NEW ZEALAND
Auckland blaze continues
A fire burning for a second day at a convention center that was under construction in the nation’s largest city, Auckland, was yesterday causing more disruption and casting doubt on whether the building would be ready to host a meeting of world leaders in 2021. Officials said a mixture of bitumen, straw-like material and plywood in the roof cavity of the seven-story structure was continuing to burn and firefighters could not properly access the area. They planned to let the fire burn itself out while preventing it spreading further. Fire and Emergency New Zealand said more than 100 firefighters and support staff continued to battle the blaze and that by early afternoon, about 70 percent of the roof had burned itself out. City workers were told to avoid downtown Auckland, and many buildings and some streets remained closed.
INDONESIA
Jokowi gives rival top job
New Cabinet members were yesterday introduced at an informal presentation on the palace steps, with President Joko Widodo tapping his election arch-rival, Prabowo Subianto — a former general with a checkered rights record — as minister of defense. Announcing Subianto’s new role, Widodo said: “I believe I don’t have to tell him about his job — he knows more than I do.” Online, Subianto supporters cheered the appointment. “They used to compete but now, together, they’re going to build this country,” one said. Rights group Amnesty International Indonesia earlier warned against appointing the former general to a top job, saying it would mark “a dark day for human rights.” Subianto, a former son-in-law of late dictator Suharto, was accused of abuses — including the kidnapping and disappearance of several pro-democracy activists — in the lead up to massive street demonstrations that brought down the regime in 1998.
VIETNAM
Vehicle map apps cause stir
An automobile importer has been ordered to remove navigation apps that show maps reflecting Chinese territorial claims that are rejected by Hanoi. The nation’s automobile registrar told the importer based in northern Vietnam to take the app out of Chinese-made vehicles it distributes in the nation, said Nguyen To An, head of motor-vehicle quality in the registration office. The maps showed the nine-dash line reflecting China’s disputed claim to sovereignty over about 80 percent of the South China Sea.
UNITED KINGDOM
Lucky tumor find at exhibit
A woman discovered she had breast cancer after an interactive heat-cam exhibit revealed a tumor during a family trip to a museum in Edinburgh. Bal Gill, 41, caught the disease in its early stages following her visit to the Camera Obscura attraction in May, which prompted her to consult a doctor. When she stepped in front of a thermal-camera display that shows which parts of the body are hot and cold, she saw one of her breasts was glowing yellow, the museum said. “I noticed a heat patch coming from my left breast. We thought it was odd and having looked at everyone else they didn’t have the same,” she said in a statement, describing the experience as “life-changing.” Gill has since had a mastectomy and has been told she will not need chemotherapy or radiotherapy after another operation next month, the BBC reported. Camera Obscura’s general manager Andrew Johnson said the museum “did not realize” its exhibit could detect signs of cancer in this way.
UNITED STATES
S Pole ozone hole shrinks
The ozone hole near the South Pole this year is the smallest since it was discovered, but it is more due to freakish Antarctic weather than efforts to cut down on pollution, NASA reported on Tuesday. The average hole in the protective ozone layer this fall is 9.3 million square kilometers. That is down from a peak of 26.6 million square kilometers in 2006. This year’s hole is even smaller than the one first discovered in 1985. “That’s really good news,” NASA scientist Paul Newman said. “That means more ozone over the hemisphere, less ultraviolet radiation at the surface.” The hole reaches its peak in September and October, and disappears by late December until the next spring in the Southern Hemisphere.
SWITZERLAND
Kurd sets himself on fire
A Syrian Kurdish man in his 30s yesterday set himself on fire outside the UN High Commissioner for Refugees’ (UNHCR) headquarters in Geneva and was quickly airlifted to hospital after the flames were extinguished, police said. The man, who resides in Germany, was flown by helicopter to the specialized burns unit at the Lausanne University Hospital, a police spokesman said, adding: “Given his state, it was impossible to ask him about his motive, but we imagine that it was the political situation.” The man had set himself ablaze and then tried to enter the UNHCR building, but security officers and medical services intervened and the fire was put out, UNHCR spokesman Andrej Mahecic said.
UNITED STATES
Finger-flipper runs for office
A viral photograph taken in the fall of 2017 showing cyclist Juli Briskman flipping off US President Donald Trump’s presidential convoy cost her her job, but now she is running for office in Loudon, Virginia. A single mother of two teens, Briskman quickly found a new job, but soon after, she was asked to run for county supervisor on the Democratic ticket. It did not take long for her to decide. “I did feel a little bit of responsibility, [because] I was handed a megaphone,” she said. “I can’t run against Trump, but I can run for this seat and make a difference right here.”
UNITED STATES
Charges added in case
Actress Lori Loughlin, her fashion designer husband and nine other parents on Tuesday faced new federal charges in a scandal involving dozens of wealthy parents accused of bribing their children’s way into elite universities or cheating on college entrance exams. A grand jury in Boston, Massachusetts, indicted the parents on charges of trying to bribe officials at an organization that receives at least US$10,000 in federal funding, which in this case is the University of Southern California. The charge carries a maximum sentence of up to five years in prison and a fine of up to US$250,000.
UNITED STATES
Jimmy Carty has third fall
Former president Jimmy Carter had another fall at his home in Plains, Georgia, fracturing his pelvis and going to the hospital for treatment and observation, a spokeswoman said on Tuesday. Carter Center spokeswoman Deanna Congileo described the fracture as minor, saying that the 95-year-old was in good spirits at the Phoebe Sumter Medical Center after falling on Monday evening and that he was looking forward to recovering at home. This is the third time Carter has fallen in the past few months. A fall in the spring led to hip replacement surgery, while a fall on Oct. 6 left a gash that took 14 stitches to close.
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