■Indonesia
Rebels agree to dialogue
Separatist rebels from Indonesia's Aceh province said yesterday they were willing to meet Indonesian government officials in Japan for peace talks to prevent a landmark peace deal from collapsing. The announcement comes less than 12 hours after Indonesia, under pressure from key foreign donors, gave the rebels another two days to resume talks to avert an all-out military assault in the province on the northern tip of Sumatra island. "Yes, we have decided that we will continue dialogue on May 17 in Tokyo," rebel spokesman Sofyan Daud said.
■ Japan
Defense bills make headway
A set of bills to bolster Japan's ability to respond to attack passed a critical vote yesterday, marking a major victory for Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi but raising concerns over this country's commitment to the strictly defensive policy it has pursued since World War II. The legislation, which won approval in parliament's lower house, would give the Cabinet and ministries greater control over local governments and other strategically important public and private institutions in case of war. It would also create guidelines for troops to use privately owned property and allow authorities to punish people who flout emergency laws.
■ Hong Kong
Illegal immigrants arrested
A gang of 23 Vietnamese illegal immigrants believed to be carrying weapons and explosives was arrested yesterday after arriving in Hong Kong by boat, police said. Police were called after two men held up a store in Pokfulam, on the west of Hong Kong, at 4am yesterday while another six men were involved in a mugging in the same area. Thirteen more men were arrested nearby and two others were found on a boat off Pokfulam which the gang is believed to have sailed in on. Three detonators and bullets believed to belong to the gang were also retrieved by officers. The 23 men are all suspected to be illegal immigrants from Vietnam and were being held for further questioning yesterday morning, a police spokesman said.
■ Malaysia
US issues travel warning
The US State Department on Wednesday advised Americans living or traveling in the Southeast Asian country of Malaysia to be aware of a persistent threat posed by extremist groups in the region. The announce-ment said there was continuing concern about the possibility of "terrorist" attacks against US citizens and American interests in Malaysia, especially in the state of Sabah, close to the southern Philippines. The State Department also said it was concerned about Jemaah Islamiya, another extremist group believed to be active in Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia and the Philippines.
■ Nepal
Army rejects restriction
The Nepalese army (RNA) will not restrict its movement to within 5km of its military barracks as previously agreed upon at peace talks until it recovered all its weapons looted by the Maoists, newspaper reports said yesterday. Last week the government and Maoists in the most recent round of peace talks agreed that the Nepal army would restrict its troops to within a radius of 5km of their barracks. "The Maoists still pose a grave threat to the maintenance of internal security and providing people with a sense of security," army spokesman Colonel Deepak Gurung was quoted as saying by the Kathmandu Post.
■France
Anti-racists sue Bardot
It takes a lot for the French to lose patience with their ageing stars, and Brigitte Bardot was given a lot of rope. On Wednesday the free ride for her tirades against the decadence of modern society ended after two anti-racist and human rights movements announced they would take the 68-year-old to court. Her latest outburst, a book called Un Cri Dans Le Silence, attacks Islam, gays, the unemployed, teachers and illegal immigrants, and calls for a return of the guillotine. The Movement Against Racism and For the Friendship of Peoples (MRAP) and the League of Human Rights said they would sue Bardot.
■ Algeria
Hostages arrive home
Seventeen European tourists were reunited with their families in emotional scenes Wednesday after being freed from their Islamic extremist abductors deep in Algeria's Sahara desert, but there were fears for another 15 still held captive. Six Germans, 10 Austrians and one Swede were freed when Algerian troops stormed a desert hide-out of the Islamic Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat, reportedly linked to the al-Qaeda network, near the Sahara's largest city of Tamanrasset. The remaining tourists were being held by a "second terrorist group", Algerian officials said.
■ Israel
Clashes erupt in Gaza Strip
Israeli soldiers killed at least three Palestinians in clashes which erupted after a large armored force raided the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Hanoun early yesterday, Palestinian medical and hospital sources reported. Dozens of Israeli army tanks, armored personnel carriers and jeeps, backed by Apache attack helicopters, entered the town before dawn. The force destroyed two buildings which according to Israel were structures used by militants to fire rockets at the Israeli town of Sderot, outside the Gaza Strip but not far from Beit Hanoun.
■ United States
Court decides fetus's fate
A judge postponed debate over whether a guardian should be appointed for the six-month-old fetus of a mentally disabled rape victim. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and two other groups filed a brief Tuesday, claiming such a judgment would go against a 1989 Florida Supreme Court ruling that said fetuses cannot have guardians because they are not legally people. An attorney for the ACLU said a delay could endanger the mother's life. The 22-year-old woman has lived in a nursing home since she was three. She has no family, is too disabled to speak and cannot help police find who impregnated her.
Agencies
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion
UNDER INVESTIGATION: Members of the local Muslim community had raised concerns with the police about the boy, who officials said might have been radicalized online A 16-year-old boy armed with a knife was shot dead by police after he stabbed a man in the Australian west coast city of Perth, officials said yesterday. The incident occurred in the parking lot of a hardware store in suburban Willetton on Saturday night. The teen attacked the man and then rushed at police officers before he was shot, Western Australian Premier Roger Cook told reporters. “There are indications he had been radicalized online,” Cook told a news conference, adding that it appeared he acted alone. A man in his 30s was found at the scene with a stab wound to his back.