Flight with U.S. citizens fleeing Haiti lands safely
A charter flight carrying dozens of U.S. citizens fleeing spiraling gang violence in Haiti landed Sunday in Miami, U.S. State Department officials said.
More than 30 U.S. citizens were on the governmentchartered flight, officials said in a statement. It arrived in the Miami International Airport after the U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince earlier this month urged U.S. citizens to leave “as soon as possible” as chaos grips Haiti.
Haiti’s main airport in Port-au-Prince remains closed following gang attacks that have raged through Haiti for weeks, pushing many people to the brink of famine. Government and aid agencies this weekend reported looting of aid supplies as the situation worsened.
The State Department announced Saturday that it would offer limited charter flights for American citizens from the less chaotic northern city of Cap-Haïtien.
Officials said they could not provide ground transportation to Cap-Haïtien and that U.S. citizens should consider the charter flights “only if you think you can reach Cap-Haïtien airport safely.”
“We encourage U.S. citizens still in Haiti who seek to depart to contact the Department of State using the crisis intake form on our website if they have not already done so,” the agency said.
North Korea resumes missile tests
North Korea fired multiple short-range ballistic missiles toward its eastern waters Monday morning, its neighbors said, days after the end of the South KoreanU.S. military drills that the North views as an invasion rehearsal.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told a parliamentary session that North Korea fired “a number of” ballistic missiles into the waters between the Korean Peninsula and Japan. He said the missiles fell outside of Japan’s exclusive economic zone and no damage or injuries has been reported.
Kishida denounced North Korea’s repeated ballistic missile tests as acts “that threaten the peace and safety of Japan, the region and the international society.” He said Japan strongly protested against North Korea over its testing activities, saying they violated U.N. Security Council resolutions that ban the North from engaging in any ballistic activities.
South Korea’s military said it also detected “several” suspected short-range ballistic launches by North Korea on Monday morning. The Joint Chiefs of Staff said the South Korean military bolstered its surveillance posture and is closely coordinating with the United States and Japan.
Iceland volcano erupts in plumes of fire
A volcano erupted with little notice in southern Iceland on Saturday night, the latest in a string of eruptions in the area, threatening local infrastructure and leading authorities to declare a state of emergency.
Lava fountains burst out of the ground, and a nearly 2mile-long fissure opened on the Reykjanes Peninsula around 8:30 p.m., the Icelandic Meteorological Office said. The eruption occurred near the town of Grindavik, the Svartsengi Power Plant and the Blue Lagoon, one of Iceland’s most famous tourist attractions.
The meteorological office said that it had received indications of a possible eruption only about 40 minutes before it happened. The office sent out its first warning moments before the eruption began.
The Blue Lagoon and Grindavik were evacuated shortly after the eruption, according to RUV.