NICARAGUA
21 Hondurans pardoned
Managua has pardoned 21 Honduran prisoners and deported then, including a leader of the Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) criminal gang, who was detained immediately upon crossing the border, police said on Sunday. The government also plans to return prisoners to Costa Rica, it said on Saturday. A similar transfer on Oct. 18 involved 43 Honduran prisoners. Managua has not disclosed reasons for its action. Sunday’s transfer involved David Elias Campbell Licona, known as “El Viejo Dan,” who was a leader of MS-13. Campbell Licona had been wanted by Honduran authorities on money laundering and gang charges since 2016, and was captured in Nicaragua in June 2021.
PHILIPPINES
Japan troops pact eyed
Manila hopes to ink a reciprocal troops access deal with Japan at “the soonest possible time,” Secretary of Defense Gilberto Teodoro said yesterday. The two nations have agreed to start negotiations on a Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA) that would allow them to deploy their forces on each other’s soil. Once the agreement is sealed, Teodoro said it would have to be submitted to the Philippine senate and Japanese legislature for ratification. Negotiations for an RAA would strengthen military cooperation between the two nations amid rising maritime tensions in the region.
CHINA
He Lifeng named to key post
Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng (何立峰) has been appointed head of the office of the Central Financial Commission (CFC) — which is responsible for running the day to day affairs of the new regulator tasked with overseeing the financial sector. He was also appointed party chief of a separate Central Financial Work Commission, which has been set up to strengthen the ideological and political role of the party in the overall financial system. The appointments, which were announced in Financial News underscore how the Chinese Communist Party has taken direct control of supervising the financial sector.
RUSSIA
Solar flares light up Siberia
Swathes of Russia and Ukraine were yesterday bathed in some of the strongest scarlet and green “northern lights” in years due to solar flares, pictures posted on social media and Russian media showed. The aurora borealis bathed swathes of Siberia, the Urals, southern Russia and Ukraine in green, scarlet and purple overnight. Pictures posted on social media showed the night sky across Russia shining red and green. The New Scientist magazine said in September that the northern lights are expected to be stronger this year than for at least a decade due to a surge in activity in the sun.
AUSTRALIA
Car plows into pub, kills five
Five people, including two children, were killed and several injured at a popular tourist town after a car crashed into a crowd of patrons on the front lawn of a pub, authorities said yesterday. Four died at the scene of the accident on Sunday evening in Daylesford, Victoria state police said. A girl who was airlifted to a hospital died there later. The SUV mounted a kerb and then drove across a grassed area outside the Royal Daylesford hotel, Police Chief Commissioner Shane Patton said during a media briefing. The driver, a 66-year-old man, was taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. Police said they would interview him later yesterday when he is released from hospital.
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered
Former US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi said if US President Joe Biden had ended his re-election bid sooner, the Democratic Party could have held a competitive nominating process to choose his replacement. “Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said in an interview on Thursday published by the New York Times the next day. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said. Pelosi said she thought the Democratic candidate, US Vice President Kamala Harris, “would have done
Farmer Liu Bingyong used to make a tidy profit selling milk but is now leaking cash — hit by a dairy sector crisis that embodies several of China’s economic woes. Milk is not a traditional mainstay of Chinese diets, but the Chinese government has long pushed people to drink more, citing its health benefits. The country has expanded its dairy production capacity and imported vast numbers of cattle in recent years as Beijing pursues food self-sufficiency. However, chronically low consumption has left the market sloshing with unwanted milk — driving down prices and pushing farmers to the brink — while
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