CHINA
Woman inks up Xi poster
A woman who live-streamed herself throwing ink onto a picture of Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) has been detained, according to activists. The US-based Chinese Human Rights Defenders activist network said authorities have also taken the woman’s father and a Chinese artist into custody after they sought to publicize her plight on social media. The woman, who has been identified by activists as 28-year-old Dong Yaoqiong (董瑤瓊), went live on Twitter on July 4 in a video in which she accused the Chinese Communist Party of employing “oppressive brain control.”
BANGLADESH
Drug war death toll hits 200
The death toll from a contentious Philippines-style war on drugs since May has hit 200, a local rights group said yesterday. The crackdown was launched to smash the surging trade in yaba, a cheap methamphetamine and caffeine pill, which authorities say has spread to almost every village and town. “So many people have been killed in such a short period of time,” said Sheepa Hafiza, executive director of the Ain o Salish Kendra rights group. “We condemn these extrajudicial killings and want fair investigations into each of these killings,” she added. About 25,000 alleged drug dealers have been arrested, home ministry spokesman Sharif Mahmud Apu told reporters.
JORDAN
Prehistoric bread uncovered
Charred remains of a flatbread baked about 14,500 years ago in a stone fireplace at a site in northeastern Jordan have shown researchers of a discovery detailed on Monday that hunter-gatherers in the Eastern Mediterranean achieved the cultural milestone of bread-making far earlier than previously known, more than 4,000 years before plant cultivation took root. “We now have to assess whether there was a relationship between bread production and the origins of agriculture,” said Amaia Arranz-Otaegui, a University of Copenhagen postdoctoral researcher in archeobotany and lead author of the research published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
UNITED KINGDOM
Modifying baby genes backed
The creation of babies whose DNA has been altered to give them what parents perceive to be the best chances in life has received a cautious green light in a landmark report from the Nuffield Council on Bioethics. “It is our view that genome editing is not morally unacceptable in itself,” said Karen Yeung, chair of the Nuffield working group and professor of law, ethics and informatics at the University of Birmingham. “They acknowledge that this may worsen inequality and social division, but don’t believe that should stand in the way,” said Marcy Darnovsky of the Center for Genetics and Society in California.
UNITED STATES
Volcano boat tours continue
Hawaiian tour boat operators plan to continue taking visitors to see lava, but will follow the US Coast Guard’s revised policy and stay farther away after an explosion caused molten rock to barrel through the roof of a vessel, injuring 23 people. The coast guard had allowed boat operators to apply for a special license to get within 50m from where the Kilauea volcano’s lava oozes into the sea, but on Monday changed the distance to 300m. “As we were exiting the zone, all of a sudden everything around us exploded,” said Shane Turpin, the owner and captain of the vessel that was hit by lava. “It was everywhere.”
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
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