INDONESIA
Sea patrols increased
The country is stepping up sea and aerial patrols of islands near the disputed South China Sea, an official said yesterday, following a diplomatic spat over “trespassing” Chinese vessels. Military aircraft and three warships with about 600 navy, army and air force personnel have been deployed to waters around the Natuna Islands, which border the South China Sea. “Territorial violations by foreign vessels in Indonesian exclusive economic zone ... is a threat to Indonesian sovereignty,” defense commander Vice Admiral Yudo Margono said in a statement. The move came after the country summoned the Chinese ambassador this week and lodged a “strong protest” over a Chinese coast guard vessel escorting Chinese fishing boats around the islands last month.
CAMBODIA
Collapse kills at least seven
Hundreds of soldiers and rescuers yesterday frantically picked through the rubble of a collapsed building in the country’s south looking for bodies as the death toll from the disaster rose to seven. They used excavators, drills and power saws to clear concrete the morning after the seven-story hotel under construction in seaside Kep province crumbled to the ground with an estimated 30 workers inside, prompting an all-night rescue. Eighteen survivors were pulled out of the debris, the Kep provincial administration said.
UNITED STATES
Driver jumps off bridge
A driver who mistakenly thought Atlanta police were chasing him as they pursued a different speeding motorist crashed his car and jumped 12m off a highway bridge to escape. The driver survived the jump early on Thursday and ran into a wooded area. On Friday, Davaughn Clarke, 25, turned himself in to police. He was taken to a hospital detention center and eventually would be transported to the Fulton County Jail, police spokeswoman Tasheena Brown said. Clarke would face several charges, including speeding, reckless driving, possession of marijuana with intent to distribute and possession of a firearm during or in attempt to commit certain felonies, Brown said.
INDONESIA
Flood death toll reaches 53
Nearly 175,000 people remain displaced in the capital, Jakarta, and nearby towns, after flash floods and landslides killed at least 53 people, amid some of the heaviest rain since records began, authorities said yesterday. “The death toll has risen to 53 people, with one person missing,” National Board for Disaster Management spokesman Agus Wibowo said. Agency data showed that 173,064 residents remain evacuated from their homes, after the deadliest flooding in years caused chaos in parts of Southeast Asia’s biggest city, with train lines blocked and power outages in some areas.
LATVIA
Baltic pipeline opens
Stored natural gas has begun flowing from the country to Finland through the new Balticconnector pipeline in a bid to ease the region’s dependence on Russian gas. “The first quantities of natural gas on the common gas market between Estonia, Latvia and Finland flowed from Latvia to Finland via Estonia on January first,” Estonia’s electricity and gas system operator Elering said in a statement on Friday. Thanks to imports from Latvia’s underground storage facility in the central village of Incukalns, Russian gas giant Gazprom would no longer be Finland’s sole supplier.
A colossal explosion in the sky, unleashing energy hundreds of times greater than the Hiroshima bomb. A blinding flash nearly as bright as the sun. Shockwaves powerful enough to flatten everything for miles. It might sound apocalyptic, but a newly detected asteroid nearly the size of a football field now has a greater than 1 percent chance of colliding with Earth in about eight years. Such an impact has the potential for city-level devastation, depending on where it strikes. Scientists are not panicking yet, but they are watching closely. “At this point, it’s: ‘Let’s pay a lot of attention, let’s
Thousands gathered across New Zealand yesterday to celebrate the signing of the country’s founding document and some called for an end to government policies that critics say erode the rights promised to the indigenous Maori population. As the sun rose on the dawn service at Waitangi where the Treaty of Waitangi was first signed between the British Crown and Maori chiefs in 1840, some community leaders called on the government to honor promises made 185 years ago. The call was repeated at peaceful rallies that drew several hundred people later in the day. “This government is attacking tangata whenua [indigenous people] on all
UNDAUNTED: Panama would not renew an agreement to participate in Beijing’s Belt and Road project, its president said, proposing technical-level talks with the US US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Sunday threatened action against Panama without immediate changes to reduce Chinese influence on the canal, but the country’s leader insisted he was not afraid of a US invasion and offered talks. On his first trip overseas as the top US diplomat, Rubio took a guided tour of the canal, accompanied by its Panamanian administrator as a South Korean-affiliated oil tanker and Marshall Islands-flagged cargo ship passed through the vital link between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. However, Rubio was said to have had a firmer message in private, telling Panama that US President Donald Trump
CHEER ON: Students were greeted by citizens who honked their car horns or offered them food and drinks, while taxi drivers said they would give marchers a lift home Hundreds of students protesting graft they blame for 15 deaths in a building collapse on Friday marched through Serbia to the northern city of Novi Sad, where they plan to block three Danube River bridges this weekend. They received a hero’s welcome from fellow students and thousands of local residents in Novi Said after arriving on foot in their two-day, 80km journey from Belgrade. A small red carpet was placed on one of the bridges across the Danube that the students crossed as they entered the city. The bridge blockade planned for yesterday is to mark three months since a huge concrete construction