Top News Stories –

Boxing legend Muhammad Ali dies aged 74 –
Muhammad Ali has died at the age of 74, a family spokesman has said. The former world heavyweight boxing champion, one of the world’s best-known sportsmen, died at a hospital in the US city of Phoenix, Arizona, after being admitted on Thursday. He was suffering from a respiratory illness, a condition that was complicated by Parkinson’s disease. Born Cassius Marcellus Clay, Ali shot to fame by winning light-heavyweight gold at the 1960 Rome Olympics. Nicknamed “The Greatest”, the American beat Sonny Liston in 1964 to win his first world title and became the first boxer to capture a world heavyweight title on three separate occasions. He eventually retired in 1981, having won 56 of his 61 fights. Crowned “Sportsman of the Century” by Sports Illustrated and “Sports Personality of the Century” by the BBC, Ali was noted for his pre- and post-fight talk and bold fight predictions just as much as his boxing skills inside the ring. But he was also a civil rights campaigner and poet who transcended the bounds of sport, race and nationality. Asked how he would like to be remembered, he once said: “As a man who never sold out his people. But if that’s too much, then just a good boxer. I won’t even mind if you don’t mention how pretty I was.” [BBC] See Video of the Day and List of the Day
Muhammad Ali in 1967

Video of the Day –

Muhammad Ali & Greenlight from Studio Dialog on Vimeo.

List of the Day –

Muhammad Ali’s best quotes [Evening Standard]

“Hey Floyd – I seen you! Someday I’m gonna whup you! Don’t you forget, I am the greatest!” – To then-world heavyweight champion Floyd Patterson during the 1960 Olympic Games.

“Why are all the angels white? Why ain’t there no black angels?” – In a sermon at apostolic church in 1983.

“Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.” – The man who captured not only his boxing style but his attitude in life.

“Sonny Liston is nothing. The man can’t talk. The man can’t fight. The man needs talking lessons. The man needs boxing lessons. And since he’s gonna fight me, he needs falling lessons.” – Before fighting world heavyweight champion Sonny Liston in February 1964.

“I’m king of the world! I’m pretty! I’m a bad man! I shook up the world! I shook up the world! I shook up the world!” – February 25 1964, after defeating Sonny Liston.

“I had a good time boxing. I enjoyed it – and I may come back.” – On being crowned Sports Personality of the Century by the BBC in 1999.

“Cassius Clay is a slave name. I didn’t choose it, and I didn’t want it. I am Muhammad Ali, a free name, and I insist people using it when speaking to me and of me.” – On his conversion to Islam.

“Man, I ain’t got no quarrel with them Viet Cong. No Vietcong ever called me nigger.” – On his refusal to answer a call up to fight in Vietnam.

“It’s hard to be humble when you’re as great as I am.”

“They did what they thought was right, and I did what I thought was right.” – On the government’s long effort to send him to prison after his refusal to go to Vietnam.

“You serious? I got to stay here and lead my people to the right man – Elijah Muhammad” – When asked why he does not flee the country, in an interview by Robert Lipsyte of The New York Times on April 26 1967, two days before refusing induction into military service.

“I’ve done my celebrating already. I said a prayer to Allah” – June 28 1971, on being told his conviction for draft evasion was overturned by the US Supreme Court.

“I told you all, all of my critics, that I was the greatest of all time. Never make me the underdog until I’m about 50 years old” – October 1 1974, after knocking out George Foreman to become heavyweight champion for the second time, in Kinshasa, Zaire.

Other News Stories –

Disasters and accidents

• 2016 European floods
  • The flood waters for the Seine River are expected to peak at six metres above its normal level. Flooding in France and Germany has so far claimed at least 11 lives. (BBC)
  • A sixth body is recovered in Bavaria near the Austrian border. (AP)
• European migrant crisis
  • Bodies of 117 people, including 75 women, 36 men and six children, are recovered from a beach near Zuwarah, Libya, possibly from yesterday’s capsize in the Mediterranean Sea. (CNN)
  • Greek authorities rescue 340 people from a boat carrying around 700 migrants that capsized 75 nautical miles off the Greek island of Crete. So far nine bodies have been recovered. (U.S. News & World Report) (CNN)
• 2016 Oklahoma floods
  • The four missing Fort Hood soldiers from the overturned Light Medium Tactical Vehicle are found dead, bringing the death toll from the accident to nine. (AP via Los Angeles Times) (UPI)
• 2016 Union Pacific oil train fire
  • Eleven cars from a 96-car Union Pacific oil train derail, and at least one catches fire, in the Columbia River Gorge near Mosier, Oregon, within about 20 feet of the city’s sewage plant. Coincidentally, aWasco County Planning Department public hearing is scheduled for Tuesday concerning a Union Pacific proposal to expand an existing railroad siding on either side of Mosier. (The Oregonian) (Wasco County Planning Commission)
• At least eight people are hospitalized after lightning struck at the Rock am Ring music festival near Mendig, Germany. (AP)
• A helicopter crashes in Nabire, Papua, Indonesia, killing a pilot and three passengers. (Detik.com)

Health and medicine

• A study by researchers at the University of North Carolina, presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting in Chicago, reports 26 percent of cancer patients can’t afford to pay for their treatment, and 18 percent can’t afford their prescriptions. (UPI) (ASCO) (Meeting)

Law and crime

• 2015 FIFA corruption case
  • FIFA shares results of their investigation with legal authorities showing former president Sepp Blatter and two others gave themselves nearly $80 million over the past five years via annual raises and World Cup bonuses. (NPR)

Politics and elections

• Venezuela’s National Election Council cancels a planned meeting to determine the validity of 1.85 million signatures on a petition for a referendum to oust President Nicolás Maduro. (UPI)

Sports

• In boxing, heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali, dies of respiratory complications in a hospital in the American city of Phoenix, Arizona. (NBC News)
• A ten person team of refugees will compete in the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. (Al Jazeera)added

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