NIGERIA
Militant leader arrested
The leader of the Ansaru militant group, a Boko Haram splinter group, has been arrested, an army spokesman said on Sunday. Khalid al-Barnawi is one of three Nigerians listed by Washington in 2012 as “specially designated global terrorists.” The US Department of State in June 2012 named al-Barnawi, alongside Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau and Ansaru founder Abubakar Adam Kambar, as terrorists. “Security agents made a breakthrough on Friday in the fight against terrorism by arresting Khalid al-Barnawi, the leader of Ansaru terrorist group in Lokoja,” military spokesman Brigadier General Rabe Abubakar said. “He is among those on top of the list of our wanted terrorists.”
ITALY
Bishop sex probe dropped
Police are dropping an investigation into a bishop for the alleged sexual abuse of seminarists, media reports said on Sunday. Prosecutors in Cassino, south of Rome, had opened a probe into Gerardo Antonazzo after receiving a letter from a seminarian accusing the bishop of sexually molesting him and others. However, prosecutor Luciano d’Emmanuele on Sunday released a statement saying no charges would be brought, La Repubblica said. Antonazzo had been quoted on Saturday stressing “how utterly unfounded the accusations are.” Sex abuse scandals have dogged the Catholic Church, with alleged victims breaking their silence in the US, Ireland, the Netherlands, Australia, France, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Mexico and Poland.
UNITED STATES
Dog leads police on chase
A Chihuahua is in custody after leading police on a chase across the Oakland-San Francisco Bay Bridge. The California Highway Patrol tweeted that the small black dog “led us on quite a chase” on Sunday and posted a video of it running furiously on the upper level of the bridge, while being trailed by a motorcycle officer. After it was captured, the Chihuahua was taken to a San Francisco animal shelter where staff members named it Ponch, after California Highway Patrol officer Frank Poncherello, played by Erik Estrada in the TV series CHiPs. A spokeswoman for the city’s Department of Animal Care and Control said the dog wore a tag decorated with a human skull, but it had no identification.
COLOMBIA
‘Narco sub’ intercepted
The navy on Sunday said it had seized more than s tonnes of cocaine and a semi-submersible “narco sub” in operations on the nation’s Pacific coastline. At Natural Sanquianga Park, a reserve in the southwest of the nation, navy personnel discovered and destroyed “a semi-submersible designed like a torpedo” able to carry 2 tonnes of cocaine, the navy said in a statement. The navy said that it has destroyed or seized 91 illegal semi-submersible “narco subs” since 1993. This was the first one destroyed this year. Near the craft, troops found an underground storage site hidden among the bushes with packs of cocaine stuffed in large plastic bags weighing 652kg, the statement said. Investigators said that a drug trafficking network was stockpiling the cocaine to eventually ship it aboard the torpedo craft to Central America. In a separate operation in the Bocagrande region of Narino, troops found packs of cocaine weighing a total of 402kg inside two boats. The seizures allegedly prevented the traffickers from earning about US$32 million in sales if the cocaine had reached international markets.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
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
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in