JAPAN
Eight claim to be N Koreans
Eight men found on the nation’s northwestern coast on Thursday night claim to be North Koreans whose boat ran adrift during a fishing trip, the government’s top spokesman told reporters yesterday. The men were found in Akita Prefecture late on Thursday near a 20m-long wooden boat and have been taken into custody. The government will deal “appropriately” with the men, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said, adding that the men, whose nationalities could not be confirmed, were healthy. The government earlier this month rescued and returned to North Korea a group of three fishermen whose boat had capsized in the Sea of Japan. Wooden boats containing what appear to be the corpses of North Koreans sometimes drift ashore on the coast, but it is unusual for them to make it to the nation alive.
UNITED STATES
Navy ends search for sailors
The navy said it has called off a search for three sailors missing since Wednesday, when a transport plane crashed in the Philippine Sea south of Japan en route to the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan. “During the course of two days, eight US Navy and Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force ships, three helicopter squadrons and maritime patrol aircraft covered nearly 1,000 square nautical miles [3,430km2],” the Seventh Fleet said in a media release. Eight other people on the C-2 Greyhound were rescued shortly after the aircraft crashed and were transferred to the Reagan. The propeller-powered C-2 was conducting a routine flight carrying passengers and cargo from Marine Corps Air Station Iwakuni in Japan to the carrier. The mainstay transport aircraft for the navy’s carrier fleet has been in operation for more than five decades and is due to be replaced by a long-range version of the tilt-rotor V-22 Osprey. The navy said it is investigating the cause of the crash.
UNITED STATES
Woman helps homeless man
A fund set up to raise money for a homeless man who helped a woman when her car ran out of gas in Philadelphia has collected more than US$280,000. The GoFundMe campaign was started by Bordentown, New Jersey, resident Kate McClure earlier this month after she was stuck along Interstate 95 and Johnny Bobbitt Jr bought her some gas with his last US$20. McClure said she did not have money to pay him back, but she returned to his spot several times in the following days to give him cash, clothes and food. She said she then started the fundraiser hoping to collect US$10,000 to cover housing and other expenses for him. McClure said she wishes she “could do more for this selfless man.” Donations had poured in from about 10,000 people by Thursday.
A Zurich city councilor has apologized and reportedly sought police protection against threats after she fired a sport pistol at an auction poster of a 14th-century Madonna and child painting, and posted images of their bullet-ridden faces on social media. Green-Liberal party official Sanija Ameti, 32, put the images on Instagram over the weekend before quickly pulling them down. She later wrote on social media that she had been practicing shots from about 10m and only found the poster as “big enough” for a suitable target. “I apologize to the people who were hurt by my post. I deleted it immediately when I
The governor of Ohio is to send law enforcement and millions of dollars in healthcare resources to the city of Springfield as it faces a surge in temporary Haitian migrants. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine on Tuesday said that he does not oppose the Temporary Protected Status program under which about 15,000 Haitians have arrived in the city of about 59,000 people since 2020, but said the federal government must do more to help affected communities. On Monday, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost directed his office to research legal avenues — including filing a lawsuit — to stop the federal government from sending
At first, Francis Ari Sture thought a human was trying to shove him down the steep Norwegian mountainside. Then he saw the golden eagle land. “We are staring at each other for, maybe, a whole minute,” Sture said on Monday. “I’m trying to think what’s in its mind.” The bird then attacked Sture five more times on Thursday last week, scratching and clawing the 31-year-old bicycle courier’s face and arms over 10 to 15 minutes as he sprinted down the mountain. The same eagle is believed to be responsible for attacks on three other people across a vast mountainous area of southern Norway
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
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