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Men in crisp white thobes sit on mats under a leafy thorn tree carefully cutting pieces of white material.

They slowly stitch them together with tender, experienced precision.

Another shroud for another life lost to senseless violence.

More men arrive and they raise their hands in prayer to grieve the recently deceased.

The latest victim of the militias terrorising their community lies in a two room morgue a few metres away.

Fatma was eight months pregnant and travelling on a cart with her young son and daughter to Hajr Hadeed in eastern Chad.

She left her husband in the violence of al Geneina, the state capital of West Darfur in Sudan, where fleeing residents are reporting a citywide massacre.

Fatma’s sister Zeinab says her five-year-old nephew El-Sheikh was holding his pregnant mother’s body when the cart arrived in the village.

She rushed with close relatives to Adre Central Hospital.

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Men stitch together shrouds with tender, experienced precision

They could feel the heaviness of Fatma’s body, but held out hope that the baby in her belly was still alive.

Hospital workers were cleaning the blood from the floor when they arrived at Dr Mahmoud Adam’s office.

He said Fatma was dead when she arrived and was quickly able to ascertain that the baby too had died.

“Since the war in Khartoum started so many wounded civilians are passing through the border from Darfur,” said Dr Mahmoud, whose hospital now has treatment tents operated by the medical aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) in its grounds.

He recalls the 2003 genocide and observes there is little difference between then and now.

“It is so sad that to see people dying and suffering like this,” he said.

Adre hospital
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The floor shows signs of where Fatma’s blood has just been washed away

We walk over to the morgue where Fatma lies covered on a cement slab.

“She was shot in the back of the head,” he said.

Dr Mahmoud believes she died instantly.

Read more on Sudan crisis:
Scale of destruction in before and after images

The fighting explained

Zeinab sits under a tree just outside the morgue building.

Her eyes are wet and wide and every couple of minutes she muffles her sobs with her dark tobe.

Fatma’s small children lie silently across her lap.

More family arrive from their village as the body is prepared for burial.

 Zeinab, Fatma’s sister and Fatma’s children wait outside the morgue at Adre Central Hospital
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The dead woman’s sister, Zeinab, waits outside the morgue with other grieving family members

Zeinab is handed different phones as family from across the region call to extend their condolences.

One call that doesn’t come is from Fatma’s husband Adam in al Geneina where telecommunications have been down for more than a week.

The only information from there is coming from the fleeing residents who have safely made it across the violence-ridden region.

The city ‘is on fire’

They say the city is on fire and that there are too many deaths to count.

Deep in the al Geneina blackout, Adam is still unaware that his wife and unborn child have been killed.

MSF Doctors care of victims of the wounded in Adre Central Hospital
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MSF doctors treat the wounded in the hospital’s grounds

No one can reach him to deliver the news.

Fatma emerges from the morgue wrapped in the white shroud.

She’s lifted onto the back of a military grade Toyota pick-up by the men from her family as wailing rings out from the crowd of women.

Dread and panic

The cries carry more than just loss, but notes of dread and panic.

The fearful anticipation that there is more grief to come.

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Somalia truck bombing kills 15 people and wounds 40 others

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Somalia truck bombing kills 15 people and wounds 40 others

A bombing at a checkpoint in Somalia has killed at least 15 people and wounded 40 others, authorities have said.

Images on social media showed a damaged truck cab on fire and black smoke billowing from the scene in the central city of Beledweyne.

No one has immediately claimed responsibility, including Al Shabaab, which often carries out attacks and controls parts of Somalia.

Police officer Ahmed Aden said the dead included five police officers who fired on the truck in a failed attempt to stop it from ramming into the nearby checkpoint.

Shops nearby were reduced to rubble, with reports of people missing beneath the debris.

It was a truck loaded with explosive devices that forcefully passed through the government-manned checkpoint, and a pick-up vehicle belonging to security personnel was chasing it when it exploded,” said witness Abdikadir Arba, who said he was about 200 metres away and was one of the first responders.

Abdifatah Mohamed Yusuf, director-general of the Hirshabelle Ministry of Humanitarian and Disaster Management, confirmed the deaths.

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“Twenty of the wounded have been admitted to Beledweyne hospitals, while another 20 are in critical condition, prompting a request for their airlift to Mogadishu for advanced medical treatment,” he said.

Read more on Sky News:
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At least 20 killed in hotel attack
Locust swarms risk food crisis

Hirshabelle is a state that includes Beledweyne. It has been the centre of the Somali government’s latest military offensive against extremists from Al Shabaab.

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Al Shabaab has been battling Somalia’s central government for more than a decade, aiming to establish its rule based on strict interpretation of Islamic sharia law.

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Fugitive on run for more than 30 years laughs as he’s finally caught

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Fugitive on run for more than 30 years laughs as he's finally caught

A fugitive convicted of attempted murder who evaded police for more than 30 years has been caught.

Greg Lawson, who had been on the run for 32 years, laughed and asked officers “how are you doing?” as he was handcuffed in Huatulco, Mexico.

Lawson, 63, fled Louisiana, in the US, just before a jury found him guilty of shooting a man called Seth Garlington in 1991 – sparking an FBI manhunt in May that year.

In a video shared by FBI News Orelans on X, formerly known as Twitter, Lawson is seen wearing a short-sleeve shirt and camouflage cap.

With police officers in escort, he patted someone on the shoulder while laughing, before another officer turned to handcuff him.

Douglas Williams Jr, the agent in charge of FBI New Orleans, said the capture would not have been possible without the help of authorities in Mexico.

“We want to thank our partners and the public in this case, who never gave up hope that justice could be served for Mr Lawson’s victim,” he said.

“There is no doubt that Mr Lawson might still be in the wind if our partners in Mexico had not been willing to deal with this so swiftly.”

The FBI said they had always suspected Lawson was hiding out in Mexico, but a “tip” they received earlier this month appeared to confirm their theory.

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He was arrested on Tuesday, 19 September, and was taken into custody back in Louisiana.

According to a local Louisiana news channel, KTBS, Lawson had a “fistfight” with Mr Garlington in a car park at a petrol station.

Court documents, they added, claim Lawson forced Mr Garlington’s vehicle off the motorway, with Lawson then firing shots.

When the jury came back from deliberation to confirm the guilty verdict, Lawson had already run away.

The FBI had offered a $10,000 (£8,200) reward for his capture.

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Sweden: Chunk of motorway collapses in landslide – leaving three in hospital

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Sweden: Chunk of motorway collapses in landslide - leaving three in hospital

Three people have been taken to hospital after a large chunk of a motorway in Sweden collapsed in a landslide early on Saturday morning.

Police said at least four cars and a bus skidded off the E6 motorway – connecting Gothenburg in Sweden to Norway’s capital Oslo – near the small town of Stenungsund.

Several buildings were also damaged, including a Burger King restaurant.

The landslide has affected a total area of around 700 x 200 metres, which is roughly equivalent of 21 football pitches.

“The hardest hit parts of the landslide area measure around 150 x 100 metres,” the Gothenburg Rescue Services added in a statement.

“A number of people have been helped out of vehicles in the slide area with the help of fire personnel and a helicopter.”

The motorway was badly damaged. Pic: Adam Ihse/TT News Agency via AP
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The motorway was badly damaged. Pic: Adam Ihse/TT News Agency via AP

The cause of the landslide is not yet clear. Pic: Adam Ihse/TT News Agency via AP
Image:
The cause of the landslide is not yet clear. Pic: Adam Ihse/TT News Agency via AP

Rescue services say further landslides cannot be ruled out.

Police say nobody is suspected of a crime, but an investigation has been launched into whether a construction site nearby caused the landslide.

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Rescue services were on the scene in the early hours. Pic: Björn Larsson Rosvall/TT News Agency via AP
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Rescue services were on the scene in the early hours. Pic: Björn Larsson Rosvall/TT News Agency via AP

There has also been heavy rainfall in the area over the past few days.

Swedish news agency TT reported several cars and one truck had fallen into cracks caused by the landslide, while rescue services told public broadcaster SVT all people have been helped out.

Specially trained dogs were on the scene to ensure no people had been overlooked among the debris.

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