death
Flood death toll stands at 116: DGHS
Three more deaths from flood were reported in Sunamganj and Moulvibazar districts in 24 hours till Tuesday morning, taking the total fatalities to 116.
The latest victims drowned in floodwater, according to the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).
The total deaths were recorded between May 17 and July 12, it said.
Among the deceased, 88 people died by drowning in floodwater, 15 from lightning strikes, two from snake bites, one from diarrhoea, and nine due to other reasons.
Read: 7.2m people affected due to flood in Bangladesh: UN
Of the deceased, 63 people died in Sylhet, 40 in Mymensingh, 12 in Rangpur and one in Dhaka division, it said.
Among a total of 70 flood-hit upazilas, 33 are in Sylhet division, 16 in Rangpur division, 20 in Mymensingh division and one in Chattogram division.
Sylhet, Sunamganj, Netrokona and Kurigram are the worst-hit districts where 13, 11, 10 and 9 upazilas were affected by flood respectively.
Elderly man stabbed to death in Dhaka
An elderly man was stabbed to death allegedly by some local criminals at Jatrabari wholesale fish market in Dhaka on Monday.
The deceased was identified as Ashrafur Rahman, a resident of Bagicha in Jatrabari. He was originally from Barishal district.
Ashrafur's son Mehedi alleged that Shyamal, 35, a local criminal, and his associates attacked Ashrafur as he had stopped them from gambling on Monday afternoon.
"My father suffered grievous injuries in the attack," Mehedi said, adding the criminals believed that he was a police informer.
Read: BCL leader stabbed dead in Cox’s Bazar
Later, Ashrafur was rushed to Dhaka Medical College and Hospital, where doctors declared him dead on arrival, said inspector Bachchu Mia, in-charge of the hospital police outpost.
Abe's body arrives in Tokyo as country mourns ex-PM's death
The body of Japan’s former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was returned to Tokyo on Saturday after he was fatally shot during a campaign speech in western Japan a day earlier.
Abe was attacked in the city of Nara and airlifted to a local hospital but died of blood loss despite emergency treatment including massive blood transfusions. Police arrested the attacker, a former member of Japan's navy, at the scene on suspicion of murder. Police confiscated the homemade gun he used, and several others were later found at his apartment.
The attacker, Tetsuya Yamagami, told investigators he plotted the shooting because he believed rumors that Abe was connected to an organization that he resents, according to police. Japanese media reported that the man had developed hatred toward a religious group his mother was devoted to. The reports did not specify the group.
A black hearse carrying Abe's body and accompanied by his wife, Akie, arrived at his home in Tokyo's upscale residential area of Shibuya, where many mourners waited and lowered their heads as the vehicle passed.
Abe’s assassination ahead of Sunday’s parliamentary election shocked the nation and raised questions over whether security for the former prime minister was adequate.
Police on Saturday said autopsy results showed that a bullet that entered Abe's upper left arm damaged arteries beneath both collar bones, causing fatal massive bleeding.
Some observers who watched videos of the assassination on social media and television noted a lack of attention in the open space behind Abe as he spoke.
A former Kyoto prefectural police investigator, Fumikazu Higuchi, said the footage suggested security was sparse at the event and insufficient for a former prime minister.
“It is necessary to investigate why security allowed Yamagami to freely move and go behind Mr. Abe,” Higuchi told a Nippon TV talk show.
Experts also said Abe was more vulnerable standing on the ground level, instead of atop a campaign vehicle, which reportedly could not be arranged because his visit to Nara was hastily planned the day before.
In videos circulating on social media, the attacker, identified as 41-year-old Yamagami, can be seen with the homemade gun hanging from his shoulder, standing only a few meters (yards) behind Abe across a busy street, and continuously glancing around.
A few minutes after Abe stood at the podium and started his speech — as a local party candidate and their supporters stood and waved to the crowd — Yamagami can be seen firing the first shot, which issued a cloud of smoke, but the projectile apparently missed Abe.
As Abe turned to see where the noise came from, a second shot went off. That shot apparently hit Abe's left arm, missing a bulletproof briefcase raised by a security guard who stood behind the former leader.
Read: Bangladesh observing state mourning paying respect to Abe
Abe fell to the ground, with his left arm tucked in as if to cover his chest. Campaign organizers shouted through loudspeakers asking for medical experts to provide first-aid to Abe, whose heart and breathing had stopped by the time he was airlifted to a hospital where he later pronounced dead.
According to the Asahi newspaper, Yamagami was a contract worker at a warehouse in Kyoto where he was a forklift operator and known as a quiet person who did not mingle with his colleagues. A next-door neighbor at his apartment told Asahi he never met Yamagami, though he recalled hearing noises like a saw being used several times late at night over the past month.
Chinese leader Xi Jinping, who early on had a frosty relationship with Abe, sent a condolence message to Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Saturday, a day after most other world leaders issued their statements.
Xi credited Abe with making efforts to improve China-Japan relations and said he and Abe had reached an important understanding on building better ties, according to a statement posted on China's Foreign Ministry website. He also told Kishida he is willing to work with him to continue to develop neighborly and cooperative relations.
Even though he was out of office, Abe was still highly influential in the governing Liberal Democratic Party and headed its largest faction, but his ultra-nationalist views made him a divisive figure to many.
When he resigned as prime minister, Abe blamed a recurrence of the ulcerative colitis he’d had since he was a teenager. He said then it was difficult to leave many of his goals unfinished, especially his failure to resolve the issue of Japanese abducted years ago by North Korea, a territorial dispute with Russia, and a revision of Japan’s war-renouncing constitution.
That ultra-nationalism riled the Koreas and China, and his push to create what he saw as a more normal defense posture angered many Japanese. Abe failed to achieve his cherished goal of formally rewriting the U.S.-drafted pacifist constitution because of poor public support.
Also read: Japan's tight gun laws add to shock over Abe's assassination
Loyalists said his legacy was a stronger U.S.-Japan relationship that was meant to bolster Japan’s defense capability. But Abe made enemies by forcing his defense goals and other contentious issues through parliament, despite strong public opposition.
Abe was groomed to follow in the footsteps of his grandfather, former Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi. His political rhetoric often focused on making Japan a “normal” and “beautiful” nation with a stronger military and bigger role in international affairs.
Japan is particularly known for its strict gun laws. With a population of 125 million, it had only 10 gun-related criminal cases last year, resulting in one death and four injuries, according to police. Eight of those cases were gang-related. Tokyo had no gun incidents, injuries or deaths in the same year, although 61 guns were seized.
Abe was proud of his work to strengthen Japan’s security alliance with the U.S. and shepherding the first visit by a serving U.S. president, Barack Obama, to the atom-bombed city of Hiroshima. He also helped Tokyo gain the right to host the 2020 Olympics by pledging that a disaster at the Fukushima nuclear plant was “under control” when it was not.
He became Japan’s youngest prime minister in 2006, at age 52, but his overly nationalistic first stint abruptly ended a year later, also because of his health.
The end of Abe’s scandal-laden first stint as prime minister was the beginning of six years of annual leadership change, remembered as an era of “revolving door” politics that lacked stability.
When he returned to office in 2012, Abe vowed to revitalize the nation and get its economy out of its deflationary doldrums with his “Abenomics” formula, which combines fiscal stimulus, monetary easing and structural reforms.
He won six national elections and built a rock-solid grip on power, bolstering Japan’s defense role and capability and its security alliance with the U.S. He also stepped up patriotic education at schools and raised Japan’s international profile.
Valiant freedom fighter Abu Musa Chowdhury receives state funeral
Liberation War hero and former Deputy Commander of Bangladesh Muktijoddha Sangsad’s Chattogram city unit late Abu Musa Chowdhury was buried with state honours at his ancestral home in Fatikchhari of the district on Friday.
The funeral took place after the Asr prayer today. A trained police team from Bhujpur police station led by Fatikchhari Upazila Executive Magistrate performed a guard of honor to Musa following an order by Deputy Commissioner (DC) Md Mominur Rahman.
Bhujpur police handed over a crest to the deceased’s son on behalf of Chattogram Superintendant of Police (SP) SM Rashidul Haque.
The upazila administration and local freedom fighters paid their respects to Musa during this time. After this, Musa was buried following a state funeral attended by noted individuals of the area.
Read: PM mourns death of freedom fighter Mukul Bose
Abu Musa Chowdhury died in the early hours of Friday following a heart attack at home. He left behind his wife, two children and countless well-wishers.
Abu Musa Chowdhury took part in various navy operations during the 1971 liberation war, which made him a navy commando.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has expressed her condolences over the death of such a patriot as Abu Musa Chowdhury.
James Caan, Oscar nominee for ‘The Godfather,’ dies at 82
James Caan, the curly-haired tough guy known to movie fans as the hotheaded Sonny Corleone of “The Godfather” and to television audiences as both the dying football player in the classic weeper “Brian’s Song” and the casino boss in “Las Vegas,” has died. He was 82.
His manager Matt DelPiano said he died Wednesday. No cause was given and Caan’s family, who requests privacy, said that no further details would be released at this time.
Al Pacino wrote in an emailed statement that, “Jimmy was my fictional brother and my lifelong friend. It’s hard to believe that he won’t be in the world anymore because he was so alive and daring. A great actor, a brilliant director and my dear friend. I loved him, gonna miss him.” Robert De Niro also wrote that he was, “very very sad to hear about Jimmy’s passing.”
A football player at Michigan State University and a practical joker on production sets, Caan was a grinning, handsome performer with an athlete’s swagger and muscular build. He managed a long career despite drug problems, outbursts of temper and minor brushes with the law.
Caan had been a favorite of Francis Ford Coppola since the 1960s, when Coppola cast him for the lead in “Rain People.” He was primed for a featured role in “The Godfather” as Sonny, the No. 1 enforcer and eldest son of Mafia boss Vito Corleone.
Sonny Corleone, a violent and reckless man who conducted many killings, met his own end in one of the most jarring movie scenes in history. Racing to find his sister’s husband, Corleone stops at a toll booth that he discovers is unnervingly empty of customers. Before he can escape he is cut down by a seemingly endless fusillade of machine-gun fire. For decades after, he once said, strangers would approach him on the street and jokingly warn him to stay clear of toll roads.
Caan bonded with Brando, Robert Duvall and other cast members and made it a point to get everyone laughing during an otherwise tense production, sometimes dropping his pants and “mooning” a fellow actor or crew member. Despite Coppola’s fears he had made a flop, the 1972 release was an enormous critical and commercial success and brought supporting actor Oscar nominations for Caan, Duvall and Pacino.
Caan was already a star on television, breaking through in the 1971 TV movie “Brian’s Song,” an emotional drama about Chicago Bears running back Brian Piccolo, who had died of cancer the year before at age 26. It was among the most popular and wrenching TV movies in history and Caan and co-star Billy Dee Williams, who played Piccolo’s teammate and best friend Gale Sayers, were nominated for best actor Emmys.
Read: Shock, grief, and gratitude after untimely death of Boseman
After “Brian’s Song” and “The Godfather,” he was one of Hollywood’s busiest actors, appearing in “Hide in Plain Sight” (which he also directed), “Funny Lady” (opposite Barbra Streisand), “The Killer Elite” and Neil Simon’s “Chapter Two,” among others. He also made a brief appearance in a flashback sequence in “The Godfather, Part II.”
But by the early 1980s he began to sour on films, though Michael Mann’s 1981 neo-noir heist film “Thief,” in which he played a professional safecracker looking for a way out, is among his most admired films.
Mann said “Jimmy was not just a great actor with total commitment and a venturesome spirit, but he had a vitality in the core of his being that drove everything from his art and friendship to athletics and very good times.”
Caan had begun to struggle with drug use and was devastated by the 1981 leukemia death of his sister, Barbara, who until then had been a guiding force in his career. For much of the 1980s he made no films, telling people he preferred to coach his son Scott’s Little League games. Scott Caan also grew up to be an actor.
“The fun of it was taken away,” he told an interviewer in 1981. “I’ve done pictures where I’d rather do time. I just walked out of a picture at Paramount. I said you haven’t got enough money to make me go to work every day with a director I don’t like.”
Short on cash, Caan was hired by Coppola for the leading role in the 1987 film “Gardens of Stone.” The movie, about life at Arlington National Cemetery, proved too grim for most audiences, but it renewed Caan’s acting career.
He returned to full-fledged stardom opposite Kathy Bates in “Misery” in 1990. In the film, based on Stephen King’s novel, Caan is an author taken captive by an obsessed fan who breaks his ankles to keep him from leaving. Bates won an Oscar for the role.
Read: Ned Beatty, titanic character actor of ‘Network,’ dies at 83
Once again in demand, Caan starred in “For the Boys” with Bette Midler in 1991 as part of a song-and-dance team entertaining U.S. soldiers during World War II and the Korean and Vietnam wars. The following year he played a tongue-in-cheek version of Sonny Corleone in the comedy “Honeymoon in Vegas,” tricking Nicolas Cage into betting his girlfriend, Sarah Jessica Parker, in a high-stakes poker game so he can spirit her away and try to persuade her to marry him.
Other later films included “Flesh and Bone,” “Bottle Rocket” and “Mickey Blue Eyes.” He introduced himself to a new generation playing Walter, the workaholic, stone-faced father of Buddy’s Will Ferrell in “Elf.”
Adam Sandler, who acted with him in “Bulletproof” and “That’s My Boy” tweeted that he, “Loved him very much. Always wanted to be like him. So happy I got to know him. Never ever stopped laughing when I was around that man. His movies were best of the best.”
Caan didn’t take a starring role in a TV series until 2003 but his first effort, “Las Vegas,” was an immediate hit. When the series debuted, he was a casino surveillance chief dealing with cheaters and competitors of the fictional Montecito Resort and Casino.
His character rose to become boss of the Montecito but remained the tough guy who had learned judo in an undercover division of the U.S. government. Caan left the show during the fourth season and it was later canceled.
Born March 26, 1939, in New York City, Caan was the son of a kosher meat wholesaler. He was a star athlete and class president at Rhodes High School and, after attending Michigan State and Hofstra University, he studied at the Neighborhood Playhouse School of the Theater under Sanford Meisner.
Following a brief stage career, he moved to Hollywood. He made his movie debut in a brief uncredited role in 1963 in Billy Wilder’s “Irma La Douce,” then landed a role as young thug who terrorizes Olivia de Havilland in “Lady in a Cage.” He also appeared opposite John Wayne and Robert Mitchum in the 1966 Western “El Dorado” and Harrison Ford in the 1968 Western “Journey to Shiloh.”
Married and divorced four times, Caan had a daughter, Tara, and sons Scott, Alexander, James and Jacob.
Japan ex-leader Shinzo Abe assassinated while giving speech
Former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, a divisive arch-conservative and one of his nation's most powerful and influential figures, has died after being shot during a campaign speech Friday in western Japan, hospital officials said.
Abe, 67, was shot from behind minutes after he started his speech in Nara. He was airlifted to a hospital for emergency treatment but was not breathing and his heart had stopped. He was later pronounced dead despite emergency treatment that included massive blood transfusions, hospital officials said.
Police arrested the suspected gunman at the scene of an attack that shocked many in Japan, which is one of the world’s safest nations and has some of the strictest gun control laws anywhere.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and his Cabinet ministers hastily returned to Tokyo from campaign events around the country after the shooting, which he called “dastardly and barbaric."
Read: Japan ex-leader Shinzo Abe apparently shot, in heart failure
Nara Medical University emergency department chief Hidetada Fukushima said Abe suffered major damage to his heart in addition to two neck wounds that damaged an artery, causing extensive bleeding. He was in a state of cardio and pulmonary arrest when he arrived at the hospital and never regained his vital signs, Fukushima said.
Abe was Japan’s longest-serving leader before stepping down in 2020.
Public television NHK aired a dramatic video of Abe giving a speech outside a train station in the western city of Nara. He is standing, dressed in a navy blue suit, raising his fist, when two gunshots are heard. The video then shows Abe collapsed on the street, with security guards running toward him. He holds his chest, his shirt smeared with blood.
In the next moment, security guards leap on top of a man in gray shirt who lies face down on the pavement. A double-barreled device that appeared to be a handmade gun is seen on the ground.
Nara prefectural police confirmed the arrest of Tetsuya Yamagami, 41, on suspicion of attempted murder. NHK reported that the suspect served in the Maritime Self-Defense Force for three years in the 2000s.
Other videos from the scene showed campaign officials surrounding Abe. The former leader was still highly influential in the governing Liberal Democratic Party and headed its largest faction, Seiwakai. Elections for Japan's upper house, the less powerful chamber of its parliament, are Sunday.
“I use the harshest words to condemn (the act),” Kishida said as he struggled to control his emotions. He said the government planned to review the security situation, but added that Abe had the highest protection.
Opposition leaders condemned the attack as a challenge to Japan’s democracy. In Tokyo, people stopped on the street to grab extra editions of newspapers or watch TV coverage of the shooting.
When he resigned as prime minister, Abe said he had a recurrence of the ulcerative colitis he'd had since he was a teenager.
He told reporters at the time that it was “gut wrenching” to leave many of his goals unfinished. He spoke of his failure to resolve the issue of Japanese abducted years ago by North Korea, a territorial dispute with Russia and a revision of Japan’s war-renouncing constitution.
That last goal was a big reason he was such a divisive figure.
His ultra-nationalism riled the Koreas and China, and his push to create what he saw as a more normal defense posture angered many Japanese. Abe failed to achieve his cherished goal of formally rewriting the U.S.-drafted pacifist constitution because of poor public support.
Loyalists said that his legacy was a stronger U.S.-Japan relationship that was meant to bolster Japan’s defense capability. But Abe made enemies by forcing his defense goals and other contentious issues through parliament, despite strong public opposition.
Abe was a political blue blood who was groomed to follow in the footsteps of his grandfather, former Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi. His political rhetoric often focused on making Japan a “normal” and “beautiful” nation with a stronger military and bigger role in international affairs.
Read: Dhaka condemns attack on Abe, wishes his quick recovery
Many foreign officials expressed shock over the shooting.
Abe said he was proud of working while leader for a stronger Japan-U.S. security alliance and shepherding the first visit by a serving U.S. president to the atom-bombed city of Hiroshima. He also helped Tokyo gain the right to host the 2020 Olympics by pledging that a disaster at the Fukushima nuclear plant was “under control” when it was not.
Abe became Japan’s youngest prime minister in 2006, at age 52, but his overly nationalistic first stint abruptly ended a year later, also because of his health.
The end of Abe’s scandal-laden first stint as prime minister was the beginning of six years of annual leadership change, remembered as an era of “revolving door” politics that lacked stability and long-term policies.
When he returned to office in 2012, Abe vowed to revitalize the nation and get its economy out of its deflationary doldrums with his “Abenomics” formula, which combines fiscal stimulus, monetary easing and structural reforms.
He won six national elections and built a rock-solid grip on power, bolstering Japan’s defense role and capability and its security alliance with the U.S. He also stepped up patriotic education at schools and raised Japan’s international profile.
Flood: 2 more deaths push up toll to 112
Although flood situation continues to improve in most places, it claimed two more lives in Moulvibazar in 24 hours till Thursday morning, taking the total fatalities to 112.
Both of them drowned in floodwater, according to the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).
The total deaths were recorded between May 17 and July 7, it said.
Among the total deceased, 85 people died by drowning in floodwater, 15 from lightning strikes, two from snake bites, one from diarrhoea, and nine due to other reasons.
Of the deceased, 59 people died in Sylhet, 40 in Mymensingh, 12 in Rangpur and one in Dhaka division, it said.
Among a total of 70 flood-hit upazilas, 33 are in Sylhet division, 16 in Rangpur division, 20 in Mymensingh division and one in Chattogram division.
Sylhet, Sunamganj, Netrokona and Kurigram are the worst-hit districts where 13, 11, 10 and 9 upazilas were affected by flood respectively.
Read: Bangladesh among global hotspots of series of floods: Study
Kushtia man, who set himself on fire outside Press Club, dies
A 45-year-old man from Kushtia who set himself on fire in front of the National Press Club on Monday to protest a company’s alleged refusal to pay his dues, succumbed to his injuries early on Tuesday morning.
Kazi Anis, a vendor on contract from Kushtia's Kumarkhali upazila, who was kept on life support at Sheikh Hasina National Institute of Burn and Plastic Surgery died at 6am, said Bacchu Mia, inspector in-charge of Dhaka Medical College and Hospital police outpost.
Also read: Kushtia man sets himself on fire in Dhaka
Kazi Anis took the extreme step at 5pm on Monday "out of frustration" after Henolux, the company, refused to settle his dues of Tk1.26 crore, according to some journalists.
Journalists and law enforcers present at the scene poured water on him and rushed him to Sheikh Hasina National Institute of Burn and Plastic Surgery in a critical condition.
Also read: N’ganj factory fire under control
Anis had suffered 85 percent burns, according to doctors.
BCL leader stabbed dead in Cox’s Bazar
A leader of Bangladesh Chhatra League (BCL) was stabbed to death allegedly by his rivals in Sadar Upazila of Cox’s Bazar on Sunday.The deceased was identified as Faisal Uddin, 25, son of Lal Mohammad of South Delpara area of Khurushkul Union. He was the joint general secretary of Sadar Upazila Chhatra League.The incident took place on Sunday evening when Faisal was returning home from an Awami League conference, said Sheikh Munir Ul Gias, officer-in-charge of Cox's Bazar Sadar Police Station.
Read: Kurigram: Bodies of two minor siblings recoveredLocals said Faisal and the relatives of Nurul Huda in the area had been at loggerheads over the murder of Nurul Huda.On Sunday evening, the relatives of Nurul Huda attacked Faisal with sharp weapons. Faisal died on the spot.On information, police rushed to the spot and recovered the body.The body was kept at Cox's Bazar District Sadar Hospital for an autopsy, added the OC. “Efforts are on to nab the culprits".
College student electrocuted, another injured in Sherpur
A college student was electrocuted and his paternal uncle injured at Bhati Langarpara Charband of Shribardi upazila in Sherpur on Sunday.
The deceased was identified as Manjurul Islam Manju, 18, son of Monu Miah in the Bhati Langarpara Charband area. He was a second year student of Sherpur Government College while his uncle was Anwar Hussain.
Police and family members said Manju and Anwar went to their seedbed to water it by water pump in the area at around 8:00am.
Manju got electrocuted while repairing electrical wire of the pump, they said, adding that Anwar was also injured in the accident when he tried to save Manju.
Read: 3 electrocuted to death in Chapainawabganj
Later, locals rushed them to Shribardi upazila health complex where on-duty doctors pronounced Manju dead.
Biplob Kumar Biswas, Officer-in-charge (OC) of Shribardi police station said the victim’s family pleaded for not conducting an autopsy.
The OC said they would take measures after discussing with high officials.