Philippine prosecutors said Wednesday they will file a libel charge carrying up to 12 years in prison against journalist Maria Ressa, who leads a news website that has clashed with President Rodrigo Duterte's administration.
The case -- under a controversial cybercrime law penalising online libel -- adds to legal pressure on Ressa and her site Rappler, which has already been hit with tax evasion charges that could shutter the outlet and put her behind bars.
Ressa, who was named a Time Magazine "Person of the Year" in 2018 for her journalistic work, slammed the fresh case as a new front of "harassment" intended to silence her website.
Rappler has drawn the administration's ire since publishing reports critical of Duterte's signature anti-drug crackdown that has killed thousands of alleged users and pushers since 2016.
However, the new case against Ressa and former Rappler reporter Reynaldo Santos, Jr stems from a 2012 report written about a businessman's alleged ties to a then-judge on 

Philippines announces libel charge against critical journalist

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A Canadian cryptocurrency exchange was granted bankruptcy protection on Monday after its president took passwords for accounts containing 180 million Canadian dollar (USD 137 million) to his grave when he died suddenly.
In a statement, QuadrigaCX said it sought protection from creditors after weeks of attempting to "locate and secure our very significant cryptocurrency reserves" following the death of its president Gerald Cotten.
Nova Scotia's high court granted the application made by Cotten's widow Jennifer Robertson on behalf of the company, which has also stopped currency trading on its platform.
Quadriga CX had announced mid-January that Cotten died of complications from Crohn's disease on December 9 while volunteering at an orphanage in India. He was 30.
In an affidavit, Robertson said the company has been unable to access an encrypted computer that he is believed to have used to store the cryptocurrencies owed to 115,000 users.
"I do not know the password or recovery key," ...

Bitcoin exchange president's death puts millions out of reach

It's not a good look when the extras are the top score, but that's what happened to an Australian women's side who were all out for 10 on Wednesday.
It took six extras for South Australia to reach double figures at the National Indigenous Cricket Championship in Alice Springs.
Opener Febi Mansell scored the only runs off the bat with four followed by 10 ducks against New South Wales.
Roxsanne Van-Veen returned the unbelievable figures of five wickets for one run off two overs. Naomi Woods took two wickets with the only two balls she bowled.
The innings was over in just 62 deliveries and NSW only needed 15 balls to knock off their target in the scheduled Twenty20 match.

Extras top score as Australian side all out for 10

Japanese car giant Toyota on Wednesday slashed its full-year net profit forecast after profits tumbled nearly 30 percent in the first nine months.
The maker of the Camry sedan and Prius hybrid now expects annual net profit of 1.87 trillion yen ($17 billion) instead of 2.3 trillion yen it projected three months ago.
The new forecast represents a 25-percent plunge from the last year.
Its net profit for the nine months to December came to 1.42 trillion yen, down 29.3 percent from the same period the previous year.
Operating profit rose 9.5 percent to 1.94 trillion yen on sales of 22.5 trillion yen, an increase of 3.1 percent.
Fellow Japanese automaker Honda last week logged a net-profit fall of 34.5 percent for the nine months to December but revised up its full-year forecasts thanks to strong motorcycle sales.
Nissan is to announce results next week, the first since its former chief executive Carlos Ghosn was arrested on November 19 for financial misconduct.

Toyota nine-month net profit dives 30%, cuts forecast

Just one year after the world's best skiers and skaters gathered in South Korea to compete for Olympic gold, many of the venues stand empty, with arguments mounting over their future and upkeep costs.
The country built six sports centres and a ceremonial stadium from scratch for the 2018 Winter Olympics and renovated six existing facilities at a total cost of $800 million.
But today only the occasional elderly stroller passes through the Olympic park in Gangneung, where the cavernous speed-skating arena stands dark and ice-less.
The sliding centre in Pyeongchang, where South Korea's Yun Sung-bin won Asia's first Olympic skeleton gold, is locked with barriers blocking road access.
And protesters are demanding that a downhill ski slope site be developed into a resort and not, as promised, returned to nature.
South Korea also spent more than $10 billion on infrastructure before the Games, including a high-speed railway from Seoul to Gangneung, 200 kilometres (120 miles) east of the ...

Silence echoes across Pyeongchang Olympic venues

Two and a half years after becoming UEFA president in the wake of the scandal that brought down Michel Platini, Aleksander Ceferin will win a new four-year term at the head of European football's governing body on Thursday.
The 51-year-old Slovenian lawyer -- who saw off the Dutchman Michael van Praag in 2016 -- is the only candidate this time in the election for the UEFA president, which will be take place at the organisation's Congress in Rome.
Previously the head of the Slovenian Football Federation, Ceferin's presidency so far has been marked by his discretion and a less charismatic approach than that of Platini.
The Frenchman is still suspended until October this year, when he will complete a four-year ban from all football-related activities following the corruption scandal that also brought down then-FIFA chief Sepp Blatter.
"The situation was ideal. The biggest scandal had tarnished football's image," Ceferin admitted during a recent speech to students in Ljubljana as he ...

Challenges lie ahead as UEFA president Ceferin set for re-election

The former chief of the Guatemalan football federation, who was convicted for extortion and fraud in connection with the FifaGate scandal, was sentenced to time served and fined $350,000.
US District Judge Pamela Chen in New York authorized Brayan Jimenez -- who presided over Guatemala's National Football Federation between December 2009 and May 2015 -- to take back his passport and return to his country, court documents showed.
A court spokeswoman and his lawyer Justine Harris added he would have to pay a fine of $350,000. He will remain on probation for two years.
Jimenez had spent more than 20 days in a Guatemalan jail, following his arrest in Guatemala City in early 2016, before being extradited to the United States, according to a spokesman for the Brooklyn federal prosecutor.
He received a reduced sentence after pleading guilty in July 2016 to conspiracy to extort and to fraud, in connection with bribes received in exchange for granting media rights and marketing on qualifying ..

Ex-Guatemala boss sentenced to time served, fined $350,000

British crash investigators launched an underwater operation to recover a body from the wreckage of the plane carrying Argentine footballer Emiliano Sala in the Channel.
"We are attempting to recover the body. If we are successful, we will consider the feasibility of recovering the aircraft wreckage," an Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB) spokesperson said in a statement.
The light aircraft carrying the 28-year-old footballer and pilot David Ibbotson to his new Premier League team Cardiff City disappeared near the British island of Guernsey on January 21.
The shipwreck hunter hired by Sala's family with the help of funds donated by football stars such as Lionel Messi found the plane wreckage on Sunday.
The AAIB has since taken over operations. It revealed on Monday that an unidentified body had been found at the site.
But it warned on Tuesday that strong tides "mean we can only use the remotely operated vehicle (ROV) for limited periods each day".
"Regardless of the results, we 

UK rescuers launch bid to recover body from Sala's plane

President Donald Trump was to urge unity in his State of the Union speech Tuesday but the new spirit of bipartisanship risked withering before he even reached the podium.
The White House said the annual speech to Congress would see an "optimistic" Trump seeking to heal the Republican-Democratic divide.
"The president is calling for unity," senior advisor Kellyanne Conway told Fox News.
However, the president got into a testy exchange with the senior Democrat in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, just hours before he was due to give the nationally televised address from the chamber of the House of Representatives.
"The state of the Trump economy is failing America's middle class," Schumer tweeted.
"The state of the Trump healthcare system is failing American families. The state of the Trump Administration is chaos."
Trump ripped back at Schumer for "already criticizing my State of the Union speech, even though he hasn't seen it yet."
Another tough preview was due a few minutes before the ...

Bickering overshadows Trump's State of Union appeal for unity

North Korea's nuclear and ballistic missile programs remain intact and Pyongyang is using airports and other facilities to shield its weapons from possible US military strikes, according to a UN panel of experts.
The panel said in a report seen by AFP on Tuesday that sanctions against North Korea were "ineffective," with Pyongyang still able to acquire illegal shipments of oil products, sell banned coal and violate an arms embargo.
"The Democratic People's Republic of Korea's nuclear and ballistic missile programs remain intact," said the report, using the official name for North Korea.
"The panel found that the DPRK is using civilian facilities, including airports for ballistic missile assembly and testing with the goal of effectively preventing 'decapitation' strikes."
The confidential report was sent to the Security Council as President Donald Trump prepares for a second summit this month with leader Kim Jong Un that the United States hopes will yield concrete progress in ...

UN experts say North Korea shielding missiles at airports

Margaret Thatcher's home town cautiously backed plans to erect a statue of the late British leader -- but only after putting it on a plinth tall enough to keep vandals at bay.
The strong-willed "Iron Lady" of the 1980s remains a polarising figure in Britain six years after her death at the age of 87.
Her sweeping privatisation and deregulation efforts are credited with pulling Britain out of the economic doldrums.
But her resolve to break the trade unions -- especially the miners -- in the face of strikes and street protests made her into a hate figure for the left.
A bid to have a statue of the  Conservative party leader  stand alongside icon Winston Churchill and other leaders filling a square opposite parliament in London fizzled out last year over concerns about "potential vandalism and civil disorder".
Thatcher's daughter Carol also reportedly objected to the absence of her mother's trademark handbag.
The 10.5 foot (3.2 metres) tall bronze statue shows the former prime minister ..

Home town backs Thatcher statue

More than thirty paintings and drawings signed "A. Hitler" and presumed to be the work of the Nazi dictator are due to go under the hammer at a Nuremburg auction house on Saturday.
The pictures -- from watercolours of pastoral scenes to sketches of female nudes -- will be sold at the German city's Weidler auction house, according to its website, which includes the listing of an Adolf Hitler "special auction" at the end of its sales catalogue.
The works include pictures either "signed or monogrammed by A. Hitler" and other furnishings, it said.
They are in a variety of styles and mediums.
"The items come from Austrian or rather European private ownership, originally from famous artists of the 3rd Reich, from heirs or from the estates of collectors," the catalogue says.
According to a report on the sale in the local Nurnberger Nachrichten newspaper the starting prices vary from 130 euros ($150) for a charcoal sketch, "Weinberg Monastery", to 45,000 euros for a watercolour entitled ...

Artworks attributed to Hitler to be auctioned in Germany

A German woman and two Egyptian children were killed Tuesday when a building collapsed in a residential neighbourhood of Egypt's southern city of Luxor, a senior security official told AFP.
"So far there is a German tourist who died along with two Egyptian girls," the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The woman, who had been passing by the building the moment it collapsed at around 6 pm (1600 GMT), succumbed to her injuries soon after arriving in hospital, he said.  A German man who had been walking with the woman was injured and taken to the hospital. His relation to the woman was unclear, medical sources and other security officials said.
At least 13 other people were injured and taken to hospital, the sources said.
Luxor is one of the country's most important tourist destinations and is home to the tomb of Egypt's legendary Pharaoh Tutankhamun in the Valley of the Kings.
Authorities have been pushing to revive tourism, a pillar of the Egyptian economy, since mass ..

German tourist, 2 Egyptian girls die in Luxor building collapse

President Donald Trump's controversial choice to lead the World Bank could spark a revolt against US dominance of the institution and spur other members to unite behind an alternate candidate.
The White House has confirmed to fellow Group of Seven nations that Trump will nominate US Treasury official David Malpass, a person familiar with the matter told AFP, intending to maintain US control of one of the leading global bodies.
The Washington-based lending institution has been led by an American since the bank's founding in the aftermath of World War II, while its sister institution, the International Monetary Fund, has always been led by a European.
In recent years, the growing emerging market countries have challenged this unwritten arrangement, demanding a more open, merit-based selection process.
Experts on the process had thought it unlikely those countries would join forces against the US candidate, but agreed they might react more strongly to Malpass, a strident critic of the ...

Trump's controversial pick to lead World Bank could spark revolt

The Taliban began an extraordinary meeting with high-ranking Afghan politicians -- including women -- on Tuesday in Moscow, where rivals of President Ashraf Ghani called for an interim government as they negotiated without him.
The unprecedented gathering saw the Taliban outline their vision for Afghanistan -- including rules around women and the adoption of an Islamic constitution -- in televised talks before heavyweights, including former president Hamid Karzai.
The Taliban lead prayers and dined with the leaders -- some sworn enemies -- before sitting down for their most significant engagement with Afghan politicians in recent memory.
The roundtable -- which saw women defend their rights before the Taliban -- comes a week after the insurgents held talks with US negotiators in Doha about ending the 17-year war.
Both sides touted "progress" at the conclusion of the six-day discussions in Qatar.
The Doha and Moscow talks, though entirely separate, both excluded the government in ...

Taliban hold rare talks with Afghan politicians in Moscow

The Museum of Modern Art in New York, home to works by Picasso, Roy Lichtenstein and other modern masters, will close for four months this year to expand and offer "more art in new and interdisciplinary ways," it said on Tuesday.
MoMA is one of the most prominent art museums in the United States and will reopen on October 21.
It will have one-third more exhibition space after the $400-million project that aims to highlight "creative affinities and frictions" by displaying a range of media together -- from painting to architecture, performance, or film, the museum said in a statement.
At its heart will be a space dubbed The Studio that will feature live programming and performances "that react to, question, and challenge histories of modern art and the current cultural moment," MoMA said.
An expanded ground floor will have street-level galleries to bring art closer to people, it added.
MoMA said that upper-level galleries will showcase works in all media by artists "from more diverse ..

New York's Museum of Modern Art to undergo four-month renovation

Facebook on Tuesday added a Messenger feature for anyone who has fired off a comment they regretted -- a way to take it back.
Messenger users will now have a 10-minute window after sending a message to undo it, leaving behind a note telling everyone in a conversation that the remark was removed, according to the leading online social network.
"Have you ever accidentally sent a message to the wrong group of friends, mistyped something, or simply wanted to remove a message in a chat?" Facebook asked rhetorically.
"You're not the only one! Starting today, we are launching a feature where you can easily remove your message on Messenger."
Facebook owns the mobile messaging application used by more than a billion people.
Early last year it was revealed that Facebook co-founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg was apparently able to remove his sent messages, which caused pressure to make the feature available to all.
The freshly added feature will let people tap on a message shown in a ...

Facebook lets senders undo sent Messenger missives

The United States warned Tuesday it was prepared to prevent a new "caravan" of Central American migrants from entering the country, with US President Donald Trump tweeting that more troops have been sent to the border.
The warnings came as Trump was preparing for a State of the Union speech to Congress that was sure to feature his so far unsuccessful battle to win funding for a wall on the US-Mexico border.
"Tremendous numbers of people are coming up through Mexico in the hopes of flooding our Southern Border. We have sent additional military. We will build a Human Wall if necessary. If we had a real Wall, this would be a non-event!" Trump said on Twitter.
Republicans should be prepared "to do whatever is necessary" for border security, given the opposition of Democrats to the wall, he said.
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen followed with a statement saying that some "2,000 aliens have arrived in northern Mexico as part of a 'caravan' seeking to cross the border into ...

Washington warns new migrant 'caravan' against crossing border

Pope Francis admitted Tuesday that priests and bishops in the Catholic Church had sexually abused nuns.
"There are some priests and also bishops who have done it," the pontiff said in response to a journalist's question on the abuse of nuns, speaking on the return flight from his trip to the United Arab Emirates.
The papal admission followed a rare outcry last week from the Vatican's women's magazine over the sexual abuse of nuns by priests and religious sisters feeling forced to have abortions or raise children not recognised by their fathers.
The issue hit the headlines last year after a nun accused an Indian bishop of repeatedly raping her in a case that triggered rare dissent within the country's Catholic Church.
Francis said the problem could be found "anywhere" but was prevalent in "some new congregations and in some regions".
"I think it's still going on, because it's not something that just goes away like that. On the contrary," he added.
He said the Church has "suspended ...

Pope admits priests, bishops sexually abused nuns

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Tuesday that he would meet Russian President Vladimir Putin later this month in Moscow for talks on Iranian military activity in Syria.
It will be their first face-to-face meeting since November and follows a series of air strikes in January against what Israel said were facilities belonging to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force in Syria.
"I'll be going on February 21 again to Russia following my discussions with President Putin in Paris a few months ago and subsequent phone conversations," Netanyahu said.
"It's very important that we continue to prevent Iran from entrenching in Syria," he said in English, at the start of a meeting at his office with Austrian President Alexander Van der Bellen.
"This is one of the subjects, the main subject, that I'll be discussing with President Putin."
On January 29, Netanyahu held talks in Jerusalem with two Russian officials on reinforcing their military coordination in Syria to avoid any 

Netanyahu to meet Putin this month for Iran-Syria talks

Four Egyptian policeman were wounded in an ambush Tuesday in the southwest of the country, a security source said, in an attack claimed by the jihadist Islamic State group.
The attack took place in El-Wadi El-Gedid governorate (New Valley in English), a mostly arid region in the Western Desert bordering Libya, when gunmen ambushed a police checkpoint, the source said.
The police "responded to the armed attack" leading to an "exchange of fire" with the assailants who managed to flee, the source said, adding that four policemen were wounded.
IS's propaganda agency Amaq released a statement claiming responsibility for the attack.
It quoted a "security source" as saying IS "fighters" attacked the so-called Baghdad checkpoint on a road linking El-Wadi El-Gedid's capital Kharga to the city of Luxor further south, without giving further details.
Egypt has been the target of several jihadist attacks in recent years including from IS who are active in the restive Northern Sinai region.
The ...

AFP

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