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Carer who 'couldn't go on' not guilty of mother's murder

Stefania Glowka denied murder but pleaded guilty to manslaughter based on diminished responsibility.

Famous dog 'is served up in Chinese restaurant after being abducted from farm'

A social media famous dog was allegedly served up as dish in a Chinese restaurant after being kidnapped from a farm and and slaughtered.

Florida developer George Pino has complete meltdown during trial over boat crash that killed teenage girl

George Pino, 54, a well-known real estate broker, is facing manslaughter and a felony vessel homicide charge for his involvement in the 2022 Biscayne boat crash.

Flamingos’ killing at Islamabad’s Rawal Lake raises alarm

ISLAMABAD: A flock of flamingos resting at Rawal Lake was hunted down by poachers with the help of locals, raising concerns among environmentalists. “We also have evidence that poachers also killed other medium-sized water birds such as the magnificent coots and moorhens,” said an official of the Islamabad Wildlife Management Board (IWMB). Most of the IWMB staff was engaged with seasonal firefighting efforts in the Margalla Hills National Park, the official said, adding that “poachers took advantage of our absence to hunt the birds. About 12 to 13 flamingos were allegedly killed but we are still ascertaining the correct numbers”. A report of the incident has been submitted with the assistant commissioner Islamabad. Incident being investigated; report submitted with assistant commissioner “The police are cooperating with the board and a first information report (FIR) will be registered after further investigations are complete,” the IWMB said. According to the management board, the incident occurred on June 3, and was reported by a bird photographer. The IWMB said sighting of flamingos in Rawal Lake was rare in this season, calling their killing an ecological tragedy. “It was after many years that flamingos had been sighted in Rawal Lake. But the excitement was cut short when poachers along with locals hunted the flock, and forced the surviving birds to escape,” the official said. After inquiries, the IWMB suspected the contractor who has commercial fishing rights for Rawal Lake. According to a social media post about the incident shared with Dawn, the birds, circled around the lake but whenever they tried to land they were followed and shots were fired at them. The surviving birds took flight again and did not return. The Islamabad Wildlife Management Board said it had collected enough evidence, including discharged cartridge, to register a complaint with the police. “The assistant commissioner had visited our office recently and extended complete support of the law,” the IWMB official said. Despite strict laws and patrolling by IWMB staff meant to protect migratory birds, enforcement around the urban wetlands remains challenging. The IWMB said it was surprised to see migratory birds in Rawal Lake in summers and believed they were vagrant birds, adding that flamingos frequented the Salt Range but were rarely seen in Rawal Lake. “But now that they had graced our city, this act may have a devastating effect and they might never return,” the board official said. Expressing serious concern over reports of the alleged killing of flamingos, Ministry of Climate Change and Environmental Coordination spokesperson Mohammad Saleem Shaikh said the Islamabad Wildlife Management Board had taken immediate notice of the incident and initiated an inquiry. He said an IWMB team had already visited the site, collected preliminary evidence and launched an assessment to ascertain the veracity of the reports and identify those involved in the alleged killing of the birds. “The IWMB is treating the matter with utmost seriousness. Evidence gathered from the site is being evaluated and further investigations are underway to establish the facts surrounding the incident, including reports that the birds may have been slaughtered and their meat consumed,” Mr Shaikh said. He added that if the allegations were substantiated, strict legal action would be taken under the applicable wildlife protection laws and all those found responsible would be brought to justice. Saleem Shaikh said the relevant local police authorities had also been informed and were extending support to trace the perpetrators. “The ministry and IWMB remain committed to the protection and conservation of wildlife, and any violation of wildlife laws will be dealt with in accordance with the law,” he added. He said flamingos were an important part of Pakistan’s wetland ecosystems and migratory bird populations, and their protection was essential for maintaining ecological balance and biodiversity conservation. Published in Dawn, June 9th, 2026

Florida woman mauled to death by two dogs despite neighbors reporting owner to police multiple times

Linda Cutler is due to appear in court on manslaughter charges over the death of Jodi Cowan

Keti Jovanovska was accused of starving her autistic son Joshua, 18, to death by 'feeding him only bread and soft drink'. Now she speaks out amid bombshell legal result: 'We went through hell'

Keti 'Kathy' Jovanovska was charged with domestic violence-related manslaughter almost four years ago after her 18-year-old son Joshua Djuric was found dead inside the family home in Sydney.

‘You escape the slaughter. But there’s a long tail of sadness’: musician Bedouine on the strangeness of Arab life outside the Middle East

With roots in Armenia, Syria and Saudi Arabia, the singer-songwriter now lives in the US. But despite her Carole King-style sound, her homelands are never far from her mind The title song to Azniv Korkejian’s fourth album as Bedouine, Neon Summer Skin, recreates a perfect day from childhood. “Being taken to the pool, where my only worry is being dragged away when the sun’s setting,” she says, calling from Los Angeles. “Later on, mom and dad wash me in the tub and put me to bed.” Steeped in dreamy 70s soft pop, the track isn’t merely an exercise in nostalgia. “I wanted to paint a picture of what it’s like to feel safe,” she says. “So much of the record is about not having the luxury to not consider your own safety. I think about this a lot when it comes to the children in Palestine and Lebanon, who are not afforded that right.” The conflicts that have ravaged the Middle East are context for Neon Summer Skin, but the album’s themes of displacement, identity and insecurity – wrapped in the deceptively soft sound of 1970s-style MOR pop – are also personal. Korkejian’s family are Armenian, but she and her parents were born in Syria, while her brothers were born in Saudi Arabia, where the Korkejians lived, “on a US compound that was like a gated community”, until 1995. That year, unnerved by the proximity of the recent Gulf war, the family successfully applied for the green card lottery and relocated to the US. “And thank God, because we would eventually have had to return to Syria,” Korkejian says. “I don’t know what would have happened to us then.” Continue reading...

Why is laughter child's brain superpower?

My Memory Is Full of Ghosts review – deeply moving visual hymn for the bombed-out Syrian city of Homs

Anas Zawahri’s documentary lays heart-wrenching testimony over languorous shots of bullet-ridden ruins and deserted streets The western Syrian city of Homs is only a husk of its former self. Previously a major industrial centre, the region became a key battleground between 2011 and 2014, for Bashar al-Assad’s army and rebel forces. Amid the immense bloodshed, hundreds of thousands of civilians were either displaced or trapped inside their own homes. Filmed in the summer of 2023, this deeply moving documentary from Palestinian-born and Syria-based film-maker Anas Zawahri maps out the collective trauma and sorrow that continue to linger, even after the shooting has stopped. Unfolding in languorous, largely static shots of bombed rubble, hollowed-out buildings, and deserted streets, the film lays bare the startling extent of wartime brutality. A sense of stillness and stagnancy hangs in the air, and almost every wall is riddled with bullet holes, urban scars that mirror the psychological wounds borne by the survivors. Their heart-wrenching testimony is laid over these images of destruction, lending a human dimension to the ruins. One resident ruminates over how Homs changed from a city of laughter to one of agony and grief. With bitter irony, another considers himself lucky to be blind, and thus does not have to suffer the mental shock of seeing his beloved home town razed. Continue reading...

Scientists reveal surprising brain benefit of laughter: ‘It’s a mental workout’

Spontaneous, joyful play is an antidote to stress, boosting endorphins and dopamine, expert says.

Scientists reveal surprising brain benefit of laughter: 'It's a mental workout'

New research suggests laughter is a vital catalyst for child development, enhancing brain growth, emotional well-being and social bonding in kids.

Schipluiden opens world’s first farm growing meat from cells without animal slaughter

A dairy farm in Schipluiden has opened the world’s first cultivated meat farm on Friday, a pilot facility where meat is grown from animal cells in bioreactors without slaughter, the province of Zui

Family of killer California mom who slaughtered husband and 6-day-old reveals chilling final hours before bloodbath

A California family’s joyful gathering just hours after welcoming a newborn turned into a horrifying murder-suicide, after authorities say a mother fatally shot her husband and two young children before taking her own life in North Hills. Marine Basmajian, 30, killed her husband Khajag Basmajia, 31, and their two children, 2-year-old Alec and six-day-old baby...

Three British men admit killing restaurant owner in Canada after 'unpaid bill' row

Canadian police confirmed Robert Evans Jr pled guilty to the manslaughter of Sharif Rahman while his father and uncle admitted being accessories to the crime.

Is Islamic banking Islamic?

“THOSE who gorge themselves on usury behave but as he might behave whom Satan has confounded with his touch; for they say, ‘Buying and selling is but a kind of usury’ — the while God has made buying and selling lawful and usury unlawful. … If, however, [the debtor] is in straitened circumstances, [grant him] a delay until a time of ease… .” — Surah Al-Baqarah, translation by Muhammad Asad. Islamic banking started in Pakistan in 1979 and by 1985, commercial banks had stopped using the word ‘interest’ and used ‘mark-up’ instead. But with time it was apparent this kind of ‘Islamic’ banking wasn’t really Islamic and was just a name change from ‘interest’ to ‘mark-up’. Pakistan’s modern Islamic banking began in 2002 when the first new fully Islamic bank started working. Since then Islamic banking has rapidly grown and now there are many Islamic banks. Islamic banks have turned out to be more profitable and there is considerable demand among Pakistanis to conduct their banking as prescribed by Islam. Islamic banks now have Sharia boards that rule whether any banking facility is Sharia-compatible and the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) also has a Sharia advisory committee. We have also progressed from merely banking and now the government issues sukuks (long-term bonds backed by assets), we have Islamic leasing, called Ijara, and Islamic insurance, called Takaful. We should examine how close to Quranic edicts is Islamic banking. Next year as we celebrate the silver jubilee of the Islamic banking industry, we should examine how close to Quranic edicts is Islamic banking and whether it has grown closer to Islamic ideals. A company can borrow from a secular commercial bank running finance for its working capital needs and long-term finance for its project financing needs. From the Islamic bank it will get Musharakah financing or Murabaha and Istisna financing. For an example of Istisna financing assume a company wants a loan for buying cotton. The bank will buy cotton for Rs10 million and sell it to the company for Rs11m with payment due in one year, or for Rs10.5m for payment due in six months. The bank doesn’t actually buy the cotton or sell it to the company. There is, however, paperwork to pretend this has taken place. The profit the bank makes depends entirely on the policy rate set by the SBP. When the policy rate is high, the bank’s profit is also equally high. In Musharakah financing, the profit an Islamic bank charges the company also depends on the SBP’s policy rate. Typically, if the interest rate charged by commercial banks is two per cent above the SBP’s policy rate, the profit rate required by Islamic banks is also the same. If during the tenor of the loan the policy rate is increased by the SBP, the profit rate is increased by Islamic banks by a similar amount. Just as commercial banks get their interest from the client whether the company is incurring a profit or a loss, Islamic banks also have no downside when a client loses money. Except for default or restructuring, no Islamic bank has ever made a loss because its borrower was losing money. This then seems distinct from trade-based, risk-assuming lending that Islam envisions. For instance, a priori people would think that under Islamic banking’s Istisna financing if a company borrows money for buying 1,000 bales of cotton, it should return the money for a 1,000 bales of cotton, no matter what the new price of cotton is. If the value of cotton has increased, the bank will make a profit and if it has decreased, it will lose. But it will not get a fixed interest-based ‘profit’ no matter what happens to cotton prices. Similarly, under Musharakah financing people would think that if the company is making profits, Islamic banks should also make a profit but not if it’s losing money. Otherwise, it is just like secular banks with Arabic names for loans. With the current practice of Pakistani Islamic banks, the benefits of having trade-based Islamic banking are lost and banks don’t have an incentive to seek and give loans to companies that have great ideas and products. If the profit is fixed at exactly the rate of interest, like it is in commercial banks, then we lose the barkat of Islamic banking. Up until last year, the SBP required banks to give a minimum interest to depositors. But Islamic banks objected that giving fixed profits to depositors would violate Islamic principles. However, the same Islamic banks are quite happy to charge their customers fixed profits based on the SBP’s policy rate. This dichotomy meant that customers of Islamic banks were getting less profits on their deposits than those given by commercial banks even as Islamic banks made more profits than others. Islamic banks were increasing people’s cost for being good Muslims. Even today, Islamic banks give lower profits to their depositors. This goes against the Islamic admonition of exploitation. When a borrower is late in paying loans or interest/ profit, both Islamic and commercial banks charge you penal interest (which is against the ayat I quoted above) but whereas commercial banks keep this profit, Islamic banks give up that profit as charity. One has to say that the difference between Islamic and commercial banks is more in nomenclature and less in substance. Bankers and economists know this but don’t say it in the hope that Islamic banks will eventually inch closer to true Islamic banking. However, it is unfortunate that even after decades this migration is non-existent. Perhaps it’s because ‘Islamic’ banks are more profitable and don’t want to exit a comfortable business model. Islamic bankers give the example of eating beef to justify Islamic banks. They say if you eat non-zabiha beef it is wrong but the same beef is halal if slaughtered properly. The example is powerful but not applicable as Islam has not prohibited eating beef, it has just prescribed a way of slaughtering cattle. The prohibition of interest is more like the prohibition of drinking wine. It doesn’t matter whether it is consumed out of a teacup or a wineglass; the prohibition stays. Similarly, while trade is allowed in Islam, interest is prohibited even if you give it Arabic names. We must endeavour to bring Islamic banking closer to the tenets of Islam — variable profits and risk sharing. The writer is a former finance minister. Published in Dawn, June 6th, 2026

‘Dutton Ranch’ Episode 5: Rip Agrees to Run Beulah’s Ranch, [SPOILER] Gets Shot to Death by the Cops and Rob-Will Returns to Cause Mayhem

SPOILER ALERT: This post contains spoilers from the fifth episode of “Dutton Ranch,” “Peaceful Find Peace,” which is now streaming on Paramount+. After last week’s dreary, cattle-slaughterin’ episode, it’s nice to have a soft reboot of the show, as Rip (Cole Hauser) offers to get the 10 Petal Ranch into shape for Beulah (Annette Bening). It’s […]

Four doctors indicted over death of journo Purgatori

Charged with manslaughter in July 2023 death of acclaimed writer

Paddleboard firm owner who caused four deaths has bid to cut sentence refused

Nerys Lloyd was sentenced to 10 years and six months for gross negligence manslaughter in April 2025.

Cattle supply crunch pushes Kerala’s meat trade into crisis

A sharp rise in blocking and seizure of cattle trucks in neighbouring States, especially Andhra Pradesh, has severely affected the supply of cattle for slaughter, pushing Kerala’s private meat industry into a difficult situation

Communist China Murders History on 37th Anniversary of Tiananmen Massacre

The Chinese Communist government continued its effort to erase the Tiananmen Square massacre from history on the 37th anniversary of that grim slaughter, ordering families of the dead to stay away from graves of their loved ones and cracking down on any attempt to remember the fallen. The post Communist China Murders History on 37th Anniversary of Tiananmen Massacre appeared first on Breitbart.