World briefs

CHINA’s biggest state-owned chemical company announces plans to acquire Italian tire manufacturer Pirelli, adding to a string of high-profile Chinese corporate purchases in Europe.

CHINA The flag carriers of New Zealand and China yesterday detailed plans for an alliance that would reinstate direct flights between Auckland and Beijing by the end of the year. The alliance, subject to regulatory approvals, would see Air China introduce a daily direct service between the two cities, while continuing to codeshare on Air New Zealand’s daily Shanghai-Auckland service.

JAPAN The governor of the southern Japanese island of Okinawa orders the Defense Ministry to suspend all work at the site where a key U.S. military air base is to be relocated, in a growing confrontation between the island and the central government.

PHILIPPINES A Philippine court begins the trial of a U.S. Marine charged with murdering a transgender Filipino.

AUSTRALIA  A seriously ill man begins a two-week ocean voyage on an icebreaker from an Australian Antarctic base to a hospital in Australia.

SOUTH AFRICA A South African judge convicts former Grand Slam doubles tennis champion Bob Hewitt of rape and sexual assault decades after the alleged assaults.

IRAN An Iranian nuclear negotiator urges world powers to find a “common position” to achieve a “balanced” final nuclear deal with the Islamic Republic as a deadline for negotiations looms.

FRANCE  Prime Minister Manuel Valls has hailed the defeat of the far-right National Front in first-round local elections, while minimizing the significance of the third-place finish of his own Socialist party. The National Front was second in Sunday’s vote with 25 percent, behind the conservative UMP party and its allies with 29 percent. Socialists and their allies had 21.5 percent, according to the Interior Ministry’s official results.

TUNISIA’s prime minister has fired five leading security officials after three gunmen attacked a renowned Tunis museum, killing 21 in the deadliest attack on tourists in Tunisia in 13 years, the government said yesterday. The ousted officials include the director of Tunisia’s tourist police and the police chiefs for the neighborhood around the National Bardo Museum and for metropolitan Tunis. All but one of those killed were foreign tourists.

UK The British parents who became fugitives after their critically ill son was refused a cancer treatment in the U.K. last year say he’s experienced a miracle recovery from his brain tumor. Brett King told The Sun newspaper in an interview published yesterday that the recovery of his 5-year-old son, Ashya, justifies the family’s decision to remove him from Southampton General Hospital to seek an innovative treatment abroad. Their decision sparked an international manhunt, and resulted in the parents being briefly jailed.