World briefs

BANGLADESH  Authorities filed murder charges yesterday against dozens of people for their roles in the 2013 collapse of a garment factory building that killed more than 1,100 people. The charges were filed against 41 people, including the building’s owner, Sohel Rana, and his parents and more than a dozen government officials, for their direct role in the deaths of 1,137 people in the collapse of Rana Plaza, said the lead investigator, Bijoy Krishna Kar of the Criminal Investigation Department.

S KOREA-CHINA South Korea and China signed a free trade deal that will remove tariffs on more than 90 percent of goods over two decades.

JAPAN  A worker at Tokyo Station got an unpleasant shock after opening an abandoned suitcase that no one had claimed for a month — the decomposing body of an elderly woman inside. The Tokyo Metropolitan Police said the corpse was found Sunday in a suitcase in a temporary storage area at Tokyo’s main train station. Japanese media reports said the body was of an elderly woman, 140 centimeters tall tall. Police are trying to establish her identity.

BELGIUM Influential European Union nations France and Germany are expressing opposition to new EU proposals to help Italy and Greece cope with a massive influx of migrants crossing the Mediterranean

AUSTRALIA’s political opposition hopes to harness momentum from the Irish gay marriage referendum after it proposed a law yesterday that would recognize same-sex marriages, which the country’s conservative prime minister opposes. Center-left Labor Party leader Bill Shorten became the first leader of a major Australian political party to back a bill to overturn a national ban on gay marriage.

GREECE As Greece and its creditors struggle to reach a deal that would get the country more rescue money, Athens is looking at ways that might buy it more time. One would be asking the IMF to bundle together all its repayments due this month, meaning it would no longer face a repayment on Friday.

VIETNAM-USA Defense Minister Phung Quang Thanh and U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said the two nations are expanding their defense cooperation to include plans to conduct military operations together. Carter also said that the U.S. will provide USD18 million to Vietnam to buy vessels for the Coast Guard. The Pentagon chief urged Vietnamese officials to give up their reclamation projects in the South China Sea. China’s rapidly expanding building projects have raised tensions and caused concerns among the United States, Vietnam and other countries in the region.

NIGERIA  A runaway oil tanker truck exploded in a crowded bus station in the south of the country, igniting 11 other vehicles and killing 69, Nigeria’s Red Cross said yesterday. Red Cross chairman Peter Emeka Kathy said about 30 other victims have been hospitalized with severe burns.

USA The U.S. Supreme Court has sided with a Muslim woman who did not get hired after she showed up to a job interview with clothing retailer Abercrombie & Fitch wearing a head scarf. The justices said yesterday that employers generally have to accommodate job applicants and employees with religious needs if the employer at least has an idea that such accommodation is necessary.