NORTH KOREA
Kim’s uncle returns home
Kim Jong-un’s uncle has returned to Pyongyang after quitting his job as ambassador to the Czech Republic, Yonhap News reported, citing lawmakers in Seoul. Kim Pyong-il is the half-brother of Kim Jong-un’s father, Kim Jong-il. Lawmakers were briefed on the move by the head of the National Intelligence Service on Friday, the news agency said. Kim Pyong-il was once considered a potential successor of his brother, but he has been distant from power since moving out of the country in 1988 to take an ambassador job in Hungary, the report said.
WEST BANK
Israeli troops kill teenager
The Palestinian Ministry of Health said Israeli troops have shot and killed a teenager near Hebron. The ministry on Saturday identified the youth as Badawi Masalmeh, 18, adding that Israeli soldiers took his body. The Israeli military said its forces spotted three people hurling Molotov cocktails at Israeli vehicles on a nearby route and fired at them. The two others were arrested.
IRAN
Official suggests opening
A senior official has suggested in an interview that authorities might be more open than in the past in approving candidates for a looming parliamentary election. “We don’t consider ourselves immune from criticism. We may also accept that mistakes have been made in the past,” Guardian Council spokesman Abbas Ali Kadkhodaee said. “But for the next legislative elections we are trying to reduce our mistakes and respect the rights of candidates.” Kadkhodaee was speaking on the eve of the opening yesterday of the registration of candidates for the parliamentary election to be held on Feb. 21. The council is responsible for organizing and monitoring elections, including vetting candidates.
NAMIBIA
President re-elected
President Hage Geingob has won the presidential election with 56.3 percent of the vote, the Electoral Commission said on Saturday, surviving the country’s biggest corruption scandal, an economic recession and a fractured ruling party. Geingob was seeking a second and final term in the Nov. 27 election. First elected in 2014 with 87 percent of the vote, Geingob avoided a potential runoff against a member of his own party, Panduleni Itula, who was running as an independent. Itula trailed with 29.4 percent of the vote and leader of the opposition Popular Democratic Movement McHenry Venaani was third with 5.3 percent.
CHINA
Police beat protesters
Riot police on Friday fired tear gas and beat residents in Wenlou — a township in Guangdong Province about 100km from Hong Kong after they took to the streets to protest against a large crematorium project. Hundreds of residents protested over the plan for a site they had been previously told by officials that would become an “ecological park.” Footage recorded by residents appeared to show riot police firing tear gas, throwing rocks and beating protesters. Videos also showed residents throwing firecrackers at the police and tipping over a vehicle. “The whole town is protesting. The government has violently deployed people to suppress it,” said one resident, who asked not to be named, adding that police had beaten elderly residents and young students. “Now police are like crazy dogs, beating whoever they see. Where is the law? Where is morality?” he said.
MEXICO
Shootout with police kills 14
A shootout in a town near the US border between suspected drug traffickers and police left at least 14 dead, including four officers, officials said on Saturday. The confrontation in Villa Union erupted when officers detected several vehicles and heavily armed passengers touring the small community. Coahuila State Governor Miguel Angel Riquelme said six officers were also wounded, but their injuries were not serious. An unspecified number of people — including a child — were also missing, officials added.
UNITED STATES
Plane crash kills nine
Nine people were killed and three were injured in an airplane crash in South Dakota late on Saturday. The aircraft, a Pilatus PC-12, carrying 12 people, was bound for Idaho from South Dakota before it crashed about noon, a National Transportation Safety Board official said. The cause of the crash is under investigation.
SWEDEN
Prop plane crash kills pilot
The pilot of a propeller plane died on Saturday after it crashed into the garden of a house in Ronneby, police said. The plane caught fire, sending heavy smoke billowing over the neighborhood. However, firefighters were able to extinguish the fire fairly quickly and no one on the ground was hurt, the police said. The plane was a DA20, a light single propeller aircraft popular with flight schools and private pilots.
UNITED STATES
Sewage floods homes
A blocked sewer main on Saturday flooded basements with brown filth and left residents in the New York City borough of Queens near Kennedy International Airport feeling sickened by the stench. A water condition caused the backup, pushing human waste into about 300 homes in Jamaica, Queens, officials said. Mayor Bill de Blasio said crews were making repairs and bringing in pumping equipment to clear up the mess. However, he advised residents to reduce usage to cut down on water going into the blocked main. Officials believe the practice of pouring cooking grease down the drain led to the blockage.
POLAND
Tigers head to Spain
Five of nine tigers that narrowly survived a grueling journey across Europe set off on Saturday for their new home at the Primadomus Wildlife Refuge in southern Spain after weeks of recovery at a zoo in Poznan. Ten emaciated and dehydrated tigers were found in late October in the back of a truck taking them from Italy to a zoo in Russia’s Dagestan Republic. The truck became stuck at the Koroszczyn crossing, where one tiger died. The survivors were divided between two zoos. “The tigers have left. We’re very happy that in just 24 to 30 hours they will arrive,” Poznan zoo spokeswoman Malgorzata Chodyla said.
UNITED STATES
‘Day O’ composer dies
Irving Burgie, who helped popularize Caribbean music and cowrote the enduring Harry Belafonte hit Day-O (The Banana Boat Song), has died at the age of 95. At the Bahamian Independence Day Parade on Saturday, Bahamian Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley announced Burgie died on Friday. His mother was from the Bahamas. The Songwriters Hall of Fame said Burgie’s songs have sold more than 100 million records around the world. Born in Brooklyn, he served in World War II and used the GI Bill to pay for music studies. He studied at the Juilliard School of Music and two universities.
Yemen’s separatist leader has vowed to keep working for an independent state in the country’s south, in his first social media post since he disappeared earlier this month after his group briefly seized swathes of territory. Aidarous al-Zubaidi’s United Arab Emirates (UAE)-backed Southern Transitional Council (STC) forces last month captured two Yemeni provinces in an offensive that was rolled back by Saudi strikes and Riyadh’s allied forces on the ground. Al-Zubaidi then disappeared after he failed to board a flight to Riyadh for talks earlier this month, with Saudi Arabia accusing him of fleeing to Abu Dhabi, while supporters insisted he was
The Chinese Embassy in Manila yesterday said it has filed a diplomatic protest against a Philippine Coast Guard spokesman over a social media post that included cartoonish images of Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平). Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Jay Tarriela and an embassy official had been trading barbs since last week over issues concerning the disputed South China Sea. The crucial waterway, which Beijing claims historic rights to despite an international ruling that its assertion has no legal basis, has been the site of repeated clashes between Chinese and Philippine vessels. Tarriela’s Facebook post on Wednesday included a photo of him giving a
‘MOBILIZED’: While protesters countered ICE agents, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz activated the state’s National Guard to ‘support the rights of Minnesotans’ to assemble Hundreds of counterprotesters drowned out a far-right activist’s attempt to hold a small rally in support of US President Donald Trump’s latest immigration crackdown in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on Saturday, as the governor’s office announced that National Guard troops were mobilized and ready to assist law enforcement, although not yet deployed to city streets. There have been protests every day since the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) ramped up immigration enforcement in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul by bringing in more than 2,000 federal officers. Conservative influencer Jake Lang organized an anti-Islam, anti-Somali and pro-US Immigration and Customs Enforcement
NASA on Saturday rolled out its towering Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft as it began preparations for its first crewed mission to the Moon in more than 50 years. The maneuver, which takes up to 12 hours, would allow the US space agency to begin a string of tests for the Artemis 2 mission, which could blast off as early as Feb. 6. The immense orange and white SLS rocket, and the Orion vessel were slowly wheeled out of the Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and painstakingly moved 6.5km to Launch Pad 39B. If the
RSS