UNITED KINGDOM
Sturgeon mulls new vote
Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon yesterday said she would again consider another vote on independence for Scotland when the government offers some certainty over Brexit. Speaking on ITV television’s Peston on Sunday program, she also said her Scottish National Party would not block another Brexit vote on any final deal, but feared what would happen if the different parts of the nation voted for opposite outcomes in the same way they did in 2016. “Once we get some clarity, which hopefully we will in autumn of this year, about the Brexit outcome and the future relationship between the UK and the EU, then I will consider again the question of the timing of an independence referendum,” she said.
DR CONGO
New Ebola cases reported
The Ministry of Health early yesterday said four new cases of Ebola and one death have been confirmed, bringing to 26 the number of deaths from an outbreak in Equateur Province in the northwest. A total of 46 cases of hemorrhagic fever have been reported in the current outbreak, including 21 confirmed cases of Ebola, 21 probable and four suspected. President Joseph Kabila and his Cabinet on Saturday agreed to increase funds for the Ebola emergency response, which now amounts to more than US$4 million. The Cabinet also endorsed a decision to provide free health care in the affected areas and to provide special care to all Ebola victims and their relatives. A new experimental Ebola vaccine will be used to try to contain the outbreak. Vaccinations are expected to start this week, with more than 4,000 doses already in the country and more on the way.
FRANCE
Besson accusation probed
Authorities on Saturday said they were investigating a rape accusation against filmmaker Luc Besson, who denies wrongdoing. A judicial official said a 27-year-old woman filed a complaint on Friday accusing the 59-year-old director of drugging and penetrating her at the hotel Bristol in Paris. BFM television and Europe-1 radio cited Besson’s lawyer as saying he denies the accusations.
UNITED STATES
Trump misspells Melania
Melania Trump on Saturday returned to the White House in “high spirits” following a week-long hospitalization for kidney treatment, but President Donald Trump heralded her homecoming with a tweet that referred to her as “Melanie” instead of “Melania.” “Great to have our incredible First Lady back home in the White House. Melanie is feeling and doing really well. Thank you for all of your prayers and best wishes!” he wrote before quickly superseding that tweet with another that spelled his wife’s name correctly.
UNITED STATES
Lava threatens key road
Lava oozed toward a key Hawaii highway that serves as an escape route for coastal residents over the weekend, after fresh explosive eruptions from the Kilauea volcano and magma flows. Molten rock from two huge cracks merged into a single stream and was expected to hit coastal Highway 137 if it kept up its rate and direction of flow, County of Hawaii Civil Defense Agency said. Authorities are trying to open up a road blocked by a 2014 lava flow to serve as an alternative escape route should Highway 137 or Highway 130 be blocked, a National Park Service employee told reporters. The Hawaii National Guard has warned of mandatory evacuations should either road be blocked.
SYRIA
IS evacuated from Yarmouk
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said a group of Islamic State (IS) fighters were yesterday evacuated from the last insurgent enclave near Damascus in a withdrawal that would restore state control over the area. With the recovery of the Yarmouk enclave, the government would have crushed the last besieged rebel enclave in the west of the nation, although swathes of territory at the borders with Turkey, Iraq and Jordan remain outside its control. The observatory said buses entered the enclave after midnight to take out fighters and their families. They departed in the direction of Badia, a sparsely populated area to the east of the capital.
SOUTH KOREA
Moon, Trump discuss North
President Moon Jae-in and US President Donald Trump yesterday discussed North Korea’s threats to cancel its unprecedented summit with Washington in a telephone call, ahead of their scheduled meeting in Washington on Tuesday, Seoul’s presidential office said. They “exchanged views on various actions taken by North Korea recently” and agreed to “work closely” for the success of the June 12 summit Singapore, Moon’s office said in a statement. In other developments, North Korea has demanded Seoul repatriate a dozen waitresses who fled to the South two years ago. Pyongyang has long claimed the women were kidnapped from a North Korean state-run restaurant in China, while Seoul insists they defected of their own free will. The restaurant’s manager said in a recent interview that he had lied to the women and blackmailed them into following him under the orders from the South’s spy agency.
SAUDI ARABIA
Rights advocates arrested
Authorities have arrested seven prominent women’s rights advocates just weeks before the kingdom is set to lift its driving ban on women. The seven, including four prominent women’s rights activists who campaigned for the right to drive, are being accused by state security of working with “foreign entities.” Pro-government media outlets have splashed their photographs online and on newspapers, accusing them of betrayal and of being traitors. The Ministry of Interior late on Saturday did not name those arrested, but said the group is being investigated for communicating with “foreign entities” and providing money to foreign circles with the aim of destabilizing the kingdom. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch called on the authorities to release the detainees.
INDIA
Diplomat jailed for spying
A diplomat convicted of passing state secrets to Pakistan’s intelligence services has been jailed for three years, her lawyer said yesterday. Madhuri Gupta was found guilty in a New Delhi court on Friday of “spying and wrongful communication of information” while posted to the Indian embassy in Islamabad. Gupta, 61, was arrested in 2010 for allegedly passing information to Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency. Her lawyer, Joginder Dahiya, said Gupta would appeal her sentencing in a higher court. “She has already been in custody for about 21 months. She should have been released on the basis of the time she has already spent in jail,” he said. Gupta avoided more serious jail time because the information she passed to Pakistani handlers in 2009 and 2010 was not military in nature, the Press Trust of India reported. She claims she was falsely implicated by embassy and foreign ministry officials with whom she had a strained relationship.
‘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