NEW ZEALAND
Luxon backs Chinese cash
National Party leader Christopher Luxon yesterday said that he would “absolutely” accept money from China to fund new roads if his party wins October’s general election. Asked if he would turn to Beijing to fund a massive road infrastructure project worth NZ$24 billion (US$14.6 billion), Luxon told public broadcaster TVNZ: “Yeah, absolutely.” He added: “New Zealand is a country the same size [area] as Great Britain and Japan [separately], we have 5 million people in it,” he said. “A strong and resilient roading network will be absolutely critical to our future.” Asked if China would want something in return, such as being able to send its own workers to build the projects, Luxon replied: “That’s not going to happen,” and added: “That’s quite a xenophobic response and a pretty simplistic response.”
COLOMBIA
President’s son confesses
Nicolas Petro, son of President Gustavo Petro, on Thursday told prosecutors that money from a drug cartel filtered into the campaign of his father last year, a confession aimed at mitigating his own exposure to money-laundering charges. Nicolas Petro “received large sums of money from Mr Samuel Santander Lopesierra, known as The Marlboro Man,” prosecutor Mario Burgos said during a hearing. “Some of the money was used by Mr Nicolas Fernando Petro himself ... and the other part went into the 2022 presidential campaign,” Burgos said. Nicolas Petro was arrested on Saturday and denied the charges in a hearing on Wednesday, but changed his tune a day later when he announced his aim “to initiate a process of collaboration.” He said: “I will refer to new facts and situations that will help justice.” Local media reports said the younger Petro learned of new evidence held by prosecutors, and that Burgos offered to reduce his potential time in prison by half if he collaborated.
DENMARK
Border controls tightened
Police are tightening border controls following recent burnings of the Koran that have affected the security situation, the Ministry of Justice said on Thursday, following a similar decision by Sweden earlier in the week. Protesters in the two nations have burned and damaged in other ways several copies of the Koran in the past few months. “Authorities have today concluded that it is necessary at this time to increase the focus on who is entering Denmark, in order to respond to the specific and current threats,” the ministry said in a statement. Tighter border controls would initially be in place until Thursday next week, it said. “The recent Koran burnings have, as the security police have said, affected the current security situation,” Minister of Justice Peter Hummelgaard said in the statement.
THAILAND
Crash kills eight
Eight people were killed when a freight train struck a pickup truck crossing the tracks in an eastern province yesterday, authorities said. The crash at 2:20am also injured four people in the Muang District of Chachoengsao Province, State Railway of Thailand said. The 54-year-old driver, Wichai Yulek, told authorities he saw the approaching train and heard a warning horn. He slowed, but passengers in the vehicle urged him to keep going. When he realized the truck was headed for a collision, he could not stop in time, the railway agency said. The deceased include an 18 year old, two people in their 20s and five people over 55, while the injured victims included four men in their 20s, the railway said.
PARLIAMENT CHAOS: Police forcibly removed Brazilian Deputy Glauber Braga after he called the legislation part of a ‘coup offensive’ and occupied the speaker’s chair Brazil’s lower house of Congress early yesterday approved a bill that could slash former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro’s prison sentence for plotting a coup, after efforts by a lawmaker to disrupt the proceedings sparked chaos in parliament. Bolsonaro has been serving a 27-year term since last month after his conviction for a scheme to stop Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva from taking office after the 2022 election. Lawmakers had been discussing a bill that would significantly reduce sentences for several crimes, including attempting a coup d’etat — opening up the prospect that Bolsonaro, 70, could have his sentence cut to
China yesterday held a low-key memorial ceremony for the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) not attending, despite a diplomatic crisis between Beijing and Tokyo over Taiwan. Beijing has raged at Tokyo since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi last month said that a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan could trigger a military response from Japan. China and Japan have long sparred over their painful history. China consistently reminds its people of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, in which it says Japanese troops killed 300,000 people in what was then its capital. A post-World War II Allied tribunal put the death toll
‘UNWAVERING ALLIANCE’: The US Department of State said that China’s actions during military drills with Russia were not conducive to regional peace and stability The US on Tuesday criticized China over alleged radar deployments against Japanese military aircraft during a training exercise last week, while Tokyo and Seoul yesterday scrambled jets after Chinese and Russian military aircraft conducted joint patrols near the two countries. The incidents came after Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi triggered a dispute with Beijing last month with her remarks on how Tokyo might react to a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan. “China’s actions are not conducive to regional peace and stability,” a US Department of State spokesperson said late on Tuesday, referring to the radar incident. “The US-Japan alliance is stronger and more
FALLEN: The nine soldiers who were killed while carrying out combat and engineering tasks in Russia were given the title of Hero of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea North Korean leader Kim Jong-un attended a welcoming ceremony for an army engineering unit that had returned home after carrying out duties in Russia, North Korean state media KCNA reported on Saturday. In a speech carried by KCNA, Kim praised officers and soldiers of the 528th Regiment of Engineers of the Korean People’s Army (KPA) for “heroic” conduct and “mass heroism” in fulfilling orders issued by the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea during a 120-day overseas deployment. Video footage released by North Korea showed uniformed soldiers disembarking from an aircraft, Kim hugging a soldier seated in a wheelchair, and soldiers and officials
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