CANADA
N Korean prisoner returns
A Canadian pastor who was imprisoned for more than two years in North Korea on Saturday arrived back home. Hyeon Soo Lim was serving a life sentence of hard labor in North Korea for alleged anti-state activities, but was released last week on what the North Korean government described as sick bail. Lim, a 62-year-old South Korean-born Canadian citizen, was convicted and sentenced in 2015 for allegedly trying to use religion to destroy the North Korean system and helping US and South Korean authorities lure and abduct North Korean citizens.
UNITED STATES
Pence heads to Colombia
Vice President Mike Pence is to visit Colombia amid escalating tensions with neighboring Venezuela. Pence was set to meet with Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos yesterday at the start of his week-long trip. He is to also visit Buenos Aires, Argentina; Santiago, Chile; and Panama City, Panama, where he is expected to deliver a number of speeches, meet with the nations’ leaders and tour the newly expanded Panama Canal. In Colombia, Pence is also expected to highlight trade, business investment and other ties between the nations. The US is also likely to be looking for assurances that Colombia is taking surging coca production seriously, which has been blamed partially on Santos’ decision in 2015 to stop using crop-destroying herbicides.
MEXICO
PRI to allow outsider to run
President Enrique Pena Nieto on Saturday endorsed a change to the Institutional Revolutionary Party’s (PRI) rules that allows outsiders to run for president. Gathering for their national assembly ahead of next year’s election, party members voted to relax requirements for presidential candidates, jettisoning a rule that nominees must be party members with at least 10 years’ standing. The change opens the door to the candidacy of Minister of Finance Jose Antonio Meade, a soft-spoken technocrat who has served in various Cabinet posts under both the PRI and the conservative National Action Party.
SWEDEN
Inventor in custody for killing
A Danish judge on Saturday remanded into temporary custody a Danish inventor accused of manslaughter over a missing Swedish journalist, who was on board a submarine he built which sank. “My client denies the allegations,” said Betina Engmark, lawyer for 46-year-old inventor Peter Madsen, adding that he was “hurt” to be suspected of involvement in her death. He was ordered to be held in custody for 24 hours, which could be renewed. Reports named the Swedish journalist as Kim Wall, who was writing a feature story about the inventor. Madsen had wanted to launch himself into the space race before building his submarine the Nautilus, the biggest privately made sub when he made it in 2008.
NEPAL
Monsoon rains kill 49
Torrential rain yesterday battered the nation, causing widespread flooding and landslides and raising the death toll from three days of severe weather to 49 people, officials said. The toll could go higher as 30 people were reported missing and another 17 were injured. Army and police personnel continued search and rescue operations, with more than 34,000 houses submerged, an official added. The Red Cross estimated that 100,000 people were affected by the disaster, with one official describing how the storm had cut off communication and electricity, adding to the challenges in rescuing people and distributing aid supplies.
FAKE NEWS? ‘When the government demands the press become a state mouthpiece under the threat of punishment, something has gone very wrong,’ a civic group said The top US broadcast regulator on Saturday threatened media outlets over negative coverage of the Middle East war, after US President Donald Trump slammed critical headlines from the “Fake News Media.” The US president since his first term has derided mainstream media as “fake news” and has sued major outlets over what he sees as unfair coverage. Brendan Carr, head of the US Federal Communications Commission — which oversees the nation’s radio, television and Internet media — said broadcasters risked losing their licenses over news coverage. “The law is clear. Broadcasters must operate in the public interest, and they will
INFLUTENTIAL THEORIST: Habermas was particularly critical of the ‘limited interest’ shown by German politicians in ‘shaping a politically effective Europe Jurgen Habermas, whose work on communication, rationality and sociology made him one of the world’s most influential philosophers and a key intellectual figure in his native Germany, has died. He was 96. Habermas’ publisher, Suhrkamp, said he died on Saturday in Starnberg, near Munich. Habermas frequently weighed in on political matters over several decades. His extensive writing crossed the boundaries of academic and philosophical disciplines, providing a vision of modern society and social interaction. His best-known works included the two-volume Theory of Communicative Action. Habermas, who was 15 at the time of Nazi Germany’s defeat, later recalled the dawn of
The Chinese public maintains relatively warm sentiments toward Taiwan and strongly prefers non-military paths to improving cross-strait relations, a recent survey conducted by the Atlanta, Georgia-based Carter Center and Emory University showed. The “China Pulse” research project, which polled 2,506 adults between Oct. 27 last year and Jan. 1 this year, found that 86 percent of respondents support strengthening cultural ties, while 81 percent favor deepening economic interaction. The report, co-authored by political scientists at Emory University and advisors at the Carter Center, indicates that the Chinese public views Taiwan’s importance through a lens of shared history and culture rather than geopolitical
Cannabis-based medicines have shown little evidence of effectiveness for treating most mental health and substance-use disorders, according to a large review of past studies published in a major medical journal on Monday. Medical use of cannabinoids has been expanding, including in the US, Canada and Australia, where many patients report using cannabis products to manage conditions such as anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder and sleep problems. Researchers reviewed data from 54 randomized clinical trials conducted between 1980 and May last year involving 2,477 participants for their analysis published in The Lancet. The studies assessed cannabinoids as a primary treatment for mental disorders or substance-use
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