Briefly

UNITED STATES

Trump fined for violating gag order

The New York judge presiding over former president Donald Trump's civil fraud trial fined the former US president $5,000 on Friday for not complying with a partial gag order and threatened him with possible jail time for future violations. Judge Arthur Engoron ordered the 77-year-old Trump to pay the fine within the next 10 days to the New York Lawyers' Fund for Client Protection. "Make no mistake: future violations, whether intentional or unintentional, will subject the violator to far more severe sanctions," Engoron said in a court filing. Engoron slapped a limited gag order on the former president on October 3 after he insulted the judge's principal law clerk in a social media post on his Truth Social platform. The offending post was removed from Truth Social the same day, but the judge complained in his filing on Friday that it remained on a Trump 2024 campaign website for 17 days, until the court asked on Thursday that it be taken down.

AUSTRALIA

Endangered birds found in New South Wales

The state government of Australia's New South Wales said on Sunday that Mukarrthippi Grasswren, one of the country's rarest birds, has been found expanding its known range to new areas. According to the NSW government, at least six birds were recently detected at three locations within Yathong Nature Reserve. These new sites are located over 6 kilometers away from the previously known habitat. The wildlife authority is declaring the core habitat as an asset of intergenerational significance to shield the critically endangered Mukarrthippi Grasswren.

TONGA

Volcano eruption depletes ozone layer

The eruption of the Hunga TongaHunga Ha'apai volcano in Tonga last year shot out a huge amount of water vapor into the sky, reaching heights of up to 55 kilometers and depleting 5 percent of the ozone layer in some regions in just one week, according to a study published on Friday. The research published in Science details balloon measurements taken all the way over near Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean to understand how volcanic eruptions influence climate and ozone chemistry. The volcanic eruption on Jan 15, 2022, was the largest recorded since 1883. The increased humidity in the stratosphere led to a series of interactions between other components shot out from the volcano that ultimately broke down ozone over the tropical southwestern Pacific and Indian Ocean regions, the authors said.

Agencies - Xinhua