ECUDAOR
Earthquake survivor found
Crews have rescued a 72-year-old survivor of the nation’s deadly earthquake almost two weeks after it struck the South American country, Venezuela announced on Saturday. A visiting Venezuelan search team located Manuel Vasquez, who had been trapped under rubble since the magnitude 7.8 earthquake that killed 660 people, the Venezuelan embassy in Quito said on its Web site. They found Vasquez “making sounds in a partially collapsed building” on Friday in Manabi Province while doing inspections for structural problems, it said. The April 16 quake was the worst to strike the nation in decades, causing buildings to collapse and damaging roads and other infrastructure in tourist areas along the coast. Vasquez was admitted to hospital with kidney trouble and lost toes. He was also dehydrated and disoriented. The nation welcomed hundreds of rescue teams, doctors, nurses, firefighters and other support staff after the quake from a slew of countries.
SOUTH AFRICA
Malema ‘whispers’ to Zuma
Fiery opposition politician Julius Malema told 40,000 cheering supporters that President Jacob Zuma should step down before the army turns on him because of the corruption allegations against him. “I am whispering to you, Zuma, wherever you are, those soldiers are going to turn their guns against you,” Malema said to roars from the crowd. “Be warned, leave office before the soldiers turn their guns on you.” Malema spoke on Saturday to supporters of his Economic Freedom Fighters party who filled the Orlando Stadium in Soweto. Malema described the policies of his party ahead of local government elections which are to take place in August. He said many members of South Africa’s current parliament are “agents of apartheid.” Malema dismissed the treason charges pressed against him earlier this week by the African National Congress. The party filed the charges after Malema said he would take up arms against the government if he saw rigging in the elections.
VENEZUELA
Minimum wage rises 30%
President Nicolas Maduro is ordering a 30 percent increase in the minimum wage, the latest move by the socialist government to grapple with high inflation and economic stagnation. The boost announced Saturday night by Maduro comes after a 25 percent increase on March 1. The new increase was effective from yesterday, which is Workers’ Day, and would push the minimum wage to 15,051 bolivars (US$1,512.7) per month. This translates into about US$50 at the current black market rate, which largely sets prices of goods for Venezuelans.
INDIA
Teen selfie fan shoots self
An Indian teenager accidently shot himself in the head with his father’s gun while trying to take a “selfie” photograph, police said yesterday. The 15-year-old is being treated in hospital at Pathankot in Punjab State and is expected to survive, Pathankot deputy police superintendent Manoj Kumar said. The accident happened on Friday evening when the schoolboy was playing at home with the licensed revolver which is normally kept in a wardrobe, Kumar told reporters. “The boy’s father and family said that he was trying to take a selfie with his gun,” he said. “We will speak to the boy when he is declared medically fit. We think that part of the blame obviously goes to the father for not keeping his loaded gun under lock and key at their home.”
‘GROSS NEGLIGENCE?’ Despite a spleen typically being significantly smaller than a liver, the surgeon said he believed Bryan’s spleen was ‘double the size of what is normal’ A Florida surgeon who is facing criminal charges after allegedly removing a patient’s liver instead of his spleen has said he is “forever traumatized” by that person’s death. In a deposition from November last year that was recently obtained by NBC, 44-year-old Thomas Shaknovsky described the death of 70-year-old William Bryan as an “incredibly unfortunate event that I regret deeply.” Bryan died after the botched surgery; and last month, a grand jury in Tallahassee indicted Shaknovsky on a charge of manslaughter. “I’m forever traumatized by it and hurt by it,” Shaknovsky added, also saying that wrong-site surgeries can happen “during
Kouri Richins, a Utah mother who published a children’s book about grief after the death of her husband is to serve a life sentence for his murder without the possibility of parole, a judge ruled on Wednesday. Richins was convicted in March of aggravated murder for lacing a cocktail given to her husband, Eric Richins, with five times the lethal dose of fentanyl at their home near Park City in 2022. A jury also found her guilty of four other felonies, including insurance fraud, forgery and attempted murder for trying to poison her husband weeks earlier on Feb. 14, 2022, with a
Former Chinese ministers of national defense Wei Fenghe(魏鳳和) and Li Shangfu (李尚福) were both sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve over graft charges, state news agency Xinhua reported on Thursday, underscoring the severity of the purge in the military. The armed forces have been one of the main targets of a broad corruption crackdown ordered by Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) after coming to power in 2012. The purges reached the elite Rocket Force, which oversees nuclear weapons as well as conventional missiles, in 2023. Earlier this year they escalated further, resulting in the removal of the top general in
‘PERSONAL MISTAKES’: Eileen Wang has agreed to plead guilty to the felony, which comes with a maximum sentence of 10 years in federal prison A southern California mayor has agreed to plead guilty to acting as an illegal agent for the Chinese government and has resigned from her city position, officials said on Monday. Eileen Wang (王愛琳), mayor of Arcadia, was charged last month with one count of acting in the US as an illegal agent of a foreign government. She was accused of doing the bidding of Chinese officials, such as sharing articles favorable to Beijing, without prior notification to the US government as required by law. The 58-year-old was elected in November 2022 to a five-person city council, from which the mayor is selected
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