HONG KONG
Police make ‘mega bust’
Authorities yesterday said that they have made their largest smuggling bust, seizing goods, including endangered species, worth an estimated US$26.9 million. The smuggling ring operated using speedboats, the government said, adding that four trucks were also impounded in a raid. A 34-year-old man was arrested in the operation that began in June and more details are to be released, it said. Law enforcement descended on the smugglers, who were operating in the New Territories, close to China, on Sept. 23. “In terms of the seizure value, this is the largest smuggling case — whether by air, sea or land — on record for customs officers,” the government said.
INDIA
Swerving bus kills riders
Twelve people were killed in the north yesterday after the bus they were on swerved off the road and hit a truck, police said. The bus driver veered off track to avoid hitting stray cattle on the road, authorities said. The accident occurred in Barabanki District, 40km southwest of Lucknow. Another 32 were injured out of the 60 passengers onboard. There are fears that the number of dead could increase as several passengers sustained critical injuries, Senior Police Officer Yamuna Prasad said.
TURKEY
Paris climate deal ratified
The country’s parliament on Wednesday ratified the Paris climate accord, making it the last G20 country to do so, after holding off for years due to what it saw as injustices in its responsibilities under the pact. The country has been a signatory to the deal since April 2016, but on Wednesday, parliament’s 353 members unanimously voted in favor of ratifying it.
GERMANY
IS women, children return
The country has repatriated eight women who joined the Islamic State (IS) group and 23 children from northern Syria, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said overnight from Wednesday to yesterday — it is the biggest such transfer since 2019. “The children are not responsible for their situation... The mothers will have to answer for their acts,” Minister of Foreign Affairs Heiko Maas said in a statement. “Many of them were held in custody on arrival in Germany,” she added.
LIBYA
More bodies wash ashore
At least 17 bodies, likely of Europe-bound migrants, have washed ashore in the west, the Red Crescent said. The bodies were found on Tuesday near the western town of Zawiya, the Red Crescent’s branch in the town said, and were handed over to authorities for burial. The migrants likely drowned. The UN International Organization for Migration has said that more than 1,100 migrants have been reported dead or presumed dead in numerous boat mishaps and shipwrecks off the country’s coast so far this year.
UNITED STATES
Texas abortion ban blocked
A federal judge on Wednesday temporarily blocked a near-total ban on abortion in Texas in a challenge brought by President Joe Biden’s administration after the Supreme Court had allowed it to go into effect. The action by District Judge Robert Pitman in Austin prevents the state from enforcing the law that prohibits women from obtaining an abortion after six weeks of pregnancy, while litigation over its legality continues. The case is part of a fierce legal battle over abortion access in the country, with numerous states pursuing restrictions.
CONDITIONS: The Russian president said a deal that was scuppered by ‘elites’ in the US and Europe should be revived, as Ukraine was generally satisfied with it Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday said that he was ready for talks with Ukraine, after having previously rebuffed the idea of negotiations while Kyiv’s offensive into the Kursk region was ongoing. Ukraine last month launched a cross-border incursion into Russia’s Kursk region, sending thousands of troops across the border and seizing several villages. Putin said shortly after there could be no talk of negotiations. Speaking at a question and answer session at Russia’s Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Putin said that Russia was ready for talks, but on the basis of an aborted deal between Moscow’s and Kyiv’s negotiators reached in Istanbul, Turkey,
In months, Lo Yuet-ping would bid farewell to a centuries-old village he has called home in Hong Kong for more than seven decades. The Cha Kwo Ling village in east Kowloon is filled with small houses built from metal sheets and stones, as well as old granite buildings, contrasting sharply with the high-rise structures that dominate much of the Asian financial hub. Lo, 72, has spent his entire life here and is among an estimated 860 households required to move under a government redevelopment plan. He said he would miss the rich history, unique culture and warm interpersonal kindness that defined life in
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
A French woman whose husband has admitted to enlisting dozens of strangers to rape her while she was drugged on Thursday told his trial that police had saved her life by uncovering the crimes. “The police saved my life by investigating Mister Pelicot’s computer,” Gisele Pelicot told the court in the southern city of Avignon, referring to her husband — one of 51 of her alleged abusers on trial — by only his surname. Speaking for the first time since the extraordinary trial began on Monday, Gisele Pelicot, now 71, revealed her emotion in almost 90 minutes of testimony, recounting her mysterious
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