COLOMBIA
Ceasefire suspended
President Gustavo Petro on Sunday suspended a ceasefire with one of a handful of armed groups with which he hoped to negotiate peace accords, saying its fighters violated the truce by attacking an indigenous community. The government said that starting tomorrow, it would resume military operations against Estado Mayor Central, a group of fighters who broke away from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia when it signed a peace pact in 2016. Indigenous leaders in the war-torn western region of Cauca said an attack by the dissident group on Saturday wounded at least three people and a young student was taken away by force.
MALAYSIA
Google sorry over ringgit
Google Malaysia yesterday apologized for misquoting the ringgit’s exchange rate, after the Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) called out its error, saying the tech giant had undervalued the currency against the US dollar. The ringgit, which fell to a 26-year low last month, has weakened about 2.44 percent. The central bank has said the currency is undervalued and does not reflect the nation’s positive economic fundamentals. “We immediately contacted the third party that provides USD-MYR exchange rate information to correct the error,” Google Malaysia said on X. BNM said in a statement on Saturday that Google published “inaccurate” information on Friday and had also done so on Feb. 6.
CHINA
More Chinese tie the knot
The number of new marriages jumped 12.4 percent last year from a year earlier, reversing a downtrend that has lasted for almost a decade as more young people tied the knot after delaying their nuptials due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The number of newlyweds rose to 7.68 million last year, Ministry of Civil Affairs data released last week showed. This was up 845,000 couples from 2022, but still far below the peak of 13.47 million couples in 2013. Premier Li Qiang (李強) earlier this month pledged that the government would work toward “a birth-friendly society and promote long-term, balanced population development,” as well as reducing the cost of childbirth, parenting and education. The nation’s population fell for a second consecutive year last year, as the record low birth rate and deaths due to COVID-19 accelerated a downturn that officials fear would have profound long-term effects on the economy.
NEW ZEALAND
Kiwis ‘take to the skies’
A flock of flightless kiwi birds yesterday briefly took to the skies, carried across the country in chartered planes on a special conservation mission. The ground-dwelling kiwi is one of the country’s beloved national icons, but it is also one of its most vulnerable native birds. Conservationists have embarked on an ambitious project to restore kiwi populations to the forested hills that surround the capital, Wellington. As part of the project, a flock of 15 kiwis were yesterday coaxed from a sanctuary in the north, then flown more than 500km in two light planes to their new home. Calling it a “milestone moment,” project leader Paul Ward said: “I never thought we would see kiwi fly.” The bird vanished from Wellington’s hills about 150 years ago, as predators were introduced and land was cleared for the growing city. The kiwi transfer was the first by air, but the project has been releasing adult birds around Wellington since 2022. Ward estimates about 75 kiwis now live around Wellington, a figure he hopes to double by May.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un sent Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) greetings with what appeared to be restrained rhetoric that comes as Pyongyang moves closer to Russia and depends less on its long-time Asian ally. Kim wished “the Chinese people greater success in building a modern socialist country,” in a reply message to Xi for his congratulations on North Korea’s birthday, the state-run Korean Central News Agency reported yesterday. The 190-word dispatch had little of the florid language that had been a staple of their correspondence, which has declined significantly this year, an analysis by Seoul-based specialist service NK Pro showed. It said
On an island of windswept tundra in the Bering Sea, hundreds of miles from mainland Alaska, a resident sitting outside their home saw — well, did they see it? They were pretty sure they saw it — a rat. The purported sighting would not have gotten attention in many places around the world, but it caused a stir on Saint Paul Island, which is part of the Pribilof Islands, a birding haven sometimes called the “Galapagos of the north” for its diversity of life. That is because rats that stow away on vessels can quickly populate and overrun remote islands, devastating bird
‘CLOSER TO THE END’: The Ukrainian leader said in an interview that only from a ‘strong position’ can Ukraine push Russian President Vladimir Putin ‘to stop the war’ Decisive actions by the US now could hasten the end of the Russian war against Ukraine next year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday after telling ABC News that his nation was “closer to the end of the war.” “Now, at the end of the year, we have a real opportunity to strengthen cooperation between Ukraine and the United States,” Zelenskiy said in a post on Telegram after meeting with a bipartisan delegation from the US Congress. “Decisive action now could hasten the just end of Russian aggression against Ukraine next year,” he wrote. Zelenskiy is in the US for the UN
A 64-year-old US woman took her own life inside a controversial suicide capsule at a Swiss woodland retreat, with Swiss police on Tuesday saying several people had been arrested. The space-age looking Sarco capsule, which fills with nitrogen and causes death by hypoxia, was used on Monday outside a village near the German border. The portable human-sized pod, self-operated by a button inside, has raised a host of legal and ethical questions in Switzerland. Active euthanasia is banned in the country, but assisted dying has been legal for decades. On the same day it was used, Swiss Department of Home