LITTLE ROCK — QUOTE OF THE DAY
“Differences with Washington regarding my leadership style and certain priorities lead me to believe that it’s now time to leave.”
Scott Gration on resigning as the U.S. ambassador to Kenya Article, this page
Assange defies U.K. order, stays put
LONDON - WikiLeaks chief Julian Assange has defied a British police summons and won’t be leaving the Ecuadorean Embassy in London until he hears about his asylum bid, a member of his defense fund said Friday.
British police had demanded that the computer expert report to a London police station Friday, the first step in what would have been his extradition to Sweden over sex-crime allegations.
But Susan Benn, a member of his defense fund, said he would rebuff the U.K. authorities.
“Mr. Assange has been advised that he should decline the police request,” she told reporters gathered outside the embassy, saying that the 40-year-old Australian was seeking asylum from Ecuador and that “asylum assessments take priority over extradition claims.”
Chimps attack American in S. Africa
JOHANNESBURG - Chimpanzees at a sanctuary founded by famed primatologist Jane Goodall pulled a Texas graduate student into their fenced-off enclosure, dragging him nearly a half-mile and biting his ear and hands.
Andrew Oberle was giving a lecture to a group of tourists at the Chimp Eden sanctuary Thursday when two chimpanzees grabbed his feet and pulled him under a fence into their enclosure, said Jeffrey Wicks of the Netcare911 emergency services company.
The 26-year-old anthropology student at the University of Texas at San Antonio suffered “multiple and severe bite wounds,” Wicks said.
He was in critical condition Friday after undergoing surgery at the Mediclinic hospital in Nelspruit, 180 miles from Johannesburg, hospital officials said.
Oberle lost part of an ear and parts of his fingers in the attack, according to the South African newspaper Beeld.
It said the sanctuary’s manager, Eugene Cussons, fired into the air to scare the chimps away from Oberle.
3 blasts kill 8, hurt 38 in central Iraq
BAGHDAD - Three bombs planted on motorcycles went off in quick succession near a market and police station in a central Iraqi town Friday, killing at least eight people and wounding dozens more, officials said.
The blasts in Balad, about 50 miles north of Baghdad, were the latest in a wave of bombings and shootings that has made June one of the deadliest months in Iraq since the last U.S. troops pulled out of the country in December.
Police said the bombs, which were hidden on motorbikes and went off within minutes of one another, also wounded at least 38 people.
Balad is a predominantly Shiite town in the majority Sunni province of Salahuddin. Shiites are a prime target of al-Qaida’s offshoot in Iraq, which claimed responsibility earlier this month for attacks that killed 72 Shiite pilgrims headed to an annual religious ceremony in Baghdad.
China: Plane hijacking foiled, 6 held
BEIJING - Passengers and crew foiled a hijacking attempt by six people on a plane in China’s far-western Xinjiang region Friday, a regional airline and state media said.
An overseas rights group, however, denied a hijacking attempt took place and said a seat dispute triggered an in-air brawl.
The Tianshan regional government’s news portal said the purported hijacking attempt was made just after the plane took off from Hotan in southern Xinjiang for the regional capital of Urumqi and the six suspects were detained after the plane returned safely.
Tianjin Airlines said on its website that the plane returned to Hotan 22 minutes after takeoff. Tianshan did not give further details, such as how many passengers were on the plane or what was known about the suspects.
Dilxat Raxit, a spokesman for the German-based World Uyghur Congress, said local sources in Hotan told him that the plane turned back after Uighurs and Hans began fighting after a disagreement over seat assignments.
Hans are China’s ethnic majority, while a large population of ethnic Uighurs lives in Xinjiang.
Front Section, Pages 9 on 06/30/2012