MEXICO
Accused envoy resigns
Ambassador to Argentina Ricardo Valero on Sunday resigned citing health problems following new allegations of shoplifting after a video from late October showed the diplomat attempting to steal a US$10 book. He was recalled earlier this month by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs amid the fallout from the Oct. 26 incident at a Buenos Aires bookstore in which he can be seen on security camera footage taking the volume from a shelf and then hiding it inside the pages of a newspaper he tucked under his arm. The book was reportedly a biography of Giacomo Casanova. The ministry accepted Valero’s resignation.
SYRIA
Defenses fire on missiles
Air defenses on Sunday fired on Israeli missiles, shooting down one that fell outside Damascus, the official Syrian Arab News Agency reported. The “hostile missiles came from the Occupied Territories,” the agency said, referring to Israel, adding that one missile came down in Aqraba, a suburb southeast of Damascus. An Israeli army spokeswoman contacted said Israel does not comment on reports in foreign media. According to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, there were three explosions in the Damascus suburbs after the missiles targeted “Syrian regime and Iranian positions.”
UNITED STATES
Derailment severs trail
The 3,524km Appalachian Trail has been severed following a CSX Transportation freight train derailment near Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, authorities have said. The train derailed early on Saturday, with two of its seven cars tumbling into the Potomac River. No one was hurt; the locomotive was towing empty grain cars. The rail bridge was undamaged and reopened on Sunday after the cars were recovered and put back on track. However, part of the wooden pedestrian bridge attached to the CSX bridge was damaged, the National Park Service said. The bridge connects the Appalachian Trail at Harpers Ferry to Maryland Heights, Maryland.
BOLIVIA
Country joins Lima Group
The country on Sunday announced its entry into the Lima Group regional bloc that was set up to find a way out of the Venezuelan crisis. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement that it hoped to “contribute to a peaceful, democratic and constitutional solution to the crisis in Venezuela, which must be guided by the Venezuelan people.” The Lima Group was founded in 2017 by Peru, Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Panama, Paraguay, Santa Lucia, Canada, Colombia, Honduras, Costa Rica and Guatemala, with the support of the US, the Organization of American States and the EU. It has called for the release of political prisoners, the holding of free elections and the entry of humanitarian aid to the stricken country.
UNITED STATES
Barber shot over haircut
A dispute over a child’s haircut ended with gunfire on Saturday at a Texas barbershop, authorities said. Deputies are looking for a man who shot an employee of a barbershop in the Houston suburb of Katy during an argument, the Harris County Sheriff’s office said on Twitter. Witnesses said the argument was over a haircut given to the man’s son. The alleged shooter left the barbershop in a gray, four-door sedan, the sheriff’s office said. The employee was shot three times and was in stable condition at an area hospital, KPRC-TV reported.
EGYPT
Ex-army chief freed
The government on Sunday released from jail a former military chief of staff arrested early last year after he tried to challenge President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi in a presidential poll, a senior official said on condition of anonymity. General Sami Anan was arrested after he announced he would run against al-Sisi, who won in the March election poll for a second term. The army accused Anan of announcing his intention to run in the election “without getting the approval of the armed forces or following the required procedures to end his service in the military.” It said his announcement constituted “direct incitement against the armed forces with the intent of causing a rift between it and the great Egyptian people.”
INDONESIA
Three die in flooded cave
Three university students were found dead in a cave after they were trapped inside by flood waters, officials said yesterday. A search-and-rescue operation launched on Sunday retrieved five people alive from Lele cave in West Java after heavy rain hit the area and flooded it, authorities said. The victims “were trapped inside the cave for quite a while before the team managed to evacuate them,” local search-rescue agency spokeswoman Seni Wulandari, adding that it took an hour for the rescue team to make it into the cave, which is 30m below ground level. The students — part of a university nature club — went there to train in basic caving.
FRANCE
Designer Ungaro dies at 86
Fashion designer Emanuel Ungaro, who was known for his use of vibrant color, mixed prints and elegant draping, has died at the age of 86. Ungaro’s death was confirmed on Sunday by the eponymous Paris fashion house he founded in 1965, which said in an Instagram post that he “will remain in our memories as the Master of sensuality, of color and flamboyance.” The designer died on Saturday in Paris, local media said. For decades, Ungaro clothed celebrities and actresses, including Jacqueline Kennedy, Gena Rowlands and Catherine Deneuve. In 1996, he sold his house to the Italian group Ferragamo. He kept creating collections and retired in 2004.
UNITED STATES
Ram Dass dies at 88
Ram Dass, who in the 1960s joined Timothy Leary in promoting psychedelic drugs as the path to inner enlightenment before undergoing a spiritual rebirth he spelled out in the book Be Here Now, died at home on Sunday. He was 88 years old. “With tender hearts we share that Ram Dass (born Richard Alpert) died peacefully at home in Maui on December 22, 2019 surrounded by loved ones,” his official Instagram account said. “He was a guide for thousands seeking to discover or reclaim their spiritual identity beyond or within institutional religion.”
PHILIPPINES
Toxic wine kills eight
Eight people died and hundreds were taken to hospitals after drinking coconut wine believed to contain high levels of methanol, authorities said yesterday. The victims all attended gatherings over the weekend in the town of Rizal, southeast of Manila, and complained of stomach pains after drinking the wine, known locally as lambanog. Nine victims are in a critical condition, Philippine General Hospital spokesman Jose Jonas Del Rosario said. In total, 300 victims were taken to hospitals. All drank the same brand of wine that had been bought in the area, police said. The local government has imposed an immediate ban on the sale of the beverage.
The pledge by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi to “work, work, work, work and work” for her country has been named the catchphrase of the year, recognizing the effort Japan’s first female leader had to make to reach the top. Takaichi uttered the phrase in October when she was elected as head of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). Many were initially as worried about her work ethic as supportive of her enthusiasm. In a country notorious for long working hours, especially for working women who are also burdened with homemaking and caregiving, overwork is a sensitive topic. The recognition triggered a
‘HEART IS ACHING’: Lee appeared to baffle many when he said he had never heard of six South Koreans being held in North Korea, drawing criticism from the families South Korean President Lee Jae-myung yesterday said he was weighing a possible apology to North Korea over suspicions that his ousted conservative predecessor intentionally sought to raise military tensions between the war-divided rivals in the buildup to his brief martial law declaration in December last year. Speaking to reporters on the first anniversary of imprisoned former South Korean president Yoon Suk-yeol’s ill-fated power grab, Lee — a liberal who won a snap presidential election following Yoon’s removal from office in April — stressed his desire to repair ties with Pyongyang. A special prosecutor last month indicted Yoon and two of his top
The Philippines deferred the awarding of a project that is part of a plan to build one of the world’s longest marine bridges after local opposition over the potential involvement of a Chinese company due to national security fears. The proposals are “undergoing thorough review” by the Asian Development Bank (ADB), which acts as a lender and an overseer of the project to ensure it meets international environmental and governance standards, the Philippine Department of Public Works and Highways said in a statement on Monday in response to queries from Bloomberg. The agency said it would announce the winning bidder once ADB
IN ABSENTIA: The MP for Hampstead and Highgate in London, a niece of deposed Bangladesh prime minister Sheik Hasina, condemned the ‘flawed and farcical’ trial A court in Bangladesh yesterday sentenced British Member of Parliament Tulip Siddiq to two years in jail after a judge ruled she was complicit in corrupt land deals with her aunt, the country’s deposed prime minister Sheikh Hasina. A judge found Siddiq, the Labour MP for Hampstead and Highgate, guilty of misusing her “special influence” as a British politician to coerce Hasina into giving valuable pieces of land to her mother, brother and sister. Siddiq’s mother, Sheikh Rehana, was given seven years in prison and considered the prime participant in the case. The trial had been carried out in absentia: Neither Hasina, Siddiq,
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