UNITED STATES
Civil rights lawyer dies
D’Army Bailey, a lawyer and judge who helped preserve the Memphis hotel where civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated and turn it into National Civil Rights Museum, died on Sunday, his wife said. Adrienne Bailey said her husband, 73, died after a long illness, surrounded by family at Methodist Hospital in Memphis. D’Army Bailey led the fight to preserve the crumbling Lorraine Motel, where King was slain while standing on a balcony on April 4, 1968. Bailey assembled donors to buy the hotel, which ultimately became the National Civil Rights Museum in 1991. Former senator Harold Ford Sr called Bailey an “unwavering advocate for justice.” Bailey received his law degree from Yale and practiced civil rights law in New York before moving to California. He is the author of The Education of a Black Radical: A Southern Civil Rights Activist’s Journey, 1959-1964 and Dr Martin Luther King Jr’s Final Journey.
JORDAN
Court releases journalist
A government-owned newspaper said that the state security court has released a staff reporter who was detained last week for allegedly violating a ban on writing about a foiled terror plot. Al-Rai daily yesterday reported that Ghazi Mrayat was freed on bail a day earlier after initially being ordered held for 15 days. At issue was a follow-up story Mrayat wrote about the arrest of an Iraqi suspect, who allegedly was sent by an Iranian group to carry out bombings in Jordan. The journalist was detained two days after a state security court imposed the news blackout last week. Al-Rai has said it did not receive the gag order in writing. The Jordanian journalists’ association and the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists had called for Mrayat’s release.
UNITED STATES
Disability pride rally in NY
New York City hosted its first parade on Sunday supporting people with disabilities, with more than 3,000 participants heading up Broadway using wheelchairs, canes and guide dogs. “We’re here full force,” said rapper Namel Norris, 33, in a wheelchair after being shot in the Bronx and paralyzed as a teenager. “I thought my life was over, but music is my calling, I have a purpose in life.” Mayor Bill de Blasio opened the inaugural NYC Disability Pride Parade, saying he is proud his city is a leader in supporting rights for disabled people. The grand marshal was former senator Tom Harkin, the Democrat who 25 years ago sponsored the Americans With Disabilities Act. De Blasio said his administration is “very, very committed already on the issue of accessible taxis, but all Tom Harkin had to do was say London was doing better to get my competitive fire going,” the mayor said.
IRAN
US reporter’s trial resumes
The trial of Washington Post journalist Jason Rezaian, accused of spying on Iran for the US, resumed behind closed doors yesterday in Tehran, state media said. The case against the 39-year-old, a dual US-Iranian citizen who denies guilt, but has been in custody for almost a year, comes with Tehran locked in nuclear talks with world powers. As Iranians waited for news of a possible nuclear deal in Vienna, the official IRNA news agency said the third session of Rezaian’s trial — he first faced the spying charges in May — had started. The report gave no other details of the proceedings. Rezaian was detained on July 22 last year. He is accused of collecting confidential information, cooperating with hostile governments and disseminating propaganda against the Iranian regime.
SOUTH KOREA
Pyongyang ‘confirms purge’
North Korea has confirmed the purging of its defense chief two months after Seoul’s spy service said he had been executed for disloyalty to leader Kim Jong-un, an official said yesterday. The National Intelligence Service told legislators in May that North Korean Minister of the People’s Armed Forces Hyon Yong-chol was killed by anti-aircraft gunfire for “talking back to Kim,” complaining about his policies and sleeping during a meeting. North Korean state media have since not mentioned Hyon or his disappearance. However, over the weekend, Pyongyang’s official Korean Central News Agency described Korean People’s Army General Pak Yong-sik as the minister of defense in a report about a meeting with a Lao military delegation. South Korean Unification Ministry spokesman Jeong Joon-hee yesterday told reporters that this confirmed Hyon’s replacement and purging.
ROMANIA
PM drops party post in probe
Prime Minister Victor Ponta stepped down as leader of the ruling Social Democratic Party until the conclusion of a corruption probe. Ponta is giving up the post to avoid damaging the party amid the investigation against him on charges of forgery, money laundering and complicity to tax fraud, he said on Sunday on Facebook. He would not hold any party positions for now, but would take part in party leadership meetings, spokeswoman Gabriela Firea said in an e-mailed statement. The corruption scandal has rocked the EU member since last month. Ponta, the first acting Romanian head of government to be targeted by a criminal probe, said he would stay on as prime minister after he resumed his post on Thursday, following a three-week absence for knee surgery in Turkey. “There is a new, special situation to which I have to react,” he said on Facebook. “The Social Democratic Party president is being investigated by anticorruption prosecutors.”
RUSSIA
Barracks collapse kills 18
At least 18 soldiers were killed when their barracks collapsed in Siberia, Ministry of Defense spokesman Igor Konashenkov said yesterday, adding that five troops remained missing. “Thirty-seven servicemen have been pulled out of the debris; 18 have died,” Konashenkov said in televised remarks. “The search is ongoing for five soldiers. Nineteen have been hospitalized.” The incident happened late on Sunday near the city of Omsk at a paratrooper training facility. TV footage showed that a section of the four-story building had collapsed and soldiers formed a chain, passing debris to clear the mountain of rubble. “Half of the heap has been cleared,” acting paratrooper commander Nikolai Ignatov told Rossiya 24 news.
FRANCE
Hostages freed, culprits flee
A group of armed assailants entered a discount clothing store near Paris yesterday, trapping 18 people inside for hours before fleeing and prompting a search throughout the area, police said. All 18 people were safely evacuated from the Primark store in a shopping center in the town of Villeneuve-la-Garenne, a regional police official said, adding that police were pursuing the suspects. Officers surrounded the shopping center and cordoned off the neighborhood about 10km north of central Paris. The suspects entered the store at about 6:30am in what police believe was an attempted robbery, another police official said. The officials were not authorized to be named. There was no immediate sign of a political or other motive for the robbery.
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
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was