ICELAND
President wins second term
President Gudni Johannesson won a landslide election, according to partial results from Saturday’s polls, with 90 percent of the votes. “I am honored and proud,” he said at his election night headquarters at Reykjavik’s Grand Hotel. “This result of this election is, to me, proof of the fact that my fellow Icelanders ... have approved of how I have approached this office.” Opinion polls had predicted rightwing challenger Gudmundur Franklin Jonsson had little chance of winning. “I send my congratulations to Gudni and his family,” Jonsson, a former Wall Street broker close to nationalists, told public broadcaster RUV. The post of president is largely symbolic, but they do have the power to veto legislation or submit it to a referendum.
UNITED KINGDOM
Rolling Stones warn Trump
The Rolling Stones are threatening us President Donald Trump with legal action for using their songs at his rallies despite cease-and-desist directives. The Stones yesterday said in a statement that their legal team is working with music rights organization BMI to stop use of their material in Trump’s re-election campaign. “If Donald Trump disregards the exclusion and persists, then he would face a lawsuit for breaking the embargo and playing music that has not been licensed,” they said. The Stones had complained during Trump’s 2016 campaign about the use of their music, when their 1969 classic You Can’t Always Get What You Want was a popular song for his events. It was played again at the close of Trump’s rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on June 20.
UNITED KINGDOM
Reading suspect charged
Counterterrorism police on Saturday charged a 25-year-old man with three counts of murder and three counts of attempted murder for a stabbing attack in a Reading park that killed three men on June 20. Prosecutors authorized the charges against Khairi Saadallah over the attack on three friends: James Furlong, 36; David Wails, 49, and Joseph Ritchie-Bennett, 39. Three others were wounded in the incident. Saadallah is due to appear in court today. Meanwhile, Glasgow police on Saturday named the man shot dead by officers during a knife attack at a hotel housing asylum seekers that left six people injured as Badreddin Abadlla Adam from Sudan.
FRANCE
Six nabbed for Banksy theft
Six people have been arrested over the theft of an artwork by street artist Banksy commemorating the victims of the 2015 Paris attacks that was stolen from the Bataclan concert hall in January last year, sources said on Saturday. The image of a girl in mourning was found earlier in the month in the attic of an abandoned farmhouse in Italy’s central east Abruzzo region. Two were charged on Friday with theft while the other four were charged with concealing theft, and all six were placed in pre-trial detention, sources said.
UNITED STATES
‘Simpsons’ to change voices
The animated TV comedy The Simpsons is ending the use of white actors to voice characters of color, producers said on Friday. The statement follows years of public pressure about the show’s Indian character Apu, who is voiced by Hank Azaria, who said earlier this year that he would no longer play the character. Azaria has also voiced the characters of black police officer Lou and the Mexican-American Bumblebee Man. Friday’s statement did not say whether Apu or the other characters would remain on the series.
LEBANON
Judge bans envoy’s remarks
A judge on Saturday banned media from reporting remarks by US Ambassador Dorothy Shea after she spoke about the Hezbollah movement, a ruling criticized as non-binding and unenforceable. During an interview with Saudi-owned news channel Al-Hadath aired on Friday, Shea said the US has “grave concerns about the role of Hezbollah, a designated terrorist organization.” “The US ambassador discussed in her interview a Lebanese party represented in parliament and Cabinet and that enjoys a wide popular base,” the judge said, referring to Hezbollah. Minister of Information Manal Abdel Samad dismissed the judge’s order, saying that “no one has the right to ban the media from covering the news.”
SINGAPORE
Travel arrangement struck
The city-state and Malaysia have agreed to establish reciprocal arrangements for essential business travel and periodic commuting, following a call between their respective prime ministers on Friday. The “Reciprocal Green Lane” would “facilitate cross-border travel for essential business and official purposes,” the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement on Saturday. A periodic commuting arrangement would allow residents of the two sides with long-term immigration passes to periodically return to their home countries.
AUSTRALIA
Victoria to test travelers
Victoria State would implement mandatory COVID-19 tests for returning travelers after a sharp spike in infections over the past two weeks, Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews said yesterday. The country’s second-most populous state had 49 new cases yesterday, its highest in more than two months and the 12th consecutive day of double-digit rises. The rest of the country has seen almost no infections. “Much like a bushfire, putting this out is challenging,” Andrews told a news conference. “Containing it, though, is something that we can do, and test and trace is the most effective thing to do.”
CHINA
Beijing criticizes Canada
The government on Saturday sharply criticized Canada, blaming its leaders for “irresponsible” statements about two Canadians accused of spying in China and calling on Ottawa to end its “megaphone diplomacy.” The evidence against the two Canadians, former diplomat Michael Kovrig and North Korea consultant Michael Spavor, is “solid and sufficient,” a statement posted on the Web site of the Chinese embassy in Ottawa said. The government has formally indicted the pair on accusations of espionage and providing state secrets.
DR CONGO
Minister briefly arrested
Minister of Justice Celestin Tunda Ya Kasende was briefly arrested on Saturday, the latest twist in a crisis over proposed judicial reforms that have shaken the governing coalition and triggered violent street protests. The action against Tunda Ya Kasende came a day after he clashed with President Felix Tshisekedi over the contested legal changes, a ministerial source said. The reforms, proposed by supporters of the still-influential former president Joseph Kabila, have caused a damaging rift in Tshisekedi’s fragile coalition. Tunda Ya Kasenda, a lawyer by profession who also holds the rank of deputy prime minister, told reporters by telephone shortly before his arrest that about a dozen officers were surrounding his Kinshasa home.
AERIAL INCURSIONS: The incidents are a reminder that Russia’s aggressive actions go beyond Ukraine’s borders, Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrii Sybiha said Two NATO members on Sunday said that Russian drones violated their airspace, as one reportedly flew into Romania during nighttime attacks on neighboring Ukraine, while another crashed in eastern Latvia the previous day. A drone entered Romanian territory early on Sunday as Moscow struck “civilian targets and port infrastructure” across the Danube in Ukraine, the Romanian Ministry of National Defense said. It added that Bucharest had deployed F-16 warplanes to monitor its airspace and issued text alerts to residents of two eastern regions. It also said investigations were underway of a potential “impact zone” in an uninhabited area along the Romanian-Ukrainian border. There
The governor of Ohio is to send law enforcement and millions of dollars in healthcare resources to the city of Springfield as it faces a surge in temporary Haitian migrants. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine on Tuesday said that he does not oppose the Temporary Protected Status program under which about 15,000 Haitians have arrived in the city of about 59,000 people since 2020, but said the federal government must do more to help affected communities. On Monday, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost directed his office to research legal avenues — including filing a lawsuit — to stop the federal government from sending
A Zurich city councilor has apologized and reportedly sought police protection against threats after she fired a sport pistol at an auction poster of a 14th-century Madonna and child painting, and posted images of their bullet-ridden faces on social media. Green-Liberal party official Sanija Ameti, 32, put the images on Instagram over the weekend before quickly pulling them down. She later wrote on social media that she had been practicing shots from about 10m and only found the poster as “big enough” for a suitable target. “I apologize to the people who were hurt by my post. I deleted it immediately when I
‘VERY DIRE’: This year’s drought, exacerbated by El Nino, is affecting 44 percent of Malawi’s crop area and up to 40 percent of its population of 20.4 million In the worst drought in southern Africa in a century, villagers in Malawi are digging for potentially poisonous wild yams to eat as their crops lie scorched in the fields. “Our situation is very dire, we are starving,” 76-year-old grandmother Manesi Levison said as she watched over a pot of bitter, orange wild yams that she says must cook for eight hours to remove the toxins. “Sometimes the kids go for two days without any food,” she said. Levison has 30 grandchildren under her care. Ten are huddled under the thatched roof of her home at Salima, near Lake Malawi, while she boils
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