IN BRIEF (Page 11)

United States

Trump to allow release of JFK files

US President Donald Trump announced on Saturday that he would allow the release of more than 3,000 previously classified files related to former President John F. Kennedy's assassination. The US National Archives has said that, pending presidential approval, it would make all the files available on its website in a single day by next Thursday. Kennedy, the 35th US president, was shot dead on Nov 22, 1963 in Dallas, Texas. Lee Harvey Oswald, who was accused of the shooting, was killed two days later by Jack Ruby.

Malaysia

Construction site death toll at 11

Eleven foreign workers were killed in a landslide at a construction site in northwest Malaysia on Saturday, authorities said. Earlier estimates had put the George Town death toll at 14, but three workers had managed to escape, said Ervin Galen Teruki, deputy operations head of the Fire and Rescue Department in Penang state. A seventh body was found on Sunday morning. The landslide occurred on Saturday morning at a site where two 49-storey condominium towers are being built.

Syria

US-backed militias seize key oilfield

US-backed militias said they captured a major oilfield in Deir al-Zor province on Sunday, pressing their offensive against Islamic State fighters in eastern Syria. The Syrian Democratic Forces said they gained control of al-Omar oilfield, one of Syria's largest, on the eastern bank of the Euphrates river. The SDF has been battling IS in oil-rich Deir al-Zor on territory east of the river, which bisects the province. The Syrian army, with Russian air power and Iran-backed militias, has been waging its own separate offensive against IS, mostly to the west of the river.

Australia

Divers find bodies in fishing tragedy

Australian police divers have recovered the bodies of two fishermen from a sunken trawler and were searching on Sunday for four others missing since the boat capsized nearly a week ago. The commercial fishing trawler with seven on board sank in rough seas off the coast of central Queensland state on Monday. Rescuers have been scouring the waters near Middle Island, north of the town of Seventeen Seventy, but just one crew member has been found alive.

Czech Republic

Billionaire's party claims vote win

The centrist ANO movement led by populist Andrej Babis decisively won the Czech Republic's parliamentary election Saturday in a vote that shifted the country to the right and paved the way for the euroskeptic billionaire to become its next prime minister. With all votes counted, the Czech Statistics Office said ANO won in a landslide, capturing 29.6 percent of the vote, or 78 of the 200 seats in the lower house of Parliament. Babis is the county's second-richest man, with a media empire including two major newspapers and a popular radio station.

France

Mustachioed Mona Lisa sold at auction

One of Marcel Duchamp's reproductions of Leonardo Da Vinci's Mona Lisa, on to which he pencilled a beard and moustache, has sold for 632,500 euros ($750,000) at Sotheby's in Paris. It was part of the sale of a collection of surrealist works owned by American Arthur Brandt, with 110 pieces fetching 3.9 million euros. Duchamp's version of the Mona Lisa was one of nine works in the sale by the French artist, who is seen as the father of conceptual art.

Xinhua - Reuters - AFP - AP

(China Daily 10/23/2017 page11)