PERU
Landslides kill 15
Landslides in the nation’s south have left at least 15 people dead, 20 injured and two missing, authorities said on Monday, warning that the toll from the disaster could rise. “The number of people dead so far has risen to 15,” said the directorate of the National Civil Defense Institute in the Arequipa region, where mud and rock slides began on Sunday as a result of torrential rains. Hardest hit were four villages in an area called Nicolas Valcarcel. Arequipa Governor Rohel Sanchez told Canal N television that “the situation in these four towns is really bad.” In hills near the villages, miners were working and were probably swept away, Sanchez said. “There is a high probability that in the tunnels themselves there are also people who are dead there.”
UNITED STATES
Senators question Meta
Senators Mark Warner and Marco Rubio, chair and vice chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, wrote to Facebook parent Meta Platforms on Monday about documents that show it knew developers in China and Russia had access to user data that could be used for espionage. “It appears from these documents that Facebook has known, since at least September 2018, that hundreds of thousands of developers in countries Facebook characterized as ‘high-risk,’ including the People’s Republic of China, had access to significant amounts of sensitive user data,” Warner and Rubio wrote in the letter to company founder Mark Zuckerberg. The letter said an internal Meta document showed that nearly 90,000 developers in China had been given access to information about users, including profile data, photographs and private messages even though Facebook had never been able to operate in China. More than 42,000 developers in Russia, and thousands in Iran and North Korea, also had access to the information, they wrote.
UNITED STATES
Powerball pays US$747m
Someone in Washington State on Monday won an estimated US$747 million Powerball jackpot. The winning numbers were 05, 11, 22, 23, 69 and the Powerball 07. Lottery officials did not immediately make an announcement of a winner, but the Powerball Web site said there was a jackpot winner in Washington State. The site also said that the jackpot for the next drawing on Thursday had dropped to US$20 million. It was the first Powerball jackpot win since Nov. 19, 2022. That winless streak allowed the prize to grow until it stood as the ninth-largest in the nation’s history. The jackpot on Monday is for a winner opting for an annuity paid over 29 years.
UNITED STATES
Intruder breaches base
An intruder has breached the home of Air Force One and a resident opened fire on the trespasser, Joint Base Andrews (JBA) said in a statement on Monday. During the incident, which occurred at about 11:30am, “a man gained unauthorized access to a JBA housing area,” it said in a statement on Twitter. “A resident discharged a firearm, security forces arrived on scene to apprehend the intruder and law enforcement is investigating the incident.” JBA is home to the fleet of blue-and-white presidential aircraft, including Air Force One, Marine One and the “doomsday” 747 aircraft that can serve as the nation’s airborne nuclear command and control centers if needed.
James Watson — the Nobel laureate co-credited with the pivotal discovery of DNA’s double-helix structure, but whose career was later tainted by his repeated racist remarks — has died, his former lab said on Friday. He was 97. The eminent biologist died on Thursday in hospice care on Long Island in New York, announced the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, where he was based for much of his career. Watson became among the 20th century’s most storied scientists for his 1953 breakthrough discovery of the double helix with researcher partner Francis Crick. Along with Crick and Maurice Wilkins, he shared the
OUTRAGE: The former strongman was accused of corruption and responsibility for the killings of hundreds of thousands of political opponents during his time in office Indonesia yesterday awarded the title of national hero to late president Suharto, provoking outrage from rights groups who said the move was an attempt to whitewash decades of human rights abuses and corruption that took place during his 32 years in power. Suharto was a US ally during the Cold War who presided over decades of authoritarian rule, during which up to 1 million political opponents were killed, until he was toppled by protests in 1998. He was one of 10 people recognized by Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto in a televised ceremony held at the presidential palace in Jakarta to mark National
US President Donald Trump handed Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban a one-year exemption from sanctions for buying Russian oil and gas after the close right-wing allies held a chummy White House meeting on Friday. Trump slapped sanctions on Moscow’s two largest oil companies last month after losing patience with Russian President Vladimir Putin over his refusal to end the nearly four-year-old invasion of Ukraine. However, while Trump has pushed other European countries to stop buying oil that he says funds Moscow’s war machine, Orban used his first trip to the White House since Trump’s return to power to push for
LANDMARK: After first meeting Trump in Riyadh in May, al-Sharaa’s visit to the White House today would be the first by a Syrian leader since the country’s independence Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa arrived in the US on Saturday for a landmark official visit, his country’s state news agency SANA reported, a day after Washington removed him from a terrorism blacklist. Sharaa, whose rebel forces ousted long-time former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad late last year, is due to meet US President Donald Trump at the White House today. It is the first such visit by a Syrian president since the country’s independence in 1946, according to analysts. The interim leader met Trump for the first time in Riyadh during the US president’s regional tour in May. US envoy to Syria Tom Barrack earlier
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