CHINA
Beijing irked by Modi visit
China summoned India’s ambassador over Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to a disputed border region in the Himalayas, a long-festering irritant in relations between the Asian giants. On Friday, Modi visited the northeastern Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh, an immense territory of nearly 84,000km2 that China claims as part of its Tibet region. Modi marked the 28th anniversary of Arunachal Pradesh being declared a state, opened a train line and called for hydropower projects to spur regional growth. The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said late on Saturday that Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Liu Zhenmin (劉振民) had called in Indian Ambassador Ashok Kantha to express “strong dissatisfaction and firm opposition” to the visit, saying it undermined China’s territorial sovereignty. Liu said China places importance on developing relations with India. It called for New Delhi not to take any action that might complicate the issue and stick to resolving it through bilateral negotiations. China and India fought a brief but bloody frontier war in 1962. They agreed to a line of actual control in 1996 and began talks on settling the dispute.
CHINA
Man kills three in care home
A nursing home worker in central China accused of killing three elderly residents with a brick and injuring 15 other people had argued with his boss over unpaid wages, according to a local government and state-run media. Luo Renchu (羅仁初), 64, attacked elderly residents and staff at the privately run home in Hunan Province at about 2am on Thursday, the first day of the Lunar New Year, the Shuangfeng County government said in a statement. Luo fled and police said they apprehended him on a mountain on Saturday afternoon. The Xinhua news agency, citing police, reported on Saturday that the attack happened shortly after Luo argued with the nursing home’s owner over unpaid wages of 40,000 yuan (US$6,394). Luo and his wife, who also works at the Aixin Nursing Home, had been promised 10,000 yuan before the Lunar New Year, but owner Fang Hongchun (房鴻春) gave them only 6,000 yuan, Xinhua said. Xinhua said the 15 injured were residents and included Fang’s mother and brother. Most suffered head injuries and six were in life-threatening condition. The home has more than 90 residents, mostly in their 70s and 80s.
THAILAND
Police arrest gathering
Thai police plucked at least three people off the streets of the capital yesterday after they held a small gathering to “exchange views” with the country’s military junta. Thailand’s military has severely restricted public gatherings since seizing power in a coup in May last year. Taking a hard line on dissent, it has detained more than 300 people, including activists, journalists and politicians. The leader of a group of four people, Akkarakit Noonchan, was dragged away by plainclothes officers shortly after the beginning of the event at Bangkok’s downtown Victory Monument, according to a witness. Akkarakit told reporters the event by the group, calling itself Serichon Thailand 58, was not intended as a protest. At least two other people were seen being detained. They had earlier displayed t-shirts depicting a bird with its beak and claws bound, as dozens of uniformed police stood by. One person has been questioned by police, Phayathai police station head of investigations Lieutenant Colonel Thepitak Saengla said. He did not give any further details.
Two medieval fortresses face each other across the Narva River separating Estonia from Russia on Europe’s eastern edge. Once a symbol of cooperation, the “Friendship Bridge” connecting the two snow-covered banks has been reinforced with rows of razor wire and “dragon’s teeth” anti-tank obstacles on the Estonian side. “The name is kind of ironic,” regional border chief Eerik Purgel said. Some fear the border town of more than 50,0000 people — a mixture of Estonians, Russians and people left stateless after the fall of the Soviet Union — could be Russian President Vladimir Putin’s next target. On the Estonian side of the bridge,
DIPLOMATIC THAW: The Canadian prime minister’s China visit and improved Beijing-Ottawa ties raised lawyer Zhang Dongshuo’s hopes for a positive outcome in the retrial China has overturned the death sentence of Canadian Robert Schellenberg, a Canadian official said on Friday, in a possible sign of a diplomatic thaw as Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney seeks to boost trade ties with Beijing. Schellenberg’s lawyer, Zhang Dongshuo (張東碩), yesterday confirmed China’s Supreme People’s Court struck down the sentence. Schellenberg was detained on drug charges in 2014 before China-Canada ties nosedived following the 2018 arrest in Vancouver of Huawei chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou (孟晚舟). That arrest infuriated Beijing, which detained two Canadians — Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig — on espionage charges that Ottawa condemned as retaliatory. In January
Jeremiah Kithinji had never touched a computer before he finished high school. A decade later, he is teaching robotics, and even took a team of rural Kenyans to the World Robotics Olympiad in Singapore. In a classroom in Laikipia County — a sparsely populated grasslands region of northern Kenya known for its rhinos and cheetahs — pupils are busy snapping together wheels, motors and sensors to assemble a robot. Guiding them is Kithinji, 27, who runs a string of robotics clubs in the area that have taken some of his pupils far beyond the rural landscapes outside. In November, he took a team
SHOW OF SUPPORT: The move showed that aggression toward Greenland is a question for Europe and Canada, and the consequences are global, not just Danish, experts said Canada and France, which adamantly oppose US President Donald Trump’s wish to control Greenland, were to open consulates in the Danish autonomous territory’s capital yesterday, in a strong show of support for the local government. Since returning to the White House last year, Trump has repeatedly insisted that Washington needs to control the strategic, mineral-rich Arctic island for security reasons. Trump last month backed off his threats to seize Greenland after saying he had struck a “framework” deal with NATO chief Mark Rutte to ensure greater US influence. A US-Denmark-Greenland working group has been established to discuss ways to meet Washington’s security concerns
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