Palestinian dies of wounds sustained in border protests
Gaza, May 3: A Palestinian man died on Thursday from gunshot wounds he sustained during last week's protests along the Gaza-Israeli border fence, the Gaza Health Ministry said.
Anas Abu Asser, 19, who was shot during last Friday's "Great March of Return" in Gaza city, had been "seriously injured", Efe news reported citing the Ministry's spokesman.
Asser's death raised the death toll of Palestinians to 48 killed by Israeli fire since weekly border protests started on March 30, according to statistics released by the Ministry.
Three Palestinians were killed and 880 others wounded last Friday during clashes between dozens of Palestinian demonstrators and Israeli soldiers along the borders.
The protesters were calling for the right of Palestinian refugees and their descendants, who according to the UN make up around two-thirds of Gaza's population, to return to their homeland inside what is now Israel.
The six-week rally is expected to peak on May 15 when Palestinians commemorate Nakba Day (Day of the Catastrophe), which this year marks 70 years since Israel's creation and subsequent displacement of some 700,000 Palestinian refugees.
Israel rejects the protests and vows to respond to any border infiltration attempts threatening its sovereignty as well as its residents.
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Pakistan reports two more polio cases; Total tally now 52
ISLAMABAD: At least two more cases of poliovirus were reported in Pakistan, taking the number of infections to 52 so far this year, a report said on Friday.
“The Regional Reference Laboratory for Polio Eradication at the National Institute of Health has confirmed the detection of two more wild poliovirus type 1 (WPV1) cases in Pakistan," an official statement said.
The fresh infections — a boy and a girl — were reported from the Dera Ismail Khan district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province.
“Genetic sequencing of the samples collected from the children is underway," the statement read. Dera Ismail Khan, one of the seven polio-endemic districts of southern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, has reported five polio cases so far this year.
Of the 52 cases in the country this year, 24 are from Balochistan, 13 from Sindh, 13 from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and one each from Punjab and Islamabad.
There is no cure for polio. Only multiple doses of the oral polio vaccine and completion of the routine vaccination schedule for all children under the age of five can keep them protected.
