TOKYO : Japan’s defence budget will swell to a record $47 billion for the next fiscal year, the government said Friday, as Tokyo beefs up its missile defence and deploys stealth jets in a bid to counter China. The defence spending was part of a $912-billion national budget for the fiscal...
International
CHICAGO : Almost 700 clergymen in Illinois have been accused of child sexual assault, a far greater number than the Catholic Church had previously disclosed, the Midwestern US state’s top prosecutor revealed Wednesday.
Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan said the Church’s revelations...
WASHINGTON : The US Senate on Wednesday night approved an emergency short-term spending bill that averts a looming government shutdown, but excludes funds that President Donald Trump sought for a US-Mexico border wall.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said the measure will fund normal...
WASHINGTON : The Latest on former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn and the Russia investigation (all times local):
7:30 p.m.
Judge Emmet Sullivan is throwing another wrench into former national security adviser Michael Flynn’s plans.
Just hours after delaying Flynn’s...
MEXICO CITY : Mexico’s austerity-minded president, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, on Tuesday returned a third of his salary to the state treasury. Lopez took office on Dec. 1 and pledged to curb public spending, including by slashing his own wages. He gave back 29 percent of the amount paid to...
WASHINGTON : Journalists faced growing dangers of being targeted for killing for their work in 2018 even as the risks from war and conflict declined, a media watchdog said Wednesday. The Committee to Protect Journalists said 34 of the 53 journalists killed on duty this year around the world were...
TOKYO : Japan on Tuesday approved plans to convert two ships into aircraft carriers — the nation’s first since World War II — as it tries to counter growing Chinese military power in the region. The new five-year defence plan calls for the military to upgrade two existing...
BEIJING : President Xi Jinping warned Tuesday that no one can “dictate” China’s economic development path as the Communist Party marked 40 years of its historic “reform and opening up” policy amid a stern challenge from the United States. In a speech at the grandiose...
SEOUL : One of South Korean largest human rights groups will strip Myanmar’s de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi of its 2004 prize because of her “indifference” to the atrocities against the Rohingya minority, organisers said Tuesday. Suu Kyi was unable to receive the Gwangju...
Washington D.C. [USA] : The United States of America has lowered the number of troops deployed at the US-Mexico border to 3,150 from 5,900. The troops had been deployed in November this year to assist Customs and Border Protection (CBP) as migrants arrived at the frontier from Central America in...
