SOMALIA
Bombing kills at least six
A suspected car bomb yesterday exploded outside a government office in Mogadishu, killing at least six people, leveling buildings and leaving an unknown number wounded, police said. “The blast was huge and the initial information we are getting indicates it was a car loaded with explosives that targeted the Hodan district headquarters,” police officer Ibrahim Mohamed said. A vehicle had rammed a security checkpoint then exploded, he said. Images from the scene showed collapsed buildings — including a mosque — with rescue workers and civilians picking through the debris.
JAPAN
‘Twitter killer’ indicted
Takahiro Shiraishi, the so-called “Twitter killer” suspected of murdering and chopping up people he lured on social media, and storing their body parts in cooler boxes, was yesterday charged with nine counts of murder. Shiraishi, 27, has admitted to killing and butchering nine people, all but one of whom were women aged between 15 and 26. A police search of his apartment on Oct. 31 last year found nine dismembered bodies with as many as 240 bone parts stashed in coolers and tool boxes, sprinkled with cat litter in a bid to hide the evidence. Prosecutors pressed charges after five months of psychiatric examination showed Shiraishi could be held criminally responsible, the Jiji Press agency said.
INDIA
Fuel protests shut cities
Nationwide protests organized by opposition parties against record high gasoline and diesel prices yesterday shut down businesses, government offices and schools in many parts of the nation, and in some places protesters blocked trains and roads and vandalized vehicles. The protests turned violent in some states. Television images showed protesters breaking car and bus windows in the Patna, the state capital of the northern state of Bihar, and protesters blocked roads with burning tires there and elsewhere, including in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state of Gujarat. “The Modi ‘govt’ is stealing from the people of India with excessive taxes on fuel,” the main opposition Congress party said on Twitter, posting graphics on many how prices of many commodities have risen under Modi.
BANGLADESH
Protest for Zia’s release
Thousands of opposition supporters yesterday staged protests nationwide calling for the immediate release of their leader and three-time former prime minister, Khaleda Zia, jailed early this year for graft. Zia, 73, is currently on trial in Dhaka on more corruption charges. A police official said about 4,000 members of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party joined protests outside the National Press Club in Dhaka, but opposition spokesman Fakhrul Islam said there were about 20,000 people.
SUDAN
Trafficking victims rescued
Police have rescued 94 victims of human trafficking, including 85 minors, from open-air goldmines near Khartoum and the city’s international airport, among other places. Interpol, which coordinated the Aug. 26 to Aug. 30 operation, yesterday said that so far 14 people, 12 of them women, have been arrested. The rescued victims came from a half-dozen countries, including Chad, Eritrea, Niger and South Sudan, underscoring the transnational aspect of human trafficking, Interpol said. Operation Sawiyan involved 200 officers, while it provided training and equipment, it said.
TURKEY
More detained for Gulen ties
Authorities yesterday detained 51 soldiers and nine others over alleged links to US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, who Ankara says orchestrated the failed coup in 2016 against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Istanbul police said. Those detained were among 89 suspects whose detention was ordered in an investigation launched by Istanbul prosecutors and spread over nine provinces, it said. Separately, Ankara prosecutors issued detention warrants for 13 senior officers, all with the rank of major and three of whom are on active duty, the Hurriyet newspaper said.
GERMANY
Crowd protests man’s death
About 2,500 people on Sunday marched in a far-right demonstration in Koethen after a man died following a fight with two Afghans, as officials pleaded for calm to avoid the anti-foreigner unrest that has shaken Chemnitz. Police and prosecutors said the 22-year-old deceased suffered acute heart failure after coming to blows with the suspects during a dispute on a playground on Saturday. The man’s death was “not directly” linked to the injuries sustained, authorities said in a statement. Reports said that he died in hospital and that he had a pre-existing heart condition. Prosecutors said that one Afghan suspect, 18, is accused of causing grievous bodily harm and that the other, 20, is charged with causing bodily harm with fatal consequences.
COLOMBIA
ELN refuses to restart talks
The National Liberation Army (ELN) yesterday said that conditions set by President Ivan Duque to restart peace talks in Havana aimed at ending its insurgency are “unacceptable.” Right-winger Duque gave the Marxist ELN a one-month deadline after his inauguration on Aug. 7 to convince him that the group is serious about laying down arms and re-entering civilian life. That cut-off point expired on Friday last week. By refusing to recognize agreements reached under Duque’s predecessor, former president Juan Manuel Santos, “and unilaterally placing unacceptable conditions, this government is ... ending the process of dialogue” aimed at reaching a peace agreement, ELN negotiators in Havana said in a statement.
UNITED STATES
Officer arrested for killing
A Dallas police officer who says she mistook her black neighbor’s apartment for her own when she fatally shot him has been arrested on a manslaughter charge. Officer Amber Guyger was off duty on Thursday last week and returning to South Side Flats, where she and 26-year-old Botham Jean had apartments, when the shooting occurred. Many questions remain about what led Guyger, who has been an officer for four years, to shoot Jean. Lawyers for Jean’s family had been calling for Guyger’s arrest since the shooting, saying that her remaining free days later showed that she was getting favorable treatment. She was arrested on Sunday and later released on bond.
UNITED STATES
Dead chef wins two Emmys
Celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain, who committed suicide in June at age 61, on Sunday posthumously earned a pair of Emmy Awards for his work on the popular CNN food-and-travel show he hosted, Parts Unknown. Bourdain was awarded one of the Emmys for outstanding writing of a nonfiction program for an episode of the series set in southern Italy that aired in November last year. He also shared a second Emmy for best informational series or special in his role as host and executive producer of Parts Unknown.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in 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
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was