THAILAND
Chinese scammers handed over
Myanmar yesterday handed 111 Chinese scam center workers to be repatriated through Thailand, the third batch in a major crackdown on the illegal operations. Hundreds of foreigners are expected to be sent home from scam compounds in Myanmar over the coming weeks, with the first two batches already flown out on Thursday and Friday. The compounds are run by criminal gangs and staffed by foreigners, many of whom say they were trafficked and forced to swindle people around the world in protracted Internet scams.
Photo: EPA-EFE / XINHUA news agency
UNITED KINGDOM
Apple ends full encryption
Apple on Friday said it was ending full end-to-end encryption for British customers and iPhone users, following US media reports that the UK government had asked for global data access. “Apple can no longer offer Advanced Data Protection [ADP] in the United Kingdom to new users and current UK users will eventually need to disable this security feature,” it said in a statement. ADP means only account holders can view content such as photographs and documents stored online and in the cloud through what is known as end-to-end encryption. The Washington Post reported earlier this month that the UK had issued “a secret government order” that Apple create a “back door” to enable the government to snoop on data uploaded by any Apple user around the world.
Photo: Reuters
GERMANY
Stabbing suspect arrested
Police arrested a suspect in the stabbing on Friday at about 6pm at Berlin’s Holocaust memorial that seriously injured a man two days before a watershed national election. Berlin Police gave no details on the identity of the suspect or his possible motive, but said an investigation was ongoing. The victim “was so seriously injured that he had to be taken by the fire brigade to hospital for emergency treatment,” police spokesman Florian Nath said. The victim was identified as a 30-year-old Spanish man.
Photo: EPA-EFE
UNITED STATES
AP sues White House aides
The Associated Press on Friday sued senior aides to President Donald Trump over a White House decision to restrict the news outlet’s access to the president and other officials for continuing to refer to the Gulf of Mexico in its coverage. The federal lawsuit alleges that the White House’s decision to bar AP reporters from the Oval Office and Air Force One violates the Constitution, including First Amendment protections for free speech, by trying to control the language that it uses to report the news. “The press and all people in the United States have the right to choose their own words and not be retaliated against by the government,” the complaint said.
Photo: AP
UNITED STATES
Woman held in romance scam
A woman used online dating apps to lure at least four older men to meet her in person, then drugged them with sedatives and stole hundreds of thousands of dollars in a “sinister” romance scheme, FBI officials in Las Vegas said on Friday. Three of the men died, authorities said. She has been charged in one of their deaths. Aurora Phelps, 43, who is in custody in Mexico, faces 21 counts including wire fraud, identity theft and one count of kidnapping resulting in death, Sue Fahami, the acting US attorney for the District of Nevada, told a news conference. “This is a romance scam on steroids,” said Spencer Evans, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Las Vegas division. One of the victims awoke from a coma after Phelps gave him prescription sedatives over the course of a week, he added.
Photo: AP
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
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