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Motorway Closed In Germany Near Austrian Border As Bomb Making Items Found

German police closed a motorway at the Austrian border overnight after stopping a car carrying suspected bomb-making materials.

During a routine check at the Kiefersfelden border crossing, police found “explosive-like” materials in a Polish-registered car. The discovery triggered a major security operation. The police detained the Polish driver and his three African passengers, from Ivory Coast and Guinea.

The A93 motorway was later reopened.

Three pipes were found in the car which police suspect were intended for pipe bombs. They also found a large amount of gunpowder in the car, as well as connecting wires and several mobile phones.

The Polish driver’s intentions remain a mystery. He is suspected of trafficking the Africans into Germany illegally. German police have stepped up checks on vehicles entering from Austria since last year’s unexpected influx of 1.1 million migrants and refugees.

The security forces raised the alert level after a number of gun, bomb and machete attacks in Germany during the summer, including a mass shooting in Munich.

Saudi Arabia Concerned Over 9/11 Relatives Seeking Damages

Saudi Arabia’s foreign ministry has said it is a matter of “great concern” that 9/11 relatives in the US may be able to sue the kingdom for damages.

On Wednesday the US Congress voted for a law allowing families of nearly 3,000 people killed in the attacks to sue. In doing so they overrode a veto by President Barack Obama, who said it would set a “dangerous precedent”.

Fifteen of the 19 hijackers that day were Saudi nationals, but the kingdom has denied any role in the attacks.

In a statement, the country’s foreign ministry said: “The erosion of sovereign immunity will have a negative impact on all nations, including the United States.”

Their argument parallels the one made by Mr Obama. He said on CNN after the vote that the law set a “dangerous precedent” and could lead to the US being opened to “a situation where we’re suddenly exposed to liabilities for all the work that we’re doing all around the world and suddenly finding ourselves subject to private lawsuits”.

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Philippine President Angers Jewish Leaders With Holocaust Remarks

Jewish leaders have reacted angrily after Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte compared his anti-drug campaign to the Holocaust.

The comment – wrongly citing numbers killed by the Nazis – was inhumane and deeply offensive, they said.

Mr Duterte said he would kill as many addicts as Hitler did Jews in his crackdown on users and dealers. “Hitler massacred three million Jews… there’s three million drug addicts. I’d be happy to slaughter them,” he said.

“What President Duterte said is not only profoundly inhumane, but it demonstrates an appalling disrespect for human life that is truly heart-breaking for the democratically elected leader of a great country,” said World Jewish Congress president Ronald S. Lauder as he demanded an apology.

US-based Jewish group the Anti-Defamation League said the comments were “inappropriate and deeply offensive”, with communications director Todd Gutnick saying it was “baffling why any leader would want to model himself after such a monster”.

Rabbi Abraham Cooper, of the US-based Simon Wiesenthal Center, said Mr Duterte owed “[Holocaust] victims an apology for his disgusting rhetoric”.

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Police Continue To Question Man On Double Murder

Police are continuing to question a man on suspicion of murdering a couple who were found stabbed on a Cardiff street near to where they worked.

Matalan workers Zoe Morgan, 21, and Lee Simmons, 33, were found dead close to the store on Queen Street at about 05:50 BST on Wednesday.

A man from Castleton, Newport, who is known to the couple, is in custody. He was arrested within an hour of their bodies being found and officers are not looking for anyone else.

Former University of South Wales fashion student Miss Morgan, of Llandaff North, worked as a visual merchandiser at the store, while Mr Simmons, of Grangetown, was a sales assistant. The pair had been in a relationship since July.

In a tribute, the university described Miss Morgan as a “popular and well-liked student” and said support had been offered to students and colleagues who knew her. Floral tributes dedicated to the couple were also left outside the Matalan store, which is due to reopen on Thursday.

The discovery of Miss Morgan and Mr Simmons’s bodies closed part of the city centre street for several hours on Wednesday. Some shops were also closed for much of the morning until police investigations were concluded and the street reopened at about 12:50.

Research Suggests Police Body Cameras Cut Complaints

Police body cameras can dramatically reduce the number of complaints against officers, research suggests.

The Cambridge University study showed complaints by members of the public against officers fell by 93% over 12 months compared with the year before. Almost 2,000 officers across four UK forces and two US police departments were monitored for the project.

Dr Barak Ariel, who led the research, said no other policing measure had led to such “radical” changes. The study aimed to find out if the use of cameras, which are usually clipped to the top half of an officer’s uniform, affected complaints against police made by the public. The experiment involved police from Northern Ireland, the West Midlands, West Yorkshire, and Cambridgeshire, as well as the Rialto and Ventura police departments in California, working for a total of almost 1.5 million hours.

The findings, published in the journal Criminal Justice and Behaviour, showed there were 113 complaints made against officers during the year trial period, compared with 1,539 in the 12 months before – a reduction of 93%.

Dr Ariel, who is based at the Cambridge Institute of Criminology, said: “I cannot think of any [other] single intervention in the history of policing that dramatically changed the way that officers behave, the way that suspects behave, and the way they interact with each other.” He said the results indicated both police and the public were adjusting their behaviour. “Once [the public] are aware they are being recorded, once they know that everything they do is caught on tape, they will undoubtedly change their behaviour because they don’t want to get into trouble. “Individual officers become more accountable, and modify their behaviour accordingly, while the more disingenuous complaints from the public fall by the wayside once footage is likely to reveal them as frivolous.”

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