FRANCE
Illegal campsites cleared
Police yesterday began to clear out two illegal refugee camp sites in Paris, following a similar operation last week. A statement from the Paris police department said the campsites were at the Porte des Poissonniers and one next to the Canal Saint Martin. About 500 people have been evacuated — mostly Afghans, but some Africans — and are being taken to lodgings in the Paris region where they can pursue asylum requests.
FRANCE
Macron aide under probe
Anti-corruption prosecutors yesterday said they opened an investigation into President Emmanuel Macron’s chief of staff Alexis Kohler over his links to Italian Mediterranean Shipping Co (MSC). The probe is to look into Kohler’s time as a senior civil servant in Ministry for the Economy and Finance from 2012 to 2016, the last two years of which he spent as a cabinet director to Macron, the then-minister. Kohler’s mother is a cousin of Rafaela Aponte, whose husband founded MSC in 1970 and built it up into a global leader. Macron’s office dismissed the allegations as “completely unfounded.”
TUNISIA
Migrants die in boat sinking
At least 48 migrants were killed when their boat sank off the coast near the island of Kerkenna and 67 others were rescued by the coast guard, officials said on Sunday. A search and rescue operation was due to resume yesterday morning. Security officials said the boat was packed with about 180 migrants, including 80 from other African countries. A survivor said the captain had abandoned the boat after it started sinking.
JAPAN
Pay cut for Aso over scandal
Minister of Finance Taro Aso yesterday announced he would return 12 months of his ministerial salary, while 20 ministry officials were penalized for tampering with documents related to a 2016 government property sale linked to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s wife. Aso apologized over the tampering, which occurred between February and April last year, but said Akie Abe was not directly involved. The tampering was done to ensure the documents matched explanations by Shinzo Abe to parliament about the scandal. Aso is richest minister in the Cabinet thanks to his family’s massive fortune made in the mining business. He earns about ¥30 million (US$274,000) a year as a minister.
UNITED STATES
Dangerous dancing for FBI
Police in Denver, Colorado, are investigating an off-duty FBI agent’s apparently accidental shooting of a man at a nightclub on Saturday, after the agent did a backflip while dancing. A video shows the agent’s gun falling out of his trousers as he executes a backflip. It discharged when he picked it up, hitting another patron in the leg. The victim was hospitalized with non-life-threatening injuries.
NEW ZEALAND
Ex-sex worker named dame
A former sex worker yesterday was made a dame companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit in Queen Elizabeth II’s birthday honors list in recognition of her services to the sex industry. Catherine Healy was instrumental in bringing about decriminalizing of sex work. She has also led the New Zealand Prostitutes Collective since 1989 and her citation said she had built it “into a globally respected public health provider.” The 62-year-old said she was surprised at the honor.
‘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
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
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in