CHINA
Demolition officials fired
Local officials in a central Chinese province violated rules in forcibly demolishing part of a hospital, sending medical staff fleeing and burying under rubble six bodies being processed at a morgue, the state broadcaster CCTV said yesterday. Xiong Zhiliang, a district official overseeing demolition work in the city of Zhengzhou, was fired, while local police were further investigating Thursday’s incident, CCTV said. Forced demolitions are common in Chinese cities, where local authorities turn to real estate development to fuel economic growth. Clashes over land are frequent, and some turn deadly. The No. 4 Hospital of Zhengzhou University has accused the local government of ordering the demolition after failing to get the hospital to agree to a road expansion project. The hospital management also complained to state media that it was extremely disrespectful for the demolition crew to bury the dead in the rubble. The Huiji district government in Zhengzhou on Thursday said that it sent in the bulldozer only after the hospital turned a deaf ear to requests that its CT room and morgue must be demolished to make way for the road project. The district defended itself by saying that the workers checked that no one was inside before they tore down the buildings.
YEMEN
Peace talks delayed
The next round of peace talks between the Yemeni government and Iran-backed Huthi rebels scheduled for next week have been postponed, Yemeni Minister of Foreign Affairs Abdel Malak al-Mekhlafi said on Saturday. “The negotiations will not take place on the announced date of Jan. 14,” Mekhlafi said on the telephone from Cairo. “They will be postponed until Jan. 20 or 23 because the Huthis rejected the date of Jan. 14,” he said. Al-Mekhlafi said UN envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed would travel to the capital, Sana’a yesterday to “convince the Huthis to participate in the negotiations on the new date.” The envoy would also seek “confidence-building measures” from the Huthis, including the lifting of their siege of Taez and allowing aid into the southwestern city, he added. The next round of peace talks would be held in Geneva, al-Mekhlafi said. The Yemeni government sat down with the rebels and their allies in Switzerland last month for six days of talks that ended with no major breakthrough. The UN says fighting since March has killed thousands of people and left about 80 percent of the population in need of humanitarian aid.
UNITED KINGDOM
Dead actress’ partner held
British media reports said the partner of a former EastEnders actress who was murdered along with her two sons has been arrested in Ghana. British police earlier opened a murder inquiry for Sian Blake, eight-year-old Zachary and four-year-old Amon, whose bodies were found in the garden of their home in southeast London. The three were last seen onDec. 13. The BBC and others reported on Saturday, without citing sources, that Blake’s partner, Arthur Simpson-Kent, was detained in Ghana. Simpson-Kent disappeared after speaking to detectives on Dec. 16. When asked about the reports, Scotland Yard said detectives are aware of an arrest in Ghana, but cannot confirm the identity of the man. Police in Ghana on Saturday said they had tracked down and arrested Simpson-Kent. “The suspect has been arrested by police and I can confirm his identity,” a Ghanaian police spokesman said. “He was at a hideout in Western Region,” he added. Blake, 43, appeared in the long-running soap opera in 1996 to 1997.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of