Sri Lanka bombings – Live: Hotel reveals bomber ‘queued calmly for breakfast buffet’ before detonating device, as death toll rises sharply
Blasts hit churches and hotels 10 years after end of civil war
Coordinated Easter Sunday bombings that ripped through Sri Lankan churches and luxury hotels were carried out by seven suicide bombers, a government investigator has revealed.
The bombings, the country’s deadliest violence since a devastating civil war ended a decade ago on the island nation, killed at least 290 people with more than 500 wounded. Eight Britons are among the dead.
Security forces are carrying out searches across the island to search for those behind the bombs at churches and hotels. No group has claimed responsibility.
Comedian wins landslide victory in Ukrainian presidential election
Volodymyr Zelenskiy, an actor and comedian with no political experience other than playing the role of president in a TV series, has won a landslide victory in Ukraine’s presidential election, with near-complete counting showing he has won over 70% of the vote.
The incumbent, Petro Poroshenko conceded defeat on Sunday evening before results started coming in.
According to official results released on Monday morning, with 85% of the vote counted, 41-year-old Zelenskiy had won 73.4% of the vote, compared to Poroshenko’s 24.4%.
Morocco: Thousands call for release of jailed activists
Huge crowds have rallied in the Moroccan capital to demand the release of activists who staged mass anti-poverty demonstrations in 2016. One campaigner’s father said he feared his son would die in prison.
Thousands of protesters have marched through downtown Rabat to denounce jail sentences given to dozens of activists over their role in the Hirak Rif movement.
The poverty-fighting campaign, which began in 2016 in the impoverished Rif region, led to the biggest unrest seen in Morocco since the 2011 Arab Spring.
Carlos Ghosn charged a fourth time for breach of trust
Japanese authorities on Monday hit former Nissan boss Carlos Ghosn with a fresh charge of aggravated breach of trust, the fourth formal indictment against the auto sector tycoon.
Public broadcaster NHK and local news agency Jiji Press reported that prosecutors filed the new indictment that paves the way for his legal team to apply for bail.
The 65-year-old strenuously denies all allegations against him and insists they have been cooked up in a “plot” by Nissan executives wary of his plans to bring the Japanese car giant closer to its French partner Renault.
The most effective ways to curb climate change might surprise you
By Drew Kann, Will Houp, Judson Jones, and Sean O’Key
The planet is barreling toward 1.5 degrees of global warming as soon as 2030 unless we enact “unprecedented changes in all aspects of society,” a dire United Nations report warned in October.
To reduce our impact on the climate and avert disaster, it’s going to take more than switching to high-efficiency light bulbs. But the most effective ways that individuals, policymakers and businesses can reduce our carbon footprint might surprise you.
Let’s see how much you know about what can be done to fight climate change.
Valley of the dolls: Scarecrows outnumber people in Tokushima village
By Natsuko Fukue
In the tiny village of Nagoro, deep in the mountains of Tokushima Prefecture, the wind howls down a deserted street with not a living soul to be seen.
But yet the street appears busy, dotted with life-sized dolls that outnumber humans 10 to one, the product of a one-woman bid to counter the emptiness and loneliness felt in Nagoro, like many Japanese villages decimated by depopulation.
Nagoro has become known as the valley of dolls after local resident Tsukimi Ayano began placing scarecrows on the street to inject some life into her depopulated village.
1 comments
Good Morning, or most likely, good evening if you’re still in Japan and welcome back. I hope you’re well.
Thank you for the postings and as always feel free to post whenever you can.
I’m should be back to speed tonight. Hopefully, ek will have his internet issues resolved this evening, too.
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