SERBIA
Thousands protest in capital
Tens of thousands of people on Saturday protested against the government in the capital, the latest such rally since mass shootings claimed the lives of 18 people. Thousands turned out at similar marches, dubbed “Serbia against violence,” in three other major cities, Novi Sad, Kragujevac and Nis, local media reported. The rallies have become the largest gatherings since widespread demonstrations triggered the fall of late president Slobodan Milosevic more than two decades ago. “Either violence will stop or Serbia will stop,” journalist Smiljan Banjac told the crowd in Belgrade. “This is not radicalization, this is our cry to protect children, to ensure that they grow up safely.”
BRAZIL
Eleven die in cyclone
At least 11 people were killed and 20 were missing after a cyclone tore through the south, local authorities said on Saturday. “According to the state branch of Protection and Civil Defense, 11 people died from the effects of the cyclone,” the government of Rio Grande do Sul state, which borders Argentina and Uruguay, said in a statement. The homes of 2,330 people were damaged and 602 people were evacuated from areas at risk due to the passage of the cyclone on Thursday and Friday.
ECUADOR
Woman alive in coffin dies
A 76-year-old woman who had been declared dead and surprised her relatives by knocking on her coffin during her wake earlier this month has died after seven days in intensive care, her family said on Saturday. Gilberto Barbera Montoya, the son of Bella Montoya, said that doctors at the state hospital where she was rushed after the incident told him she died on Friday evening. The Ministry of Health confirmed in a statement that she died from an ischemic stroke after spending a week in intensive care and under “permanent surveillance,” but did not provide further information on the medical investigation surrounding the case. Her son said that he had not received any report from the authorities on the medical explanation of what happened and warned that things “are not going to stay like this.” He added that a sister of the deceased woman had formally complained about the incident, seeking to identify the doctor who declared her dead to begin with. Bella Montoya reportedly woke up and started knocking on June 9 after spending five hours inside her coffin at a funeral home in Babahoyo. A technical committee has been formed to review how the hospital issues death certificates, the health ministry said last week.
UNITED STATES
Three arrested in dino heist
Police have hunted down a velociraptor that was stolen from outside a South Dakota arts and science center. Sioux Falls Police Sergeant Aaron Benson on Friday said that a security officer spotted three people carrying the statue away from the Washington Pavilion and called police just after midnight. Officers used surveillance video to track the statue to a nearby apartment, the Argus Leader reported. “When opening the door, detectives could clearly see the velociraptor was sitting right inside,” Benson said. Police detained the three suspects on charges of grand theft. Benson said one was 18, another 19 and the third a juvenile. The Washington Pavilion’s science center did not provide any information on the size or weight of the statue. Scientists believe velociraptors grew to about 1.8m long and weighed about 45kg.
‘UNUSUAL EVENT’: The Australian defense minister said that the Chinese navy task group was entitled to be where it was, but Australia would be watching it closely The Australian and New Zealand militaries were monitoring three Chinese warships moving unusually far south along Australia’s east coast on an unknown mission, officials said yesterday. The Australian government a week ago said that the warships had traveled through Southeast Asia and the Coral Sea, and were approaching northeast Australia. Australian Minister for Defence Richard Marles yesterday said that the Chinese ships — the Hengyang naval frigate, the Zunyi cruiser and the Weishanhu replenishment vessel — were “off the east coast of Australia.” Defense officials did not respond to a request for comment on a Financial Times report that the task group from
Chinese authorities said they began live-fire exercises in the Gulf of Tonkin on Monday, only days after Vietnam announced a new line marking what it considers its territory in the body of water between the nations. The Chinese Maritime Safety Administration said the exercises would be focused on the Beibu Gulf area, closer to the Chinese side of the Gulf of Tonkin, and would run until tomorrow evening. It gave no further details, but the drills follow an announcement last week by Vietnam establishing a baseline used to calculate the width of its territorial waters in the Gulf of Tonkin. State-run Vietnam News
DEFENSE UPHEAVAL: Trump was also to remove the first woman to lead a military service, as well as the judge advocates general for the army, navy and air force US President Donald Trump on Friday fired the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General C.Q. Brown, and pushed out five other admirals and generals in an unprecedented shake-up of US military leadership. Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social that he would nominate former lieutenant general Dan “Razin” Caine to succeed Brown, breaking with tradition by pulling someone out of retirement for the first time to become the top military officer. The president would also replace the head of the US Navy, a position held by Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to lead a military service,
Four decades after they were forced apart, US-raised Adamary Garcia and her birth mother on Saturday fell into each other’s arms at the airport in Santiago, Chile. Without speaking, they embraced tearfully: A rare reunification for one the thousands of Chileans taken from their mothers as babies and given up for adoption abroad. “The worst is over,” Edita Bizama, 64, said as she beheld her daughter for the first time since her birth 41 years ago. Garcia had flown to Santiago with four other women born in Chile and adopted in the US. Reports have estimated there were 20,000 such cases from 1950 to
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