FIJI
George Speight pardoned
Former coup leader George Speight was yesterday granted a presidential pardon and freed after spending 24 years in jail on treason charges. The Corrections Service said that the businessman-turned-putschist was formally granted a pardon along with six others. He was granted clemency on the recommendation of a Mercy Commission that was set up to deal with politically sensitive cases. Speight, a businessman, led a 2000 coup that held then-prime minister Mahendra Chaudhry and lawmakers hostage for 56 days.
NEW CALEDONIA
Two killed during raid
Two people were shot dead during a police operation overnight in the French territory, where unrest began in May between indigenous Kanaks and French loyalists, French media reported yesterday. That brought to 13 the number of people who have died since the start of the crisis that was sparked by a voting reform that was suspended in June.
PAKISTAN
Family forgives officer
The family of a blasphemy suspect killed in custody has forgiven the police officer accused of killing him, saying on Wednesday that they would not press charges “in the name of God.” Abdul Ali, 52, also known as Sakhi Lala, was allegedly shot dead last week in a police station in Quetta by police officer Saayd Mohammad Sarhadi, who had accessed the facility by pretending to be Ali’s relative, police said. “We will not fight the case,” Ali’s son Muhammad Usman told a news conference, sitting with another brother and elders from his tribal clan. “We have forgiven the police officer in the name of God.” One of the elders, Faizullah Noorzai, said that the tribe would disown Ali. “We and our families are the kind of people who would sacrifice their lives for the sake of the Prophet Mohammed and his respect.”
UNITED STATES
Train joyrider arrested
Police have arrested a teenage girl they say was one of two people who took an empty New York City subway train on a brief joyride before they crashed it and fled. They are looking for a male companion they believe was also pictured on the train. Surveillance photographs released by the New York Police Department on Tuesday showed one person dressed all in pink, including a pink shower cap, and another in a blue tank top. Police arrested the 17-year-old girl on Wednesday. They have charged her with criminal mischief and reckless endangerment. The pair boarded an unoccupied train parked at the Briarwood subway station in Queens just after midnight on Thursday last week and somehow got it running, police said in a news release. They crashed it into another parked train and ran, police said. No injuries were reported.
UNITED STATES
Wagon incident hurts 25
About 25 children and adults were injured on Wednesday when a wagon carrying them overturned at an apple orchard in Wisconsin. The children, parents and chaperones were on a field trip to the orchard in Lafayette when one of two wagons being pulled by a tractor turned sideways and rolled over, Chippewa County Sheriff Travis Hakes told reporters. Hakes said the tractor was traveling at a low speed when the wagon rolled over while going downhill. Three people sustained critical injuries, while injuries to five others were considered serious.
‘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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