World briefs

Thailand A pro-democracy activist, Sirawith Seritiwat, widely known as Ja New, who was attacked and left unconscious on a Bangkok sidewalk said yesterday he will refuse an offer of police protection that would require him to stop political activities.

Sri Lanka  Prosecutors have asked police to locate three key witnesses in the 2006 killings of five ethnic Tamil students, days after a judge dismissed charges against 13 policemen suspected in the case because of a lack of evidence.

Nepal A Canadian aid worker has been sentenced to nine years in prison in Nepal for sexually abusing two boys who were found at his home.

Japan The prime minister Shinzo Abe said yesterday that the government will abide by a court ruling ordering it to compensate former leprosy patients’ families over a lengthy segregation policy that severed family ties and caused long-lasting prejudice.

Libya The U.N. says more than 1,000 people have been killed since April in fighting between rival militias over the Libyan capital, a grim milestone in the stalemated conflict.

UAE Bahrain has recorded temperatures that make the month of June the hottest ever experienced in the Arab Gulf country in more than a century.

Saudi Arabia State-owned oil company Aramco has awarded USD18 billion in contracts to expand oil and gas capacity at two of its fields. Aramco said in a statement yesterday it had awarded 34 contracts for engineering, procurement and construction at the Majran and Berri offshore.

France A court has acquitted French tycoon Bernard Tapie of fraud over a USD452.5 million payment linked to the sale of sportswear company Adidas in the 1990s. Tapie, who has been battling cancer, was not present for yesterday’s verdict.

France President Emmanuel Macron’s top diplomatic adviser is spending two days in Tehran as part of an urgent bid to deescalate rising tensions with Iran over its unraveling nuclear deal with world powers.

Sweden Top court said yesterday it won’t extradite a fugitive to China, saying he risks the death penalty, torture or degrading treatment that would violate the European Convention on Human Rights.

US H. Ross Perot, the colorful, self-made Texas billionaire who rose from a childhood of Depression-era poverty and twice ran for president as a third-party candidate, has died. He was 89.

US President Donald Trump lashed out for a second day at Britain’s ambassador to the United States Kim Darroch yesterday, describing him as “wacky” and a “pompous fool,” after a leak of emails critical of the American administration.