KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — U.S. peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad says he’s traveling to Afghanistan for more discussions as he tries to bring about peace talks to end the country’s 17-year war.
Khalilzad, on his official Twitter account, said he wants to build on six days of meetings with the Taliban in the capital of Qatar, where he says significant progress was made.
The Taliban said this week its representatives met with U.S. representatives in Qatar to discuss “ending the invasion of Afghanistan.”
Last week, the Taliban threatened to walk away from talks, accusing Washington of seeking to “expand the agenda” — presumably a reference to U.S. demands that the insurgents hold direct talks with Kabul.
Khalilzad says any peace talks must include the Afghan government and a comprehensive cease-fire.
SAO PAULO (AP) — Rescuers in helicopter searched for survivors in a huge area in Southeastern Brazil buried by mud from the collapse of a dam holding back mine waste, with at least nine people dead and up to 300 missing.
Nearly a full day since the disaster happened, finding many more survivors was looking increasingly unlikely.
“Most likely, from now on we are mostly going to be recovering bodies,” said Romeu Zema, the governor of the state of Minas Gerais.
Workers with Brazilian mining company Vale were eating lunch when the dam collapsed, unleashing a sea of reddish-brown mud that knocked over and buried several structures of the company and surrounding areas.
The status of the workers and others in the city of Brumadinho was unknown, but the level of devastation quickly led President Jair Bolsonaro and other officials to describe it as a “tragedy.”
ROME (AP) — A prosecutor is investigating a flight instructor who survived a midair collision between a small tourist plane and a helicopter in the Italian Alps.
Authorities said the bodies of the last two people from the crash in Italy’s Val d’Aosta region were found, raising the death toll to seven.
The French flight instructor was one of two survivors of the accident over the Rutor glacier. Italian news agency ANSA quoted Aosta Chief Prosecutor Paolo Fortuna saying he was investigating the instructor for alleged manslaughter and had questioned him in a hospital intensive care unit.
ANSA says the instructor reportedly was sitting in the rear of the plane and his students were in front. The students, a Belgian man and a Frenchman, died.
The helicopter was bringing skiers to the glacier.