13 People, Including 7 Children Killed in Philadelphia Fire

^{PHOTO: EXTERIORS OF BURNED ROW HOME, FIREFIGHTERS OUTSIDE OF ROW HOME}

INTERNATIONAL: At least 13 people, including seven children, were killed in an early morning fire on Wednesday, 5 January in a Philadelphia apartment building after smoke detectors has failed to go off, the Philadelphia Fire Department has announced.

Firefighters have arrived around 6:40 a.m. and fought for about 50 minutes to control the blaze on the second floor of the three-story row house in the city's Fairmount neighborhood, owned by the city's public housing authority.

Eight people have managed to escape the building through one of the two exits, and seven children were among those killed, Philadelphia Deputy Fire Commissioner Craig Murphy told reporters at a nearby news conference. Officials did not give the children's ages.

Fire officials have said the death count could change.

Nearby, fire trucks were still parked outside the red-brick building, its facade blackened, its windows smashed out and dark.

A child and an adult were taken by paramedics to nearby hospitals. There were four smoke detectors in the building but they failed to activate, fire officials said.

There were conflicting accounts as to when the smoke detectors were last inspected.

The fire department has said they were last inspected in 2020.The executive vice president at the Philadelphia Housing Authority, Dinesh Indala has told reporters the last annual inspection was in May 2021.

He has stated there were six functioning detectors at the time of the May inspection, not four. He said he did not know why the detectors did not go off.

The building was converted to house two families, Indala has confirmed, and 26 people lived in the building.

 Kazakh Police Use Flash Grenade to Protesters Who Try to Storm Mayor’s Office

Kazakh police have used flash grenades as hundreds of protesters have tried to storm the mayor's office in the country's biggest city, Almaty, in the early hours of Wednesday, 5 January.

Police have removed hundreds of protesters from the city's main square using tear gas and flash grenades.

^{PHOTO: NIGHT SHOTS OF PROTESTS AND CLASHES IN KAZAKH CITY OF ALMATY}

A witness has recalled, there were series of explosions in the vicinity of the city's main square where the mayor's office is located.

Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has declared a two-week state of emergency in the Central Asian nation's biggest city Almaty and in the western Mangistau province, both of which have become scenes of mass protests.

Protests have erupted in several Kazakh cities and towns after the authorities have lifted price caps on liquefied petroleum gas, a popular car fuel, allowing prices to surge.

In Snowy Trenches,Ukranian Soldiers Vow to Stand Firm

^{PHOTO: UKRAINIAN SERVICEMEN ON GUARD IN TRENCHES AT FRONTLINE COMMENTS BY SERVICEMEN}

A soldier peers over the top of a trench as snow falls thickly over the surrounding fields near the village of Krymske in eastern Ukraine.

This is the frontline of Ukraine's war against Russian-backed forces in the Luhansk region. Russian troop movements near Ukraine's borders have alarmed Kyiv and its Western allies in recent weeks, though the soldiers here say they are ready for any escalation from Russia.

One soldier says that they are determined to stand firm, and they will not give up their country. They fought for the independence for a long time.

The soldier named Martin has added, he doesn’t plan to stay there forever. he plans to repel any Russian attack and come back home so that his daughter will later say: 'Wow, father, you managed to stop superpower with your own hands.

U.S. officials have warned Russia might launch a new attack against Ukraine as early as the second half of January when the ground will be harder, making it easier for tanks and other armour to move swiftly.

Russia has demanded security guarantees it wants from the West in order to defuse the current crisis. Moscow denies it is planning a new military offensive and accuses Kyiv of building up its own forces in the east of the country.