NEW ZEALAND
Former leader found liable
A judge has ordered a former prime minister to pay several million dollars in compensation for her role in the collapse of a construction company. After serving as the nation’s first female leader from 1997 to 1999, Jenny Shipley in 2004 became board chairwoman of Mainzeal. The company collapsed in 2013, owing creditors NZ$110 million (US$75.68 million). High Court Judge Francis Cooke yesterday found the directors had engaged in reckless trading by using money owed to subcontractors to continue operating over several years. Shipley was ordered to pay NZ$6 million as part of a NZ$36 million finding against the directors.
JAPAN
Coalition backs Nipah vaccine
A global coalition set up to fight emerging epidemics has struck a US$31 million deal with scientists at the University of Tokyo to speed up work on a vaccine against a brain-damaging disease caused by the Nipah virus. The Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) said that the research team would receive up to US$31 million to advance the development and manufacturing of a shot. “Not only is the case fatality rate for this disease high ... there is a serious risk [it] could become a threat to global health security,” CEPI chief executive officer Richard Hatchett said.
CHINA
Quake fears stop mining
A southwestern county has ordered a halt to shale gas mining amid fears that it might have helped cause an earthquake in the area that killed two people, the Xinhua news agency reported. The magnitude 4.9 quake hit Sichuan Province’s Rongxian County on Monday afternoon, damaging thousands of buildings, injuring 12 people and affecting more than 13,000 people, Xinhua said, adding that it was the third earthquake above magnitude 4 in two days. “Due to safety reasons and requirements on safe production, shale gas mining companies have suspended mining work,” it quoted the county government as saying.
NIGERIA
Buhari has early lead in poll
President Muhammadu Buhari surged to an early lead in election returns on Monday, winning seven of 36 states in Africa’s largest democracy, while the main opposition rejected the count, alleging manipulation. Buhari faced a strong challenge from top opposition candidate Atiku Abubakar. Abubakar’s party chairman, Uche Secondus, accused ruling party agents of hacking into the electoral commission’s computer server and manipulating results. He rejected the count as “incorrect, thus unacceptable.” Final results are expected on Tuesday or Wednesday.
ZAMBIA
‘Indian jibe’ MP charged
Authorities on Monday charged a prominent ruling party MP, Chishimba Kambwili, with hate speech for allegedly telling an ethnic Indian worker that he was stealing local jobs. Kambwili, a fierce critic of President Edgar Lungu, allegedly told an Indian-origin road worker that his occupation should be reserved for Zambians. A clip purporting to show the incident went viral on social media last week, prompting the government to issue a rebuke. “Police in Lusaka have arrested and charged Chishimba Kambwili with expression or showing hatred, ridicule or contempt for persons because of race, tribe or place of origin,” police spokeswoman Esther Katongo said in a statement. If convicted Kambwili faces up to two years in jail.
UNITED KINGDOM
Labour open to second vote
The main opposition Labour Party has said that it could support a second Brexit referendum as the EU opened the door to postponing the country’s exit from the bloc beyond the March 29 deadline. The Labour Party on Monday said that it would put forward its own plan for Brexit, adding that if its plan was rejected, it would lend its support to an amendment on holding a second referendum on EU membership. “We are committed to ... putting forward or supporting an amendment in favor of a public vote to prevent a damaging Tory Brexit being forced on the country,” Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said in a statement.
MEXICO
Walmart union urges raises
A union representing workers at Walmart’s local unit on Monday said that it would go on strike next month if it does not secure better pay and conditions for thousands of employees. The National Association of Trade and Home Offices, which holds 121 collective contracts in 10 states with Walmart de Mexico y Centroamerica, said that it was seeking a 20 percent salary hike over last year’s wage levels for the 8,000 workers it represents. The union also aims to establish a first-ever sales commission for clerks, to be set at 4 percent. It also said that employees were not properly compensated for working overtime and that some staff suffered abuses, including sexual harassment from superiors.
UNITED STATES
R Kelly released on bail
R Kelly on Monday walked out of a Chicago jail after posting US$100,000 bail that allows him to go free while awaiting trial on charges that he sexually abused four people dating back to 1998, including three underage girls. Hours earlier, the rhythm and blues star pleaded not guilty to the allegations after spending the weekend behind bars. Court records showed that a 47-year-old woman from the Chicago suburb of Romeoville, Illinois, posted the US$100,000 bail and identified herself on the bond slip as “a friend” of Kelly, the Chicago Tribune reported.
UNITED STATES
Burch returns from Yemen
US citizen Danny Burch has been reunited with his family after 18 months in captivity in Yemen, President Donald Trump said on Monday. Burch, an oil engineer who grew up in Texas and spent years working in Yemen, was taken hostage in September 2017, his family said at the time, although Reuters reported in January last year that he had been released and taken to Oman. “Today he is safe and secure, and is reunited with his wife and children,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement.
UNITED STATES
Pregnant mom to be buried
A funeral is to be held tomorrow for a pregnant mother of six who police said was killed when a driver hit her family outside a convenience store after words were exchanged about his smoking. Melissa Castillo DeLoatch, 32, shielded her youngest child during the incident on Wednesday last week in Haverstraw, New York, police said. Her husband and the children, aged 11 months to 10 years, were treated at regional hospitals. Her husband had argued with Jason Mendez after telling him not to smoke in front of the children, police said. Mendez then “intentionally drove his vehicle across the parking lot ... into a family of eight persons,” a felony complaint said. He then reversed and drove over the family members again, it added.
AFGHAN CHILD: A court battle is ongoing over if the toddler can stay with Joshua Mast and his wife, who wanted ‘life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness’ for her Major Joshua Mast, a US Marine whose adoption of an Afghan war orphan has spurred a years-long legal battle, is to remain on active duty after a three-member panel of Marines on Tuesday found that while he acted in a way unbecoming of an officer to bring home the baby girl, it did not warrant his separation from the military. Lawyers for the Marine Corps argued that Mast abused his position, disregarded orders of his superiors, mishandled classified information and improperly used a government computer in his fight over the child who was found orphaned on the battlefield in rural Afghanistan
Millions of dollars have poured into bets on who will win the US presidential election after a last-minute court ruling opened up gambling on the vote, upping the stakes on a too-close-to-call race between US Vice President Kamala Harris and former US president Donald Trump that has already put voters on edge. Contracts for a Harris victory were trading between 48 and 50 percent in favor of the Democrat on Friday on Interactive Brokers, a firm that has taken advantage of a legal opening created earlier this month in the country’s long running regulatory battle over election markets. With just a month
US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris is in “excellent health” and fit for the presidency, according to a medical report published by the White House on Saturday as she challenged her rival, former US president Donald Trump, to publish his own health records. “Vice President Harris remains in excellent health,” her physician Joshua Simmons said in the report, adding that she “possesses the physical and mental resiliency required to successfully execute the duties of the presidency.” Speaking to reporters ahead of a trip to North Carolina, Harris called Trump’s unwillingness to publish his records “a further example
RUSSIAN INPUT: Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov called Washington’s actions in Asia ‘destructive,’ accusing it of being the reason for the ‘militarization’ of Japan The US is concerned about China’s “increasingly dangerous and unlawful” activities in the disputed South China Sea, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told ASEAN leaders yesterday during an annual summit, and pledged that Washington would continue to uphold freedom of navigation in the region. The 10-member ASEAN meeting with Blinken followed a series of confrontations at sea between China and ASEAN members Philippines and Vietnam. “We are very concerned about China’s increasingly dangerous and unlawful activities in the South China Sea which have injured people, harm vessels from ASEAN nations and contradict commitments to peaceful resolutions of disputes,” said Blinken, who
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