World briefs

CHINA-US The U.S. Army chief of staff told Chinese officials during a visit yesterday that China should not feel threatened by American ally South Korea’s decision to deploy a powerful U.S. missile defense system.

CHINA The ousted editors of a liberal Chinese magazine are suing the government in an effort to wrest back control of one of the country’s best-known political journals.

AFGHANISTAN A breakaway Taliban faction has appointed a new leader for the group, the nephew of the faction’s leader who was killed last year.

PAKISTAN’s Interior Minister says a blacklisted American citizen who entered Pakistan earlier this month has been deported again after being interrogated. Ali Khan told the National Assembly that Matthew Barrett, a 33-year-old Alabama native (pictured, right), was first deported in 2011 after being detained near a sensitive military installation. He did not say when Barrett was deported this time.

THAILAND If Muslim separatists in southern Thailand were responsible for the bombings last week at tourist spots, it would mark a dangerous new expansion of the low-level war that has plagued the mostly Buddhist country for more than a decade.

AUSTRIA A knife-wielding man attacked passengers yesterday on a train in western Austria, seriously wounding two teenagers, police said. The suspect was arrested.

USA Authorities in Florida say a man who may have been on a hallucinogenic drug fatally stabbed a married couple, biting off part of the man’s face before wounding a would-be rescuer. Martin County Sheriff William Snyder told reporters yesterday that a man in his 20s may have been on drugs when he attacked the couple at their Tequesta home yesterday [Macau time].

USA Fire crews gained some significant ground on a massive Northern California wildfire that has destroyed 175 homes, businesses and other structures and charred nearly 7 square miles. Authorities arrested 40-year-old Damin Anthony Pashilk on 17 counts of arson. 1,600 firefighters were battling the blaze yesterday through warm temperatures and light winds.

VEGAS The last tower of the iconic Riviera Hotel and Casino came tumbling down along the Las Vegas Strip to make way for a convention center expansion. The demolition of the Monte Carlo wing came two months after the taller Monaco tower was leveled the same way. The 2,075-room property closed in May 2015 after 60 years hosting headliners from Liberace to Dean Martin.