UNITED STATES
Prince Andrew to settle
Britain’s Prince Andrew, accused in a lawsuit of sexually abusing a then-17-year-old girl supplied to him by financier Jeffrey Epstein, has agreed to settle by making a donation to his accuser’s charity and declaring that he never meant to malign her character, a court filing showed on Tuesday. The deal avoids a trial. Besides the undisclosed donation to Virginia Giuffre’s charity, it says that Andrew acknowledges she has suffered as an abuse victim. It did not specify whether Giuffre would personally receive money as part of the settlement. Judge Lewis Kaplan said he would suspend the case until March 17, when he might set a trial date if the lawyers do not ask for a dismissal by then.
UNITED STATES
Priest gets blessing wrong
Thousands of Catholics might have to be rebaptized after the church discovered that a priest had gotten one word wrong in the blessing for decades, invalidating the rite. For 26 years, Father Andres Arango had been performing the first sacrament of Catholic life with the words: “We baptize you,” instead of “I baptize you,” which is what the Vatican stipulates. “It is not the community that baptizes a person and incorporates them into the Church of Christ; rather, it is Christ, and Christ alone, who presides at all sacraments; therefore, it is Christ who baptizes,” Bishop of Phoenix Thomas Olmsted said. Arango’s error was identified in the middle of last year, a quarter of a century after he began working as a priest, diocese spokeswoman Katie Burke told reporters on Tuesday. “Father Arango was using the incorrect words from the beginning of his priesthood until it was brought to the attention of the diocese last summer,” she said. “I do not have an exact number of people baptized between 1995 and 2021, but I believe they number in the thousands.” Since the mistake came to light, Arango has quit his regular job “to dedicate his full time ministry to helping and healing the people who were affected by this mistake,” Burke said. “The diocese is working closely with Father Arango and the parishes at which he was previously assigned to notify and make arrangements to baptize anyone who may have been baptized invalidly.” A Web site has been set up to answer questions from worried parishioners, including: “Does this affect my marriage?” and: “Do I need to go to confession?”
BRAZIL
Flooding, landslides kill 18
Landslides and flooding triggered by heavy rainfall killed at least 18 people in a tourist town in the hills above Rio de Janeiro, firefighters said on Tuesday. “So far, 18 deaths caused by landslides and floods have been confirmed,” the Rio de Janeiro Fire Department said in a statement. More than 180 firefighters and other rescue workers were at the scene in the hill town of Petropolis, the statement said.
MEXICO
Migrants sew mouths shut
A dozen undocumented migrants on Mexico’s southern border on Tuesday sewed their mouths shut in a bid to convince the country’s immigration authority to grant them passage toward the US border. The migrants helped each other seal their lips using needles and plastic thread, leaving a small space to consume liquids and using alcohol to wipe away drops of blood from the stitches, images showed. “We hope that the National Migration Institute can see that they are bleeding, that they are human beings,” said Irineo Mujica, a rights advocate at the demonstration.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
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