RUSSIA
Presidential race closes
Registration of candidates for next month’s presidential election has closed, TASS reported yesterday, with a list including President Vladimir Putin, who is expected to win, and three politicians who all support Moscow’s war in Ukraine. The list did not include the anti-war candidate Boris Nadezhdin after the Central Election Commission on Thursday barred him from running, saying it had found flaws in the collection of signatures required for the support of his candidacy. The commission registered Vladislav Davankov, deputy chair of the Russian Duma and a member of the New People caucus; Leonid Slutsky, the leader of the Kremlin-loyal ultranationalist Liberal Democratic Party; and the Communist Party nominee, Nikolai Kharitonov.
TRINIDAD & TOBAGO
Oil spill after shipwreck
Emergency workers were on Saturday scrambling to clean up a massive oil spill after a mystery vessel ran aground near the Caribbean island, casting a pall over Carnival tourism. At least 15km of coastline have been affected in Tobago and authorities were poised to declare a national emergency, Tobago House of Assembly Chief Secretary Farley Augustine told reporters. Environmental officials said the spill has damaged a reef and Atlantic beaches, boding ill for the island’s resorts and hotels. The government might elevate the accident to a Level 3 disaster, Augustine said, adding: “Everything indicates that we are going in that direction.” The mystery vessel, identified as The Gulfstream, capsized on Wednesday off the coast of the Cove Eco-Industrial Park in southern Tobago, and currents have dragged the boat shoreward. When sighted on Wednesday, the ship was sailing under an unidentified flag and made no emergency calls. Emergency Management Agency said there were no signs of life on the vessel, whose cargo was initially believed to consist of sand and wood.
UNITED KINGDOM
King thanks well-wishers
King Charles III on Saturday expressed his “heartfelt thanks” to well-wishers, in his first statement since being diagnosed with cancer. In a message to the public on X, the 75-year-old monarch added that it was “equally heartening” to hear how sharing his diagnosis has helped promote understanding of the condition. “I would like to express my most heartfelt thanks for the many messages of support and good wishes I have received in recent days,” Charles wrote. “As all those who have been affected by cancer will know, such kind thoughts are the greatest comfort and encouragement.”
UNITED STATES
Reward for dead wolves info
A federal agency is offering a US$50,000 reward for information about the deaths of three endangered gray wolves from the same pack in southern Oregon. The collars from two gray wolves sent a mortality signal on Dec. 29. State wildlife officials responded and found three dead wolves, two with collars and one without, the Fish and Wildlife Service said in a statement. The collared wolves were an adult breeding female and a subadult from the Gearhart Mountain Pack. The other wolf killed was also a subadult. The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife said it is aware of seven wolves remaining in the pack, including a breeding male. Officials did not indicate in the statement how the wolves died. A phone message left Saturday seeking more information was not immediately returned.
ANGER: A video shared online showed residents in a neighborhood confronting the national security minister, attempting to drag her toward floodwaters Argentina’s port city of Bahia Blanca has been “destroyed” after being pummeled by a year’s worth of rain in a matter of hours, killing 13 and driving hundreds from their homes, authorities said on Saturday. Two young girls — reportedly aged four and one — were missing after possibly being swept away by floodwaters in the wake of Friday’s storm. The deluge left hospital rooms underwater, turned neighborhoods into islands and cut electricity to swaths of the city. Argentine Minister of National Security Patricia Bullrich said Bahia Blanca was “destroyed.” The death toll rose to 13 on Saturday, up from 10 on Friday, authorities
Two daughters of an Argentine mountaineer who died on an icy peak 40 years ago have retrieved his backpack from the spot — finding camera film inside that allowed them a glimpse of some of his final experiences. Guillermo Vieiro was 44 when he died in 1985 — as did his climbing partner — while descending Argentina’s Tupungato lava dome, one of the highest peaks in the Americas. Last year, his backpack was spotted on a slope by mountaineer Gabriela Cavallaro, who examined it and contacted Vieiro’s daughters Guadalupe, 40, and Azul, 44. Last month, the three set out with four other guides
Local officials from Russia’s ruling party have caused controversy by presenting mothers of soldiers killed in Ukraine with gifts of meat grinders, an appliance widely used to describe Russia’s brutal tactics on the front line. The United Russia party in the northern Murmansk region posted photographs on social media showing officials smiling as they visited bereaved mothers with gifts of flowers and boxed meat grinders for International Women’s Day on Saturday, which is widely celebrated in Russia. The post included a message thanking the “dear moms” for their “strength of spirit and the love you put into bringing up your sons.” It
‘LIMITING MYSELF’: New Zealand’s foreign minister said that the omments by Phil Goff were ‘disappointing’ and made the diplomat’s position in the UK ‘untenable’ New Zealand’s most senior envoy to the UK has lost his job over remarks he made about US President Donald Trump at an event in London this week, New Zealand Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters said yesterday. Phil Goff, who is New Zealand’s High Commissioner to the UK, made the comments at an event held by international affairs think tank Chatham House in London on Tuesday. Goff asked a question from the audience of the guest speaker, Finnish Minister of Foreign Affairs Elina Valtonen, in which he said he had been re-reading a famous speech by former British prime minister Winston
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