A Robot With Soul.
Anatomy of a fall.
1. Authorities in Japan have seized a Chinese fishing boat and arrested its captain in a move that is likely to inflame an ongoing diplomatic row between Tokyo and Beijing. The seizure, which occurred on Thursday about 170 kilometers from the south-western port city of Nagasaki, came after the skipper refused an order to stop for an onboard inspection, according to media reports. A Japanese fisheries agency vessel intercepted the Chinese boat and its 11 crew after spotting it in Japan’s exclusive economic zone – an area within 200 nautical miles (370 kilometers) of its coastline. (Source: theguardian.com)
2. The Pentagon is sending the Navy’s largest and most advanced aircraft carrier to the Middle East, as the U.S. steps up plans for a potential attack on Iran, two U.S. officials said. The USS Gerald R. Ford carrier strike group is deploying to the region after spending several months in the Caribbean and Mediterranean. It will be joining the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and nine other warships already operating in the Middle East. The move comes as President Trump ramps up pressure on Iran to make concessions over its nuclear program. Officials from the U.S. and Iran held a first round of talks last week, and Trump has indicated that he is open to making a deal with Tehran to head off military action. (Source: wsj.com)
3. Iran’s theocratic rulers are extending their clampdown beyond the streets and into the broader political sphere, targeting politicians who took a stand against the bloody crackdown on protesters. At least seven members of Iran’s reformist movement—designed to change the Islamic Republic from within—were arrested in recent days, including its leader. The arrests come as the realization that Iranian security forces carried out one of the biggest waves of political killing in recent history creates fractures within the country’s political system. That has prompted many in the reformist camp to stake out much bolder positions against the regime, putting them at risk. Members of the Reformist Front—an umbrella group for reformist parties and a key backer of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian in the last presidential election—broke ranks recently with the government’s official line that the deaths were the work of rioters and terrorists and condemned the killings. (Source: wsj.com)
