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8-31-2005

巴格達人群擠踏近700朝拜者喪生 (Nearly 700 Pilgrims Killed in Baghdad Stampede)

伊拉克衛生部說，什葉派穆斯林經過通往巴格達一座清真寺的橋上時發生的人群擠踏事件中有將近700名什葉派穆斯林喪生。有關官員說，當有傳言說在數十萬名信徒當中可能有自殺式炸彈殺手的時候，人群驚慌失控。官員說，死者中大多數是婦女、兒童和老人，他們不是被踩死，就是被擠到橋下的底格裏斯河裏身亡。

據報導，有300多人受傷，死亡數字可能還會增加。早些時候，反叛分子在這座清真寺附近發射迫擊炮彈，打死至少7人。伊拉克總理賈法裏宣佈全國哀悼三天。

伊拉克各宗教和民族派別最近數星期以來一直在制定憲法草案的問題上爭論不休，相互之間關繫緊張。

Iraq's Health Ministry says nearly 700 Shi'ite pilgrims have been killed (today/Wednesday) in a stampede as pilgrims crossed a Baghdad bridge to a shrine in the capital. Officials say panic swept through the crowd after a rumor spread that suicide bombers were among the hundreds of thousands of pilgrims. Officials say most of the dead are women, children and the elderly, who were either trampled or shoved to their deaths in the Tigris River below.

More than 300 people were reported injured, and the death toll could rise. Earlier, insurgents fired mortars near the shrine (the Khadimiyah mosque), killing at least seven people. Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari has declared three days of national mourning.

Tensions have been high among Iraq's main religious and ethnic communities in recent weeks as they haggled over the draft constitution.

美救援颶風災民行動進展艱難 (U.S. Rescue Efforts for Hurricane Refugees Progress Slowly)

在兇猛的卡特裏娜颶風過後，有關當局在美國墨西哥灣沿海一帶地區艱難地援救倖存者並恢復秩序。星期一颶風帶來的狂風暴雨使數十萬人無家可歸，更多的人需要食物和潔凈飲用水。新奧爾良市大約80%的地方星期三仍然一片汪洋，工程人員試圖修補被颶風破壞的兩處關鍵堤防。當局已經告訴救援隊伍，要集中精力搶救困在屋頂上的倖存者，暫時不要管水中漂流的屍體。

在淹水較少的地方，警方正試圖制止普遍的哄搶行為。新奧爾良的市長說，撤離的居民可能還要再過幾個月才能回家。在密西西比州，州長黑利.巴伯星期三說，卡特裏娜颶風摧毀了格爾夫波特和比洛克西兩個城市沿海地區90%的建築。當局說，那裏非正式的死亡數字是110人，並警告說，幾乎可以肯定死亡數字會更高。

布希總統縮短了在德克薩斯州的休假，星期三返回華盛頓監管救災努力。

Authorities are struggling to reach survivors and restore order along the U.S. Gulf of Mexico coastline in the wake of devastating Hurricane Katrina. The high winds and torrential rains from Monday's storm have left hundreds of thousands of people homeless, and thousands more in need of food and clean drinking water. Some 80 percent of New Orleans remains flooded Wednesday, as engineers try to fix two key levees damaged in the storm. Authorities have told rescue teams to focus on saving survivors trapped on rooftops, and to bypass dead bodies seen floating in the water.

In drier areas, police are trying to contain widespread looting. The city's mayor says it may be months before evacuated residents can return. In the state of Mississippi, Governor Haley Barbour said today that Katrina wiped out 90 percent of the buildings near the coast in the cities of Gulfport and Biloxi. Authorities say the unofficial death toll in the area is 110 and warn it is almost certain to go higher.

President Bush is cutting short his Texas vacation and will return to Washington today to oversee relief efforts.