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Honduran President Xiomara Castro said the riot was “planned by maras with the knowledge and acquiescence of security authorities.”

41 women shot, stabbed, burned to death in Honduras prison riot
Relatives of inmates wait in distress outside the entrance to the women's prison in Tamara, on the outskirts of Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Tuesday, June 20, 2023

A grisly riot at a women’s prison in Honduras Tuesday left at least 41 women dead, most burned to death, in violence the country’s president blamed on “mara” street gangs that often wield broad power inside penitentiaries.


Twenty-six of the victims were burned to death and the remainder shot or stabbed at the prison in Tamara, about 30 miles (50 kilometers) northwest of the Honduran capital of Tegucigalpa, said Yuri Mora, the spokesperson for Honduras’ national police investigation agency. At least seven inmates were being treated at a Tegucigalpa hospital.


“The forensic teams that are removing bodies confirm they have counted 41,” said Mora.


Video clips shown by the government from inside the prison showed several pistols and a heap of machetes and other bladed weapons that were found after the riot.


Honduran President Xiomara Castro said the riot was “planned by maras with the knowledge and acquiescence of security authorities.”


“I am going to take drastic measures!” Castro wrote in her social media accounts.


Prisoners belonging to the feared Barrio 18 gang reportedly burst into a cell block and shot other inmates or set them afire.


Relatives awaiting news about inmates gathered outside the morgue in Tegucigalpa. They confirmed that inmates in the prison had told them they lived in fear of the Barrio 18 gang.


Johanna Paola Soriano Euceda was waiting for news about her mother Maribel Euceda, and sister, Karla Soriano. Both were on trial for drug trafficking, but were held in the same area as convicted prisoners.


Soriano Euceda said they had told her on Sunday that “they (Barrio 18 members) were out of control, they were fighting with them all the time. That was the last time we talked.”


Another group of dozens of anxious, angry relatives gathered outside the prison, located in a rural area about 20 miles (30 kilometers) from the capital.


“We are here dying of anguish, of pain ... we don’t have any information,” said Salom³n Garc­a, whose daughter is an inmate at the facility.


Azucena Martinez, whose daughter was also being held at the prison, said “there are a lot of dead, 41 already. We don’t know if our relatives are also in there, dead.”


Julissa Villanueva, head of the country’s prison system, suggested the riot started because of recent attempts by authorities to crack down on illicit activity inside prisons and called Tuesday’s violence a reaction to moves “we are taking against organized crime.”


“We will not back down,” Villanueva said in a televised address after the riot.


Gangs wield broad control inside the country’s prisons, where inmates often set their own rules and sell prohibited goods.


They were also apparently able to smuggle in guns and other weapons, a recurring problem in Honduran prisons.


“The issue is to prevent people from smuggling in drugs, grenades and firearms,” said Honduran human rights expert Joaquin Mejia. “Today’s events show that they have not been able to do that.”


The riot appears to be the worst tragedy at a female detention center in Central America since 2017, when girls at a shelter for troubled youths in Guatemala set fire to mattresses to protest rapes and other mistreatment at the badly overcrowded institution. The ensuing smoke and fire killed 41 girls.


The worst prison disaster in a century also occurred in Honduras, in 2012 at the Comayagua penitentiary, where 361 inmates died in a fire possibly caused by a match, cigarette or some other open flame.


Tuesday’s riot may increase the pressure on Honduras to emulate the drastic zero-tolerance, no-privileges prisons set in up in neighboring El Salvador by President Nayib Bukele. While El Salvador’s crackdown on gangs has given rise to rights violations, it has also proved immensely popular in a country long terrorized by street gangs.

Modi has harnessed yoga as a cultural soft power to stretch his nation's diplomatic reach and flex his country's rising place in the world.

Yoga diplomacy: PM Modi will bend leaders into shape on International Yoga Day
FILE - Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi performs yoga to mark International Day of Yoga in Dehradun, India, Thursday, June 21, 2018.

NEW DELHI: India's prime minister has a reputation for casting himself as an ascetic.


So when Narendra Modi leads foreign dignitaries and bureaucrats in a session for International Yoga Day on Wednesday at the United Nations' Secretariat in New York, millions of Indians will take note.


Yoga, an ancient discipline first practiced by Hindu sages, is now one of India's most successful cultural exports after Bollywood. And it's become a piece of India's diplomacy


Surinder Goel, a 61-year-old yoga instructor in the capital, New Delhi, practices daily.


He says the activity is "India's contribution to the world." "Our prime minister has done a great job in spreading yoga to the world," Goel said. "Today, even the Muslim countries learn and follow it, only because of the PM."


Goel says yoga should be a daily practice worldwide, no matter how busy a person is. "He (Modi) is the busiest man, despite that he practices daily. When our PM can do Yoga daily, why can't the common person do it? We should make Yoga compulsory in schools. The whole world should do Yoga 365 days," he says.


Nine years ago, the Hindu nationalist leader successfully lobbied the UN to designate June 21 as International Yoga Day. Since then, Modi has harnessed yoga as a cultural soft power to stretch his nation's diplomatic reach and flex his country's rising place in the world.


Modi has promoted yoga so much that even foreign diplomats have been seen stretching themselves in gardens and their embassy offices.


Government bureaucrats and officers have taken to social media to show themselves folding in different poses and sometimes tiredly grabbing their backs after mass outdoor yoga sessions. The Indian military has done downward dog with trained K-9 units, boat pose atop an aircraft carrier and mountain pose in the high-altitude Himalayas in bone-chilling temperatures.


Modi has also been living la vida yoga, flexing his own hardcore devotion to the practice.


In 2018 he posted a two-minute video on Twitter that showed him doing a range of yoga poses in a garden, including stretching and leaning backwards on a rock in a spread-armed savasana that birthed many memes.


In 2019, after the final day of national polling, he retreated to a Himalayan mountain cave to meditate and seek isolation — with a camera crew that relayed live visuals to the entire nation. A year later, Modi went the extra mile, tweeting videos showing an animated version of him doing yoga poses.


Now, Modi is guiding leaders from around the world in the practice of yoga to promote its benefits as part of his three-day visit to the US.


With over 1.42 billion people, which recently surpassed China as the most populous, India has become fragmented largely along religious lines. Despite its religious roots, Modi has used yoga to try and boost his image in the diverse nation.


Modi's ministers, following their leader in practising yoga, have sometimes marked it with religious connotations by doing sun salutations and chanting Sanskrit verses considered holy in Hinduism.


Government employees and students have been asked to practice the same, and some state administrations ruled by Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party have sought to make it mandatory in schools.


This has angered some of the prime minister's critics. In particular, some Muslims — India's largest minority, which has faced rising violence under Modi by Hindu nationalists — say they should not be forced to perform sun salutations or chant Hindu hymns.


Government ministers tried to address these concerns by guaranteeing that sun salutations would be optional, though some dissenters are not assured.


Srivalli Cherla has noticed yoga becoming more politicized in recent years.


The 30-year-old yoga instructor based in India's remote Ladakh region originally took to yoga for physical exercise in 2017. After months of consistent practice, she noticed subtle changes in her body and mental health and realized yoga was helping her release the anger she was holding on to.


"Whenever I am having a bad day, I come back home and roll out my yoga mat. It's a form of mental discipline too; you learn not to give in to certain thoughts, so it challenges you mentally," she says.


Cherla said she had signed up for a program to receive a yoga instructor certification recognized by the Indian government's Ayush Ministry, which promotes Ayurveda traditional medicine. But she quit just 10 days into training.


"The teacher passed a comment that essentially called it a Hindu — and not secular — practice, which left a bad taste in my mouth. I've never seen it as religious. It's part of India's culture, but this comment made me realize what they were teaching didn't align with my own beliefs or experience of yoga," she says.


In New Delhi, yogi Goel agrees that yoga is for everyone, regardless of religion. "We should not connect Yoga with religion or politics. Yoga is meant to benefit the common people, not ministers," Goel says.


And he believes yoga has the power to do more than just diplomacy. "Yoga can change the person, the country and the world," he says.

Mr Balaj was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate in an alleged cash-for-jobs scam last week.

 Arrested Tamil Nadu Minister To Undergo Open-Heart Surgery On June 21
The surgery will be performed early on Wednesday. (file)

Chennai: Arrested Tamil Nadu Minister V Senthil Balaji will undergo an open-heart surgery at a private hospital here on June 21, Health Minister Ma Subramanian said on Tuesday, a week after the beleaguered DMK leader was advised a bypass surgery.


The surgery will be performed early on Wednesday, Mr Subramanian told reporters here.


"Since the surgery has to be mandatorily performed on Senthil Balaji, it will be done tomorrow," he said.


"We are in touch with hospital administration...they are going to do open-heart surgery early morning tomorrow," Mr Subramanian added.


Mr Balaj was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate in an alleged cash-for-jobs scam last week. He was initially admitted to a government hospital after he complained of chest pain but was shifted to the private facility following a court order.


The government hospital had on June 14 said Mr Balaji had then undergone Coronary Angiogram which had revealed "triple vessel disease" and advised Coronary Artery Bypass Graft (CABG) surgery at the 'earliest.' On Tuesday, Mr Subramanian said his colleague was not aware of the "critical blocks" before they were diagnosed last week by the government doctors.


His family doctor as well medical experts from the ESI Hospital, referred to by the ED, endorsed it and said the surgery was required, he added.


"Now the doctors (at Kauvery Hospital) are ready for the surgery," he said.


Earlier, certain medicines that Mr Balaji was prescribed had to be stopped and only "5-6 days" from then could the surgery be done, the health minister said.

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