HONG KONG
Mainland cars protested
Several hundred people marched on Sunday, opposing a controversial government scheme that allows mainland Chinese cars into the territory, further escalating tensions between the two sides. About 300 protesters in the busy downtown area chanted slogans such as “[we] oppose mainland cars roaming in Hong Kong freely!” and waved banners that read “No, no, no, mainland Chinese cars.”
NEW ZEALAND
Flu scare quarantines plane
Health authorities yesterday said they overreacted to an influenza scare on a flight from Japan by quarantining the plane on the tarmac at Auckland airport for several hours. The Air New Zealand flight from Tokyo was isolated after it landed yesterday morning, when the airline informed health officials that about 60 Japanese students were displaying flu-like symptoms. The Auckland Regional Public Health Service put local hospitals on standby for mass patient admissions, as medical teams in biohazard suits entered the Boeing 777-200 to examine the sick passengers. They were eventually allowed to disembark after about three hours, when it was determined that, while some had colds, they had been immunized against flu and did not have the virus.
AUSTRALIA
Gay marriage bills mulled
Two rival bills that would lift a ban on gay marriage were introduced into parliament yesterday, weeks after the ruling Labor Party lifted its opposition to same-sex unions. The bills are essentially the same. Both place same-sex couples on the same footing as heterosexuals, but allow religious ministers the freedom to refuse to solemnize marriages inconsistent with their beliefs.
AUSTRALIA
UK rapist to be deported
A British man convicted of torturing and raping a young woman in a case that drew parallels to the film The Silence of the Lambs yesterday lost his fight against deportation. Leslie Neil Cunliffe was released from jail on parole in April after serving about 12 years for his crimes. Cunliffe was dubbed the “Silence of the Lambs” rapist by authorities after he posed as a policeman in 1999, abducting a 21-year-old woman at gunpoint and locking her in a backyard shed with padded walls. The woman was tied to a chair that had been bolted to the floor and her eyes and mouth taped shut during the ordeal in which she was raped and tortured over several hours in the property in Geelong, west of Melbourne. Cunliffe eventually strapped a fake bomb to her, stripped her from the waist and took photos to demand a A$1 million (US$1.07 million) ransom. The woman escaped after Cunliffe went out to buy food and a woman heard her screams for help.
AFGHANISTAN
Ten-year-old bombers caught
Police arrested two 10-year-old would-be suicide bombers in the south, officials said on Sunday, months after President Hamid Karzai pardoned the pair over a similar incident. The children had two vests full of explosives when they were detained, he added. They had previously been arrested by security forces, again wearing explosive vests, but were reportedly released in August last year, along with 18 other children, after receiving a pardon from the president. The two boys had gone to Pakistan after their release, but were sent back to the country after being trained to conduct suicide attacks. “They told me I would be safe after conducting a suicide attack,” one the boys, Azizullah, was quoted in a statement sent by Kandahar media office.
IRAN
Naval forces built up: US
The country has built up its naval forces in the Gulf and prepared boats that could be used in suicide attacks, but the US Navy could prevent it from blocking the Strait of Hormuz, the commander of US naval forces in the region said on Sunday. “They have increased the number of submarines ... they increased the number of fast attack craft,” Vice Admiral Mark Fox, who heads the US Fifth Fleet, said at a briefing on the fleet’s base in Bahrain. “Some of the small boats have been outfitted with a large warhead that could be used as a suicide explosive device. The Iranians have a large mine inventory.”
DR CONGO
Kabila aide killed in crash
A close aide to President Joseph Kabila was killed and Finance Minister Augustin Matata Ponyo was seriously injured in a plane crash on Sunday in the east of the country, the president’s office said. Two US crewmembers also died, as well as two people crushed by the plane as it came down at Bukavu airport. The statement identified Kabila’s aide as Augustin Katumba Mwanke, 48, considered a key member of Kabila’s entourage. Sud-Kivu Governor Marcellin Tshisambo had also suffered fractures in both legs, an airport official said.
SPAIN
Rally held for rights judge
Thousands of people rallied on Sunday in the capital in support of the disbarred judge famous for taking on international human rights cases. Baltasar Garzon was convicted on Thursday by the Supreme Court, in which the seven-judge panel disbarred him for 11 years. A large square outside the main gates of the Supreme Court filled with about 10,000 people, many carrying placards and banners calling for justice for the former judge and chanting, “Garzon, friend, Spain is with you.” The case was just one of three against Garzon. “Garzon, a top judge, is on trial for three different supposed crimes, something unheard of in Spanish legal history,” said Juan de la Torre, a 47-year-old chemist. “Yet, in each separate case it’s the same seven judges trying him.”
URUGUAY
Attacker subdued on plane
Passengers leapt to the aid of the pilot of a Brazilian jet, subduing an attacker on a flight from Montevideo to Sao Paulo, Brazil, an official said on Sunday. The incident took place on Saturday on TAM flight JJ8047. “A man, apparently mentally troubled, tried to attack the pilot in the cabin; that was where the incident took place and that was when the plane swayed a little,” said Sebastian Torres, a member of the government’s industry delegation who was en route to China when the incident took place. After the incident, the attacker came out “and walked down the aisle ... Then some passengers tried to grab him and he resisted and struggled with them” before he was handcuffed, Torres said.
ITALY
Facebook pics betray fugitive
A wanted Sicilian drug dealer who fled to the UK has been extradited after he gave the game away by posting photos on Facebook of London locations. Michele Grasso vanished from his hometown of Taormina in 2010 as police sought to arrest him for drug dealing. Grasso posted photos under the title “Christmas in London,” followed by snaps of trips to the Ministry of Sound nightclub, the London Eye wheel, Tower Bridge and Oxford Circus. Last year, Grasso was sentenced in absentia by a court to five years in jail and a 24,000 euro (US$32,000) fine for drug dealing.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
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