Russian Attack Kills One, Causes Fire in West Ukrainian City of Lviv 

Black smoke billows over the city after drone strikes in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv on September 19, 2023, amid Russia's military invasion on Ukraine. (AFP)
Black smoke billows over the city after drone strikes in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv on September 19, 2023, amid Russia's military invasion on Ukraine. (AFP)
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Russian Attack Kills One, Causes Fire in West Ukrainian City of Lviv 

Black smoke billows over the city after drone strikes in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv on September 19, 2023, amid Russia's military invasion on Ukraine. (AFP)
Black smoke billows over the city after drone strikes in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv on September 19, 2023, amid Russia's military invasion on Ukraine. (AFP)

Russia struck three industrial warehouses in a drone strike on the western Ukrainian city of Lviv early on Tuesday, causing a huge fire and killing at least one person, local officials said.

Lviv governor Maxim Kozitsky said firefighters were tackling the blaze and that a 26-year-old man had been taken to hospital. City mayor Andriy Sadovyi later said the body of a man who worked at one of the warehouses had been found under the rubble.

Emergency services said the fire had spread over an area of 9,450 square meters (11,300 square yards) after an attack at around 5 a.m. (0200 GMT).

"I want to emphasize that these are ordinary industrial warehouses. Nothing military was stored there," Kozitsky said on the Telegram messaging app.

He said Russian forces had launched 18 drones in the attack and that 15 had been shot down, including seven that were directly over the Lviv region.

Ukraine's air force said Russia had launched a total of 30 drones and one Iskander ballistic missile in attacks on Ukraine overnight, and that 27 of the drones had been shot down.

Reuters could not independently verify the report. There was no immediate comment from Moscow, which has carried out frequent air strikes on Ukraine since Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Russia has repeatedly attacked infrastructure critical to Ukraine's defense, energy system and agriculture but many civilians have also been killed. At least seven people were killed in July when a Russian missile slammed into a residential building in Lviv, which is far from front lines.

Moscow has denied deliberately targeting civilians or civilian infrastructure.



Bangladesh Says Student Leaders Held for Their Own Safety

People take part in a song march to protest against the indiscriminate killings and mass arrest in Dhaka on July 26, 2024. (AFP)
People take part in a song march to protest against the indiscriminate killings and mass arrest in Dhaka on July 26, 2024. (AFP)
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Bangladesh Says Student Leaders Held for Their Own Safety

People take part in a song march to protest against the indiscriminate killings and mass arrest in Dhaka on July 26, 2024. (AFP)
People take part in a song march to protest against the indiscriminate killings and mass arrest in Dhaka on July 26, 2024. (AFP)

Bangladesh said three student leaders had been taken into custody for their own safety after the government blamed their protests against civil service job quotas for days of deadly nationwide unrest.

Students Against Discrimination head Nahid Islam and two other senior members of the protest group were Friday forcibly discharged from hospital and taken away by a group of plainclothes detectives.

The street rallies organized by the trio precipitated a police crackdown and days of running clashes between officers and protesters that killed at least 201 people, according to an AFP tally of hospital and police data.

Islam earlier this week told AFP he was being treated at the hospital in the capital Dhaka for injuries sustained during an earlier round of police detention.

Police had initially denied that Islam and his two colleagues were taken into custody before home minister Asaduzzaman Khan confirmed it to reporters late on Friday.

"They themselves were feeling insecure. They think that some people were threatening them," he said.

"That's why we think for their own security they needed to be interrogated to find out who was threatening them. After the interrogation, we will take the next course of action."

Khan did not confirm whether the trio had been formally arrested.

Days of mayhem last week saw the torching of government buildings and police posts in Dhaka, and fierce street fights between protesters and riot police elsewhere in the country.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's government deployed troops, instituted a nationwide internet blackout and imposed a curfew to restore order.

- 'Carried out raids' -

The unrest began when police and pro-government student groups attacked street rallies organized by Students Against Discrimination that had remained largely peaceful before last week.

Islam, 26, the chief coordinator of Students Against Discrimination, told AFP from his hospital bed on Monday that he feared for his life.

He said that two days beforehand, a group of people identifying themselves as police detectives blindfolded and handcuffed him and took him to an unknown location to be tortured before he was released the next morning.

His colleague Asif Mahmud, also taken into custody at the hospital on Friday, told AFP earlier that he had also been detained by police and beaten at the height of last week's unrest.

Police have arrested at least 4,500 people since the unrest began.

"We've carried out raids in the capital and we will continue the raids until the perpetrators are arrested," Dhaka Metropolitan Police joint commissioner Biplob Kumar Sarker told AFP.

"We're not arresting general students, only those who vandalized government properties and set them on fire."