■MALAYSIA
Bangladeshi man murdered
A Bangladeshi man was brutally slashed to death while another was seriously injured in an attack at a workers’ hostel in Johor, news reports said yesterday. The victim, a 35-year old factory worker, was resting at his quarters on Friday afternoon with a friend when a group of men, believed to be Vietnamese, attacked them, the Star daily reported. A police spokesman said several of the victims’ housemates, who were alerted by the sounds of a heated quarrel, found the victim lying face down in a pool of blood with slash wounds on his chest. The victim’s friend was found slashed on the shoulders and chest and rushed to a nearby hospital. Police said the attackers had been identified and the case was being investigated as murder.
■AUSTRALIA
Orangutan attempts escape
Adelaide Zoo was evacuated yesterday after an “ingenious” 62kg orangutan short-circuited an electric fence and hopped a wall surrounding her enclosure. The ape, a 27-year-old female named Karta, jammed a stick into wires connected to the fence and then piled up debris to climb a concrete and glass wall at the zoo. Zoo curator Peter Whitehead told reporters Karta sat on top of the fence for about 30 minutes before apparently changing her mind about the escape and climbing back into the enclosure. “I think when she actually got out and realized where she was ... [she] realized she shouldn’t be there [and] actually hung onto the wall and dropped back into the exhibit,” Whitehead said. The zoo was cleared as a precaution and veterinarians stood by with tranquilizer guns. “You’re talking about an animal that’s highly intelligent,” Whitehead said. “We’ve had issues with her before in normal day-to-day operations where she tries to outsmart the keepers. She’s an ingenious animal.”
■IRAN
Court hears Saberi appeal
Abdolsamad Khorramshahi, the lawyer for Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi said a court began yesterday to hear Saberi’s appeal against her eight-year prison sentence for espionage. Saberi, a 32-year-old freelance reporter, was detained in late January and sentenced on April 18 on charges of spying for the US.
■TURKEY
Bomb kills five
Five people were killed, including two members of a state-sponsored rural militia, in the mainly Kurdish southeast on Saturday after a roadside bomb exploded, security sources said. The incident took place near the city of Sirnak. Three of the dead were civilians, the sources said.
■UNITED KINGDOM
Soldier finishes marathon
A British soldier who was injured by a rocket attack in Iraq finished the London Marathon on Saturday, two weeks after the race began. Major Phil Packer was told he would never walk again after he lost the use of his legs during the attack in the southern Iraqi city of Basra in February last year. But the 36-year-old completed the course by walking 3.2km a day on crutches since the marathon started on April 26, and was greeted by hundreds of well-wishers who lined the final mile. Packer raised £630,000 (US$950,000) for the Help For Heroes soldiers’ charity, and is hoping to raise £1 million. “I’ve walked 52,400 steps and somebody has walked with me every step of the way, be it a dinner lady, a London taxi driver or a Metropolitan Police officer,” Packer said upon completing the marathon. “I’ve had time to talk to people and have conversations, people have really opened up about their feelings about the [armed] services and it has been humbling.”
■IRAN
Poll to have 475 candidates
A total of 475 Iranians have registered as prospective candidates for next month’s presidential election, less than half the number who signed up in 2005, a top election official said yesterday. “Of the 475 who signed up as candidates, 433 are men and 42 are women,” Kamran Daneshjoo, the head of the election committee, told reporters. He said the oldest prospective candidate was an 86-year-old man, while the youngest was a 19-year-old man. Candidates had until midnight on Saturday to register for the June 12 election. The four main candidates are President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, former prime minister Mir Hossein Mousavi, ex-parliament speaker Mehdi Karroubi and the former head of the Revolutionary Guards, Mohsen Rezai. The total number of candidates this year compares with the 1,014 who registered in the 2005 vote.
■GUINEA
Security fires on rioters
Security forces fired on rioters in the capital Conakry on Saturday, wounding at least two people, in the first major public disorder since a military junta seized power in December, a police source said. A police station and several police vehicles were attacked in the riot that was sparked when thieves dressed in military uniform robbed a local shop, a senior police official who declined to be identified said. Captain Moussa Dadis Camara came to power in a bloodless December coup following the death of former president Lansana Conte. He is battling to maintain stability in the world’s top bauxite exporter. Popular anger at his junta has risen after reports of human rights abuses by soldiers. Analysts say stability could hinge on Camara keeping his promise to hold elections in December.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in