North Korean leader reappears in public after 40-day absence
SEOUL, South Korea — After vanishing from the public eye for nearly six weeks, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un is back, ending rumors that he was gravely ill, deposed or worse.
Now, a new, albeit smaller, mystery has emerged: Why the cane?
Kim, who was last seen publicly at a Sept. 3 concert, appeared in images released by state media Tuesday smiling broadly and supporting himself with a walking stick while touring the newly built Wisong Scientists Residential District and another new institute in Pyongyang, part of his regular “field guidance” tours. The North didn’t say when the visit happened, nor did it address the leader’s health.
Kim’s appearance allowed the country’s massive propaganda apparatus to continue doing what it does best — glorify the third generation of Kim family rule. And it will tamp down, at least for the moment, rampant rumors of a coup and serious health problems.
Before Tuesday, Kim missed several high-profile events that he normally attends and was described in an official documentary last month as experiencing “discomfort.”
US agency OKs return of student who took dying mom to Mexico
LOS REYES LA PAZ, Mexico — Only hours after the publication of an Associated Press story on his case Tuesday, the U.S. government issued a humanitarian visa enabling the return of a Harvard University student who broke immigration rules by taking his dying mother to Mexico.
Dario Guerrero was born in Mexico and moved with his family to California when he was 2. The Obama administration granted him and hundreds of thousands of other young immigrants a reprieve from deportation two years ago.
But these people can’t leave the U.S. without government approval. And Guerrero’s mother was dying of cancer.
Desperate to save her, Guerrero took his mother to clinics in Mexico before getting that approval. She died there in August, and he’s been stuck since then. The government denied his initial request to return, saying he effectively deported himself by taking his mother across the border before the paperwork was done on his approval request.
Guerrero has been languishing since then at his grandparents’ home outside Mexico City, saying he’s hoping for another chance to return home to his family in California and complete his studies in Massachusetts.
Hundreds gather in Turkey to bury Kurdish women killed fighting militants
MURSITPINAR, Turkey — In the Turkish town of Suruc, across the border from the beleaguered Syrian town of Kobani, several hundred people gathered Tuesday at a cemetery to bury four female Kurdish fighters who died there fighting extremists from the Islamic State group.
Waving colorful Kurdish flags and with many wearing traditional headscarves, they chanted slogans in support of their brethren in Kobani, where Kurdish fighters are zealously defending the town.
The four coffins, draped in Kurdish flags and the flag of the main Kurdish militia fighting in Kobani — known as the YPG — were lowered into the ground as some people cried silently. Others wept more openly.
Many families came to pray for other fighters who were killed in previous days and have been buried at the same cemetery. They were seen sitting by the makeshift graves of their loved ones, crying. Some placed flowers on top of graves.
By wire sources
