World briefs
HONG KONG’s government said yesterday there are no plans to remove a pair of statues depicting World War II Japanese army sex slaves known as “comfort women” that were erected in front of Japan’s Consulate in the Chinese territory. Activist Tsang Kin-shing said the bronze statues were a reminder to Japan of its culpability in forcing women recruited or captured from Japan, the Korean Peninsula and elsewhere to serve in front-line brothels.
MALAYSIA held a memorial service yesterday to mark the anniversary of the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over eastern Ukraine in July 2014, which killed all 298 people aboard. More than 90 family members attended the memorial.
NORTH KOREA A magnitude 5.9 earthquake off North Korea early yesterday jolted watchers of the country’s weapons development but experts say it was not caused by a nuclear test. The quake was centered far offshore and very deep while North Korea’s past nuclear tests were conducted on land.
JAPAN has protested to North Korea after a Japanese patrol vessel spotted an armed boat believed to be from there allegedly fishing illegally, an official said yesterday.
SAUDI ARABIA says 11 South Asian workers have died in a fire that engulfed the building where they lived. The kingdom’s civil defense says the fire, which broke out Wednesday in the southwestern city of Najran, injured another six. Saudi media, quoting civil defense, say the victims were from India and Bangladesh.
IRAQ Human Rights Watch yesterday condemned videos circulating on social media purportedly showing Iraqi forces killing and beating men suspected of being Islamic State group fighters in Mosul.
POLAND said yesterday it was glad it will have a chance to defend its logging in the ancient Bialowieza forest before a European Union court and implied that it knows better about the preservation of nature than western Europe.
FRANCE-GERMANY Maintaining healthy ties with President Donald Trump is essential despite clear differences of opinion, the leaders of France and Germany said yesterday. German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that last week’s G-20 summit in Hamburg showed common ground, for instance on fighting terrorism.
BRAZIL Former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva launched a defiant public defense yesterday after being convicted of corruption and money laundering, accusing his political opponents of trying to prevent him from becoming president again.
