MEXICO
Blast injures five captives
A gas explosion ripped through a house where dozens of abducted migrants were being held captive in a city near the Texas border on Monday, injuring five people, two of them gravely, authorities said. Grupo Coordinacion, a joint governmental security agency in the state of Tamaulipas, said in a statement that the afternoon blast blew out the windows and doors of the home in Reynosa, which is across from McAllen, Texas. Three of the five were hospitalized, and all were from Guatemala. Authorities were trying to locate an unknown number of migrants who may have been injured, but ran away after the blast. Investigators determined the house was being used by a criminal gang to hold captive at least 60 migrants of different nationalities who were trying to get to the US. The migrants told police they were abducted a week ago.
WORLD
Shark attacks hit record
Last year saw a record-
setting 98 unprovoked shark attacks worldwide, including 30 in Florida alone, data released by the Florida Museum of Natural History on Monday showed. The previous record was 88 attacks in 2000, scientists say. International Shark Attack File curator George Burgess said attacks were expected to continue to increase as human populations grow and shark populations recover. Of the six fatalities last year, two happened off the Indian Ocean island of Reunion; the others occurred off Australia, Egypt, New Caledonia and the US. The US led the world with 59 attacks, including those in Florida, eight in each of the Carolinas and seven in Hawaii. California and Texas each had two attacks, and New York and Mississippi each had one. Australia and South Africa followed the US, with 18 and 8 attacks respectively.
UNITED STATES
Sikh barred over turban
A Sikh Indian-American actor and designer on Monday said he was barred from boarding an Aeromexico flight from Mexico City to New York because he refused to remove his turban. “This morning in Mexico City I was told I could not board my @aeromexico flight to NYC because of my turban,” Waris Ahluwalia wrote in his Instagram account. The 41-year-old bearded actor posted a picture of himself holding up his boarding pass and another in front of an Aeromexico customer service desk. The House of Waris chief was heading to New York’s fashion week. The Mexican airline issued a statement late on Monday saying that it was obligated to follow “federal requirements in terms of security determined by the US Transportation Security Administration to review passengers.” The airline said it “regrets the inconvenience that any passenger may perceive from the application of these procedures” and it vowed to transport all passengers regardless of their religious beliefs.
AUSTRALIA
Use sunscreen: Jackman
Movie star Hugh Jackman, who has again undergone treatment for skin cancer, yesterday urged people to wear sunscreen and have regular check-ups. The 47-year-old first had a basal cell carcinoma removed in 2013 after his wife, Deborra-Lee Furness, told him to get a mark on his nose checked. He has been treated several times since. “An example of what happens when you don’t wear sunscreen,” he tweeted, alongside a photo of himself with a plaster over his nose. “Basal Cell. Mildest form of cancer. USE SUNSCREEN PLEASE!!” Jackman grew up in Australia, which has one of the highest incidences of skin cancer in the world.
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