INDONESIA
Trade minister resigns
Trade Minister Gita Wirjawan yesterday said he had resigned, effective immediately, to focus on his campaign to win the presidential nomination for the ruling Democratic Party. The US-educated former investment banker is one of 10 candidates vying for the party’s nomination. State Enterprises Minister Dahlan Iskan, a media magnate, is expected to throw his hat in the ring, forcing a small Cabinet reshuffle as early as this weekend. The general election is in April. Political parties must secure either 20 percent of the seats or 25 percent of the vote to nominate a candidate for the July presidential poll.
IRAQ
Public building attacked
Gunmen and suicide bombers staged a brazen assault on a government building in Baghdad on Thursday, officials said, killing two people. The firefight at a state-run transportation company was one of several attacks that left 11 dead across the city. At least six gunmen stormed the Company for Transportation, interior ministry spokesman Saad Maan Ibrahim said. Police shot and killed four of the militants inside the building, while the other two blew themselves up at the entrance, Maan said. He added that the stand-off ended with at least one employee and a policeman killed in the attack, but gave no details on how they died.
PANAMA
32 N Koreans released
Authorities have released 32 of the 35 North Koreans detained since July last year after an undeclared cargo of Cuban arms was found on their ship, prosecutors said on Thursday. The remaining three North Koreans — the Chong Chon Gang vessel’s captain, first officer and political secretary — face trial on arms trafficking charges, prosecutor Nathaniel Murgas told reporters. He said the organized crime office ordered the sailors’ release on Tuesday, and that they were turned over to immigration authorities. The other crew members face up to 12 years in prison if convicted.
LIBYA
Assembly poll date set
The nation is to elect an assembly on Feb. 20 to draft a constitution intended to advance the transition to democracy and break political stalemate more than two years after a NATO-backed uprising toppled Muammar Qaddafi. Just hours before the congress decision, gunmen kidnapped the son of the special forces commander in Benghazi, later calling the colonel to demand he withdraw troops in return for his son’s release, state news agency LANA said. At least one soldier was killed, medical and security sources said, after troops clashed with gunmen in the eastern city. “We want all Libyan people and groups to reconcile and support these elections,” General National Congress President Nouri Abusahmain said after announcing the date of the vote on Thursday.
UNITED STATES
Heroin in Happy Meals
A McDonald’s worker accused of dealing heroin in Happy Meal boxes to customers using the code phrase “I’d like to buy a toy” was being held on bail on Thursday in Pittsburgh, a spokesman for a local prosecutor said. Police arrested Shantia Dennis, 26, on Wednesday on charges of drug distribution after undercover officers conducted a controlled buy under the Golden Arches, a statement from the Allegheny County District Attorney’s Office said. They also seized a 50-unit bag of heroin from Dennis as well as 10 units purchased by the plainclothes officers, office spokesman Mike Manko said.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion