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion — Kyiv and Moscow agreed to swap 1,000 prisoners of war and civilian detainees each.
‘A difficult night’
Officials said Russia attacked Ukraine with 14 ballistic missiles and 250 Shahed drones overnight while Ukrainian forces shot down six missiles and neutralized 245 drones — 128 drones were shot down and 117 were thwarted using electronic warfare.
The Kyiv City Military Administration said it was one of the biggest combined missile and drone attacks on the capital.
“A difficult night for all of us,” the administration said in a statement.
Posting on X, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha called it “clear evidence that increased sanctions pressure on Moscow is necessary to accelerate the peace process.”
Posting on X, UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy spoke of “another night of terror for Ukrainian civilians.”
“These are not the actions of a country seeking peace,” Lammy said of the Russian strike.
Katarina Mathernová, the European Union’s ambassador to Kyiv, described the attack as “horrific.”
“If anyone still doubts Russia wants war to continue — read the news,” Katarina Mathernová wrote on the social network.
Air raid alert in Kyiv
The debris of intercepted missiles and drones fell in at least six Kyiv city districts. According to the acting head of the city’s military administration, Tymur Tkachenko, six people required medical care after the attack and two fires were sparked in Kyiv’s Solomianskyi district.
The Obolon district, where a residential building was heavily damaged in the attack, was the hardest hit with at least five wounded in the area, the administration said.
Yurii Bondarchuk, a local resident, said the air raid siren “started as usual, then the drones started to fly around as they constantly do.” Moments later, he heard a boom and saw shattered glass fly through the air.
“The balcony is totally wiped out, as well as the windows and the doors,” he said as he stood in the dark, smoking a cigarette to calm his nerves while firefighters worked to extinguish the flames.
The air raid alert in Kyiv lasted more than seven hours, warning of incoming missiles and drones.
Kyiv’s mayor, Vitalii Klitschko, warned residents ahead of the attack that more than 20 Russian strike drones were heading toward the city. As the attack continued, he said drone debris fell on a shopping mall and a residential building in Obolon. Emergency services were headed to the site, Klitschko said.
Separately, 13 civilians were killed on Friday and overnight into Saturday in Russian attacks in Ukraine’s south, east and north, regional authorities said.
Three people died after a Russian ballistic missile targeted port infrastructure in Odesa on the Black Sea, local Gov. Oleh Kiper reported. Russia later said the strike Friday targeted a cargo ship carrying military equipment.
Russia’s defense ministry on Saturday claimed its forces overnight struck various military targets across Ukraine, including missile and drone-producing plants, a reconnaissance center and a launching site for anti-aircraft missiles.
A complex deal
The prisoner swap on Friday was the first phase of a complicated deal involving the exchange of 1,000 prisoners from each side.
It took place at the border with Belarus, in northern Ukraine, according to a Ukrainian official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly.
The released Russians were taken to Belarus for medical treatment, the Russian Defense Ministry said.
POWs arrived at the medical facility in the Chernihiv region for a second day on Saturday. But for many their arrival was bittersweet.
Those who were not reunited with their loved ones took solace in the released POWs providing some information about when their relatives were last seen.
Anna Marchenko, the daughter of a missing Ukrainian serviceman, was elated when a released POW said they had seen her father.
“This is such a big news. It’s like a fresh breath of air,” she said. “I didn’t see him, but at least it’s some news. At least it’s news that gives us the opportunity to continue to breathe and live in peace.”
However, the exchange — the latest of dozens of swaps since the war began and the biggest involving Ukrainian civilians so far — did not herald a halt in the fighting.
Battles continued along the roughly 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) front line, where tens of thousands of soldiers have been killed, and neither country has relented in its deep strikes.
After the May 16 Istanbul meeting, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan called the prisoner swap a “confidence-building measure” and said the parties had agreed in principle to meet again.
But Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday that there has been no agreement yet on the venue for the next round of talks as diplomatic maneuvering continued.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said Moscow would give Ukraine a draft document outlining its conditions for a “sustainable, long-term, comprehensive” peace agreement, once the ongoing prisoner exchange had finished.
Far apart on key conditions
European leaders have accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of dragging his feet in peace efforts while he tries to press his larger army’s battlefield initiative and capture more Ukrainian land.
The Istanbul meeting revealed that both sides remained far apart on key conditions for ending the fighting. One such condition for Ukraine, backed by its Western allies, is a temporary ceasefire as a first step toward a peaceful settlement.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said that overnight and early on Saturday its forces shot down over 100 Ukrainian drones over six provinces in western and southern Russia.
The drone strikes injured three people in the Tula region south of Moscow, local Gov. Dmitriy Milyaev said, and sparked a fire at an industrial site there.
Andriy Kovalenko, of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, said Saturday the drones hit a plant in Tula that makes chemicals used in explosives and rocket fuel.