Top News Stories –

Finland’s postal workers to mow lawns –
Finland’s postal service will be doing more than just delivering letters and parcels this summer – its workers will be mowing lawns, too. The state-owned Posti company is offering a weekly grass cutting service, with customers able to choose either 30 minutes or 60 minutes of lawn-mowing time, the national broadcaster Yle reports. It will only be available on Tuesdays, though, as the volume of post tends to be lighter than on other days, and customers will have to provide their own lawnmower. They’ll also have to be willing to pay 65 euro (£51; $73) a month for the half-hour sessions. [BBC]

Top Twitter Trends –

Other News Stories –

Armed conflicts and attacks

• Moro conflict
  • The U.K. Foreign Office and the U.S. State Department issue travel advisories regarding the Philippine island of Mindanao and the Sulu Archipelago after a recent kidnapping near Davao City. (Sun Star Cebu),(Rappler)
• Syrian Civil War
  • The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reports that airstrikes have killed at least seven people in Aleppo. (AP)
• Iraqi Civil War (2014–present)
  • A suicide bomber kills at least nine people at a Shi’ite mosque in southwestern Baghdad. A second attacker was shot dead by security forces before he could detonate his explosives. (Reuters)
• The United States admits it has killed 20 civilians and wounded 11 others in airstrikes in Syria and Iraq between September 10, 2015, and February 2, 2016. (UPI)

Arts and culture

• Eurovision Song Contest 2016, Romania in the Eurovision Song Contest 2016
  • Romania is expelled from this year’s Eurovision Song Contest in Stockholm, Sweden, after its national broadcaster, Romanian Television (TVR) failed to pay outstanding debts dating back to 2007. Ovidiu Anton was due to perform the song “Moment of Silence” at the contest. (Sky News)
• The Carver County, Minnesota Sheriff’s office conducts an autopsy on Prince to determine cause of death. (Reuters)

Business and economics

• Creditors, including 800 sacked workers, vote to place Queensland Nickel into liquidation allowing creditors to pursue its owner, Australian politician Clive Palmer, for costs. (Australia)
• Fiat Chrysler announces plans to withdraw 1.1 million vehicles worldwide due to problems with the gearshift confusing drivers. (BBC)
• Valeant, a Canada based pharmaceutical company, says it has received new notices of default from its bondholders. (Reuters)

Disasters and accidents

• A passenger train derails near the South Korean city of Yeosu resulting in the death of a railroad engineer and eight people being injured. (Reuters)
• A warehouse storing chemicals and fuel catches fire in the Chinese city of Jingjiang resulting in an unknown number of casualties. (AFP via Channel News Asia)
• At least 15 people have been killed in a landslide in the Tawang District in India‘s Arunachal Pradesh state. (Times of India)
• 2015–16 South Pacific cyclone season
  • The Samoan Islands and Wallis and Futuna brace for the impact of Cyclone Amos as the Fiji Meteorological Service upgrades the cyclone to a category three storm, with sustained winds as high as 140 km/h at its centre. (Radio New Zealand)
• State oil company Petroleos Mexicanos reports the death toll has risen to 28 from Wednesday’s explosion at Petroquimica Mexicana de Vinilo’s Clorados 3 petrochemical plant in the Gulf port city ofCoatzacoalcos, Veracruz. Some workers are still missing while 18 others remain hospitalized. Officials say the explosion came from an unspecified leak. The plant produces the hazardous industrial chemicalvinyl chloride. (AP)

International relations

• United Kingdom withdrawal from the European Union
  • Mayor of London and cabinet member Boris Johnson says that U.S. President Barack Obama is “inconsistent and hypocritical” in persuading the British people to remain in the European Union. (The Sun)
• Taiwan–United States relations
  • The U.S. House Committee on Foreign Affairs unanimously passes a resolution reaffirming the Taiwan Relations Act and the Six Assurances. (Taipei Times) (Focus Taiwan)
• 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference
  • A record 175 states sign the United Nations climate agreement in New York on opening day. The agreement will enter into force once 55 countries representing at least 55 percent of global emissions formally join it. (ABC News Australia) (AP)
• NATO–Russia relations, Cold War II
  • U.S. General Curtis Scaparrotti, the incoming head of the United States military forces in Europe, says he supports a permanent brigade-sized presence of U.S. combat troops in Eastern Europe to deterRussia’s expanded and assertive actions. (Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty)
• Belizean–Guatemalan territorial dispute
  • Belize accuses Guatemala of “amassing” troops on the disputed Belize–Guatemala border following the death of a teenage Guatemalan boy in a shooting incident apparently involving Belize Defence Force soldiers. Guatemalan President Jimmy Morales called the shooting a “cowardly and excessive attack” that merits the “total condemnation of the Guatemalan state”. (AP via ABC News)

Law and crime

• Former chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Rajendra K. Pachauri is to face a court in Delhi, India on charges of sexual harassment. Pachauri is accused of stalking, intimidation and sexual assault of a former employee. (The Guardian)
• 2016 Pike County, Ohio, shootings
  • Eight family members are murdered in four different locations in Pike County, Ohio. Three children, including a four-day-old baby, survived the killings. (Fox News), (AP) (AP²)
• Five people have been killed in two separate shootings in the American town of Appling, Georgia. (Atlanta Journal-Constitution)
• Felony disenfranchisement
  • In the United States, Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe signs an executive order restoring the rights of an estimated 200,000 convicted felons to vote and run for office. (AP)

Politics and elections

• 2016 Macedonian protests
  • The European Union announces it is considering imposing sanctions on Macedonia’s leaders for reneging on an agreement last year to investigate corruption in the ruling class and issuing an amnesty instead to those involved. (Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty)
• Thousands of Sudanese students take to the streets around the University of Kordofan in Khartoum and other parts of the country to protest the recent killing of students last Monday. Security forces opened fire on a peaceful protest, killing many students after they attempted to nominate pro-opposition candidates for their campus elections. (The Guardian)
• Mexican Drug War, War on Drugs
  • Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto proposes legalizing marijuana for medical purposes and easing limits for personal use of the drug. He said he would be sending a bill to the Congress to increase the amount users can legally carry from the current five grams to 28 (0.18-1oz). The news comes just two days after he addressed the United Nations General Assembly at a special session on drug policy and is seen as a chance to re-think the current strategy of fighting drug-trafficking, especially in Mexico where the fighting has killed tens of thousands of people. (BBC)
• Philippine general election, 2016
  • The Commission on Election announced that the May 9 elections shall push through despite a massive breach on its database by hackers which puts 55 million registered Filipino voters at risk.

Science and technology

• Amazon Reef
  • Oceanographers discover an extensive reef system near the Amazon River, estimated to span an area of 3,600 square miles (9,300 km²). (The Atlantic), (The Guardian), (Los Angeles Times),(Phys.org), (CNN)
• China’s National Space Administration says it is working on a program to land a rover on Mars by 2020. (AP)
• Energy development
  • The Alaska SeaLife Center (Seward, Alaska) announces that 98 percent of the center’s heating and cooling now comes from low-cost, alternative energy derived from seawater. (Tech Times)
• Scientists discover the quantum tunneling of water molecules. (Phys. Rev. Letters), (Phys.org), (Tech Times)

Sport

• 2022 FIFA World Cup
  • President of FIFA Gianni Infantino says a new independent committee will be set up to monitor working conditions at Qatar’s 2022 World Cup venues. The move is an attempt by the world football’s governing body to ease fears of human rights abuses in the state, where organizations like Amnesty International documented multiple cases of poor working conditions and abuses against migrant workers. (BBC)

News from Wikipedia – please support this valuable resource