HONG KONG
Protest song ban rejected
A judge yesterday denied a government request for an injunction banning Glory to Hong Kong (願榮光歸香港), an anthem that emerged from the territory’s huge pro-democracy protests in 2019. The government last month requested an injunction order so that the song — penned anonymously — would be banned from being disseminated or performed “with the intention of inciting others to commit secession or with a seditious intent.” However, Judge Anthony Chan (陳健強) said in his ruling that banning the song would raise serious freedom of expression issues. “I believe that the intrusion to freedom of expression here, especially to innocent third parties, is what is referred to in public law as ‘chilling effects,’” he wrote. “Whilst I entirely accept that no chilling effect is intended behind the injunction, it is the duty of the court to keep in mind that there is a whole spectrum of Hong Kong people,” he said.
DENMARK
Countries battle bird flu
Norway and Finland face record outbreaks of bird flu this year, which have killed thousands of seagulls and other species, put livestock at risk and restricted travel in some areas, officials said. Avian influenza has circulated throughout Europe in the past few years, leading to a cull in May and last month of millions of birds on French farms alone and affecting the supply of poultry meat and eggs. Officials in the Arctic town of Vadso, part of Norway’s Finnmark County, said they had collected more than 10,000 dead birds in the area and the Norwegian Food Safety Authority on Thursday imposed a travel ban covering three nature reserves. Finland also said wild birds were heavily affected and that the H5N1 strain has now been found in 20 fur farms, up from 12 earlier this week.
MYANMAR
Suu Kyi moved from prison
Civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who was ousted in a 2021 military coup, has been moved from prison to a government building on Monday night, an official from her National League for Democracy party said yesterday on condition of anonymity. Aung San Suu Kyi has been seen only once since she was held after the Feb. 1, 2021 putsch — in grainy state media photos from a bare courtroom in Naypyidaw. The party official also confirmed that Aung San Suu Kyi had met lower house Speaker Ti Khun Myat and was likely to meet Chinese special envoy for Asian affairs Deng Xijun (鄧錫軍), who is visiting the country. A source from another political party said she had been moved to a VIP compound in Naypyidaw. There have been concerns about the health of the Nobel laureate, 78, since her detention.
UNITED STATES
Eagles’ Meisner dies at 77
Randy Meisner, a founding member of the Eagles who added high harmonies to such favorites as Take It Easy and The Best of My Love, and stepped out front for the waltz-time ballad Take It to the Limit, has died, the band said on Thursday. Meisner died on Wednesday night in Los Angeles of complications from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, the Eagles said in a statement. He was 77. The bassist had endured numerous afflictions in recent years and personal tragedy in 2016 when his wife, Lana Rae, accidentally shot herself and died. Called “the sweetest man in the music business” by former bandmate Don Felder, the baby-faced Meisner joined Don Henley, Glenn Frey and Bernie Leadon in the early 1970s to form a quintessential Los Angeles band and one of the most popular acts in history.
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 hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
JOINT EFFORTS: The three countries have been strengthening an alliance and pressing efforts to bolster deterrence against Beijing’s assertiveness in the South China Sea The US, Japan and the Philippines on Friday staged joint naval drills to boost crisis readiness off a disputed South China Sea shoal as a Chinese military ship kept watch from a distance. The Chinese frigate attempted to get closer to the waters, where the warships and aircraft from the three allied countries were undertaking maneuvers off the Scarborough Shoal — also known as Huangyan Island (黃岩島) and claimed by Taiwan and China — in an unsettling moment but it was warned by a Philippine frigate by radio and kept away. “There was a time when they attempted to maneuver
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