World briefs

CHINESE manufacturing contracted in December for the first time in seven months in another sign the slowdown in the world’s No. 2 economy is quickening, according to a survey of factories released yesterday.

AUSTRALIA Tearful Australians laid mounds of flowers at the site where a gunman held hostages for 16 hours at a popular Sydney cafe. The siege ended early Tuesday with a barrage of gunfire that left two hostages and the Iranian-born gunman dead, and a nation that has long prided itself on its peace rocked to its core.

NORTH KOREA asked the U.N. Security Council in a letter to take up the CIA’s harsh treatment of terror suspects, instead of the North’s own human rights situation. North Korea’s U.N. Ambassador Ja Song Nam objected to the inclusion of his country’s human rights record on the Security Council’s agenda for debate — the first step toward a possible referral to the International Criminal Court.

PHILIPPINES  The Philippine government says it is seeking custody of a U.S. Marine charged with the murder of a Filipino transgender woman. The Department of Foreign Affairs said yesterday that it has asked Washington to turn over custody of Marine Pfc. Joseph Scott Pemberton after he was charged by Filipino prosecutors Monday in the October killing of Jennifer Laude in Olongapo city, northwest of Manila. Laude, whose former name was Jeffrey, had apparently been strangled and drowned in a toilet bowl.

UKRAINE Fighting in eastern Ukraine between government troops and Russian-backed separatist forces has ground almost to halt. That should be good news for Ukraine, but Russia looks intent to pile on the economic misery. In a detailed op-ed piece Monday, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev painted a grim forecast of Russian economic blockades ahead as Ukraine embarks on closer integration with Europe.

USA The price of oil has fallen by nearly half in just six months, a surprising and steep plunge that has consumers cheering, producers howling and economists wringing their hands over whether this is a good or bad thing. The price of a barrel of oil is just under USD56, down from a summer high of $107, and lower than at any time since the U.S. was still in recession in the spring of 2009.

USA Demonstrators blocked streets around police headquarters and chained shut four doors of a California police headquarters to protest recent grand jury decisions not to indict white officers who killed unarmed black men in Ferguson, Missouri, and New York. Police made 25 arrests as the protesters chained themselves to the doors of the Oakland police headquarters during soggy weather and prevented people from getting inside.

RUSSIA  The Bank of Russia drastically raises its key interest rate to 17 percent from 10.5 percent to try to boost its currency, which has been plunging along with oil prices. The moves come after the ruble has shed roughly 50 percent of its value since January, battered by Western sanctions imposed over the conflict in Ukraine and a huge drop in the price of oil. A falling ruble threatens to send inflation in Russia to dangerously high levels.

UK Four men convicted of a failed plot to bomb the London subway system have lost an attempt to appeal against their convictions. Muktar Said Ibrahim, Ramzi Mohammed and Yassin Omar argued that their trials were unfair because they were denied access to lawyers during police questioning. Ismail Abdurahman, who was convicted as an accomplice, claimed that a witness statement he provided was later used against him. The European Court of Human Rights ruled yesterday that the delay in granting access to lawyers was permissible because there had been “an exceptionally serious and imminent threat to public safety.”