CHINA
Release of advocate urged
A group of UN human rights experts on Wednesday condemned the detention in China of a rights activist who promoted the Tibetan language and called for charges against him to be dropped. The six experts criticized a regional court ruling last month that upheld charges of “incitement to separatism” against Tashi Wangchuk, who has been held for more than two years. They said the charge can carry a five-year prison sentence. The court case largely centered on comments the activist made in a New York Times article and video documentary in which he called for the Tibetan minority to be taught in their mother tongue.
ISRAEL
Army helped stop attack
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday said that Israeli intelligence services prevented the downing of an “Australian airliner” as part of wide-ranging international intelligence-sharing, but gave no details. His comments followed a statement from the army that a branch of military intelligence known as “Unit 8200” had foiled an “aerial attack abroad by [the] Islamic State [group].” Israeli media said the army statement referred to an attempted bombing in July last year of an Etihad Airways flight due to leave Sydney for Abu Dhabi, which was foiled by Australian security forces before the plane took off. An Australian man had sent his unsuspecting brother to board the flight carrying a homemade bomb disguised as a meat-mincer, Australian police said.
MONTENEGRO
Suspected attack on compound
An unknown person blew themselves up after throwing a suspected grenade into the US embassy compound in Podgorica, the government said yesterday. “In front of the USEmbassyMNE building in Podgorica, Montenegro, an unknown person committed suicide with an explosive device. Immediately before, that person threw an explosive device,” the official government account tweeted, adding that the device was “most probably” a hand grenade.
INDONESIA
Eleven missing in landslide
Eleven people are missing and 14 have been injured following a landslide yesterday that cascaded down the terraced slopes of a rice field on Java, officials said. The missing people, farmers tending their crops in Brebes District were buried under an avalanche of mud and rock at about 8am. “The landslide buried the farmers working in their rice fields,” National Agency for Disaster Management spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said in a statement. The incident followed several days of heavy rain in the mountainous area. Another 14 farmers were injured and have been taken to a nearby medical center for treatment.
CAMBODIA
PM vows to ‘shame’ Australia
Prime Minister Hun Sen has threatened to “shame” Australia and block the release of a joint statement at a regional summit in Sydney next month if he faces pressure over a political crackdown at home. The prime minister has been chastised by Western countries for taking a hammer to the nation’s democracy in recent months by dissolving the main opposition party, shuttering independent news outlets and pursuing critics in the courts. On Wednesday, Hun Sen said he would not tolerate any pressure on domestic politics when he attends an ASEAN summit hosted by Australia next month. “If you treat me inappropriately, I will hit back and leave shame on your face at the scene,” he said.
‘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