RENNES, FRANCE (AFP) – An 11-year-old British girl was shot dead and her father seriously wounded when their Dutch neighbour in northwestern France opened fire, according to authorities.

The family was in the garden of their home in the village of Saint-Herbot near Quimper in Brittany on Saturday night when their neighbour appeared with a firearm, according to the initial investigation. At around 10pm, law enforcement officials intervened “following gunfire”, Quimper public prosecutor Carine Halley said in a statement on Sunday.

The 11-year-old was found dead at the scene, while her father had sustained life-threatening injuries, according to the magistrate.

The mother’s life was not deemed to be in danger and a second child was unharmed but “in a state of shock”, prosecutor Halley said. The shooter was identified as a 71-year-old Dutch pensioner.

While police were still trying to determine the motive for the shooting, “it would appear that there had been a dispute between the two neighbours for several years over a plot of land adjoining the two properties”, Halley added. A police source told AFP that the neighbour had fired his rifle through a hedge before retreating to his home with his wife.

Both the neighbour and his wife have surrendered to authorities and been arrested.

The public prosecutor’s office has opened an investigation on charges of voluntary manslaughter of a minor and attempted voluntary manslaughter.

TEHRAN (AFP) – An Iranian policeman was killed on Sunday in a car-ramming attack by a relative of a boy whose family said was killed by security forces during nationwide protests last year, local media reported. A police official said the attacker was shot dead after the killing, which occurred during a commemoration for the boy Kian Pirfalak in Izeh, a city in southwestern Khuzestan province.

Pirfalak was one of seven killed in a shooting in November during demonstrations. “A policeman was killed following an appeal by the opposition to stir up insecurity on Kian Pirfalak’s birthday,” Khuzestan Deputy Police Chief Colonel Hojjat Sefidpoust said, cited by Tasnim news agency.

The report said the attacker, who rammed his car into police, was a cousin of Pirfalak’s mother.

Sefidpoust said the assailant had died of his wounds after being shot “thanks to the intervention of personnel” in the area.

In November, state media attributed the shooting which killed the boy to “terrorists” but his mother blamed security forces. The judiciary announced on April 7 that a man accused of killing Pirfalak and the six others had been sentenced to death.

SANAA, YEMEN (AP) – Clashes between suspected al-Qaeda militants and Yemen’s pro-government forces in the country’s south killed three men on Saturday, a military official and tribal leaders said.

The fighting broke out on Saturday evening when militants thought to be al-Qaeda members attacked the Shabwa Defence Forces near the town of al-Musnaiya in southern Shabwa province with machine guns, two tribal leaders and a military official said.

The three spoke on condition of anonymity. They said the gunbattle in the province lasted for several hours, killing two Shabwa Defence Forces fighters and one militant before the militants finally withdrew.

Yemen’s ruinous civil war began in 2014 when the Iran-backed Houthi rebels seized the capital of Sanaa and much of northern Yemen and forced the government into exile.

Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, also known by its acronym AQAP, is active in several regions of wartorn Yemen, including Shabwa and other far-flung provinces and is considered to be one of the more dangerous branches of the terror network.

A prominent member of al-Qaeda Hamad bin Hamoud al-Tamimi, was killed in February in a suspected United States (US) drone attack. Amid years of chaos and conflict, the militant group has cemented a strong foothold in areas of the country, particularly in the remote east and south of the Arab nation.

The conflict in Yemen has killed over 150,000 people, including over 14,500 civilians, according to the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project, creating one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. There has been a lull in the fighting since a six-month cease-fire agreement was reached in April 2022.

The truce expired in October 2022, however, back-channel negotiations between Saudi and Houthi officials have been ongoing for months.

PHILADELPHIA (AFP) – An overpass on one of the United States’ (US) busiest highways collapsed after a tanker crossing underneath burst into flames, Pennsylvania’s governor said, predicting it will take months to fully restore the “critical artery”.

Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro said at a press briefing surprisingly no one travelling along Interstate 95 above the blaze had been injured, but that authorities were working to “identify any individual or individuals who may have been caught in the fire” below.

With roughly 160,000 vehicles per day passing through that section of highway in northeastern Philadelphia, according to the state’s transportation secretary, the collapse is likely to lead to major traffic delays just as the summer holiday season gets underway.

Interstate 95 (I-95) connects major cities along the US East Coast from Maine to southern Florida.

Shapiro said the northbound side of the road completely collapsed in the fire, while the southbound lanes had been deemed structurally unsound. A “complete rebuild” is expected to take a “number of months”, he said. “This is a major artery for people and goods, and the closure will have significant impacts on the city and region,” US Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg said on Twitter, adding that his office will “be there with support throughout the process of I-95 returning to normal”.

Shapiro said he will sign a disaster declaration to help free up funds for the repairs.

Local media reported that Philadelphia police were looking for the driver of the vehicle associated with the fire, whose whereabouts are unknown.

A spokesman told AFP its Philadelphia field division “is supporting the investigation” and referred additional inquiries to the fire department. The fire department declined to comment.

The White House said US President Joe Biden had been briefed on the situation and been in touch with local authorities to offer assistance.

Television images showed flames and billowing smoke coming from the crumbled section of I-95 in the northeastern city’s Tacony neighbourhood, with parts of the elevated roadway having fallen onto the lanes below.

Shapiro told the press conference he had taken an aerial survey of the damage, describing it as “remarkable devastation”.

The fire started around 6.20am, he said, when traffic is typically light, though videos showed drivers on the highway trying to navigate the unfolding disaster in real time.

Residents told local media outlets they heard several explosions, which Battalion Chief Derek Bowmer of the Philadelphia Fire Department said earlier in the day were coming from underground, caused by runoff from the truck. Authorities said they were rushing to increase capacity on public transit in the area to help commuters, and evaluating different options for longer-term detours around the collapsed section.

That portion of I-95 runs nearby the Delaware River, but local officials said the wreckage did not pose any environmental threats to the water.

“I hope it’s clear to everyone to here that every agency – local, state and federal – are working together to address this,” said Shapiro.

MEXICO CITY (AP) – Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s governing Morena party decided a series of five polls over the summer will decide the party’s nomination for the June 2024 presidential election.

The four Morena contenders will have to resign their government posts by Friday, including Mexico City Mayor Claudia Sheinbaum, who is considered the frontrunner. That is meant to prevent primary candidates from using their posts to gain an unfair advantage. Each can campaign throughout the summer. The party is desperate to avoid splits and accusations of manipulated polls that have marked past primary races in Morena.

The four contenders joined hands and chanted “Unity! Unity! Unity!” after the announcement.

Mexico’s top diplomat Marcelo Ebrard already said he will resign this week. Rounding out the field is Senator Ricardo Monreal and Interior Secretary Adán López, who is no relation to the president.

Two allied parties, the Green and Labor parties, will also field one primary candidate apiece for the coalition’s nomination.

ANNAPOLIS, MARYLAND (AP) – Three people were killed and three wounded in a shooting at a house in Maryland’s capital city, police said.

Annapolis Police Chief Edward Jackson told reporters at a media briefing that the shooting stemmed from what he described as an “interpersonal dispute” and that there was no further threat to the public.

“It’s a very active and fluid investigation. We’re still trying to determine everything that occurred. We’re still piecing it together. We have a lot more work to do,” Jackson said.

He declined to elaborate on the relationship between the people involved, but said those killed ranged in age from their 20s to their 50s.

He said authorities hadn’t established a firm motive for the shooting.

“It wasn’t random,” Jackson said, noting that the victims “died outside” the home.

Numerous police cars were seen in the residential area where the shooting happened south of the city centre and near the waterfront. Jackson said officers responded to the shooting around 8pm.

The police department issued a news release saying that one of the wounded was flown to a trauma centre. The police statement said that a suspect was in custody. The chief later described the person as a “person of interest” and that no charges had been filed.

The chief said authorities have recovered a weapon.

QUITO (AFP) – An elderly Ecuadoran woman who woke up inside a coffin at her own wake is being treated at the same state hospital that declared her dead two days earlier, her son said.

A video posted on Twitter shows Bella Montoya, 76, in her open coffin breathing heavily while two men assist her.

Her son, Gilbert Balberán, said “she was hitting the box” with her left hand after the five- hour wake.

Balberán had to arrange for the donation of a coffin for the impoverished family after the Martin Icaza public hospital, in the coastal town of Babahoyo, declared Montoya dead on Friday.

“They even gave us a death certificate,” he said in a video broadcast by local media.

Ecuadoran media reported the unusual incident, with headlines celebrating the woman’s “resurrection”.

“My mom is on oxygen. Her heart is stable. The doctor pinched her hand and she reacted,” Balberán said in an El Universo newspaper report.

“They tell me that this is good, because it means that she is reacting little by little.”

Montoya was admitted to hospital with a suspected stroke “and went into cardiorespiratory arrest without responding to resuscitation manoeuvres, so the doctor on duty confirmed her death,” Ecuador’s Health Ministry said in a statement.

The ministry said it had established a committee to investigate the incident and that it would supervise Montoya’s care.

Balberán said he had visited his mother in the hospital’s intensive care unit on Sunday.

“Little by little I am grasping what has happened. Now I only pray for my mother’s health to improve. I want her alive and by my side,” he said.