AUSTRALIA
Dingo review ordered
The Queensland state government yesterday ordered an urgent review into the management of dingoes on Fraser Island after a spate of attacks by the wild dogs this year. The government announced the review three days after a father rescued his toddler from a dingo’s jaws. The boy had been dragged from a parked campervan in a remote part of the island off the Queensland coast. The 14-month-old’s skull was fractured and he suffered multiple puncture wounds to his neck and head, his parents said. Queensland Minister for Environment Leeanne Enoch said that she was bringing forward a review into dingo management on the island. The number of rangers patrolling the island would be boosted, while more efforts would be made to educate visitors about the dangers of dingoes, Enoch added. The attack on the toddler is the third this year on the island, which attracts up to 400,000 visitors each year.
UNITED KINGDOM
Two arrested over killing
Two young men have been arrested over the killing of a journalist shot dead in Derry, police in Northern Ireland said on Saturday. The 18 and 19-year-old men were arrested in Derry under anti-terror laws and taken to Belfast for questioning, the police said. Journalist Lyra McKee, 29, was late on Thursday shot in the head by, police believe, dissident republicans linked to the New IRA paramilitary group as they clashed with police. “Lyra was killed by shots that were fired indiscriminately,” Detective Superintendent Jason Murphy said. “The shots were fired in a residential area at a time when there were large numbers of local people on the street including children.” The gunman showed no thought for who may have been killed or injured.”
UNITED STATES
China-linked scientists fired
A prominent cancer center in Houston, Texas, has ousted three of five scientists whom federal authorities identified as being involved in Chinese efforts to steal US research. Peter Pisters, the president of MD Anderson Cancer Center, told the Houston Chronicle that the National Institutes of Health last year wrote to the center detailing conflicts of interest and unreported foreign income by five faculty members, and gave it 30 days to respond. “As stewards of taxpayer dollars invested in biomedical research, we have an obligation to follow up,” Pisters said. The newspaper said all three are ethnically Chinese. It is not clear if any of them face federal charges or deportation.
UNITED STATES
One arrested over raid
A man suspected of involvement in a mysterious dissident group’s raid on North Korea’s embassy in Madrid in February was arrested in Los Angeles. Christopher Ahn, a former marine, was arrested and charged on Friday, a person familiar with the matter said. The specific charges against Ahn were not immediately clear. Separately, on Thursday, federal agents raided the apartment of Adrian Hong, a leader of the Free Joseon group, also known as the Cheollima Civil Defense group, which itself as a government-in-exile dedicated to toppling the Kim family dynasty in North Korea, the person said. Hong was not arrested. A Spanish police investigator in the case in Madrid on Saturday said that Ahn was identified by the Spanish police at a later stage of its investigation into the Feb. 22 raid and that an international arrest warrant was also issued against him.
‘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