CANADA
Sikh activist’s home targeted
Shots appear to have been fired at the home of a Sikh separatist activist, police said on Monday, following recent allegations by Ottawa and Washington that Indian dissidents living abroad in both countries have been targeted for assassination. Constable Tyler Bell-Morena said Peel Regional Police were alerted by construction crews about what appeared to be “a bullet hole in a window of the home” of Inderjit Singh Gosal in Ontario, and are investigating. Gosal is also a close associate of prominent Sikh separatist leader Gurpatwant Singh Pannun, a US Sikh activist in New York whom US authorities say was the target of a thwarted assassination plot in the US last year. There were no injuries in the shooting as the Ontario home is under construction and currently unoccupied.
UNITED STATES
Kennedy apologizes
Robert Kennedy Jr’s presidential ambitions resulted in public family drama after a political action committee aired a Super Bowl advertisement invoking the Democratic family’s legacy to implicitly compare the independent candidate to his assassinated uncle, former president John F. Kennedy. The 30-second spot, financed by the American Values 2024 Super Political Action Committee (PAC) that is backing Kennedy, featured a shortened version of a campaign song that the 35th president used in his 1960 campaign. The spot also mimicked cartoon and newsreel effects using black-and-white pictures of Robert Kennedy Jr similar to the former president. However, in a notable departure from John F. Kennedy’s bygone Democratic Party dynasty, the ad urged Americans to “Vote Independent.” After the game, Robert Kennedy Jr responded to online criticism, including from one of his cousins, emphasizing that his campaign did not produce the spot, which cost an estimated US$7 million. “I’m so sorry if the Super Bowl advertisement caused anyone in my family pain,” Kennedy wrote late on Sunday night on X, formerly Twitter.
UNITED STATES
Pastor arrested for narcotics
A Connecticut pastor has been arrested on allegations that he sold crystal methamphetamine out of his church’s rectory, police said. The reverend of a United Methodist Church in Woodbury was taken into custody on Friday last week after police received a tip about the drugs, authorities said. The pastor was charged with possession of narcotics with intent to sell, possession of a controlled substance and use of drug paraphernalia, among other charges. The reverend was released on US$10,000 bail and was ordered to appear in Waterbury Superior Court on Friday next week.
GREECE
Gunman kills three
A man shot three people dead at the premises of a shipping company in a coastal suburb of Athens on Monday before killing himself, a Greek police source said. The shooter broke into the building in Glyfada belonging to European Product Carriers and killed two men and a woman before barricading himself inside, the source said. Greek media reported the gunman was an Egyptian employee of the company who had been made redundant and that he was found dead in the basement with his weapon next to him. A police source said that preliminary findings pointed to a suicide. Police earlier said officers entered the building and evacuated two women the shooter had locked in the toilets. Nearby roads were closed and a large police presence surrounded the building.
RARE EVENT: While some cultures have a negative view of eclipses, others see them as a chance to show how people can work together, a scientist said Stargazers across a swathe of the world marveled at a dramatic red “Blood Moon” during a rare total lunar eclipse in the early hours of yesterday morning. The celestial spectacle was visible in the Americas and Pacific and Atlantic oceans, as well as in the westernmost parts of Europe and Africa. The phenomenon happens when the sun, Earth and moon line up, causing our planet to cast a giant shadow across its satellite. But as the Earth’s shadow crept across the moon, it did not entirely blot out its white glow — instead the moon glowed a reddish color. This is because the
DEBT BREAK: Friedrich Merz has vowed to do ‘whatever it takes’ to free up more money for defense and infrastructure at a time of growing geopolitical uncertainty Germany’s likely next leader Friedrich Merz was set yesterday to defend his unprecedented plans to massively ramp up defense and infrastructure spending in the Bundestag as lawmakers begin debating the proposals. Merz unveiled the plans last week, vowing his center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU)/Christian Social Union (CSU) bloc and the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) — in talks to form a coalition after last month’s elections — would quickly push them through before the end of the current legislature. Fraying Europe-US ties under US President Donald Trump have fueled calls for Germany, long dependent on the US security umbrella, to quickly
Romania’s electoral commission on Saturday excluded a second far-right hopeful, Diana Sosoaca, from May’s presidential election, amid rising tension in the run-up to the May rerun of the poll. Earlier this month, Romania’s Central Electoral Bureau barred Calin Georgescu, an independent who was polling at about 40 percent ahead of the rerun election. Georgescu, a fierce EU and NATO critic, shot to prominence in November last year when he unexpectedly topped a first round of presidential voting. However, Romania’s constitutional court annulled the election after claims of Russian interference and a “massive” social media promotion in his favor. On Saturday, an electoral commission statement
Chinese authorities increased pressure on CK Hutchison Holdings Ltd over its plan to sell its Panama ports stake by sharing a second newspaper commentary attacking the deal. The Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office on Saturday reposted a commentary originally published in Ta Kung Pao, saying the planned sale of the ports by the Hong Kong company had triggered deep concerns among Chinese people and questioned whether the deal was harming China and aiding evil. “Why were so many important ports transferred to ill-intentioned US forces so easily? What kind of political calculations are hidden in the so-called commercial behavior on the
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