CHINA
‘Jade Rabbit’ blasts off
A rocket carrying the nation’s first rover mission to the moon blasted off early yesterday. The rover, named “Jade Rabbit,” is scheduled to arrive on the moon in the middle of this month, Xinhua news agency said. If the rocket successfully soft-lands on the moon, China will become the third country to do so, after the US and the former Soviet Union. The Jade Rabbit will travel across the moon, examining its geological structures and beaming images back to Earth. It will also set up a telescope to survey the surface as well as observe the Earth’s plasmasphere, Xinhua said.
AUSTRALIA
Cold wait for crews
Two helicopter crews were stranded in Antarctica awaiting rescue yesterday, three of the group with “serious” injuries, after a chopper crash. The government’s Antarctic Division (AAD) said a pilot and two passengers were hurt when their Squirrel helicopter came down 150 nautical miles (278km) from Davis Station on Sunday night as it returned from a penguin colony surveillance mission near the Amery ice shelf. A second helicopter flying in tandem immediately set down to assist the injured trio, and its passenger and pilot were caring for them until a recovery and medical support mission could be scrambled. “Reports from the incident site are that all are warm and sheltered and being closely monitored. Communication is being maintained with Davis station,” the AAD said.
CHINA
Skull cache found in ruins
Archeologists have unearthed the skulls of more than 80 young women who may have been sacrificed more than 4,000 years ago, Xinhua reported yesterday. The skulls were found in what appears to have been a mass grave at the Shimao Ruins, the site of a neolithic stone city in Shaanxi Province. The women’s bodies were not present, Xinhua said, adding that archeologists concluded that the skulls were “likely to be related to the construction of the city wall” in “ancient religious activities or foundation ceremonies” before construction began. The Shimao Ruins cover more than 4km2 and were discovered in 1976.
AUSTRALIA
Bird captures camera theft
A sea eagle snatched a video camera that was recording crocodiles in the Kimberly region and captured fascinating footage of its 110km journey across the country. Wildlife rangers yesterday released video footage that reveals the bird’s caper. The bird’s flapping wings can be seen as it grabs the device and takes off, and the eagle later poses for a selfie, poking its face into the camera lens. Rangers set up the motion-sensor camera along the Margaret River in May, hoping to record images of crocodiles. The camera, which is about 10cm by 15cm long and 5cm wide, disappeared soon after and the rangers figured it had fallen into the water. The rangers recently found out the device had been found near the Mary River, about 110km away, ranger Roneil Skeen told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. The rangers plan to bolt down their cameras from now on, Skeen said.
AUSTRALIA
Artist Martin Sharp dies
Psychedelic artist Martin Sharp, a founder of the controversial Oz magazine who designed posters and ablum covers for Jimi Hendrix, Cream and Bob Dylan, has died aged 71. His death on Sunday, after a long struggle against emphysema, was confirmed by artist and friend Garry Shead, the Sydney Morning Herald reported.
UNITED KINGDOM
Scotland in mourning
Mourners lit candles as Scotland remembered those who were killed when a police helicopter plunged through the roof of a Glasgow pub, killing at least nine people, police said yesterday. Emergency service workers earlier began attempts to winch the police aircraft back through the roof of The Clutha, where it is feared further corpses may be found under its carcass, further raising the death toll. All three on board the helicopter and two men who were in the pub have been named. More than 100 people were watching a Glaswegian ska band in the popular live music bar on Friday night when the unexplained disaster struck. In sombre scenes, candles were lit in Glasgow Cathedral during a packed memorial service on Sunday.
ITALY
Seven killed in factory fire
A fire early on Sunday swept through an illegal, makeshift dormitory in a Chinese-run garment factory in Tuscany, killing seven people, firefighters said. The blaze, which partially collapsed the factory’s roof, broke out in a loft where 11 people were sleeping, fire inspector Stefano Giannelli said. Tuscany Governor Enrico Rossi said that numerous garment factories are in the hands of Chinese organized crime syndicates. “This is on all of our consciences. We need to see the situation for what it is. This is the largest concentration of black-market labor in Italy’s central north, probably all of Europe,” Rossi said on Sky TG 24.
CROATIA
Church wins marriage poll
A strong majority voted on Sunday to outlaw same-sex marriage in a referendum sought by a church-backed group, but strongly opposed by rights groups, nearly complete official results showed. A total of 65.76 percent of voters said they wanted to amend the constitution to include a definition of marriage as a “union between a woman and a man,” according to results from almost 99 percent of polling stations released by the electoral commission. Croatia’s constitution does not define marriage. Passions ran high ahead of the vote, with the church-backed “yes” camp citing the defense of traditional family values and their opponents accusing them of discrimination against gays.
UNITED KINGDOM
Lennon files auctioned
School files detailing the adolescent wrongdoings of “class clown” John Lennon fetched nearly ￡8,500 (US$14,000) each in an online auction on Sunday. The pair of detention sheets revealed that the Beatle received punishment for “fighting in class,” being a “nuisance,” “shoving” and showing “no interest whatsoever” during his time at Quarry Bank High School for Boys in Liverpool. The counterculture icon twice managed to accumulate three detentions in one day, according to the files kept on Lennon during the 1955-1956 school year, when he was 15.
HONDURAS
Defeated candidate protests
Defeated leftist presidential candidate, Xiomara Castro, the wife of ousted former president Manuel Zelaya, led thousands of supporters onto the streets of Tegucigalpa on Sunday to protest an election result she called fraudulent. The demonstration by a crowd estimated at several thousand passed off peacefully, which analysts said offered some hope for political stability. The ruling National Party’s Juan Hernandez won last week’s election with 36.8 percent of the vote. Castro ran as the candidate of the Liberty and Refoundation Party — a coalition of leftist politicians, unions and indigenous groups founded by her husband.
FLYBY: The object, appears to be traveling more than 60 kilometers per second, meaning it is not bound by the sun’s orbit, astronomers studying 3I/Atlas said Astronomers on Wednesday confirmed the discovery of an interstellar object racing through the solar system — only the third-ever spotted, although scientists suspect many more might slip past unnoticed. The visitor from the stars, designated 3I/Atlas, is likely the largest yet detected, and has been classified as a comet, or cosmic snowball. “It looks kind of fuzzy,” said Peter Veres, an astronomer with the International Astronomical Union’s Minor Planet Center, which was responsible for the official confirmation. “It seems that there is some gas around it, and I think one or two telescopes reported a very short tail.” Originally known as A11pl3Z before
US President Donald Trump’s administration on Monday accused Harvard University of violating the civil rights of its Jewish and Israeli students, and threatened to cut off all federal funding if the university does not take urgent action. Harvard has been at the forefront of Trump’s campaign against top US universities after it defied his calls to submit to oversight of its curriculum, staffing, student recruitment and “viewpoint diversity.” Trump and his allies claim that Harvard and other prestigious universities are unaccountable bastions of liberal, anti-conservative bias and anti-Semitism. In a letter sent to the president of Harvard, a federal task
‘CONTINUE TO SERVE’: The 90-year-old Dalai Lama said he hoped to be able to continue serving ‘sentient beings and the Buddha Dharma’ for decades to come The Dalai Lama yesterday said he dreamed of living for decades more, as the Buddhist spiritual leader prayed with thousands of exiled Tibetans on the eve of his 90th birthday. Thumping drums and deep horns reverberated from the Indian hilltop temple, as a chanting chorus of red-robed monks and nuns offered long-life prayers for Tenzin Gyatso, who followers believe is the 14th reincarnation of the Dalai Lama. Looking in good health, dressed in traditional maroon monk robes and a flowing yellow wrap, he led prayers — days after confirming that the 600-year-old Tibetan Buddhist institution would continue after his death. Many exiled Tibetans
BRICS leaders are to meet in Rio de Janeiro from today, with the bloc depleted by the absence of Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), who is skipping the annual summit of emerging economies for the first time in 12 years. The grouping meets as its members face imminent and costly tariff wars with the US. Conceived two decades ago as a forum for fast-growing economies, the BRICS have come to be dominated by Beijing, which grew much faster and larger than the rest. China has not said why Xi would miss the summit, a first since he became president in 2013. “I expect there
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