‘WEAPONIZED STATE’: A report said the president and vice president had eradicated independent institutions, and silenced the opposition inside and outside the nation
Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega, his wife and dozens of senior officials were responsible for arbitrary detentions, torture and extrajudicial executions, a report by UN experts said yesterday.The report compiled by the Group of Human Rights Experts on Nicaragua names 54 people it said played key
The US government has banned US government personnel in China, as well as family members and contractors with security clearances, from any romantic or sexual relationships with Chinese citizens, The Associated Press (AP) has learned.Four people with direct knowledge of the matter told the AP about
‘STRANGE’: Norfolk Island faces US tariffs that are nearly three times higher than Australia proper, despite being the No. 223 exporter in the world
Australia yesterday expressed puzzlement over US President Donald Trump’s decision to slap a 29 percent trade tariff on its tiny Pacific territory of Norfolk Island.The island — home to many descendants of the HMS Bounty mutineers — has a total population of a little more than 2,000 people and lies
The 1999 action game Shenmue yesterday was named the most influential video game of all time following a survey organized by BAFTA, the British association that honors films, television and video games.The series, created by Japanese designer Yu Suzuki, stars a young Ryo Hazuki as he seeks to avenge
Yodelers of the world, you never stood a chance: Monkeys will always be better at yodeling than humans because they have a “cheap trick” hidden in their voice box, scientists said yesterday.When monkeys howl — or yodelers yodel — they rapidly switch back and forth between low and high-frequency soun
MALAYSIAMH370 search pausedThe latest search for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 has been suspended as it is “not the season,” Minister of Transport Anthony Loke said yesterday, more than a decade after the plane went missing. “They have stopped the operation for the time being, they will resume the
A girl on Wednesday rides a merry-go-round at an amusement park in Basra, Iraq, during Eid al-Fitr, which marks the end of the Muslim month of Ramadan.
FUNDING: As the two candidates’ campaigns combined have spent more than US$98m, the Wisconsin race has become the most expensive in US judicial history
US President Donald Trump’s second presidency was dealt a spinning blow by voters in Wisconsin on Tuesday as they elected a liberal judge to the state’s Supreme Court, despite his powerful adviser Elon Musk pouring millions into the race to sway the polls. Two months into his barnstorming return to
Rescuers yesterday pulled a man alive from the rubble five days after Myanmar’s devastating earthquake, as calls grew for the junta to allow more aid in and halt attacks on rebels. The shallow magnitude 7.7 earthquake on Friday last week flattened buildings across Myanmar, killing more than 2,700 pe
A Chinese construction company is facing questions over the deadly collapse of a Bangkok skyscraper — the only major building in the Thai capital to fall in a catastrophic earthquake that has killed more than 2,000 people in Thailand and neighboring Myanmar. The 30-story tower, still under construct
Val Kilmer, who starred in films such as Top Gun, The Doors, and Batman Forever while earning a reputation as a Hollywood bad boy, has died, the New York Times reported. He was 65. The cause of death was pneumonia, the paper said, citing his daughter Mercedes Kilmer. The California-born, Juilliard-t
CIVILIAN DEATHS: At least 15 people, including children, were killed in Israeli airstrikes at dawn yesterday, Gaza’s civil defense agency said
Israeli Minister of Defense Israel Katz yesterday announced a major expansion of a military operation in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip, saying the army would seize “large areas” of the Palestinian territory. The defense chief in a statement said that Israel would expand its presence in Gaza to “destroy a
MASS GRAVE: The slain workers and their vehicles clearly showed that they were humanitarian personnel, and Israel killed them in ‘cold blood,’ the Red Crescent said
Palestinians held funerals on Monday for 15 medics and emergency responders killed by Israeli troops in southern Gaza, after their bodies and mangled ambulances were found buried in an impromptu mass grave, apparently plowed over by Israeli military bulldozers.The Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRC
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people.The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several
A volcanic eruption restarted in Iceland, with lava flow threatening the already severely damaged fishing town Grindavik.An eruption — the eighth on the same volcanic rift since late 2023 — started at 9:45am yesterday “just north of the protective barrier by Grindavik,” the Met Office said in a stat
SPACEX: Wang Chun, along with a filmmaker, a robotics researcher and a polar guide, took off on Monday on a path never flown before in 64 years of human spaceflight
A bitcoin investor who bought a SpaceX flight for himself and three polar explorers blasted off on Monday night on the first rocket ride to carry people over the North and South poles.Wang Chun (王春), a Chinese-born entrepreneur, hurtled into orbit from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. SpaceX’s Falcon ro
Scientists at the world’s largest atom smasher have released a blueprint for a much bigger successor that could help solve remaining enigmas of physics.The plans for the Future Circular Collider — a nearly 91km loop along the French-Swiss border and even below Lake Geneva — published late on Monday
An Australian judge sitting on Hong Kong’s top court yesterday sided with the government to rule against former pro-democracy lawmaker Lam Cheuk-ting (林卓廷), who was jailed for revealing an anti-graft probe.Hong Kong, a common law jurisdiction, invites overseas judges to hear cases at its Court of Fi
OPTIONS: Asked if one potential avenue to a third term was having J.D. Vance run for the top job and then pass the baton to him, Trump said: ‘That’s one,’ among others
US President Donald Trump on Sunday that “I’m not joking” about trying to serve a third term, the clearest indication he is considering ways to breach a constitutional barrier against continuing to lead the country after his second term ends at the beginning of 2029.“There are methods which you cou
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