Villages

Ten years ago, Susan McWhinney-Morse had no desire to leave her longtime Beacon Hill home and neighborhood just because she and her husband were retired and growing older. The expectation then, as it is now, was that retired people sold their homes, then moved to Florida or some other retirement-like community where they would be surrounded by other senior residents. "But my little slogan was ‘No, no, I won't go!' " said McWhinney-Morse. "I love where I live, and I felt strongly about a society that takes the elderly and warehouses them.

A brother of the blind legal activist Chen Guangcheng, whose decision to seek refuge in the US Embassy here after evading illegal house arrest prompted a diplomatic standoff between China and the United States, has slipped through the security cordon around his village and made his way to the capital, according to a lawyer who met him Thursday. The brother, Chen Guangfu, said he came to Beijing to advocate on behalf of his son, who has been in police custody since attacking a group of plainclothes officers who broke into the family home in their search for Chen Guangcheng.

LUCKNOW, India -- Helicopters dropped food to almost 2 million marooned Indian villagers yesterday as the death toll from unusually heavy monsoon rains and floods in South Asia rose to more than 225. The food drops to 2,200 villages closed off by flooding aimed to help desperate residents in the worst-hit eastern parts of India's Uttar Pradesh state. Umesh Sinha, the state relief commissioner, also said nearly 280,000 acres of rice paddy crops had been destroyed. In India's northeastern Assam state, flooding forced rhinos from their habitat at the Kaziranga National Park and their panicked charges...

From a teenager who was a month old when her parents were killed in Rwanda's genocide to a young man inspired to become a doctor, hundreds of orphans have found hope for the future in a special village outside the Rwandan capital. Now, the South African-born, New York woman who founded Agahozo Shalom hopes the village can be a model for orphans around Rwanda and the rest of the world. Anne Heyman brought five of the young people from the village to New York this week, where they helped raise money and met with Rwanda's U.N. Ambassador Eugene-Richard Gasana.

NEWTOK, Alaska -- The last time chronic flooding forced this tiny village to relocate, sled dogs pulled the old church to its new location 3 miles away, far from the raging Ninglick River. That was in 1950 and life was simpler in Newtok, mostly a collection of sod dwellings. Modern structures gradually took over the new site as the river again crept to the edge of the Yupik Eskimo community. Persistent erosion has eaten an average of 70 feet of bank a year, and now melting permafrost is subsiding, further subjecting the village to severe flooding from intensifying storms.

AL HOCEIMA, Morocco -- A powerful earthquake devastated an isolated, picturesque region of northern Morocco yesterday, killing more than 560 people as they slept, injuring hundreds, and laying ruin to villages that suffered for decades from government neglect. Rescuers with pick axes and trained dogs were searching for survivors trapped under the rubble of their fragile mud-and-stone homes, which crumbled in the 6.5-magnitude temblor. Victims were most likely women, children, and the elderly because the men in the region tend to immigrate to the Netherlands and Germany...

Gunmen surrounded villages in northeast Nigeria and set them ablaze, killing at least 12 people and wounding 48 others in violence that could spread as attackers remain hiding in the rural region, the Nigerian Red Cross said Monday. The attacks targeted four villages early Sunday morning in a remote area of Adamawa state, which borders Cameroon. The number of dead could rise as relief workers remain unable to reach the villages affected and about 2,000 people have fled, the Red Cross said in a report obtained by The Associated Press.

GUVECCI, Turkey — Syrian security forces fanned out through villages and towns in Syria’s northern province of Idlib yesterday, randomly hauling in males over age 16 as the government worked to silence a center of antiregime protest. In this border region, where thousands of Syrian civilians have fled to havens in Turkey, Turkish officials were preparing to send food, clean water, medicine, and other aid to thousands more stranded on the Syrian side. The unusual plan for a cross-border operation on Syrian soil appeared to have Syrian clearance, being announced...

Driving along the rural French roads from Villefranche-sur-Saone to Macon is like browsing the Beaujolais aisle at your local wine shop. The familiar labels (that is, villages) pop up one after the other: Morgon, Brouilly, Chiroubles, Chenas, Fleurie, Julienas, Saint-Amour. You can zip through most of them as quickly as you can down a glass of cherry-colored Regnie and cover most of the area in the time it takes to finish a bottle. For better and worse, fast-forward has been the popular image of this storied region a half-hour's drive...

LAGOS, Nigeria — A lead poisoning outbreak that has killed more than 400 children in the rural farmlands of northern Nigeria remains “a neglected, underfunded emergency,’’ the United Nations warned yesterday, saying many villages remain coated with the deadly metal. In a report, UN officials said the outbreak in Zamfara state that began in March remains an “alarming, continuing health risk’’ for an unknown number of villages. The report released yesterday also said that one of the two villages already decontaminated now shows new traces of lead and...

The brother of Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng has fled his closely guarded village to seek legal advice Thursday in Beijing on how to protect his son from what their supporters call retaliation by local officials, an attorney said. Chen sought protection of U.S. diplomats last month after escaping virtual house arrest in his hometown, sparking a standoff between Beijing and Washington and highlighting the extralegal measures taken by local Chinese officials to suppress dissent.

Ten years ago, Susan McWhinney-Morse had no desire to leave her longtime Beacon Hill home and neighborhood just because she and her husband were retired and growing older. The expectation then, as it is now, was that retired people sold their homes, then moved to Florida or some other retirement-like community where they would be surrounded by other senior residents. "But my little slogan was ‘No, no, I won't go!' " said McWhinney-Morse. "I love where I live, and I felt strongly about a society that takes the elderly and...

Voters in the Vermont village of Northfield want to merge it with the town of the same name to streamline municipal operations. Residents say it will be more cost-effective and efficient. The village and the town have squared off on municipal matters in the past. Voters approved the merger Tuesday. The process will involve presenting the Vermont Legislature with a merger plan during the 2013 session. Vermont Public Radio reports (http://bit.ly/KvFGR3) most of the population lives in the village.

The Planning Board Thursday is set to open a hearing on a proposed expansion of Beacon Village, the 420-unit housing complex off Beacon Street. First Patriot Corp., which owns the complex, is applying through Peach Orchard Place LLC for a special permit to develop 60 additional apartments and one single-family home on another part of the site. It also is seeking approval under subdivision rules to construct a new road providing access from Peach Orchard Road to the proposed new development area, according to Anthony Fields, the town's planning director.

BEIRUT - Syrian forces killed at least five people when they raided a Sunni farming village on Sunday, torching homes and looting shops in what activists said is a sign of worsening relations among the country's religious groups. Tensions stemming from the 14-month-old uprising against President Bashar Assad also touched off clashes across the border in Lebanon as the revolt threatened to turn into a broader conflict. The relentless violence further undermines a UN-backed peace plan that is supposed to bring an end to Syria's deadly crisis.

Gunmen surrounded villages in northeast Nigeria and set them ablaze, killing at least 12 people and wounding 48 others in violence that could spread as attackers remain hiding in the rural region, the Nigerian Red Cross said Monday. The attacks targeted four villages early Sunday morning in a remote area of Adamawa state, which borders Cameroon. The number of dead could rise as relief workers remain unable to reach the villages affected and about 2,000 people have fled, the Red Cross said in a report obtained by The Associated Press.

TEHRAN -- An earthquake with a magnitude of at least 5.9 shook a sparsely populated area of southern Iran yesterday, flattening seven villages, killing 10 people, and injuring 70, officials and state-run television said. The temblor was felt as far away as Oman and the United Arab Emirates. Heidar Alishvandi, the governor of Qeshm, was quoted by state television as saying rescue teams were deployed to the affected area, and people in the wrecked villages moved quickly to safety.

PADANG, Indonesia - The death toll from Indonesia’s massive earthquake probably will double as officials yesterday reached rural communities wiped out by landslides that buried more than 600 people under mountains of mud, most of them guests at a wedding celebration. Virtually nothing remained of four villages that had dotted the hillside of the Padang Pariman district in Indonesia’s West Sumatra just three days ago, said officials and a photojournalist who flew over the devastated area.

Syrian forces killed at least five people when they raided a Sunni farming village on Sunday, torching homes and looting shops in what activists said is a sign of worsening relations among the country's religious groups. Tensions stemming from the 14-month-old uprising against President Bashar Assad also touched off clashes across the border in Lebanon as the revolt threatened to morph into a broader conflict. The relentless violence further undermines a U.N.-backed peace plan that is supposed to bring an end to Syria's deadly crisis.

Syrian forces killed at least five people in a raid on a farming village in the country's northwest on Sunday while continuing to crack down on rebellious areas near the capital Damascus, activists said. The continuing violence further undermines a U.N.-backed peace plan that is supposed to bring an end to the country's 14-month-old crisis. The first step of the plan, a cease-fire that began on April 12, has had only a limited effect. This throws into doubt the rest of the plan, which calls for talks between the regime of President Bashar...