PERU
Weather hampers search
A search and rescue mission battled snow and fog on Friday to hunt for eight South Koreans, three Europeans and three Peruvians whose helicopter went missing in the mountainous south of the country. The bad weather prevented aircraft from participating in the mission, while mountain patrols that left on Thursday from the villages of Ocongate and Marcapata saw their progress hampered by deep snow. “The conditions are very adverse. Snow in the area is now about 30cm deep and fog makes it impossible to view the ground from the air,” Cusco police chief General Hector Dulanto said.
UNITED STATES
Pro-NASA events hosted
More than a dozen US universities were scheduled to host events yesterday to urge support for NASA, which faces major cuts to its planetary programs in the next fiscal year. Ranging from shoe shines to car washes and bake sales, the events were not actually designed to raise money to send to NASA, the organizers stressed. “Our goal is not to raise money but to raise awareness and to have people tell [US] Congress to put the funds back to last year’s funding level,” said Cindy Conrad, an assistant at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado.
UNITED STATES
Drug baron gets 23 years
A court sentenced Jamaican drug baron Christopher “Dudus” Coke to 23 years in prison on Friday, bringing the curtain down on the career of one of the Caribbean’s most notorious gangsters. Coke pleaded guilty to racketeering conspiracy and conspiracy to commit assault in aid of racketeering, following his 2010 extradition from Jamaica. The sentence passed in New York federal court by Judge Robert Patterson was the maximum. It did not reflect the multiple murders and years of cocaine trafficking that Coke presided over in his Kingston stronghold. The head prosecutor for Manhattan, US Attorney Preet Bharara, said that Coke’s crime empire had finally crumbled.
UNITED STATES
Man seeks phone pay-off
A man assigned the old phone number of Florida neighborhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman, who has been charged with murder for shooting dead an unarmed black teenager, is seeking compensation after a rash of threatening calls. Junior Alexander Guy, 49, got his first cellphone last month. Immediately he was besieged by callers angry at Zimmerman, who gave the number to a police dispatcher in a recorded call the night of the shooting. Guy told the Sentinel he was forced to move out of his home and relocate his mother, who lived with him. Orlando lawyer Robert Trimble has asked T-Mobile to pay damages, “a fair and reasonable sum,” to Guy, but the cellphone provider, according to reports, has refused.
BRAZIL
Tribe seeks end to logging
A tribe that calls the Amazon rainforest home is urging the government to stop illegal logging on its land, a watchdog said on Friday. In a statement, Survival International said the Awa tribe had made a “desperate appeal” to the minister of justice to “evict loggers from our land immediately ... before they come back and destroy everything.” Consisting of just 450 people, the Awa tribe suffers the fastest rate of deforestation in the Amazon, according to the group. The appeal calls on the public to show their support for the Awa by sending protest messages to the Minister of Justice Jose Eduardo Cardozo. So far, more than 27,000 people have done so, Survival said.
Hungarian authorities temporarily detained seven Ukrainian citizens and seized two armored cars carrying tens of millions of euros in cash across Hungary on suspicion of money laundering, officials said on Friday. The Ukrainians were released on Friday, following their detention on Thursday, but Hungarian officials held onto the cash, prompting Ukraine to accuse Hungary’s Russia-friendly government of illegally seizing the money. “We will not tolerate this state banditism,” Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrii Sybiha said. The seven detained Ukrainians were employees of the Ukrainian state-owned Oschadbank, who were traveling in the two armored cars that were carrying the money between Austria and
Kosovar President Vjosa Osmani on Friday after dissolving the Kosovar parliament said a snap election should be held as soon as possible to avoid another prolonged political crisis in the Balkan country at a time of global turmoil. Osmani said it is important for Kosovo to wrap up the upcoming election process and form functional institutions for political stability as the war rages in the Middle East. “Precisely because the geopolitical situation is that complex, it is important to finish this electoral process which is coming up,” she said. “It is very hard now to imagine what will happen next.” Kosovo, which declared
Australians were downloading virtual private networks (VPNs) in droves, while one of the world’s largest porn distributors said it was blocking users from its platforms as the country yesterday rolled out sweeping online age restriction. Australia in December became the first country to impose a nationwide ban on teenagers using social media. A separate law now requires artificial intelligence (AI)-powered chatbot services to keep certain content — including pornography, extreme violence and self-harm and eating disorder material — from minors or face fines of up to A$49.5 million (US$34.6 million). The country also joined Britain, France and dozens of US states requiring
MORE BANS: Australia last year required sites to remove accounts held by under-16s, with a few countries pushing for similar action at an EU level and India considering its own ban Indonesia on Friday said it would ban social media access for children under 16, citing threats from online pornography, cyberbullying, online fraud and Internet addiction. “Accounts belonging to children under 16 on high-risk platforms will start to be deactivated, beginning with YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Threads, X, Bigo Live and Roblox,” Indonesian Minister of Communications and Digital Meutya Hafid said. “The government is stepping in so that parents no longer have to fight alone against the giants of the algorithm. Implementation will begin on March 28, 2026,” she said. The social media ban would be introduced in stages “until all platforms fulfill their
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