World briefs

JAPAN-N. KOREA Japan is stepping up patrols and urging local authorities and fishermen to be on the alert after several boats thought to be from North Korea, some carrying dead bodies, were found on its northern coast.

INDONESIA Rain-triggered landslides and floods have killed 11 villagers on Indonesia’s main island of Java, an official said yesterday.

AUSTRALIA Police have arrested a man accused of planning a mass shooting for New Year’s Eve in a crowded Melbourne square. Ali Ali, a 20-year-old Australian-born citizen with Somali parents, was trying to obtain an automatic rifle to attack the downtown Federation Square in Australia’s second-largest city.

BANGLADESH’s High Court has upheld a verdict by a trial court sentencing 139 border guards to death for their actions in a 2009 mutiny in which 74 people, including 57 military commanders, were killed.

EGYPT Authorities say security forces have killed at least 14 Islamic militants in Sinai and an adjacent Suez Canal province following the massacre at a village mosque in the northern part of the peninsula last week that killed 305 people.

KENYA President Uhuru Kenyatta was sworn in for a second term yesterday in what some hoped would be the end of months of election turmoil, which Kenyatta said stretched the country “almost to the breaking point.” But violence continued, with at least one person killed as police fired rifles and tear gas to break up a large opposition gathering.

IRELAND’s deputy prime minister resigned yesterday to avert a parliamentary vote that would have collapsed the government and triggered a snap election at a crunch time for Brexit negotiations.

BRAZIL For the second time this year, a small hot-air balloon — also known as a “lantern” — has set fire to the velodrome built for last year’s Rio de Janeiro Olympics. Local media showed firefighters standing on the roof of the building putting out the fire.

COLOMBIA An Israeli man built a Latin American network of hostels that provided drugs and prostitutes for backpackers, a Colombian official said Monday after the suspect was deported.

OPEC Energy ministers from both Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates dodged questions yesterday about whether OPEC will extend the cartel’s oil production cuts, saying the decision will come at a planned meeting in Vienna later this week.

NIGERIA Africa’s most populous city is aiming to become a cultural hub for the continent, as the boisterous city of Lagos hosted the AFRICAN Culture and Design festival. Exhibits included a mix of traditional and modern art, with the goal of expanding awareness of Africa’s creative talents.