PANAMA
Cortizo named ‘virtual victor’
The Electoral Court on Sunday declared opposition candidate Laurentino Cortizo the “virtual winner” in the nation’s tight presidential election. After scrutinizing the results from 92 percent of polling stations, court magistrate Heriberto Arauz said in a televised announcement shortly before midnight that Cortizo had a narrow lead of 2 percentage points over his rival Romulo Roux. The close race pitted the candidates of the two most important opposition political forces in the Central American country. Cortizo, of the Democratic Revolutionary Party, had 33 percent of the votes versus 31 percent for Roux, from former president Ricardo Martinelli’s Democratic Change party. Arauz said the voting trend remained stable as results came in. After announcing the results, Arauz took the phone and dialed the candidate, who was waiting at a campaign point with his wife, Yazmin, and supporters. “You are the virtual winner of the elections for the next five years,” Arauz said. “With humility I receive the announcement, which is important for the country,” Cortizo told the magistrate during the call. “An announcement of great responsibility.”
AUSTRALIA
DJ Adam Neat dies
Popular Australian DJ Adam Neat has died on the Indonesian island of Bali after reportedly crashing through a glass door while trying to help an injured friend. “It is with great regret that we can confirm Adam Neat was involved in a fatal accident while trying to help a friend who had suffered multiple fractures in Bali on Saturday,” a post on his official Facebook page said. Neat, who performed as Adam Sky, was based in Singapore and was regularly ranked in the top three Asia-based DJs, according to his Web site. National broadcaster ABC said Neat, 42, was believed to have severed an artery in his arm when he crashed through a glass door as he rushed to help a female friend who fell from a balcony at the resort where they were staying.
UNITED STATES
Substance burns partygoers
Police on Sunday said that 10 teenagers who went to a party in a New York City public housing complex on Saturday ended up at hospitals after someone tossed a caustic substance on them from above. Authorities were investigating after the injuries in a courtyard off Third Street in Manhattan’s East Village. Those affected were aged 15 to 18 and reported burns or irritation to their skin. Police were yet to determine where the substance — possibly drain cleaner or something similar — was thrown from. Valerie Vail told the New York Times that her daughter sustained coin-sized burns on her back, chest and arms. The newspaper reported that residents had called police to complain about noise from the large party.
FRANCE
Fleas invade police station
A police station in northeastern Paris had to be evacuated on Sunday after it was invaded by fleas, a police union said. “Police station closed until further notice!” read an notice stuck to the front door of the station in the 19th district of the French capital. In a fit of pique on Twitter, the Alliance police union said the station had been invaded by the blood-sucking pests, “making working conditions INTOLERABLE!!!” Despite pest control efforts, the problem, which first surfaced three weeks ago, had not been eradicated, France Bleu Paris radio station reported. Even off duty, some had inadvertently taken the fleas with them, with the insects causing havoc at home, even biting their children, a union official told the station.
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