THAILAND
Bangkok floods spread
Floodwaters are moving closer to the heart of the capital, with officials warning that no major barriers are standing in the way to prevent the water from reaching downtown Bangkok. City spokesman Jate Sopitpongstorn said yesterday that workers have finished building a massive flood wall in hopes of diverting some of the mass of water still piled up in northern Bangkok. However, he said the city would have to rely on its existing drainage system to fight water that was already less than 10km from the central business district.
IRAQ
Bombs target Sahwa leader
Four bombs targeting the home of an Iraqi anti-al-Qaeda militia leader killed at least three people and wounded several north of Baghdad yesterday, security officials said. The bomb blasts struck the home of Yassin Issa Daud, a leader of Sahwa militia in Taji at about 6:30am, Taji police Captain Ahmed Fahad said. The explosions killed three people, including Daud’s brother and wife, and wounded six other people, Fahad said, adding Daud was not in his home at the time of the attack. Officials from the interior and defence ministries put the toll at four killed and 11 wounded. “Four people were killed and 11 others wounded by the explosion of four roadside bombs that targeted the house of a Sahwa leader in Taji,” the interior ministry official said.
SOUTH AFRICA
Lions shot after attacks
Wildlife workers drove through the night across sand and dunes, desperate to save two lions who had strayed from a vast park and killed a farmer’s cow. The farmer had already killed a third lion. South African National Parks spokeswoman Henriette Engelbrecht on Wednesday said that instead of saving the big cats, a park researcher ended up rescuing a ranger, pulling him free and leaving the ranger’s boot in the lion’s jaws. The two lions were then shot. Engelbrecht says Tuesday’s events near the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park left two rangers and a researcher “very disappointed and very shocked.” She says the men had never before met with lions bold enough to attack people in a vehicle.
KENYA
Murder probe restarted
British police say a team of detectives has traveled to Kenya to further investigate the murder of a British woman more than 20 years ago. Julie Ward, 28, was murdered in September 1988 while visiting the Masai Mara game reserve to photograph animals. Two game rangers were charged and acquitted in 1992 in relation to the murder. Britain’s Metropolitan Police said on Friday that six detectives and a crime scene manager will work alongside Kenyan police for 11 days, interviewing witnesses. The team also will pursue DNA and fingerprint evidence. The force has made at least three previous trips to Kenya in relation to the case.
NIGERIA
Bombings rock cities
A triple suicide bombing of military headquarters in Maiduguri and three roadside bombs in different areas shook northeast Nigeria’s biggest city on Friday, while militants launched multiple gun and bomb attacks two other cities west of it, witnesses and the military said. It was one of the most violent days in radical Islamist sect Boko Haram’s growing campaign of violence against local authorities in Borno state. Earlier, three roadside bombs exploded in quick succession in an apparently coordinated strike, hitting the wards of Meduguri and Jajeri and the El-Kanemi College of Islamic Theology.
BRAZIL
Jilted fiancee compensated
A court has ordered a man to pay US$6,500 for saying: “I don’t” to his former fiancee. Rio de Janeiro State Judge Benedicto Abicair said that Marcelo de Azevedo Fernandes must pay for “moral and material” damages to Cristiane Costa de Andrade. The ruling was posted on Friday on the court’s Web site. The couple was to have been married in September 2007, but Fernandes called it off. The judge said in his ruling that Andrade’s “suffering, anguish and humiliation cannot be ignored.” The fine is supposed to pay for the jilted woman’s wedding costs and visits to a psychologist.
CANADA
‘Super visa’ unveiled
Officials on Friday announced a new two-year, multi-entry “super visa” for parents and grandparents of immigrants settled in Canada. The move came after wait times for sponsorship of “family class” applications had grown to an unwieldy seven years or longer. The multiple-entry “Parent and Grandparent Super Visa” will be valid for up to 10 years, officials said, and allow applicants to remain in Canada for 24 months before needing seek visa renewal. The new visas will begin on Dec. 1 and the will be issued, “on average, within eight weeks of the application,” officials said.
BRITAIN
Come clean on duchy: ruling
A tribunal said Prince Charles must end a culture of secrecy covering his 700-year-old Duchy of Cornwall estate and answer some public requests for environmental information. The First-Tier Tribunal on information rights said on Friday that it had ruled on Thursday on a tussle between an environmental campaigner and the heir to the throne. Judge John Angel said the Duchy of Cornwall — the 55,000 hectare estate established in the 14th century — must abide by environmental information regulations. It means the estate must answer requests made under the regulations, which are similar to freedom of information laws, but relate to environmental issues. The duchy earned Prince Charles almost £18 million (US$29 million) last year.
UNITED STATES
Central Park cleared for race
The thousands of runners in the New York City Marathon this weekend will have a clear path through Central Park after workers removed branches and trees snapped by a snowstorm late last month. Central Park Conservancy spokeswoman Dena Libner said on Thursday that the cleanup would continue for a couple more weeks, but that the park would be ready for today’s race. Thousands of trees were damaged over about 160 hectares of the park. The National Weather Service said about 7.6cm of wet snow weighed down branches until they snapped. The marathon runs through all five city boroughs and ends in Central Park.
ITALY
Bombing spared Roman sites
An archeologist is thanking NATO for the precision of its bombing raids over Libya, saying they spared many of the country’s ancient Roman sites. Hafed Walda, a Libya-born research fellow at King’s College, London, told a conference in Rome on Friday that inspections had not revealed any damage to the ancient ruins of Leptis Magna and Sabratha. He says he wants to “say thank you to NATO for achieving precision strikes” during the campaign to protect civilians from slain Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi’s regime during this year’s revolt. Walda said he would be heading soon to Benghazi, but reports indicate there has been no damage to sites there either.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
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
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was