#News : #USA, What we know about #Charlie #Kirk’s memorial service:

Thousands of people will gather Sunday to honor the life of assassinated #conservative activist Charlie Kirk at a memorial service expected to underscore his indelible influence on American politics.

With a lineup of speakers from the highest levels of the U.S. government, including U.S. President Donald Trump, Kirk’s memorial is poised to resemble something akin to a state funeral for the U.S. conservative movement, carrying with it all the gravity – and security concerns – such an occasion entails.

Here’s what we know:
The service and speakers

Kirk’s memorial service will be held at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Arizona, on Sunday, 11 days after he was fatally shot during a campus event at Utah Valley University. The service is scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. MT (1 p.m. ET), according to a web page about the memorial from Kirk’s organization, Turning Point USA.

The memorial will feature a who’s who of U.S. leaders and conservative pundits paying tribute to the slain activist, who was a close ally of the president. Trump said earlier this week he will “say a few words” at the ceremony.

“We’ll be going out to a service on Sunday. I’ll be leaving with some of the people in this room, just to celebrate Charlie and all that he’s done,” Trump said Thursday at a news conference with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

Kirk was a “great person,” the president said, adding he believed Kirk might have become president himself one day.

In addition to the president, Turning Point USA has also said that Vice President JD Vance and Kirk’s widow, Erika, will deliver remarks. Erika Kirk, who had two young children with Kirk, has pledged to continue her late husband’s work, including his campus tours and podcast. On Thursday, Turning Point USA announced she is the organization’s new CEO.

Beyond the marquee speakers, numerous other Trump administration officials and high-profile conservative personalities are expected to attend, highlighting Kirk’s stature in Republican politics and his relationships with members of the White House and Trump’s Cabinet.

White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller are also slated to provide remarks, as are Donald Trump Jr. and Tucker Carlson, the former Fox News host and conservative commentator.

Worship music at the service will be led by prominent Christian contemporary musicians like Chris Tomlin, Brandon Lake, Phil Wickham and Kari Jobe and Cody Carnes.
Attendance will be ‘big,’ Trump says

It’s unclear how many people will attend the memorial, but State Farm Stadium – home to the NFL’s Arizona Cardinals – can seat more than 63,000 people, according to its website, with the ability to expand to accommodate an additional 10,000.

“We’re going to have a stadium, and I bet that stadium is going to be pretty packed, maybe completely packed,” Trump said Monday when asked about the memorial. “It’s going to be big.”

Attending the memorial in person requires registration through Turning Point USA, which has said people will be welcomed on a “first-come, first-served” basis. That includes providing a name, email, phone number and ZIP code, with additional guidance to be given to attendees Saturday evening. Doors are expected to open around 8 a.m. MT (10 a.m. ET).

Parking will be free, but Turning Point USA has asked those who attend to carpool if possible. Attendees are also asked to follow a dress code: “Sunday Best – Red, White, or Blue.”

Overflow seating will be available at Desert Diamond Arena, just across West Maryland Avenue, according to Turning Point USA. The event also will be livestreamed on Kirk’s Rumble account, the organization said.

The organization had not released any attendance registration numbers as of late Friday morning.
Law enforcement faces security challenges

With so many American leaders in attendance, Kirk’s memorial will present a major test for law enforcement, particularly the Secret Service, which will be the lead agency coordinating security while already strained and under pressure in an era of rising political violence.

“Our teams are already on the ground in Phoenix and Glendale, working side-by-side with state, local, and federal partners. Together, we are fully committed to ensuring that these solemn events receive the comprehensive protection and support they require,” William Mack, the special agent in charge of the Phoenix field office, said in a statement.

The memorial has been given a Level 1 special event assessment rating, a senior Department of Homeland Security official said – the highest such designation. The SEAR-1 rating, previously given to other major events like the Super Bowl and the Kentucky Derby, frees federal resources across the federal government to coordinate on security.

“This designation is reserved for events of the highest national significance and enables the federal government to provide the full range of law enforcement and security resources necessary to support local officials in ensuring a safe and successful event,” the official said.

US national security agencies “have no information to indicate a verified, credible threat” to the event, according to a joint threat assessment obtained by CNN. But the assessment notes extremists “may view the memorial service or related events as attractive attack targets due to the attendance of these individuals, other senior U.S. government officials, state and local government officials, and political activists, and due to major international media attention.”

The threat assessment indicates authorities have observed “several threats of unknown credibility” to some of the people who are expected to attend the ceremony, including the Kirk family, Trump and Vance, but does not spell out any threats to the event itself.

Since Kirk’s killing, sources say they have observed streams of online hate from people of various political affiliations, but are not tracking any credible threats.

Turning Point has signaled attendees should expect “TSA-level screening,” saying on its web page for the memorial that “advanced security measures are in place, which may result in longer wait times than usual.” Bags will not be allowed inside.

Under normal circumstances, State Farm Stadium falls under the jurisdiction of the Arizona Department of Public Safety, which confirmed state, federal and local law enforcement are coordinating on planning and security for Kirk’s memorial. A department spokesperson declined to provide further details, telling CNN, “We are not able to discuss that planning, tactical and security considerations, or staffing.”

Asked about the Glendale Police Department’s preparation for Kirk’s memorial, spokesperson Officer Moroni Mendez noted the city has hosted many large events in recent years, giving it the experience needed to deal with an influx of visitors. State Farm Stadium, for example, hosted Super Bowl LVII in 2023.

“With that, we obviously have the experience, and are proficient at hosting these types of mega events,” Mendez told CNN, though he acknowledged this event will be different.

“There’s going to be a lot of important people here. We had a meeting with the Secret Service yesterday to talk about how we’re going to go about planning this event,” Mendez said.

Mendez warned traffic in and around Glendale will be impacted and that some intersections will be closed as police work to direct attendees to parking lots.

“We’ll have all our units available. It will be a busy day for everyone, not just Glendale but also Arizona DPS and all the agencies assisting.”

By Dakin Andone, CNN

#ICE denies using excessive force as it broadens immigration arrests in Chicago.


PARK RIDGE, Ill. — It was 3:30 a.m. when 10 U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers gathered in a parking lot in the Chicago suburbs for a briefing about a suspect they were hoping to arrest. They went over a description of the person, made sure their radios were on the same channel and discussed where the closest hospital was in case something went wrong.

“Let’s plan on not being there,” said one of the officers, before they climbed into their vehicles and headed out.

Across the city and surrounding suburbs, other teams were fanning out in support of " Operation Midway Blitz." It has unleashed President Donald Trump’s mass deportations agenda on a city and state that has had some of the strongest laws preventing local officials from cooperating with immigration enforcement.

ICE launched the operation on Sept. 8, drawing concern from activists and immigrant communities fearful of the large-scale arrests or aggressive tactics used in other cities targeted by the Republican president. They say there has been a noticeable uptick in immigration enforcement agents, although a military deployment to Chicago has yet to materialize.

The Associated Press went on a ride-along with ICE in a Chicago suburb -- much of the recent focus -- to see how that operation is unfolding.
A predawn wait, then two arrests

A voice came over the radio: “He got into the car. I’m not sure if that’s the target.”

Someone matching the description of the man that ICE was searching for walked out of the house, got into a car and drove away from the tree-lined street. Unsure whether this was their target, the officers followed. A few minutes later, with the car approaching the freeway, the voice over the radio said: “He’s got the physical description. We just can’t see the face good.”

“Do it,” said Marcos Charles, the acting head of ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations.

Agents in multiple vehicles soon overtook the car and boxed it in. After talking to the man, they realized he was not the person being sought for but that he was in the United States illegally, so they took him into custody.

Eventually, a little after dawn broke on the one- and two-story brick houses, the man they were looking for came out of the house and got into a car. ICE officers closed in. The man got out of the car and was arrested. ICE said both men were in the country illegally and had criminal records.

Charles called it a “successful operation.”

“There was no safety issues on the part of our officers, nor the individuals that we arrested. And it went smoothly,” he said.
`ICE does not belong here’

Activists and critics of ICE say that’s increasingly not the norm in immigration operations.

They point to videos showing ICE agents smashing windows to apprehend suspects, a chaotic showdown outside a popular Italian restaurant in San Diego, and arrests like that of a Tufts University student in March by masked agents outside her apartment in Somerville, Massachusetts, as neighbors watched.

Charles said ICE is using an “appropriate” amount of force and that agents are responding to suspects who increasingly are not following commands.

There has been “an uptick in people that are not compliant,” he said, blaming inflammatory rhetoric from activists who, he said, are encouraging people to resist.

Alderman Andre Vasquez, who chairs the Chicago City Council’s committee on immigrant and refugee rights, strenuously objected to that description, faulting ICE for any escalation.

“We’re not here to cause chaos. The president is,” Vasquez. He accused immigration enforcement agents of trying to provoke activists into overreacting in order to justify calling in a greater use of force such as National Guard troops. “ICE does not belong here.”
Shooting death of immigrant by ICE officer heightens tensions

Chicago was already on edge when a shooting Sept. 12 heightened tensions even more.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security said an ICE officer fatally shot Silverio Villegas Gonzalez, a Mexican immigrant who tried to evade arrest in a Chicago suburb by driving his car at officers and dragging one of them. The department said the officer felt his life was threatened and had opened fire, killing the man.

Charles said he could not comment because there is an open investigation. But he said he met with the officer in the hospital, saw his injuries and felt that the force used was appropriate.

The officer was not wearing a body camera, Charles said.

Gov. JB Pritzker, D-Ill., has demanded “a full, factual accounting” of the shooting. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum condemned the death and said Mexico is demanding a thorough investigation.

“These tactics have led to the loss of life of one of our community members,” said Democratic state Rep. Norma Hernandez.

In another use of force incident under “Midway Blitz” that has drawn criticism, a U.S. citizen was detained by immigration agents alongside his father and hit by a stun gun three times Tuesday in suburban Des Plaines, the man’s lawyer said.

Local advocates have also condemned ICE agents for wearing masks, failing to identify themselves, and not using body cameras -- actions that starkly contrast with Chicago Police Department policy.
‘It was time to hit Chicago’

Charles said there is no timeline for the ICE-led operation in the Chicago area to end. As of Thursday, immigration enforcement officials have arrested nearly 550 people. Charles said 50% to 60% of those are targeted arrests, meaning they are people whom immigration enforcers are specifically trying to find.

He pushed back on criticism that ICE randomly targets people, saying agents weren’t “going out to Home Depot parking lots” to make indiscriminate arrests.

Charles said ICE has brought in more than 200 officers from around the country for the operation.

He said that for too long, cities such as Chicago that limited cooperation with ICE had allowed immigrants, especially those with criminal records, to remain in the country illegally. It was time to act, he said.

“It was time to hit Chicago.”

Rebecca Santana, The Associated Press

Associated Press writer Christine Fernando in Chicago contributed to this report.

#Haitian gang attacks town, kills teacher, kidnaps residents and burns buildings.

Gunmen opened fired on the streets of Bassin Bleu around noon on Thursday, killing at least one high school teacher, according the Catholic Church and local leaders.

The surge of violence stirred panic in the community as gang members burned the police station, the town hall and a number of other buildings and looted a credit union.

It was the first attack of this scale in the community, which has largely gone untouched by spiraling gang violence besieging Haiti. Such brutal attacks on rural communities have grown increasingly common as gangs have gradually expanded their control across the country.

“Many people in Bassin Bleu managed to escape, and were forced to flee their homes and cross a river with a powerful current just to not be suffocated by the violence,” the office of the bishop in northwestern Haiti wrote in a statement. “What can we do because now we have nowhere to run.”

The office and local leader Rodlet Jean Baptiste, speaking on Radio Caraibes, blamed the attack on the gang Kokorat San Ras, which has a firm grip on the region.

The gang is part of a larger gang coalition known as Viv Ansanm, behind some of the worst atrocities in the Caribbean nation in recent years. In May, the Trump administration designated the group as a foreign terrorist organization.

According to a recent report by the United Nations, “Kokorat San Ras, despite its limited numbers, is also a very brutal gang” that operates in the Artibonite region. Its roughly 20 members have “committed acts of extreme violence, forcing people to abandon large areas of cropland and threatening agricultural production.”

The bishop’s office also cast blame on Haitian police and the country’s government, which has struggled to reel in the heavily-armed gangs. It demanded action in easing soaring gang violence in the northwest region.

“Why are government authorities, who are responsible for our people’s safety, letting the country reach this state?” it wrote. “Haitians have become the victims of our own fellow Haitians. We are tired.”

Haitian National Police did not immediately respond to a request for comment and more information on the attack.

Years of attempts by UN parties and world leaders, including the UN backed Multinational Security Support mission working alongside Haitian National Police, to put an end to spiraling violence in Haiti has done little to ease the bloodshed.

Just last week, gunmen threw a Molotov cocktail into an police armored vehicle, killing three people outside the capital. And days before that, dozens of people were massacred in a small fishing village, something a local official said “highlights the urgent need for effective state intervention.”

UN Secretary-General António Guterres has condemned such attacks, saying he was “alarmed by the levels of violence rocking Haiti.”

Evens Sanon, The Associated Press

#Trump declines approval of Taiwan military aid package: report, U.S. President Donald Trump declined to approve US$400 million in military aid to Taiwan in recent months while negotiating on trade and a potential summit with Beijing, the Washington Post reported Thursday.

The decision would mark a sharp departure from U.S. policy toward the democratic island, which faces a constant threat of invasion by China.

A White House official told the Post that the aid package decision was not yet final.

Trump and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping are set to speak Friday, their second call since the 79-year-old Republican returned to the White House. The telephone talks come as the two sides seek a compromise on tariffs and a deal on video-sharing app TikTok.

While the United States stopped recognizing Taiwan in the late 1970s in favor of China, Washington has remained Taipei’s most important backer and biggest supplier of military aid.

Under former president Joe Biden, Washington approved more than US$2 billion in military aid packages for Taiwan. But Trump “does not support sending weapons without payment, a preference also on display with Ukraine,” the Post noted.

It said that U.S. and Taiwanese defence officials met in Anchorage, Alaska in August and discussed a package of weapons sales “which could total in the billions of dollars,” including drones, missiles and sensors to monitor the island’s coastline.

Since Trump returned to the White House in January, there have been growing jitters in Taipei over the strength of the Taiwan-U.S. relationship and Washington’s willingness to defend the island if China were to attack.

Visiting Taiwan in late August, the head of the U.S. Senate armed services committee said he was determined the United States and Taiwan remain “the best of friends.”

“It is our determination and our intention that Taiwan remain free and make its own decisions,” Republican Senator Roger Wicker said after talks with Taiwanese President Lai Ching-te.

“Part of maintaining the freedoms that we have is enhanced cooperation militarily, enhanced cooperation with our defence industrial base, making the best use of those funds.”

#Ukraine hits Russian oil #refinery deep behind front, Ukrainian drones on Thursday hit a major Russian oil refinery some 1,400 kilometres (870 miles) from the front line, triggering a fire, officials from both countries said.

The strike is the latest in a wave of drone attacks on Russia’s energy infrastructure as Kyiv seeks to knock out Russia’s vital energy revenues that fund its army.

A source in Ukraine’s SBU security agency said its drones had hit “the heart” of a refinery in the central Bashkortostan region run by state-controlled energy giant Gazprom.

Unverified images on Russian social media showed a fire at the facility and a plume of dark smoke rising above it.

Russia typically does not confirm successful Ukrainian strikes, but Radiy Khabirov, the Russian head of the region, said Thursday the refinery had been hit.

“Two drones attacked the facility. There were no fatalities or people wounded. Passive and active defences were activated and the site’s security opened fire to neutralize them,” he said on social media on Thursday morning.

“We are assessing the state of the damage and currently extinguishing the fire,” he added.

Strikes over the summer months have knocked out a notable portion of Russia’s refining capacity.

Though there are no official estimates as to the extent of the damage, fuel prices have surged across the country and petrol shortages have been recorded in many regions.

The Kremlin extended a ban on petrol exports in a bid to keep prices on the domestic market in check.

Gazprom Neft said earlier Thursday it was delaying planned maintenance work at one site in order not to exacerbate the fuel crisis.

U.S. President Donald Trump is also seeking to hobble Russia’s potential to earn from its energy sales, ramping up tariffs on India over its purchases of Russian oil, threatening China and urging Europe to do the same.

Retreating Alsek Glacier reveals new island in southeast #Alaska, Mauri S. Pelto, a glaciologist at Nichols College in Massachusetts, had anticipated for some time that the Alsek Glacier in southeast Alaska’s Glacier Bay National Park and Preserve would detach from the land mass referred to as Prow Knob. As the glacier has retreated, it has eroded a basin now filled by Alsek Lake, which is fed by the nearby Alsek River, glacier melt and icebergs, he said.

Pelto for years has used satellite imagery as part of his work chronicling changes in glaciers, and he had been checking images of the area at least once a month as he watched for the separation to occur, he said. It appears to have happened sometime between late July and early August.

Glacier Bay has over 1,000 glaciers, according to the park. While many glaciers in Alaska are retreating, not many new islands of size are revealed by their retreat, Pelto said. Prow Knob is roughly 2 square miles (5 square kilometres), and its highest point is just over 1,000 feet (304.8 metres), he said.

Imagery from the early 1980s, shared by NASA Earth Observatory, shows the Alsek Glacier largely surrounding Prow Knob, with Alsek Lake on one side. The glacier at that time shared a connection with Grand Plateau Glacier, the images show.

Over time, the lake has expanded as the glaciers have retreated. Alsek Lake is one of three lakes next to glaciers in the region that has seen marked growth since the 1980s, Pelto said.

Becky Bohrer, The Associated Press

16-year-old with a loaded gun threatened to shoot up his New York City high school, police say.

The 16-year-old student posted the threat to Instagram around 10:15 a.m. while in class at Benjamin N. Cardozo High School in Bayside, Queens, Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said. A person who saw the post alerted the FBI, which then contacted the NYPD, Tisch said.

Officers went to the school, located the student and found a 9mm handgun in his backpack that was loaded with 13 rounds of ammunition, Tisch said. Unlike some other New York City public schools, Cardozo High School does not screen students for weapons, she said.

“We are so grateful that this incident did not end tragically,” Mayor Eric Adams said at a news conference announcing the arrest.

Police did not publicly identify the 16-year-old by name because he is a minor, Tisch said, adding that he had no prior criminal history. A message seeking information about the charges he faces was left for the Queens district attorney’s office.

According to Tisch, the threatening post showed what appeared to be school work on a desk, and the caption included a slang term for anger or frustration and read, in part: “vow to shoot the school up.” Location data showed that it was posted from the school, she said.

Police officers worked with school staff to locate the 16-year-old, removed him from his classroom without incident and took him to an empty conference room where they searched his backpack and found the gun, Tisch said. The boy also had three cell phones on him, she said, one in a school-issued locking pouch and two others.

Officers confirmed that the Instagram post came from the 16-year-old’s account by calling a phone number associated with it, Tisch said. When officers called the number, the commissioner said, one of the boy’s cellphones rang.

Adams, a former police captain, lamented the easy availability of guns, even as he touted the NYPD’s success in making gun-related arrests and driving shootings, murders and other crime lower.

“This was a failure of a society that allowed a 16-year-old to get so close to shooting up a school and potentially killing classmates and teachers,” Adams said. The boy, he said, “either would have ended up dead or in jail for many years” had he followed through on the threat.

Tisch said the swift law enforcement response and collaboration between the FBI, which received the tip, and the NYPD, which acted on it, was an example of the system working to prevent mayhem.

“I will be honest, as a mother of two young, school age boys, I am shaken,” Tisch said. “But, as your police commissioner, I am resolute in ensuring that the NYPD does everything in our power to keep our children safe.”

Michael R. Sisak, The Associated Press

North Korea’s Kim oversees drone test, orders AI development, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un oversaw a test of an attack drone and ordered greater research into possible use of artificial intelligence (AI) in the technology, state media said Friday.

Pictures shared by the official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) showed the unmanned vehicle taking off and then destroying a target.

State media said the exercise demonstrated the “excellent combat effectiveness of Kumsong-series tactical attack drones” and that Kim expressed “great satisfaction”.

Drones are emerging as a “major military activity asset, raising it as a top-priority and important task in modernizing the armed forces of the DPRK,” Kim reportedly said, using the acronym for North Korea.

He also ordered “efforts to rapidly developing the newly-introduced artificial intelligence technology” as well as the “expanding and strengthening” of drone production capabilities.

Analyst Hong Min at Seoul’s Korea Institute for National Unification said Kim sees drone technology as critical to securing “great power status”.

“The drones raise concerns because they offer low-cost, high-efficiency threats: autonomous mission execution, improved accuracy and lethality, suitability for mass production, and enhanced tactical flexibility,” he added.

Pyongyang unveiled its first attack drones last year and experts have warned its new capability in this area could be linked to its budding alliance with Russia.

Analysts also say North Korean troops sent to fight for Russia will be gaining modern warfare experience -- including how drones are used on the battlefield.

South Korean and Western intelligence agencies have said the North sent over 10,000 soldiers to Russia in 2024 -- primarily to the Kursk region -- along with artillery shells, missiles and long-range rocket systems.

Around 600 North #Korean soldiers have been killed and thousands more wounded fighting for Russia, Seoul has said.

The Trump administration has singled out Chicago as its latest mark for immigration enforcement, using traffic stops in immigrant-heavy areas and targeting day labourers outside hardware stores.

“We will not back down,” U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem posted Thursday on X, recirculating dramatic footage of arrests at a suburban Chicago home days earlier.

Activists and local leaders are also defiant, trying to deter agents, warn residents and keep attention on a man killed by an immigration officer last week.
Focusing on day laborers

As U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement launched a new operation this month, the focus appeared to be on traffic stops in largely immigrant and Latino neighborhoods and suburbs. This week, activists say arrests of day labourers are also on the rise, echoing what immigration agents have done elsewhere.

Federal agents were spotted at roughly half a dozen Home Depot and Menards stores in the city and suburbs resulting in individual arrests, according to activists.

“Our neighbors who build, paint, fix and beautify this city have been the target of these unwarranted attacks,” said Miguel Alvelo Rivera with the Latino Union, which advocates for day labourers.

He spoke Thursday near a Home Depot in the heavily Latino and immigrant Brighton Park neighborhood where ICE agents were spotted a day earlier. The Chicago area has roughly 300 such workers, according to the Latino Union.

In immigrant and activist circles, the arrests are commonly referred to as abductions because many agents wear masks, drive unmarked vehicles and don’t have insignia on their clothes.

Giselle Maldonado, 23, said two of her uncles -- Gabriel Soto-Rivera, 40, and Eder Nicolas Jimenez Barrios, 37 -- were detained Monday by ICE on Chicago’s west side as they were driving to work as HVAC technicians. Her uncles have since told other family members that they believed they were being pulled over for a routine traffic stop.

Maldonado found out her uncles had been detained when her mother sent her videos of the encounter posted to TikTok. In the videos, an agent wearing a vest with the words “Police Federal Agent” can be seen speaking to someone in a vehicle.

Maldonado said she immediately thought of Gabriel’s two young children.

“Who’s going to be there for them?” she said. “They’re babies.”
Bike patrols and whistles

Known for organizing, Chicago’s activists have quickly dispatched volunteers to sightings of immigration agents. They record video and gather other information to notify the family of arrestees.

Activists circulate the licence plates of suspected ICE vehicles on social media and take part in disruptive demonstrations outside hotels where agents are believed to be staying. Bike patrols look out for agents, while some follow vehicles on foot and yell to warn those in the vicinity.

One neighborhood on Chicago’s southwest side is making a lot of noise, literally.

When word of increased enforcement in Chicago ramped up, Baltazar Enriquez started buying orange emergency whistles so people could warn others of nearby ICE agents. He said they are reliable even when technology fails.

“If they hear that sound, they immediately start closing their doors, locking their gates,” he said of neighbors. “This has worked for us here. People are asking us, ‘Can I get a whistle?’ ”
Arrests in Chicago

The number of arrests in Chicago is difficult to track. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has offered details on only a few dozen, while an Illinois congresswoman briefed by ICE this week said the number was 250.

However, skepticism remains as some information circulated by ICE included out-of state-arrests. In at least one instance, a U.S. citizen was taken into custody.

Before dawn on Tuesday morning, federal agents, Noem and Gregory Bovino, a Border Patrol agent central to a Los Angeles operation, stormed a home in suburban Elgin. They blew open a door as helicopters hovered.

Elected officials criticized the move as a stunt. DHS said five people were arrested. They were filmed in handcuffs for videos later posted to Noem’s social media accounts.

Joe Botello, who was born in Texas, told Chicago media outlets he was among the men kept in handcuffs until he showed identification. DHS confirmed he was in custody, but disputed the characterization as an arrest.

“No U.S. citizen was arrested, they were briefly held for their and officers’ safety while the operation in the house was underway,” DHS said.

Another man arrested at the same home was ordered released without bond Thursday as his case continues, with Magistrate Judge Keri Holleb Hotaling noting Carlos Augusto Gonzalez-Leon “has a criminal history of nothing.” In court records, federal officials said he was previously arrested and deported to Mexico at least three times between 2013 and 2022.

His lawyer, Daniel J. Hesler, described Gonzalez-Leon as a hard worker who is providing for his family in Mexico and his wife, who is in hospice care.
Criticism over fatal shooting grows

The death of a Mexican man at the hands of ICE agents has drawn questions from the president of Mexico and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker.

Authorities say immigration agents were pursuing a man with a history of reckless driving who had entered the country illegally. They have said Silverio Villegas Gonzalez evaded arrest and dragged an officer with his vehicle. DHS said the officer fired because he feared for his life.

Noem praised the unnamed officer as brave, referring to Gonzalez as “a criminal illegal alien” who resisted arrest.

Many in the suburb of Franklin Park doubt authorities’ claims, remembering him at a vigil as a kind family man.

Gonzalez, who worked as a cook, had dropped off one of his children at day care that morning.

“He took the time to talk to the teachers about anything going on in the classroom. He was easy to get a hold of. He was always very respectful to the staff,” said Mary Meier, director of Small World Learning Center in Franklin Park.

The 38-year-old was from the state of Michoacan in western Mexico, according to the Consulate General of Mexico in Chicago, which said it would “closely monitor” the investigation.

Sophia Tareen And Christine Fernando, The Associated Press

‘Raped, jailed, tortured, left to die’: The hell of being gay in #Turkmenistan.

Two men who escaped one of the world’s most secretive and repressive states have told AFP how they were tortured, beaten and raped in Turkmenistan for the “crime” of being gay.

When the oil- and gas-rich Central Asian republic makes the headlines, it is usually for the eccentricities of its “National Leader” and “Hero Protector” Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov.

The dentist-turned-autocrat who writes poems about his horse -- and whose football team has never lost a game in the local league -- is a health freak. So much so that his son Serdar, the president, plans to “eradicate smoking” there by the end of the year.

But behind the monumental statues and the marble city of Arkadag built in Berdymukhamedov’s honour, opponents and minorities are mercilessly persecuted, say Amnesty and Human Rights Watch, none more so than LGBTQ people, who are often jailed or sent to psychiatric hospitals.

Arslan, who is now in hiding abroad, told AFP how he was raped five times in jail -- where HIV-positive prisoners are condemned to a slow death from lack of treatment -- while David was beaten and raped by his torturers, who wore gloves “to avoid touching my blood”.

Their rare testimonies, supported by official documents and confirmed by NGOs, reveal a hidden side of the reclusive regime, which tolerates no independent media or rights groups.

The authorities refuse to comment on all such allegations. But last year at the UN they insisted that “all discrimination” was illegal in Turkmenistan.

Homosexual relations are a crime, they said, because they run counter to the “traditional values” of the Turkmen people.

Arslan’s story

Arslan -- whose name AFP has been changed to protect him -- grew up in poverty in the second largest city of Turkmenabat, near the Uzbek border. “We had neither bread nor basic clothes,” said the 29-year-old, who comes from the Uzbek minority.

When he moved to the capital Ashgabat at 18, he was taken aback by the pomp of the white marble edifices built by the country’s first post-Soviet president Saparmurat Niyazov and Berdymukhamedov, who took power in 2006.

He also discovered a small gay community and formed a secret relationship with a man. But three years later he was arrested with about 10 other “suspected homosexuals”.

He believes his boyfriend was forced to denounce him.

Arslan was beaten by the police and jailed for two years for sodomy at a closed-door hearing in January 2018. He spent nine months in a penal colony before being pardoned.

Of the 72 men in his barracks, around 40 were there for their sexual orientation. One day, the leader of the barracks, a murderer -- “who was sleeping with lots of the prisoners” -- turned his attention to him, raping him repeatedly after plying him with sedatives.

“It was abominable,” said Arslan, who tried to kill himself by taking “a bunch of pills”. When he told the prison director about the rapes from hospital, “he laughed, saying I was there for that”.

After his release, Arslan got work and tried to rebuild his life, but the stigma was overwhelming. People recognized him and threatened him, “yelling at me in the street”.

He was twice sent to a psychiatric unit after being arrested again in 2021 and 2022. “They wanted to cure me because to them I have a disease.”

He decided to leave the country, but with authorities trying to curb a mass exodus of Turkmens fleeing hardship and repression, he was refused a passport.

Eventually after circumventing tight internet controls, he got help from the NGO EQUAL PostOst, which assists LGBTQ people in the former communist bloc, and was able to buy a passport.

“Everything is settled through corruption” in Turkmenistan, he said. Transparency International has declared the country one of the 15 most corrupt on the planet.

Finally he was finally able to flee to one of the few countries that allow Turkmens to enter without a visa.

Screams go unheard

David Omarov, 29, has been HIV-positive since he was a teenager, with education about the virus and preventive measures almost nonexistent in Turkmenistan.

From a middle-class background in the capital, his life was turned upside down in 2019 when he was summoned by the security services during one of the frequent crackdowns on LGBTQ people. He was held for several days and tortured to give the names of other men.

“They knew I was HIV-positive,” he told AFP.

“So they hit me with gloves and kicked me to avoid touching my blood. But I started bleeding profusely. Maybe that saved me.

“The worst is that no one hears your screams,” he said, adding that he was raped by his torturers but cannot yet bear to tell what they did to him. “Those are wounds that haven’t healed,” he said.

Omarov said Turkmenistan justifies the persecution as a defence of its “traditional values”.

“They’re folk fascists,” he said.

While Turkmenistan is predominantly Muslim, the government is secular, with huge emphasis on the veneration of Turkic folklore and traditions.

Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, 68, and his son, Serdar, 43, are portrayed as guardians of this steppe culture with personality cults akin to those of Stalin or the Kims in North Korea.

They have also put the Turkmen Akhal-Teke horse and the Alabai dog on a pedestal as national symbols, dotting the country with statues of the animals.