IN BRIEF (Page 11)

Republic Of Korea

New committee for DPRK summit

President Moon Jae-in formed a committee to prepare for the upcoming summit meeting with Kim Jong-un, top leader of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, the Blue House said on Thursday. Moon appointed Im Jong-seok, presidential chief of staff, to lead the preparation committee. Moon and Kim have agreed to hold their first meeting in late April at Peace House, an ROK building in the truce village of Panmunjom that straddles the two neighbors.

United States

Trump picks new economic aide

US television commentator and conservative economic analyst Larry Kudlow, 70, will replace Gary Cohn as President Donald Trump's top economic adviser, the White House and Kudlow said on Wednesday, adding another loyalist to Trump's inner circle. Kudlow, a Republican who served as an economic adviser to former president Ronald Reagan in the 1980s and also worked on Wall Street, is an ardent advocate of "supply side" economic policies that focus on cutting taxes and reducing regulations.

2 killed in Super Hornet jet crash

The US Navy said on Wednesday two aviators had been killed in an F/A-18F Super Hornet crash during a training flight off the coast of Key West, Florida. The Navy said in a statement the pilot and weapons systems officer were recovered from the water and declared dead after the two-seater jet crashed on its final approach to Naval Air Station Key West. The incident is under investigation, it said.

Japan

Govt separates subway attackers

Seven of 13 members of a cult behind a deadly sarin attack in Tokyo's subway have been moved to different prison facilities, the Justice Ministry said on Thursday, as speculation grew that they could soon be executed. All criminal prosecutions against former Aum Shinrikyo members concluded in January. The move came more than two decades after the cult's members released deadly sarin on the Tokyo subway system during rush hour, killing 13 people and injuring thousands.

Iran

$740 million oil deal with Russia

Iran's state-run oil company has signed a $740 million agreement with a Russian-Iranian consortium to develop two oil fields near the Iraqi border. Under the agreement, about 105 million barrels of crude will be produced over a 10-year span in oil fields in Aban and West Paidar in the southwest near the border with Iraq. This is the second energy contract with foreign companies following the landmark 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.

Syria

Aid convoy enters eastern Ghouta

The International Committee of the Red Cross in Syria said a convoy of 25 aid trucks entered the northern pocket of Syria's besieged eastern Ghouta on Thursday. The Syrian Arab Red Crescent said around 340 tons of food aid had entered eastern Ghouta in a convoy in cooperation with the ICRC and the United Nations.

(China Daily 03/16/2018 page11)