AUSTRALIA
Croc takes night-swimmer
A woman is feared dead after being seized by a crocodile during a nighttime swim with a friend at a beach in the north of the nation. The women went for a stroll on Thornton Beach on Sunday evening in the far north of Queensland State before making a fateful decision to take a dip in an area known to be infested with the reptiles. “The woman was swimming with a female friend, also in her 40s, at 10:30pm when the incident occurred,” police said in a statement. Nine News cited witnesses as hearing the woman yell: “A croc’s got me, a croc’s got me.” Senior Constable Russell Parker said the women — Australians visiting the area — were in the water when one of them was grabbed, with her friend desperately trying to drag her to safety. “Her friend raised the alarm with a nearby business and they subsequently contacted the police,” Parker said. A rescue helicopter was sent up with thermal imaging equipment, but was unable to find the missing woman. Marine police also failed to do so when the search resumed yesterday. Parker added that the surviving woman was “very, very shaken and shocked” but appeared to have escaped with only grazes.
INDIA
Police arrest alleged rapists
Police have arrested two men over the gang rape of a teenage girl whose body was found hanging from a tree. The girl, reportedly 15 and from one of the low social castes, was strangled — allegedly by three men — on Friday night outside her village in the state of Uttar Pradesh. Her body was found the next morning hanging by her scarf from a tree about 1km from her home in Bahraich district, police Superintendent Salik Ram Verma said. Two men were arrested and “the third accused is on the run,” Verma told reporters. The girl had left her sleeping family to secretly meet one of the men, only to discover that he had brought along two of his friends, who attacked her. “When the girl resisted their bid, she was raped and later strangled. To make it look like a case of suicide, they hung her body from a tree and left the spot,” Verma told reporters. Four police constables have also been suspended after an initial lack of action over the incident sparked outrage.
SOUTH KOREA
Ban denies interest in top job
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon yesterday denied that his current visit to the nation is testing the waters for a presidential bid, saying his comments on the subject had been exaggerated. Ban arrived in his home country last week for a six-day visit that has been dominated by speculation over a possible run for the presidency next year, after he steps down from his UN post at the end of this year. An initial statement that he might seek “advice” on what to do when he returns home as an ordinary citizen, was jumped on by local media as the clearest indication yet that he is considering the role. However, Ban yesterday said he was “baffled” by the “exaggerated” spin put on his remarks.
UGANDA
N Korean ties cooled
The nation promised to halt military cooperation with old ally North Korea after a visit to Kampala by South Korean President Park Geun-hye on Sunday. North Korea has for many years sent military trainers to the nation, but Minister of Foreign Affairs Sam Kutesa said the relationship would now end. “We are disengaging the cooperation we have with North Korea as a result of UN sanctions,” Kutesa said. “Our policy is that we do not support nuclear proliferation.”
‘CHILD PORNOGRAPHY’: The doll on Shein’s Web site measure about 80cm in height, and it was holding a teddy bear in a photo published by a daily newspaper France’s anti-fraud unit on Saturday said it had reported Asian e-commerce giant Shein (希音) for selling what it described as “sex dolls with a childlike appearance.” The French Directorate General for Competition, Consumer Affairs and Fraud Control (DGCCRF) said in a statement that the “description and categorization” of the items on Shein’s Web site “make it difficult to doubt the child pornography nature of the content.” Shortly after the statement, Shein announced that the dolls in question had been withdrawn from its platform and that it had launched an internal inquiry. On its Web site, Le Parisien daily published a
China’s Shenzhou-20 crewed spacecraft has delayed its return mission to Earth after the vessel was possibly hit by tiny bits of space debris, the country’s human spaceflight agency said yesterday, an unusual situation that could disrupt the operation of the country’s space station Tiangong. An impact analysis and risk assessment are underway, the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA) said in a statement, without providing a new schedule for the return mission, which was originally set to land in northern China yesterday. The delay highlights the danger to space travel posed by increasing amounts of debris, such as discarded launch vehicles or vessel
RUBBER STAMP? The latest legislative session was the most productive in the number of bills passed, but critics attributed it to a lack of dissenting voices On their last day at work, Hong Kong’s lawmakers — the first batch chosen under Beijing’s mantra of “patriots administering Hong Kong” — posed for group pictures, celebrating a job well done after four years of opposition-free politics. However, despite their smiles, about one-third of the Legislative Council will not seek another term in next month’s election, with the self-described non-establishment figure Tik Chi-yuen (狄志遠) being among those bowing out. “It used to be that [the legislature] had the benefit of free expression... Now it is more uniform. There are multiple voices, but they are not diverse enough,” Tik said, comparing it
RELATIONS: Cultural spats, such as China’s claims over the origins of kimchi, have soured public opinion in South Korea against Beijing over the past few years Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) yesterday met South Korean counterpart Lee Jae-myung, after taking center stage at an Asian summit in the wake of US President Donald Trump’s departure. The talks on the sidelines of the APEC gathering came the final day of Xi’s first trip to South Korea in more than a decade, and a day after his meeting with the Canadian prime minister that was a reset of the nations’ damaged ties. Trump had flown to South Korea for the summit, but promptly jetted home on Thursday after sealing a trade war pause with Xi, with the two
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