8 NEWS The world at a glance ...
MurderedKiev, Ukraine
Comedian triumphs: Ukrainian President Volodymyr
Zelensky’s Servant of the People party—named after the
sitcom that made the actor turned politician famous—
romped to victory in this week’s legislative elections.
Set to claim 253 of the legislature’s 450 seats, the
newly founded Servant of the People will be the first
party since Ukraine split from the Soviet Union in
1991 to win an outright parliamentary majority.
The pro-Moscow opposition took only 13 percent
of the party-list vote. That puts Zelensky in a strong position to
negotiate with Russia, which is supporting an insurgency in eastern
Ukraine and occupying Crimea. Elected president in April, Zelensky
had played the lead role in Servant of the People: a teacher who
becomes president after his anti-corruption rant goes viral.Sofia, Bulgaria
Entire nation hacked: A cyber-
security expert was arrested last week for
allegedly hacking into Bulgaria’s tax agency
and stealing the tax returns, social security
records, and bank and income details of
more than 5 million of the country’s 7 million residents. Kristian
Boykov, 20, faces a maximum of three years in prison; he says
he is innocent. Boykov had previously hacked the Bulgarian
Education Ministry’s website in 2017, saying then it was his
“civic duty” to expose its vulnerabilities. This time, though,
the private information was released onto the dark web, which
Boykov says he would never do. Prime Minister Boyko Borissov
has called Boykov a “wizard” and said the government should
hire hackers like him.Caracas
Massive blackout: Another huge blackout threw Venezuela into
darkness this week, forcing the government to tell workers and
school students to stay home. Officials blamed “an electromagnetic
attack” for the outage—which cut electricity to 19 of Venezuela’s
23 states—but experts believe the cause is a decrepit power grid.
It’s the fourth major blackout to hit the country this year; in a
weeklong March blackout, millions of people lost access to water,
worsening already dire condi-
tions in a country with chronic
shortages of food and medicine.
Opposition leader Juan Guaidó,
who is recognized as the coun-
try’s rightful president by the
West, said the blackouts resulted
from “the corruption and inca-
pacity” of President Nicolás
Maduro’s leftist regime.
San José, Costa Rica
Deadly alcohol: At least 20 people have died across Costa Rica
over the past two months after drinking alcohol tainted with lethal
methanol. Authorities this week recalled 30,000 bottles of various
liquor brands, mostly varieties of cheap grain alcohol. Methanol
poisoning can be hard to diagnose because the symptoms—
abdominal pain, headache, and lack of coordination—can be
similar to a hangover. Methanol is produced in distilling but is sup-
posed to be removed by the manufacturer before bottling. In some
outbreaks of methanol poisoning, the liquor in the brand-name
bottle was found to have been replaced with a home-distilled spirit.
Mexico City
Stopping migrants: Mexico said
this week that it has cut the
flow of migrants heading to the
U.S. by 36 percent, and so will not
accept a U.S. proposal for a “safe
third country” agreement. Such a
pact would force Central American
migrants to apply for asylum in
Mexico rather than file claims in
the U.S. President Trump last month gave Mexico 45 days to stop
the migrants or be hit with steep tariffs. Since then, Mexico has
deployed some 21,000 police and National Guard officers to its
southern and northern borders. An average of 4,156 migrants a
day were arrested near the U.S. border in early June, Mexico’s
government said; by last week, the daily average had dropped
to 2,652. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Mexico had
“made real progress” but added “we’ve got a long way to go yet.”
The two sides will evaluate the situation again in another 45 days.
Dease Lake, British Columbia
Teen killers? Two Canadian teenagers who were thought missing
and possibly murdered are now believed by police to have gone
on a killing spree in remote British Columbia. A burned-out truck
belonging to Kam McLeod, 19, and Bryer Schmegelsky, 18, was
found on the side of a highway, and police discovered the body of
an unidentified 50-something man a mile away. On
a road some 290 miles northeast, authorities had
days earlier found the bodies of American Chynna
Deese, 24, and her Australian boyfriend, Lucas
Fowler, 23, shot to death next to their vehicle. The
two teens are now suspects in all three deaths,
and locals and tourists are spooked. “We are ask-
ing the public: If you spot Kam or Bryan, consider
them dangerous,” said a police spokeswoman.
SWPoliceForce,^ Newscom,
Reuters,
AP,^ Newscom^
Borissov: Pro-‘wizard’Blocked at the U.S. borderZelensky votesCaracas goes dark.