attack

London — Police are investigating a pepper spray assault at Heathrow Airport’s Terminal 3 car park that disrupted travel and sent 21 people, including a 3-year-old girl, for medical treatment, authorities said. The Metropolitan Police said Monday the incident appears to have stemmed from a suitcase robbery involving people known to one another, revising an earlier account that described a fight following an argument. Commander Peter Stevens said detectives pieced together the sequence after reviewing CCTV footage and…

MOGADISHU — Somalia’s National Intelligence and Security Agency (NISA) has arrested 11 people accused of plotting terrorist attacks and conducting espionage against the government and civilians, the agency said Thursday, describing a covert cell disrupted in Mogadishu and across parts of Lower and Middle Shabelle. In a statement, NISA said the suspects were allegedly in the advanced stages of planning violence and gathering intelligence to enable attacks. The arrests followed what the agency called a sophisticated,…

EU warship seizes suspected pirate ‘mother ship’ off Somalia after tanker hijack; 24 crew freed unharmed A 30-hour standoff ends without casualties in the Western Indian Ocean European naval forces have captured an Iranian-flagged dhow believed to have served as a pirate “mother ship” in the hijacking of the oil products tanker Hellas Aphrodite, bringing a tense 30-hour standoff to a close and freeing all 24 crew members unharmed, officials said. Operation Atalanta, the European Union’s counter-piracy mission, said the dhow…

Kenya’s elite unit thwarts Al-Shabaab IED plot in Garissa after community tip-off NAIROBI — Kenya’s Special Operations Group (SOG) says it disrupted a potentially deadly attack by Al-Shabaab militants in Garissa County after local residents alerted security forces to suspicious activity along a rural stretch of road. Officials reported that eight suspected militants were intercepted on the Welmerer–Yumbia road as they were attempting to assemble improvised explosive devices (IEDs). Security teams engaged the group,…

Raid on Northern Mozambican Mine Leaves Police Missing, Operations Halted An attack on a mining site in Mozambique’s volatile Cabo Delgado province has forced miners to flee, left equipment ablaze and an unspecified number of police officers missing, authorities and local sources said Friday. The assault — blamed on Islamist militants — interrupted operations at the site and prompted fear among communities already traumatised by years of violence. What happened Raiders struck the extraction site in the north of the…

Drone strike in Lower Shabelle underscores the moral and strategic dilemmas of remote warfare A reported drone strike this week in Akunji village, in Somalia’s volatile Janaale district of Lower Shabelle, has reopened painful questions about who bears the cost of a campaign fought mostly from the air. Local accounts and media reports say civilians may have been killed; authorities have not confirmed responsibility. The fog that surrounds the incident is familiar in Somalia — and emblematic of a broader global debate over…

Mayor-elect of German town badly wounded in stabbing; motive unclear The newly elected mayor of Herdecke, a small town outside Dortmund in western Germany, was seriously wounded in a stabbing attack that left national leaders demanding answers and local residents reeling. What happened Iris Stalzer, 57, was attacked shortly after noon near her home on Monday, public broadcaster WDR reported. Chancellor Friedrich Merz called the assault a "heinous act" and said on X that "we fear for her life," urging that "the crime and…

Manchester synagogue attack raises fraught questions about security, policing and public protest On a day reserved for introspection and prayer, a Jewish community in north Manchester was thrust into trauma. A car and knife attack outside the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation synagogue in Crumpsall on Thursday left three men hospitalised and two dead — the alleged attacker and a passer-by who tried to intervene — and has prompted a national debate over community safety, the limits of protest and how police respond in rapidly…

Puntland State says it killed ISIS cell blamed for landmine that slain senior commander GAROWE, Somalia — Puntland State’s regional forces say they killed seven Islamic State fighters and captured one more in a mountain sweep on Sunday, striking a cell accused of planting the landmine that killed Brig. Gen. Qalyare, one of the region’s most senior officers, last week. The operation unfolded in the Dhasan area of the Cal Miskaad range, a jagged spine of rock and scrubland along Somalia’s northeast. In a brief statement,…

North Western State of Somalia police warn against attacks on Ethiopian migrants after Hargeisa incident Hargeisa, North Western State of Somalia — Police in the North Western State of Somalia capital moved quickly on Saturday to warn would-be vigilantes that anyone who harms Ethiopian nationals will be prosecuted after a group of youths attacked Ethiopian migrants in the city. Authorities said no serious injuries were reported, but the incident has unsettled a city that prides itself on order and relative calm. What…