NIGERIA
Boko Haram attacks town
Boko Haram has killed at least 60 people in a “devastating” attack on the northeastern Nigeria border town of Rann, Amnesty International said on Friday, calling it one of the deadliest assaults by the group in its nearly decade-long insurgency. Fighters on motorcycles drove through the town near the Cameroon border on Monday morning, setting houses on fire and killing people left behind, the international rights group said in a series of Twitter posts. The fighters also chased residents fleeing the “massive attack” and killed several outside town. Amnesty International published satellite imagery that it said showed “hundreds of burned structures.”
PHILIPPINES
Pair blamed for blast
Two suicide bombers from Indonesia were behind the explosions that left 22 people dead in a Catholic church in the southern province of Sulu on Jan. 27, Secretary of the Interior Eduardo Ano said. The two people were helped by Abu Sayyaf militants, who acted as a guide in the bombings, which also injured about 100 people, Ano told reporters in Leyte Province on Friday. CNN Philippines quoted Ano as saying that the Indonesians wanted to set an example among Filipino militants, adding that there are still some foreign terrorists in the country. The military this week launched an airstrike against a splinter group from the Abu Sayyaf that it believed led the attack. Secretary of Defense Delfin Lorenzana earlier said a Yemeni couple might have been behind the blast.
HONG KONG
Sex-change IDs refused
The High Court refused to allow three transgender people to be recognized as males on their official identity cards because they have not undergone full sex-change operations. The three, identified as Henry Tse, Q and R, are shown on their ID cards as having been born female, but are undergoing hormone therapy.
JAPAN
Fishing boat seized
A crab fishing boat with 10 people onboard has been seized by Russian authorities, an official said yesterday. The No. 68 Nishino-maru was taken to Russia’s eastern port of Nakhodka, where the crew members are expected to be questioned, said an official of Shimane Prefecture, western Japan. “We are asking the Russian side, through diplomatic channels, to release them as soon as possible,” he told reporters, adding that the fishermen were in good condition. Local media said the boat left Shimane on Jan. 26 to fish for snow crabs, also known as spider crabs, but lost contact on Wednesday.
INDONESIA
Drug suspect recaptured
A French drug suspect on the run since escaping from jail nearly two weeks ago has been recaptured, police said yesterday. Felix Dorfin — who faces the death penalty if convicted — was found hiding in a forest in North Lombok on Friday night, police said, and was returned to jail in Mataram, the island’s capital. Wearing disheveled black clothes and looking tired, Dorfin initially tried to bribe officers to let him go. “He didn’t resist arrest, but wanted to bribe our officers,” North Lombok police chief Herman Suriyono said yesterday, adding that he was found following a tip-off from locals in the area. After being checked by medical teams he was returned to jail. The 35-year-old Frenchman was arrested in September last year allegedly carrying a false-bottomed suitcase filled with 4kg of drugs.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not