PAKISTAN
Tribal clashes leave 15 dead
Clashes between two tribes feuding over the ownership of a coal mine in the country’s remote northwest left 15 men dead and several wounded, police said yesterday. The fighting erupted on Monday between the Sunny Khel and Zarghun Khel tribes in Dara Adam Khel, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province along the border with Afghanistan. The men were armed with handguns and assault rifles, and the fighting lasted for hours, local police official Munawar Khan said. Security forces were summoned to bring the situation under control, and Khan said that order was later restored. The two tribes have been fighting over the ownership rights for the mine since 2019. Khan said it was unclear what triggered the latest clashes, and officers were still investigating.
INDIA
Cough syrups may be tested
The national drug regulator has proposed testing cough syrups in government laboratories before they are exported, media outlet News18.com reported yesterday, after Indian-made syrups were linked to the deaths of at least 70 children in Gambia and 19 in Uzbekistan last year. The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare received the proposal from the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation this month and is considering it, the news Web site quoted an unidentified ministry official as saying. “The proposal is to test the finished goods at government labs before exporting,” the official told News18.com. The ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
HONG KONG
Libraries must censor: Lee
Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee (李家超) yesterday said that public libraries need to ensure books do not contravene local laws, amid criticism that many books and videos related to China’s Tiananmen Square Massacre have been removed from library shelves. “These books are accessible by people in private book shops. If they want to buy, they can buy,” Lee told reporters, when asked about the removal of literature and documentaries about the massacre from public libraries. “What libraries need to do is to ensure that there’s no breach of any laws in Hong Kong, including of course, copyrights etc, and also if they spread any kind of messages that are not in the interests of Hong Kong,” Lee said, without elaborating. Hong Kong’s Ming Pao newspaper reported that more than 40 percent of video materials and books involving “political themes” had been removed from public libraries since 2020.
CHINA
Comedian probed for Xi joke
A Chinese comedian who joked about two dogs embodying the work ethic of one of President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) military slogans has been suspended from work, after attracting the ire of strident online nationalists. Beijing authorities on Monday launched a probe into leading talk show company, Shanghai Xiaoguo Culture Media Co, after a growing chorus of social media posts said that Li Haoshi (李昊石) had insulted the People’s Liberation Army. In an audio clip of Li’s performance posted to Sina Weibo, the comedian, known as House, likened the behavior of two wild dogs he had observed to “having a good work style, being able to fight and win battles” — an eight-character slogan Xi used during a 2013 People’s Liberation Army national legislative session. “I will take on all the responsibility for this, stop all my performances, deeply reflect and re-learn,” Li wrote on Sina Weibo. China enacted a law in 2021 criminalizing insults against military personnel.
GERMANY
Five jailed for jewelry heist
The Dresden state court yesterday convicted five men over the theft of more than 100 million euros (US$109 million) of 18th-century jewels from a Dresden museum in 2019. They were given prison sentences of between four years and four months and six years and three months, news agency dpa reported. One defendant was acquitted. The court ruled that the five — aged 24 to 29 — were responsible for the break-in at the Green Vault Museum on Nov. 25, 2019, and the theft of 21 pieces of jewelry containing more than 4,300 diamonds, with a total insured value of at least 113.8 million euros. They were convicted of particularly aggravated arson in combination with dangerous bodily injury, theft with weapons, damage to property and intentional arson. The men laid a fire just before the break-in to cut the power supply to street lights outside the museum, and also set fire to a car in a nearby garage before fleeing to Berlin. They were caught several months later.
MEXICO
Tourist dies in knife attack
An Argentine tourist who was attacked on Friday by a man with a machete has died of his wounds, the district attorney’s office reported on Monday. The victim was with a couple of Argentine friends at a restaurant in the Lagunas de Chacahua in Oaxaca, when they were attacked on Friday. He “was transferred to Mexico City, where he died this Monday afternoon as a result of the injuries inflicted,” the prosecutors’ office said in a statement. His friends were also wounded, but their injuries were not life-threatening. The attacker was detained and is today to appear before a judge to be charged with aggravated homicide, the prosecutors’ office added. The possible motive for the attack was not immediately known.
ITALY
US$880m of cocaine seized
Police yesterday said they had seized 2,700kg of highly pure cocaine hidden in two refrigerated containers containing bananas that had been shipped from Ecuador. The haul found in the Calabrian port of Gioia Tauro is estimated to be worth more than 800 million euros, the Guardia di Finanza police said in a statement. The shipment had come from Guayaquil in Ecuador and its final destination was Armenia, via the Black Sea port of Batumi in Georgia. The drugs were discovered in the 12m containers thanks to specialized scanners, helped by a sniffer dog named Joel, the police added. Police said they had found a further 600kg of cocaine in the past few days in fruit containers from Ecuador being shipped through Gioia Tauro. These consignments had been destined for other parts of Italy, Croatia, Greece and Georgia, they added.
NIGERIA
Chef cooks for 100 hours
A chef has spent 100 hours preparing meals non-stop, aiming to set a Guinness World Record for the longest cooking session by an individual. Lagos chef Hilda Bassey has captivated the country with her marathon cooking, which started on Thursday and ended on Monday night. President Muhammadu Buhari and several politicians and celebrities congratulated Bassey, while cheering supporters camped outside an events center to witness the 27-year-old chef preparing a mix of local and foreign dishes, from jollof rice to pasta and akara, which is made from bean flour. The current longest cooking record is held by Indian chef Lata Tondon, who set a time of 87 hours and 45 minutes in 2019. Bassey’s time has to be certified by Guinness World Record officials before it can be made official.
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered
Former US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi said if US President Joe Biden had ended his re-election bid sooner, the Democratic Party could have held a competitive nominating process to choose his replacement. “Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said in an interview on Thursday published by the New York Times the next day. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said. Pelosi said she thought the Democratic candidate, US Vice President Kamala Harris, “would have done
Farmer Liu Bingyong used to make a tidy profit selling milk but is now leaking cash — hit by a dairy sector crisis that embodies several of China’s economic woes. Milk is not a traditional mainstay of Chinese diets, but the Chinese government has long pushed people to drink more, citing its health benefits. The country has expanded its dairy production capacity and imported vast numbers of cattle in recent years as Beijing pursues food self-sufficiency. However, chronically low consumption has left the market sloshing with unwanted milk — driving down prices and pushing farmers to the brink — while
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