News in Brief

Obama to meet Abbas on Tuesday
Afp, Washington

 
US President Barack Obama will hold talks with Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas on Tuesday on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, the White House said.
Obama is due to address the annual assembly of world leaders on Tuesday. The meeting with Abbas comes six days before the visit of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the White House amid ongoing Israel-Palestinian peace negotiations.

Mexico disaster toll keeps rising
Afp, Acapulco

 
More than 100 people have been killed and scores are missing in landslides and flooding caused by heavy rain in Mexico, a senior government official said late Friday.
The death toll stood at 101, with 68 people missing following a massive mudslide that swallowed half of the village of La Pintada, in Guerrero state, the official said.

Saudi 'optimistic' on MERS-free hajj
Afp, Riyadh

 
Saudi authorities are optimistic that October's hajj pilgrimage to the kingdom, one of the world's annual largest gatherings, will pass without outbreaks of the deadly MERS coronavirus which has killed 49 people in the country, the health minister said yesterday.
No MERS outbreaks were recorded at last year's hajj, nor during the Umrah season in July and August of this year. Authorities have urged the elderly and chronically ill to avoid the event and have reduced the number of people they will allow to perform come.

Attacks on security forces kill 9 in Iraq
Afp, Baghdad

 
Violence in Iraq killed nine security forces members yesterday, among them four police who died in an attack by suicide bombers on a base north of Baghdad, officials said.
In the northern province of Nineveh, gunmen killed two prison guards and soldier, while a roadside bomb left two more soldiers dead.
More than 480 people have been killed so far this month in Iraq and over 4,300 since the beginning of the year, according to AFP figures based on security and medical sources.