IN BRIEF (Page 12)

Iran

Teheran warns of possible Israeli action

Iran will respond firmly to any Israeli naval action against its oil shipments, Iran's defense minister said on Wednesday, in comments that came a week after Israel's prime minister said its navy could act against Iranian oil "smuggling" to evade US sanctions. US President Donald Trump last year quit a nuclear deal with Iran and reimposed some sanctions, aiming to cut Teheran's oil exports to zero. Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told naval officers last week that Iran was still resorting to clandestine measures to ship fuel. Iran's Defense Minister Amir Hatami told the state news agency IRNA that Teheran had the military capabilities to confront any Israeli intervention, and said the international community would also not accept such action.

Vietnam

Malaysia urged to release female suspect

Vietnamese Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh had a telephone conversation with his Malaysian counterpart on Tuesday, regarding the trial of Vietnamese woman Doan Thi Huong involved in the 2017 murder of a man from the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. He asked Malaysia to set her free, local media reported on Wednesday. Huong's Indonesian co-defendant, Siti Aisyah, was released on Monday after two years in custody. Aisyah and Huong, 30, were accused of smearing the DPRK man, with a nerve agent at Kuala Lumpur airport on Feb 13, 2017, resulting in his death.

Mexico

19 migrants kidnapped from bus at border

Nineteen passengers kidnapped from a bus last week in northern Mexico were migrants, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said on Tuesday, as investigators worked through the murky details of the case. The men were crossing the violent state of Tamaulipas, on the US-Mexican border, on Thursday when four vehicles blocked the road and forced their bus to stop, according to authorities. Armed men then boarded the coach and kidnapped 19 passengers whose names they had on a list. The bus was traveling from the port of Tampico to Reynosa, a border city across from McAllen, Texas.

Republic of Korea

Star quits as K-pop sex scandal spreads

A burgeoning K-pop sex scandal claimed a second scalp as a singer who rose to fame after coming second in one of the country's top talent shows admitted secretly filming himself having sex and sharing the footage. Jung Joonyoung, 30, announced his immediate retirement from show business amid allegations he shot and shared sexual imagery without his partners' consent. "I admit to all my crimes," he said on Tuesday. He was one of three male artists in a group chat room where some members shared secretly filmed footage of a sexual nature of at least 10 women, according to local broadcaster SBS.

Reuters - Xinhua - AFP

(China Daily 03/14/2019 page12)