INDIA
Key space tests launched
The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) yesterday carried out the first of a series of key test flights after overcoming a technical glitch ahead of its planned mission to take astronauts into space by 2025, the space agency said. The test involved launching a module to outer space and bringing it back to Earth to test the spacecraft’s crew escape system, ISRO chairman Sreedhara Somanath said. The launch was delayed by 45 minutes in the morning because of weather conditions. The attempt was again deferred by more than an hour because of an issue with the engine, and the ground computer put the module’s liftoff on hold, said Somanath.
CHINA
Ad executive arrested
An executive and two former employees of WPP, one of the world’s biggest advertising companies, have been arrested, two people familiar with the situation said. The arrests involved WPP’s GroupM media trading division and included a raid on offices in Shanghai, said the people, who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to speak publicly. WPP declined to comment, and the Chinese embassy in London did not respond to a request for comment.
RUSSIA
Court detains US journalist
A court on Friday ordered Russian-American journalist Alsu Kurmasheva to be detained for three more days, after prosecutors said she had failed to register as a “foreign agent.” Kurmasheva was working for the US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty when she was detained by law enforcement officers in Kazan on Wednesday. She faces up to five years in jail if found guilty of the charges. She is the second US journalist to be detained by Russia, after Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich was arrested in March for “spying.”
CHINA
Tsingtao probes pee video
Tsingtao Brewery, one of the country’s biggest beer makers, said it has opened an investigation after a video appearing to show a factory employee urinating on raw ingredients went viral this week. The clip, published online on Thursday, purportedly shows a male worker at a Tsingtao warehouse clambering into a high-walled container and relieving himself onto its contents. The footage circulated widely on Chinese social media, racking up tens of millions of views on the popular Sina Weibo platform. Tsingtao on Friday said that it had contacted the police over the incident and an investigation was ongoing. Some Web users were not about to pass up the chance to make a wry quip about the country’s famously light and fizzy mass-market brews. “I’ve always said the beer here is like horse pee. Turns out I was wrong,” one of them commented. “Thanks, I think I’ll have wine instead,” quipped another.
UNITED STATES
Republicans drop Jordan
Republicans on Friday abruptly dropped Representative Jim Jordan as their nominee for House speaker, after the ally of former US president Donald Trump failed badly on a third ballot for the gavel. The outcome meant another week without a House speaker, bordering on a full-blown crisis. House Republicans have no realistic or working plan to unite the fractured party, elect a new speaker and return to the work of Congress that has been languishing since Representative Kevin McCarthy was ousted as speaker at the start of the month. “We’re in a very bad place right now,” McCarthy said.
‘GREAT OPPRTUNITY’: The Paraguayan president made the remarks following Donald Trump’s tapping of several figures with deep Latin America expertise for his Cabinet Paraguay President Santiago Pena called US president-elect Donald Trump’s incoming foreign policy team a “dream come true” as his nation stands to become more relevant in the next US administration. “It’s a great opportunity for us to advance very, very fast in the bilateral agenda on trade, security, rule of law and make Paraguay a much closer ally” to the US, Pena said in an interview in Washington ahead of Trump’s inauguration today. “One of the biggest challenges for Paraguay was that image of an island surrounded by land, a country that was isolated and not many people know about it,”
DIALOGUE: US president-elect Donald Trump on his Truth Social platform confirmed that he had spoken with Xi, saying ‘the call was a very good one’ for the US and China US president-elect Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) discussed Taiwan, trade, fentanyl and TikTok in a phone call on Friday, just days before Trump heads back to the White House with vows to impose tariffs and other measures on the US’ biggest rival. Despite that, Xi congratulated Trump on his second term and pushed for improved ties, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. The call came the same day that the US Supreme Court backed a law banning TikTok unless it is sold by its China-based parent company. “We both attach great importance to interaction, hope for
‘FIGHT TO THE END’: Attacking a court is ‘unprecedented’ in South Korea and those involved would likely face jail time, a South Korean political pundit said Supporters of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol yesterday stormed a Seoul court after a judge extended the impeached leader’s detention over his ill-fated attempt to impose martial law. Tens of thousands of people had gathered outside the Seoul Western District Court on Saturday in a show of support for Yoon, who became South Korea’s first sitting head of state to be arrested in a dawn raid last week. After the court extended his detention on Saturday, the president’s supporters smashed windows and doors as they rushed inside the building. Hundreds of police officers charged into the court, arresting dozens and denouncing an
RELEASE: The move follows Washington’s removal of Havana from its list of terrorism sponsors. Most of the inmates were arrested for taking part in anti-government protests Cuba has freed 127 prisoners, including opposition leader Jose Daniel Ferrer, in a landmark deal with departing US President Joe Biden that has led to emotional reunions across the communist island. Ferrer, 54, is the most high-profile of the prisoners that Cuba began freeing on Wednesday after Biden agreed to remove the country from Washington’s list of terrorism sponsors — part of an eleventh-hour bid to cement his legacy before handing power on Monday to US president-elect Donald Trump. “Thank God we have him home,” Nelva Ortega said of her husband, Ferrer, who has been in and out of prison for the
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