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Harrison Ford auctions Han Solo Star Wars jacket in honour of daughter with epilepsy –
Harrison Ford is auctioning his Star Wars: The Force Awakens jacket for charity. The 73-year-old actor – who reprised his role as Han Solo in the latest installment of the sci-fi franchise – donated the iconic garment which he wore in his first scene in the 2015 movie to raise money for epilepsy research. The signed garment will benefit the NYU Langone Center and FACES (Finding A Cure for Epilepsy and Seizures), with bidding starting at $18,000 on ifOnly. But the actor – whose 26-year-old daughter Georgia suffers from the condition – joked the director of the Comprehensive Epilepsy Center at the New York clinic, Dr. Orrin Devinsky, had taken a shine to the jacket. [Daily Mirror] In February 2016 the production company behind Star Wars: The Force Awakens was being prosecuted over a filming incident in which Harrison Ford broke his leg.
Harrison Ford

FBI finds method to hack gunman’s iPhone without Apple’s help –
The FBI has managed to unlock the iPhone of the San Bernardino gunman without Apple’s help, ending a court case, the US justice department says. Apple had been resisting a court order issued last month requiring the firm to write new software to allow officials to access Syed Rizwan Farook’s phone. But officials on Monday said that it had been accessed independently and asked for the order to be withdrawn. Responding to the move, Apple said: “From the beginning, we objected to the FBI’s demand that Apple build a backdoor into the iPhone because we believed it was wrong and would set a dangerous precedent. As a result of the government’s dismissal, neither of these occurred. This case should never have been brought.” [Daily Telegraph]

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Armed conflicts and attacks

• War in Afghanistan (2015–present)
  • Taliban fighters fire explosives at Afghanistan’s Parliament while it is in session. Members of Parliament said no one was wounded while a Taliban spokesperson claims it caused heavy casualities. (Al Jazeera)
• War in Somalia (2009–present)
  • At least 115 Al-Shabaab militants are killed and a further 110 are captured following heavy fighting with pro-government forces in the Galmudug region of Somalia, according to the regional government. There has been no independent confirmation of this claim. (BBC)
• Aftermath of the Brussels bombings
  • Belgian prosecutors release Faycal C., a man charged in connection with last week’s deadly Brussels bombings. The prosecutor’s office says the evidence which led to his arrest has not been backed up by the ongoing investigation. (Reuters)
• 2016 Lahore suicide bombing
  • Pakistan officials tell Reuters its forces will launch a paramilitary crackdown on Islamist militants in Punjab. Sunday’s attack was Taliban-affiliated Jamaat-ul-Ahrar’s fifth bombing since December. (Reuters)

Business and economics

• Stamford, Connecticut’s, Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide says the $15 billion offer from China’s Anbang Insurance Group is “reasonably likely” to win out over the $13.6 billion cash-and-stock offerU.S.-based Marriott International submitted last week. (AP) (Reuters) (UPI) (The Washington Post)

Disasters and accidents

• 2015–16 UK and Ireland windstorm season
  • The United Kingdom‘s Met Office warns of major travel disruption due to heavy rain, flooding and “damaging” high winds as Storm Katie moves in from the Atlantic Ocean bringing winds of up to 75mph.(Sky News)
• The Alaska village of Nelson Lagoon is coated in volcanic ash after an especially vigorous and ongoing eruption of Mount Pavlof. (Alaska Dispatch News)
  • Alaska Airlines cancels 41 flights to and from six cities across the state, Barrow, Bethel, Fairbanks, Kotzebue, Nome, and Prudhoe Bay, due to Pavlof’s “massive ash cloud.” The carrier announces flights will remain grounded pending Tuesday’s assessment of flying conditions. (KTUU-TV)

International Relations

• Senkaku Islands dispute, China–Japan relations
  • As part of its wider military build up along the Japanese archipelagos in the East China Sea, Japan activates a new radar station on the island of Yonaguni that is close to the disputed Senkaku Islands.(Reuters)

Law and crime

• A three-year-old girl is decapitated in an apparently random killing by a man with a cleaver in Taipei, Taiwan. The man was arrested shortly afterwards. (The Guardian)
• The United States Capitol in Washington, D.C. is on lockdown following reports of shots fired at the Capitol Visitor Center. The White House, in what appears to be an unrelated incident, was briefly locked down this afternoon. (CNN)
  • Police lift the lockdown. An armed man was shot by police, is in police custody, and is undergoing surgery at MedStar Washington Hospital Center. A female bystander suffers what appears to be a minor injury. (The Washington Post)
• FBI–Apple encryption dispute
  • Federal prosecutors announce the case against Apple Inc., concerning encrypted data on an iPhone belonging to one of the San Bernardino shooters, has been dropped since the FBI has found a means to access the data without com­prom­ising any in­form­a­tion on the phone. (Los Angeles Times) (Los Angeles Times²)
• A U.S. federal district court, in a case filed by retailer Wal-Mart Stores. Inc., strikes down a Puerto Rican tax increase for on-island companies, with more than $2.75 billion in revenues that buy goods from off-island “related parties,” because the levy clearly discriminates against interstate commerce. (Reuters)
• The United States Secret Service, responding to an online petition demanding Quicken Loans Arena revoke its ban on open carrying of firearms, says only law enforcement officers will be allowed to haveguns inside the Republican National Convention to be held in the Cleveland, Ohio, arena on July 18–21, 2016. (USA Today)
• The American Civil Liberties Union and Lambda Legal file a federal lawsuit against a new North Carolina law that bars transgender people from choosing bathrooms consistent with their gender identity, arguing the measure is discriminatory and threatens individuals’ personal safety. (Reuters)
• Ferguson unrest
  • A Missouri court strikes down parts of a law, meant to address concerns raised after the police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, that limit cities’ ability to profit from traffic tickets and court fines. The judge wrote the law unconstitutionally targeted St. Louis-area municipalities with caps on revenues from traffic fines that were lower than other cities in the state. (AP)

Politics and elections

• Thousands of protestors rally in front of the Parliament of Pakistan in Islamabad in support of Mumtaz Qadri, the killer of reformist Punjab governor Salmaan Taseer in 2011 who was subsequently executed last February. The Pakistan Army was called in to control the situation. (BBC) (Al Jazeera)
• Governor Nathan Deal, of the American state of Georgia, vetoes a religious liberties bill that would have protected people whose religious beliefs don’t include same-sex marriage. (The Atlanta Journal-Constitution) (The Washington Post) (ESPN)
• New York Governor Andrew Cuomo signs an order banning all non-essential travel to North Carolina, i.e., travel not necessary for the enforcement of New York state law, public health, and/or safety, following the state’s passage of a law blocking local governments from passing anti-discrimination ordinances. (CBS News)

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