World Briefs

INDIA A death warrant was issued yesterday for the four men convicted in the 2012 gang rape and murder of a young woman on a New Delhi bus that galvanized protests across India and brought global attention to the country’s sexual violence epidemic. A New Delhi court scheduled the hangings for Jan. 22, the Press Trust of India news agency reported.

SOUTH KOREA President Moon Jae-in yesterday said he hopes to see North Korean leader Kim Jong Un fulfill a promise to visit the South this year and called for the Koreas to end a prolonged freeze in bilateral relations. In his New Year’s speech, Moon also reaffirmed his government’s commitment to resume inter-Korean economic activities that have been held back by U.S.-led sanctions imposed on the North over its nuclear weapons and missiles program.

JAPAN Tokyo prosecutors obtained an arrest warrant yesterday for former Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn’s wife on suspicion of perjury, adding to the couple’s legal troubles in the country where he once was revered as a star executive.

IRAN A researcher with dual French-Iranian nationality held for months in a notorious Tehran prison will not be tried on espionage charges, her lawyer said yesterday. But she and another French researcher still face other security-related charges. Iranian prosecutors dropped the spying charges against Fariba Adelkhah after an hours-long hearing, Saeid Dehghan told The Associated Press. Both Adelkhah and Roland Marchal will remain in custody on charges of spreading propaganda, their lawyer said.

SWITZERLAND A dozen climate activists have gone on trial for storming a Credit Suisse office in Lausanne, Switzerland, and playing tennis inside, part of a protest against the bank’s investments in fossil fuels.
In a trial billed as the first of its kind in Switzerland, the environmentalists from the “Lausanne Action Climate” group entered the courtroom yesterday in suburban Renens with a number of supporters on hand outside holding up placards and chanting.

RUSSIA A fire at a greenhouse farm in a Moscow suburb killed eight people and injured one yesterday. Russian emergency services said. All eight victims — seven men and one woman — were illegal migrants from Vietnam who worked at the farm, officials said. Russia’s Emergency Ministry initially identified the victims as Tajiks.

FRANCE has warned it will retaliate with the full backing of the European Union if the United States imposes tariffs on up to $2.4 billion worth of French products, including Champagne, Roquefort cheese, handbags, and lipstick.

GERMANY moved 35 soldiers serving in Iraq to neighboring Jordan and Kuwait yesterday amid tensions over the U.S. killing of a top Iranian general in an airstrike in Baghdad last week.