IRAN
US-Israel deal riles Tehran
A US$38 billion aid deal between the US and Israel makes Iran more determined to strengthen its military, Iranian Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces General Mohammad Hossein Bagheri said yesterday. In comments broadcast live on Iranian state TV, Bagheri said the deal “will make us more determined in strengthening the defense power of the country.” Last week, the US signed an unprecedented new security agreement with Israel that would give the Israeli military US$38 billion over 10 years. Iran does not recognize Israel and supports anti-Israeli militant groups such as Palestinian Hamas and Lebanon’s Hezbollah. Bagheri’s remarks were given during an annual military parade marking the anniversary of Iraq-Iran war in 1980.
MEXICO
Illegal sawmills closed
Environmental authorities said they have closed seven sawmills operating illegally in the forest reserve that serves as the wintering ground for monarch butterflies that migrate to the country from the US and Canada. No logging is permitted in the reserve’s core zone, but loggers have tried to cut trees there in the past. A larger buffer zone does permit some strictly regulated logging and farming. Authorities announced the closures on Tuesday as part of a stepped-up enforcement effort in which the federal police’s Gendarme division is participating. Illegal logging in the 13,551-hectare core zone dropped from almost 20 hectares last year to about 12 hectares this year. The butterflies are expected to begin arriving in Mexico late next month or in early November.
UNITED STATES
Saint’s relic on display
The heart of a celebrated Roman Catholic saint is being publicly displayed this week — the first time the religious relic has left Italy. Hundreds of the faithful were expected to line up yesterday at the Immaculate Conception Church in Lowell, Massachusetts, for a glimpse of the heart of St Padre Pio. Honoring the relics of saints is an ancient practice in the Roman Catholic faith. St Padre Pio was a Capuchin friar best known for possessing the stigmata, or wounds of Jesus Christ. He died in Foggia, Italy, in 1968 and was canonized by Pope John Paul II in 2002. The heart will also be displayed in Boston later this week as part of the run-up to the saint’s feast day tomorrow.
UNITED STATES
Nutella puncher sentenced
A California man was sentenced on Tuesday to two years in jail for punching an elderly man at a store in a dispute over Nutella samples. Derrick Gharabighi, who had been detained since the altercation in September last year at a Costco warehouse store in Burbank, received the sentence, but was immediately released, having earned credit for time served. The 25-year-old was arrested and charged with elder abuse after punching in the face a 78-year-old man who had challenged him for taking too many samples of the chocolate-hazelnut spread. “He takes two, three of them, left one,” Sahak Sahakian told local media at the time. “I want to take that one, and he catch my hand. I say: ‘What are you doing? Let me eat this one.’” Police said Sahakian suffered “significant laceration above his left eye and swelling around the same area of his face.” Free samples are a huge attraction at Costco stores throughout the country. Hungry shoppers can often be seen crowding around a sample table to grab free food and drinks.
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
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