Foreign News
Gas blast in Kenyan capital kills three and injures nearly 300
A huge gas blast in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, has killed at least three people and injured nearly 300.
A lorry carrying gas cylinders exploded in Embakasi district at about 23:30 (20:30 GMT) on Thursday, “igniting a huge ball of fire”, an official said.
Housing, businesses and cars were damaged, with video showing a huge blaze raging close to blocks of flats.
An investigation has started and Kenya’s deputy president has said those responsible will be held accountable.
A child was among those who died, according Embakasi police chief Wesley Kimeto, who added that the death toll could rise. Some 271 people were taken to hospital, according to the authorities, including at least 25 children.
Nairobi county Governor Sakaja Johnson said many of these people had been treated and sent home, but at least 39 have been sent to other facilities – some with critical injuries. A further 27 people were treated on site for non-life-threatening injuries.
The government initially said the blast happened at a gas plant where workers were refilling gas cylinders, but the authorities later clarified that a truck had exploded in a parking yard.
According to government spokesperson Isaac Mwaura, a fireball from the blast “spread widely”. A flying gas cylinder hit a clothing and textiles warehouse, burning it down. “The inferno further damaged several vehicles and commercial properties, including many small and medium sized businesses,” he said in a statement. “Sadly, residential houses in the neighbourhood also caught fire, with a good number of residents still inside, as it was late at night.”
The fire has been contained and a search and rescue operation has been launched to find out if people are missing or have simply taken shelter elsewhere.
“There is still a search going on of whether there are bodies which have been burnt in various houses,” said Embakasi East MP Babu Owino.
The Energy and Petroleum Regulatory Authority (Epra) said in a statement that the gas plant was illegal and that it had rejected three applications for construction permits to build a storage and filling facility at the site. Epra said the designs did not meet its safety standards and there was a high population around the proposed site. It is not clear how the facility was still able to operate.
Mr Mwaura, who visited the site, said the owners of the company involved must “compensate the victims” and take “full responsibility” for the explosion. “It is immoral to risk the lives of fellow Kenyans for profit,” he added. “Sometimes we have weak enforcement institutions and of course the element of corruption, which has now led to the death of three of us Kenyans.”
Kenyan Vice-President Rigathi Gachagua promised a tough government response. “As we call for caution and adherence to the rule of law, those culpable in this unacceptable occurrence will be held accountable,” he said.
About 10 trucks were completely burned inside the compound where the explosion occurred. One vehicle landed on top of a block of flats dozens of metres away, partially destroying the building’s front.
Witnesses told the BBC that the explosion sent objects including gas cylinders and a shipping container, flying into the air.
At the Mama Lucy Kibaki Hospital, where many of the injured were initially treated, the BBC spoke to a man named Geoffrey. He said he and his family were woken by a big explosion and thought their building was collapsing.”When I saw that the fire was too much, I used my body to shield my child and sustained burns on my back in the process,” said Geoffrey.”My family members got minor injuries but I got the most severe burns”.
Isaac Mwaura, the government spokesperson, said a command centre has been set up to help co-ordinate rescue operations and humanitarian assistance is being given to those affected.
He also said the government plans to provide two months’ rent for survivors whose houses were razed in the explosion.
(BBC)
Iran has begun several days of public mourning and funeral processions for its former Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, more than four months after he was killed in strikes launched by the US and Israel.
The former Ayatollah’s body will lie in state in Tehran’s Grand Mosalla from Friday, ahead of his burial in his hometown of Mashhad next Thursday.
Iranian authorities said 12 to 20 million people were expected to attend, which they are calling the “funeral of the century”.
It comes as Iran and the United States observe a fragile ceasefire after signing a preliminary deal to halt their conflict in June.
Six days of ceremonies will start at 06:00 (03:30 BST) on Saturday, at Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Mosalla, which visitors can visit to pay their respects until Sunday afternoon.
There will be an official funeral ceremony in Tehran on Saturday, which the Tehran-based Mohammad Rasulullah Corps is leading.
The group’s commander Hassan Hassanzadeh said Khamenei’s coffin would be displayed on an elevated platform, with crowd flows designed to allow visitors to enter and leave within 15 to 20 minutes.
Khamenei’s body will lie in the Grand Mosalla for three days, alongside the remains of family members who were also killed in the US and Israeli strikes in February.
Authorities have ordered public and private offices in Tehran to close from Saturday through Monday, while traffic restrictions will shut down most of the city centre to private vehicles, AFP reported. The airspace over Tehran will be partially closed from Friday and fully closed on Monday.
On Tuesday, events will move to Qom, just south of Tehran, where a senior Shia cleric will lead funeral prayers at Jamkaran – one of Iran’s most prominent and symbolic religious sites.
Khamenei’s body will then travel to Najaf in Iraq on Wednesday. Following a procession at the shrine of Imam Ali, Shia Islam’s first imam, ceremonies will continue in Karbala before the body returns to Iran.
Iranian officials say the Iraq events follow requests from Iraqi groups, with some analysts seeing them as representative of Khamenei’s influence across the Shia Muslim world and Iran’s religious and political ties across the region.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi visited Baghdad to coordinate the arrangements, saying the funeral had a “symbolic importance”.
On Thursday, Khamenei will be buried in the city of his birth, Mashhad, at the Imam Reza Shrine, the mausoleum of Shia Islam’s eighth imam and Iran’s most important pilgrimage site, which attracts millions of visitors each year.
Representatives from multiple countries are expected to attend the ceremonies, including Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.
Ceremonies will continue across the country for 40 days, with commemorative events planned until the first anniversary of Khamenei’s burial.
Khamenei was succeeded by his son, Mojtaba, who has not been seen in public since becoming supreme leader.
Key questions around the ceremony centre on whether Mojtaba will attend the funeral.
Last week, secretary of the organising committee, Ali Akbar Pourjamshidian, said any decision on Mojtaba’s attendance would be announced by the offices of the armed forces commander-in-chief and the supreme leader.
Questions also remain about who will lead the funeral prayer, as in Shia tradition the role carries religious and political significance.
[BBC]
Nigeria says it will seek compensation from South Africa for its citizens who have left the country following recent protests targeting undocumented migrants.
Foreign ministry spokesperson Kimiebi Imomotimi Ebienfa told the BBC that the issue would be discussed between the two governments “at the highest levels”.
Acting High Commissioner to South Africa Alexander Ajayi said on local television on Tuesday that the government had begun documenting businesses and properties left behind by Nigerians.
One Nigerian trader waiting to be repatriated told the BBC he had lived in South Africa for nearly a decade and had abandoned his business and home because he feared for his safety.
Oghodero Erejor Wilson, 32, said he was losing “everything because of fear”.
“I left everything in my house including clothes.”
He is among hundreds of Nigerians still waiting to be evacuated from South Africa. More than 600 Nigerians have already been repatriated in recent weeks.
The South African authorities say those who have been flown home were in the country illegally – though this is disputed by Nigeria.
About 25,000 nationals of other African countries have left South Africa following a wave of protests in recent weeks by groups demanding that the government does more to curb illegal migration.
Some anti-migrant groups had given undocumented foreigners a deadline of 30 June to leave the country and organised marches attended by thousands of people on Tuesday. These were largely peaceful but there were isolated incidents of violence against foreigners.
The South African police say that about 900 people were arrested, mostly for immigration-related offences and looting.
The BBC has asked South Africa’s government for comment on Nigeria’s compensation demand.
Nigeria’s acting high commissioner said he had asked all of those who had left South Africa “to document very accurately those things they were leaving behind in terms of businesses, in terms of even cars, movable and immovable properties”.
Foreign ministry spokesperson Ebienfa told the BBC that all claims would be verified before any formal request was made
“We have not severed ties with South Africa, we are still engaging them at the highest level, we will sort those details using our usual diplomatic channels,” he said.
Wilson, the trader, said he had run a clothing business in the South African city of Centurion in Gauteng province for several years.
But he said he had now closed his shop and fled to stay near the Nigeria High Commission in South Africa’s capital, Pretoria.
Scheduled to leave on the next repatriation flight to Nigeria on Friday, he estimates the goods left in his shop are worth more than 16,000 rand ($975; £735).
Wilson said his residency documents had expired in 2021 and he had been unable to renew them.
He said he was not very hopeful about the prospect of getting compensation.
“If South Africa government can compensate it, it will be nice, but I know they won’t,” he said.
(BBC)
US President Donald Trump made more than $1bn (£750m) last year from business dealings in cryptocurrency, according to his mandatory financial report for 2025.
In a 927-page disclosure, he reported $635m in royalties from a Trump meme coin that has plunged in value since he launched it days before taking office.
He also reported over $500m in income from World Liberty Financial, a cryptocurrency firm founded by his own sons and the children of his special envoy, Steve Witkoff.
He earned millions more from real estate and Trump-themed items. But the White House denied he was profiting from the presidency.
The earnings from his latest financial disclosure far outpace the previous ones for 2024, when Trump disclosed over $600m in income.
But the White House, which has repeatedly emphasised that Trump has placed his business in a trust managed by his sons, again denied any conflict of interest.
White House deputy press secretary Anna Kelly said the president had proudly made the US “the crypto capital of the world”.
“Neither the President nor his family has ever engaged – or will ever engage – in conflicts of interest,” she said in a statement.
She added: “All actions by President Trump and his administration are taken in the best interest of the American people – and any so-called ‘reporters’ pushing otherwise are recycling the same, tired, false narrative that Democrats and the legacy media have been pushing for a decade.”
The president himself has also highlighted that he is not subject to federal conflict of interest laws.
Trump once criticised cryptocurrency, famously calling Bitcoin a “scam” and a “disaster waiting to happen”.
But Tuesday’s disclosure shows his crypto earnings far overshadow income from his real estate business, which first catapulted him to fame.
He earned around $77m from his Mar-a-Lago club and $122m from his golf club in Doral, Florida.
He also earned more than $30m each from golf clubs in Bedminster, New Jersey, and Jupiter, Florida, and Turnberry, Scotland.
Trump also earned millions from other business ventures, according to the financial disclosure.
These included $4.7m in royalties from Trump-branded watches, along with Trump-branded Bibles, trainers, fragrances and guitars.
First Lady Melania Trump also listed her income from 2025 in the disclosure. She made $10.7m from a “license agreement” related to the documentary about her that was released last year.
Another $6m in income is listed for her from the sale of NFTs, which are digital images sold online.
The president listed millions of dollars, too, in settlements from various legal actions.
These included $16m from a lawsuit against ABC, $16m from CBS Broadcasting and CBS Interactive, $24.5m from Meta, $22m from YouTube and $8m from X.
But the White House has said most of that money went towards Trump’s future presidential library or a nonprofit dedicated to the upkeep of park sites in the Washington DC area.
According to a list of the world’s richest people compiled by Forbes magazine, Trump has an estimated fortune of $6bn – up from $2.3bn in 2024. Bloomberg’s Billionaire’s Index puts the president’s net worth at $7.6bn.
After his return to the White House, Trump adopted a friendly approach to the crypto industry, even as companies linked to his family issued digital tokens.
The Trump-appointed head of financial regulator, the Securities and Exchange Commission, is also seen as an ally of the crypto industry.
Since taking office in April 2025, Paul Atkins has shifted the agency away from the strict, regulation-by-enforcement approach of his predecessor.
Last July, the president signed the GENIUS Act into law, to make “make America the undisputed leader in digital assets”.
(BBC)
Sai Sudharsan century, Padikkal 94* put India A in command
Iran begins public mourning for Ayatollah killed in February
Hope returns, Roach out for West Indies after injury-hit Sri Lanka bat
Juventus Training Camp from 6-10 July in Colombo
Wijesundara set for debut as injury-hit Sri Lanka struggle to make up XI
UNEP support pledged to strengthen Sri Lanka’s Environmental Priorities
‘Dates have the highest sugar content to fight Coronavirus’
Sunday Island 27 December – Headlines
#SundayIsland 17th December – Headlines
Sunday Island – 28th March
Sunday Island Headlines – 21 March
Sunday Island – 21st February – Headlines
-
News5 days agoLAWASIA warns against ad hoc initiative to increase judges’ retirement ages
-
News7 days agoAnother 1,132 Sri Lankan Personnel to be deployed for United Nations Peacekeeping Missions
-
News4 days agoChamuditha to seek removal of injunction on Youtube programme
-
Features4 days agoClimate action to bring South Asia together
-
Business7 days agoMonth-end profit-takings drive stock trading; indices up
-
Features6 days agoPeople’s Bank expands digital banking network with 125th cheque deposit kiosk
-
News4 days agoCPRP alleges another death in custody, seeks protection for witness
-
News7 days agoFSP complains of irregularities in a Guinness World Record event held in Sri Lanka