AUSTRALIA
Monkey thieves charged
Two men yesterday were charged with stealing rare pygmy marmosets, as a baby was reunited with its mom and the hunt continued to find its dad. Three of the monkeys were snatched from their enclosure at the Symbio Wildlife Park south of Sydney on Saturday, with police and zookeepers launching a desperate bid to locate the suckling infant. There were fears it would die if away from its mother for more than 24 hours while keepers also worried its twin would perish because their mother was too stressed to feed. After a tip-off from the public, two men, aged 23 and 26, were arrested and charged.Police found the unnamed four-week-old infant in the men’s car and a 10-month-old female, Sophia, at another address. The father, Gomez, remains missing.
Photo: EPA
NEPAL
Quake shakes nation
An earthquake with an epicenter near Mount Everest yesterday woke up people in the nation. The US Geological Survey said the earthquake had a magnitude of 5.4. The National Seismology Center said the epicenter was on the border between Ramechap and Solukhumbu districts, about 120km east of Kathmandu. Police said there were no immediate reports of casualties or damages.
PHILIPPINES
Police detonate bomb
Manila police detonated an improvised bomb found yesterday by a street sweeper in a trash bin near the US embassy, snarling morning traffic after authorities closed a portion of a major boulevard where the device was found. No one was reported hurt in the incident. Two explosions were heard as a bomb disposal unit detonated what Metropolitan Manila police chief Oscar Albayalde later described as an improvised explosive device.
JAPAN
Cyberattack investigated
The government is investigating a report that a high-level cyberattack in September — possibly involving a state actor — might have stolen information from an internal military computer network. Ministry of Defense and Ground Self-Defense Force officials said they were investigating a Kyodo News report on the attack. The hackers did not leave a detailed trail and the extent of the damage is unclear, Kyodo said, citing ministry sources. The agency said the hackers took advantage of the fact that computers at the National Defense Academy and National Defense Medical College are connected to a university network and to an internal network linking military bases. Senior military officials were quoted as saying the attack was viewed as a crisis, and staff at the ministry and in the military were temporarily banned from connecting to the Internet.
INDIA
Escaped militant recaptured
A top Sikh militant commander was recaptured by police yesterday in Delhi, a day after he was freed in a dramatic jailbreak by a gang wearing police uniforms. Harminder Singh Mintoo, who heads a Sikh separatist group — the Khalistan Liberation Force — was arrested on the outskirts of Delhi about 200km from the high-security prison in Punjab where he had been remanded on terror charges. Four other inmates who also escaped — members of a local gang jailed for murder — are still at large. Mintoo was arrested in 2014 and is still awaiting trial for terrorism offences. Three policemen were injured in the prison raid and a woman was killed on a highway a few kilometers from the prison when police opened fire on her car after the driver allegedly failed to stop at a checkpoint. Police later said she had no connection with the escapees.
CHINA
Film studio for Chongqing
The government has announced plans to build a US$2 billion film studio as part of a national push to expand its cultural influence. The studio in Chongqing will include a theme park and tourist attractions, state media reported late on Sunday. Construction is to begin early next year and is expected to cost 15 billion yuan (US$2.18 billion). Officials say they have operating agreements already with several foreign partners. Xinhua news agency said the park is to be named after the “One Belt, One Road” program.
INDONESIA
Downed pilot rescued
The pilot of an army helicopter was rescued on Sunday, three days after the aircraft crashed in North Kalimantan on Borneo, an official said yesterday, but three other crew members were found dead yesterday. The injured airman was discovered along with the wreckage of the Bell 412 helicopter. Rescuers are still looking for a fifth crew member. The helicopter went down as it was carrying supplies to a remote army post near the Malaysian border.
CHINA
Next UN boss sets goals
Incoming UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres yesterday said in Beijing that he wants the organization to be more nimble and less bureaucratic and its peacekeepers to be better trained and respectful of human rights. He said that he wants to make sure the different parts of the UN “work for the same purpose” and are subject to independent public evaluation. He also said the UN’s peacekeeping forces need to be trained to avoid violating women’s and children’s rights.
UNITED STATES
Corps mulls Dakota plans
The Army Corps of Engineers on Sunday said it had no plans to forcibly remove people protesting plans to run an oil pipeline beneath a lake near the Standing Rock Sioux reservation in North Dakota, despite telling them to leave by early next month. The Corps, which manages the federal land where the main camp protesting the Dakota Access pipeline is, said last week it would close public access to the area north of the Cannonball River on Monday next week. On Sunday, the agency said in a statement that it had “no plans for forcible removal” of protesters. The statement said anyone who remained would be considered unauthorized and could be subject to various citations. It also said emergency services might not be adequately provided to the area.
VENEZUELA
State announces charges
The state prosecutor on Sunday said it would charge 11 members of the military with responsibility in the death of 12 civilians following a security raid last month in the violent country’s coastal state of Miranda. President Nicolas Maduro last year launched a security campaign known as “Operation to Free the People,” or “OLP” to fight crime and gangs. Rights groups and residents say authorities have murdered innocent people, arrested thousands and destroyed private property without legally mandated court orders. In the Miranda case, 12 bodies were discovered on Friday and Saturday in a mountainous area of the state, the state prosecutor’s office said in a statement. “The state prosecutor will attribute several crimes to the arrested officials, including the violation of fundamental rights,” the statement read, adding that the 11 members of the military included a lieutenant colonel. Local media reported the bodies were discovered in a mass grave.
SPAIN
IS-linked suspects arrested
The Ministry of the Interior said that police arrested four people suspected of having links to an illegal migration network believed to have been used by the Islamic State (IS) group to move militants to Europe, including those involved in Paris attacks last year. A ministry statement said the four had links with the so-called “Syrian refugee route” that the Islamic State group is thought to have used to get militants to Europe via the Greek island of Leros in October last year.
UNITED STATES
Attorney sex rules debated
The California state bar association is overhauling ethics rules for attorneys for the first time in 30 years and some lawyers are unhappy about a proposal that would open them up to discipline for having sex with clients. California bars attorneys from coercing a client into sex or demanding sex in exchange for legal representation. Supporters of an all-out ban say the relationship between a lawyer and client is inherently unequal, so any sexual relationship is potentially coercive. However, some attorneys say it is an unjustified invasion of privacy. Another change would bring California in line with other states by subjecting prosecutors to discipline for failing to turn over evidence they know or reasonably should know would help the defense. The sex ban has divided the rules revision commission. Opponents of the ban, including the Los Angeles County Bar Association’s ethics committee, say it is unnecessary and would be struck down as an unconstitutional violation of fundamental privacy rights.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At 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
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese