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EFE News Briefs for Friday, Aug. 29
[August 29, 2014]

EFE News Briefs for Friday, Aug. 29


(EFE Ingles Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) More than 3 million flee Syria, U.N. says Geneva (EFE).- The number of Syrians forced to flee their country as a result of the civil war that began in 2011 topped 3 million on Friday, the U.N. refugee agency said.



"There are worrying signs too that the journey out of Syria is becoming tougher, with many people forced to pay bribes at armed checkpoints proliferating along the borders," the agency, known as the UNHCR, said in a statement.

"Refugees crossing the desert into eastern Jordan are being forced to pay smugglers hefty sums ($100 a head or more) to take them to safety," the statement continued.


Nearly half the Syrian population have been driven from their homes, including around 6.5 million internally displaced people, the UNHCR said.

___ Nicaragua: 27 Trapped in mine Managua (EFE).- The number of people trapped inside a gold mine on Nicaragua's northern Atlantic coast is 27 and not 24, as reported earlier, the government said.

Rescue teams have established contact with 20 of the miners, government spokeswoman Rosario Murillo told official media.

"They told us about an hour ago that 20 of them (the miners) are at one spot and can communicate and ask for food and water," she said.

The cave-in at the mine in the municipality of Bonanza was triggered by a landslide on nearby El Comal mountain. Two miners managed to escape.

___ Mexico's Pemex forecasts 6.7 pct drop in crude production in 2014 Mexico City (EFE).- Mexican state-owned oil company Petroleos Mexicanos said it expects its crude output to fall by 6.7 percent in 2014 compared to last year, attributing the result to measurement improvements.

The head of Pemex's exploration and production division, Gustavo Hernandez, said production will fall from 2.52 million barrels per day in 2013 to 2.35 million bpd at the close of 2014.

Hernandez downplayed the decline in production, telling reporters that equipment to gauge crude output was recalibrated last December and that adjustment was yielding a more accurate measurement.

The target for crude production in 2015 is 2.4 billion bpd, just a 2.1 percent increase over 2014's projected level, while natural gas output is expected to come in at 5.8 billion cubic feet per day, roughly equivalent to the forecast level for this year, Hernandez said.

___ Brazil AG wants review of amnesty for crimes of 1964-1985 junta Brasilia (EFE).- The Brazilian Attorney General's Office has called for a revision of a 1979 law that has prevented the prosecution of members of the 1964-1985 military regime for crimes against humanity.

The brief, signed by Attorney General Rodrigo Janot, was submitted to the federal Supreme Court and is based on a 2010 ruling by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights demanding that Brazil investigate and punish human rights abuses committed under the dictatorship.

Even though the amnesty was imposed by the very people who stood to benefit from it, Brazil's highest court in 2010 rejected a motion brought by grassroots groups asking for the measure to be overturned as unconstitutional.

___ EU approves Telefonica's acquisition of E-Plus Madrid (EFE).- The German unit of Spain's Telefonica, Telefonica Deutschland, obtained final approval from the European Commission to acquire smaller rival E-Plus, the German subsidiary of Dutch telecom company KPN.

Telefonica said it plans to close the acquisition in the third quarter and soon will begin executing the necessary measures to finance the transaction.

On July 2, the European Commission authorized the takeover after Telefonica Deutschland, which sells services in Germany under the O2 brand, pledged to sell up to 30 percent of the merged company's network capacity and offer to divest radio wave spectrum and certain assets to ensure adequate competition in the German market.

___ NATO demands Russia halt "illegal military actions" in Ukraine Brussels (EFE).- NATO demanded that Russia immediately halt its "illegal military actions" in eastern Ukraine and its support for mainly ethnic-Russian militias battling Kiev's forces in that region.

It also called on Moscow to take "immediate and verifiable" steps to de-escalate the crisis.

"We condemn in the strongest terms Russia's continued disregard of its international obligations," NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said in a statement to the media after an extraordinary meeting of the NATO-Ukraine commission, which was held at Kiev's request.

"Despite Moscow's hollow denials, it is now clear that Russian troops and equipment have illegally crossed the border into eastern and southeastern Ukraine. This is not an isolated action, but part of a dangerous pattern over many months to destabilize Ukraine as a sovereign nation," the Danish former prime minister said.

EFE dr (c) 2014 EFE News Services (U.S.) Inc.

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