POLAND
Five die in escape room
Five teenage girls died and one man was seriously injured on Friday when a fire broke out in a room where they were playing an escape game in the city of Koszalin, officials said. “The victims of this tragedy are 15-year-old children, girls celebrating a birthday,” Minister of the Interior Joachim Brudzinski told broadcaster TVN24. Fire brigade spokesman Tomasz Kubiak could only confirm that the dead were women, telling reporters that “one man with severe burns was taken to an intensive care unit.” The injured man was thought to be 25 years old, local police told reporters. Police and fire officials said they did not yet know what started the blaze in the escape room.
PERU
Maduro urged to step down
A dozen Latin American governments and Canada on Friday delivered a blistering rebuke to Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, questioning the legitimacy of his soon-to-begin second term and urging him to hand over power as the only path to restoring democracy in his crisis-wracked South American country. The sharp criticism came at a meeting in Lima of foreign ministers from countries including Argentina, Brazil and Colombia, all of which have been weighing how to confront the increasingly authoritarian Maduro while absorbing a growing exodus of Venezuelans fleeing economic chaos. In a statement, the Lima Group urged Maduro to refrain from taking the presidential oath on Thursday and instead cede power to the opposition-controlled congress until new, fairer elections can be held.
BRAZIL
Bolsonaro mulls US base
The country is open to hosting a US military base to counter Russian influence in the region, President Jair Bolsonaro said. Bolsonaro, who took office on Tuesday, is a fan of US President Donald Trump and a fierce critic of Venezuela’s socialist President Nicolas Maduro, who has close ties with Russia. In an interview with the SBT network Thursday night, Bolsonaro said that “my approximation with the United States is economic, but it could also be warlike,” adding that the base would be “symbolic,” as US military power can reach any part of the globe.
MEXICO
Police close migrant shelter
Police on Friday took steps to close a migrant shelter in Tijuana, sparking protests from some of the dozens of US-bound people who had been staying there after traveling in a caravan from Central America. The arrival of several thousand migrants in the past few months has challenged the country’s new president to make good on pledges to protect migrants. Tijuana officials cited sanitary reasons for closing the shelter, a two-story warehouse in a zone known for crime and prostitution near the US border.
UNITED NATIONS
New envoy to be appointed
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Friday agreed to appoint a new envoy to Somalia after its president refused to reverse a decision to expel a representative for raising human rights concerns. Guterres on Friday spoke by telephone with Somalian President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed — his second call to the Somalian leader in three days — to once again urge him to change his mind, diplomats said. However, the president dug in his heels and said envoy Nicholas Haysom would remain persona non grata and would not be allowed to return to Somalia, they said.
The Burmese junta has said that detained former leader Aung San Suu Kyi is “in good health,” a day after her son said he has received little information about the 80-year-old’s condition and fears she could die without him knowing. In an interview in Tokyo earlier this week, Kim Aris said he had not heard from his mother in years and believes she is being held incommunicado in the capital, Naypyidaw. Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, was detained after a 2021 military coup that ousted her elected civilian government and sparked a civil war. She is serving a
China yesterday held a low-key memorial ceremony for the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) not attending, despite a diplomatic crisis between Beijing and Tokyo over Taiwan. Beijing has raged at Tokyo since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi last month said that a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan could trigger a military response from Japan. China and Japan have long sparred over their painful history. China consistently reminds its people of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, in which it says Japanese troops killed 300,000 people in what was then its capital. A post-World War II Allied tribunal put the death toll
‘NO AMNESTY’: Tens of thousands of people joined the rally against a bill that would slash the former president’s prison term; President Lula has said he would veto the bill Tens of thousands of Brazilians on Sunday demonstrated against a bill that advanced in Congress this week that would reduce the time former president Jair Bolsonaro spends behind bars following his sentence of more than 27 years for attempting a coup. Protests took place in the capital, Brasilia, and in other major cities across the nation, including Sao Paulo, Florianopolis, Salvador and Recife. On Copacabana’s boardwalk in Rio de Janeiro, crowds composed of left-wing voters chanted “No amnesty” and “Out with Hugo Motta,” a reference to the speaker of the lower house, which approved the bill on Wednesday last week. It is
FALLEN: The nine soldiers who were killed while carrying out combat and engineering tasks in Russia were given the title of Hero of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea North Korean leader Kim Jong-un attended a welcoming ceremony for an army engineering unit that had returned home after carrying out duties in Russia, North Korean state media KCNA reported on Saturday. In a speech carried by KCNA, Kim praised officers and soldiers of the 528th Regiment of Engineers of the Korean People’s Army (KPA) for “heroic” conduct and “mass heroism” in fulfilling orders issued by the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea during a 120-day overseas deployment. Video footage released by North Korea showed uniformed soldiers disembarking from an aircraft, Kim hugging a soldier seated in a wheelchair, and soldiers and officials
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