■MALDIVES
Nations vow to cut carbon
Six countries seen as most threatened by rising sea levels have vowed to cut their carbon emissions as a gesture of their commitment to fight global warming, the government said yesterday. The countries, mostly low-lying nations, met over the weekend in the country ahead of a UN climate change meeting in Mexico and pledged to drastically cut their emissions while pressing others to follow suit. “Antigua and Barbuda, Costa Rica, Ethiopia, the Maldives, the Marshall Islands and Samoa all pledged to slash greenhouse gas emissions and pursue green growth and development,” the government said in a statement. The nation is aiming to be carbon neutral by 2020.
■PAKISTAN
Bomber wounds eight
A suicide bomber ran past guards at a minority Shiite mosque in Sargodha city, Punjab Province, then blew himself up on Sunday, wounding eight worshipers, officials said. The attack appeared to be the latest in a string by Sunni extremists against other Muslims they consider infidels. Sargodha police chief Bashir Ahmad said eight people had been taken to the hospital, two of whom were in critical condition. The attacker apparently was not more than 17-years-old, he added.
■THAILAND
Suspected separatists kill
Suspected Islamic separatists shot dead three people, including one Malaysian, in the latest violence in the insurgency-plagued southern provinces, police said yesterday. The 57-year-old Malaysian was gunned down early on Sunday at his karaoke business in the border town of Sungai Kolok in Narathiwat Province. The same day in neighboring Pattani Province, a 50-year-old Buddhist teacher was shot dead at his home by suspected militants, while a 54-year-old Muslim man was killed in a drive-by shooting in front of a mosque, police said. The government last week extended emergency rule in three troubled southern provinces until October.
■AUSTRALIA
Nude man causes chaos
An armed man wearing nothing but a holster and standing on top of a billboard brought central Perth to a standstill during a lengthy altercation with police. The shaven-headed man, brandishing a small pistol, drew a tactical response team, a police helicopter, a fire truck, ambulances and crowds of onlookers as authorities shut down part of the city on Saturday. “He’s just ranting and raving at this stage, nothing that’s really ... making a great deal of sense,” inspector Neil Blair told reporters at the scene. “It’s not the actions of a rational person to be up there naked in the middle of Perth with what appears to be a handgun.” The man, who appeared on the billboard around lunchtime, finally put down his weapon and surrendered to police in the early evening.
■HONG KONG
Godfather of Cantopop dies
Tai Sze-chung (戴思聰), veteran vocal coach to Cantopop’s biggest stars, has died from heart disease. He was 69. Tai’s daughter Wancy told reporters her father passed away early on Sunday from complications from an acute coronary heart problem. The Apple Daily reported yesterday that Tai was hospitalized after fainting at his home early on Saturday. Tai was nicknamed “godfather of the music industry” for his star-studded list of students. Among those he tutored were late pop diva Anita Mui (梅艷芳), singer Faye Wong (王菲) and actor-singers Andy Lau (劉德華) and Leon Lai (黎明).
■GERMANY
Autobahn becomes table
The autobahns are renowned for average speeds well in excess of 130kph, but the average dropped to near zero on Sunday as tens of thousands of people sat at a 60km-long table for a cultural celebration titled, appropriately enough, “Still Life.” Cars were strictly forbidden. “Attention on the A40,” a radio traffic report warned. “There is a 60 kilometer closure between Duisburg and Dortmund due to the longest table in the world.” A festival spokesman said an estimated 3 million people turned out amid fine weather, 1 million of them with their bicycles, to celebrate on the highway between Dortmund and Bochum. Tens of thousands sat at the table, which was made up of 20,000 individual tables, spokesman Oliver Haenig, said. The highway, which crosses North Rhine-Westphalia state, is normally one of Europe’s busiest.
■NIGERIA
Gunmen release journalists
Gunmen in the southeastern oil region released four local journalists and their driver unharmed on Sunday, after nearly a week in captivity. The kidnappers ambushed a convoy of cars carrying the journalists in the southern state of Akwa Ibom on Monday last week as it approached Aba, in neighboring Abia state. “Due to the pressure from various quarters, the kidnappers had to release us this morning,” Wahab Oba, chairman of the Lagos state chapter of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, told reporters shortly after being freed. Oba said no ransom was paid for their release. The gunmen had initially demanded 250 million naira (US$1.7 million).
■IRAN
Tehran to file complaint
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Sunday Tehran would file a complaint to international bodies over the deadly mosque bombing by an insurgent group he said the US supported. The twin suicide bombings of a mosque in the southeast killed 28 people on Thursday last week in an attack claimed by the Jundallah insurgent group as revenge for the execution of its leader by Iranian authorities last month. Ahmadinejad did not specify if the complaint would be specifically against the US, but he did tell state TV that the US supported the bombings.
■UNITED STATES
Eight wounded in shooting
Police say eight people were wounded in a burst of gunfire in downtown Indianapolis during the Indiana Black Expo and two more in separate shootings that followed. Police spokesman Lieutenant Jeff Duhamell said early on Sunday that authorities made no immediate arrests directly tied to the shootings and were seeking those responsible. He said none of the injuries was life-threatening. Police said the victims were males ages 10 to 18.
■UNITED STATES
Holy Land ‘killer’ charged
Police in Connecticut charged a 19-year-old man with raping and killing a 16-year-old girl after the two walked together to a closed and decaying religious attraction. Francisco Cruz, of Waterbury, is charged with murder and sexual assault in the death of his friend Chloe Ottman. Her body was found near Holy Land USA on Saturday. Police say Cruz admitted that he killed Ottman on Thursday evening and led investigators to her body. The 7 hectare former religious attraction is on a hillside overlooking Waterbury. It featured a Hollywood-style Holy Land USA sign and replicas of Bethlehem and Jerusalem made from scrap wood, chicken wire, sheet-metal and other materials. It closed years ago, though its 15m cross is still illuminated at night.
‘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