PHILIPPINES
Duterte hospital visit denied
President Rodrigo Duterte is in his residence at the presidential office in Manila signing papers, his spokesman said, denying that Duterte was confined at a hospital. “I just talked to him,” spokesman Salvador Panelo said in a statement. “He’s neither confirming nor denying that he went to the hospital.” ABS-CBN News said in a report citing social media posts that Duterte had been confined at a hospital in Manila since Friday and that the medical center was under tight security. Duterte’s former aide Bong Go shared a photograph of the leader sitting at a table and holding yesterday’s copy of the Philippine Star newspaper. Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte said she had not received any report that her father was ill, the Philippine Daily Inquirer reported. The 74-year-old president has long complained of Barrett’s esophagus — an inflammation of the tube connecting the mouth to the stomach.
SYRIA
Defenses intercept missiles
The nation’s air defenses targeted projectiles fired from the direction of Israel for the second night in a row, state media said on Saturday. The projectiles came from “occupied territory” into its airspace in the south, the Syrian Arab news agency said, referring to Israel. Residents said loud blasts echoed across Damascus late on Friday.
SOUTH AFRICA
Schwarzenegger kicked
Actor Arnold Schwarzenegger was apparently assaulted during a public appearance in South Africa on Saturday, but the 71-year-old quickly recovered and said: “I’m just glad the idiot didn’t interrupt my Snapchat.” Video showed the former California governor standing and filming children at a sporting event in Johannesburg when a man makes a flying kick into his back. Schwarzenegger stumbles forward and the man is grabbed by security personnel. Off camera a man shouts several times: “Help me!” The video shortly afterward shows Schwarzenegger smiling and shaking hands with bystanders before walking out ringed by security. Schwarzenegger later posted on Twitter: “Thanks for your concerns, but there is nothing to worry about. I thought I was just jostled by the crowd, which happens a lot. I only realized I was kicked when I saw the video like all of you. I’m just glad the idiot didn’t interrupt my Snapchat.” Schwarzenegger also tweeted a second video of the incident “without whatever he was yelling so he doesn’t get the spotlight.” Schwarzenegger had been attending his Arnold Classic Africa event, which features dozens of sports and fitness activities. In a separate Twitter post, the event blamed a “crazed fan” for the assault. The statement cited organizer Wayne Price as saying that the assailant was “known to the police for orchestrating similar incidents in the past.”
ZIMBABWE
Central bank secures loan
The central bank has secured a US$500 million loan from unspecified international banks to support interbank currency trading from today and ease a cash crunch that has brought fuel and medicine shortages, Governor John Mangudya said. The central bank introduced a new local currency in February, the RTGS dollar, and launched an interbank trading platform where businesses and individuals could buy and sell US dollars. However, dollars have been scarce on the official market, where a US dollar fetches 3.4 RTGS dollars compared with 6.3 RTGS dollars on the black market.
FRANCE
‘Yellow vests’ dwindle
“Yellow vest” protesters on Saturday turned out nationwide to mark six months of rallies against President Emmanuel Macron’s policies, but with their numbers dwindling, a government tally showed. The count from the Ministry of the Interior — routinely dismissed by yellow jackets — put the numbers at 15,500, of whom 1,600 marched in Paris. That was down again from last week’s count of 18,600, while the yellow jackets’ own tally put the total at 41,000. However, many of those who turned out on Saturday were determined to keep going. “When I hear Macron say that he has done his bit, I can’t agree, and that motivates me even more,” said Virginie, an executive secretary who took part in a march in the southern city of Montpellier.
UNITED KINGDOM
March for marriage equality
Thousands of people on Saturday marched in Belfast to demand that the province’s leaders permit same-sex marriage. They want same-sex couples to be treated the same way in Northern Ireland as they are in the rest of the nation, where same-sex marriage is legal. However, the socially conservative Democratic Unionist Party, an ally of Prime Minister Theresa May’s government, is opposed to a redefinition of the law.
UNITED STATES
Republican says impeach
Representative Justin Amash on Saturday that he believed President Donald Trump has engaged in “impeachable conduct,” becoming the first Republican Party politician to call for removing Trump. He also accused Attorney General William Barr of “deliberately” misleading the public over the actual content and tenor of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russian interference aimed at tipping the 2016 election to Trump. In a series of tweets, the lawmaker from Michigan — a member of the ultra-conservative Freedom Caucus — said “few members of Congress even read Mueller’s report,” which identified “multiple examples of conduct satisfying all the elements of obstruction of justice.” “Undoubtedly any person who is not the president of the United States would be indicted based on such evidence,” Amash added. “Contrary to Barr’s portrayal, Mueller’s report reveals that President Trump engaged in specific actions and a pattern of behavior that meet the threshold for impeachment.” Amash’s comments went even further than those by most Democratic leaders in Congress.
BELGIUM
The mullet lives
Hundreds of people on Saturday gathered in the little western town of Boussu to celebrate the mullet, an iconic 1980s hairdo. For some it is a throwback to a simpler time, for others an anti-fashion statement or simply a bit of a laugh. “This cut is a state of mind, a declaration of independence. It carries symbolic weight as an affirmation of self,” organizer Damien Hubert said as he told reporters how the festival evolved from a music video film shoot. “To be honest, I’m not sure that many people ever found the cut very attractive. We’re not kidding ourselves about that.” Many of those who turned out for a beer and a bold trim were 30 and 40-somethings. “When I was little, I was in love with MacGyver, this is like a return to my childhood,” 31-year-old Marie Vandeville said as she went under the razor, referring to the US television series MacGyver, in which the lead character sports a mullet. “I’ll only leave it a few days, afterward we’ll even it up.”
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion