Over 700 migrants feared dead in Mediterranean this week - UN

Refugee agency says survivors from three shipwrecks being taken to Italian ports but hundreds of people still missing

 Migrants fall into the sea from a boat that capsized last week as Italian navy ships attempted a rescue. Photograph: Reuters
Associated Press

More than 700 migrants are feared dead in three Mediterranean Sea shipwrecks off southern Italy in the last few days as they tried to reach Europe in unseaworthy boats, according to the UN refugee agency.

Carlotta Sami, spokeswoman for UNHCR, said on Sunday that an estimated 100 people were missing from a smugglers’ boat that capsized on Wednesday. The Italian navy took horrific pictures of that capsizing as it attempted to rescue survivors.

She said about 550 others were missing from a smuggling boat that capsized on Thursday morning after leaving the western Libyan port of Sabratha a day earlier.

She said refugees said that boat, which was carrying about 670 people, did not have an engine and was being towed by another packed smuggling boat before it capsized. About 25 people from the capsized boat managed to reach the first boat while 79 others were rescued by international patrol boats and 15 bodies were recovered.

In a third shipwreck on Friday, Sami said 135 people were rescued, 45 bodies recovered and an unknown number of people – many more, the migrants say – were missing.

Survivors were being taken to the Italian ports of Taranto and Pozzallo. Sami said the UN agency was trying to gather further information.

Italy’s southern islands are the main destinations for countless numbers of smuggling boats launched from Libya each week packed with people seeking jobs and safety in Europe. Hundreds of migrants drown each year attempting the dangerous Mediterranean Sea crossing.

Lightning strikes injure dozens in France, Germany

Lightning strikes on Saturday injured more than 40 in Europe, including children playing at a popular park in Paris and attendees at a children's soccer game in Germany. 

In Paris' Park Monceau, a surprise spring storm prompted adults and children attending a birthday party to seek shelter under a tree. Eleven people, including eight children, were injured when lightning struck. 

An off-duty fireman rushed to the scene after the strike, and found nine of the 11 prone under the tree, according to Paris fire service spokesman Eric Moulin. Six of the wounded were in serious condition, and four suffered life-threatening injuries. 

"Without his actions, it would have been much worse," Moulin said.

In Western Germany, lightning struck a children's soccer match, seriously injuring three adults. The strikes hit shortly after the game finished at about 2 p.m. and seemed to come out of the blue. 

"There were no clouds in the sky … so that this incident couldn’t have been expected," police spokesman Dominik Lentz told n-tv television. 

Besides the three adults, which included the match's referee, another 32 people including 30 children between the ages of 9 and 11 were taken to the hospital as a precaution, the dpa news agency reported.

Heavy rains delayed by nearly three hours a French Open match that pit Serena Williams against France's Kristina Mladenovic, cutting off power around the grounds. Williams won, advancing to the fourth round. 

Lightning strikes the U.S. about 25 million times a year, according to the U.S. National Weather Service, and kills an average of 49 people a year. So far in 2016, there have been five lightning-related deaths in the U.S. Some of the victims were working outside; others were engaged in recreation, including attending a family picnic.

Contributing: Associated Press

Trump Supports Cutting Social Security From A ‘Moral Standpoint:’ Report

The presumptive GOP presidential nominee has been saying the opposite on the campaign trail.

SPENCER PLATT/GETTY IMAGES

Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential candidate, speaks at a rally in Fresno, California, on Friday.

Donald Trump supposedly told House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) he supports cutting Social Security but will not admit it publicly because it would hurt his election chances,according to a report in Bloomberg BusinessWeek.

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee reportedly made the comments during a May 12 meeting with Ryan aimed at mending ties between the two top Republican leaders, Bloomberg reported, citing an unnamed source who was in the room. (Ryan has yet to endorse Trump.)

“From a moral standpoint, I believe in it,” Trump said of cutting Social Security. “But you also have to get elected. And there’s no way a Republican is going to beat a Democrat when the Republican is saying, ‘We’re going to cut your Social Security’ and the Democrat is saying, ‘We’re going to keep it and give you more.’ ”

Trump’s professed opposition to cutting Social Security and Medicare has been both a hallmark of his campaign and one of his greatest departures from traditional conservative ideology. And Ryan, who repeatedly criticized Trump before the mogul effectively secured the GOP nomination, has made proposing dramatic reductions in the popular social insurance programs a defining feature of his congressional career.

He openly says he will lie to the people about it because he knows that the people are against it.Alex Lawson, Social Security Works

Many conservative House Republicans told The Huffington Post shortly after the May 12 meeting that that they were unconcerned about Trump’s public posture on the programs. Several members interpreted him as wanting to extend the solvency of Social Security and Medicare solvency through some combination of the benefit cuts and other reforms that conservatives favor.

Trump policy advisor Sam Clovis had already appeared to reverse course on May 11, indicating that Trump would be willing to consider cuts as president.

Of course, what Trump reportedly said to Ryan is consistent with what he told Fox News host Sean Hannity back in 2011.

“Things have to be done, but it has to be done with both parties together,” Trump said at the time. “You can’t have the Republicans get too far ahead of this issue.”

Trump may very well be running his campaign according to beliefs he espoused years ago: Social Security and Medicare must be cut, but telling people that should be avoided, because it is too politically unpopular.

“It is really clear: Donald Trump would 100 percent go along with the Republican donor class position of cutting Social Security,” said Alex Lawson, executive director of Social Security Works, a group that promotes benefits expansion. “He openly says he will lie to the people about it because he knows that the people are against it.”

“In his eyes the ‘moral’ thing to do is to steal people’s hard-earned benefits and not talk about it,” Lawson added.

Social Security, the United States’ public retirement, disability and life insurance program, faces a funding gap beginning in 2034. Without congressional action to either raise the program’s revenues or scale back benefits there will be an across-the-board benefit cut of approximately 20 percent.

The Democratic party has adopted steadily more progressive positions on Social Security in recent years, arguing not only that the shortfall should be closed entirely through revenue increases — such as lifting the cap on earnings subject to Social Security taxes — but also that benefits should be expanded to address a growing retirement income deficit.

Both Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton and her rival Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) support increasing benefits and have pledged that they will not cut the program.

Editor’s note: Donald Trump regularly incites political violence and is a serial liar, rampant xenophobe, racist, misogynist and birther who has repeatedly pledged to ban all Muslims — 1.6 billion members of an entire religion — from entering the U.S.