JAPAN
Spy satellite launched
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd yesterday launched a rocket carrying a government intelligence-gathering satellite on a mission to watch movements at military sites in North Korea and improve responses to natural disasters. The H2A rocket lifted off from the Tanegashima Space Center carrying the optical satellite as part of Tokyo’s reconnaissance effort to rapidly buildup its military capability. The satellite can capture images even in severe weather. Japan began the intelligence-gathering satellite program after a North Korean missile flew over Japan in 1988 and it aims to set up a network of 10 satellites to spot and provide early warning for possible missile launches. Yesterday’s liftoff was closely watched ahead of a planned launch of a new flagship H3 rocket developed by Mitsubishi Heavy and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency as the successor to the H2A. The first test flight of the new rocket failed last year. The Mitsubishi Heavy-operated, liquid-fuel H2A rocket with two solid-fuel sub-rockets has 41 consecutive successes since a failure in 2003, or a 98 percent success rate.
Photo: Kyodo / Reuters
CHINA
New climate envoy named
Beijing has named former minister of foreign affairs Liu Zhenmin (劉振民) as its new special envoy for climate change, after his predecessor, Xie Zhenhua (解振華) stepped down due to health reasons, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment said in a statement yesterday. Xie, 74, served as China’s top climate representative at 16 rounds of climate talks. His resignation was announced following a video meeting with US Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry and comes only weeks after he helped secure an agreement to tackle emissions from fossil fuels at the COP28 climate talks in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. Liu, 68, acted as Xie’s special adviser in Dubai and has experience in climate diplomacy, participating in negotiations to draw up the 1997 Kyoto Protocol as well as the 2015 Paris Agreement. Unlike Xie, Liu is a fluent English speaker. He served as under-secretary-general at the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs from 2017 to 2022, with a broad brief that included climate issues.
UNITED STATES
Mississippi water tainted
Mississippi health officials on Thursday told residents in Jackson to boil their tap water after traces of Escherichia coli were found in the state’s capital’s supply — a result the manager of Jackson’s long-troubled water system disputed while calling it a devastating setback for rebuilding public trust. The boil-water notice, which officials also imposed in the Jackson suburb of Flowood, was issued just days before the expected arrival of a blast of cold weather that could further disrupt the local water infrastructure. The bacteria’s presence indicates that the water might be contaminated with human or animal waste, the Mississippi Department of Health said. Residents of the two Mississippi cities were advised to boil their water for one minute before using it. The precaution was to last for at least two days as officials collected new samples for testing. Ted Henifin, Jackson’s interim water manager, told a news conference that state officials refused to validate the lab results before issuing the boil-water notice and suggested there might have been false positive tests. He also said it was unlikely that samples from Jackson and Flowood would be contaminated at the same time, as the cities’ water systems are not connected.
‘UNUSUAL EVENT’: The Australian defense minister said that the Chinese navy task group was entitled to be where it was, but Australia would be watching it closely The Australian and New Zealand militaries were monitoring three Chinese warships moving unusually far south along Australia’s east coast on an unknown mission, officials said yesterday. The Australian government a week ago said that the warships had traveled through Southeast Asia and the Coral Sea, and were approaching northeast Australia. Australian Minister for Defence Richard Marles yesterday said that the Chinese ships — the Hengyang naval frigate, the Zunyi cruiser and the Weishanhu replenishment vessel — were “off the east coast of Australia.” Defense officials did not respond to a request for comment on a Financial Times report that the task group from
DEFENSE UPHEAVAL: Trump was also to remove the first woman to lead a military service, as well as the judge advocates general for the army, navy and air force US President Donald Trump on Friday fired the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General C.Q. Brown, and pushed out five other admirals and generals in an unprecedented shake-up of US military leadership. Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social that he would nominate former lieutenant general Dan “Razin” Caine to succeed Brown, breaking with tradition by pulling someone out of retirement for the first time to become the top military officer. The president would also replace the head of the US Navy, a position held by Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to lead a military service,
Four decades after they were forced apart, US-raised Adamary Garcia and her birth mother on Saturday fell into each other’s arms at the airport in Santiago, Chile. Without speaking, they embraced tearfully: A rare reunification for one the thousands of Chileans taken from their mothers as babies and given up for adoption abroad. “The worst is over,” Edita Bizama, 64, said as she beheld her daughter for the first time since her birth 41 years ago. Garcia had flown to Santiago with four other women born in Chile and adopted in the US. Reports have estimated there were 20,000 such cases from 1950 to
CONFIDENT ON DEAL: ‘Ukraine wants a seat at the table, but wouldn’t the people of Ukraine have a say? It’s been a long time since an election, the US president said US President Donald Trump on Tuesday criticized Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and added that he was more confident of a deal to end the war after US-Russia talks. Trump increased pressure on Zelenskiy to hold elections and chided him for complaining about being frozen out of talks in Saudi Arabia. The US president also suggested that he could meet Russian President Vladimir Putin before the end of the month as Washington overhauls its stance toward Russia. “I’m very disappointed, I hear that they’re upset about not having a seat,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida when asked about the Ukrainian
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