■ Philippines
Typhoon makes landfall
The most powerful typhoon to hit the country in eight years bore down on the northern island of Luzon yesterday, slamming into coastal regions with high winds and heavy rain, officials and witnesses said. The weather bureau said Typhoon Cimaron was packing winds of about 195kph, with gusts up to 230kph. President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, who is visiting China, urged residents in northern provinces to stay at home and prepare for the worst.
■ China
Two blasts leave 26 dead
Two accidents in Xinjiang Province on Saturday killed 26 workers, 14 of them in a coal mine blast and 12 in an explosion at an oil storage facility, state media reported yesterday. An explosion trapped the 14 men in a state-run mine 30km outside the provincial capital, Urumqi. Intense heat prevented rescuers from reaching them for more than seven hours, the official Xinhua news agency reported. The other blast killed 12 workers cleaning a crude oil storage tank at a facility belonging to China National Petroleum Co outside the city of Karamay, Xinhua and state television reported.
■ Australia
PM says troops innocent
Prime Minister John Howard and military chiefs yesterday denied allegations that Australian peacekeeping troops were responsible for the deaths of two men during street violence in East Timor. They dismissed the claims made in a report in Dili's main newspaper, Suara Timor-Leste. At least five people have been killed in fighting blamed on rival gangs in East Timor recently, but the newspaper said two men whose bodies were found on Friday were killed by Australian forces.
■ Malaysia
Two arrested in airline scam
Two men have been arrested over a scam which duped hundreds of Malaysians into applying for nonexistent jobs as flight attendants with Hong Kong carrier Cathay Pacific, a report said yesterday. Some 800 hopefuls responded to an advertisement promising salaries of US$3,000, but suspicions arose when short-listed candidates were asked to fork over 5,500 ringgit (US$1,508) for registration and training. The two men were busted after police, in the guise of job-seekers, arranged for interviews.
■ Nepal
Ceasefire extended
Communist rebels were set to extend their ceasefire yesterday, pledging to continue peace negotiations with the government. Dev Gurung, a member of the Maoist rebel peace talks team, said the group would meet within a day to decide whether the ceasefire would be extended for three more months or indefinitely. The rebels declared a three-month ceasefire in April, and began peace talks with the government. The truce was extended in July by another three months, which ended yesterday.
■ Hong Kong
Hundreds want last ride
Hundreds of people have bought tickets for four rides on the historic Star Ferry that plies across Victoria Harbor to mark the end of the existing Hong Kong Island ferry pier. People started lining up from 5am on Saturday to buy the 1,800 tickets, which cost about US$11 went on sale six-and-a half hours later, the South China Morning Post said. Ticket proceeds will be donated to charity. The special tickets were for four final cross-harbor trips at 12am on Nov. 11 to mark the end of the 49-year old ferry pier, which is being dem-olished as part of a reclama-tion scheme to create new land for rail and road links.
■ Russia
Merger forms new party
Three parties loyal to the Kremlin merged on Saturday to form a new "Justice Russia" party, ahead of legislative elections in December next year. The alliance unites the leftwing Rodina (Fatherland), Jizn (Party of Life) and the Party of Pensioners. The Justice Russia party president, voted by delegates of the three groups at a special congress in Moscow, will be Sergei Mironov, currently head of Jizn and president of the upper house of parliament. Mironov told Russian news agencies the party would be a new "leftwing political force" and a "hard opposition" to the pro-Kremlin United Russia party.
■ Bulgaria
Voters choose president
Voters were deciding yesterday between their pro-European president and a maverick ultranationalist in a runoff election that will determine who will lead the country into the EU. President Georgi Parvanov, a 49-year-old historian, won the first round on Oct. 22 by a wide 64 percent to 21.5 percent margin against Volen Siderov, a 50-year-old journalist, known for his mix of populism and racism. According to a poll conducted by the National Center for Public Opinion Research last week among 1,000 Bulgarians, Parvanov's support is 73 percent, while Siderov trails with 24 percent. Final results are expected today.
■ Congo
Presidential run-off held
The nation voted yesterday in a presidential election run-off intended to end decades of war and pillage. Jules Katasko, 34, couldn't hold back his smile as he walked away after pushing his paper into the bright orange ballot box. "For most of my life we had Mobutu Sese Seko, a dictator. He said `yes,' we all had to do it; he said `no,' we all had to stop it. Now it's us who decide whether its `yes' or 'no,'" he said. About 25 million people are registered to vote in the run-off between President Joseph Kabila and former warlord Jean-Pierre Bemba, top finishers in the July 30 first round. The vote will be accompanied by provincial elections, but results are not expected for three weeks.
■ Cyprus
Turkey EU talks at risk
Turkey could face a suspension of EU entry talks for failing to meet its obligations by the end of this year, but the door to Turkish EU membership should be left open, Cypriot President Tassos Papadopoulos said yesterday. Papadopoulos told the Cypriot daily Phileleftheros that delaying or conditionally suspending the talks were alternatives to the two "extremes" of allowing Turkey to continue negotiations unhindered, and a complete breakdown in talks. Turkey's progress after a year of accession negotiations will be assessed on Nov. 8.
■ Israel
Livni cancels Qatar trip
Foreign Minister Tsipi Livni had canceled plans to attend a UN meeting in Qatar because of the expected presence of legislators from the Islamist militant group Hamas, officials said yesterday. Israel has low-level ties with Qatar, and Livni's invitation to a UN convention on democracy would have been the first visit by a leading Israeli minister to the Gulf state in a decade. Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said Livni had never finalized details for the trip but stopped making plans after learning that two legislators from Hamas, the Palestinian ruling party, would be attending the convention.
■ United States
Burger record smashed
Japanese eating champion Takeru Kobayashi won his third straight Krystal hamburger-eating contest in Chattanooga, Tennessee, setting a new world record in the process. Kobayashi ate 97 of the small hamburgers in eight minutes on Saturday. That beat the previous record of 69 burgers, which he set at the first Krystal contest in 2004. Californian Joey Chestnut came in second by eating 91 hamburgers, and Pat Bertoletti of Chicago ate 76 to place third. Kobayashi also holds the title of hot dog-eating champion from Nathan's Famous Fourth of July International Hot Dog-Eating Contest at Coney Island, New York.
■ Canada
Al-Qaeda issues threat
The al-Qaeda network has threatened the nation with terrorist attacks if Ottawa fails to withdraw its troops deployed in Afghanistan, the National Post reported on Saturday. The threat was issued by a member of the al-Qaeda information and strategy committee, Hossam Abdul Raouf, in a document written in July, the Toronto newspaper said. Raouf wrote that the Canadians "will either be forced to withdraw their forces or face an operation similar to New York, Madrid, London." The document was obtained and translated by a US non-profit organization, the SITE Institute, that monitors the Internet for terrorist threats, the paper said.
■ Iraq
Alleged cameraman nabbed
The army captured a man said to have worked as the personal cameraman for Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the late leader of the al-Qaeda in the country, the defense ministry said yesterday. Spokesman Mohammed al-Askari told al-Iraqiyah TV that Khalid al-Hayani was captured by Iraqi army troops in Diyala Province. However, he declined to say when al-Hayani was captured or give his nationality. He would only add that video tapes and documents were found in al-Hayani's possession. The Jordanian-born Al-Zarqawi, who was killed in a US airstrike June 7 in Diyala, had appeared in several video tapes posted on militant Internet sites.
■ Brazil
Presidential run-off held
Some 126 million voters were eligible to cast ballots yesterday in a run-off presidential election that looked likely to give a second term to President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who held a commanding opinion poll advantage over centrist former Sao Paulo governor Geraldo Alckmin. Two voter intention surveys out on Saturday credited Lula with more than 61 percent support and a lead of 22 points over Alckmin. Voters were also to choose governors in 10 of the 27 states where gubernatorial elections were not decided in the Oct. 1 voting.
■ Nicaragua
Ortega comeback alarms US
Former president Daniel Ortega is a hair's breadth from regaining power, according to new opinion polls. The Sandinista leader is far ahead of rival candidates and could win in the first round of a presidential election next Sunday, a prospect causing consternation in Washington. Two surveys gave the former Marxist revolutionary between 33.8 and 34.4 percent support, just short of the 35 percent needed to avoid a run-off. Ortega, ousted in a 1990 election after his Sandinista government had fought a civil war against US-backed Contra guerrillas, has reinvented himself as a moderate who will bring jobs and growth. US Ambassador Paul Trivelli and senior Bush officials have warned of dire consequences if he wins.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
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