UNITED STATES
May Day arrests in Seattle
Seattle police on Sunday evening used pepper spray to disperse black-clad anti-capitalist protesters authorities say threw rocks, flares, bricks and Molotov cocktails at officers during a rowdy May Day gathering. Eight men ranging in age from about 20 to 32 were charged, along with a teenaged girl, police said. Authorities said five officers were hurt, none seriously. The clashes followed a peaceful march earlier in the day by advocates for workers and immigrants, just one of several events in cities nationwide to call for better wages for workers, an end to deportations and support for President Barack Obama’s administration plan to give work permits to immigrants in the country illegally whose children are citizens. Seattle Mayor Ed Murray blamed the “senseless violence” on a “different crowd” from those who had attended the earlier march.
UNITED KINGDOM
Adams criticized for tweets
Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams late on Sunday used a racial slur on his Twitter account, days before his party is to contest regional elections in Northern Ireland.
His tweet compared a former slave’s struggle against slave-owners in the Quentin Tarantino film Django Unchained with the treatment of Irish nationalists in a Catholic area of Belfast, Ballymurphy. “Watching Django Unchained — A Ballymurphy Nigger!” Adams tweeted. A second message read “Django — an uppity Fenian!” The tweets were deleted shortly after being posted, but had already been widely shared and criticized. Reacting to the furor, Adams said his use of the “N-word” was ironic. “Anyone who has seen the film, as I did last evening, and who is familiar with the plight of nationalists in the north until recently, would know that my tweets about the film and the use of the N-word were ironic and not intended to cause any offence whatsoever,” he said in a Sinn Fein statement. “Attempts to suggest that I am a racist are without credibility. I am opposed to racism and have been all my life.” Ballymurphy is known as the site of 1971 killings of civilians by British soldiers.
COLOMBIA
Peruvian gangster deported
The government on Sunday deported top Peruvian crime lord Gerson Galvez, a day after arresting the man described as the new version of Mexico’s Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman. Galvez, also known as Caracol (Snail), was arrested in a restaurant in Medellin, the Ministry of Defense said late on Saturday. He was handed over to Peruvian authorities because of his “dangerousness” and flown back to his home country, National Police Chief Jorge Nieto told a press conference. President Juan Manuel Santos congratulated the police on Twitter, describing Galvez as “one of the most feared crime capos in the region.”
SOUTH AFRICA
Lions explore new home
Lions rescued from circuses in Colombia and Peru on Sunday scratched their manes on trees and explored their new territory bush after being released into a sanctuary north of Johannesburg. One of the 33 lions, a male known as Zeus, let out a mighty roar before stepping out of his cage into an enclosure where he will spend the coming months being monitored by a vet. The lions arrived at the Emoya Big Cat Sanctuary shortly after dawn on Sunday, ending a two-day journey from South America.
Many of them had teeth and their claws removed by their circus owners so they will remain in enclosures and can never be released into the wild.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
‘POLITICAL EARTHQUAKE’: Leo Varadkar said he was ‘no longer the best person’ to lead the nation and was stepping down for political, as well as personal, reasons Leo Varadkar on Wednesday announced that he was stepping down as Ireland’s prime minister and leader of the Fine Gael party in the governing coalition, citing “personal and political” reasons. Pundits called the surprise move, just 10 weeks before Ireland holds European Parliament and local elections, a “political earthquake.” A general election has to be held within a year. Irish Deputy Prime Minister Micheal Martin, leader of Fianna Fail, the main coalition partner, said Varadkar’s announcement was “unexpected,” but added that he expected the government to run its full term. An emotional Varadkar, who is in his second stint as prime minister and at
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia