8-31-2005

巴格达人群挤踏近700朝拜者丧生 (Nearly 700 Pilgrims Killed in Baghdad Stampede)

伊拉克卫生部说，什叶派穆斯林经过通往巴格达一座清真寺的桥上时发生的人群挤踏事件中有将近700名什叶派穆斯林丧生。有关官员说，当有传言说在数十万名信徒当中可能有自杀式炸弹杀手的时候，人群惊慌失控。官员说，死者中大多数是妇女、儿童和老人，他们不是被踩死，就是被挤到桥下的底格里斯河里身亡。

据报导，有300多人受伤，死亡数字可能还会增加。早些时候，反叛分子在这座清真寺附近发射迫击炮弹，打死至少7人。伊拉克总理贾法里宣布全国哀悼三天。

伊拉克各宗教和民族派别最近数星期以来一直在制定宪法草案的问题上争论不休，相互之间关系紧张。

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.

美救援飓风灾民行动进展艰难 (U.S. Rescue Efforts for Hurricane Refugees Progress Slowly)

在凶猛的卡特里娜飓风过后，有关当局在美国墨西哥湾沿海一带地区艰难地援救幸存者并恢复秩序。星期一飓风带来的狂风暴雨使数十万人无家可归，更多的人需要食物和洁净饮用水。新奥尔良市大约80%的地方星期三仍然一片汪洋，工程人员试图修补被飓风破坏的两处关键堤防。当局已经告诉救援队伍，要集中精力抢救困在屋顶上的幸存者，暂时不要管水中漂流的尸体。

在淹水较少的地方，警方正试图制止普遍的哄抢行为。新奥尔良的市长说，撤离的居民可能还要再过几个月才能回家。在密西西比州，州长黑利.巴伯星期三说，卡特里娜飓风摧毁了格尔夫波特和比洛克西两个城市沿海地区90%的建筑。当局说，那里非正式的死亡数字是110人，并警告说，几乎可以肯定死亡数字会更高。

布什总统缩短了在德克萨斯州的休假，星期三返回华盛顿监管救灾努力。

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.