CHINA
Some karaoke songs banned
The government is to establish a blacklist of songs containing “illegal content” that would be banned at karaoke establishments across the country starting on Oct. 1, the Ministry of Culture and Tourism said. Such content includes that which endangers national unity, sovereignty or territorial integrity, contravenes state religious policies by propagating cults or superstitions, or encourages illegal activities such as gambling and drugs, the ministry said on its Web site on Tuesday. Content providers to karaoke venues would be responsible for auditing the songs, it said, adding that the country has nearly 50,000 entertainment outlets with a basic music library of more than 100,000 songs, making it difficult for venue operators to identify illegal tracks.
INDIA
Elephants enjoy their holiday
After an evening walk, elephants rescued from circuses and temples in the country are to be treated to a feast of their favorite fruits and vegetables as they mark today’s World Elephant Day. A lavish spread of watermelons, bananas, papayas and pumpkins is to be laid out for Asian elephants at a sanctuary run by Wildlife SOS near the banks of the Yamuna River, on the outskirts of the ancient holy city of Mathura. The center observes a week of events surrounding the holiday. “World Elephant Day is there to promote awareness about the plight of elephants in India and around the world, and what they actually go through and why their population is declining,” said Shirina Sawhney of Wildlife SOS, which also runs the country’s only elephant hospital.
GERMANY
Nurse ‘swaps shot for saline’
Authorities in the north of the country on Tuesday appealed to thousands of people to get another shot of a COVID-19 vaccine after a police investigation found that a Red Cross nurse might have injected them with a saline solution. The nurse is suspected of injecting salt solution into people’s arms instead of genuine doses at a vaccination center in Friesland — a rural district near the North Sea coast — in the early spring. “I am totally shocked by this episode,” local councilor Sven Ambrosy posted on Facebook as local authorities issued the call to about 8,600 residents who might have been affected. The motive of the nurse, who was not named, was not clear, but she had aired skeptical views about vaccines in social media posts, police investigators said.
GUINEA
Marburg case monitored
Health authorities are monitoring 155 people who might have come into contact with a confirmed case of Marburg viral infection, a highly infectious hemorrhagic fever similar to Ebola, a WHO official said on Tuesday. The Marburg case, which the WHO said was the first in West Africa, was confirmed in southeastern Gueckedou. Georges Ki-Zerbo, the WHO country head in Guinea, said that Marburg had been circulating in animals, particularly bats, in southern Guinea, as well as in Sierra Leone and Liberia. “There is no known secondary case... The contacts have been traced, and 155 people are under observation for three weeks,” Ki-Zerbo said in an interview. “It is active surveillance. The contacts are kept at home, isolated from other members of the family. They are visited every day to check on potential symptoms.”
Millions of dollars have poured into bets on who will win the US presidential election after a last-minute court ruling opened up gambling on the vote, upping the stakes on a too-close-to-call race between US Vice President Kamala Harris and former US president Donald Trump that has already put voters on edge. Contracts for a Harris victory were trading between 48 and 50 percent in favor of the Democrat on Friday on Interactive Brokers, a firm that has taken advantage of a legal opening created earlier this month in the country’s long running regulatory battle over election markets. With just a month
US Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris is in “excellent health” and fit for the presidency, according to a medical report published by the White House on Saturday as she challenged her rival, former US president Donald Trump, to publish his own health records. “Vice President Harris remains in excellent health,” her physician Joshua Simmons said in the report, adding that she “possesses the physical and mental resiliency required to successfully execute the duties of the presidency.” Speaking to reporters ahead of a trip to North Carolina, Harris called Trump’s unwillingness to publish his records “a further example
North Korea blew up sections of roads in its own territory that are part of links once used to connect the southern part of the peninsula with the north, in a show of defiance after it accused Seoul of flying drones over Pyongyang. North Korea detonated bombs north of its eastern and western borders at around noon yesterday, South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) said. South Korea’s military later fired off warning shots within its border, said the JCS, which also confirmed there were no reports of damage in South Korea from the detonations. A video released by the South Korean
RUSSIAN INPUT: Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov called Washington’s actions in Asia ‘destructive,’ accusing it of being the reason for the ‘militarization’ of Japan The US is concerned about China’s “increasingly dangerous and unlawful” activities in the disputed South China Sea, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told ASEAN leaders yesterday during an annual summit, and pledged that Washington would continue to uphold freedom of navigation in the region. The 10-member ASEAN meeting with Blinken followed a series of confrontations at sea between China and ASEAN members Philippines and Vietnam. “We are very concerned about China’s increasingly dangerous and unlawful activities in the South China Sea which have injured people, harm vessels from ASEAN nations and contradict commitments to peaceful resolutions of disputes,” said Blinken, who