INDONESIA
Mount Ruang erupts
A volcano erupted several times in North Sulawesi Province, forcing hundreds of people to be evacuated after it spewed lava and a column of smoke into the sky. Mount Ruang, a stratovolcano, first erupted at 9:45pm on Tuesday and twice again in the early hours of yesterday, the country’s volcanology and geological agencies said. There were no reports of any deaths or injuries, but more than 800 people were evacuated from two villages on Ruang Island to the nearby island of Tagulandang, state news agency Antara reported. The first eruption pushed an ash column 2km into the sky, with the second eruption pushing it to 2.5km, said Muhammad Wafid, the head of the geological agency.
JAPAN
Snake delays train
Even small delays in Japan’s much-vaunted bullet trains are rare and more unusual still are snakes on board holding up shinkansen services. On Tuesday evening, a passenger alerted security to a 40cm serpent lurking on a train between Nagoya and Tokyo, resulting in a 17-minute hold-up. It was unclear whether the animal was venomous or how it ended up on the train, a spokesman for Central Japan Railway Co said. “It’s difficult to imagine wild snakes somehow climbing onto the train at one of the stations. We have rules against bringing snakes into the shinkansen, but we don’t check passengers’ baggage,” he said. The train was originally scheduled to go on to Osaka, but the company used a different train for the trip, causing a delay of about 17 minutes, he said.
UNITED STATES
Scooter shooters kill one
Four people were shot — one fatally — on a street corner in the Bronx, New York, on Tuesday evening by people riding on mopeds, police said. About 10 shots were fired after two scooters pulled up to the intersection after 6pm and passengers on the back of each pulled out guns, Assistant Police Chief Benjamin Gurley said. Three people standing on the street corner, ranging in age from 23 to 37, sustained gunshot wounds to their legs. The fourth, a 29-year-old man, was hit in the legs and chest and later died, Gurley said. “The perpetrators wore masks and hoodies to block their identities and then they fled on the scooters northbound,” Gurley said. One person was taken into custody for questioning on Tuesday, but Gurley said police were unsure if that person was involved in the shooting.
UNITED STATES
Bob Graham dies
Former senator and Florida governor Bob Graham, who gained national prominence as chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, has died. He was 87. Graham’s family announced the death on Tuesday in a statement posted on X by his daughter Gwen Graham. “We are deeply saddened to report the passing of a visionary leader, dedicated public servant, and even more importantly, a loving husband, father, grandfather, and great-grandfather,” the family wrote. Bob Graham served three terms in the Senate and made an unsuccessful bid for the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination, emphasizing his opposition to the invasion of Iraq following the Sept. 11 attacks. He perfected the “workdays” political gimmick of spending a day doing jobs from horse stall mucker to FBI agent, and kept a meticulous diary, noting almost everyone he spoke with, everything he ate and the TV shows he watched.
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