World briefs
TURKEY Nearly 500 suspects, including generals and military pilots, went on trial yesterday in Turkey accused of leading last year’s failed coup attempt and carrying out attacks from an air base in Ankara. Many of the suspects face life terms in prison for crimes that include violating the Constitution, murder, attempting to assassinate the president and attempting to overthrow the government.
CAMBODIA’s prime minister yesterday ordered the ouster of an American-led Christian organization that seeks to rescue and rehabilitate women working in the sex trade, saying its comments in a TV report last week demeaned the country.
THAILAND Former Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra declared her innocence and asked for “kindness” from a court yesterday during her final statement in a criminal negligence trial that could land her in prison for 10 years if she is convicted.
AUSTRALIA A survey of more than 30,000 Australian university students released yesterday found that half the respondents had been sexually harassed and almost one in 50 had been sexually assaulted on campuses, but few made formal complaints.
PAKISTAN’s newly-elected Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has been sworn in to his office at the presidency palace in the capital, Islamabad. Top leaders from the ruling Pakistan Muslim League party, diplomats, bureaucrats and senior military officials attended the ceremony, which was held hours after the lower house of the parliament elected Abbasi as the prime minister with 221 votes.
JORDAN The lower house of Jordan’s parliament yesterday scrapped a provision in the kingdom’s penal code that allowed a rapist to escape punishment if he married his victim.
BULGARIA-MACEDONIA Macedonia and neighboring Bulgaria signed a landmark friendship agreement yesterday that is designed to dampen a historic rivalry in a section of the Balkans where many countries remain at odds over old ethnic and territorial disputes.
FINLAND Two Spanish NATO jet fighters briefly violated Finnish airspace while intercepting three Russian aircraft near Estonia yesterday, NATO said.
COLOMBIA The United Nations began removing containers holding more than 7,000 weapons from demobilization zones where the arms were handed over by former fighters for Colombia’s largest rebel group who are beginning life as civilians under a peace agreement.
BRAZIL A Brazilian baby who was shot while still inside his mother’s womb a month ago has been buried in Rio de Janeiro, in a case that has become a symbol of surging violence in the city’s slums.
