THAILAND
Three policemen shot
Three policemen were shot dead in an ambush by suspected Muslim militants in the insurgency-racked far south, an official said yesterday. The three Muslim officers were returning from evening prayers when they were attacked on Thursday night in Krong Pinang District in Yala Province, police said. “It’s the work of militants who want to incite further unrest,” Yala deputy police commander Colonel Banlue Chuwet said by telephone. An imam was shot in the leg in the same attack, he added.
PHILIPPINES
Senator refuses to make plea
A court has entered a not-guilty plea for a senator and dictatorship-era martial law enforcer who has been detained on charges of economic plunder with two other prominent colleagues. The Sandiganbayan Court made the move after ailing Senator Juan Ponce Enrile refused to enter a plea on Friday to the large-scale corruption charge, which he has denied. The 90-year-old legislator was brought to the court in an ambulance from a police hospital, where he has been detained since surrendering last week. Enrile and two other senators were ordered arrested by the court for allegedly receiving huge kickbacks from a scam that diverted millions of dollars from antipoverty and development funds allotted to lawmakers. Enrile was defense minister when former president Ferdinand Marcos placed the nation under martial rule in 1972.
VANUATU
Inter-island ferry sinks
Two people were confirmed dead and another two were missing after an inter-island ferry sank in the Pacific archipelago yesterday, with survivors forced to endure more than six hours adrift, officials said. The ferry carrying 30 passengers and 13 crew sank in the early hours of the morning as it was sailing from Malekula to the capital, Port Vila, Vanuatu Red Cross chief executive Jacqueline De Gaillande said. “The accident happened at 2am this morning [yesterday] and we were aware of it at 8am,” she said. “By 10am the boat had completely sunk in 800 feet [240m] of water... Right now, we have 28 passengers safe and 11 crew. The bodies of two women passengers have been recovered, and there is one crew member and one child missing.” De Gaillande said the cause of the accident was unknown.
ENGLAND
Rickshaw takes motorway
A Frenchman pedaling home on a rickshaw took a wrong turn onto a motorway and was stopped by police on Wednesday. The rider, dressed in a straw hat and a gray sweater despite heavy rain, was apprehended near the town of Lewes. “Police helping a lost French man... on his way to Paris on his Rickshaw,” local police wrote on Twitter, with a photo of the man astride his three-wheeled cart. Police escorted the rider to the end of the motorway, where he was able to join a cycle path to continue his journey via the port of Newhaven.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
China would train thousands of foreign law enforcement officers to see the world order “develop in a more fair, reasonable and efficient direction,” its minister for public security has said. “We will [also] send police consultants to countries in need to conduct training to help them quickly and effectively improve their law enforcement capabilities,” Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong (王小洪) told an annual global security forum. Wang made the announcement in the eastern city of Lianyungang on Monday in front of law enforcement representatives from 122 countries, regions and international organizations such as Interpol. The forum is part of ongoing