INDIA
Fire kills COVID-19 patients
A fire yesterday in a hospital in western India killed 13 COVID-19 patients as an extreme surge in cases leaves the nation short of medical care and oxygen. New Delhi reported another global record in daily infections for a second straight day, adding 332,730 new cases. Hospitals have been taking to social media, pleading with the government to replenish their oxygen supplies and threatening to stop admitting patients. Local media reported that 25 COVID-19 patients died at a New Delhi hospital within 24 hours, quoting unnamed officials as saying that “low pressure oxygen” could be the cause of their deaths.
PHILIPPINES
Leader’s daughter tops poll
The daughter of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has topped the latest opinion poll on preferred presidential candidates for an election next year. The survey showed that 27 percent of 2,400 respondents would vote for Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio above 13 other suggested candidates. She last month told reporters that there was no chance she would run next year. However, few in the country are convinced amid a flurry of social media activity and campaigns urging her to succeed her father, who cannot seek re-election under the country’s constitution.
INDONESIA
Zoom sentencing booms
The Southeast Asian country has since last year sentenced almost 100 prisoners to death over Zoom. Courts turned to virtual hearings as COVID-19 restrictions shut down most in-person trials, including murder and drug trafficking cases, which can carry the death penalty. This month, 13 members of a drug trafficking ring, including four foreigners, learned via video that they would be shot for smuggling 400kg of methamphetamine into Indonesia. “Virtual hearings degrade the rights of defendants facing death sentences — it’s about someone’s life and death,” Amnesty International Indonesia director Usman Hamid said.
UNITED STATES
Party sparks quake fears
A gender reveal party in New Hampshire was such a blast that it set off reports of an earthquake, police said. Police in Kingston on Tuesday evening received reports of a loud explosion at a nearby quarry, where they found people who said they were holding a gender reveal party. The source of the blast was 36kg of tannerite, police said. The partygoers thought the quarry would be the safest spot to light the explosive, which is typically sold as a target for firearms practice, police said. Some nearby residents reported property damage, local media reported. “It knocked pictures off our walls,” one resident said. “I’m all up for silliness and whatnot, but that was extreme.”
A string of rape and assault allegations against the son of Norway’s future queen have plunged the royal family into its “biggest scandal” ever, wrapping up an annus horribilis for the monarchy. The legal troubles surrounding Marius Borg Hoiby, the 27-year-old son born of a relationship before Norwegian Crown Princess Mette-Marit’s marriage to Norwegian Crown Prince Haakon, have dominated the Scandinavian country’s headlines since August. The tall strapping blond with a “bad boy” look — often photographed in tuxedos, slicked back hair, earrings and tattoos — was arrested in Oslo on Aug. 4 suspected of assaulting his girlfriend the previous night. A photograph
‘GOOD POLITICS’: He is a ‘pragmatic radical’ and has moderated his rhetoric since the height of his radicalism in 2014, a lecturer in contemporary Islam said Abu Mohammed al-Jolani is the leader of the Islamist alliance that spearheaded an offensive that rebels say brought down Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and ended five decades of Baath Party rule in Syria. Al-Jolani heads Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which is rooted in Syria’s branch of al-Qaeda. He is a former extremist who adopted a more moderate posture in order to achieve his goals. Yesterday, as the rebels entered Damascus, he ordered all military forces in the capital not to approach public institutions. Last week, he said the objective of his offensive, which saw city after city fall from government control, was to
IVY LEAGUE GRADUATE: Suspect Luigi Nicholas Mangione, whose grandfather was a self-made real-estate developer and philanthropist, had a life of privilege The man charged with murder in the killing of the CEO of UnitedHealthcare made it clear he was not going to make things easy on authorities, shouting unintelligibly and writhing in the grip of sheriff’s deputies as he was led into court and then objecting to being brought to New York to face trial. The displays of resistance on Tuesday were not expected to significantly delay legal proceedings for Luigi Nicholas Mangione, who was charged in last week’s Manhattan killing of Brian Thompson, the leader of the US’ largest medical insurance company. Little new information has come out about motivation,
‘MONSTROUS CRIME’: The killings were overseen by a powerful gang leader who was convinced his son’s illness was caused by voodoo practitioners, a civil organization said Nearly 200 people in Haiti were killed in brutal weekend violence reportedly orchestrated against voodoo practitioners, with the government on Monday condemning a massacre of “unbearable cruelty.” The killings in the capital, Port-au-Prince, were overseen by a powerful gang leader convinced that his son’s illness was caused by followers of the religion, the civil organization the Committee for Peace and Development (CPD) said. It was the latest act of extreme violence by powerful gangs that control most of the capital in the impoverished Caribbean country mired for decades in political instability, natural disasters and other woes. “He decided to cruelly punish all
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