INDIA
Foundry explosion kills 10
At least 10 people were killed and several others seriously injured in an explosion at a steel foundry in the southeast, a local government official said on Thursday. “Ten people died in the blast on Wednesday evening and about nine are battling for their lives in hospital,” said Lav Agarwal, district administrator of Visakhapatnam in the state of Andhra Pradesh. Local media reported that a fire broke out on Wednesday after a huge blast heard at about 8pm, and that firefighters continued to battle the blaze in the morning as a full search for further bodies was undertaken.
AUSTRALIA
Scout descendant accused
A man reported to be the great-grandson of Scout movement founder Robert Baden-Powell appeared in a Brisbane court yesterday charged with murdering his wife. Gerard Baden-Clay, 41, is accused of killing his wife, Allison, and interfering with her corpse, which was found in a Brisbane creek 10 days after he reported her missing to police in April. He was charged on Wednesday, following a two-month investigation which saw searchers scour massive tracts of land near the family home where the couple lived with their three daughters.
THAILAND
Police find body of student
Police have recovered the body of a US college student who went missing after a late-night swim off the resort island of Phuket. Police Lieutenant Colonel Panya Chaichana said that Joshua Shane’s body washed ashore yesterday afternoon. Panya said Shane appeared to have drowned. The 21-year-old student from Arizona State University disappeared after he went swimming with at least three friends on Tuesday night. The university said he had been studying abroad. Panya said a teacher accompanying the students confirmed his identity.
AUSTRALIA
Crocodile safaris considered
A plan is being considered to allow the trophy hunting of saltwater crocodiles, officials said yesterday, with the controversial idea being thrown open for public comment. The federal government rejected a similar proposal several years ago on the grounds that it was not appropriate, but has agreed to revisit the issue as crocodile numbers soar. Environment Minister Tony Burke said he would not comment until the consultation process, open until July 25, takes its course. If approved, it would mean hunters could pay money to kill crocodiles, which the Northern Territory government says will provide jobs for Aborigines — with most crocodile habitat on their land — and stimulate tourism.
NEW ZEALAND
Lucy Lawless gladly guilty
Xena: Warrior Princess actress Lucy Lawless says she has “no regrets” about boarding and preventing an oil-drilling ship from leaving a New Zealand dock, a protest action that saw her plead guilty yesterday to trespass charges. “For the first time in my life, I put my body and reputation on the line to stand up for my beliefs and do the right thing,” she said. “I hope I’ve encouraged other people to do the same.” In February, the 44-year-old native New Zealander and six other Greenpeace activists climbed a drilling tower on the vessel Noble Discoverer, which was docked in New Zealand bound for the Arctic, to protest oil exploration in the Arctic. Lawless spent four days atop the 53m tower, camping and blogging about her experiences.
UNITED STATES
‘Goodfellas’ mobster dies
Henry Hill, the mobster turned government informant portrayed in the book Wiseguy and later in the movie Goodfellas, has died after a long illness. Hill, 69, died at a Los Angeles hospital on Tuesday from heart failure, his fiance Lisa Schinelli Caserta told celebrity news Web site TMZ.com. Born on June 11, 1943, in Brooklyn, New York, Hill was an associate of New York City’s Lucchese crime family from the 1960s to the 1980s. Hill became an FBI informant fearing for his life after he and others stole US$5 million from Lufthansa Airlines at JFK airport in 1978 and several of his associates were later killed. He and his wife were expelled from the program in the early 1990s.
UNITED STATES
Lawmaker pleads for man
Representative Chris Smith met with senior Bolivian officials to plead for the release of a New York man who he said had been wrongly jailed without charge for a year. Smith said the Bolivian interior and justice ministers promised him they would personally look into the case of Jacob Ostreicher. Smith met with the US citizen earlier this week and attended a court hearing. Ostreicher made an investment in rice farming and said he was swindled by an associate who turned out to have been involved with a drug trafficker. Prosecutors jailed Ostreicher in June last year on suspicion of money laundering.
UNITED STATES
Man loses shooting case
A Texas man who claimed the state’s stand-your-ground law allowed him to fatally shoot a neighbor after an argument about noise at a party has been convicted of murder. A jury convicted 47-year-old Raul Rodriguez on Wednesday in Houston in the death of 36-year-old Kelly Danaher. He faces up to life in prison. Prosecutors called Rodriguez, who took a gun when he went to complain about Danaher’s party in 2010, the aggressor. Defense attorneys argued the retired Houston area firefighter acted in self-defense.
GAZA STRIP
Groups seek blockade end
Fifty international aid groups and UN agencies have called on Israel to lift its Gaza border blockade, saying it violates international law. Israel began restricting access to Gaza after Hamas militants captured an Israeli soldier in 2006. It tightened the blockade after Hamas seized the territory in 2007. Since 2010, Israel has limited Gaza exports and travel. Egypt used to cooperate, but eased restrictions after the fall of former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak last year. The groups said yesterday that more than half of Gaza’s 1.6 million people are children. Signatories include seven UN agencies, among them the WHO.
JORDAN
Boy kills family members
A 17-year-old Jordanian went on a shooting spree, killing his father, mother, two brothers and an uncle because he had “differences” with them, police said yesterday. “The suspect has confessed to killing five members of his family, including his father, who works as a teacher, mother, two brothers, who study at a local university and his uncle, a retired colonel,” a police spokesman said, speaking on condition of anonymity. The spokesman added that police “found the bodies wrapped in clothes on the floor of the family house. “Almost all of the victims have been shot in the head,” he said, adding that further investigations were under way. He did not elaborate on the nature of the “differences.”
‘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