UNITED STATES
‘Ugliest dog’ goes to Yoda
Yoda’s short tufts of hair, protruding tongue and long, seemingly hairless legs were enough to earn it the World’s Ugliest Dog title at a Northern California fair. The 14-year-old Chinese crested and Chihuahua mix won the honor on Friday night at the 23rd annual contest at the Sonoma Marin Fair. Owner Terry Schumacher of Hanford, California, said the 900g dog has come a long way since she was found abandoned behind an apartment building. Schumacher says she first thought the pooch was a rat.
Photo: AFP
MALI
Terrorists killed in raid
The bodies of militants belonging to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb — killed during a raid on their camp in the western Wagadou region by army forces from neighboring Mauritania — have been found, a Mauritanian military official said on Saturday. “We are seeing bodies on the ground, burned out cars,” said the official speaking from the Mauritanian capital Nouakchott, without giving a precise death toll. The official said troops were combing nearby forest. “It’s complicated and dangerous, the terrorists may have mined the area. They are dangerous. We have to take maximum care to avoid ambushes,” the official said. A Malian official said earlier that he “could not say from which side the casualties had come.” The Mauritanian army bombed the camp on Friday evening in an operation that involved fierce fighting and left four soldiers wounded, security sources said.
LIBYA
Soccer players defect
Four members of the national soccer team and 13 other soccer figures have defected to rebels in a blow to Muammar Qaddafi’s government, the rebel authority said on Saturday. Qaddafi has faced a string of defections by officers and diplomats, but has resisted efforts by rebels backed by a NATO bombing campaign to dislodge him after four decades in power. Abdel Hafiz Ghoga, vice chairman of the rebel council, said the soccer players had been in touch with the insurgent leadership in Benghazi and were staying in Tunisia. “It’s a direct reflection of opinions and feelings of all people across Libya. These 17 members were on their way to Mali when they declared their defection,” he said.
RUSSIA
NBA owner to lead party
The billionaire owner of basketball’s New Jersey Nets took charge of a pro-business political party in his native country on Saturday, a move that could help reformists marginalized under Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Mikhail Prokhorov, who earned his fortune in the metals industry, before buying his way into the US’ NBA, said he planned to make the Right Cause party into the main alternative to Putin’s long-dominant United Russia. Right Cause was formed just two years ago and has no seats in parliament after reformist groups were eliminated from the political maintream under Putin, who was president from 2000 until 2008. Prokhorov said in an acceptance speech after being elected Right Cause’s leader that he hoped to make it the second-largest party in parliament. Right Cause does not describe itself as an opposition party and backs President Dmitry Medvedev.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of