UNITED STATES
Race case raises concern
President Joe Biden’s administration on Wednesday urged the Supreme Court to decline to hear a case against Harvard University challenging the ability of it and other schools to consider race as a factor in student admissions to boost diversity. The justices in June asked the administration for its views on the case, which could give the court’s 6-3 conservative majority a chance to end affirmative action policies used to increase the number of black and Hispanic students on campuses. Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar argued in a brief that it would be an “extraordinary step” for the court to reconsider its past rulings, and called the case a “poor vehicle” to do so.
NORTH AMERICA
Temperatures reach highs
A spell of unseasonably warm weather last week affected southern and western parts of the US and southwestern Canada, with temperatures 15°C to 20°C above average in some places. December temperature records were broken in multiple locations. Penticton, British Columbia, had its highest-ever December on Wednesday last week, as the temperature reached 22.5°C. In the US, Montana, North Dakota, Washington and Wyoming all equaled or broke state temperature records for the month.
UNITED STATES
Officials to feed manatees
Florida’s manatees — which are increasingly facing starvation, largely as a result of pollution — are going to be fed directly by wildlife officials, in what they called an “unprecedented” step to prevent further die-off. The pilot program is to start with Indian River Lagoon, on the state’s east coast, southeast of Orlando, federal and state authorities said on Wednesday. Many manatees migrate to the area in winter, to bask in the warm water discharged by a nearby power plant and to graze on seagrass. Over the past decade, heavy runoff from nearby farms and urban areas has caused algae blooms to explode, which increasingly threaten the sea mammals’ main food source. At least 1,017 manatees have died so far this year.
UNITED STATES
Fox News tree set ablaze
Police in New York on Wednesday arrested a man suspected of deliberately torching a giant Christmas tree in front of the Fox News headquarters. The 49-year-old man faces charges of arson after he was found at about midnight climbing the structure supporting the 15m tree in the heart of Manhattan. The tree then went up in flames. The man had a lighter on him, but police are uncertain whether he used any propellant to help start the blaze. The fire was quickly brought under control and no one was hurt. Police have not yet ascribed a motive to the incident.
UNITED STATES
Gig work popularity growing
Sixteen percent of Americans have earned money doing household chores and running errands for other people through online apps and Web sites, a Pew Research Center survey showed. If people are younger, non-white and poorer, they are more likely to have worked online gigs, such as giving rides, delivering groceries and cleaning homes, according to a survey of 10,348 adults conducted from Aug. 23 to 29. More than half of the online gig workers said they wanted to save extra money or cover gaps in their incomes, while about six in 10 said the money they earned was essential or important for meeting their basic needs.
INDIA
Full honors for top general
The bodies of former first chief of defense staff General Bipin Rawat and 12 others who died in a helicopter crash were yesterday to be taken to New Delhi, where the top general would be laid to rest with full military honors, Minister of Defense Rajnath Singh said. Rawat, his wife and 12 defense personnel were on Wednesday en route to a military staff college in the south when the air force helicopter they were traveling in came down near the town of Coonoor. The lone survivor of the crash, an air force group captain, is on life support at a military hospital. The cause of the crash is being investigated. Rawat, 63, was appointed as the nation’s first chief of defense staff by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government in late 2019. The position was set up with the aim of integrating the army, navy and air force.
SOUTH KOREA
Fertility rate to fall further
The nation’s fertility rate, already the world’s lowest, is expected to drop even further, as the COVID-19 pandemic puts downward pressure on the number of births, statements by the Ministry of Finance and statistics office said. By 2031, the government sees the fertility rate edging back up to 1.0, as the large cohort of people born in the 1990s to a second baby boomer generation enter their 30s and start forming families, they said. A fertility rate of about two children per woman, the so-called replacement rate, is needed to keep population from falling. The national population of about 52 million would decline gradually until 2030, then shrink at a more rapid pace to about 38 million by 2070, the same size it was in 1979, the statements said.
CAMEROON
People flee to Chad border
Clashes between fishing and herding communities in the far north region on Wednesday killed two people, wounded several others and sent many residents fleeing over the nearby border into Chad, local sources said. Musgum fishers attacked “from all sides” areas mostly populated by Choa Arab herders in the town of Kousseri, the region’s prefect, Jean-Lazare Ndongo Ndongo, said on the CRTV news channel. “We have two deaths,” as well as wounded, he added, without saying what sparked the clashes. “Despite the efforts of the forces deployed to hold the town, they set fire to some houses, particularly in the predominantly Arab neighborhoods,” he said. The attackers were then repelled and reinforcements have since arrived in the town, he added. Chadian President Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno said it was a “worrying situation.”
PHILIPPINES
Terror law ‘unconstitutional’
The Supreme Court yesterday said that parts of an anti-terrorism law passed last year were unconstitutional, in a decision hailed by one of its opponents as a “partial victory.” The controversial law, signed by President Rodrigo Duterte in July last year, has alarmed some lawyers and human rights advocates who fear it could be used to suppress free speech and harass government opponents. The law grants police and military sweeping powers to tackle security threats, but legal experts had said that its overly broad articles could open the door to discriminatory enforcement, privacy infringements and suppression of peaceful dissent. The court struck down a part of the law “for being overbroad and violative of freedom of expression,” it said in a statement. A detailed breakdown of the court’s ruling was not immediately available. The government had no immediate response to the decision.
THE ‘MONSTER’: The Philippines on Saturday sent a vessel to confront a 12,000-tonne Chinese ship that had entered its exclusive economic zone The Philippines yesterday said it deployed a coast guard ship to challenge Chinese patrol boats attempting to “alter the existing status quo” of the disputed South China Sea. Philippine Coast Guard spokesman Commodore Jay Tarriela said Chinese patrol ships had this year come as close as 60 nautical miles (111km) west of the main Philippine island of Luzon. “Their goal is to normalize such deployments, and if these actions go unnoticed and unchallenged, it will enable them to alter the existing status quo,” he said in a statement. He later told reporters that Manila had deployed a coast guard ship to the area
HOLLYWOOD IN TURMOIL: Mandy Moore, Paris Hilton and Cary Elwes lost properties to the flames, while awards events planned for this week have been delayed Fires burning in and around Los Angeles have claimed the homes of numerous celebrities, including Billy Crystal, Mandy Moore and Paris Hilton, and led to sweeping disruptions of entertainment events, while at least five people have died. Three awards ceremonies planned for this weekend have been postponed. Next week’s Oscar nominations have been delayed, while tens of thousands of city residents had been displaced and were awaiting word on whether their homes survived the flames — some of them the city’s most famous denizens. More than 1,900 structures had been destroyed and the number was expected to increase. More than 130,000 people
A group of Uyghur men who were detained in Thailand more than one decade ago said that the Thai government is preparing to deport them to China, alarming activists and family members who say the men are at risk of abuse and torture if they are sent back. Forty-three Uyghur men held in Bangkok made a public appeal to halt what they called an imminent threat of deportation. “We could be imprisoned and we might even lose our lives,” the letter said. “We urgently appeal to all international organizations and countries concerned with human rights to intervene immediately to save us from
RISING TENSIONS: The nations’ three leaders discussed China’s ‘dangerous and unlawful behavior in the South China Sea,’ and agreed on the importance of continued coordination Japan, the Philippines and the US vowed to further deepen cooperation under a trilateral arrangement in the face of rising tensions in Asia’s waters, the three nations said following a call among their leaders. Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr and outgoing US President Joe Biden met via videoconference on Monday morning. Marcos’ communications office said the leaders “agreed to enhance and deepen economic, maritime and technology cooperation.” The call followed a first-of-its-kind summit meeting of Marcos, Biden and then-Japanese prime minister Fumio Kishida in Washington in April last year that led to a vow to uphold international
RSS