INDIA
Key space tests launched
The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) yesterday carried out the first of a series of key test flights after overcoming a technical glitch ahead of its planned mission to take astronauts into space by 2025, the space agency said. The test involved launching a module to outer space and bringing it back to Earth to test the spacecraft’s crew escape system, ISRO chairman Sreedhara Somanath said. The launch was delayed by 45 minutes in the morning because of weather conditions. The attempt was again deferred by more than an hour because of an issue with the engine, and the ground computer put the module’s liftoff on hold, said Somanath.
CHINA
Ad executive arrested
An executive and two former employees of WPP, one of the world’s biggest advertising companies, have been arrested, two people familiar with the situation said. The arrests involved WPP’s GroupM media trading division and included a raid on offices in Shanghai, said the people, who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to speak publicly. WPP declined to comment, and the Chinese embassy in London did not respond to a request for comment.
RUSSIA
Court detains US journalist
A court on Friday ordered Russian-American journalist Alsu Kurmasheva to be detained for three more days, after prosecutors said she had failed to register as a “foreign agent.” Kurmasheva was working for the US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty when she was detained by law enforcement officers in Kazan on Wednesday. She faces up to five years in jail if found guilty of the charges. She is the second US journalist to be detained by Russia, after Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was arrested in March for “spying.”
CHINA
Tsingtao probes pee video
Tsingtao Brewery, one of the country’s biggest beer makers, said it has opened an investigation after a video appearing to show a factory employee urinating on raw ingredients went viral this week. The clip, published online on Thursday, purportedly shows a male worker at a Tsingtao warehouse clambering into a high-walled container and relieving himself onto its contents. The footage circulated widely on Chinese social media, racking up tens of millions of views on the popular Sina Weibo platform. Tsingtao on Friday said that it had contacted the police over the incident and an investigation was ongoing. Some Web users were not about to pass up the chance to make a wry quip about the country’s famously light and fizzy mass-market brews. “I’ve always said the beer here is like horse pee. Turns out I was wrong,” one of them commented. “Thanks, I think I’ll have wine instead,” quipped another.
UNITED STATES
Republicans drop Jordan
Republicans on Friday abruptly dropped Representative Jim Jordan as their nominee for House speaker, after the ally of former US president Donald Trump failed badly on a third ballot for the gavel. The outcome meant another week without a House speaker, bordering on a full-blown crisis. House Republicans have no realistic or working plan to unite the fractured party, elect a new speaker and return to the work of Congress that has been languishing since Representative Kevin McCarthy was ousted as speaker at the start of the month. “We’re in a very bad place right now,” McCarthy said.
HOLLYWOOD IN TURMOIL: Mandy Moore, Paris Hilton and Cary Elwes lost properties to the flames, while awards events planned for this week have been delayed Fires burning in and around Los Angeles have claimed the homes of numerous celebrities, including Billy Crystal, Mandy Moore and Paris Hilton, and led to sweeping disruptions of entertainment events, while at least five people have died. Three awards ceremonies planned for this weekend have been postponed. Next week’s Oscar nominations have been delayed, while tens of thousands of city residents had been displaced and were awaiting word on whether their homes survived the flames — some of them the city’s most famous denizens. More than 1,900 structures had been destroyed and the number was expected to increase. More than 130,000 people
Some things might go without saying, but just in case... Belgium’s food agency issued a public health warning as the festive season wrapped up on Tuesday: Do not eat your Christmas tree. The unusual message came after the city of Ghent, an environmentalist stronghold in the country’s East Flanders region, raised eyebrows by posting tips for recycling the conifers on the dinner table. Pointing with enthusiasm to examples from Scandinavia, the town Web site suggested needles could be stripped, blanched and dried — for use in making flavored butter, for instance. Asked what they thought of the idea, the reply
A group of Uyghur men who were detained in Thailand more than one decade ago said that the Thai government is preparing to deport them to China, alarming activists and family members who say the men are at risk of abuse and torture if they are sent back. Forty-three Uyghur men held in Bangkok made a public appeal to halt what they called an imminent threat of deportation. “We could be imprisoned and we might even lose our lives,” the letter said. “We urgently appeal to all international organizations and countries concerned with human rights to intervene immediately to save us from
US Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen on Monday met virtually with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng (何立峰) and raised concerns about “malicious cyber activity” carried out by Chinese state-sponsored actors, the US Department of the Treasury said in a statement. The department last month reported that an unspecified number of its computers had been compromised by Chinese hackers in what it called a “major incident” following a breach at contractor BeyondTrust, which provides cybersecurity services. US Congressional aides said no date had been set yet for a requested briefing on the breach, the latest in a serious of cyberattacks
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