NEWS OF THE DAY
From Around the World
1 _ U.S. soldier slain: A coalition service member was killed Saturday by enemy fire in northern Iraq, the Pentagon said in a statement. A U.S. official told the Associated Press the individual was an American stationed at the Makhmour base outside the Islamic State-held city of Mosul. The incident was an “indirect fire attack,” specifically rockets, said the official who spoke on condition of anonymity. The U.S.-led coalition has reported that the build-up of Iraqi troops at Makhmour in preparation for an assault on Mosul has brought a spike in the frequency of such attacks. The last U.S. service member killed in Iraq was in October 2015.
2 _ Syria fighting: Air strikes on the northern Syrian city of Raqqa on Saturday killed at least 39 people and wounded many others in an intensified bombardment of the Islamic State group’s capital. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said the raids hit several areas in the city, which has been held by the extremists since 2013. It was not immediately clear what country’s warplanes carried out the air strikes. The Islamic State group is not included in the truce that was brokered by Russia and the U.S. that went into effect on Feb. 27 and led to a drop of violence in Syria.
3 _ Deadly crash: Nineteen people were killed when a bus filled with Egyptian pilgrims crashed and rolled over in Saudi Arabia on Saturday, Egypt’s state-run news agency said. The bus was carrying 43 Egyptians and a driver when it crashed, according to MENA. It says 25 people were injured in the incident. The pilgrims were performing Umrah, a pilgrimage to Mecca that, unlike the annual Hajj pilgrimage, can be done at any time of the year.
4 _ Welfare cuts: Tensions within Britain’s ruling Conservative Party have exploded as a prominent minister resigned over the government’s plans to cut benefits for the disabled while giving tax breaks for the better off. Iain Duncan Smith quit late Friday, two days after the cuts were unveiled in a sixth consecutive austerity budget — a plan that has drawn criticism from many members of Prime Minister David Cameron’s own party. The work and pensions secretary said he could no longer support policies that he believes are driven more by political ideology than economic necessity.
5 _ Garbage collection: Sanitation workers began removing mountains of trash from the suburbs of Beirut on Saturday in what residents hoped would mark the end of Lebanon’s eight-month garbage crisis. Dozens of trucks started carrying trash to the Naameh landfill just south of the capital, one of three landfills opened as part of a temporary solution announced by the government a week ago. As garbage began piling up in Beirut last year, protesters formed the “You Stink” movement, demanding sweeping reform in Lebanon’s government.
_ 6 Emergency landing: A Philippine Airlines plane carrying more than 250 people made a safe emergency landing in Manila on Saturday shortly after takeoff because of suspected smoke in the cockpit, an official said. The Airbus A340 aircraft was airborne for 10 minutes when its pilot declared an emergency and requested to land back in Manila, said Eric Apolonio of the Civil Aviation Authority. It was not immediately clear what went wrong with Flight PR 1857, which had 13 crew members and 241 passengers and was bound for central Cebu province.
_ 7 Officers killed: Militants killed 13 Egyptian police officers in an attack Saturday on a checkpoint south of northern Sinai’s provincial capital of el-Arish, the Interior Ministry said. A Sinai-based Islamic State affiliate claimed responsibility for the attack, according to a statement circulated on social media. The local affiliate has been attacking Egyptian security forces in Sinai and claimed the downing of a Russian airliner in October that killed 224 people.
_ 8 Social media: Pope Francis is expanding his presence on social media with an Instagram account. The pontiff, who has more than 26 million followers on Twitter, made his debut Saturday on Instagram, the photo-sharing site. On the eve of the launch, a Vatican communications official, Monsignor Dario Vigano, said the account will allow people to share the pope’s “gestures of tenderness and mercy.” The pope’s account will use the name @Franciscus, his name in Latin.