Saturday, December 31, 2022
Chinese fighter jet flies 20 feet from US military plane
US officials say this Chinese jet got so close to an American military plane that the US pilot had to perform evasive manoeuvers while flying in international airspace over the South China Sea in order to avoid a collision.
Six In The Morning Saturday 31 December 2022
Ukraine war: Deadly explosions hit Kyiv on New Year's Eve
By Hugo Bachega in Kyiv and Robert Greenall in London
A wave of Russian missiles have hit cities across Ukraine, officials say.
Kyiv Mayor Vitaly Klitschko said there had been several blasts in the capital, causing at least one death. A hotel has also been damaged.
The attacks happened two days after Russia carried out one of the largest air strikes since the start of the war.
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky had warned Russia could launch more attacks to make Ukrainians "celebrate the New Year in darkness".
Iran’s supreme court accepts protester’s appeal against death sentence
Sahand Noor Mohammadzadeh is accused of damaging public property during anti-government riots and ‘waging war against God’
Reuters
Iran’s supreme court has accepted a protester’s appeal against his death sentence for allegedly damaging public property during anti-government demonstrations, and sent his case back for review, the judiciary said on Saturday.
Sahand Noor Mohammadzadeh, 25, was arrested on 4 October and sentenced to death two months later on the charge of “waging war against God” for allegedly trying to break a highway guardrail in Tehran and setting a rubbish bin on fire.
He rejected the accusations, saying he was forced to confess to his guilt and went on a hunger strike two weeks ago.
How China's rise is reshaping Indo-Pacific security order
"Let China sleep, for when she wakes, she will shake the world," a quote often attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte, neatly summarizes the current geopolitical situation. China has awakened and is staking its claim to be a global superpower.
President Xi Jinping said at the 20th Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in October that the country aims to lead the world in national strength and international influence by 2049, a year that marks the 100th anniversary of the founding of the CCP.
China's new claim to global leadership is the first "real challenge" to Asia's existing security architecture, which has been in place since the end of the Korean War in 1953, Felix Heiduk, a political researcher at the Berlin-based German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), wrote in a recent study.
UN vote on Israel's occupation 'a victory,' say Palestinians
The Palestinians on Saturday welcomed a vote by the United Nations General Assembly requesting that the International Court of Justice (ICJ) provide an opinion on the legal consequences of Israel's occupation of the Palestinian territories.
The Hague-based ICJ, also known as the World Court, is the top U.N. court dealing with disputes between states. Its rulings are binding, though the ICJ has no power to enforce them.
The vote on Friday nonetheless presents a challenge for Israel's incoming Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who took office on Thursday at the head of a hard-right government that includes parties who advocate for occupied West Bank lands to be annexed.
Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem - areas the Palestinians want for a state - in a 1967 war. Peace talks broke down in 2014.
The Death of a Forced FriendshipRussian Invasion of Ukraine Ends an Era in Finland
Russia and Finland once maintained close relations that were partly imposed by Moscow. Since Putin's invasion of Ukraine, though, the Finns are strengthening their defenses and striving to join NATO. For many, it marks the end of an era.
By Nadia Pantel
All that remains of Lenin is a bit of red glue on a marble pedestal. For 43 years, it stood in a small park in the southern Finnish coastal town of Kotka. At times, people smeared it with paint, and the local council regularly argued over whether its presence trivialized Stalinism. But Lenin remained. In 1995, a Polish artist gave him a left arm, which the statue had been lacking. And from then on, Lenin held a bronze cigarette in his hand.
Recent months, though, have seen movement on the issue. First, the city of Turku took down a Lenin statue, followed by a Soviet monument in Helsinki. In October, the Kotka City Council finally sent a demolition squad to Finland's last remaining Lenin.
The Alt-Right Manipulated My Comic. Then A.I. Claimed It.
Ms. Andersen is a cartoonist and the illustrator of a semiautobiographical comic strip, “Sarah’s Scribbles.”
At 19, when I began drafting my webcomic, I had just been flung into adulthood. I felt a little awkward, a little displaced. The glittering veneer of social media, which back then was mostly Facebook, told me that everyone around me had their lives together while I felt like a withering ball of mediocrity. But surely, I believed, I could not be the only one who felt that life was mostly an uphill battle of difficult moments and missed social cues.
I started my webcomic back in 2011, before “relatable” humor was as ubiquitous online as it is today. At the time, the comics were overtly simple, often drawn shakily in Microsoft Paint or poorly scanned sketchbook pages. The jokes were less punchline-oriented and more of a question: Do you feel this way too? I wrote about the small daily struggles of missed clock alarms, ill-fitting clothes and cringe-worthy moments.
Friday, December 30, 2022
What are the charges brought against Myanmar’s former leader Aung San Suu Kyi?
The court session in army-ruled Myanmar was held behind closed doors and a gag order prevented lawyers from discussing the trial.
Six In The Morning Friday 30 December 2022
Trump's tax returns released after years-long effort
By Kayla Epstein
BBC News, New York
Former President Donald Trump's tax returns have been released, ending a bitter six-year long battle to gain greater insights into his finances.
The returns stretch from 2015 through 2020, covering Mr Trump's candidacy and time in the White House.
They give details of various entities through which he would have paid tax, including holdings companies and personal income.
The BBC is reviewing the documents.
Responding to Friday's release of hundreds of pages of tax returns, Mr Trump's camp warned that the disclosure will lead to the US political divide becoming "far worse".
China bridles as EU states prepare to scale up Covid monitoring
Spain joins Italy in requiring arrivals to show a negative result as Chinese state media call move ‘discriminatory’
Philip Oltermann in Hamburg
European countries are preparing to scale up the monitoring of potential new coronavirus variants from China, as Spain becomes the second EU state to bring back mandatory testing at airports in response to Beijing’s rapid rollback of anti-infection measures.
Spain on Friday followed Italy’s lead by requiring arrivals from China to show a negative test result, though unlike Rome it makes exceptions for those who can prove they are fully vaccinated.
At a press conference announcing the new measures, the Spanish health minister, Carolina Darias, also said she was pushing to revise the conditions that had to be met in order for travellers to obtain the EU’s digital Covid certificate.
Germany sees record-breaking heat, drought, and sun in 2022
Scientists said Germany was an average of 1.7 degrees C warmer than when record-keeping began. They reiterated warnings that allowing climate change to continue unchecked would have devastating consequences.
The German Weather Service (DWD) published its annual summary on Friday, confirming that 2022 will have at least tied for the hottest year on record.
Only when all the final data from every weather station in the country are collected in January, the DWD said, can the organization say if 2022 was hotter than 2018, the current record holder.
One thing was certain, however: in 2022, the country has been on average 1.7 degrees Celsius (3.06 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than it was since recordkeeping began in 1881.
With advances and setbacks, a year of struggle for women's rights
From the US revoking the federal right to abortion to Afghanistan mandating the burqa and gradually banning women from public spaces, FRANCE 24 takes a look back at the main events that marked the struggle for women’s rights around the world over the past year.
From one continent to another, women both achieved milestones and encountered setbacks in 2022.
Iran has been dominated by riots and demonstrations provoked by the death of Mahsa Amini, a young Iranian Kurdish woman who died in custody after the country’s morality police arrested her for violating hijab laws.
Palestinians watch on as far-right Israeli gov’t comes into power
While some Palestinians see the new government as no different from previous ones, others are worried.
The Israeli parliament has sworn in Benjamin Netanyahu as the new prime minister, inaugurating the country’s most far-right, religiously conservative government in history, leaving Palestinians worried about what comes next.
The year 2022 was already the deadliest for Palestinians in the occupied West Bank since 2006, as Israel conducted near-daily military raids, and the Gaza Strip faced three days of Israeli bombardment in August.
Suspect in Abe slaying may face raft of additional firearms charges
THE ASAHI SHIMBUN
December 30, 2022 at 18:31 JST
The suspect in the slaying of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe may face at least five additional charges concerning suspected firearms violations after police decided to refer him to prosecutors for the offenses.
The possible charges against Tetsuya Yamagami, 42, that will be referred by Nara prefectural police to prosecutors include suspected breaches of both the Firearm and Sword Possession Control Law and the Weapons Manufacturing Law, according to sources.
The Firearm and Sword Possession Control Law prohibits the firing of “handguns or other firearms” in public places.
Police concluded the handmade gun that police say Yamagami used to shoot Abe on July 8 while he was campaigning in Nara city falls into the category of “handguns or other firearms” under the law.
Thursday, December 29, 2022
How fragile is the peace between Serbs and Kosovars?
After weeks of protests, ethnic Serbs in Kosovo have agreed to take down the barricades amidst hopes of tensions easing.
Taiwan: Why the US & China are on collision course for war | DW News
"The Chinese seem to be preparing for a war against Taiwan" says Taiwan's Foreign Minister Joseph Wu. This puts the US and China on collision course for war – with potentially dramatic stakes for the world.
China's President Xi Jinping has vowed that Beijing will "reunify" with the island – if necessary, by force. A large majority of people in Taiwan say they don't want reunification. The United States is increasingly clear that it would intervene to defend Taiwan from any attack.
Six In The Morning Thursday 29 December 2022
Russia fires dozens of missiles at Ukrainian cities
By Hugo Bachega & Matt Murphy
in Kyiv and London
Cities across Ukraine have been targeted by a wave of Russian missile strikes, in one of the largest bombardments since the war began.
At least three people - including a 14-year-old girl - were taken to hospital after explosions hit the capital Kyiv, Mayor Vitaliy Klitschko said.
Blasts were also heard in the cities of Kharkiv, Odesa, Lviv and Zhytomyr.
Ukraine's military said 69 missiles were launched, with air defences intercepting 54 of them.
Iranian chess player ‘moving to Spain’ after competing without headscarf
Sara Khadem and family plan to set up residence in an unnamed Spanish city, according to reports
Ashifa Kassam in Madrid
One of Iran’s top-ranked female chess players is reportedly planning to settle in Spain after photographs emerged of her taking part in an international tournament without a headscarf.
Sara Khadem, ranked 804 in the world and 10th in her home country, was not planning to return to Iran after the tournament due to fear of reprisals, two sources told Spanish newspaper El País.
Instead, Khadem and her husband, the film director Ardeshir Ahmadi, and the couple’s young child will move to an unnamed Spanish city.
Israel: Netanyahu sworn in as leader of far-right government
Several Israelis have voiced their concern over the new government's proposed plans. Expanding settlements in the West Bank and weakening the Israeli judiciary were among the goals set by Netanyahu's coalition.
The newly formed coalition government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was sworn in at the Knesset on Thursday, making it the country's most far-right government to date.
Veteran Israeli politician Netanyahu is back in the prime minister's office after his Likud party won the most seats in the November 1 election. After spending nearly a year and a half in opposition, Netanyahu submitted his Cabinet lineup last week, minutes before a crucial deadline.
His coalition government allies the Likud party with ultra-Orthodox parties, most notably the Religious Zionism party.
Turkish court upholds life sentence for rights campaigner and Erdogan critic Osman Kavala
A Turkish appellate court on Wednesday upheld the conviction of a leading critic of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan whose jailing has added to tensions in Ankara’s uneasy ties with the West.
Paris-born activist and philanthropist Osman Kavala was sentenced to life in jail without the possibility of parole in April on the charge of trying to topple the government by financing street protests in 2013.
Seven others were jailed for 18 years each for aiding the attempt to overthrow the government of then-prime minister Erdogan during the so-called Gezi Park rallies in Istanbul.
Asia's tourist hotspots prepare for boom as China relaxes COVID rules
By Chayut Setboonsarng, Xinghui Kok and Stella Qiu
Asian countries are bracing for an influx of Chinese tourists as COVID restrictions are dismantled, and while some are wary, operators in others are preparing packages such as hotpot buffets to cash in on the expected spike in travel.
Chinese tourists will no longer need to quarantine on return home starting Jan. 8, the government announced this week, a move that spurred a surge in bookings from what was the world's largest outbound travel market in 2019.
The once $255 billion a year in global spending by Chinese tourists ground to a virtual halt during the pandemic, leaving a gaping hole in the Asian market, where countries from Thailand to Japan had depended on China as the largest source of foreign visitors.
One of the world's most congested cities just opened its first metro line
Bangladesh on Wednesday launched its first metro rail service in the capital Dhaka, with officials and commuters hopeful it will help ease traffic in one of the world's most densely populated and congested cities.
The largely Japanese-funded project, known as Line 6, was inaugurated at a ceremony by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina -- who described the new railway as a "milestone," the Dhaka Tribune reported. "Another feather added to the crown of the development of Bangladesh," she said.
She added that there would also be train carriages reserved solely for women and said the Dkaha metro would help reduce traffic jams in the city "significantly".
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