AFGHANISTAN
Army launches offensive
The army has launched an offensive in the southern Taliban heartland to try to weaken the insurgents before the start of the new “fighting season,” officials said yesterday. Police and troops, in their first major assault since US-led NATO forces ended their combat mission in December last year, began targeting militants on Monday in four districts of Helmand Province. The Ministry of Defense said 76 insurgents were killed on the first day of the operation, which would also target militants in six districts in neighboring Kandahar, Farah, and Uruzgan provinces.
INDONESIA
Prisoner transfer delayed
The transfer of five convicts, including two Australians, to another prison for execution has been delayed because of medical concerns and the families’ requests to spend more time with the prisoners, the attorney general’s office said yesterday. Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan, two Australians convicted in 2005 as the ringleaders of a plot to smuggle heroin from Bali, were due to be moved this week from prison in Bali to a maximum security prison at Nusakambangan Island, the site of the expected execution by firing squad. “I’m sure this week there won’t be a transfer,” Tony Spontana, spokesman for the attorney general’s office, told reporters.
INDONESIA
Anti-graft boss listed in case
Police yesterday named the head of the nation’s anti-graft agency as a suspect in a case related to a falsified passport from 2007. “Abraham Samad has been named a suspect for falsifying a document,” Endi Sutendi, spokesman for South and West Sulawesi police, told a news conference in a live broadcast. After questioning more than 20 witnesses, police said they had enough evidence to name Samad as a suspect in the case. Samad’s deputy, Bambang Widjojanto, was named as a suspect by police last month in a 2010 perjury complaint, part of a dispute with police that has raised concerns about the future of the anti-graft agency.
SRI LANKA
UN rights report delayed
The new government on Monday won a six-month delay in the publication of a UN report on alleged war crimes, after the UN human rights boss praised its willingness to open the country up to scrutiny. Government forces have been accused of widespread human rights violations in the final stages of the civil war that ended in May 2009. The UN Human Rights Council inquiry was due to report back next month. UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein said he had recommended deferral of the team’s report until September, and the president of the Human Rights Council had agreed, given “the changing context in Sri Lanka, and the possibility that important new information may emerge which will strengthen the report.”
INDIA
Millionaire charged
Police on Monday charged a millionaire Kerala businessman with murder after he allegedly rammed an SUV into his security guard for being slow in opening a gate, an official said. Muhammad Nisham, 39, was arrested last month after he allegedly pinned his guard, Chandarabose, against a wall with his Hummer. Chandarabose, 50, was left with multiple injuries and died of cardiac arrest at a hospital on Monday, after undergoing multiple surgeries. Nisham, a tobacco tycoon, allegedly chased the guard inside the complex in the attack, squeezing him against a wall before beating him with an iron rod.
CHINA
Senior official in graft probe
A former senior provincial official suspected of crimes such as breaking the strict family planning laws, graft and abuse of power will be prosecuted, the government said yesterday. Zhu Mingguo (朱明國) was the former head of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference in Guangdong Province. The Chinese Communist Party’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection said an investigation found he had accepted a “huge amount of bribes” in the selection of officials and management of companies. He also “seriously violated the family planning policy,” it added.
CHINA
Cop fired over salamander
A police chief in Shenzhen has been sacked after colleagues roughed up a group of reporters who had tried to report on a group of officers feasting on a giant salamander, an endangered animal, at a seafood restaurant last month. The Shenzhen police said in a statement on their official microblog late on Monday that an investigation had shown that the giant salamander in question had been raised in captivity, which meant “there was no such problem of an endangered giant salamander.” However, east Shenzhen precinct chief Wang Yuanping did not provide accurate information about the investigation and abused his power in ordering four officers to stand guard outside the restaurant, the statement said.
JAPAN
Tokyo aids anti-terror efforts
The government yesterday said it would provide US$15.5 million in development aid to support anti-terrorism efforts in the Middle East and Africa. The move comes after the recent beheadings of two Japanese hostages by militants from the Islamic State group.
UNITED STATES
Cancer claims Lesley Gore
Singer-songwriter Lesley Gore, who topped the charts in 1963 at age 16 with her epic song of teenage angst, It’s My Party, and followed it up with the hits Judy’s Turn to Cry and the feminist anthem You Don’t Own Me, died on Monday. She was 68. Gore, a nonsmoker, died of lung cancer at New York-Presbyterian Hospital in Manhattan, according to her partner of 33 years, Lois Sasson. “She was a wonderful human being — caring, giving, a great feminist, great woman, great human being, great humanitarian,” jewelry designer Sasson said. Gore was discovered by Quincy Jones as a teenager and signed to Mercury Records. With her brother, Michael, she wrote the Academy Award-nominated Out Here On My Own from the film Fame.
FRANCE
Louis Jourdan dies aged 93
Veteran French actor Louis Jourdan, who starred in Gigi and Octopussy, has died in Los Angeles at the age of 93, his official biographer said on Sunday. Jourdan died of natural causes at his Beverly Hills home on Saturday, Olivier Minne said by telephone from Paris. “He embodied French elegance and Hollywood offered him the parts to go with that,” Minne said. Over his decades-long career, he starred in dozens of films and TV series, acting alongside movie greats such as Frank Sinatra, Grace Kelly and Shirley MacLaine. In one of his most memorable performances, he played a leading role in the Oscar-winning 1958 musical Gigi. Born in Marseille in 1921, he made his debut on French screens in 1939, acting in a string of romantic comedies.
UNITED STATES
Irving Singer dead at 89
Irving Singer, a philosopher, author and professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has died at age 89. He died on Feb. 1 after a period of declining health, daughter Emily Singer confirmed on Monday. Singer, whose academic career spanned 65 years, served on the MIT faculty in the Department of Philosophy and Linguistics from 1958 until his retirement in 2013. He wrote 21 books in the field of humanistic philosophy, focusing on areas such as the philosophy of love, the nature of creativity and moral issues.
UNITED STATES
De Borchgrave dies aged 88
Arnaud de Borchgrave, a flamboyant Belgium-born journalist who covered wars and befriended world leaders, has died. He was 88. De Borchgrave served as a foreign correspondent for Newsweek magazine, and later led the Washington Times in its early days as its top editor. Washington Times president and chief executive Larry Beasley said De Borchgrave was a giant of journalism and helped put the publication on the map. De Borchgrave’s family said he had cancer. He died on Sunday.
UNITED STATES
Durham shooter indicted
A North Carolina grand jury on Monday indicted a man on three counts of murder in the shootings of three young Muslims in what authorities have said was a dispute over parking spaces and family members call a hate crime. Local television stations reported that a grand jury in Durham County indicted Craig Hicks, 46, on Monday. Yusor Mohammad Abu-Salha, 21; her husband, Deah Shaddy Barakat, 23; and her sister, Razan Mohammad Abu-Salha, 19, were found dead in the couple’s Chapel Hill condominium last week. Hicks’ court date is March 4. His lawyer, Stephen Freedman, said he could not comment.
A new online voting system aimed at boosting turnout among the Philippines’ millions of overseas workers ahead of Monday’s mid-term elections has been marked by confusion and fears of disenfranchisement. Thousands of overseas Filipino workers have already cast their ballots in the race dominated by a bitter feud between President Ferdinand Marcos Jr and his impeached vice president, Sara Duterte. While official turnout figures are not yet publicly available, data from the Philippine Commission on Elections (COMELEC) showed that at least 134,000 of the 1.22 million registered overseas voters have signed up for the new online system, which opened on April 13. However,
EUROPEAN FUTURE? Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama says only he could secure EU membership, but challenges remain in dealing with corruption and a brain drain Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama seeks to win an unprecedented fourth term, pledging to finally take the country into the EU and turn it into a hot tourist destination with some help from the Trump family. The artist-turned-politician has been pitching Albania as a trendy coastal destination, which has helped to drive up tourism arrivals to a record 11 million last year. US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, also joined in the rush, pledging to invest US$1.4 billion to turn a largely deserted island into a luxurious getaway. Rama is expected to win another term after yesterday’s vote. The vote would
ALLIES: Calling Putin his ‘old friend,’ Xi said Beijing stood alongside Russia ‘in the face of the international counter-current of unilateralism and hegemonic bullying’ Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) yesterday was in Moscow for a state visit ahead of the Kremlin’s grand Victory Day celebrations, as Ukraine accused Russia’s army of launching air strikes just hours into a supposed truce. More than 20 foreign leaders were in Russia to attend a vast military parade today marking 80 years since the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II, taking place three years into Russia’s offensive in Ukraine. Putin ordered troops into Ukraine in February 2022 and has marshaled the memory of Soviet victory against Nazi Germany to justify his campaign and rally society behind the offensive,
Myanmar’s junta chief met Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) for the first time since seizing power, state media reported yesterday, the highest-level meeting with a key ally for the internationally sanctioned military leader. Senior General Min Aung Hlaing led a military coup in 2021, overthrowing Myanmar’s brief experiment with democracy and plunging the nation into civil war. In the four years since, his armed forces have battled dozens of ethnic armed groups and rebel militias — some with close links to China — opposed to its rule. The conflict has seen Min Aung Hlaing draw condemnation from rights groups and pursued by the
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