Month: October 2016

Kim Kardashian has been held at gunpoint in her Paris hotel room, the BBC reports. 

Her husband, rapper Kanye West, abruptly left his set early at the Meadows Festival in New York on Sunday night after learning of the news.

“Kim Kardashian West was held up at gunpoint inside her Paris hotel room this evening, by two armed masked men dressed as police officers,” a spokesperson said.

“She is badly shaken but physically unharmed.”

A Paris police official confirmed that there was a robbery involving Kardashian but she was unharmed, and that an investigation was underway.

The 35-year-old reality TV star is currently in the French city attending Paris Fashion Week, with her mother Kris Jenner and her sister Kendall Jenner.

West told his concert audience that he had to leave early as he had a “family emergency”.

A number of fans caught on video the moment he announced he was cutting the gig short.

In a later statement they added: “Due to a family emergency, Kanye West was forced to end his performance towards the end of his set.

“We appreciate the great show he put on for fans to close the inaugural Meadows Festival.

“Our thoughts are with West and his family.”

 

Photo: Reuters

 

Fifty-two people were killed and many more injured in Ethiopia’s Oromia region during a protest at a religious festival, the government says, the BBC reports.

Some died in a stampede after police employed tear gas, rubber bullets and baton charges, witnesses said.

Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn said rioters had caused “pre-planned mayhem” that led people to fall to their deaths in ravines.

He denied reports that the security forces had opened fire.

In a national address on state TV, he praised their “great efforts” to protect the public and blamed “evil forces” for the deaths, vowing to bring to justice those responsible..

Thousands had gathered for the religious festival in Bishoftu, 40km (25 miles) from the capital Addis Ababa.

Some reports said police responded after anti-government protesters threw stones and bottles, but others said demonstrators were entirely peaceful.

Pope Francis on Sunday called for a “stable peace” as he visited mainly Muslim Azerbaijan, several months after pushing for an end to a festering territorial feud while in arch-foe Armenia, AFP reports.

The pontiff met in private with Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev – who is accused by rights groups of ruthlessly stamping out dissent in the energy-rich country – before addressing a gathering of government officials.

The Pope – on the last leg of a Caucasus tour that also took him to Georgia – reiterated calls for peace to he made three months ago in neighbouring Armenia, with the two country’s locked in a long-simmering conflict over the breakaway region of Nagorny Karabakh.

“There is no alternative to patiently and assiduously searching for shared solutions by means of committed and sustained negotiations,” he said in a carefully worded statement that did not mention the disputed territory explicitly, expressing sympathy “to the many people who suffer the effects of bloody conflicts.”

Calling for “a new phase for stable peace in the region”, the pope invited all players “to grasp every opportunity to reach a satisfactory solution.”

According to a decree signed by President Serzh Sargsyan, Vigen Sargsyan has been relieved of the duties of the Head of Staff of the President’s Office.

According to another presidential decree, Vigen Sargsyan has been appointed as Minister of Defense.

According to a decree signed by President Serzh Sargsyan Edward Nalbandian has been reappointed as Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Armenia.

According to a decree signed by President Serzh Sargsyan Armen Gevorgyan has been relieved of the duties of the Secretary of the National Security Council.

According to another presidential decree, Armen Gevorgyan has been appointed the Head of Staff of the President’s Office.

According to a decree signed by President Serzh Sargsyan, Yuri Khachaturov has been relieved of the duties of the Chief of Staff of RA Armed Forces.

According to another presidential decree, Yuri Khachaturov has been appointed Secretary of the National Security Council.

According to a decree signed by President Serzh Sargsyan, Movses Hakobyan has been relieved of the duties as Deputy Defense Minister, Head of the Logistics Department of the Ministry of Defense.

According to another presidential decree, Movses Hakobyan has been appointed Chief of Staff of RA Armed Forces.

The 2016 Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine goes to Yoshinori Ohsumi of Japan for discoveries about autophagy – how the body breaks down and recycles old cellular components, the BBC reports.

Ohsumi’s work is important because it helps explain what goes wrong in a range of diseases, from cancer to Parkinson’s.

He studied baker’s yeast to find the genes that regulate this “self eating” process.

Last year’s prize was shared by three scientists who developed treatments for malaria and other tropical diseases.

Armen Jigarkhanyan, the renowned actor and director, is marking his 81st birthday anniversary today.

In 1954, he was admitted to Yerevan Institute of Theater and Arts. His debut was in January 1955, in Viktor Gusev’s play “Ivan Rybakov” at the Russian Drama in Yerevan.

Armen Jigarkhanyan’s debut in cinema was in 1960. But it was “Hello, That’s Me!”, a 1966 Armenian drama film directed by Frunze Dovlatyan, that made him famous.

Armen Jigarkhanyan played in about 300 films, thereby becoming one of the Russian actors that have played in the largest number of movies.

In 1996, on the basis of his course, he established Moscow Drama directed by Armen Jigarkhanyan, which ranks high among Moscow’s small theaters.

Armen Jigarkhanyan is in the Guinness Book of Records as the Russian actor that has played the largest number of film roles.