World Briefs

MAR-A-LAGO A Chinese woman recently arrested at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club lied repeatedly to Secret Service agents while carrying computer malware unlike anything a government analyst had ever seen and had more than USD8,000 in cash at her hotel room. 

JAPAN A search was underway for a Japanese fighter jet yesterday after it disappeared from radar during a flight exercise in northern Japan. The F-35A stealth jet went missing while flying off the eastern coast of Aomori, about half an hour after taking off from the Misawa air base with three other F-35As for anti-fighter battle training.

THAILAND A man has been arrested on suspicion of raping and killing a German tourist on the island of Koh Si Chang in the Gulf of Thailand. Police said the victim was approached and attacked by Ronnakorn Romruen (pictured) while she was traveling on her rental motorbike. 

INDIA Maoist rebels yesterday attacked a convoy of India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party with an improvised explosive device as it traveled through the central Indian state of Chhattisgarh, killing a state party lawmaker and four others in his vehicle, police said.

AFGHANISTAN U.S. forces revised yesterday the death toll from a Taliban attack the previous day near the main American base in the country, saying three U.S. soldiers were killed but not a contractor who was initially reported among the fatalities. The Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack.

ISRAELI voters decided yesterday whether to give Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu another term in office in a tight election that has become a referendum on his decade in power. Clouded by a series of looming corruption indictments, Netanyahu is seeking a fourth consecutive term and a fifth overall.

ALGERIA protesters rejected the interim leader named yesterday to replace former President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, shouting “out with the system” as they demonstrated for the dismantling of the political hierarchy that has led Algeria for two decades.

SWIFT Music superstar Taylor Swift says the efforts of a Tennessee LGBTQ advocacy group to fight a handful of contentious bills moving inside the state’s Republican-controlled General Assembly inspired her to make a sizeable donation. Swift donated USD113,000 to the organization.