■ BHUTAN
New king crowned
The isolated Himalayan kingdom crowned a new king yesterday, placing a charismatic Oxford-educated bachelor as head of state of the world’s newest democracy. In an ancient ritual in the white-walled palace overlooking the picturesque Thimphu valley, 28-year-old Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck was handed Bhutan’s Raven Crown by his father, becoming the world’s youngest reigning monarch. The deeply revered former king, who is 52, abdicated two years ago as part of his plan to reform and modernize the deeply traditional and insular nation of more than 600,000 people by ending absolute royal rule.
■COLOMBIA
Aid plan fails to meet target
The nearly US$5 billion US aid package known as Plan Colombia failed to meet its goal of halving illegal narcotics production in the Andean nation, a US congressional report released on Wednesday said. The General Accounting Office report does, however, note that the mostly military assistance helped Colombia markedly improve security, with kidnapping and murder rates falling and the armed forces greatly diminishing the leftist rebel threat. Its release comes as US officials make it clear that aid for Colombia, an estimated US$657 million this fiscal year, will be now be trimmed because of the US financial crisis. The widening scandal over army killings of civilians to boost body counts that cost Colombia’s army chief his job this week could, also affect US aid.
■PERU
Civil liberties suspended
The government suspended civil liberties in the southern province of Tacna on Wednesday and gave the army the go-ahead to rein in protests that have killed three people. But troops have not yet been deployed against the violent protests over a new law that reallocates mining royalties to a neighboring province to pay for basic services like water and education. Three people have been killed in the unrest since last week, said Yehude Simon, Cabinet chief to President Alan Garcia. On Tuesday, protesters clashed with police and burned a municipal building in Ciudad Nueva.
■UNITED KINGDOM
Interpreter guilty of spying
A British army interpreter accused of spying for Iran was found guilty by a court in London on Wednesday. Daniel James, 45, was arrested in 2006 when he was working for General David Richards, who was then commanding international forces in Afghanistan and is now head of the British army. Reservist James was convicted by a jury at the Central Criminal Court of sending coded e-mails to the Iranian military attache in Kabul. Jurors were to continue their deliberations yesterday on a second charge against him relating to a memory stick containing secret documents found in his possession plus a third count of misconduct in a public office.
■UNITED NATIONS
Ban condemns abductions
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon strongly condemns the abduction of four aid workers and two pilots in central Somalia and demands their immediate release, his spokeswoman Michele Montas told a press briefing on Wednesday. “He is deeply concerned about the worsening trend of killings and abductions of aid workers in Somalia,” Montas said. The four aid workers linked to the French NGO Action Against Hunger and their two pilots were kidnapped on Wednesday in Dhusa Mareb, witnesses and officials said. Somali sources said the hostages were two French nationals, a Belgian, a Bulgarian and the two Kenyan pilots.
A string of rape and assault allegations against the son of Norway’s future queen have plunged the royal family into its “biggest scandal” ever, wrapping up an annus horribilis for the monarchy. The legal troubles surrounding Marius Borg Hoiby, the 27-year-old son born of a relationship before Norwegian Crown Princess Mette-Marit’s marriage to Norwegian Crown Prince Haakon, have dominated the Scandinavian country’s headlines since August. The tall strapping blond with a “bad boy” look — often photographed in tuxedos, slicked back hair, earrings and tattoos — was arrested in Oslo on Aug. 4 suspected of assaulting his girlfriend the previous night. A photograph
‘GOOD POLITICS’: He is a ‘pragmatic radical’ and has moderated his rhetoric since the height of his radicalism in 2014, a lecturer in contemporary Islam said Abu Mohammed al-Jolani is the leader of the Islamist alliance that spearheaded an offensive that rebels say brought down Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and ended five decades of Baath Party rule in Syria. Al-Jolani heads Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), which is rooted in Syria’s branch of al-Qaeda. He is a former extremist who adopted a more moderate posture in order to achieve his goals. Yesterday, as the rebels entered Damascus, he ordered all military forces in the capital not to approach public institutions. Last week, he said the objective of his offensive, which saw city after city fall from government control, was to
The US deployed a reconnaissance aircraft while Japan and the Philippines sent navy ships in a joint patrol in the disputed South China Sea yesterday, two days after the allied forces condemned actions by China Coast Guard vessels against Philippine patrol ships. The US Indo-Pacific Command said the joint patrol was conducted in the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone by allies and partners to “uphold the right to freedom of navigation and overflight “ and “other lawful uses of the sea and international airspace.” Those phrases are used by the US, Japan and the Philippines to oppose China’s increasingly aggressive actions in the
‘KAMPAI’: It is said that people in Japan began brewing rice about 2,000 years ago, with a third-century Chinese chronicle describing the Japanese as fond of alcohol Traditional Japanese knowledge and skills used in the production of sake and shochu distilled spirits were approved on Wednesday for addition to UNESCO’s Intangible Cultural Heritage list, a committee of the UN cultural body said It is believed people in the archipelago began brewing rice in a simple way about two millennia ago, with a third-century Chinese chronicle describing the Japanese as fond of alcohol. By about 1000 AD, the imperial palace had a department to supervise the manufacturing of sake and its use in rituals, the Japan Sake and Shochu Makers Association said. The multi-staged brewing techniques still used today are
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