CRIMEA
Pro-Russia lawmaker shot
Former Ukrainian lawmaker Oleg Tsaryov, a pro-Russian figure who sources said Moscow had enlisted to lead a puppet administration in Kyiv after Russia’s invasion, was shot twice in a late-night attack in the sanatorium where he lives, family and officials said on Friday. A source in the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) intelligence agency said the shooting was a special operation conducted by the agency. The attack took place in Yalta in Crimea. “He had been for a long time on the list of traitors who have to answer for their crimes. He was not just a fan of the ‘Russian world,’ but rather a person who came along with Russian tanks in order to capture Kyiv,” the SBU source said. Tsaryov was “in critical condition, with doctors fighting to save his life, but there is a good chance he will be kicking the bucket,” they said.
UNITED KINGDOM
Rolling Stones top charts
The Rolling Stones on Friday topped the British music charts, securing their 14th UK No. 1 album with new record Hackney Diamonds. Rockers Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood, who released the record last week, outsold the rest of the top five of the Official Albums Chart, the Official Charts Co said in a statement. The band, which formed in 1962, joins The Beatles, Robbie Williams and Bruce Springsteen as acts with the most studio albums — 11 — to reach No. 1 on the UK’s Official Albums Chart, it added. Hackney Diamonds, the Stones’ first album of original material since 2005 and the first recording since drummer Charlie Watts died in 2021, also topped the Official Vinyl Albums Chart. The album also topped charts in Australia and Germany.
UNITED STATES
Phillips challenges Biden
Representative Dean Phillips said he would challenge President Joe Biden for the Democratic nomination, seizing on worries about the economy and Biden’s age. Saying he would represent “America’s exhausted majority,” the Minnesota representative laid out a populist Democratic platform focusing on household economic issues on Friday. “I think it’s time for a new generation,” Phillips told CBS News on Friday. “I think the time is now because I think four years from now it might be too late.”
UNITED STATES
Home with meth lab for sale
Do you secretly dream of being Walter White, the chemistry teacher-turned-druglord from Breaking Bad? Now is your chance to own a luxury California home complete with meth lab — for sale at US$1.55 million. The six-bedroom house in tony San Jose offers a “great location” with easy access to the freeway, according to a realtor’s listing. There are three-and-a-half bathrooms, a swimming pool, a luxury spa, garage parking for one car, solar panels and air-conditioning throughout, as well as a place you can cook up deadly and addictive illegal drugs. “Home has inactive Meth lab and meth contamination,” the listing on property Web site Redfin says. “Home has not been cleared of contamination and will be transferred to the new buyer in its current state.” The San Jose home’s previous owner was Peter Karasev, the Los Angeles Times reported, who was arrested in March on suspicion of attacking electricity transformers. As well as the meth lab, police searching his house also found a weapons stockpile including guns and “homemade liquid explosive, multiple energetic homemade destructive devices,” police told a news conference at the time.
The Philippine Department of Justice yesterday labeled Vice President Sara Duterte the “mastermind” of a plot to assassinate the nation’s president, giving her five days to respond to a subpoena. Duterte is being asked to explain herself in the wake of a blistering weekend press conference where she said she had instructed that Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr be killed should an alleged plot to kill her succeed. “The government is taking action to protect our duly elected president,” Philippine Undersecretary of Justice Jesse Andres said at yesterday’s press briefing. “The premeditated plot to assassinate the president as declared by the self-confessed mastermind
Texas’ education board on Friday voted to allow Bible-infused teachings in elementary schools, joining other Republican-led US states that pushed this year to give religion a larger presence in public classrooms. The curriculum adopted by the Texas State Board of Education, which is controlled by elected Republicans, is optional for schools to adopt, but they would receive additional funding if they do so. The materials could appear in classrooms as early as next school year. Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott has voiced support for the lesson plans, which were provided by the state’s education agency that oversees the more than
Ireland, the UK and France faced travel chaos on Saturday and one person died as a winter storm battered northwest Europe with strong winds, heavy rain, snow and ice. Hampshire Police in southern England said a man died after a tree fell onto a car on a major road near Winchester early in the day. Police in West Yorkshire said they were probing whether a second death from a traffic incident was linked to the storm. It is understood the road was not icy at the time of the incident. Storm Bert left at least 60,000 properties in Ireland without power, and closed
CONSPIRACIES: Kano suspended polio immunization in 2003 and 2004 following claims that polio vaccine was laced with substances that could render girls infertile Zuwaira Muhammad sat beside her emaciated 10-month-old twins on a clinic bed in northern Nigeria, caring for them as they battled malnutrition and malaria. She would have her babies vaccinated if they regain their strength, but for many in Kano — a hotbed of anti-vaccine sentiment — the choice is not an obvious one. The infants have been admitted to the 75-bed clinic in the Unguwa Uku neighbourhood, one of only two in the city of 4.5 million run by French aid agency Doctors Without Borders (MSF). Kano has the highest malaria burden in Nigeria, but the city has long
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