Portal:Current events/2017 September 8

Current events of September 8, 2017 (2017-09-08) (Friday)

Arts and culture

• Pope Francis pastoral visits
  • Pope Francis, responding to rebel leader Rodrigo Londono's open letter asking for forgiveness for the suffering the group had inflicted on the country, during his talk in Villavicencio urges Colombians skeptical of the peace deal to be open to reconciliation. (Reuters) (Salem Radio Network)

Disasters and accidents

• 2017 Chiapas earthquake
  • Tsunami waves are reported in Mexico from the earthquake late yesterday with the biggest wave measuring 2.3 feet (0.70 m). (Fox News)
  • The death toll from yesterday's earthquake rises to over 50 people. (AP), (AFP via Focus News Agency), (Sky News)
• 2017 Atlantic hurricane season
  • Hurricane Jose
    • Hurricane Jose intensifies into an "extremely dangerous" Category 4 hurricane as it nears the northern Leeward Islands, according to the National Hurricane Center. (CBS News)
  • Hurricane Irma
    • Hurricane Irma's death toll this week is at least 21 people after recently hitting Cuba and The Bahamas as a Category 4 storm with maximum sustained winds of 155 mph (250 km/h). (Reuters) (National Hurricane Center)
    • Approximately 5.6 million people in the US states of Florida and South Carolina have been asked to evacuate. (Fox News)
• A Duke University medical helicopter crashes near Belvidere, North Carolina, killing four people. (Daily Mail)
• A helicopter crashes in Medford, New Jersey, leaving two people dead, including Troy Gentry of Montgomery Gentry. (Sky News)

International relations

• Foreign military sales, Bahrain–United States relations
  • The U.S. State Department has approved a package of potential arms sales worth more than USD$ 3.8 billion to the Kingdom of Bahrain including F-16 jets, upgrades, missiles and patrol boats. (Reuters)
• North Korea–Philippines relations
  • The Philippines suspends trade relations with North Korea to comply with a recent United Nations Security Council resolution over its repeated missile tests. (Reuters)
• Qatar diplomatic crisis
  • Qatar Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Than telephones Saudi Arabia Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman to discuss the three-month old crisis. (Al Jazeera)
  • Saudi Arabia suspends any dialogue with Qatar, accusing it of “distorting facts”, just after a phone call between the leaders of both countries suggested a breakthrough in the Gulf dispute.(Reuters)

Law and crime

• The U.S. Justice Department announces Roman Seleznev, the son of Russian parliament member Valery Seleznev, pleaded guilty in a $50 million identity theft probe. This past April, Seleznev was sentenced to 27 years in prison on 38 counts of hacking crimes. (Reuters) (Sputnik)