UKRAINE
Portugal wins Eurovision
Portugal’s Salvador Sobral on Saturday won the Eurovision Song Contest performing a jazz-style ballad written by his sister, taking the top spot for the first time in the country’s history and celebrating with a call to “put emotion back into music.” Along with singers from Italy and Bulgaria, Sobral was a favorite going into the final of the annual song fest, which was held in Kiev, and he led the voting throughout the evening. A soft-spoken 27-year-old with a scraggly beard, Sobral won with Amar Pelos Dois (Love For Both of Us). It is the first time Portugal won since it first entered the contest in 1964.
TUNISIA
Thousands protest amnesty
Several thousand people marched through central Tunis on Saturday to protest against a bill that would grant amnesty to businessmen accused of corruption when former president Zine El-Abidine Ben Ali was in power. Critics of the Economic Reconciliation bill say it is a step back from the spirit of Tunisia’s 2011 revolution to oust Ben Ali, but government officials say it is a way get the businessmen to inject some of their ill-gotten cash back into the economy. The draft law allows businessmen to reveal stolen funds and repay them.
GREECE
Train derails, hits house
Three people died and 10 were injured when a train derailed in the county’s north on Saturday night and ripped through a house, police said. The train carrying 70 passengers and five crew was heading from Athens to the second-biggest city of Thessaloniki when it derailed in the town of Adendro, 37km from Thessaloniki, railway company TRAINOSE said. At least two carriages crashed into the ground floor of a house, ripping through its walls. Others toppled on to their sides, their windows smashed. It was unclear what caused the accident. “Death came calling,” the Athens News Agency quoted local resident Yorgos Mylonas as saying. “I heard a strange noise and then I saw the train approaching and ramming into my neighbor’s house.” Three of the injured are in serious condition, TRAINOSE said. Earlier, in a statement on its Web site, the company had said that four people were killed in the crash, but it removed that reference. At least two dozen fire trucks were deployed in the rescue operation.
ITALY
Hundreds rescued from sea
Rescuers on Saturday saved 484 migrants from boats in the Mediterranean Sea and found the bodies of seven men who had died in the attempt to get to Europe, the coast guard said. The migrants were rescued from four separate rubber boats by the coast guard and navy, an aid group and two private vessels, the coast guard said in a statement.
AUSTRIA
Snap election for fall: Kern
The nation is to hold a snap parliamentary election this year, probably in the autumn, Chancellor Christian Kern told ORF TV yesterday, hours before the conservative party in his coalition was due to meet to choose a new leader. Minister of Foreign Affairs and Integration Sebastian Kurz, who is widely expected to take over as leader of the conservative People’s Party, has said he wants to hold a snap election, which Kern opposes. “There will definitely ... be an election, I assume in the coming autumn,” Kern told ORF, adding that he did not think carrying on with a minority government was a viable option.
NEPAL
Local elections held
Voting began yesterday in the nation’s first local elections in two decades. Polls opened in three provinces at 7am, with nearly 50,000 candidates vying for the position of mayor, deputy mayor, ward chairman and ward member in 283 municipalities. Long lines started to formed early outside polling stations in Kathmandu, where the paper ballot was about 1m long to accommodate names of the 878 candidates. “It is difficult to expect much from our politicians — they have always been selfish and not worked for the people — but I hope that with this election things will change,” housewife Shova Maharjan, 41, said after casting her vote in the capital. Results are expected later in the week.
INDIA
Jilted man held for murder
A jilted man who allegedly kidnapped and raped his ex-girlfriend before smashing her head with bricks and running her over with a car has been arrested, Indian police said yesterday. Police in the northern state of Haryana said the 23-year-old victim was abducted by the man and his friend who then allegedly raped and mutilated her. They then dumped her in an isolated industrial area where a resident discovered her four days later when they noticed stray dogs nibbling at her body. “We have arrested two men under various sections,” said Jagjeet Singh, spokesman for Sonipat city police in Haryana. “The main accused, Sumit, and she [the victim] were in a relationship, but she didn’t want to marry him and he lost it. He wanted revenge.” Singh said a post-mortem showed the woman had been drugged or sedated during the attack.
ISRAEL
Alleged attacker slain
A Jordanian man on Saturday stabbed and wounded an Israeli officer in east Jerusalem before being shot dead, police said. The officer was taken to hospital with “moderate” injuries after the attack in the walled Old City. The assailant was identified as Mohammad Skaji, a 57-year-old Jordanian who a police statement said had “entered Israel a few days ago.” The Jordanian government denounced the “crime” of the death of its citizen, giving his full name as Mohammed Abdullah Salim al-Kassaji.
IVORY COAST
Army mutiny draws protest
At least five people were wounded by gunfire yesterday during protests against an army mutiny in the nation’s second city, Bouake, according to a witness, as popular opposition to the three-day revolt over bonus payments grew. The witness saw five people being treated for gunshots at Bouake’s main hospital following an attempt by city residents to stage a protest march. Two other protesters, who had been beaten, were also being treated. Earlier in the day, mutinous soldiers had opened up access to the city to allow residents to go to work, but were searching vehicles and checking the identity documents of bus passengers.
EGYPT
Colonel killed in blast
An army colonel was killed and three recruits injured yesterday when their armored vehicle was hit by an explosion in the Sinai Peninsula, security sources said. The Islamic State group said one of its members drove a motorcycle packed with explosives into a gathering of the tribesmen and detonated it, killing 15 and damaging military equipment. There has been no immediate comment was available from the army.
DOUBLE-MURDER CASE: The officer told the dispatcher he would check the locations of the callers, but instead headed to a pizzeria, remaining there for about an hour A New Jersey officer has been charged with misconduct after prosecutors said he did not quickly respond to and properly investigate reports of a shooting that turned out to be a double murder, instead allegedly stopping at an ATM and pizzeria. Franklin Township Police Sergeant Kevin Bollaro was the on-duty officer on the evening of Aug. 1, when police received 911 calls reporting gunshots and screaming in Pittstown, about 96km from Manhattan in central New Jersey, Hunterdon County Prosecutor Renee Robeson’s office said. However, rather than responding immediately, prosecutors said GPS data and surveillance video showed Bollaro drove about 3km
Tens of thousands of people on Saturday took to the streets of Spain’s eastern city of Valencia to mark the first anniversary of floods that killed 229 people and to denounce the handling of the disaster. Demonstrators, many carrying photos of the victims, called on regional government head Carlos Mazon to resign over what they said was the slow response to one of Europe’s deadliest natural disasters in decades. “People are still really angry,” said Rosa Cerros, a 42-year-old government worker who took part with her husband and two young daughters. “Why weren’t people evacuated? Its incomprehensible,” she said. Mazon’s
‘MOTHER’ OF THAILAND: In her glamorous heyday in the 1960s, former Thai queen Sirikit mingled with US presidents and superstars such as Elvis Presley The year-long funeral ceremony of former Thai queen Sirikit started yesterday, with grieving royalists set to salute the procession bringing her body to lie in state at Bangkok’s Grand Palace. Members of the royal family are venerated in Thailand, treated by many as semi-divine figures, and lavished with glowing media coverage and gold-adorned portraits hanging in public spaces and private homes nationwide. Sirikit, the mother of Thai King Vajiralongkorn and widow of the nation’s longest-reigning monarch, died late on Friday at the age of 93. Black-and-white tributes to the royal matriarch are being beamed onto towering digital advertizing billboards, on
POWER ABUSE WORRY: Some people warned that the broad language of the treaty could lead to overreach by authorities and enable the repression of government critics Countries signed their first UN treaty targeting cybercrime in Hanoi yesterday, despite opposition from an unlikely band of tech companies and rights groups warning of expanded state surveillance. The new global legal framework aims to bolster international cooperation to fight digital crimes, from child pornography to transnational cyberscams and money laundering. More than 60 countries signed the declaration, which means it would go into force once ratified by those states. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described the signing as an “important milestone,” and that it was “only the beginning.” “Every day, sophisticated scams destroy families, steal migrants and drain billions of dollars from our economy...
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