NORWAY
US military aircraft missing
Authorities were on Friday searching for a US Marine Corps aircraft that went missing during a training exercise. The military said that the Marine Osprey was reported missing when it did not make a scheduled arrival in Bodo. The civilian Joint Rescue Coordination Centre Northern Norway launched a search and rescue operation. Later the military said that “discoveries were made from the air” south of Bodo, adding the “due to the weather conditions, it has not been possible to enter the site.” The Marine Corps confirmed the incident on Twitter, saying that its cause is under investigation. Norway said the aircraft was participating in NATO’s regular Cold Response exercise.
INDONESIA
86% have virus antibodies
Jakarta estimates that 86.6 percent of the country’s population has COVID-19 antibodies, even though only about half of them have been fully vaccinated against the virus. The government held a seroprevalence survey in November and December last year to assess whether it can open its borders ahead the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, Minister of Health Budi Gunadi Sadikin said in a statement on Friday. About 99.1 percent of people who have had two vaccine doses had COVID-19 antibodies, compared with 73.9 percent for the unvaccinated.
EAST TIMOR
Presidential vote under way
Citizens were at the polls yesterday to elect a new president, hoping that the most competitive election in the history of Southeast Asia’s youngest country will end a protracted political impasse. Voters lined up outside polling stations at the crack of dawn to choose between a record 16 candidates led by what many in the country see as revolutionary heroes, President Francisco Guterres and former president and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Jose Ramos-Horta. “I hope the leader that I have voted for can pay more attention to the education, infrastructure and farming sectors. I am very happy that I’ve voted for a candidate based on my consciousness,” Filomena Tavares Maria, 35, said as she waited at a polling station.
MIDDLE EAST
States seek energy security
Government ministers from Germany and Japan are heading to the Middle East to safeguard their energy security after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine upended global supplies. German Minister of Economic Affairs and Climate Action Robert Habeck and Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs Yoshimasa Hayashi are set to hold separate meetings with officials in Qatar and the United Arab Emirates over the next several days. “The Russian war of aggression against Ukraine has put the issue of energy security at the center of international discussion,” Habeck said in a statement. Asian consumers are also grappling with tight energy markets. Hayashi is scheduled to visit the UAE today to meet with his counterpart as well as Emirati Minister of Industry and Advanced Technology Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber. The small Persian Gulf nation provides about one-third of Japan’s oil imports.
COLOMBIA
Italian killed in shark attack
An Italian tourist died on Friday after being attacked by a shark off the coast of Colombia’s San Andres Island in the Caribbean Sea, local media reported. The 56-year-old man, identified by local media as Antonio Roseto Degli Abruzzi, was swimming near a cliff when he was bitten by the shark. The Teleislas channel said the unusual attack took place in an area with few swimmers, local media said.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
China would train thousands of foreign law enforcement officers to see the world order “develop in a more fair, reasonable and efficient direction,” its minister for public security has said. “We will [also] send police consultants to countries in need to conduct training to help them quickly and effectively improve their law enforcement capabilities,” Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong (王小洪) told an annual global security forum. Wang made the announcement in the eastern city of Lianyungang on Monday in front of law enforcement representatives from 122 countries, regions and international organizations such as Interpol. The forum is part of ongoing
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