Page 10 The Skanner August 23, 2017
News
Navy Dismisses 7th
Fleet Commander After
Warship Accidents
TOKYO (AP) — The commander of
the Navy’s Asia-based 7th Fleet was
dismissed Wednesday after a series
of warship accidents raised questions
about its operations in the Pacific.
A two-sentence statement issued by
the Navy said Adm. Scott Swift, com-
mander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, had
relieved Vice Adm. Joseph Aucoin “due
to a loss of confidence in his ability to
command.”
The move follows four Navy acci-
dents in the Pacific since late January,
including two collisions that left sail-
ors dead and missing.
“While each of these four incidents is
unique, they cannot be viewed in isola-
tion,” Swift said late Tuesday.
He said the Navy will carry out a
“deliberate re-set” of all its ships in
the Pacific, focused on navigation, me-
chanical systems and bridge resource
management. It will include training
and an expert assessment of each ship.
Trump Revisits His
Charlottesville Comments
in Angry Speech
PHOENIX (AP) — President Donald
Trump opened his political rally in
Phoenix with calls for unity and an
assertion that “our movement is about
love.” Then he erupted in anger.
He blamed the media for the wide-
spread condemnation of his response
to violence at a Charlottesville, Vir-
ginia, protest organized by white su-
premacists. And he shouted that he had
“openly called for healing, unity and
love” in the immediate aftermath of the
tragedy and had simply been misrepre-
sented in news coverage.
He read from his three responses to
the racially charged violence — getting
more animated with each one. He with-
drew from his suit pocket the written
statement he’d read the day a woman
was killed by a man who’d plowed a
car through counter-protesters, but he
skipped over the trouble-causing part
that he’d freelanced at the time — his
observation that “many sides” were to
blame.
That, as well as his reiteration days
later that “both sides” were to blame
for the violence that led to the death of
Heather Heyer and two state troopers,
led Democrats and many Republicans
to denounce Trump for not unmistak-
ably calling out white supremacists
and other hate groups.
“You know where my heart is,”
Trump told the crowd of thousands
shoehorned into the Phoenix conven-
tion center. “I’m only doing this to show
you how damned dishonest these peo-
ple are.”
North Korea Photos
Suggest New Solid-Fuel
Missile Designs
TOKYO (AP) — North Korea’s state
media released photos Wednesday that
appear to show the designs of one or
possibly two new missiles.
Concept diagrams of the missiles
were seen hanging on a wall behind
leader Kim Jong Un while he visited
a plant that makes solid-fuel engines
for the country’s ballistic-missile pro-
gram.
One of the photos clearly showed
a diagram for a missile called “Puk-
guksong-3,” which appears to be the
latest in its Pukguksong, or Polaris,
series. The other was harder to dis-
cern, though it carried a “Hwasong,” or
Mars, designation name.
The photos were carried in the morn-
ing edition of the Rodong Sinmun, the
ruling party’s newspaper, and released
ROYAL MALAYSIAN NAVY VIA AP
World News Briefs
In this photo released by the Royal Malaysian Navy, a Royal Malaysian Navy sailor scans the sea for
missing sailors from the USS John S. McCain off the Johor coast of Malaysia, Wednesday, Aug. 23, 2017. The
commander of the Navy’s 7th Fleet will be removed after a series of warship accidents in the Pacific this
year, two U.S. officials said Wednesday.
by the Korean Central News Agency
just two days after the United States
and South Korea began annual mili-
tary exercises that the North claims are
a rehearsal for war.
Tensions on the peninsula generally
ratchet up during the maneuvers and
a series of larger exercises held each
spring.
Police: DNA of Headless
Torso Matches Swedish
Journalist
COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — A
headless torso found on a beach off
Copenhagen has been identified as
that of missing Swedish journalist Kim
Wall, who is believed to have died on an
amateur-built submarine earlier this
month, Danish police said Wednesday.
Wall, 30, was last seen alive on Aug.
10 on Danish inventor Peter Madsen’s
submarine, which police believe he in-
tentionally sank off Denmark’s eastern
coast the following day.
Madsen, 46, who was then arrested
on preliminary manslaughter charges,
denies having anything to do with
Wall’s disappearance. Her family says
that she was working on a story about
Madsen.
The torso was found on a beach by a
member of the public who was cycling
on Copenhagen’s southern Amager is-
land Monday, near where she was be-
lieved to have died. Copenhagen police
said Tuesday that her head, arms and
legs had “deliberately been cut off ” her
body.
The cause of the journalist’s death is
not yet known, police said, adding they
were still looking for the rest of her
body.
Saudi Police Arrest
Teenage Boy for Dancing
in the Street
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP)
— Saudi police have arrested a 14-year-
old boy who was filmed dancing at an
intersection in the Red Sea city of Jid-
dah.
The video, which went viral on so-
cial media, shows the boy with head
phones and wearing grey sweat shorts,
a striped T-shirt and neon green and
yellow Crocs on his feet. He is swaying
his hips and arms to the 90s hit song
“Macarena,” and appears to be smiling
and giggling throughout the dance
The state-linked Sabq news website
quoted Col. Aati bin Attiyah al-Qurashi
as saying police arrested the young
man and were preparing to refer him
to prosecutors for disrupting traffic.
Western music and dancing is taboo
in Saudi Arabia but such incidents in
the past have not necessarily led to
lengthy imprisonment or serious pun-
ishment.