Families claim their dead as Thais mourn 29 killed in mass shooting

NAKHON RATCHASIMA, Thailand — Grieving relatives of 29 people murdered by a rogue soldier in Thailand held Buddhist prayer ceremonies Monday (Feb 10), as questions multiply over how and why the unprecedented shooting spree happened.

Holding portraits of their relatives and dabbing away tears, families of the victims arrived at a city morgue in Nakhon Ratchasima, better known as Korat, to carry home coffins bearing their dead.



The killer started his rampage on Saturday afternoon with weapons stolen from a barracks' arsenal, where he gunned down Mehta Lertsiri, 22, who was guarding the depot.

"I don't know what to do next," Mehta's grief-stricken grandfather, Udom Prapotsang, said outside of the morgue waiting to claim his body.

"His four-year-old son keeps asking why he can't call his dad. I will remember to tell him fond stories about his dad."

Flowers and messages of condolences mounted outside the bullet-riddled mall where a terrifying siege unfolded Saturday night.

The killer, armed with automatic weapons, held out for 17 hours as hundreds of shoppers cowered in toilets, storerooms and under tables.

"RIP Korat, we will not forget," said one of the condolence messages left in a growing tribute outside the Terminal 21 mall in the northeastern city.

The gunman - Sergeant-Major Jakrapanth Thomma - was shot dead by a commando unit Sunday morning, ending a rampage that left 29 dead and scores more wounded.

A Buddhist monk in orange robes led a prayer ceremony on a grass verge outside the mall for Peeraphat Palasan, who was shot dead as the gunman sprayed bullets into traffic, killing the 25-year-old engineer and causing his car to crash.

His father, Witoon, was among a dozen mourners crying, kneeling, hands clasped - some holding incense sticks - in prayer.

"My son had just finished work and came here to go shopping," Witoon said. "I never thought I would lose him so soon."

Lucky survivors have recounted hiding across the mall, keeping up to speed with the gunman's movements through friends on the outside and snippets of CCTV footage shared over messaging groups.

As Korat - and the country - mourned, there were growing questions about why the gunman went on a killing spree over an apparent private debt to a senior officer and how he was able to steal weapons, including an M60 machine gun, and hundreds of rounds of ammunition.

Divisive Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha was hammered on social media for a tone-deaf response to the crisis during a visit to the city on Sunday where he posed for selfies, high-fived a crowd and smiled before shutting down questions from the media at a press conference.

"There should be no smiles, joking around and touching hands like people are your fan club," popular blogger Sorakon Adulyanon, aka Noom Muang Chan, said on Facebook.

Others drew unfavourable comparisons with the dignified response of New Zealand's Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern to the Christchurch mass shooting last year.

As criticism snowballed, the gruff former army chief Prayut was prodded into a rare act of contrition late Sunday.

"We are all saddened by what happened," he said on his official Facebook page.

"I intended to offer my moral support ... my expression may have been misunderstood or made many people uncomfortable."

Agence France-Presse

Husband injures wife, kills man, self in Florida mall

MELBOURNE, Fla. -- A man armed with "several pockets full of ammunition" opened fire at a Florida shopping mall on Saturday, injuring his wife and killing another man before fatally shooting himself, police said.

Investigators believe a domestic dispute triggered the shooting just as stores at Melbourne Square mall on Florida's east coast were preparing to open for the day, said Melbourne police commander Vince Pryce.

Police who responded to the scene after receiving calls about a shooting could still hear gunfire when they arrived, Pryce said at a televised news conference.

Inside by the food court, they found the suspected gunman, Jose Garcia-Rodriguez, 57, of Palm Bay; his wife, Idanerys Garcia-Rodriguez, 33; and an unidentified male victim.

The unidentified man died as a result of the shooting, and the gunman was killed by a self-inflicted gunshot wound, Pryce said.

Idanerys Garcia-Rodriguez, who appeared to be the target, was in good condition at a hospital Saturday afternoon, Pryce said.

Pryce said reports that the unidentified man had tried to wrestle the gun away from Jose Garcia-Rodriguez were unconfirmed. The man's connection to the married couple was being investigated.

About 100 people were inside the mall at the time of the shooting, and police quickly evacuated them and closed the shopping center for the day.

"It was crazy," local resident Donna Evans said in a videotaped interview with the Florida Today newspaper. "All of a sudden, you just hear the 'pop, pop, pop, pop, pop, pop'."

Pryce said three handguns were found at the scene, as well as the ammunition Jose Garcia-Rodriguez was carrying.

The mall is expected to reopen on Sunday.

source: interaksyon.com

Protesters gather at America's biggest shopping mall

WASHINGTON DC - Hundreds of demonstrators filed into America's largest shopping mall Saturday as part of an ongoing wave of protests against racially charged police violence, interrupting one of the holidays' busiest shopping days.

Protesters gathered at the Mall of America, in Bloomington in the Midwestern state of Minnesota, and held up signs with slogans such as "Black Lives Matter," which has become a rallying cry for nationwide demonstrations against police.

Photos posted on Twitter showed dozens of demonstrators -- including several shopkeepers -- placing their hands in the air. The gesture is a tribute to Michael Brown, a black teen killed by a white police officer in Ferguson, Missouri.

Some witnesses claim Brown had his hands in the air when he was shot on August 9. His death and the subsequent grand jury decision not to charge the officer involved touched off weeks of nationwide protests over what demonstrators say is the police's disproportionate use of deadly force against African Americans.

According to the Mall of America protest's Facebook page, more than 3,000 people said they would attend the demonstration. Photos posted on social media showed throngs of people gathered across several levels of the sprawling shopping center, with more outside.

Police and mall security were quick to respond, but there were no immediate reports of arrests, according to the Minneapolis Star Tribune newspaper.

Several protesters tweeted an image of a mall information screen warning people they faced arrest.

"This demonstration is in clear violation of mall of America policy," the warning read. "Those who continue to demonstrate are subject to arrest."

Most protesters appeared to have dispersed by mid-afternoon.

The grand jury decision last month not to indict police officer Darren Wilson over Brown's death was followed by a similar grand jury verdict that declined to charge another white policeman in the "chokehold" death in Staten Island of Eric Garner, a black father of six.

These and other deaths, including that of 12-year-old Tamir Rice -- shot dead by Cleveland police as he brandished a toy gun -- have unleashed simmering resentment of police tactics in the United States and highlighted uneasy relations between black men and law enforcement officials.

The Mall of America sees some 40 million visitors annually and is an important tourist draw for Minnesota, according to the mall's website.

It would take a shopper 86 hours to visit all the shops in the mall if they spent 10 minutes in each shop.

source: interaksyon.com

69 dead, 63 missing as Nairobi siege enters 3rd day

NAIROBI - At least 69 people are confirmed to have been killed and 63 more recorded missing in an ongoing Nairobi shopping mall siege, Kenya Red Cross said Monday.

The 63 recorded missing are thought to include both hostages still being held by Islamist militants fighting Kenyan troops inside the complex, as well as those possibly killed in the three-day-long siege. Others may be hiding in the sprawling center.

As the stand-off entered its third day, sustained bursts of rapid gunfire erupted at dawn and lasted 15 minutes, and soldiers posted around the mall ducked for cover.

Somali Shebab militants on Monday threatened to kill hostages they are holding as Kenyan troops move to end their siege.

Kenyan Interior Minister Joseph Ole Lenku said in a security update Monday that "a few" hostages remain in the mall, but would not give precise figures.

The Shebab have not said how many people were being held by the dozen-or-so attackers, who marched into the four-storey building at midday Saturday, spraying shoppers with machine gunfire and tossing grenades.

"We authorize the mujahedeen inside the building to take actions against the prisoners as much as they are pressed," Shebab spokesman Ali Mohamud Rage said in a statement posted on an Islamist website.

Nonstop skirmishes

Earlier, Kenyan troops battled into the early hours of Monday as they tried to end a bloody standoff with Somali Islamist militants holding hostages inside a shopping mall, with police warning the death toll of 68 could rise sharply.

The army said it had secured most of the upmarket, part Israeli-owned Westgate complex, and that most the hostages had been rescued. It said it was trying to bring a "speedy conclusion" to the drama, now into its third day.

Security and intelligence sources told AFP that Israeli agents were also assisting in the operation. Kenya's National Disaster Operation Center said a "major engagement" with the Al Qaeda-linked Shebab fighters was in process.

"Our concern is to rescue all hostages alive and that is why the operation is delicate," the Kenya Defense Forces said in its latest update.

It did not say how many people were being held by the dozen or so attackers.

"All efforts are underway to bring this matter to a speedy conclusion," it said, adding four of its soldiers were wounded in what appeared to be the final efforts to secure the mall, which is popular with wealthy Kenyans and expatriates.

An AFP correspondent close to the mall said the area was eerily quiet, with no sounds of gunshots heard -- possibly indicating the attackers were holed up deep inside the sprawling four-story complex, one of Nairobi's largest buildings.

"The criminals are now all located in one place within the building," Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta said in a speech to the nation.

"They shall not get away with their despicable and beastly acts," Kenyatta said in an emotional speech, in which he announced he had lost a nephew and his fiancée in the attack. "We will punish the masterminds swiftly, and indeed very painfully."

Kenyatta said more than 1,000 people were rescued, and that he had also received "numerous offers of assistance from friendly countries."

A Kenyan security source said Israelis "are rescuing the hostages and the injured". The Israeli foreign ministry refused to confirm or deny its agents were involved, although a Western intelligence official confirmed the Israelis were playing a frontline role.

British and US agents were also at the scene, the source said.

Bodies still inside

Terrified witnesses told of scenes of horror and panic as the masked gunmen tossed grenades and sprayed automatic gunfire in the packed centre around midday on Saturday, sending panicked shoppers and staff fleeing or diving for cover.

Officials estimated some 200 people have been wounded, and the Red Cross made a nationwide appeal for blood donors.

Police sources who had entered the building on Sunday evening said they feared that death toll, now confirmed at 68, "could be much, much higher ... judging from the bodies sighted inside."

Somalia's Shebab rebels said the carnage was in retaliation for Kenya's military intervention in Somalia, where African Union troops are battling the Islamists.

"If you want Kenya in peace, it will not happen as long as your boys are in our lands," Shebab spokesman Sheik Ali Mohamud Rage said in a statement.

The group also issued a string of statements via Twitter, one of them claiming that Muslims in the center had been "escorted out by the Mujahideen before beginning the attack."

Witnesses have confirmed that the gunmen were trying to weed out non-Muslims for execution by interrogating people on their faith.

The dead also included three Britons, two French women, two Canadians including a diplomat, a Chinese woman, two Indians, a South Korean, a South African and a Dutch woman, according to their governments. Also killed was Ghanaian poet and former UN envoy Kofi Awoonor, 78, while his son was injured.

'People sprayed with bullets'

Mall worker Zipporah Wanjiru, who emerged from the ordeal alive but in a state of shock, said she hid under a table with five other colleagues.

"They were shooting indiscriminately, it was like a movie seeing people sprayed with bullets like that," she said, bursting into tears. "I have never witnessed this in my life."

Cafe waiter Titus Alede, who risked his life and leapt from the first floor of the mall, said it was a "miracle from God" that he managed to escape the approaching gunmen.

"I remember them saying 'you killed our people in Somalia, it is our time to pay you back'," he said.

One teenage survivor told how he played dead to avoid being killed.

"I heard screams and gunshots all over the place. I got scared ... (and) hid behind one of the cars," 18-year-old Umar Ahmed told AFP.

In the hours after the attack began, shocked people of all ages and races could be seen running from the mall, some clutching babies, while others crawled along walls to avoid stray bullets.

Israeli interests in Kenya have come under attack before, and the Westgate mall has long been seen as a potential target.

The attack is the worst in Nairobi since an Al-Qaeda bombing at the US embassy killed more than 200 people in 1998.

It was condemned by world powers.

US President Barack Obama called Kenyatta offering support "to bring the perpetrators of the attack to justice", while UN chief Ban Ki-moon said the violence was "totally reprehensible".

Kenya's Vice President William Ruto has asked the International Criminal Court to delay his trial for crimes against humanity over deadly 2007-08 post-election violence because of the mall standoff, his lawyer said.

source: interaksyon.com

Would You Buy A House Built on Top of a Shopping Mall?

When I was kid, I thought it would be awesome to live in a mall. My family and I stayed in a hotel built in or on top of one: We could go get Starbucks for breakfast in our PJs and if I ever needed something new and shiny to validate my existence, it was readily available. Of course, even I thought there were limits to what living above a mall could be like; for instance, I always assumed that living in a building like that meant you pretty much had to live in an apartment. I was a foolish child. You can both live in a house and live above a mall, thanks to the Chinese. You can have it all, people.

Zhuzhou Jiutian Real Estate, a developer in Zhuzhou, China, the second largest city in the Hunan province, has actually built a set of houses on top of a shopping mall. It’s a perfect solution, really, for someone who loves or needs to live in the city, but wants suburban comforts like a lawn and personal privacy.

According to China Daily, putting gardens and other community areas with vegetation on building rooftops is rapidly becoming a national trend in China. So it’s not that this thought hasn’t been had before. In Beijing, all new buildings under 12 stories are legally required to feature “green rooftops.”

The “neighborhood” has four houses, each with a pretty large amount of surrounding property. Zhuzhou Jiutian built the houses at the same time as the mall itself. I’m pretty sure that made the process a lot easier. There is only one problem. While the houses are fully functional with working electricity and plumbing, they’re technically commercial structures. The houses will function as office space for the mall’s staff. What a waste!

Still, even if the design isn’t reaching its maximum potential, the roof-house design does show an interesting new way to think about urban planning.

source: geekosystem.com