INDONESIA
‘Tank Man’ photographer dies
The photographer who took the defining image of China’s Tiananmen Square crackdown, known all over the world as “Tank Man,” has died in Indonesia, according to US officials. US authorities confirmed the death of 64-year-old Charlie Cole in Bali, where the Texan had been a long-time resident. “We offer our sincerest condolences to the family on their loss,” a US Department of State official said. Cole won the 1990 World Press Photo award for his picture of a man, with a shopping bag in each hand, standing in front of a column of tanks and armored vehicles the day after Chinese troops killed hundreds of pro-democracy protesters in the heart of Beijing.
AUSTRALIA
Third Iran detainee named
One of three Australians recently revealed to be detained in Iran was yesterday identified by her family as a Melbourne University lecturer. Academic Kylie Moore-Gilbert, who specializes in Middle Eastern politics with a focus on Gulf states, has been held for a “number of months” in Iran on charges that remain unclear. “Our family thanks the government and the University of Melbourne for their ongoing support at this distressing and sensitive time,” a statement released by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade on behalf of the family said. Perth-based travel-blogging couple Jolie King and Mark Firkin are the other two to have been arrested. Moore-Gilbert’s arrest is unrelated to that of the couple, whose charges also remain unclear.
INDIA
Dozens of devotees drown
More than 30 Hindu worshipers have drowned in swollen rivers and in a lake in India as thousands participated in religious ceremonies in which figures of a Hindu god are immersed in water, officials and news reports said on Friday. At least 11 people drowned when their boat capsized earlier in the day on a lake in central India, rescuers said. Six people were able to swim ashore in the lake in Bhopal, the capital of Madhya Pradesh state, and a search was on for one missing person, National Disaster Response Force spokesman Krishan Kumar said.Eleven bodies were recovered from the lake, Kumar said. The Press Trust of India news agency said that 18 other people drowned when they were swept away by flooded rivers in a half dozen towns in western Maharashtra state on Thursday and Friday. Four other worshipers drowned in the Yamuna river in New Delhi during religious ceremonies.
VENEZUELA
Guaido faces photo probe
The state prosecutor’s office on Friday said that it would open an investigation into National Assembly President Juan Guaido after Minister of the Interior Nestor Reverol presented photographs on state television showing the opposition leader in the company of two suspected members of a Colombian drug-trafficking group. Guaido said the two men had asked to take a photo with him when he secretly crossed into Colombia from Venezuela in February. He denied knowing who the men were. “We didn’t ask for their criminal record to take a photo,” he told reporters in Caracas. Colombian police sources confirmed the men were members of the Rastrojos, a criminal group that engages in drug trafficking. Colombian President Ivan Duque sought to downplay the photos. “Beyond whether there are photos or not, if he greeted or didn’t greet a lot of people ... I want to emphasize who he is. He is a titan, a hero fighting for his country’s democracy,” Duque said.
A deluge of disinformation about a virus called hMPV is stoking anti-China sentiment across Asia and spurring unfounded concerns of renewed lockdowns, despite experts dismissing comparisons with the COVID-19 pandemic five years ago. Agence France-Presse’s fact-checkers have debunked a slew of social media posts about the usually non-fatal respiratory disease human metapneumovirus after cases rose in China. Many of these posts claimed that people were dying and that a national emergency had been declared. Garnering tens of thousands of views, some posts recycled old footage from China’s draconian lockdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic, which originated in the country in late
French police on Monday arrested a man in his 20s on suspicion of murder after an 11-year-old girl was found dead in a wood south of Paris over the weekend in a killing that sparked shock and a massive search for clues. The girl, named as Louise, was found stabbed to death in the Essonne region south of Paris in the night of Friday to Saturday, police said. She had been missing since leaving school on Friday afternoon and was found just a few hundred meters from her school. A police source, who asked not to be named, said that she had been
VIOLENCE: The teacher had depression and took a leave of absence, but returned to the school last year, South Korean media reported A teacher stabbed an eight-year-old student to death at an elementary school in South Korea on Monday, local media reported, citing authorities. The teacher, a woman in her 40s, confessed to the crime after police officers found her and the young girl with stab wounds at the elementary school in the central city of Daejeon on Monday evening, the Yonhap news agency reported. The girl was brought to hospital “in an unconscious state, but she later died,” the report read. The teacher had stab wounds on her neck and arm, which officials determined might have been self-inflicted, the news agency
ISSUE: Some foreigners seek women to give birth to their children in Cambodia, and the 13 women were charged with contravening a law banning commercial surrogacy Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday thanked Cambodian King Norodom Sihamoni for granting a royal pardon last year to 13 Filipino women who were convicted of illegally serving as surrogate mothers in the Southeast Asian kingdom. Marcos expressed his gratitude in a meeting with Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet, who was visiting Manila for talks on expanding trade, agricultural, tourism, cultural and security relations. The Philippines and Cambodia belong to the 10-nation ASEAN, a regional bloc that promotes economic integration but is divided on other issues, including countries whose security alignments is with the US or China. Marcos has strengthened