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Kenya’s Kelvin Kiptum: Marathon world record holder dies in road accident
The men’s marathon world record holder, Kenya’s Kelvin Kiptum, 24, has died in a road accident in his home country.
He was killed alongside his coach, Rwanda’s Gervais Hakizimana, in a car on a road in western Kenya. A third person was taken to hospital after the accident at about 23:00 local time (20:00 GMT), police were quoted as saying by the AFP news agency.
Kiptum made a stunning breakthrough in 2023 as a rival to his compatriot Eliud Kipchoge – whose record he later beat. It was in Chicago last October that Kiptum bettered Kipchoge’s achievement, running the 26.1 miles (42km) in two hours and 35 seconds.
Giving further details of the crash, police said Kiptum was the driver, and the vehicle “lost control and rolled, killing the two on the spot”. A spokesman quoted by AFP added that the third passenger – who was female – had been injured and “rushed to hospital”.
Just last week, his team announced that he would attempt to run the distance in under two hours at the Rotterdam marathon – a feat that has never been achieved in open competition.
Kenya’s opposition leader and former prime minister, Raila Odinga, said on X that the country had lost a true hero and was mourning “a remarkable individual… and Kenyan athletics icon”.
Paying tribute to the young man, Sebastian Coe, the president of World Athletics, described Kiptum as “an incredible athlete leaving an incredible legacy, we will miss him dearly”.
The rise to fame for the father-of-two had been rapid – he only ran his first full marathon in 2022. He competed in his first major competition four years earlier running in borrowed shoes as he could not afford a pair of his own.
He was among a new crop of Kenyan athletes who began their careers on the road, breaking away from the past tradition of athletes starting on the track before switching to longer distances. Kiptum told the BBC last year that his unusual choice was simply determined by a lack of resources. “I had no money to travel to track sessions,” he explained.
His coach, Hakizimana, 36, was a retired Rwandese runner. Last year, he spent months helping Kiptum target the world record. Their relationship as coach and athlete began in 2018, but the pair first met when the world record holder was much younger. “I knew him when he was a little boy, herding livestock barefooted,” Hakizimana recalled last year. “It was in 2009, I was training near his father’s farm, he’d come kicking at my heels and I would chase him away. “Now, I am grateful to him for his achievement.”
(BBC)
European leaders, including in France and Germany, have announced they are working on a plan in the event the United States follows through on its threat to take over Greenland as tensions soar.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot told France Inter radio on Wednesday that while nations want to act if the US moves to seize Greenland from an ally, Denmark, they want to do so “together with our European partners”.
“I myself was on the phone with the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio yesterday. He discarded the idea that what just happened in Venezuela could happen in Greenland,” Barrot said.
On Saturday, the United States – using fighter jets, attack helicopters, and special forces – abducted Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro, bringing him to New York City to be tried for alleged drug trafficking.
US President Donald Trump’s decision to greenlight the abduction of Maduro led to widespread condemnation and fear that Greenland, which the president has previously said should be part of Washington’s security apparatus, could be forcibly taken.
But since then, European allies have rallied behind Greenland’s sovereignty, saying the country belongs to its people.
Johannes Koskinen, chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee of Finland’s parliament, called for the issue to be raised within NATO.
“[Allies should] address whether something needs to be done and whether the United States should be brought into line in the sense that it cannot disregard jointly agreed plans in order to pursue its own power ambitions,” he said.
Denmark’s Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen and his Greenlandic counterpart, Vivian Motzfeldt, requested an urgent meeting with Rubio to discuss the situation.
“We would like to add some nuance to the conversation,” Rasmussen wrote in a social media post. “The shouting match must be replaced by a more sensible dialogue. Now.”
Denmark has warned that any move to take Greenland by force would mean “everything would stop”, including NATO and 80 years of close security links.
Greenland’s government will join a meeting between Rubio and Danish officials next week following renewed US claims on the Arctic island, its foreign minister said on Wednesday.
The European Union will support Greenland and Denmark when needed and will not accept violations of international law no matter where they occur, European Council President Antonio Costa said.
“On Greenland, allow me to be clear: Greenland belongs to its people. Nothing can be decided about Denmark and about Greenland without Denmark or without Greenland,” Costa said in a speech.
“The European Union cannot accept violations of international law – whether in Cyprus, Latin America, Greenland, Ukraine, or Gaza. Europe will remain a firm and unwavering champion of international law and multilateralism.”
Greenland – the world’s largest island, with a population of 57,000 people – is located between Europe and North America. Since 2019, during Trump’s first term, the president has raised the idea of controlling Greenland, saying it would benifit US security.
So far, Trump has not ruled out using force to take the island.
Rubio told reporters on Wednesday that Trump’s intention is to buy Greenland. “That’s always been the president’s intent from the very beginning.”
House US House Speaker Mike Johnson said he hasn’t heard talk of sending the military into Greenland and the US is “looking at diplomatic channels”.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump and his national security team have “actively discussed” the option of buying Greenland.
“He views it in the best interest of the United States to deter Russian and Chinese aggression in the Arctic region. And so that’s why his team is currently talking about what a potential purchase would look like,” Leavitt told reporters.
Neither Leavitt nor Rubio ruled out the use of force. But Leavitt said, “The president’s first option, always, has been diplomacy.”
[Aljazeera]
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Landslide early warnings issued to the Districts of Badulla, Kandy, Matale and Nuwara Eliya
The Landslide Early Warning Center of the National Building Research Organisation [NBRO] has issued landslide early warnings to the districts of Badulla, Kandy, Matale and Nuwara Eliya for the next 24 hours commencing at 1200hrs today [08]
Accordingly
LEVEL II AMBER landslide early warnings have been issued to the Divisional Secretaries Divisions and surrounding areas of Ududumbara in the Kandy District, Wilgamuwa in the Matale District, and Nildandahinna and Walapane in the Nuwara Eliya District.
LEVEL I YELLOW landslide early warnings have been issued to the Divisional Secretaries Divisions and surrounding areas of Meegahakiwula, Welimada, Kandaketiya, Lunugala, Badulla, Passara, Uva Paranagama and Hali_Ela in the Badulla District, Ambanganga Korale in the Matale District, and Mathurata and Hanguranketha in the Nuwara Eliya District.
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