The Fiji Times

North Korea notifies Japan of plan to launch satellite

SEOUL/TOKYO (Reuters) -North Korea has notified Japan of a plan to launch a satellite between May 31 and June 11, a Japanese coast guard official said on Monday. Analysts say the military satellite is part of nuclear-armed North Korea’s efforts to advance surveillance technology, including drones, to improve its ability to strike targets in the...

Oil climbs after US leaders strike provisional debt deal

SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Oil prices rose in early Asian trade on Monday after U.S. leaders reached a tentative debt ceiling deal, possibly averting a default in the world’s largest economy and oil consumer. Brent crude futures climbed 39 cents, or 0.5%, to $77.34 a barrel by 2317 GMT, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude was...

Italy PM says good ties with China possible without Belt and Road

MILAN (Reuters) – Good relations with China are possible even without being part of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) deal, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said in an interview published on Sunday, as her government weighs abandoning the project. Italy is the only major Western country to have joined China’s BRI scheme, which envisions...

UK health minister says will not negotiate on pay with nurses’ union

LONDON (Reuters) -Britain’s health minister, Steve Barclay, said on Sunday that the government would not negotiate on pay with the nurses’ union, as the threat of further strikes looms. The government’s offer, which includes a one-off payment equivalent to 2% of salaries in the 2022/23 financial year and a 5% pay rise for 2023/24, was...

South Africa to investigate U.S. allegations of arms shipment to Russia

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa has appointed a panel to investigate U.S. allegations that a Russian ship had collected weapons from a naval base near Cape Town last year, the presidency said in a statement on Sunday. The U.S. ambassador to South Africa Reuben Brigety said on May 11 that he was...

Indonesia seeks $700 million to install 200 MW of solar power

JAKARTA (Reuters) – Indonesian state utility Perusahaan Listrik Negara seeks a $700-million investment to install a 200-megawatt (MW) solar panel that will replace diesel power generators in a bid to reduce carbon emission, the company said late on Saturday. The plan is part of its target to reach net zero carbon emissions by 2060. PLN...

Somalia says it will revert to direct vote for officials starting next year

MOGADISHU (Reuters) – Somalia will start electing its president and other officials by direct vote next year, the government announced on Sunday, ending a system of indirect voting in the Horn of Africa country that has endured three decades of conflict and clan battles. Amid widespread insecurity caused by an Islamist insurgency and weak state...

Venice’s waters turn fluorescent green near Rialto Bridge

MILAN (Reuters) – The waters in Venice’s main canal turned fluorescent green on Sunday in the area near the Rialto bridge and authorities are seeking to trace the cause, Italy’s fire department said. The regional environmental protection agency has received samples of the altered waters and is working to identify the substance that changed their...

Around 33 tribal militants killed in clashes in India’s Manipur -minister

GUWAHATI, India (Reuters) – Around 33 tribal militants have been killed recently in India’s far northeastern state of Manipur in an ongoing security force operation following ethnic clashes in the region, the state’s chief minister said on Sunday. The state bordering Myanmar has witnessed growing tension in recent weeks, with rioting and ethnic clashes killing...

Gunmen kill two rangers in Congo’s Virunga National Park

BENI, Democratic Republic of Congo (Reuters) – Gunmen killed two rangers in Congo’s Virunga National Park on Sunday, the Congo Institute for Nature Conservation (ICCN) said in a statement, the second attack this month in the country’s restive east. The attack took place near Rwindi in North Kivu province, north of another attack on May...

Turkey’s Erdogan prevails in election test of his 20-year rule

ANKARA (Reuters) -President Tayyip Erdogan extended his two decades in power in elections on Sunday, winning a mandate to pursue increasingly authoritarian policies which have polarised Turkey and strengthened its position as a regional military power. His challenger, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, called it “the most unfair election in years” but did not dispute the outcome. Official...

Five months in with no deal in sight, Israel’s judicial protests endure

TEL AVIV (Reuters) – Amid a sea of hundreds, perhaps thousands of Israeli flags at an anti-government protest in Tel Aviv on Saturday, a plain white poster protruded with a handwritten message in black: “Democracy without compromise.” For five months now, tens of thousands of Israelis have taken to the street every week to protest...

Modi inaugurates new parliament building as part of New Delhi’s makeover

NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated India’s new parliament building on Sunday, a modern complex which is part of his Hindu nationalist government’s grand plan to give a makeover to the British colonial-era architecture in the nation’s capital. The inauguration, and the ongoing revamp of the heart of New Delhi based on...

Voting starts in Turkey presidential election runoff

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Turks began voting on Sunday in a presidential runoff that could see Tayyip Erdogan extend his rule into a third decade and persist with Turkey’s increasingly authoritarian path, muscular foreign policy and unorthodox economic governance. Erdogan, 69, defied opinion polls and came out comfortably ahead with an almost five-point lead over his...

Britain says border e-gates back in service after outage sparked delays

LONDON (Reuters) -Britain’s automated border control gates have returned to normal operation, the Home Office said on Saturday, after a nationwide system issue caused major delays. Images posted on social media earlier showed long queues of hundreds of people at London’s Heathrow and Gatwick airports, with frustrated passengers complaining of having to wait several hours...

Avalanche kills 11 members of nomadic tribe in northern Pakistan

MUZAFFARABAD, Pakistan (Reuters) – At least 11 people died after an avalanche hit members of a nomadic tribe as they crossed a mountainous area in northern Pakistan, the country’s disaster management agency said on Saturday. Another 13 people were injured in the avalanche which struck a group of families at Shounter Top Pass late on...

Nicaragua government accuses Catholic Church of money laundering, freezes accounts

(Reuters) – Nicaraguan police said on Saturday they are investigating several dioceses of the Catholic Church for money laundering, a day after local media reported that the bank accounts of parishes in the Central American country had been frozen. The police, loyal to the government of President Daniel Ortega which has clashed fiercely with Nicaragua’s...

Pacific islands, in spotlight, to push climate change in South Korea summit

SYDNEY (Reuters) – Pacific island leaders will meet South Korea’s President Yoon Suk Yeol in Seoul on Monday, their third summit in a week with a large economy as the region seeks stronger action on climate change as it becomes a focus of geopolitical power attention. The Pacific islands span 40 million square kilometres of...

Plastic-spewing artwork unveiled for Paris talks against waste

PARIS (Reuters) – Lobbyists Greenpeace unveiled an artwork in Paris on Saturday in the shape of a machine churning out bottles in front of an oil derrick to coincide with talks on eliminating plastic waste. Canadian artist Benjamin Von Wong said his 5-metre-high work by the River Seine showed the link between fossil fuels and...

Senegalese government websites hit with cyber attack

DAKAR (Reuters) -A group of hackers called Mysterious Team made multiple Senegalese government websites go offline overnight on Friday by hitting them with denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, a government spokesperson said. The group claimed responsibility for the cyber attacks in a series of Twitter posts using the hashtag #FreeSenegal used by campaigners alleging political repression in...

Rwanda suspect denies killings but ‘sorry’ over genocide

CAPE TOWN (Reuters) – One of the Rwanda genocide’s most wanted remaining suspects, accused of ordering the death of 2,000 people hiding in a church, denied on Friday any involvement though said he was “sorry” for the 1994 killings. On the run for two decades, Fulgence Kayishema was arrested on Wednesday under a false name...

Tens of thousands in Serbia protest mass shootings, government policies

BELGRADE (Reuters) – Tens of thousands braved rain and wind in Belgrade on Saturday in an anti-government protest over two mass shootings that killed 18 people, blaming the deaths on a culture of violence that critics say authorities have allowed to permeate society. On May 3 a teenage boy killed nine pupils and a security...

Charity vessel rescues almost 600 migrants off Italy

ROME (Reuters) – A vessel operated by the charity Doctors without Borders (MSF) rescued nearly 600 migrants sailing on an overcrowded boat which was in distress off the island of Sicily on Saturday, the group said on Twitter. “After three hours of operation, the 599 survivors, including women and children, are now safely aboard …...

Russian Orthodox Church fires Archpriest for ‘obstruction’ of icon transfer

(Reuters) – Patriarch Kirill, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, on Saturday dismissed his expert on art and restoration for obstructing the transfer of a historic 15th-century Trinity icon to the Church from a Moscow museum. Russian President Vladimir Putin had decided that the icon be handed over to the Church from Moscow’s Tretyakov Gallery...

Canada backs Ukraine’s application to join trans-Pacific trade pact

OTTAWA (Reuters) – Canada backs Ukraine’s application to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), Canadian Trade Minister Mary Ng said on Friday. “Following the UK’s accession, as more economies express interest in joining, Canada welcomes Ukraine’s application to join CPTPP,” Ng said on Twitter. Ukraine is seeking to join the 11-country...

Egypt unearths mummification workshops, tombs in ancient burial ground

SAQQARA, Egypt (Reuters) – Egypt unearthed human and animal mummification workshops as well as two tombs in the ancient burial ground of Saqqara, officials said on Saturday, marking the latest in a string of discoveries that the country hopes can help revive its vital tourism industry. Mostafa Waziri, the head of Egypt’s Supreme Council of...

NATO urges Kosovo to de-escalate tension with Serbia

BRUSSELS (Reuters) -NATO on Saturday urged Kosovo to dial down tensions with Serbia, a day after its government forcibly accessed municipal buildings to install mayors in ethnic Serb areas in the north of the country. The resulting clashes on Friday between Kosovan police and protesters opposed to the ethnic Albanian mayors prompted Serbia to put...

Man arrested over Downing Street collision faces indecent images charge

LONDON (Reuters) – London police said on Saturday that a man arrested after a car collision into the gates of Downing Street, the site of British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s office, had been separately charged with making indecent images of children. The 43-year-old appeared in court on Saturday in relation to the images and was...

Freed Belgian aid worker lost weight, not sense of humour, during Iran ordeal

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Freed Belgian aid worker Olivier Vandecasteele lost 30 kg (66 lb) but not his sense of humour during over a year in an Iranian jail, his spokesman said on Saturday following his release in a prisoner swap. Vandecasteele arrived back in Belgium on Friday from Iran where he had been accused of...

World

30th May

Britain’s Prime Minister Sunak congratulates Erdogan on election win