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Man is charged with flying drones to bring drugs from Mexico

Agencies
August 19, 2017

San Diego, Aug 19: A 25-year-old US citizen has been charged with using a drone to smuggle more than 13 pounds (6.1 kilograms) of methamphetamine from Mexico by drone, an unusually large seizure for what is still a novel technique to bring illegal drugs into the United States, authorities said Friday.

Jorge Edwin Rivera told authorities that he used drones to smuggle drugs five or six times since March, typically delivering them to an accomplice at a nearby gas station in San Diego, according to a statement of probable cause. He said he was to be paid $1,000 for the attempt that ended in his arrest.

The US Drug Enforcement Administration said in a recent annual report that drones are not often used to smuggle drugs from Mexico because they can only carry small loads, though it said they may become more common. In 2015, two people pleaded guilty to dropping 28 pounds (62 kilograms) of heroin from a drone in the border town of Calexico, California. That same year, Border Patrol agents in San Luis, Arizona, spotted a drone dropping bundles with 30 pounds (66 kilograms) of marijuana.

Alana Robinson, acting US attorney for the Southern District of California, said drones haven’t appealed to smugglers because their noise attracts attention and battery life is short. Also, payloads pale compared to other transportation methods, like hidden vehicle compartments, boats or tunnels.

As technology addresses those shortcomings, Robinson expects drones to become more attractive to smugglers. The biggest advantage for them is that the drone operator can stay far from where the drugs are dropped, making it less likely to get caught.

“The Border Patrol is very aware of the potential and are always listening and looking for drones,” Robinson said.

Border Patrol agents in San Diego allegedly encountered Rivera on Aug. 8 about 2,000 yards (1,830 meters) from the Mexico border with the methamphetamine in a lunch box and a 2-foot (0.6-meter) drone hidden in a nearby bush.

Benjamin Davis, Rivera’s attorney, didn’t immediately respond to messages seeking comment on Friday. Rivera is being held without bail and is scheduled to be arraigned Sept. 7.

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News Network
June 25,2020

Ottawa, Jun 25: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took his son out for ice cream on Wednesday in his first family outing since Canada started easing out of its pandemic lockdown.

It was also Saint-Jean-Baptiste Day in Quebec province.

Wearing masks, the Canadian leader and his six-year-old son Hadrien were cheered at Chocolats Favoris in Gatineau, Quebec.

According to a pool report, Trudeau said the shop tapped into a federal emergency wage subsidy and business loan in order to weather the pandemic, and "avoid being frozen out of the frozen treat market."

Hadrien is said to have bounced with excitement, settling on a vanilla cone with a cookie topping while dad bought a vanilla cone dipped in chocolate for himself.

Father and son then headed out to the patio, where they doffed their masks to eat their cones.

Canada's provinces and territories declared states of emergency mid-March, closing schools and non-essential businesses in response to the pandemic.

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Agencies
March 25,2020

Moscow, Mar 25: An earthquake measuring 7.5 on the Richter scale struck off Russia's Kuril Islands on Wednesday, the United States Geological Survey (USGS) said.

The magnitude of the quake, which occurred at 2:49 am (UTC), was registered at a depth of 56.7 kilometres, about 219 kilometres southeast of the Russian town of Severo-Kuril'sk, the USGS said.

There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage to the property as a result of the quake.
Further details are awaited.

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News Network
June 29,2020

Paris, Jun 29: More than half a million people have been killed by the novel coronavirus, nearly two thirds of them in the United States and Europe, according to an news agency tally at 2200 GMT Sunday based on official sources.

The official death count for the disease now stands at 500,390 deaths from 10,099,576 cases recorded worldwide. The United States has suffered the highest death count (125,747), followed by Brazil (57,622) and the United Kingdom (43,550).

The tallies, using data collected by AFP from national authorities and information from the World Health Organization (WHO), probably reflect only a fraction of the actual number of infections.

Many countries are testing only the most serious cases.

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