FRANCE
Mayotte braces for storm
Residents of Mayotte yesterday braced for a storm expected to bring strong winds and flash floods less than a month after the Indian Ocean archipelago was devastated by a deadly cyclone. The territory was placed on red alert on Saturday in anticipation of the passage of Dikeledi, a storm forecast to skirt about 100km south of Mayotte. It hit the northern coast of Madagascar as a cyclone on Saturday evening and weakened into a severe tropical storm, but is expected to regain intensity as it moves toward Mayotte. It could be reclassified as a cyclone by this morning, Meteo-France said.
THAILAND
Killed for gratitude: suspect
A man accused of killing a former Cambodian opposition lawmaker in Bangkok said he committed the crime to repay someone who helped him during a tough period in his life, police said yesterday. Ekkalak Paenoi on Saturday confessed to the crime in a livestream video after being charged with premeditated murder and unauthorized gun ownership. Lim Kimya, a former lawmaker for the dissolved Cambodia National Rescue Party, was gunned down on Tuesday last week by a motorcyclist as he arrived in Bangkok by bus from Cambodia with his French wife. Ekkalak — who Thai media have said was a former marine — was arrested in Cambodia on Wednesday, before being extradited to Thailand on Saturday. “The shooter said he took this job to pay a debt of gratitude to someone who had helped him during a tough period after he was sacked from the navy,” said Attaporn Wongsiripreeda, a senior police official in Bangkok. Some Thai media reports said he was paid 60,000 baht (US$1,727), but Attaporn told a local broadcaster that Ekkalak claimed he did not receive payment.
FRANCE
Dozens injured in tram crash
Two trams on Saturday collided in a tunnel in a rare accident in the eastern city of Strasbourg, injuring dozens of people, authorities said. The collision occurred near Strasbourg’s main train station, one of the busiest in France outside Paris. Minister of Transport Philippe Tabarot said that “probably around 36” people were injured in the accident, while authorities later put that figure at 68. A video posted by a witness on social media showed a chaotic scene with the two trams significantly damaged in a tunnel near the station. One of the trams appeared to have derailed as a result of the impact, the cause of which has yet to be established.
SCOTLAND
Captured lynx dies
One of four lynx thought to have been released illegally in the Highlands died within hours after it was captured, wildlife authorities said on Saturday. The medium-sized wildcats extinct in Scotland for hundreds of years were spotted in the snowy Cairngorms National Park last week, raising concerns that a private breeder had illegally released the predators into the wild. The lynx that died was one of a pair captured on Friday. “This unfortunate development just serves to further demonstrate the folly of abandoning these amazing animals in the wild, with no preparation or real concern for their welfare,” Royal Zoological Society of Scotland head of conservation and science programs Helen Senn said. Wildlife experts have speculated that the cats were released by someone who took matters into their own hands because they were frustrated by the slow process of securing government approval or an opponent who wanted to create problems that would block the reintroduction effort.
‘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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