ECUDAOR
Earthquake survivor found
Crews have rescued a 72-year-old survivor of the nation’s deadly earthquake almost two weeks after it struck the South American country, Venezuela announced on Saturday. A visiting Venezuelan search team located Manuel Vasquez, who had been trapped under rubble since the magnitude 7.8 earthquake that killed 660 people, the Venezuelan embassy in Quito said on its Web site. They found Vasquez “making sounds in a partially collapsed building” on Friday in Manabi Province while doing inspections for structural problems, it said. The April 16 quake was the worst to strike the nation in decades, causing buildings to collapse and damaging roads and other infrastructure in tourist areas along the coast. Vasquez was admitted to hospital with kidney trouble and lost toes. He was also dehydrated and disoriented. The nation welcomed hundreds of rescue teams, doctors, nurses, firefighters and other support staff after the quake from a slew of countries.
SOUTH AFRICA
Malema ‘whispers’ to Zuma
Fiery opposition politician Julius Malema told 40,000 cheering supporters that President Jacob Zuma should step down before the army turns on him because of the corruption allegations against him. “I am whispering to you, Zuma, wherever you are, those soldiers are going to turn their guns against you,” Malema said to roars from the crowd. “Be warned, leave office before the soldiers turn their guns on you.” Malema spoke on Saturday to supporters of his Economic Freedom Fighters party who filled the Orlando Stadium in Soweto. Malema described the policies of his party ahead of local government elections which are to take place in August. He said many members of South Africa’s current parliament are “agents of apartheid.” Malema dismissed the treason charges pressed against him earlier this week by the African National Congress. The party filed the charges after Malema said he would take up arms against the government if he saw rigging in the elections.
VENEZUELA
Minimum wage rises 30%
President Nicolas Maduro is ordering a 30 percent increase in the minimum wage, the latest move by the socialist government to grapple with high inflation and economic stagnation. The boost announced Saturday night by Maduro comes after a 25 percent increase on March 1. The new increase was effective from yesterday, which is Workers’ Day, and would push the minimum wage to 15,051 bolivars (US$1,512.7) per month. This translates into about US$50 at the current black market rate, which largely sets prices of goods for Venezuelans.
INDIA
Teen selfie fan shoots self
An Indian teenager accidently shot himself in the head with his father’s gun while trying to take a “selfie” photograph, police said yesterday. The 15-year-old is being treated in hospital at Pathankot in Punjab State and is expected to survive, Pathankot deputy police superintendent Manoj Kumar said. The accident happened on Friday evening when the schoolboy was playing at home with the licensed revolver which is normally kept in a wardrobe, Kumar told reporters. “The boy’s father and family said that he was trying to take a selfie with his gun,” he said. “We will speak to the boy when he is declared medically fit. We think that part of the blame obviously goes to the father for not keeping his loaded gun under lock and key at their home.”
The pitch is a classic: A young celebrity with no climbing experience spends a year in hard training and scales Mount Everest, succeeding against some — if not all — odds. French YouTuber Ines Benazzouz, known as Inoxtag, brought the story to life with a two-hour-plus documentary about his year preparing for the ultimate challenge. The film, titled Kaizen, proved a smash hit on its release last weekend. Young fans queued around the block to get into a preview screening in Paris, with Inoxtag’s management on Monday saying the film had smashed the box office record for a special cinema
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
‘DISAPPEARED COMPLETELY’: The melting of thousands of glaciers is a major threat to people in the landlocked region that already suffers from a water shortage Near a wooden hut high up in the Kyrgyz mountains, scientist Gulbara Omorova walked to a pile of gray rocks, reminiscing how the same spot was a glacier just a few years ago. At an altitude of 4,000m, the 35-year-old researcher is surrounded by the giant peaks of the towering Tian Shan range that also stretches into China, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. The area is home to thousands of glaciers that are melting at an alarming rate in Central Asia, already hard-hit by climate change. A glaciologist, Omarova is recording that process — worried about the future. She hiked six hours to get to
The number of people in Japan aged 100 or older has hit a record high of more than 95,000, almost 90 percent of whom are women, government data showed yesterday. The figures further highlight the slow-burning demographic crisis gripping the world’s fourth-biggest economy as its population ages and shrinks. As of Sept. 1, Japan had 95,119 centenarians, up 2,980 year-on-year, with 83,958 of them women and 11,161 men, the Japanese Ministry of Health said in a statement. On Sunday, separate government data showed that the number of over-65s has hit a record high of 36.25 million, accounting for 29.3 percent of