BELGIUM
Doctors acquitted of murder
A jury yesterday cleared three doctors accused of murder in a euthanasia case in a landmark trial in a country that legalized assisted dying nearly two decades ago. The prosecution said that the doctors had not respected the conditions for euthanasia in the case of Tine Nys, a 38-year-old woman who asserted her right to die in 2010 because of severe mental suffering. The Belga news agency reported that the jury at the court in Ghent acquitted the doctors of poisoning Nys, prompting members of the public present to burst into sustained applause, drawing a rebuke from the judge. The accused are the doctor who gave Nys the lethal drip, as well as a general practitioner and a psychiatrist whose green light was needed for the assisted suicide. The case followed the complaints of two of Nys’ sisters, who deplored what they said was a hasty decision and who accused the suspects of “poisoning” their sister. The sisters claimed that not all treatments were tried for Nys following her diagnosis for autism two months before her death.
INDIA
Police kill hostage-taker
A man who held nearly two dozen children hostage at his daughter’s birthday party was shot dead by police before locals beat his wife to death as she tried to escape, authorities said yesterday. All 23 children — the youngest was six months old — were rescued as anxious parents gathered outside the house in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh late on Thursday. The man, identified as Subhash Batham, was demanding that murder charges against him be dropped, as well as a ransom of 10 million rupees (US$140,156) per child, police officer Amit Mishra told reporters. “He fired several rounds, injuring a few persons,” Mishra said. “We tried to negotiate with him, but to no avail. Concerned over safety of the children, we eventually broke open the rear door of the house and shot him.” The man, who was apparently celebrating his daughter’s first birthday, was out on bail over the murder charge. The wife was killed as she tried to run away.
JAPAN
One likely dead in avalanche
An avalanche at a ski resort on Hokkaido on Thursday hit a group of eight foreign skiers, likely killing at least one. The avalanche occurred when the group was skiing outside of a designated course near the Tomamu ski resort in central Hokkaido, the nearby Shimukappu village office said. One skier who escaped from the snow called police asking for help, village official Atsushi Tada said. The caller said that one of them, a Frenchman in his 40s, was feared dead, but six others survived, although further details of their conditions were not available. Rescuers from Hokkaido police were expected to head to the site to carry out a rescue operation.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
China would train thousands of foreign law enforcement officers to see the world order “develop in a more fair, reasonable and efficient direction,” its minister for public security has said. “We will [also] send police consultants to countries in need to conduct training to help them quickly and effectively improve their law enforcement capabilities,” Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong (王小洪) told an annual global security forum. Wang made the announcement in the eastern city of Lianyungang on Monday in front of law enforcement representatives from 122 countries, regions and international organizations such as Interpol. The forum is part of ongoing