LOS ANGELES — Universal says it will release two new Halloween films, including one with the ominous title Halloween Ends. 
 
The studio said Friday that the first of the films, Halloween Kills, will be released in 2020 and the second film will come in 2021.  
  
A teaser video includes the voice of Jamie Lee Curtis, who starred in the original 1978 film and last year’s blockbuster sequel, Halloween. The video states the saga of Curtis’ character, Laurie Strode, and villain Michael Myers “isn’t over.” 
 
Universal says Halloween Kills will be released on Oct. 16, 2020, and Halloween Ends will arrive Oct. 15, 2021. 
 
Last year’s film set records and earned $253.5 million worldwide. 
 
Curtis is also serving as a producer on the films, which are being overseen by Blumhouse Productions. 

An Indian court has sentenced a man to 10 years in prison for the drugging and death of a 15-year-old British girl whose body was found on a beach in the resort city of Goa in 2008.

Mumbai High Court Justices R D Dhanuka and Prithviraj Chavan handed Samson D’Souza the sentence for culpable homicide Friday days after overturning his acquittal last year in the attack on Scarlett Keeling. But the court upheld the trial court’s acquittal of another suspect in her death.

Vikram Varma, a lawyer representing Keeling’s mother, Fiona MacKeown, said he was happy with the court’s decision.

It has taken a lot of time, but justice has been done, he said.

The teenager’s death caused outrage among the millions of tourists who throng Goa’s beaches.

A Florida sheriff has launched an investigation into Jeffrey Epstein’s time spent out of jail after the financier’s conviction on prostitution-related charges.

Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw said in a statement Friday the investigation will focus on whether deputies monitoring Epstein violated any rules while he was out on work release. Under a 2008 plea deal, Epstein was allowed to spend most days at his office rather than in the county jail.

Epstein served a 13-month sentence, registered as a sex offender and paid restitution to dozens of victims who were teenagers at the time of his encounters with them.

The 66-year-old Epstein is also on trial in New York on federal sex trafficking charges that could result in a 45-year prison sentence. He had previously escaped federal charges.

Facebook says it plans to appeal German authorities’ decision to fine it 2 million euros ($2.3 million) under a law designed to combat hate speech.

The Federal Office for Justice said July 2 Facebook failed to meet transparency requirements for handling hate speech complaints, and contended the company’s report for the first half of 2018 didn’t reflect the actual number of complaints about suspected illegal content. Facebook disputes that and says the legislation lacks clarity.
 

A Facebook statement Friday stressed its desire to comply fully with the German law and said the fine notice provided “some helpful new guidance.” It said it would appeal the decision “to get the clarity we need” but intends to drop the appeal and make necessary changes once it resolves the issue with German authorities.

Rain-swollen rivers in Bangladesh broke through at least four embankments, submerging dozens of villages and doubling the number of people fleeing their homes overnight to 400,000 in one of the worst floods in recent years, officials said Friday.

Heavy rains and overflowing rivers have swamped 23 districts in northern and northwestern Bangladesh, officials said.

At least 30 people have been killed since the floods began last week.

“The government has opened more than 1,000 temporary shelters but due to deep waters and lack of communications, many people aren’t able to reach them,” Raihana Islam, an official in the flood-afflicted district of Bogra, told Reuters.

Islam said scores of people had instead camped on embankments, railway lines and highways, where traffic has come to a standstill.

Aside from concern over crops, authorities are also worried that rising flood waters could take a toll on livestock.

Flooding severe

South Asia receives monsoon rains between June and October that often lead to floods later in the season, but the intensity of the deluge in Bangladesh is uncommon.

“The severity of the flood of this year is worse compared to recent years,” Ariful Islam, an executive engineer of Bangladesh Water Development Board, said.

The floods worsened after three embankments on the Brahmaputra river, which flows down from the Himalayas, through northeastern India and into Bangladesh, gave way late Thursday, said Mohammad Moniruzzaman, an official in the federal agriculture ministry.

“The onrush of water submerged a vast area along with several dozen villages,” he told Reuters.

Millions displaced in India

In the neighboring Indian state of Assam, floods on the Brahmaputra and its tributaries since last week displaced some 5.8 million people, but the situation has improved with waters receding, a state minister said.

“While some people have started going back to their homes, about 70% continue to remain in makeshift relief camps,” Assam Water Resources Minister Keshab Mahanta said.

Water levels were also coming down in the northern Indian state of Bihar, where floods have killed at least 78 people.

“We are now taking measures to prevent outbreak of any disease,” Manish Kumar, the emergency officer at Bihar’s worst flood-hit district of Sitamarhi, told Reuters.

Two people died in Sri Lanka and five were missing because of heavy rain that forced hundreds to flee their homes across the island nation, the state-run Disaster Management Center said.

The central districts of Nuwara Eliya and Ratnapura were the worst affected.

Japan’s foreign minister Friday summoned South Korea’s ambassador and accused Seoul of violating international law by refusing to join in an arbitration panel to settle a dispute over World War II forced labor.

South Korea had until midnight Thursday to respond to Japan’s request for a three-nation panel.  The neighboring countries are quarreling over South Korean court decisions ordering Japanese companies to compensate victims of forced labor during Japan’s 1910-1945 colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.

Foreign Minister Taro Kono said after summoning Ambassador Nam Gwan-pyo that Japan will “take necessary measures” against South Korea if interests of Japanese companies are harmed, without giving details.

Their talks were held in an icy atmosphere, briefly turning confrontational.

“It is extremely problematic that South Korea is one-sidedly leaving alone the situation that violates the international law, which is the foundation of our bilateral relationship,” Kono told Nam. “The action being taken by the South Korean government is something that completely overturns the order of the international community since the end of the World War II.”

Japan: compensation settled

Kono urged Seoul to immediately take action to stop the court process, under which the plaintiffs of the lawsuit are preparing to seize assets of the Japanese companies, including Mitsubishi Heavy Industry.

Nam defended his government and mentioned Seoul’s proposal of creating a joint fund as a way to settle the dispute. Kono raised his voice, saying Tokyo had already rejected the idea. He also criticized the ambassador for being “rude” to suggest it again. 

Japan says all compensation issues had been settled under the 1965 bilateral agreement and that the South Korean government’s lack of intervention to stop the court process is a breach of the international treaty. 

Tokyo is considering taking the issue to the International Court of Justice, although some officials say South Korea is expected to refuse going to court. Tokyo may seek damages from South Korea in case assets of Japanese companies are seized, Japanese media have reported.

At the same time, Seoul is protesting Japan’s tightened controls on sensitive high-tech exports to South Korea that could affect South Korean manufacturers as well as global supplies of smartphones and displays.

The trade dispute adds to their already strained relations.

Self-immolation

In Seoul, a 78-year-old South Korean man died hours after setting himself ablaze near the Japanese Embassy on Friday, police said.

Police said the man had phoned an acquaintance earlier to say he planned to self-immolate to express his antipathy toward Japan. Kim’s family told investigators that his father-in-law had been conscripted as a forced laborer during the Japanese occupation. 

Seoul has accused Tokyo of weaponizing trade to retaliate against South Korean court rulings calling for Japanese companies to compensate aging South Korean plaintiffs for forced labor during World War II, and plans to file a complaint with the World Trade Organization.

Tokyo said the issue has nothing to do with historical dispute between the countries and says privileged licensing for the materials affected by the export controls can be sent only to trustworthy trading partners. Without presenting specific examples, it has questioned Seoul’s credibility in controlling the exports of arms and items that can be used for civilian and military purposes.

South Korea has proposed an inquiry by the U.N. Security Council or another international body on the export controls of both countries.

About 60 percent of the world’s coral reefs are under stress from rising temperatures, according to the nonprofit group Reef Resilience Network. And new research shows just how devastating two heat waves were to coral in the Indian Ocean. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.

The second set of summer Democratic presidential debates will feature a rematch with a twist, plus the first showdown of leading progressives as the party wrestles with its philosophical identity and looks ahead to a 2020 fight against President Donald Trump.

Former Vice President Joe Biden and California Sen. Kamala Harris will take center stage in Detroit on July 31, barely a month after Harris used the first debates to propel herself into the top tier with an aggressive takedown of the 76-year-old Biden’s long record on race.

CNN, which is broadcasting the debates, assigned candidates randomly with a drawing Thursday night, with 20 candidates spread evenly over two nights, July 30-31.

This time, Harris, the lone black woman in the field, will be joined by another top black candidate, New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, who also has been an outspoken critic of Biden. Booker had denounced Biden for his recollections of the “civility” of working in a Senate that included white supremacists and for his leadership on a 1994 crime bill that the New Jersey senator assailed as a mass incarceration agent in the black community.

Meanwhile, Sens. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts lead the July 30 lineup, allowing the two progressive icons to compete directly for the affections of the party’s left flank. They will be joined by several more moderate candidates who are likely to question the senators’ sweeping proposals for single-payer health insurance and tuition-free college, among other plans.

Biden vs. Harris has quickly become the defining candidate-on-candidate juxtaposition in the early months of the contest. 

Although of different sexes, races and generations, the two rivals share the same broad path to the nomination, particularly the broad coalition of white and black voters necessary to win the Southern primaries that dominate the early months of the nominating calendar. 

Harris’ June attacks on Biden’s 1970s opposition to federal busing orders as a way to desegregate public schools was a way for her to stand out to liberal whites and to try to cut into Biden’s strength in the black community, where he is lauded as the loyal vice president to Barack Obama, the nation’s first black president.

To be clear, Biden aides say Harris’ broadsides sparked a new aggressiveness and determination for the former vice president, and he’s gone on a policy offensive in recent weeks, most notably on health care. 

A proponent of adding a public option to the Affordable Care Act insurance exchanges, Biden almost certainly will try to pin down Harris on her support for Sanders’ “Medicare for All” proposal. Harris, though, has stopped short of Sanders’ explicit call for abolishing private insurance, and she insists that the plan can be paid for without any tax hikes on the middle class. 

Biden and Harris will be joined on the stage July 31 by Booker; New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio; Colorado Gov. Michael Bennet; former Obama Cabinet member Julian Castro; New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand; Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard; Washington Gov. Jay Inslee; and entrepreneur Andrew Yang.

Flanking Sanders and Warren on the stage July 30 will be Montana Gov. Steve Bullock; Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Indiana; former Maryland Rep. John Delaney; former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper; Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar; former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke; Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan; and author Marianne Williamson.

Delaney and Hickenlooper have been among the most outspoken moderates warning Democrats against a leftward lurch. Klobuchar, Bullock and Buttigieg also position themselves as more centrist than Warren and Sanders. 

A generational split also will be on display: Buttigieg, 37, and O’Rourke, 46, each have called for the party to pass the torch, while Sanders, at 77, is more than twice the young mayor’s age. Warren, meanwhile, recently turned 70.

It will be the first debate opportunity for Bullock, who takes the spot that California Rep. Eric Swalwell had in June before dropping out in recent weeks. Another late entry to the race, billionaire activist Tom Steyer, did not meet the polling or fundraising thresholds required for the July debate.

For several of the longshot candidates, the July debates are critical. The Democratic National Committee is doubling the polling and fundraising requirements to make the stage in the next round of debates, scheduled for September in Houston and October in a city yet to be announced. 

As of now, it’s likely those higher standards would mean many of the 20 candidates on stage in Detroit won’t have a place in Houston. 

President Donald Trump plans to nominate lawyer Eugene Scalia to be his new labor secretary. If confirmed, Scalia will replace Alexander Acosta, who resigned last week amid criticism of his handling of a 2008 secret plea deal with financier Jeffrey Epstein, who was indicted this month on charges of sexually abusing underage girls.

Born: October 25, 1963. He is one of late-Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s nine children.

Education: University of Chicago Law School, where he was editor-in-chief of the Law Review.

Professional experience: Served as a special assistant to then and now current Attorney General William Barr.

Served as chief legal officer for Department of Labor during the George W. Bush administration.

In 2006, he helped Walmart win a lawsuit against a Maryland law that would have required companies with more than 10,000 workers to spend at least 8% of their payroll costs on health care.

U.S. lawmakers have sent a clear signal to Cambodian leaders that they have to reverse course on limiting democracy or face consequences.

“The passage of the Cambodia Democracy Act is an important step toward holding Prime Minister Hun Sen and his cronies accountable for continuing to trample on the rights of the Cambodian people,” said Congressman Steve Chabot, a Republican from Ohio.

Republican Congressman Ted Yoho of Florida introduced the bill in January after Cambodian authorities

The United States sanctioned two Iraqi militia leaders and two former Iraqi provincial governors it accused of human rights abuses and corruption, the U.S. Treasury Department said Thursday.

The sanctions targeted militia leaders Rayan al-Kildani and Waad Qado and former governors Nawfal Hammadi al-Sultan and Ahmed al-Jubouri, the department said in a statement.

“We will continue to hold accountable persons associated with serious human rights abuse, including persecution of religious minorities, and corrupt officials who exploit their positions of public trust to line their pockets and hoard power at the expense of their citizens,” Sigal Mandelker, Treasury undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, said.

The department said many of the actions that prompted the sanctions occurred in “areas where persecuted religious communities are struggling to recover from the horrors inflicted on them” by Islamic State, the militant group that controlled parts of Iraq for several years.

Militia leaders

The Treasury Department said Kildani is the leader of the 50th Brigade militia and is shown cutting off the ear of a handcuffed detainee in a video circulating in Iraq last year.

It said Qado is the leader of the 30th Brigade militia, which engaged in extortion, illegal arrests and kidnappings. Sultan and Jubouri were designated for being engaged in corruption, including the misappropriation of state assets, and other misdeeds, the department said.

Iraq in March issued a warrant for the arrest of Sultan, the former governor of Nineveh province, on corruption charges after at least 90 people were killed in a ferry accident in the provincial capital, Mosul.

As a result of the designation, any property the four persons hold in the United States would be blocked and U.S. persons are barred from business dealings with them.

Taliban insurgents assaulted a provincial police headquarters Thursday in southern Afghanistan, killing at least 12 people and wounding more than 60 others.

Officials said multiple heavily armed men wearing suicide vests stormed the well-guarded building in the center of Kandahar about 5 p.m. local time. The attack began with a suicide bomber detonating an explosives-packed vehicle at the main entrance to police headquarters.

A large number of civilians were said to be among the casualties because the security installation is near residential areas. The siege was ongoing six hours later, according to residents and insurgent officials.

The Taliban claimed responsibility for the violence, saying they had killed and injured dozens of security forces, though insurgent claims are often inflated.

“Kandahar police headquarters initially came under a tactical bomb blast that enabled several martyrdom-seeking mujahedeen [holy warriors], equipped with heavy and light weapons, to enter the compound and launched [the] operation inside the [police] headquarters,” the group asserted in a statement.

Other attacks

This was the second deadly Taliban assault on government forces in as many days.

On Wednesday, authorities said an insurgent attack in Badghis province killed more than 30 U.S.-trained Afghan commandos and captured an unspecified number of others. The slain forces reportedly had been assigned to storm a Taliban-run prison to free inmates.

The spike in insurgent attacks in Afghanistan comes as the United States is negotiating a political settlement to the conflict with the Taliban.

Critics say the rise in Taliban attacks could be aimed at increasing its leverage in the months-long peace dialogue between the two adversaries in the war, the longest U.S. foreign military intervention.

Sudanese women were a driving force during months of protests that ousted veteran autocrat Omar al-Bashir, but the sexual violence they endured risks being forgotten with the signing of a power-sharing deal, women’s rights activists said Thursday.

Action must be taken to address scores of rapes committed during a deadly crackdown by security forces in June and ongoing sexual harassment on Sudan’s streets today, they said.

“There has been much recognition for the role that women have played in Sudan’s revolution, but now no one is addressing the sacrifices we have made,” said Hala Al-Karib of the Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa.

“We have numerous cases of rape committed by security forces, but still the same perpetrators are out on the streets of Sudan today, harassing and intimidating women — and nothing is being done to stop them,” she said from Khartoum.

Military council denies charges

The Sudanese Embassy in Nairobi was not immediately available to comment. The military council has previously denied that rape took place.

From students and academics to housewives and street traders, women came out in force to protest against al-Bashir’s 30-year rule, before he was replaced by the military in April.

But the protests didn’t stop as demonstrators demanded the ruling military council swiftly hand power to civilians, leading to a crackdown on June 3 in which at least 128 people were killed, according to the opposition. The Health Ministry put the death toll at 61.

Sides agree to investigation 

The military and an opposition alliance signed an accord on Wednesday aimed at leading the North African nation to democracy with elections in three years. The two sides also agreed to launch an independent investigation into the violence.

Al-Karib, who was active in the protests since they began in December, said the sexual violence was “retribution” for women’s role in the uprising, adding that there was an attempt to “push women back in the home” now that a political deal was in place.

The protests were sparked by hardships like soaring inflation and fuel shortages, and many women and girls saw the demonstrations as an opportunity to demand greater freedoms in the strict Islamic country, where women’s lives were tightly controlled by men.

Videos posted on social media showed women from Port Sudan in the east to Khartoum, dressed in headscarves, marching and chanting, clapping and singing songs.

But the military response was harsh.

70 cases documented

The Sudan Doctors’ Committee said it documented 70 cases of rape during the June 3 crackdown and that female students and street vendors reported ongoing harassment, including grabbing and the use of sexist and insulting language across Sudan.

Women’s rights groups across Africa called on the military council to end violations of women and urged the international community to ensure those responsible for the sexual violence were held to account.

“The council has overseen a raft of violations including merciless killings, brutal rape and sexual violence, meted out on peaceful demonstrators by state actors and state affiliates,” said the Solidarity for African Women’s Rights coalition.

“We call on the African Union, the Intergovernmental Authority on Development, members of the diplomatic community and friends of Sudan to call for an end to these violations and for a peaceful transition in Sudan.”

Some Republicans are criticizing the chants of “send her back” by the crowed at a rally with President Donald Trump.
 
But none of those who have spoken so far are directly taking on Trump after he stirred up his supporters by reviling young Democratic congresswomen who’ve criticized him and suggesting they leave the U.S. Trump spoke Wednesday night in North Carolina.
 
The four lawmakers include a black woman, a Hispanic and two Muslims.
 
Minnesota Rep. Tom Emmer heads the House GOP’s campaign arm, and told reporters Thursday “there’s no place” for such chants.
 
Illinois Rep. Adam Kinzinger tweeted that the crowd’s call was “ugly, wrong & would send chills down the spines of our Founding Fathers.”
 
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell says it’s time to “lower the rhetoric” about racism.

White House hopeful Elizabeth Warren is proposing new regulations on the private equity industry, pitching constraints designed to end what she decries as “legalized looting” by investment firms that take over troubled companies.

Warren’s plan, the latest in a series of policy ideas that have propelled the Massachusetts senator to the top tier of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary, would hold private equity firms liable for debts and pension promises made by the companies they buy up. It would restrict the firms’ ability to pay dividends as well as high fees that shift money out of acquired companies.

The new private equity rules bring Warren’s detail-driven campaign back to the familiar ground that launched her political career — reining in Wall Street.

Warren, the former chair of the independent panel that oversaw the government’s 2008 bailout of major financial institutions, is a longtime foe of the financial industry who has underscored since launching her presidential run that she is a capitalist. But like democratic socialist Bernie Sanders , a rival for the Democratic nomination to challenge President Donald Trump, Warren is building her campaign around a promise of sweeping upheaval she says would spread around more of the benefits of economic growth.

“I am tired of big financial firms looting the economy to pad their own pockets while the rest of the economy suffers,” Warren wrote in a Medium post announcing her plan on Thursday. “I am done with Washington ignoring the evidence and acting as though boosting Wall Street helps our families. Financial firms have helped push our economy badly off track.”

Warren’s private equity proposals also include new rules that would require worker pay to take precedence over other obligations when companies declare bankruptcy as well as more open disclosure of investment firms’ fees, both of which are included in private legislation she’s set to introduce later Thursday alongside Senate and House Democratic colleagues. Her platform further calls for the restoration of dividing lines between commercial and investment banking that were repealed in 1999, a change that was part of both the Republican and the Democratic platforms during the 2016 presidential election despite Trump’s lack of emphasis on it during his campaign.

The private equity industry pushed back at Warren’s proposal on Thursday. American Investment Council President Drew Maloney, whose group represents private equity firms, said that the industry “is an engine for American growth and innovation — especially in Senator Warren’s home state of Massachusetts.”

“Extreme political plans only hurt workers, investment, and our economy,” Maloney said in a statement.

Private equity-backed companies headquartered in Warren’s home state employ nearly 400,000 people, the AIC said.

Warren is headed to Iowa for a two-day campaign swing during which she’s likely to tout her new private equity plan, the latest installment of a broader self-described “economic patriotism” agenda that also includes a $2 trillion investment in environmentally friendly manufacturing.

Besides bolstering her credentials as an antagonist of Wall Street, Warren’s new proposal also gives her the chance to tout her avoidance of high-dollar fundraisers and reliance on small donors to power her campaign. Sanders, a Vermont senator, has similarly vowed to forgo high-dollar fundraisers, but the private equity industry remains a notable supporter of several of their Democratic presidential rivals.

Federal Election Commission records show that employees of Blackstone, which leads Private Equity International’s ranking of top private equity firms, have donated a total of $102,100 to 11 Democratic presidential hopefuls this year, with South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg topping the list of recipients at $30,800. Neither Warren nor Sanders reported receiving contributions from the private equity giant’s employees.

A federal appeals court has upheld the securities fraud conviction against former drug company CEO Martin Shkreli.

Shkreli was sentenced to seven years in prison last year for looting a drug company he founded, Retrophin, of $11 million to pay back investors in two failed hedge funds he ran.

A message requesting comment was emailed to Shkreli’s legal team Thursday.

Before his arrest, Shkreli was best known for buying the rights to a lifesaving drug at another company in 2014 and raising the price from $13.50 to $750 per pill.

He also gained notoriety for attacking critics on social media under the moniker “Pharma Bro.” He was barred from Twitter for posts about a female journalist.

Fifty years after humans first set foot on the moon, the rock samples collected by Apollo astronauts are being studied by volcanologists who believe what they learn could help predict eruptions on Earth more accurately. Faith Lapidus reports.

Australia’s annual influenza season started unusually early in 2019, and already there are more than 144,000 confirmed cases. At least 231 people have died, so far, including some children, although most of the victims were frail, elderly Australians.

This year is likely to be one of Australia’s most severe for influenza, and the government, worried about a vaccine shortage, has ordered 400,000 more doses.

Dr. Chris Zappala, vice president of the Australian Medical Association, hopes the community can cope.

“We’ve had millions and millions of vaccines through the country already, and we hope it’s enough. I think we can put some trust in the epidemiologists who do this every year. Remember, what’s happened here is we’ve got an extremely wily organism that mutates and makes things difficult,” Zappala said.

Multiple flu viruses circulate each year, and they are broadly grouped into two types: A and B. A particularly potent strain may well be to blame for an early start to Australia’s influenza season. Experts hope it will end before its usual peak in August, the last month of winter.

But Professor Brendan Murphy, Australia’s Chief Medical Officer, says it is hard to tell.

“The one thing you can say definitely about flu is that you can’t predict (it),” Murphy said. “This season may be a very early season that may fade away and not have the big, late winter peak or it may continue. We just don’t know. That is why we recommend everybody get vaccinated and be prepared.”

Australia suffered its worst flu season on record in 2017, when more than 250,000 cases were reported. More than 1,100 people died, slightly less than those killed in road accidents.

The government recommends that every Australian older than 6 months should get a flu shot every year.

Flu season in Australia usually runs from June to September, peaking in August.
 

A man screaming “You die!” burst into an animation production studio in Kyoto and set it on fire early Thursday, killing one person, leaving 12 others presumed dead and a dozen possibly trapped inside.

The blaze injured another 36 people, some of them critically, Japanese authorities said.

The fire broke out in the three-story Kyoto Animation building in Japan’s ancient capital of Kyoto, after the suspect sprayed an unidentified liquid to accelerate the blaze, Kyoto prefectural police and fire department officials said.

One person died of severe burns, said fire department official Satoshi Fujiwara. Most of the 10 seriously injured had burns. Rescuers found 12 people presumed dead on the first and second floors, Fujiwara said.

As many as 18 others could be still trapped on the third floor, he said.

The suspect was also injured and taken to a hospital, officials said. Police are investigating the man on suspicion of arson.

Survivors who saw the attacker said he was not their colleague and that he was screaming “(You) die!” when he dumped the liquid and started the fire, according to Japanese media reports.

Footage on Japan’s NHK national television showed gray smoke billowing from the charred building. Other footage showed windows blown out.

“There was an explosion, then I heard people shouting, some asking for help,” a female witness told TBS TV. “Black smoke was rising from windows on upper floors, then there was a man struggling to crawl out of the window.”

Witnesses in the neighborhood said they heard bangs coming from the building, others said they saw people coming out blackened, bleeding, walking barefoot, Kyodo News reported.

Rescue officials set up an orange tent outside the studio building to provide first aid and sort out the injured.

Fire department officials said more than 70 people were in the building at the time of the fire and many of them ran outside.

Kyoto Animation, better known as KyoAni, was founded in 1981 as an animation and comic book production studio, and is known for mega-hit stories featuring high school girls, including “Lucky Star,” “K-On!” and “Haruhi Suzumiya.”

U.S. President Donald Trump, who has made religious freedom a centerpiece of his foreign policy, met Wednesday with victims of religious persecution from countries like China, Turkey, North Korea, Iran and Myanmar.

Trump counts evangelical Christians among his core supporters and the State Department is hosting a conference on the topic this week that will be attended by Vice President Mike Pence and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Four of the 27 participants in the Oval Office meeting were from China, the White House said: Jewher Ilham, an Uighur Muslim; Yuhua Zhang, a Falun Gong practitioner; Nyima Lhamo, a Tibetan Buddhist; and Manping Ouyang, a Christian.

Ilham told Trump her father was one of many Uighurs “locked up in concentration camps” in the Xinjiang region and that she had not spoken with him since 2017.

China sanctions possible

The Trump administration has been weighing sanctions against Chinese officials over the treatment of the Uighurs, including the Communist Party chief of Xinjiang, Chen Quanguo, but has so far held back amid Chinese threats of retaliation.

Relations between the United States and China are already tense over a tit-for-tat trade war, with the United States alleging that China engages in unfair trading practices.

Reuters reported in May that the U.S. administration was considering sanctions on Chinese video surveillance firm Hikvision over the country’s treatment of its Uighur minority, citing a person briefed on the matter.

Nearly two dozen nations at the U.N. Human Rights Council this week urged China to halt persecution of ethnic Uighurs in Xinjiang, where U.N. experts and activists say at least 1 million are held in detention centers.

The Chinese government has traditionally rejected any suggestion that it abuses religious rights and human rights.

Rohingya from Myanmar 

Also present at the meeting were Rohingya Muslims from Myanmar, the White House said. On Tuesday, Pompeo announced sanctions against Myanmar military’s Commander-in-Chief Min Aung Hlaing and other leaders it said were responsible for extrajudicial killings of Rohingya in 2017, barring them from entry to the United States.

Trump’s ambassador for religious freedom, Sam Brownback, said during Wednesday’s meeting that the administration would announce “additional measures” on religious freedom at the State Department meeting Thursday.

Among the other victims who met with Trump were Christians from Myanmar, Vietnam, North Korea, Iran, Turkey, Cuba, Eritrea, Nigeria and Sudan; Muslims from Afghanistan, Sudan, Pakistan and New Zealand; Jews from Yemen and Germany; a practitioner of Cao Dai from Vietnam; and a Yezidi from Iraq.