Welcome to the Overnight News Digest with a crew consisting of founder Magnifico, current leader Neon Vincent, regular editors side pocket, maggiejean, Chitown Kev, Interceptor7, Magnifico, annetteboardman, jck, and Besame. Alumni editors include (but not limited to) Man Oh Man, wader, palantir, Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse (RIP), ek hornbeck (RIP), ScottyUrb, Doctor RJ, BentLiberal, Oke (RIP) and jlms qkw.
OND is a regular community feature on Daily Kos, consisting of news stories from around the world, sometimes coupled with a daily theme, original research or commentary. Editors of OND impart their own presentation styles and content choices, typically publishing each day near 12:00 AM Eastern Time.
Please feel free to share your articles and stories in the comments.
We have some interesting tidbits from around the world this evening. No discussion of US politics. But lots of challenges elsewhere just as we have them.
From CNN:
By Nimi Princewill, AnneClaire Stapleton, Stephanie Busari and Martin Goillandeau, CNN
(CNN)At least 13 people were killed in a blast in western Ghana on Thursday after a motorcycle collided with a vehicle carrying explosives, according to officials.
An additional 59 people were injured in the explosion, according to AFP.
From the BBC:
Three Canadians have been shot and one has died after a dispute among guests at a hotel resort near Cancún, Mexico, local security officials say.
Gunfire erupted on Friday at the Hotel Xcaret Mexico in the tourist town of Playa del Carmen, about 70km (45 miles) south of Cancún on the Caribbean coast.
From CNN:
Kyiv, Ukraine (CNN)Tensions between Ukraine and Russia are at their highest in years, with a Russian troop build-up near the two nations' borders spurring fears that Moscow could launch an invasion.
Ukraine has warned that
Russia is trying to destabilize the country ahead of any planned military invasion. Western powers have repeatedly warned Russia against further aggressive moves against Ukraine.
From the New York Times:
Businesses that held on through several outbreaks are now trembling as the highflying metropolitan hub struggles with supply chain issues and a relentless approach to the pandemic.
HONG KONG — Perry Lam felt confident that his business had weathered the worst of the pandemic. Several rounds of bar closures in Hong Kong had dimmed the city’s vibrant nightlife, threatening to destroy his brewery. But things seemed better late last year.
After the government’s relentless effort to stamp out the virus, there were no local infections, bars began ordering kegs of his lager again and money was coming in. “You saw the silver lining,” said Mr. Lam, 34.
From the Daily Beast:
ROME—The last thing most people will now remember about Pope Benedict XVI is not likely his legacy as head of the Roman Catholic Church or his historic resignation in 2013.
Thanks to an investigation conducted by the German law firm Westpfahl Spilker Wastl, it is likely going to be that before he became pontiff, Joseph Ratzinger knowingly allowed rampant clerical sex abuse to continue when he was head of the Munich diocese. “During [Ratzinger’s] time in office, there were abuse cases happening,” Martin Pusch, who headed the investigation ordered by the German church, told reporters. “In those cases, those priests continued their work without sanctions. The church did not do anything.”
From Kyodo News:
An earthquake with a magnitude of 6.6 rattled southwestern and western Japan early Saturday, leaving more than 10 injured amid strong shaking but no tsunami waves were triggered, the weather agency and local authorities said.
The focus of the quake under the Pacific Ocean was within a zone off Japan's coast where it is predicted that a massive earthquake and ensuing tsunami could occur in the future. Saturday's quake had a magnitude lower than 6.8, the standard for the government to hold an extraordinary expert meeting to evaluate an earthquake.
From The Guardian:
NLD politician and hip hop artist Phyo Zayar Thaw handed sentence alongside democracy activist Kyaw Min Yu
A military tribunal in Myanmar has sentenced a member of Aung San Suu Kyi’s ousted party to death for terror offences, as the junta ramped up a crackdown on the toppled leader’s party.
The south-east Asian country has been in chaos since the February coup, with more than 1,400 killed in a subsequent crackdown on dissent, according to a local monitoring group.
From the New York Times:
The disaster caused by the largest eruption in decades has been defined so far by the nation’s near-complete disconnection in an ever-connected age.
Damien Cave
SYDNEY, Australia — When the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai volcano erupted with colossal force at 5:10 p.m. local time on Saturday, Jan. 15, Soane Francis Siua, a Catholic seminary student in Fiji, heard a loud boom and tried to work out why the earth seemed to be rattling.
Thunderstorm? Earthquake? Cyclone? No, he quickly discovered: It was a volcano not far offshore from where he grew up in Tonga. He remembered being home when it erupted a few years ago. This time, based on what he could feel from 400 miles away, he suspected something far worse.
From the BBC:
By Jonathan Marcus
A sharp escalation in the conflict in Yemen this week has raised questions about the direction the war is taking and what it means for the wider region.
From The Daily Beast:
Corbin Bolies
Two men went into a local post office in Ireland on Friday to try and make a quick buck off a dead man’s pension—and, naturally, they brought the body with them.
In an incident almost eerily reminiscent of Weekend at Bernie’s, one man initially tried to enter Hosey’s shop and post office in the Irish town of Carlow to claim the pension on behalf of another man. He was told no, and he later returned with two other men—one breathing, one not—to claim the payment, according to the Irish Times.
From Insider.com:
- Tonga turned away a plane carrying disaster aid from Australia after someone on board tested positive for COVID-19.
- The tsunami-ravaged Pacific nation is one of the few countries completely free of COVID-19.
- The aid supplies on board the plane were put on another flight that departed on Friday.
From local.12.com:
ALBERTA, Canada (WKRC) - Health officials in Canada have ordered a restaurant to close temporarily after it was found that employees were accepting dog photos instead proof of vaccination or negative COVID-19 test results.
In Alberta, businesses are required to ask for one of the two, or a medical exemption, for indoor venues. They also must require patrons to wear masks.