HONG KONG
Police, protesters clash
Police fired tear gas to disperse protesters who on Saturday returned to the city streets for a rally that turned violent. Protesters gathered outside Mong Kok Police Station in Kowloon and paralyzed traffic, the government said in a statement. The demonstrators threw fire bombs and set fire to barricades, it said. Police used pepper spray and one officer drew a firearm in clashes with the protesters, the South China Morning Post reported. MTR Corp, operator of the city’s rail network, suspended service at the Mong Kok subway station after a fire broke out at one of the entrances, Radio Television Hong Kong reported.
JAPAN
Ship and fishing boat crash
More than a dozen crew members of a cargo ship are missing after it collided with a fishing boat in waters off northern Japan, Japan Coast Guard spokesman Tomoyuki Hanzawa said yesterday. The 1,989-tonne Belize-flagged cargo ship Guoxing 1 was carrying about 3,000 tonnes of iron scrap and rapidly took in water after the hit, he said. The collision between the Guoxing 1 and a 138-tonne fishing boat happened at about 10pm and the cause is unknown, he added. The Guoxing 1 had a crew of 14 Chinese and Vietnamese nationals, of which 13 are still missing and the coast guard is searching for them, Hanzawa said. One Vietnamese crew member was rescued by a nearby ship, while the 15 Japanese crew members of the fishing boat are safe.
SRI LANKA
Parliament to be dissolved
The nation’s new president, Gotabaya Rajapaksa, was expected to dissolve parliament and call snap a legislative election six months ahead of schedule, a state-run newspaper said yesterday. Rajapaksa was likely to exercise his constitutional power to sack the assembly when it completed four-and-a-half years out of its five-year term last night, the Sunday Observer said. Official sources told reporters that a general election was most likely in the final week of April if the 225-member national assembly is dissolved by today.
SLOVAKIA
Opposition wins election
Voters handed a resounding victory to the center-right, anti-graft OLaNO opposition party in Saturday’s general election, dominated by an angry backlash over the 2018 murder of a journalist probing corruption in the eurozone state. Having vowed to immediately push through anti-corruption measures when in office, OLaNO leader Igor Matovic galvanized voter outrage over the murder of Jan Kuciak and his fiancee, and the high-level graft their deaths exposed. “People want us to clean up Slovakia. They want us to make Slovakia a fair country where laws will apply to everyone,” Matovic told reporters.
SYRIA
Eight Hezbollah fighters die
Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group lost at least eight fighters in northwest Syria in skirmishes with insurgents and airstrikes by Turkey’s air force, an opposition war monitor and the militant group said on Saturday. The casualties followed the death of at least 33 Turkish soldiers earlier this week. The deaths marked the highest for the group in Syria in years. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said that 14 Hezbollah fighters were killed. Hezbollah later released a statement listing the names and photographs of eight of its fighters, including an Iranian cleric identified as Sayyed Ali Zengani. It gave no details other than saying that they “were martyred while performing their jihadi duties.”
BACKLASH: The National Party quit its decades-long partnership with the Liberal Party after their election loss to center-left Labor, which won a historic third term Australia’s National Party has split from its conservative coalition partner of more than 60 years, the Liberal Party, citing policy differences over renewable energy and after a resounding loss at a national election this month. “Its time to have a break,” Nationals leader David Littleproud told reporters yesterday. The split shows the pressure on Australia’s conservative parties after Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s center-left Labor party won a historic second term in the May 3 election, powered by a voter backlash against US President Donald Trump’s policies. Under the long-standing partnership in state and federal politics, the Liberal and National coalition had shared power
NO EXCUSES: Marcos said his administration was acting on voters’ demands, but an academic said the move was emotionally motivated after a poor midterm showing Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday sought the resignation of all his Cabinet secretaries, in a move seen as an attempt to reset the political agenda and assert his authority over the second half of his single six-year term. The order came after the president’s allies failed to win a majority of Senate seats contested in the 12 polls on Monday last week, leaving Marcos facing a divided political and legislative landscape that could thwart his attempts to have an ally succeed him in 2028. “He’s talking to the people, trying to salvage whatever political capital he has left. I think it’s
CONTROVERSY: During the performance of Israel’s entrant Yuval Raphael’s song ‘New Day Will Rise,’ loud whistles were heard and two people tried to get on stage Austria’s JJ yesterday won the Eurovision Song Contest, with his operatic song Wasted Love triumphing at the world’s biggest live music television event. After votes from national juries around Europe and viewers from across the continent and beyond, JJ gave Austria its first victory since bearded drag performer Conchita Wurst’s 2014 triumph. After the nail-biting drama as the votes were revealed running into yesterday morning, Austria finished with 436 points, ahead of Israel — whose participation drew protests — on 357 and Estonia on 356. “Thank you to you, Europe, for making my dreams come true,” 24-year-old countertenor JJ, whose
UNSCHEDULED VISIT: ‘It’s a very bulky new neighbor, but it will soon go away,’ said Johan Helberg of the 135m container ship that run aground near his house A man in Norway awoke early on Thursday to discover a huge container ship had run aground a stone’s throw from his fjord-side house — and he had slept through the commotion. For an as-yet unknown reason, the 135m NCL Salten sailed up onto shore just meters from Johan Helberg’s house in a fjord near Trondheim in central Norway. Helberg only discovered the unexpected visitor when a panicked neighbor who had rung his doorbell repeatedly to no avail gave up and called him on the phone. “The doorbell rang at a time of day when I don’t like to open,” Helberg told television
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