CBS News
Morocco earthquake: Photos show widespread devastation
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An earthquake has sown destruction and devastation in Morocco, where death and injury counts continued to rise early Monday as rescue crews continued digging people out of the rubble both alive and dead in villages that were reduced to rubble. Law enforcement and aid workers — Moroccan and international — continued arriving Monday in the region south of the city of Marrakech that was hardest hit by the magnitude-6.8 tremor on Friday night, and several aftershocks.
Thousands of residents were waiting for food, water and electricity, with giant boulders blocking steep mountain roads.
The majority of the deaths, at least 2,122 as of Sunday, were in Marrakech and five provinces near the epicenter, the Interior Ministry reported. Search and rescue and debris removal teams were out with dogs searching for survivors and bodies.
PHILIPPE LOPEZ/AFP via Getty Images
The Friday temblor toppled buildings that couldn’t withstand the shaking, trapping people in rubble and sending others fleeing in terror. The area was shaken again Sunday by a magnitude 3.9 aftershock, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
There was little time for mourning as survivors tried to salvage whatever they could from damaged homes.
Khadija Fairouje’s face was puffy from crying as she joined relatives and neighbors hauling possessions down rock-strewn streets. She had lost her daughter and three grandsons aged 4 to 11 when their home collapsed while they were sleeping less than 48 hours earlier.
“Nothing’s left. Everything fell,” said her sister, Hafida Fairouje.
Abu Adem Muhammed/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
Help was slow to arrive in Amizmiz, where a whole chunk of the town of orange and red sandstone brick homes carved into a mountainside appeared to be missing. A mosque’s minaret had collapsed.
“It’s a catastrophe,” said villager Salah Ancheu, 28. “We don’t know what the future is. The aid remains insufficient.”
The worst destruction was in rural communities that are hard to reach because the roads that snake up the mountainous terrain were covered by fallen rocks.
Flags were lowered across Morocco, as King Mohammed VI ordered three days of national mourning starting Sunday. The army mobilized search and rescue teams, and the king ordered water, food rations and shelters to be sent to those who lost homes.
Some slept on the ground or on benches in a Marrakech park.
Said Echarif/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
Tourists and residents lined up to give blood.
“I did not even think about it twice,” Jalila Guerina told The Associated Press, “especially in the conditions where people are dying, especially at this moment when they are needing help, any help.” She cited her duty as a Moroccan citizen.
Rescuers backed by soldiers and police searched collapsed homes in the remote town of Adassil, near the epicenter. Military vehicles brought in bulldozers and other equipment to clear roads, MAP reported.
Distraught parents sobbed into phones to tell loved ones about losing their children.
Fernando Sanchez/Europa Press via Getty Images
Ambulances took dozens of wounded from the village of Tikht, population 800, to Mohammed VI University Hospital in Marrakech.
Many were trapped under the rubble.
FETHI BELAID/AFP via Getty Images
Friday’s quake had a preliminary magnitude of 6.8 when it hit at 11:11 p.m., lasting several seconds, the USGS said. A magnitude 4.9 aftershock hit 19 minutes later, it said. The collision of the African and Eurasian tectonic plates occurred at a relatively shallow depth, which makes a quake more dangerous.
It was the strongest earthquake to hit the North African country in over 120 years, according to USGS records dating to 1900, but it was not the deadliest. In 1960, a magnitude 5.8 temblor struck near the city of Agadir, killing at least 12,000. That quake prompted Morocco to change construction rules, but many buildings, especially rural homes, are not built to withstand such tremors.
NACHO DOCE / REUTERS
CBS News
Four senior House Democrats say Biden should leave presidential race, sources say
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Washington — Several senior House Democrats said Sunday that President Biden should end his reelection campaign in the wake of his recent debate performance, multiple people tell CBS News.
Reps. Jerry Nadler of New York, Mark Takano of California, Adam Smith of Washington and Joe Morelle of New York said Sunday during a Zoom meeting with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries that Mr. Biden should leave the race, according to a person on the call and three other people familiar with the meeting.
Reps. Jim Himes of Connecticut, Don Beyer of Virginia and Jamie Raskin of Maryland also expressed skepticism of the president’s electoral chances, the member on the call and a person familiar with the meeting said. Beyer’s office on Sunday reaffirmed his support for Mr. Biden, despite initial reports suggesting that he was part of the group calling on the president to step aside.
CBS News has reached out to all the members who sources say either expressed reservations about the president’s chances or said he should withdraw from the race.
A spokesperson for Jeffries declined to comment on the call.
Michael M Santiago/Getty Images
The meeting came after House Democratic leaders convened a call last week amid a slow leak of Democratic lawmakers who have called for him to step aside. On Saturday, Rep. Angie Craig, who represents a frontline district in Minnesota, became the latest House Democrat to call for the president to withdraw from the race on Saturday. And the attention is expected to be on the president’s support in Congress as lawmakers return from recess this week.
Meanwhile, Mr. Biden has appeared defiant in recent days, making clear that he plans to stay in the race despite concern from some members of his party. When asked during an interview with ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos on Friday whether he would step down if there were calls from the party’s leaders in Congress, Mr. Biden brushed the question aside, saying “they’re not going to do that.”
The president said he had an hour-long conversation with Jeffries and had spent “many hours” with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. The president also convened a meeting at the White House with Democratic governors last week.
“If the Lord almighty came down and said ‘Joe, get out of the race,’ I’d get out of the race,” the president said. “The Lord almighty’s not coming down.”
Meanwhile, Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia has been speaking with Democratic colleagues about finding ways to convince the president to step aside and let others seek the nomination, a senator who’s been contacted by Warner told CBS News on Thursday. The senator noted at the time that there weren’t formal plans yet.
Nikole Killion and Fin Gómez contributed reporting.
CBS News
Stoltenberg says Orbán’s visit to Moscow does not change NATO’s position on Ukraine
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Washington — NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said Sunday that far-right Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán‘s trip to Moscow last week for talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin does not change NATO’s position on assistance to Ukraine despite Hungary being a member country of the alliance.
“Prime Minister Orbán… he made it clear when he came to Moscow that he didn’t go there on behalf of NATO, different NATO allies interact with Moscow in different ways,” Stoltenberg said Sunday on “Face the Nation.”
Hungary assumed the largely ceremonial role of the six-month rotating presidency of the EU on Monday, July 1. In less than a week, Orbán visited Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Ukraine and launched the “Patriots for Europe” alliance with other right-wing nationalists, according to Reuters.
But on Friday, during a rare trip to Russia by a European leader, he also met with Putin, a meeting that came just days before a NATO summit in Washington, D.C. where the topic of providing further military aid to Ukraine will be at the forefront.
CBS News
Despite other European officials condemning Orbán’s trip to Moscow, Stoltenberg emphasized the meeting doesn’t change NATO’s common goals of aiding Ukraine in the war launched by the Russian invasion.
“What matters for me is that all allies have agreed that we need to do more for Ukraine, both with this new training and assistance that NATO will provide to Ukraine, but also with the long term pledge,” he said on “Face the Nation. “And I also expect that by the summit that starts next week, allies will make new announcements on more air defense and more ammunition.”
Stoltenberg added that a main factor in NATO’s ability to make decisions on support to Ukraine is the common goal for peace.
“And the only way to get there is to convince President Putin that he will not win on the battlefield, he has to sit down and accept a solution where Ukraine prevails as a sovereign, independent nation in Europe,” Stoltenberg said. “The only way to convince Putin that he will not win on the battlefield is abroad military support to Ukraine. So a negotiated solution that is lasting for Ukraine requires military support to Ukraine.”
This week’s summit in Washington also comes as NATO allies have been bracing for possible Trump 2024 victory.
During former President Donald Trump’s first term as president, America’s allies were shocked by his open criticism of the failure of some NATO members to meet defense funding commitments, and the Trump campaign has said that calling on allies to increase their defense spending is a policy that a future Trump White House would aggressively pursue.
Trump said at a February campaign rally in South Carolina that he’d encourage Russia to “do whatever the hell they want” to NATO allies who don’t pay their fair share into the Western military alliance. Referring to a conversation with an unnamed leader of a NATO country who asked him, “If we don’t pay, are you still going to protect us,” Trump said he replied, “Absolutely not.”
The NATO Secretary General met with Mr. Biden in June at the White House ahead of this week’s summit. When asked Sunday of his personal assessment of Mr. Biden as an effective leader, Stoltenberg said their conversation was a positive one.
“We had a good-we had a productive meeting. And of course, there is no way to make these big decisions on how to further strengthen NATO, enlarge NATO, new members without having a strong US leadership,” he said.
CBS News
Second gentleman Doug Emhoff tests positive for COVID
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Washington — Second gentleman Doug Emhoff has tested positive for COVID-19, his office said on Sunday.
Emhoff tested positive on Saturday after experiencing mild symptoms, Liza Acevedo, the communications director for the second gentleman, said in a statement, which noted that he is fully vaccinated and has received three booster shots.
“He is currently asymptomatic, continuing to work remotely, and remaining away from others at home,” Acevedo said. Vice President Kamala Harris has tested negative and remains asymptomatic. Harris and Emhoff appeared with President Biden and first lady Jill Biden at an event to mark the July 4 holiday days ago.
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The Vice President’s office recently announced a busy travel schedule for Harris this month, as she participates in a series of events geared toward key groups like women, Black Americans and young people. Harris spoke at an event in Louisiana on Saturday and is slated to appear this week at an event in Texas. She’s also scheduled to speak at a campaign event in Nevada this week.
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