Mexico's leader has heart procedure
MEXICO CITY -- Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador spoke with unusual frankness about his health Saturday, acknowledging he spent the night in a Mexico City hospital after undergoing a cardiac catheterization Friday.
Lopez Obrador said he had prepared a "political will" to be opened in case he dies to orient his movement, but said, "I don't think it will be needed." He did not reveal what the document says.
The president said his doctors had become concerned, apparently about a possible blockage of his arteries, after he underwent a stress test a couple of weeks ago. He had been scheduled to undergo the catheterization then, but contracted covid-19 and the procedure had to be put on hold.
Lopez Obrador said the catheterization -- in which a small, flexible tube is inserted into a blood vessel -- found "the arteries are good, there was no blockage."
Because Lopez Obrador built his Morena party largely himself, and is overwhelmingly its central figure, there have been concerns he might try to keep running the country after his single allowed term ends in 2024. Lopez Obrador, however, has said he will retire from public life and return to his ranch.
Lopez Obrador had just returned to public view after a week of isolation for his second covid-19 infection in a year. The 68-year-old president suffered a heart attack in 2013 and has high blood pressure.
7 people die in Afghanistan bomb blast
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- A bomb attached to a packed minivan exploded in Afghanistan's western Herat province on Saturday, killing at least seven civilians and wounding nine others, Taliban officials said.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the explosion, but Islamic State has claimed credit for similar attacks on civilians and the country's new Taliban leaders elsewhere in the country since the group seized power on Aug. 15.
Saturday's bombing was the first such attack in Herat. Local Taliban official Naeemulhaq Haqqani said investigations were ongoing.
A Taliban intelligence official in western Herat told the Associated Press that the bomb was attached to the van's fuel tank. He spoke on condition of anonymity as he wasn't authorized to release the information to the public.
Herat Ambulance chief Ebrahim Mohammadi said the victims -- three in critical condition -- were transferred to the provincial hospital.
Extremists kidnap 17 girls in Nigeria
ABUJA, Nigeria -- Islamic extremists have abducted 17 girls in northeast Nigeria, witnesses said Saturday as the West African nation's military said it "remains resolute in decisively countering the terrorists."
Members of the Boko Haram jihadi group attacked Pemi, a village in the Chibok local government area of Borno state, on Thursday, two residents told The Associated Press. The state is where Boko Haram's decade-long insurgency against the Nigeria government has been concentrated.
The militants targeted a church and Christians when they stormed Pemi on Thursday, according to local leader Hassan Chibok. "They were shooting sporadically after they rounded the community," Chibok said. "Some could not have access to escape, so they abducted 17 girls." Eight of the girls came from one household, he said.
Another resident, Yana Galang, said the extremists razed a church building and targeted nearby houses.
A Nigerian army spokesman, Onyema Nwachukwu, told AP on Friday that the insurgents were "desperate" to grow their influence and are relying more on the use of child soldiers. He was commenting on a video from a Boko Haram offshoot which purported to show child soldiers executing Nigerian army personnel.
In a statement late Friday, Boko Haram also claimed responsibility for killing "many Christians" and setting fire to two churches and several houses during an attack on the Borno town of Bimi.
Mumbai fire kills 6 people, injures 15
NEW DELHI -- A fire in a 19-story residential building killed at least six people and injured 15 others on Saturday in Mumbai, India's financial and entertainment capital, officials said.
The fire was caused by a short-circuit in an air conditioner in one of the apartments, Mumbai Mayor Kishori Pednekar said.
Residents said the fire started on the 15th floor and a big column of black smoke soon enveloped the building. More than 90 people escaped the building on their own or helped by neighbors, they said.
Nearly two dozen fire engines extinguished the blaze and controlled the smoke after a two-hour effort, media reports said. Firefighters rushed the injured to two nearby hospitals. Four of the injured victims were in critical condition, said police officer Saurabh Tripathi.
Fires are common in India, where building laws and safety norms are often flouted by builders and residents. In August, a fire killed eight coronavirus patients at a hospital in Ahmedabad, a major city in Gujarat state. In December 2018, a late-night fire in a Mumbai restaurant killed 15 people.