MEXICO
Kellogg’s cereals seized
The country has seized 380,000 boxes of Corn Flakes, Special K and other Kellogg’s cereals, claiming the boxes had cartoon drawings on them in violation of recently enacted laws aimed at improving children’s diets. While Corn Flakes or Rice Krispies are clearly not the worst thing Mexican children eat, the laws prohibit food companies from using marketing tactics that might appeal to children, like cartoons or mascots. The consumer protection agency also said on Friday that the cereal boxes did not clearly state nutritional values like calories, fats, salt or sugar, or did not have the proper warning signs for levels of those ingredients that are considered excessive.
RUSSIA
Hacker group broken up
Moscow on Friday said that it had dismantled the prominent hacking group REvil, which last year carried out a high-profile attack on US software firm Kaseya, following a request from Washington. The announcement came on the same day that Ukrainian government sites were hit by hackers in an attack that Kiev linked to Moscow, which has amassed tens of thousands of troops on the border. Russia’s Federal Security Service said in a statement that it had “suppressed the illegal activities” of members of the group during raids on 25 addresses that swept up 14 people. The searches were carried out following an “appeal from the relevant US authorities.”
UNITED STATES
Militia leader remains jailed
The founder and leader of the far-right Oath Keepers militia group remained in jail after his first court appearance on Friday, a day after his arrest on charges he plotted with others to attack the Capitol on Jan. 6 last year to stop Congress from certifying President Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory. The seditious conspiracy charges against Stewart Rhodes and 10 other Oath Keepers members or associates are the first to be levied in connection with the riot. They are also the first to be brought by the Department of Justice in more than a decade. A federal magistrate judge in Plano, Texas, ordered Rhodes, 56, of Granbury, Texas, to be held in custody until a detention hearing on Thursday.
UNITED STATES
Baldwin hands over phone
Actor Alec Baldwin has handed his cellphone to authorities as they investigate the fatal shooting of a cinematographer on the Rust movie set, almost a month after a warrant was issued for the device. The actor was holding a Colt gun during a rehearsal for the Western being filmed in New Mexico in October last year when it discharged a live round, killing Halyna Hutchins. Police are investigating why live ammunition was present on set, and last month requested Baldwin’s phone on the grounds “there may be evidence on the phone” that could be “material and relevant to this investigation.”
UNITED STATES
Students stage walkout
Hundreds of Chicago students staged a walkout on Friday, saying there were not enough precautions in place to protect them from COVID-19, despite an agreement between the teachers’ union and school district to return to classrooms. The walkout at schools across the city culminated outside district offices downtown, where the students waved signs, chanted and briefly blocked traffic. “Hey, hey, ho, ho, Lori Lightfoot’s got to go,” they said, a reference to the Chicago mayor.
DOUBLE-MURDER CASE: The officer told the dispatcher he would check the locations of the callers, but instead headed to a pizzeria, remaining there for about an hour A New Jersey officer has been charged with misconduct after prosecutors said he did not quickly respond to and properly investigate reports of a shooting that turned out to be a double murder, instead allegedly stopping at an ATM and pizzeria. Franklin Township Police Sergeant Kevin Bollaro was the on-duty officer on the evening of Aug. 1, when police received 911 calls reporting gunshots and screaming in Pittstown, about 96km from Manhattan in central New Jersey, Hunterdon County Prosecutor Renee Robeson’s office said. However, rather than responding immediately, prosecutors said GPS data and surveillance video showed Bollaro drove about 3km
Tens of thousands of people on Saturday took to the streets of Spain’s eastern city of Valencia to mark the first anniversary of floods that killed 229 people and to denounce the handling of the disaster. Demonstrators, many carrying photos of the victims, called on regional government head Carlos Mazon to resign over what they said was the slow response to one of Europe’s deadliest natural disasters in decades. “People are still really angry,” said Rosa Cerros, a 42-year-old government worker who took part with her husband and two young daughters. “Why weren’t people evacuated? Its incomprehensible,” she said. Mazon’s
‘MOTHER’ OF THAILAND: In her glamorous heyday in the 1960s, former Thai queen Sirikit mingled with US presidents and superstars such as Elvis Presley The year-long funeral ceremony of former Thai queen Sirikit started yesterday, with grieving royalists set to salute the procession bringing her body to lie in state at Bangkok’s Grand Palace. Members of the royal family are venerated in Thailand, treated by many as semi-divine figures, and lavished with glowing media coverage and gold-adorned portraits hanging in public spaces and private homes nationwide. Sirikit, the mother of Thai King Vajiralongkorn and widow of the nation’s longest-reigning monarch, died late on Friday at the age of 93. Black-and-white tributes to the royal matriarch are being beamed onto towering digital advertizing billboards, on
SECRETIVE SECT: Tetsuya Yamagami was said to have held a grudge against the Unification Church for bankrupting his family after his mother donated about ￥100m The gunman accused of killing former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe yesterday pleaded guilty, three years after the assassination in broad daylight shocked the world. The slaying forced a reckoning in a nation with little experience of gun violence, and ignited scrutiny of alleged ties between prominent conservative lawmakers and a secretive sect, the Unification Church. “Everything is true,” Tetsuya Yamagami said at a court in the western city of Nara, admitting to murdering the nation’s longest-serving leader in July 2022. The 45-year-old was led into the room by four security officials. When the judge asked him to state his name, Yamagami, who
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