UNITED STATES
Pentagon bans ‘Pokemon’
Department of Defense officials on Friday said employees should not download Pokemon Go onto their government-issued smartphones. “You can imagine a number of reasons [why] that wouldn’t necessarily be a prudent thing to do,” Pentagon deputy press secretary Gordon Trowbridge told reporters. “Aside from any security concerns, I think taxpayers would appreciate government phones being used for government business.” Trowbridge jokingly said he could not confirm reports a Pokemon “gym” — a virtual battle arena — has been placed in the courtyard in the middle of the vast Pentagon building.
BRAZIL
Rousseff’s judgement to begin
The final judgement phase in the impeachment of suspended president Dilma Rousseff is to start on Aug. 25, just four days after the Rio de Janeiro Olympics end, the senate news service said on Friday. “The judgment session for Dilma Rousseff will start on the 25th at 9am. The notice has been delivered to Jose Eduardo Cardozo, the suspended president’s lawyer,” the official news outlet said. Rousseff is accused of breaking budget laws in taking unauthorized government loans to mask the depth of economic difficulties during her 2014 re-election. Rousseff, a former leftist guerrilla, says her impeachment is a coup in disguise. The senate must vote by a two-thirds majority at the end of the judgement session, which could take several days, to remove her from office. If that happens, interim president Michel Temer would stay on until scheduled elections in 2018.
CUBA
Fidel Castro turns 90
Thousands partied along Havana’s Malecon seafront into the early hours of yesterday, celebrating retired Cuban president Fidel Castro turning 90 to the tune of Latin beats as an electric storm in the distance lit up the night sky. On the strike of midnight, a live band played Happy Birthday in honor of the iconic leftist revolutionary on the “Anti-imperialist Tribune,” a plaza located outside the newly opened US embassy, while fireworks exploded on the other side of the bay. Colorful floats carrying dancers and salsa bands stretched for kilometers down the Malecon, as Havana’s annual carnival was combined this year with Castro’s birthday concert. “This is the best gift we can give him, this party,” said dancer Leydis Campos, 25, decked in a skimpy limegreen outfit, her eyelids caked in glitter. “To 90 years past, and to 90 more.” Tributes have ranged from the conventional, such as photograph exhibits about his life, to the outlandish, with one cigar maker rolling the longest smoke in the world, measuring 90m, in Castro’s honor.
UNITED STATES
‘Criminal Minds’ star fired
Thomas Gibson, the star of Criminal Minds on CBS, has been fired from the show after an altercation with a producer. The actor, who has played investigator Aaron Hotchner on the crime procedural since its debut in 2005, was suspended earlier this week for kicking a producer in what the actor later described as the result of creative differences, according to news reports. However, the producers of the show, ABC Studios and CBS Television Studios, on Friday said that the separation would be made permanent, saying in a statement that “Thomas Gibson has been dismissed from Criminal Minds.”
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