Rescue workers race to find survivors after deadliest tremor in 32 years kills 217 in central Mexico.

by Elizabeth Melimopoulos & Ali Rae, Al Jazeera

Mexico City, Mexico – Fabiola Luna Rios was in her house in the southern part of this city when Tuesday’s earthquake struck.

“This was a horrible experience,” the 47-year-old told Al Jazeera as she sat with her husband, Jesus Alberto, on Obregon Avenue on Tuesday night.

“I really felt panic,” she said. “I went out to the street, but when I saw my house, I saw it moving left to right.”

Alberto, who was in Mexico state at the time, added that he thought “the ground was opening up”.

“I felt houses were falling and for two seconds, I thought we would die,” he told Al Jazeera.

The 7.1 magnitude earthquake, which struck shortly after 1:00pm local time (18:00 GMT), caused dozens of buildings to collapse and sent residents fleeing to the streets.

By midnight, at least 200 people had been killed across central Mexico, including more than 20 children who died after their school building collapsed.

Officials said the the death toll was expected to rise.

Luis Felipe Puente, the director of the government’s civil protection service, tweeted that the death toll was at 248 just after midnight on Wednesday.

Later on however, he lowered the number to 217, giving no explanation for the lower toll.

At least 86 deaths were reported in Mexico City and its surrounding areas. In the state of Morelos, directly south of the capital, 71 people were killed.

Another 43 people were reported dead in the state of Puebla, about 122km from Mexico City and the location of the earthquake’s epicentre.

In Mexico state, he said 12 people were killed, while four died in the state of Guerrero. One person was killed in Oaxaca state.

Scenes of chaos and destruction were seen across Mexico City, as rescue workers and others raced to find and help survivors still trapped under collapsed buildings.

It was the second earthquake to strike Mexico in less than two weeks. The first tremor – a powerful 8.1-magnitude earthquake – hit southern Mexico on September 7, killing at least 98 people and destroying and damaging thousands of homes.

‘This was way stronger’

For those who were alive in 1985, Tuesday’s quake brought back familiar feelings experienced during the devastating earthquake that killed some 10,000 people exactly 32 years ago.

“This is not the first time I’ve felt something like this,” Luis Alvarado, 39, told Al Jazeera from the neighbourhood of La Condesa in Mexico City.

“I witnessed the one in 1985 and the feeling wasn’t very different,” he said.

Maria Irene Pies, who lives in the La Roma neighbourhood, agreed, but said she felt Tuesday’s quake was much stronger.

“I was here during the 1985 earthquake, but I felt this was way stronger,” the 73-year-old told Al Jazeera.

“I was in my house when the earthquake started and it was really strong,” she said.

“Mirrors started falling, the furniture started moving.”

Pies, who lives near a medical laboratory, has been told to stay away due to fears that chemicals may have spilled during the tremor.

Like many others in Mexico City, she has moved to the streets over worries of aftershocks.

Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto, who said on Twitter that he had been flying to Oaxaca went the tremor struck, returned to Mexico City on Tuesday afternoon where he called an emergency meeting.

In a tweet, he warned Mexicans to “review the damage, disconnect the lights and turn off gas” before returning to their homes.

He also visted the site of the collapsed school where the pupils were killed. Thirty-eight remained missing.

Officials gave out the numbers of shelters and hostels for those needing a place to stay.

‘We are united’

Fernando Irando, who also lives in Mexico City, said that while he is used to earthquakes, “this [one] went above and beyond” any he has felt before.

“I think the city resisted it and I think there will be aftershocks and I hope we will be able to resist it,” the 61-year-old told Al Jazeera.

Just after nightfall, rescue workers and residents continued to search for those who were trapped under rubble.

In the neighbourhood of La Roma, residents desperately called for help, asking friends and family to bring medicine, food, water, lamps and batteries to help rescue workers and those still trapped under collapsed buildings.

“There are people trapped among the rubble and we are trying to give all the support,” Ana Marina Orenday Porras told Al Jazeera.

“Colonia Roma [Street] is devastated,” she said, referring to one of the main avenues of Mexico City.

“As we walked around, we realised that many buildings have fallen and many are about to fall, and we are trying to give all the support we can, as citizens, because authorities can’t cope with the size of the disaster.”

Back on Obregon Avenue, Rios and Alberto, said that unlike in 1985, they felt people were better equipped to react to a tremor this size.

“This time, I feel that people were more helpful [than in 1985],” Rios said.

Alberto agreed, adding “after all, we are all Mexicans and we are always united”.

Refugees reject Aung San Suu Kyi’s claim that Rohingya are safe in Myanmar, as Amnesty accuses her of victim blaming.

by Al Jazeera

Rohingya refugees who fled violence in Myanmar have dismissed leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s stated concern over their plight, as activists accused her government of “burying their heads in the sand” over violence tearing through Rakhine state.

In a sprawling and squalid camp on the Bangladesh-Myanmar border, Rohingya refugees on Tuesday rejected Aung San Suu Kyi’s claim that many members of their minority group were safe in Myanmar and said her vow to repatriate displaced Rohingya carried no weight.

“Suu Kyi is a traitor. We can’t rely on her words,” said Sultan Ahmed, who arrived in Cox’s Bazar in Bangladesh along with hundreds of thousands of refugees two weeks ago.

The 80-year-old told Al Jazeera that he did not believe the de facto leader would act on her words because “everything is run and decided by the army”.

Aung San Suu Kyi “is only a name there. Nobody cares about her,” he said.

The Nobel Peace Prize laureate has faced fierce international criticism for saying little about the abuses faced by the Rohingya.

She broke her silence on Tuesday, condemning “all human rights violations” in Rakhine State, and vowing to take action against those who commit abuses.

However, she failed to comment on the military offensive that sent more than 420,000 Rohingya pouring across the border into Bangladesh, an operation the UN has branded as “ethnic cleansing”.

Abdul Hafiz, a Rohingya man in Kutupalong, was angered by Aung San Suu Kyi’s implication that Rohingya were themselves responsible for their plight.

Aung San Suu Kyi had said more than half of Rohingya villages were not affected by the violence, and invited diplomats and observers to visit those villages so they could learn why Buddhists and Muslims “are not at each other’s throats in these particular areas”.

“Let them see the plight of the people there,” Hafiz told the Associated Press news agency.

“They have kept people in confinement. Let the world media know from them whether we are tortured or living in joy.”

Shah Ahmed, a 60-year-old refugee who fled Maungdaw in northern Rakhine State two weeks ago, said he also no longer trusted Aung San Suu Kyi.

But he told Al Jazeera he was ready to return to his village if her government would “ensure peace, our safety and return of our property”.

Mixed responses

Human rights groups were sceptical too, criticising Aung San Suu Kyi for failing to condemn the army’s alleged abuses, as well as her claim that army operations had ceased on September 5.

“While it was positive to hear Aung San Suu Kyi condemn human rights violations in Rakhine state, she is still silent about the role of the security forces,” Amnesty said in a statement.

“Aung San Suu Kyi today demonstrated that she and her government are still burying their heads in the sand over the horrors unfolding in Rakhine State,” the rights group said.

“At times, her speech amounted to little more than a mix of untruths and victim blaming.”

Phil Robertson of Human Rights Watch, referring to Aung San Suu Kyi’s assertion that military operations had ended, asked: “If that is true, then who is burning all the villages we’ve seen in the past two weeks?”

He said satellite images showed about half of all Rohingya villages had been torched and it was time that Aung San Suu Kyi, the government and the military faced the fact that the security forces “don’t follow a code of conduct and shoot and kill who they want”.

Ronan Lee, a Rohingya researcher at Deakin University, said Aung San Suu Kyi’s speech was “deeply concerning from a humanitarian point of view”.

It was likely to provide the military with “genuine solace and certainty that she will not call on them to stop what they are doing,” he told Al Jazeera from Melbourne.

Meanwhile, foreign diplomats who were present in Naypyidaw as she gave her speech gave an overall positive reaction to her address.

The ambassador of China, Hong Liang, welcomed Aung San Suu Kyi’s speech saying it would improve understanding. Nikolay Listopadov, Russia’s ambassador to Myanmar, said there was no evidence of ethnic cleaning.

Mohammad Sufiur Rahman, Bangladesh’s ambassador to Myanmar, said: “I simply say one thing, that whatever she said is encouraging and we have to implement that in the right spirit.”

US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Patrick Murphy also attended the address but did not comment.

Additional reporting by Saif Khalid in Cox’s Bazar. Follow him on Twitter @msaifkhalid

Amnesty accuses Myanmar army of carrying out ‘ethnic cleansing’ of the Rohingya, as nearly 400,000 flee to Bangladesh.

by Al Jazeera

Security forces and vigilante mobs in Myanmar are carrying out a scorched-earth policy in the majority-Muslim region of Rakhine State, burning down entire Rohingya villages and shooting at people as they try to flee, Amnesty International has said.

According to new satellite imagery, fire-detection data, photographs and videos from the ground, the human rights group said on Thursday that there were at least 80 large-scale fires in inhabited areas across northern Rakhine State since 25 August.

“The evidence is irrefutable – the Myanmar security forces are setting northern Rakhine State ablaze in a targeted campaign to push the Rohingya people out of Myanmar,” said Tirana Hassan, Amnesty International’s Crisis Response Director.

“Make no mistake: this is ethnic cleansing.”

At least 370,000 Rohingya are estimated to have fled from Rakhine State to neighbouring Bangladesh after fighters from the Arakan Rohingya Solidarity Army (ARSA) attacked police posts, sparking a major military backlash.

Myanmar’s government said on Wednesday that nearly 40 percent of Rohingya villages had been targeted by the army in so-called “clearance operations,” with 176 out of 471 villages empty of people, and an additional 34 villages “partially abandoned.”

According to the report, Rohingya said that soldiers, police and vigilante groups would sometimes encircle a village and fire into the air before entering, but would often just storm in and start firing in all directions.

“When the military came, they started shooting at people who got very scared and started running. I saw the military shoot many people and kill two young boys. They used weapons to burn our houses,” one survivor said.

“There used to be 900 houses in our village; now only 80 are left. There is no one left to even bury the bodies.”

Amnesty said it was able to corroborate the burning by analysing photographs taken from across the Naf River in Bangladesh, showing huge pillars of smoke rising inside Myanmar.

The international rights organisation said that in some areas, local authorities warned villages in advance that their homes would be burned, a clear indication that the attacks were both deliberate and planned.

One witness from Pan Kyiang village in Rathedaung township described how in the early morning of September 4, the military came with the village administrator: “He said by 10am today we had better leave since everything would be set on fire.”

As his family was packing up their belongings, he saw what he described as a ‘ball of fire’ hitting his house, at which point they fled in panic.

Villagers who hid in a nearby paddy field witnessed soldiers burning houses using what appears to be rocket launchers.

Amnesty said the exact number of fires and extent of property destruction could be much higher, as cloud cover during the monsoon season has made it difficult for satellites to pick up all burnings.

Security has deteriorated sharply in Rakhine since Aung San Suu Kyi’s government sent thousands of troops into Rohingya villages and hamlets last October after nine policemen were killed by ARSA.

The security forces’ offensive has been beset by allegations of arson, killings and rape; with Antonio Guterres, the UN secretary-general, warning of the risk of ethnic cleansing.

Aung San Suu Kyi has been widely condemned for lack of moral leadership and compassion in the face of the crisis, denting the Nobel Peace Prize laureate’s reputation.

Rakhine-based Rohingya fighters, who emerged in October last year, say they have no ties to any ‘terrorist group’.

by Faisal Edroos

The Arakan Rohingya Solidarity Army (ARSA), a small group of men fighting in Myanmar’s western region of Rakhine, have rejected accusations they have links with al-Qaeda, ISIL (also known as ISIS) or other armed groups; and warned foreign fighters against entering the troubled region.

In a statement released on Thursday, ARSA said it had “no links with al-Qaeda, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS), Lashkar-e-Taiba or any other transnational terrorist group”.

In its statement, ARSA used ISIS to refer to the armed ISIL group.

It said it did not welcome the involvement of any of those entities in the conflict and called on countries in the region “to prevent terrorists from entering Arakan and making a bad situation worse”.

Arakan is another term for Rakhine, the western state of Myanmar where most of the country’s 800,000 Rohingya live.

The statement also said the group was concerned about the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Rakhine and called on aid groups and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) to visit the area and provide life-saving assistance to those that had been affected by the violence.

Speaking on the condition of anonymity, a Rohingya living in Rakhine’s embattled township of Buthidaung told Al Jazeera that it was unlikely that ARSA’s latest announcement would sway international support in favour of the Rohingya.

“For years the international community has known that there are no terrorist groups in Rakhine. Even though ARSA has distanced itself from such groups today, it’s clear, our neighbours and the world has no interest in coming to our defence.”

More than 370,000 Rohingya have fled from Rakhine to neighbouring Bangladesh after the military launched a counteroffensive following attacks by ARSA on 30 police posts and an army base last month.

Witnesses told Al Jazeera that entire Rohingya villages had been burned to the ground since the start of the security forces’ operation, while Antonio Guterres, UN secretary-general, warned of the risk of ethnic cleansing, appealing to the country’s authorities to end violence against the majority-Muslim Rohingya in Rakhine.

The Myanmar army has put the death toll at around 400, saying most of those killed were fighters. Residents, however, say it is more than 3,000 people.

Despite facing decades of oppression, the predominantly Muslim Rohingya had largely refrained from violence.

‘Systematic abuses’

ARSA, formerly known as Harakatul Yakeen, first emerged in October 2016 when it attacked three police outposts in the Maungdaw and Rathedaung townships, killing nine police officers.

In an 18-minute video statement released last October, Ataullah Abu Amar Jununi, the group’s leader, defended the assault, blaming the Myanmar army for inciting the violence.

“For over 75 years there have been various crimes and atrocities committed against the Rohingya … that’s why we carried out the October 9, 2016, attack – to send a message that if the violence is not stopped, we have the right to defend ourselves,” he said.

Maung Zarni, a non-resident fellow at the European Centre for the Study of Extremism, told Al Jazeera that the group’s actions were borne out of “systematic abuses of genocidal proportions” by the Myanmar military.

“They’re a group of hopeless men who decided to form some kind of self-defence group and protect their people who are living in conditions akin to a Nazi concentration camp,” he said.

“ARSA’s actions resemble Jewish inmates at Auschwitz who rose up against the Nazis in October 1944.”

An extensive report issued last December by the International Crisis Group said ARSA is “led by a committee of Rohingya emigres in Saudi Arabia and is commanded on the ground by Rohingya with international training and experience in modern guerrilla war tactics”.

It said the group did not appear to have “extremist motivations,” and enjoyed considerable sympathy and backing from Muslims in northern Rakhine state.

North Korea warns Washington will pay the price for any fresh sanctions passed on Pyongyang at UN meeting on Monday.

by Al Jazeera

North Korea threatened to make the United States pay a “due price” on Monday for leading the push for fresh sanctions on Pyongyang.

The UN Security Council is expected to vote on the US led resolution later today, following North Korea’s sixth and most powerful nuclear test to date on September 3.

Original wording, including the imposition of an oil embargo on the isolated state and a travel ban on leader Kim Jong-un, has been watered down to appease fellow Security Council members China and Russia, according to diplomats.

Both states, who each have the power to veto any resolution, have been reluctant to pursue tougher penalties on North Korea.

Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, has expressed concern that increasing sanctions on oil would have negative humanitarian impacts for the North Korean people.

“I am concerned cutting off the oil supply to North Korea may cause damage to people in hospitals or other ordinary citizens,” he told South Korea’s Yonhap news agency on September 6.

China has so far refused to shut off oil supplies to Pyongyang, with Beijing controlling a pipeline that provides approximately 520,000 tonnes of crude oil to its North Korean neighbour each year, according to industry sources.

The final resolution contains reduced sanctions on oil and no longer proposes blacklisting the North Korean leader, a copy obtained by Reuters news agency shows.

An unnamed North Korean foreign ministry spokesman claimed on Monday the US was “going frantic to fabricate the harshest ever ‘sanctions resolution’ by manipulating the United Nations Security Council”.

“In case the US eventually does rig up the illegal and unlawful ‘resolution’ on harsher sanctions, the DPRK shall make absolutely sure that the U.S. pays due price,” the statement, carried by Pyongyang’s state media organisation, the Korean Central News Agency (KNCA), added.

Jens Stoltenberg, NATO’s secretary-general, condemned North Korea’s “reckless behaviour” on Sunday, claiming Kim Jong-un’s actions present a global threat that requires a concerted international response.

The NATO chief stressed the need for any resolution to the crisis on the Korean Peninsula to be conflict-free: “We are now totally focused on how we can contribute to a peaceful solution of the conflict,” he told the BBC.

Any resolution passed by the Security Council requires nine votes in favour and no veto by either the United States, Britain, Russia, China or France.

UN human rights chief Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein denounces ‘brutal security operation’ by Myanmar military against Rohingya.

by Al Jazeera

The top UN human rights official has denounced Myanmar’s “brutal security operation” against Rohingya in Rakhine state, which he said was “clearly disproportionate” to militia attacks carried out last month.

Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein, addressing the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva on Monday, said that more than 270,000 people had fled to Bangladesh, with more trapped on the border, amid reports of the burning of villages and extrajudicial killings.

“I call on the government to end its current cruel military operation, with accountability for all violations that have occurred, and to reverse the pattern of severe and widespread discrimination against the Rohingya population,” Zeid said.

“The situation seems a textbook example of ethnic cleansing.”

The UN chief’s warning comes a day after Bangladesh’s foreign minister said “a genocide” is being waged in the country’s violence-hit Rakhine state.

“The international community is saying it is a genocide. We also say it is a genocide,” AH Mahmood Ali told reporters after briefing diplomats in Dhaka on Sunday.

Ali described actions following the attacks on security forces on August 25 as “revenge” by Myanmar troops.

“Should all people be killed? Should all villages be burnt? It is not acceptable,” he said, adding Dhaka was seeking a peaceful solution, not a “war” against Myanmar.

“We did not create the problem. Since the problem started in Myanmar, that’s why they should resolve. We have said we’ll help them,” he said, adding that the problem took a “new turn” after the August 25 attacks.

The minister’s comments come as the chair of Bangladesh’s National Commission for Human Rights said leading figures in Myanmar could face trial for “genocide” at an international tribunal.

“The way the genocide has been carried out in Myanmar, the way the people were killed in arson attacks, we are thinking about pressing for a trial against Myanmar, and against the Myanmar army, at an international tribunal,” Kazi Reazul Hoque said on Sunday while visiting a refugee camp in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar district, near the border with Myanmar.

“We will come to a decision after assessing what are the steps that should be taken to that end. And at the same time we urge the international community to come forward with their help,” Hoque said.

Dozens killed in southern provinces, as tsunami wave of up to one metre is measured off Salina Cruz coast.

by Al Jazeera

A major earthquake off the southern coast of Mexico killed at least 32 people late on Thursday authorities said, with the president saying it was the biggest in a century to hit the country.

The US Geological Survey reported the earthquake’s magnitude as 8.1, but President Enrique Pena Nieto said on Friday it was 8.2, making it the largest in Mexico in 100 years. He also said it was bigger than the one in 1985 when thousands were killed in four Mexican states.

Its epicentre was 123km southwest of the town of Pijijiapan, at a depth of 70km, according to USGS.

“It was a large-scale earthquake,” Pena Nieto said. “It had a bigger magnitude than the one Mexicans knew in 1985,” when thousands were killed in four states in the country.

Some of the worst initial reports came from the town of Juchitan in Oaxaca state, where sections of the town hall, a hotel, a bar and other buildings were reduced to rubble

Alejandro Murat, the state governor, said 23 deaths were registered in Oaxaca, 17 of them in Juchitan.

Two children were also killed in Tabasco state.

Chiapas Governor Manuel Velasco said that three people were killed in San Cristobal, including two women who died when a house and a wall collapsed. He called on people living near the coast to leave their houses as a protective measure.

“There is damage to hospitals that have lost energy,” he said.

“Homes, schools and hospitals have been damaged.”

Pena Nieto said that serious damage had been caused and that one million people initially had been without power following the quake, but that electricity had been restored to 800,000 of them.

“The house moved like chewing gum, and the light and internet went out momentarily,” said Rodrigo Soberanes, who lives near San Cristobal de las Casas in Chiapas, a poor, largely indigenous state popular with tourists.

The civil defense in Chiapas said on its Twitter account that its personnel were in the streets aiding people and warned residents to prepare for aftershocks.

The quake was so powerful that frightened residents in Mexico’s distant capital city fled apartment buildings, many in their pyjamas, and gathered in groups in the street.

“There have been half a dozen of magnitude five and four aftershocks reported already,” Randy Baldwin, a geophysicist with US Geological Survey’s National Earthquake Information Center, told Al Jazeera.

“There are possibilities that the aftershocks will probably continue for the next several months.”

Tsunami measured

Tsunami waves have been measured off Mexico’s Pacific coast; the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said waves of one metre above the tide level were measured off Salina Cruz.

It was also felt in much of Guatemala, which borders Chiapas.

Mexican officials ordered schools to remain closed on Friday in 10 states, including Mexico City so that officials could inspect for structural damage.

Al Jazeera’s David Mercer, reporting from Mexico City, said there were helicopters hovering over the area monitoring the damage caused by the quake.

“There are not enough reports about the damage caused yet but as day light comes, I am sure they are going to get a better grasp on that information,” he said.

Smaller tsunami waves were observed on the coast or measured by ocean gauges in several other places.

The centre’s forecast said Ecuador, El Salvador and Guatemala could see waves of a meter or less.

No threat was posed to Hawaii and the western and South Pacific.

Lucy Jones, a seismologist in California who works with the US Geological Survey, said such quake was to be expected.

“Off the west coast of Mexico is what’s called the subduction zone, the Pacific Plate is moving under the Mexican peninsula,” she told Associated Press news agency.

“It’s a very flat fault, so it’s a place that has big earthquakes relatively often because of that.”

“There’s likely to be a small tsunami going to the southwest. It’s not going to be coming up and affecting California or Hawaii,” she said.

“For tsunami generation, an eight is relatively small.”