SOUTH KOREA
Ten dead after bus crashes
Ten people were killed and nine injured after their bus caught fire on a highway, officials said yesterday. Twenty people, including the driver, were on the bus when it smashed into the guardrail and caught fire on the Gyeongbu Expressway near the southeastern city of Ulsan on Thursday night, the Ministry of Public Safety and Security said in a release. Ulsan officials said the passengers are retirees of a petrochemical company and their spouses who were returning home from a tour to China. The exact cause of the fire was under investigation, but authorities suspect it started after a ruptured tire caused the bus to hit the guardrail, with the friction from the bus sliding sparking flames, Ulsan officials said. Ulsan officials said the injured were treated for smoke inhalation and burns.
UNITED STATES
Clinton hints at China ‘ring’
Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton privately said the US would “ring China with missile defense” if the Chinese government failed to curb North Korea’s nuclear program, a potential hint at how the former secretary of state would act if elected president. Clinton’s remarks were revealed by WikiLeaks in a hack of the Clinton campaign chairman’s personal account. The e-mails include a document excerpting Clinton’s private speech transcripts, which she has refused to release. A section on China features several issues in which Clinton said she confronted the Chinese while leading the Department of State. Clinton said she told Chinese officials that the US might deploy additional ships to the region to contain the North Korean missile threat. If North Korea successfully obtains a ballistic missile, “they could actually reach Hawaii and the west coast theoretically,” Clinton said. “We’re going to ring China with missile defense. We’re going to put more of our fleet in the area,” Clinton said in a 2013 speech.
UNITED STATES
Rahimi pleads not guilty
The Afghan-born American wanted for bomb attacks that rattled New York and New Jersey last month pleaded not guilty from his hospital bed on Thursday to charges of attempted murder. Ahmad Khan Rahimi’s public defender entered a plea of not guilty on state charges that his client attempted to murder five police officers and unlawfully possessed weapons while on the run in New Jersey. Bail was set at US$5.2 million. Rahimi was shown lying in bed in a hospital, where he is being treated after being critically wounded in a shootout with police on Sept. 19 that led to his capture.
VENEZUELA
Assembly rebukes legislator
The opposition majority legislature on Thursday censured a lawmaker from President Nicolas Maduro’s socialist party for throwing a microphone at a colleague during a debate. Legislator Hugbel Roa was speaking against a motion to congratulate newly named Cardinal Baltazar Porras — a stern Maduro critic — when he lost his temper with opposition lawmaker Marco Bozzo, who was in favor. “Shut up, shut up, shut up!” Roa said before throwing the microphone at Bozzo. Bozzo lunged toward him to retaliate, but colleagues intervened to keep the two men apart. The scuffle was just the latest chaos to engulf the National Assembly, of which the opposition took control in January, ending the left’s 17-year monopoly on power. The center-right opposition won a landslide in mid-term elections as voters punished the socialists for a devastating economic crisis.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
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
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was