MEXICO
Correct daughter found
A prosecutor said DNA tests on Alondra Diaz match the US mother who has been searching for her for eight years. Jose Martin Godoy Castro late on Thursday said tests show that Alondra is the daughter of Houston woman Dorotea Garcia, who has searched for the girl since Alondra’s father took her to Mexico without her consent. Garcia’s search gained international attention last month after Judge Cinthia Elodia Mercado ruled that another teenager, Alondra Luna, 14, was the missing girl and ordered her released to Garcia. Video recordings circulated widely of Alondra Luna screaming and desperately resisting police after the court decision. Garcia reunited with her real daughter late on Tuesday in a courtroom in the western state of Michoacan.
MEXICO
Two missing in plane crash
A British and a US citizen are missing after their airplane crashed off the coast of Puerto Vallarta in the west of the nation, officials said on Thursday. The crash occurred last week in the popular resort area and the two have been missing since, local fire service chief and civil protection head Carlos Gomez told reporters. The small plane, a Cessna 180, which is often used used for skydiving, came down on May 7, about 1km from the coast of Las Glorias beach in Jalisco. Wreckage from the aircraft was found about 1,000m below sea level, Gomez said. “It is still unknown whether the bodies of missing people are inside the fuselage,” Gomez added. A Mexican pilot and two US citizens survived the accident, although the Americans sustained minor injuries.
HONDURAS
Missing state funds probed
Officials on Thursday said they are investigating allegations that millions of dollars embezzled from the Institute of Social Security might have been used to finance the National Party. The Ministry of Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs said in a statement that authorities were studying checks issued by the state agency. The ministry did not say which party received the checks, but National Anti-Corruption Council director Gabriela Castellanos said three protected witnesses have said it is the National Party of President Juan Orlando Hernandez. “The moment these witnesses, who are implicated in acts of corruption, told us they knew of the existence of checks written to the National Party, we put them before the Public Ministry,” she said. She said top businessmen, officials and politicians were involved in the alleged scam.
ISRAEL
New government approved
Parliament late on Thursday narrowly approved Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s new government. The new administration marks a shift to the right and looks likely to complicate Netanyahu’s fraught relationships with the Palestinians and with US President Barack Obama. “We will safeguard our security and strive for peace,” Netanyahu said in a speech ahead of the parliamentary vote, which was interrupted by loud laughter from the opposition and heckling from Arab Israeli lawmakers, three of whom were ejected. After two months of coalition horse-trading, the session was delayed for another two hours to give Netanyahu time to placate senior members of his Likud party. They were dissatisfied by the portfolios they received, after Netanyahu was forced to give ministerial positions to coalition partners. Opposition members called the prime minister’s deal-making “a farce” and the coalition was approved by a vote of 61-59.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not