Chinese media calls for ‘people’s war’ as US trade war heats up
Updated 0505 GMT (1305 HKT) May 14, 2019
China will survive its trade war with the United States, state media insists, as it mounts a fierce new propaganda campaign against US “greed.”
North Korea: spring drought deepens concerns over food shortages
State media says rainfall was at record lows for the first five months of the year as experts blame climate change
Fears are growing for young children and other vulnerable groups as a drought in North Korea threatens to worsen food shortages in the isolated country.
The Red Cross said the drought that began in early spring added to the woes of last year when food production fell to the lowest level in a decade. Four in 10 people in North Korea are estimated to be in urgent need of food assistance.
“We are particularly concerned about the impact that this early drought will have on children and adults who are already struggling to survive,” said Mohamed Babiker, who heads the North Korea office of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
Revealed: Tory links to Steve Bannon’s far-right training school
A secretive training school for far-right “culture warriors” set up by Steve Bannon has close links to Tory politicians and advisors, an investigation has revealed.
“The Academy for the Judeo-Christian West” set up shop in a remote 800-year-old former Italian monastery earlier this year with the stated aim of becoming a “gladiator school” to train the “next generation of nationalist and populist leaders” who would propagate the ideology across Europe.
While former Trump adviser Mr Bannon wrote the academy’s curriculum and picked its name, day-to-day operations are handled by a right-wing think-tank called the Dignitatis Humanae Institute (DHI), which took on the abbey’s lease in January this year. DHI boasts an array of links to Britain’s Conservative party dating back years
Deadly clashes in Sudan after military, protest leaders strike deal
Five Sudanese protesters and an army major were shot dead Monday in the capital, hours after protest leaders and the ruling generals reached a breakthrough agreement on transitional authorities to run the country.
The latest developments came as the prosecutor general’s office said ousted president Omar al-Bashir had been charged over the killings of protesters during anti-regime demonstrations that led to the end of his rule last month.
The major and a protester were killed at a sit-in outside the army headquarters in Khartoum where thousands of protesters remain camped for weeks, demanding that the army generals who took power after ousting Bashir step down.
Indefinite curfew in Sri Lanka province amid anti-Muslim riots
A Sri Lankan province north of the capital, Colombo, was placed under indefinite curfew on Tuesday after anti-Muslim riots in the wake of the Easter bombings, police said.
A nationwide night curfew was relaxed in all areas except the North Western Province (NWP) where a Muslim man was killed by a mob on Monday, police said, in a violent backlash against last month’s bombings.
The 45-year-old died of injuries sustained when a crowd stormed his carpentry workshop in the Puttalam district in the NWP and slashed him, official sources said.
WhatsApp discovers ‘targeted’ surveillance attack
Hackers were able to remotely install surveillance software on phones and other devices using a major vulnerability in messaging app WhatsApp, it has been confirmed.
WhatsApp, which is owned by Facebook, said the attack targeted a “select number” of users, and was orchestrated by “an advanced cyber actor”.
A fix was rolled out on Friday.
The attack was developed by Israeli security firm NSO Group, according to a report in the Financial Times.
On Monday, WhatsApp urged all of its 1.5 billion users to update their apps as an added precaution.
The attack was first discovered earlier this month.