Philippines' typhoon toll reaches 81 amid rescue efforts
Manila, Sep 19: Philippines authorities on Wednesday raised the death toll to 81 and the number of missing to 70 following typhoon Mangkhut's path through the country's north where rescuers continue searching for dozens of people trapped in a mine buried by a landslide.
The strongest typhoon of the season swept the north of the island of Luzon on Saturday. The number affected by the typhoon now exceeds one million, Efe news reported.
Out of those missing, 66 were registered in the Cordillera region where the mining town of Itogon, Benguet province, is located. There, at least 39 deaths were confirmed at a mine amid the ongoing rescue efforts.
In Itogon, floods and landslides caused by Mangkhut also buried an area with gold mining sites and several makeshift shelters where some miners and their families lived illegally.
At least 200 people, including experts and volunteers, have been working since Sunday to rescue those trapped and as of Tuesday night had recovered 19 bodies by digging with picks and shovels in the mud as heavy machinery could not reach the area.
According to the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council, 148,400 people were being helped inside and outside evacuation centres.
Authorities estimated that most of these people will have to stay at least three more weeks in the centres, where hygiene, sanitation and drinking water conditions were becoming increasingly precarious, according to the Red Cross.
"In this first intervention, our priority is to guarantee water and sanitation to the affected population, and later we will focus on the economic security of the families," said the head of Red Cross' Spain delegation in the Philippines, Luis Carrasco.
Red Cross teams were planning to deploy water treatment plants in Benguet as they could not manage to reach further north. "As we go north and find water points, we will install more treatment plants," Carrasco said.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Kerala court gives man three life sentences for sexual assault on minor daughter
Thiruvananthapuram (PTI): A Kerala court has sentenced a man to three life terms for repeatedly sexually assaulting his six-year-old daughter in July last year.
Thiruvananthapuram Fast Track Special Court (FTSC) judge R Rekha sentenced the man to life imprisonment for each of the offences under sections 5(l) (penetrative sexual assault on a child repeatedly), 5(m) (penetrative sexual assault on a child below 12 years) and 5(n) (sexual assault of child by a relative through blood or adoption..) of the POCSO Act.
Confirming the sentence given to the man, special public prosecutor (SPP) R S Vijay Mohan said on Tuesday that the father was also additionally sentenced to varying sentences under various provisions of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (POCSO) and the IPC for a total of 21 years.
Besides that, the court also imposed a fine of Rs 90,000 on the 40-year-old father, the SPP said.
However, as the punishments have to be undergone concurrently, the man will serve a life sentence, the prosecutor said.
The prosecutor said that in its order on sentence, the court observed that he is a stain on the trust associated with fatherhood.
The court also said that a father who is supposed to protect his daughter has committed a heinous crime, according to the SPP.
It also observed that such an act can never be justified as through such a crime, the childhood of the victim has been lost.
The incident occurred in July 2023 when the victim's mother was working in the Gulf region and the girl was living in her father and maternal grandmother's homes.
The SPP said that the child was sexually assaulted when she was staying with her father.
According to the girl, her father took her inside a room by promising to show her the mobile phone and then sexually assaulted the child, the SPP said.
As the girl felt pain in her private parts as a result of the assault, she told her grandmother who took her to a doctor, the prosecutor said.
The child told the doctor what happened, and on the doctor's instructions the police were informed and a case was registered, the SPP said.
Even the victim's 15-year-old sister testified in the court that the father used to behave inappropriately when he came home drunk, the prosecutor said.
The trial in the case started on March 29, 2024 and was completed within a month, the SPP said.
