CHINA
Rocket launch fails
The first attempt by a private company to send a rocket into space has failed. Beijing-based Landscape late on Saturday said that the first and second stage of its ZQ-1 rocket worked normally, but something went wrong with the final stage. It was the first three-stage rocket built by a private company in the nation. Video posted by a news site showed the 19m-tall red-and-white rocket lifting off against clear blue skies. Landscape said that “cowling separation was normal, but something abnormal happened after the second stage.”
PAKISTAN
Indian TV ban renewed
The nation’s top court has reinstated a ban on the broadcast of Indian TV content following a petition from local producers. Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar announced the verdict on Saturday, overturning a lower court’s ruling last year that had lifted the 2016 ban on airing Indian content on TV or FM radio. The regulatory body for electronic media said that Saturday’s order was implemented immediately. Earlier this year, India banned performances by Pakistani artists, while some Indian stations have stopped airing Pakistani content. Indian producers have called for a comprehensive ban on Pakistani content.
CAMEROON
Election protesters arrested
Minister of Territorial Administration Paul Atanga Nji said that anti-riot police have arrested at least two dozen people who on Saturday staged peaceful protests against the re-election of President Paul Biya. Nji said that among those arrested was a lawyer who represented opposition candidate Maurice Kamto, who said he won the Oct. 7 election. Nji said the government would not tolerate acts to undermine national security as it prepares to inaugurate 85-year-old Biya for his seventh term in the next week or so.
AUSTRALIA
Police rescue kangaroo
A kangaroo that hopped into the sea for a dip at a Melbourne beach was rescued by police, officers said yesterday. Officers said they were called to Safety Beach in Melbourne on Saturday afternoon amid reports that the animal was struggling in the water. When they arrived, the kangaroo had already made its way back onto dry land and was on the sand covered with a blanket by a beachgoer. However, as they approached, it suddenly turned around and bounded back into the waves. “It began to swim, but got into difficulty in the swell and breaking waves and went under water a couple of times,” Victoria Police said in a statement. Two officers jumped into the water and brought the marsupial, by now unconscious, back to a grassy area and resuscitate it using compressions, they said.
ROMANIA
Earthquake shakes capital
An magnitude 5.8 earthquake rattled central and eastern Romania early yesterday and was also felt in Ukraine, Moldova and Bulgaria. No significant damage was reported. The temblor, which lasted several seconds, occurred at 3:38am in the eastern region of Vrancea at a depth of 150km, the National Earth Physics Institute said. The quake woke residents in the capital, Bucharest, and elsewhere. Bucharest Ambulance Service spokeswoman Alice Grasu said a dozen or so residents telephoned immediately after the quake reporting panic attacks. Electricity was temporarily downed in an area near the epicenter northeast of Bucharest. There were reports of pictures and plaster falling off walls in the capital.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
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