The Jim Bakker Show

Gunman kills three at Maryland company, suspected in Delaware shooting

By Ian Simpson

(Reuters) – An employee of a Maryland kitchen countertop company fatally shot three co-workers and critically wounded two others on Wednesday and is suspected in a later shooting in nearby Delaware, authorities said.

A manhunt was on for the suspected gunman, Radee Prince, 37, who entered Advanced Granite Solutions in Edgewood, Maryland, just before 9 a.m. and fired multiple shots from a handgun, Harford County Sheriff Jeffrey Gahler told reporters.

Three people died at the company’s premises in a business park northeast of Baltimore. Two people were taken to a hospital, one of whom had come out of surgery, he said.

Gahler called the shooting a “targeted attack.” Asked about the gunman’s possible motive, he said: “We believe he’s tied into a relationship here at work.”

Prince had worked for Advanced Granite Solutions for the past four months and had been scheduled to work on Wednesday, the sheriff said. The suspect fled in a black GMC Acadia with Delaware license plates after the shooting.

Police in Wilmington, Delaware, about 30 miles northeast of Edgewood, said in a statement that Prince was also being sought in connection with a shooting there about two hours later.

The statement did not give details about the incident and a police spokesman could not be reached for comment.

(Reporting by Ian Simpson in Washington; Editing by Chris Reese and Peter Cooney)

Las Vegas hotel guard says he heard drilling, then hail of bullets

FILE PHOTO: A candlelight vigil is pictured on the Las Vegas strip following a mass shooting at the Route 91 Harvest Country Music Festival in Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S., October 2, 2017. Picture taken October 2, 2017. REUTERS/Chris Wattie/File Photo

By Ian Simpson

(Reuters) – A hotel security guard wounded by the Las Vegas gunman who killed 58 people told a U.S. television talk show on Wednesday that he heard drilling before the shooter began spraying a hallway with hundreds of rapid-fire rounds.

Mandalay Bay security guard Jesus Campos, the first person to confront gunman Stephen Paddock, gave “The Ellen DeGeneres Show” his first public account of how he responded to the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history.

Contradictory statements from police and the hotel about what time Campos arrived at Paddock’s room have raised questions about the police response. Campos himself came under increased scrutiny last week after he skipped out on scheduled television interviews.

The guard told DeGeneres he had been called to check on an open stairwell door near Paddock’s suite on the 32nd floor. He found it was blocked by a metal bracket, and he called hotel security to send up a building engineer.

“At that time I heard what I assumed was drilling sounds and I believed that they were in the area working somehow,” said Campos, who was joined for the interview by the engineer, Stephen Schuck.

Campos said he took cover when Paddock began shooting from behind the door.

“I felt a burning sensation. I went to go lift my pant leg up and I saw the blood. That’s when I called it in on my radio that shots have been fired,” he said.

After he was hit, Campos said, he used his cellphone to call the hotel’s security desk in order to keep the emergency radio frequencies clear.

When Schuck arrived on the 32nd floor, Campos “leaned out and he said, ‘Take cover! Take cover!’ and yelled at me,” Schuck said. “Within milliseconds, if he didn’t say that, I would have got hit.”

Police have said that Paddock, a 64-year-old avid gambler, fatally shot himself before they entered the room. He wounded almost 550 people when he opened fire on an outdoor concert from his window, according to authorities, and strafed the hotel hallway with about 200 bullets.

Las Vegas police on Friday presented a third version of the timeline for the shooting that showed they responded immediately to the gunfire, and that Paddock shot Campos at about the same time he opened fire on concertgoers.

(Reporting by Ian Simpson in Washington; editing by Daniel Wallis and G Crosse)

Boston man found guilty in Islamic State beheading plot

By Scott Malone

BOSTON (Reuters) – A Boston-area man was found guilty on Wednesday of conspiracy to commit acts of international terrorism and supporting Islamic State for a 2015 plot to attack police and behead a conservative blogger who organized a “Draw Mohammed” contest.

David Wright, 28, was found guilty of five criminal charges for planning with his uncle and a friend to behead blogger Pamela Geller. The plot fell apart after Wright’s uncle said he wanted to kill law enforcement officers instead and was shot dead by police.

During a 3-1/2-week trial, federal prosecutors presented evidence that Wright, who lived in the Boston suburb of Everett, had read and viewed copious amounts of online propaganda from the militant group and vowed to join its cause. They also showed evidence suggesting he had been in touch with members of the Islamic State in Syria.

Wright, his uncle Usamaah Abdullah Rahim and friend Nicholas Rovinski had focused their attention on Pamela Geller, the blogger who organized the “Draw Mohammed” contest in Garland, Texas, which she described as an exercise of free speech, though many Muslims consider cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed offensive.

Two gunman attacked that contest and were shot dead, leading Wright and his counterparts to hatch a plan to behead Geller in New York.

(Reporting by Scott Malone; Editing by Andrew Hay)

Canada’s oil sands survive, but can’t thrive in a $50 oil world

FILE PHOTO - Giant dump trucks dump raw tar sands for processing at the Suncor tar sands mining operations near Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada on September 17, 2014. REUTERS/Todd Korol/File Photo

By Nia Williams

CALGARY, Alberta (Reuters) – Canada’s oil sands producers are stuck in a rut.

The nation’s oil firms are retrenching, with large producers planning little or no further expansion and some smaller projects struggling even to cover their operating costs.

As the era of large new projects comes to a close, many mid-sized producers – those with fewer assets and producing less than 100,000 barrels of oil a day in the oil sands – have shelved expansion plans, unable to earn back the high start-up costs with crude at around $50 per barrel. Larger Canadian producers, meanwhile, focus on projects that in the past were associated with smaller names.

The last three years have seen dozens of new projects mothballed and expansions put on hold, meaning millions of barrels of crude from the world’s third-largest reserves may never be extracted.

Where industry groups in 2014 expected Canada’s oil sands output to more than double to nearly 5 million barrels per day (bpd) by 2030, that forecast has been knocked down to 3.7 million bpd.

This follows a spell of consolidation that has seen foreign majors sell off more than $23 billion in Canadian assets in a year and turn to U.S. shale patches such as the Permian basin in Texas, which produce returns more quickly and where proximity to refiners means the barrels fetch a better price.

“We cannot compete with that huge sucking noise to the south that is called the Permian. Investment dollars are spiraling away down there,” Derek Evans, chief executive of small oil sands producer Pengrowth Energy <PGF.TO> told Reuters in an interview.

Permian production rose 21 percent in 12 months through July compared to a 9 percent increase in Alberta’s oil sands, according to Canadian and U.S. government data.

COSTLY STARTUP PHASE

Mid-sized producers are hurting the most, due to start-up costs that far exceed those in other major producing areas. Oil sands producers have slashed operating costs by a third since 2014, but building a new thermal project – in which steam is pumped as deep as one kilometer (1094 yards)underground to liquefy tar-like bitumen and bring it to the surface – requires U.S. crude benchmark at around $60 a barrel to break even, analysts estimate.

The North American benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude <CLc1> has traded between $42 and $55 a barrel so far this year. The U.S. Energy Information Administration forecasts it will average $49.69 a barrel in 2017 and $50.57 a barrel next year.

There are around half a dozen thermal projects in the costly start-up phase, when engineers steadily increase steam pressure to bring a reservoir’s production up to full capacity.

One of those is Athabasca Oil Corp’s <ATH.TO> Hangingstone project. It was originally conceived as a 80,000 bpd project, but instead will bring output to only 12,000 bpd from the current 9,000 bpd. The project can break even with U.S. crude prices of at least $53 a barrel, meaning right now Athabasca keeps losing money on Hangingstone production. Size is crucial in the oil sands; the more bitumen a company can squeeze out of a plant, the lower fixed costs per barrel will be.

“(Athabasca) was a company built when oil was $100 a barrel. In those days we were going to find funding for joint ventures and build greenfield projects to a massive size. The reality is the world changed,” chief executive Rob Broen told Reuters.

Quarterly filings show why smaller players are struggling. Transportation and marketing costs at Hangingstone, along with the cost of natural gas used to produce steam to extract oil, and other operating costs are much higher compared with Cenovus Energy’s <CVE.TO> Christina Lake project, one of the highest-quality and biggest bitumen reservoirs in the oil sands.

Pengrowth’s development plans are on hold as well, Evans said, because the company needs U.S. crude to stay at $55 for a sustained period to justify investment in its 14,000 bpd Lindbergh thermal project, at one point intended to grow as large as 40,000 bpd.

THE BIG GO SMALL

Large producers have pulled back in response to lower global prices as well. For example, Suncor Energy’s <SU.TO> 194,000 bpd Fort Hills mine, due to start producing oil by the end of this year, is the company’s last megaproject.

Canadian Natural <CNQ.TO> restarted construction on its 40,000 bpd Kirby North project last November, one of a handful of smaller projects to start producing in 2019.

Other companies like MEG Energy <MEG.TO> are planning expansions at existing sites in 20,000 bpd “modules” rather than starting large new projects from scratch. But even such more modest investments are out of reach for smaller companies like Athabasca and Pengrowth.

“It’s very hard (for a small company) to drag itself out of the financing black hole it would have to get in to build a project to start with,” said Nick Lupick, an analyst at AltaCorp Capital. “A large company can take that on their balance sheet without having to leverage too highly.”

(Reporting by Nia Williams; Editing by David Gaffen and Tomasz Janowski)

U.S., Russia set for likely U.N. row over Syria toxic gas inquiry

FILE PHOTO: A United Nations (U.N.) chemical weapons expert, wearing a gas mask, holds a plastic bag containing samples from one of the sites of an alleged chemical weapons attack in the Ain Tarma neighbourhood of Damascus, Syria August 29, 2013. REUTERS/Mohamed Abdullah/File Photo

By Michelle Nichols

UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – The United States said on Wednesday it would push the United Nations Security Council to renew within days an international inquiry into who is to blame for chemical weapons attacks in Syria, setting the stage for a likely showdown with Russia.

Russia has questioned the work and future of the joint inquiry by the U.N. and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), and said it would decide whether to support extending the mandate after investigators submit their next report.

The inquiry, known as the Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM), is due to report by Oct. 26 on who was responsible for an April 4 attack on the opposition-held town of Khan Sheikhoun that killed dozens of people.

“We would like to see it renewed prior to the report coming out,” U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley told reporters.

“The Russians have made it very clear that should the report blame the Syrians suddenly they won’t have faith in the JIM. If the report doesn’t blame the Syrians then they say that they will. We can’t work like that,” Haley said.

A separate OPCW fact-finding mission determined in June that the banned nerve agent sarin had been used in the Khan Sheikhoun attack, which prompted the United States to launch missiles on a Syrian air base.

Haley said she would circulate a draft resolution to the 15-member Security Council later on Wednesday to renew the mandate for the JIM, which is due to expire in mid-November. It was unanimously created by the council in 2015 and renewed in 2016.

A resolution must get nine votes in favor and not be vetoed by any of the council’s five permanent members – Russia, China, the United States, Britain and France – in order to pass.

The JIM has found that Syrian government forces were responsible for three chlorine gas attacks in 2014 and 2015 and that Islamic State militants used mustard gas.

Syria agreed to destroy its chemical weapons in 2013 under a deal brokered by Russia and the United States. The Syrian government has repeatedly denied using chemical weapons during a civil war that has lasted more than six years.

Mikhail Ulyanov, director of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s non-proliferation and arms control department, said on Friday there were “serious problems” with the work of the inquiry.

“In order to judge if it deserves an extension of the mandate, we need to see the report … and assess it,” Ulyanov told a briefing at the United Nations to present Moscow’s view on the “Syrian chemical dossier.”

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Editing by Paul Simao)

U.S. says holds Myanmar military leaders accountable in Rohingya crisis

A Rohingya refugee woman who crossed the border from Myanmar a day before, carries her daughter and searches for help as they wait to receive permission from the Bangladeshi army to continue their way to the refugee camps, in Palang Khali, Bangladesh October 17, 2017. REUTERS/Jorge Silva

By David Brunnstrom and Jonathan Landay

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Wednesday the United States held Myanmar’s military leadership responsible for its harsh crackdown on the Rohingya Muslim minority.

Tillerson, however, stopped short of saying whether the United States would take any action against Myanmar’s military leaders over an offensive that has driven more than 500,000 Rohingya Muslims out of the country.

Washington has worked hard to establish close ties with Myanmar’s civilian-led government led by Nobel laureate and former dissident Aung San Suu Kyi in the face of competition from strategic rival China.

“The world can’t just stand idly by and be witness to the atrocities that are being reported in the area,” Tillerson told Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank.

“We really hold the military leadership accountable for what’s happening,” said Tillerson, who said the United States was “extraordinarily concerned” by the situation.

Rohingya Muslims have fled Myanmar in large numbers since late August when Rohingya insurgent attacks sparked a ferocious military response, with the fleeing people accusing security forces of arson, killings and rape.

Tillerson said Washington understood Myanmar had a militancy problem, but the military had to be disciplined and restrained in the way it dealt with this and to allow access to the region “so that we can get a full accounting of the circumstances.”

“Someone, if these reports are true, is going to be held to account for that,” Tillerson said. “And it’s up to the military leadership of Burma to decide, ‘What direction do they want to play in the future of Burma?'”

Tillerson said Washington saw Myanmar, which is also known as Burma, as “an important emerging democracy,” but the Rohingya crisis was a test for the power-sharing government.

He said the United States would remain engaged, including ultimately at the United Nations “with the direction this takes.”

The European Union and the United States have been considering targeted sanctions against Myanmar’s military leadership.

Punitive measures aimed specifically at top generals are among a range of options that have been discussed, but they are wary of action that could hurt the wider economy or destabilize already tense ties between Suu Kyi and the army.

Tillerson also said he would visit New Delhi next week as the Trump administration sought to dramatically deepen cooperation with India in response to China’s challenges to “international law and norms” in Asia.

Tillerson said the administration had began a “quiet conversation” with some emerging East Asian democracies about creating alternatives to Chinese infrastructure financing.

(Reporting by David Brunnstrom and Jonathan Landay; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Alistair Bell)

Somalis defy police to protest against massive truck bombings

Protesters chant slogans while demonstrating against last weekend's explosion in KM4 street in the Hodan district in Mogadishu, Somalia October 18, 2017. REUTERS/Feisal Omar

By Abdi Sheikh

MOGADISHU (Reuters) – Thousands of Somalis demonstrated on Wednesday against those behind bombings that killed more than 300 people at the weekend, defying police who opened fire to keep them away from where their loved-ones perished.

The twin blasts at busy junctions in the heart of Mogadishu on Saturday injured another more than 400 in what were the country’s deadliest truck bombings.

Police initially opened fire to prevent people from accessing the rubble-strewn scene of the attack, injuring at least two people, the emergency response service said.

But eventually they had to let thousands of the demonstrators gather there after they were overwhelmed by the numbers. Residents said they had never seen such a big protest in the city.

“We are demonstrating against the terrorists that massacred our people. We entered the road by force,” said Halima Abdullahi, a mother who lost six of her relatives in the attacks.

The Islamist militant group al Shabaab, which began an insurgency in 2007, has not claimed responsibility, but the method and type of attack – a large truck bomb – is increasingly used by the al Qaeda-linked organization.

Mohamed Ali, a police captain at the scene, said it was fine for the demonstrators to access the scene to express their grief.

“For some who could not see their relatives alive or dead, the only chance they have is to at least see the spot where their beloved were killed,” he told Reuters.

The government buried at least 160 of those who were killed because they could not be identified after the blast.

Masked security officers kept an eye on the protest on foot and on motorbikes. Some of the protesters sat on police trucks waving sticks and chanting: “We do not want al Shabaab”.

The militants were driven out of Mogadishu in 2011 and have been steadily losing territory.

But they retain the capacity to mount large bomb attacks. Over the past three years, the number of civilians killed by insurgent bombings has steadily climbed as al Shabaab increases the size of its bombs.

In the central town of Dusamareb, residents also marched for several hours to protest against the bombings in Mogadishu and clerics called for the war against the militants to be stepped up.

Abdikadir Abdirahman, the director of Aamin Ambulances, said one pregnant demonstrator was evacuated from the Mogadishu protest after she developed complications.

“The other two were also demonstrating. They were injured by bullets which the police fired to disperse the demonstrators who wanted to enter the blast scene by force,” he said.

(Writing by Duncan Miriri; Editing by Alison Williams)

Turkey says will not submit to ‘impositions’ from United States in visa crisis

U.S. Consulate is pictured in Istanbul, Turkey, October 11, 2017. REUTERS/Murad Sezer

ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkey will not submit to “impositions” from the United States over an on-going visa crisis and will reject any conditions it cannot meet, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Wednesday.

A delegation from the United States is visiting Turkey in an attempt to repair diplomatic ties between the NATO allies after both countries stopped issuing visas to each other’s citizens this month.

Washington first suspended visa services at its missions in Turkey, after Turkish authorities detained two Turkish nationals employed as U.S. consular staff. The U.S. delegation has asked Ankara for information and evidence regarding the detained staff, private broadcaster Haberturk reported.

“We will cooperate if their demands meet the rules of our constitution but we will not succumb to impositions and we will reject any conditions that we cannot meet,” Cavusoglu told a news conference, when asked about the report of requests from the U.S. delegation.

A translator at the consulate in the southern province of Adana was arrested in May and a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) worker was detained in Istanbul two weeks ago. Both were detained on suspicion of links to last year’s failed coup, allegations the United States has rejected.

Haberturk said the U.S. delegation, which arrived in Turkey this week, laid out four conditions to solve the visa crisis, including that Turkey must provide information about its investigations into the detained workers, and evidence related to DEA worker Metin Topuz.

President Tayyip Erdogan’s spokesman said last week Topuz had been in contact with a leading suspect in last year’s failed military coup. Turkish media reported similar accusations against the translator in May.

The U.S. delegation told Ankara that if the contacts which Turkish authorities are seeking to investigate were undertaken on the instructions of the consulate, the employees should not have been arrested, Haberturk said.

(Reporting by Tulay Karadeniz; Writing by Ece Toksabay; Editing by Dominic Evans)

Philippine president declares Marawi liberated as battle goes on

FILE PHOTO: Government soldiers stand guard in front of damaged building and houses in Sultan Omar Dianalan boulevard at Mapandi district in Marawi city, southern Philippines September 13, 2017. REUTERS/Romeo Ranoco

By Neil Jerome Morales and Manolo Serapio Jr

MANILA (Reuters) – Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte declared the southern city of Marawi liberated from pro-Islamic State militants on Tuesday, although the military said 20-30 rebels were holding about 20 hostages and still fighting it out.

In a rousing address to soldiers a day after the killing of two commanders of the rebel alliance, Duterte said he would never again allow militants to stockpile so many weapons, but Marawi was now free and it was time to heal wounds and rebuild.

“I hereby declare Marawi City liberated from terrorist influence, that marks the beginning of rehabilitation,” Duterte, wearing a camouflage cap and dark sunglasses, said during his unannounced visit.

Isnilon Hapilon, who was wanted by the United States and was Islamic State’s Southeast Asian “emir”, and Omarkhayam Maute, one of two brothers central to the alliance, were killed in a targeted operation on Monday. Their bodies were recovered and identified, authorities said.

The 148-day occupation marked the Roman Catholic-majority Philippines’ biggest security crisis in years and triggered concerns that with its mountains, jungles and porous borders, the island of Mindanao could become a magnet for Islamic State fighters driven out of Iraq and Syria.

More than 1,000 people, mostly rebels, were killed in the battle and the heart of the city of 200,000 has been leveled by air strikes.

Duterte said the liberation was not a cause for celebration and later apologized to the people of Marawi for the destruction.

“We had to do it,” he said. “There was no alternative.”

Armed forces chief Eduardo Ano said the remaining gunmen were now a “law enforcement matter”, while military spokesman Restituto Padilla described them as “stragglers”.

“There is no way that they can get out anymore, there is no way for anyone to get in,” Padilla told news channel ANC.

NOT A FIGHTER, NOT A PROBLEM

Padilla said the military believed Malaysian operative Mahmud Ahmad was in Marawi, but it could not be certain. He said Mahmud was no threat.

“Dr. Mahmud is an academic, he’s not a fighter,” Padilla said. “We don’t feel he is a problem.”

But some security experts say otherwise and believe Mahmud, 39, a recruiter and fundraiser who trained at an al Qaeda camp in Afghanistan, could replace Hapilon as Islamic State’s point-man in Southeast Asia.

Another leader, Abdullah Maute, has yet to be accounted for. Intelligence indicated he died in an August air strike, though no body was found.

Defence officials say the core leadership was key to recruiting young fighters and arranging for extremists from Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and beyond to join the push to carve out an East Asian “Wilaya”, or Islamic State province.

Hapilon had teamed up with the moneyed Maute clan in their stronghold of Lanao del Sur, one of the Philippines’ poorest provinces, and brought with him fighters from his radical faction of Abu Sayyaf, a group better known for banditry.

Defence Secretary Delfin Lorenzana, who estimated Marawi operations to have cost 5 billion pesos ($97.5 million), said reconstruction could start in January.

“There are still stragglers and the structures are still unsafe because of unexploded ordnance and improvised explosive devices,” he said on radio.

The Marawi occupation set alarm bells ringing in the Philippines, with militants surprising security forces with their combat prowess, the volume of arms and ammunition they stockpiled and their ability to withstand intensive air strikes aided by U.S. surveillance drones and technical support.

($1 = 51 pesos)

(Additional reporting by Manuel Mogato; Writing by Martin Petty; Editing by Nick Macfie)

Ford to recall about 1.3 million vehicles in North America

(Reuters) – Ford Motor Co said on Wednesday it would recall about 1.3 million vehicles in North America, including certain 2015-17 Ford F-150 and 2017 Ford Super Duty trucks, to add water shields to side door latches. (http://ford.to/2ySvCBJ)

The No.2 U.S. automaker said the safety recall is due to frozen door latch or a bent or kinked actuation cable in the affected vehicles, that may result in a door not opening or closing.

The company said it was not aware of any accidents or injuries associated with the issue but said because of the fault the door may appear closed, increasing the risk of the door opening while driving.

The cost of the recall was estimated to be $267 million and would be reflected in its fourth quarter results, the company said. (http://bit.ly/2yT3EWu)

Ford said it continues to expect full-year adjusted earnings in the range of $1.65 to $1.85‍ per share.

(Reporting by Ankit Ajmera in Bengaluru; Editing by Anil D’Silva and Arun Koyyur)

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