JAPAN
Police search for attacker
Police were yesterday searching for the attacker who fatally stabbed a junior-high school student and wounded another at a McDonald’s restaurant, local media reported. The teens were in line to order at about 8:30pm on Saturday when the attacker entered the fast-food restaurant in Fukuoka Prefecture’s Kitakyushu and wordlessly stabbed them both, national broadcaster NHK reported. They were rushed to a hospital where the girl later died. The other victim, a boy, survived and told police he did not know the man who had stabbed them, NHK said. It was not clear whether the girl knew the man, who remained at large yesterday. Dozens of police have deployed to find the attacker, described as a man who appears to be in his 40s, Television Nishinippon reported.
IRAN
Singer arrested after concert
Authorities have arrested a female singer who performed a virtual concert on YouTube, a lawyer said. Parastoo Ahmady, 27, was arrested in Sari City on Saturday, lawyer Milad Panahipour said. On Thursday, the judiciary had filed a case regarding Ahmady’s concert performance, in which she performed wearing a long black sleeveless and collarless dress, but no hijab. She was accompanied by four male musicians. Ahmady had posted her concert on YouTube the day before. “I am Parastoo, a girl who wants to sing for the people I love. This is a right I could not ignore; singing for the land I love passionately,” she said. The online concert has been viewed more than 1.4 million times. Panahipour said that he did not know the charges against Ahmady or her place of detention, adding that two musicians in her band were arrested in Tehran on Saturday. Separately, a court has sentenced Iranian-American journalist Reza Valizadeh to 10 years in prison for working at a US-funded radio outlet, his lawyer, Mohammad Hossein Aghasi, wrote on X on Saturday.
FRANCE
Oldest Miss France crowned
A 34-year-old flight attendant from the French Caribbean island of Martinique on Saturday became the oldest contestant to win the Miss France pageant. Angelique Angarni-Filopon clinched the crown thanks to a rule change that permitted women older than 24 to participate, as well as those who are married or are mothers. “In 2011, a young woman aged 20 finished first runner-up in the Miss Martinique competition. Today, it’s the same young woman aged 34 who stands before you to again represent Martinique, its diaspora as well as all the women who were once told that it was too late,” she said on winning the competition, which was broadcast by TF1.
UNITED STATES
Trump wins ABC News case
ABC News is to pay a US$15 million settlement to resolve a defamation lawsuit brought by president-elect Donald Trump, court documents filed on Saturday showed. The lawsuit stemmed from on-air comments made by top anchor George Stephanopoulos, who said Trump was found “liable for rape” during an interview with US Representative Nancy Mace that aired in March. The settlement require ABC News to donate US$15 million to a fund dedicated to “a presidential foundation and museum” for Trump. The news organization and Stephanopoulos would also issue public apologies saying they “regret statements” made about Trump during the aforementioned interview, and the broadcaster would pay an additional US$1 million in attorney fees. Trump had been found liable for sexual abuse — a different transgression from rape under New York law — in a case filed by writer E. Jean Carroll.
ANGER: A video shared online showed residents in a neighborhood confronting the national security minister, attempting to drag her toward floodwaters Argentina’s port city of Bahia Blanca has been “destroyed” after being pummeled by a year’s worth of rain in a matter of hours, killing 13 and driving hundreds from their homes, authorities said on Saturday. Two young girls — reportedly aged four and one — were missing after possibly being swept away by floodwaters in the wake of Friday’s storm. The deluge left hospital rooms underwater, turned neighborhoods into islands and cut electricity to swaths of the city. Argentine Minister of National Security Patricia Bullrich said Bahia Blanca was “destroyed.” The death toll rose to 13 on Saturday, up from 10 on Friday, authorities
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
Local officials from Russia’s ruling party have caused controversy by presenting mothers of soldiers killed in Ukraine with gifts of meat grinders, an appliance widely used to describe Russia’s brutal tactics on the front line. The United Russia party in the northern Murmansk region posted photographs on social media showing officials smiling as they visited bereaved mothers with gifts of flowers and boxed meat grinders for International Women’s Day on Saturday, which is widely celebrated in Russia. The post included a message thanking the “dear moms” for their “strength of spirit and the love you put into bringing up your sons.” It
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