‘A truly evil figure’

IRAQ: The Iraqi Anglican congregation at St. George’s sits next to Baghdad’s Green Zone, where rockets aimed at the U.S. Embassy landed on Sunday, “But with your prayers, we are fine until now,” a church deacon told me. Attendance is down, he said, because authorities have closed three bridges leading to the area since anti-government demonstrations began in September.

KENYA: Fighters with al-Shabaab, the Somalia-based and al-Qaeda-linked terror group, overran a key military base used by U.S. counterterrorism forces near Kenya’s coast before dawn Sunday, killing three U.S. military personnel and destroying several U.S. aircraft and vehicles.

VENEZUELA: The Nicolás Maduro regime swore in its own candidate to lead the democratically elected National Assembly after blocking opposition leaders from attending the vote and allegedly paying off lawmakers to switch sides. The move, dubbed a parliamentary coup, appears to rob opposition leader Juan Guaidó of the presidency of the body, where for a year he has staked a rival claim as head of state and received recognition from the United States and other countries. Guaidó and allied lawmakers met at a local newspaper, where he was again voted in 100-0, and the U.S. State Department said it would continue to recognize him as head of state.

LEBANON: Former Nissan head and fugitive Carlos Ghosn made his movie-worthy escape from Japan with the help of two U.S. security operatives, one an ex–Green Beret and the other a Lebanese-born U.S. citizen who worked in Iraq and Afghanistan.

AUSTRALIA: Similar to conditions in a volcanic eruption or atomic bomb blast, the wildfires in southeastern Australia are burning so hot they create their own thunderstorms and lightning. One Australian expert has been widely reported estimating that half a billion animals have been affected by the wildfires.

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