NEW ZEALAND
Antarctic patrol plan nixed
The Ministry of Defence said it has suspended plans to build an Antarctic and Southern Ocean patrol vessel, because planned spending is being reassessed due to the impact of costs related to the COVID-19 pandemic. A case for ordering the ship had been expected to go before the government this year for approval. According to the Defence Assessment 2021 report, the Southern Ocean and Antarctica have become increasingly strategically important, and the continent is a potential location for a range of military and security-related activities. The ministry said it did not have a timeframe for when or if the project would be resumed.
AUSTRALIA
Baby killed at home by dog
A 17-month-old baby has been killed after being attacked by a dog at her home in St Helens. Merseyside police were called to the address after reports that the girl had been attacked. Emergency services attended and took her to a hospital, but she died as a result of her injuries. The dog was put down by police, who said that it would be subjected to a forensic examination to determine its breed and legality. Detective Inspector Lisa Milligan said the dog had been bought by the family a week earlier. “Our officers take the issue of dangerous dogs very seriously. Over the past years, we have worked ... to ensure prohibited dogs are taken off the streets,” she said.
PHILIPPINES
Party backs Marcos Jr
The political party of President Rodrigo Duterte has endorsed Ferdinand Marcos Jr’s presidential bid, the Manila Standard reported yesterday, citing a resolution. Officials of the Philippine Democratic Party-People’s Power, or PDP-Laban, party did not respond to requests to confirm the report, but said that an announcement would be made at a news conference. Marcos Jr, the son and namesake of the late Philippine president Ferdinand Marcos, is leading in opinion polls by a wide margin ahead of the May 9 presidential election.
SRI LANKA
Troops oversee gas pumps
The government ordered the military to post soldiers at hundreds of gas stations on Tuesday, to help distribute fuel after a sudden rise in prices of key commodities and the accompanying shortages forced tens of thousands of people to line up for hours. The decision to position troops near gasoline pumps and kerosene supply points came after three elderly people dropped dead during their wait in long lines, officials said. “At least two army personnel will be deployed at every fuel pump,” military spokesman Nilantha Premaratne said, adding that the soldiers would help organize fuel distribution, but would not be involved in crowd control. The move is a response to complaints of stockpiling and inefficient distribution, government spokesman Ramesh Pathirana said.
TURKEY
Abramovich’s yacht docks
A superyacht owned by Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich has docked in the country, which has not joined European sanctions against Moscow. Abramovich, 55, was among the people listed under sanctions adopted by the EU last week. The billionaire’s 140m Bermudan-flagged superyacht Solaris was filmed in Bodrum in southwest Turkey on Monday, more than a week after being spotted in Montenegro, which is not part of the EU. Abramovich, who also owns an even bigger yacht, the 162m Eclipse, has also been hit with a UK assets freeze and travel ban.
GREECE
Three die in explosion
Three workers died on Monday in a blast at a dynamite factory that “totally flattened” the building, the company and local officials said. The early morning explosion at the ELTEK factory in Agalaioi, east of the Greek town of Grevena, also injured a security guard. “The building was totally flattened,” Grevena Mayor Yiorgos Dastamanis told Star TV, while local residents said the blast felt like an earthquake. The company said the cause of explosion was under investigation. “[We] confirm the deaths of three employees at our Grevena factory during an accident in the production line,” ELTEK said in a statement, expressing condolences to the bereaved families.
SWEDEN
Two die in knife attack
Two women died after being stabbed at a high school on Monday, police said, adding that an 18-year-old student had been arrested. The two women, both in their 50s, “were employees of the school,” the police said in a statement following the attack at Malmo Latinskola, a high school in the center of Malmo. Local media said the alleged attacker called the emergency number to say where he was, and that he had put down his weapon and admitted to having killed two people. He was armed with a knife and an axe, Swedish media reported. The suspect was arrested without difficulty shortly, police said.
UNITED STATES
Monroe portrait to be sold
A portrait of actress Marilyn Monroe by 1960s pop icon Andy Warhol us to go up for auction in May with an estimated value of US$200 million, which would set a record, Christie’s announced on Monday. The work, Shot Sage Blue Marilyn, “is poised to be the most expensive painting of the 20th century ever sold at auction,” said Alex Rotter, Christie’s chairman of 20th and 21st century art. The 1964 likeness of Monroe’s face screenprinted with bright yellow hair, a pink face and light blue eyeshadow, is one of five paintings Warhol made of Monroe.
NICARAGUA
Chamorro gets jail sentence
Would-be presidential challenger Cristiana Chamorro was on Monday sentenced to eight years in prison after being found guilty of financial crimes, a human rights group said. Chamorro, 68, is to remain under house arrest, as she has been since she was detained in June last year, the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights said. The charges had prevented her from running in a presidential election in November last year in which she was regarded as the favorite. She was accused by the state of laundering money, property and assets through her media foundation, as well as promoting “ideological falsehood” and destabilizing the government. The center said that Chamorro and others were also slapped with “million-dollar fines” that are “impossible to pay, and if they are commuted, it would be the equivalent to life imprisonment.”
BRAZIL
Floods kill at least five
New floods triggered by torrential rain in the tourist town of Petropolis killed at least five people, authorities said on Monday, just over a month after a similar tragedy claimed 233 lives. Four more people remain missing after a month’s worth of rain fell in a matter of hours on Sunday on the scenic city in the mountains outside Rio de Janeiro, emergency officials said. “Emergency services have so far responded to more than 50 calls for landslides and rescues for stranded individuals,” officials said in a statement.
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
The governor of Ohio is to send law enforcement and millions of dollars in healthcare resources to the city of Springfield as it faces a surge in temporary Haitian migrants. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine on Tuesday said that he does not oppose the Temporary Protected Status program under which about 15,000 Haitians have arrived in the city of about 59,000 people since 2020, but said the federal government must do more to help affected communities. On Monday, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost directed his office to research legal avenues — including filing a lawsuit — to stop the federal government from sending
A Zurich city councilor has apologized and reportedly sought police protection against threats after she fired a sport pistol at an auction poster of a 14th-century Madonna and child painting, and posted images of their bullet-ridden faces on social media. Green-Liberal party official Sanija Ameti, 32, put the images on Instagram over the weekend before quickly pulling them down. She later wrote on social media that she had been practicing shots from about 10m and only found the poster as “big enough” for a suitable target. “I apologize to the people who were hurt by my post. I deleted it immediately when I
‘VERY DIRE’: This year’s drought, exacerbated by El Nino, is affecting 44 percent of Malawi’s crop area and up to 40 percent of its population of 20.4 million In the worst drought in southern Africa in a century, villagers in Malawi are digging for potentially poisonous wild yams to eat as their crops lie scorched in the fields. “Our situation is very dire, we are starving,” 76-year-old grandmother Manesi Levison said as she watched over a pot of bitter, orange wild yams that she says must cook for eight hours to remove the toxins. “Sometimes the kids go for two days without any food,” she said. Levison has 30 grandchildren under her care. Ten are huddled under the thatched roof of her home at Salima, near Lake Malawi, while she boils
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