World briefs

CHINA’s top judge renewed his commitment to uncovering and overturning wrongful convictions, citing to national legislators yesterday the much-publicized case of an 18-year-old executed and confirmed years later to have been innocent. Chinese courts at all levels overturned convictions in 1,317 criminal cases last year, Zhou Qiang, president of the Supreme People’s Court, said yesterday in an annual report to the legislature.

THAILAND’s anti-corruption body has recommended that 250 former lawmakers be impeached, in the latest move targeting supporters of ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. National Anti-Corruption Commission spokesman Vicha Mahakun said yesterday that the agency found the lawmakers had misused their authority by seeking to amend the now-defunct constitution to make the Senate fully, rather than partly, elected.

MALAYSIA’s transport minister yesterday vowed to take stern action against an air traffic control supervisor if it is confirmed that he was asleep on the job when Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 disappeared a year ago.
Bangladesh The roof of a five-story cement factory under construction in Bangladesh collapses, killing at least four workers and trapping many others, an official says.

CAMBODIA Leading clothing retailers such as Gap and H&M need to help alleviate labor abuses at factories in Cambodia that manufacture their products, a human rights organization says.

MYANMAR authorities free several students detained after a bloody protest, but others involved in the stand-off over a new education law will face charges including disrupting stability.

AFGHANISTAN An Afghan official says Taliban gunmen have killed seven policemen in an ambush in the northern Kunduz province.

SRI LANKA Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s official visit to Sri Lanka reflects a bounce back in bilateral relations as the South Asian power seeks to mitigate China’s growing influence on its Indian Ocean neighbors.

IRAQ Rockets and mortars echo across Saddam Hussein’s hometown of Tikrit yesterday as Iraqi security forces clash with Islamic State militants a day after sweeping into the Sunni city north of Baghdad. Recapturing Tikrit is seen as a key step toward rolling back the extremist group, which seized much of northern and western Iraq last summer and controls about a third of Iraq and Syria.

GREECE German officials say that the matter of compensation for the Nazis’ World War II occupation of Greece is closed and the government isn’t prepared to discuss the issue further with Athens. Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras has revived the question of war-time debts, telling Parliament on Tuesday that his debt-ridden country has never been fully compensated by Germany.