NORTH KOREA
Test a ‘solemn warning’
The government yesterday said that two missiles fired on Thursday were newly designed tactical weapons that sent a “solemn warning” to South Korea over plans to hold military drills with the US. The Korean Central News Agency provided no technical specifications, but said that the tests were of a “new-type tactical guided weapon” that sent a “solemn warning to the South Korean warmongers” over their insistence on holding the drills. Leader Kim Jong-un said that the missiles were capable of low-altitude flight and cautioned Seoul against “ignoring the warning” implicit in their development, the agency reported.
MONGOLIA
Leader to visit White House
President Khaltmaa Battulga is to meet with US President Donald Trump on Wednesday next week at the White House, which said that the visit would center on deepening cooperation between the two nations. The leaders are to discuss a range of issues, including defense and security, trade and investment, sovereignty and the rule of law. The plan follows a visit to Mongolia late last month by White House National Security Adviser John Bolton. The last time Mongolia’s leader visited the White House was in June 2011.
BALKANS
Cocaine ring stymied
Police from several European nations on Thursday announced that they have dismantled a cocaine smuggling ring. After months of investigations on three continents and 1 tonne of cocaine seized, 16 people were arrested, 11 in Europe — Croatia, Czech Republic, Serbia and Switzerland — and five in Hong Kong, Europol said in a statement. The agency welcomed the disabling of the “Balkan organized criminal network suspected of large-scale cocaine trafficking from South America to Europe using private planes.”
SYRIA
Strikes kill 103 civilians
Airstrikes by the government and its allies on schools, hospitals, markets and bakeries have killed at least 103 civilians in the past 10 days, including 26 children, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said in a statement yesterday. “These are civilian objects, and it seems highly unlikely, given the persistent pattern of such attacks, that they are all being hit by accident,” Bachelet said, adding that the rising toll had been met with “apparent international indifference.” The government in April began its offensive against a rebel enclave in the northwest, the last area of insurgent opposition to President Bashar al-Assad. The offensive has driven hundreds of thousands of people from their homes or temporary shelters to seek refuge near the border with Turkey and has killed hundreds of civilians, according to war monitoring groups.
MINERAL DEPOSITS: The Pacific nation is looking for new foreign partners after its agreement with Canada’s Metals Co was terminated ‘mutually’ at the end of last year Pacific nation Kiribati says it is exploring a deep-sea mining partnership with China, dangling access to a vast patch of Pacific Ocean harboring coveted metals and minerals. Beijing has been ramping up efforts to court Pacific nations sitting on lucrative seafloor deposits of cobalt, nickel and copper — recently inking a cooperation deal with Cook Islands. Kiribati opened discussions with Chinese Ambassador Zhou Limin (周立民) after a longstanding agreement with leading deep-sea mining outfit The Metals Co fell through. “The talk provides an exciting opportunity to explore potential collaboration for the sustainable exploration of the deep-ocean resources in Kiribati,” the government said
Romania’s electoral commission on Saturday excluded a second far-right hopeful, Diana Sosoaca, from May’s presidential election, amid rising tension in the run-up to the May rerun of the poll. Earlier this month, Romania’s Central Electoral Bureau barred Calin Georgescu, an independent who was polling at about 40 percent ahead of the rerun election. Georgescu, a fierce EU and NATO critic, shot to prominence in November last year when he unexpectedly topped a first round of presidential voting. However, Romania’s constitutional court annulled the election after claims of Russian interference and a “massive” social media promotion in his favor. On Saturday, an electoral commission statement
Chinese authorities increased pressure on CK Hutchison Holdings Ltd over its plan to sell its Panama ports stake by sharing a second newspaper commentary attacking the deal. The Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office on Saturday reposted a commentary originally published in Ta Kung Pao, saying the planned sale of the ports by the Hong Kong company had triggered deep concerns among Chinese people and questioned whether the deal was harming China and aiding evil. “Why were so many important ports transferred to ill-intentioned US forces so easily? What kind of political calculations are hidden in the so-called commercial behavior on the
The head of Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic intelligence agency, was sacked yesterday, days after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he no longer trusts him, and fallout from a report on the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack. “The Government unanimously approved Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposal to end ISA Director Ronen Bar’s term of office,” a statement said. He is to leave his post when his successor is appointed by April 10 at the latest, the statement said. Netanyahu on Sunday cited an “ongoing lack of trust” as the reason for moving to dismiss Bar, who joined the agency in 1993. Bar, meant to
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