UNITED KINGDOM
Actress nicked by chainsaw
Cate Blanchett has sustained a cut to the head following a chainsaw accident at her home in East Sussex. The Oscar-winning actor, who relocated from Sydney to Crowborough last year, was asked how lockdown was going by former Australian prime minister Julia Gillard on her podcast last week. “I’m fine,” Blanchett said. “I had a bit of a chainsaw accident yesterday, which sounds very, very exciting, but it wasn’t. Apart from the little nick to the head, I’m fine.” Gillard said: ‘Be very careful with that chainsaw. You’ve got a very famous head, I don’t think people would like to see any nicks taken out of it.”
SOUTH KOREA
North threatens to shut office
In the latest blow for inter-Korean cooperation, North Korea threatened to permanently shut a liaison office with the South as it continued to condemn its rival for failing to prevent advocates from sending anti-North Korean leaflets across the border. The statement by the Workers’ Party of Korea on Friday came a day after the sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, Kim Yo-jong, said her country would end a military agreement reached with the South in 2018 to reduce tensions if Seoul fails to stop the advocates. Kim Yo-jong also said Pyongyang could permanently shut the office and a joint factory park in the border town of Kaesong, which have been symbols of reconciliation between the two countries. Desperate to save a faltering diplomacy, Seoul said it would push new laws to ban advocates from flying leaflets by balloon to the North.
RUSSIA
Spill caused by warming
An unprecedented fuel spill that has polluted huge stretches of Arctic rivers was caused by melting permafrost, officials said on Friday, ordering a review of infrastructure in vulnerable zones. The spill — which has colored remote tundra waterways with bright red patches visible from space — has highlighted the danger of climate change for the country as areas locked by permafrost for centuries thaw amid warmer temperatures. News of the cause of the accident came amid a huge cleanup effort outside the Arctic city of Norilsk, which President Vladimir Putin said should be bankrolled by metals giant Norilsk Nickel.
CHINA
Travel warning issued
The country has advised its citizens not to visit Australia, citing racial discrimination and violence against Asians, in what appears to be Beijing’s latest attempt to punish the country for advocating an investigation into the COVID-19 pandemic. A notice issued by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism on Friday said there has “been an increase in words and deeds of racial discrimination and acts of violence against Chinese and Asians in Australia, due to the impact of COVID-19 pandemic.”
FRANCE
Militant leader killed
The country’s security forces have killed the leader of al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, Algerian Abdelmalek Droukdel, in northern Mali, the Minister of Defense Florence Parly said on Friday. Droukdel was killed on Thursday near the Algerian border, where the group has bases from which it has carried out attacks and abductions of Westerners in the sub-Saharan Sahel zone, Parly said. “Many close associates” of Droukdel — who commanded several affiliate extremist groups across the lawless region — were also “neutralized,” she added.
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
Polish presidential candidates offered different visions of Poland and its relations with Ukraine in a televised debate ahead of next week’s run-off, which remains on a knife-edge. During a head-to-head debate lasting two hours, centrist Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski, from Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s governing pro-European coalition, faced the Eurosceptic historian Karol Nawrocki, backed by the right-wing populist Law and Justice party (PiS). The two candidates, who qualified for the second round after coming in the top two places in the first vote on Sunday last week, clashed over Poland’s relations with Ukraine, EU policy and the track records of their
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
A team of doctors and vets in Pakistan has developed a novel treatment for a pair of elephants with tuberculosis (TB) that involves feeding them at least 400 pills a day. The jumbo effort at the Karachi Safari Park involves administering the tablets — the same as those used to treat TB in humans — hidden inside food ranging from apples and bananas, to Pakistani sweets. The amount of medication is adjusted to account for the weight of the 4,000kg elephants. However, it has taken Madhubala and Malika several weeks to settle into the treatment after spitting out the first few doses they
RSS