AFGHANISTAN
Soldier in hearing on suicide
A US soldier charged with abuse that led to the suicide of a 19-year-old fellow soldier faced a preliminary hearing yesterday on a base in the country, the military said. Specialist Ryan Offutt is charged with offenses including maltreatment, involuntary manslaughter and negligent homicide in the death of Private Danny Chen, the military statement said. Offutt is one of eight infantrymen charged in connection with Chen’s suicide. Chen shot himself in a guardhouse on Oct. 3 last year after what investigators say were weeks of racial slurs and physical abuse.
PHILIPPINES
Magnitude 5.7 quake strikes
A moderate earthquake roused people from sleep, but caused no injuries or damage in the north early yesterday, officials said. The US Geological Survey (USGS) reported that the magnitude 5.7 earthquake hit the Babuyan Islands region off the country’s mountainous north. Officials in the country placed its magnitude at 5.5. The quake’s center, at a depth of 22.4km, was about 511km north of Manila, the USGS said. Benito Ramos, who heads the government’s Office of Civil Defense, said the quake woke some people up, but did not cause any injuries or damage.
PHILIPPINES
Summit called on disputes
The country has urged ASEAN to hold a summit of China and five other Asian claimants to try to resolve long-simmering territorial disputes in the South China Sea. Foreign Secretary Albert del Rosario said yesterday he asked his ASEAN counterparts during an annual meeting in Cambodia last week to back the country’s call for the 10-member bloc to organize such a summit “as soon as possible.” Manila is ready to host the unprecedented meeting, he said.
SOUTH KOREA
North denies punishments
North Korea on Saturday angrily hit back at allegations that citizens who failed to appear sincere in the mourning of the North’s late leader Kim Jong-il were being rounded up and sentenced to hard labor. Some media outlets in the South have claimed North Koreans who did not participate in organized public mourning, failed to cry or did not appear genuine, have been sentenced to at least six months in labor camps. However, Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency said such “misinformation” touched off “towering resentment” among North Koreans, denouncing those who spread the allegations as “pitiable human scum.”
CAMBODIA
French deaths probed
Police were yesterday investigating how five bodies, thought to be those of a Frenchman and his four children who went missing last year, ended up in a car dumped in a pond behind the French family’s home. Laurent Vallier, 42, and his children aged between two and nine disappeared from their home in Kompong Speu Province near the capital, Phnom Penh, in September and the French embassy said it had alerted authorities in November that they were missing. The embassy said in a statement it had been informed of the discovery of the remains, but that, “because of the state of the corpses, it is impossible to confirm that these are the bodies of Monsieur Vallier and his children.” Police said one skull had been found inside an open suitcase, having apparently floated in there after the car was submerged. Relatives of Vallier’s Cambodian wife, who died during childbirth, held a religious ceremony for the dead yesterday.
MEXICO
Women held for trafficking
Investigators say four women are being held in the city of Guadalajara in connection with an apparent child-trafficking ring that aimed to supply babies to childless Irish couples. The Jalisco State prosecutor’s office said a 21-year-old woman had been arrested after a relative reported that she was “renting out” one of her children. The woman said she had been paid to give the child to a group of three women who needed baby pictures for legitimate advertising purposes. Investigators found the other three women were taking the child and several others to a hotel where Irish couples believed they were going to adopt them.
UNITED STATES
Escaped detainee surrenders
A man who stole a police car after having his hands handcuffed behind his back turned himself in to state troopers in Indiana after two days on the run. William Blankenship, 22, surrendered on Thursday evening after meeting with two state troopers at his family home in Knox, police said. Blankenship was pulled over for speeding on Tuesday, handcuffed and put in the back seat of a police car after an officer reported seeing drug paraphernalia in his car, authorities said. As the officer checked the suspect’s car, Blankenship drove off with the police car, which was found on Wednesday in a pond.
ARGENTINA
Woman hit by cat
An elderly woman was left fighting for her life on Saturday after a cat thrown out of a fourth-floor apartment during a heated argument landed on her head, local media reported. The incident occurred in the Belgrano neighborhood of Buenos Aires when, during the dispute, a man grabbed the family cat and threw it at his wife. She managed to dodge the feline, which then sailed through an open window plunging toward the ground and striking the woman, an 85-year-old neighbor. Police said the victim suffered a fractured skull and was rushed to hospital, where she had to be connected to a ventilator.
UNITED KINGDOM
Kate Bush stalker deported
Police say a man was arrested close to the home of singer Kate Bush, amid media reports that a fan broke into her home and attempted to propose marriage. Devon and Cornwall police confirmed on Saturday that a 32-year-old man was detained on Dec. 26 and later deported, following a report of damaged property at Bush’s home in Devon. The Daily Mail newspaper reported that the man was Frank Tufaro, from New York, who had flown to Britain with a US$4,500 Tiffany engagement ring. The newspaper said the singer was not at home at the time of the incident.
UNITED KINGDOM
ATM heist falls short
Thieves spent six months digging a tunnel to steal money from an automatic teller (ATM) machine — but probably only got away with £6,000, officials said on Saturday. The gang dug the 30m long tunnel under a car park and part of a video shop in Manchester, in order to raid the cash machine inside the building, police said. They installed lighting and roof supports, and were also believed to have drilled tiny holes into the floor of the store through which they poked telescopic cameras to check their progress. “In all my years of service, I have never seen anything quite as elaborate as this,” Detective Ian Shore said. However, a source at the store said there was only just over £6,000 in the machine.
‘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
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
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