Free Republic

An angry mob set fire to a local parliament building in an Indonesian provincial capital, leaving at least three people dead and five others hospitalized, officials said. The blaze in Makassar, the capital city of South Sulawesi province, began late Friday. Television reports showed the provincial council building ablaze overnight, causing the area to turn an eerie orange color. Rescuers retrieved three bodies by Saturday morning, while five people were hospitalized with burns or with broken bones after jumping from the building, said Fadli Tahar, a local disaster official. Protesters in West Java's Bandung city also set a regional parliament...

Banda Aceh, Indonesia: Two men were publicly flogged 76 times each in Indonesia’s conservative province of Aceh on Tuesday after they were found guilty of sexual relations by a court operating under strict Islamic law. Gay sex is outlawed in Aceh, which imposes a version of sharia, the Islamic legal code, but it is not illegal elsewhere in the world’s most populous Muslim majority country. The men were part of a group of 10 who were flogged Tuesday at a park in the provincial capital Banda Aceh for a range of alleged crimes. The pair were flogged separately with a...

According to a press release from the FDA, Cesium-137 (Cs-137) was detected by U.S. Customs & Border Protection in shipping containers that arrived at ports in Los Angeles, Houston, Miami, and Savannah. Samples found the presence of Cs-137, a radioactive isotope in a shipment of breaded shrimp. The FDA confirmed that Walmart received raw frozen shrimp that could be affected by the issue. Cs-137 is a product of nuclear fission and is used in medical devices and gauges, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention explains. It can also be used to gauge “the flow of liquid through pipes,” the...

Microsoft warns patched systems remain vulnerable as attackers find new ways to infiltrate SharePoint servers. Microsoft has issued a critical warning about Chinese state-backed hackers exploiting security flaws in its SharePoint software. These vulnerabilities have been used to compromise a growing list of government agencies and private organizations worldwide, including the US National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). In a detailed blog post, Microsoft identified three hacking groups with ties to China. The groups, known as Linen Typhoon, Violet Typhoon, and Storm-2603, are believed to have taken advantage of SharePoint weaknesses that mainly affect customers who operate the software on their...

President Donald Trump said Tuesday he and President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. of the Philippines have reached a trade agreement. Shortly after, he also revealed more detailed terms of an agreement with Indonesia. Both agreements call for 19% tariffs on goods the US imports from the two countries, paid by American businesses, while American goods shipped there won’t be charged a tariff. Trump’s announcement of the agreement with the Philippines came after he met with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. at the White House on Tuesday. “It was a beautiful visit, and we concluded our Trade Deal,” Trump wrote on his social...

Donald J. Trump and his allies have begun investigations to support their claims that Joseph R. Biden Jr. was incapacitated and his staff conspired to take presidential actions in his name. Former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. is escalating his battle against Republican claims that he might not have been in control of high-profile clemency decisions issued under his name at the end of his term and, more generally, that his cognitive state impaired his functioning in office. In an interview with The New York Times, Mr. Biden said that he had orally granted all the pardons and commutations issued...

...South Korea’s new president, Lee Jae Myung, sent special envoys to Australia and Germany to discuss defense and trade issues, and plans on dispatching delegations to several others. Brazil and India announced plans to increase their bilateral trade by 70 percent, to $20 billion. Indonesia says it is nearing a treaty with the European Union that would drop most tariffs on both sides to zero. And in Vietnam, which Mr. Trump said had accepted 20 percent tariffs on its goods headed to the United States before last week’s letters, the deputy trade minister emphasized efforts to reduce her country’s reliance...

It is no surprise that Steve Bannon has picked Butterworth’s. ..... Having been Donald Trump’s original explainer, godfather to US nationalist-populism and an evangelist to its far-right western siblings, he could hardly be less. Bannon’s former protégé, Raheem Kassam, a British alt-right journalist, who was once an adviser to Nigel Farage, is co-owner. Republican senators, Maga influencers and members of Trump’s administration come here to be seen. Yet its decor is a million miles from Mar-a-Lago’s Gulf bling. At the next table a portly young man in a bow tie is talking earnestly to his lunch partner about Opus Dei’s...

if one more person tells me “capitalism is making people starve” i’m going to lose it the poorest people in America are literally gigantic. like medically unexplainable balloon-shaped and built like refrigerators. we’re not dealing with famine—we’re dealing with doorways having to be widened have you seen what capitalism gives broke people in this country??? you can wake up at 2pm, take your government-subsidized Ozempic with a 3,000 calorie $9 “coffee” milkshake from Starbucks, get driven to Target in an air-conditioned car you don’t own, buy 40 pounds of seed oils and corn syrup with an EBT card, tap pay...

Democrats are planning a nationwide sick day where they pledge to stop working, spending, and producing. Sounds good, make the Democrat-led cities collapse even faster.

JUST IN - Iran's Grand Ayatollah Makarem Shirazi issues fatwa, calling Muslims around the world to kill Trump and Netanyahu, declaring them "enemies of God."

A Brazilian tourist who fell while hiking near the crater of an active volcano in Indonesia has been found dead, her family and rescuers said. Juliana Marins survived the initial fall from a cliff during an early morning group hike along a steep trail on Mount Rinjani, with rescuers reporting hearing her screams for help on Saturday. ... She was hiking up Indonesia's second-tallest volcano with five friends and a guide on Saturday at about 06:30 local time (23:30 GMT Friday), when authorities said she fell from "a cliff that surrounds the trail next to the volcano's crater". One group...

Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) issued a statement on Tuesday, declaring that the Islamic Republic’s firm and coordinated military response to the Zionist regime’s recent aggression ultimately forced the enemy—and its regional and Western supporters—to unilaterally halt their offensive operations. According to the statement, following the orders of the Leader of the Islamic Revolution and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Iranian forces responded decisively and courageously to every act of hostility. The retaliatory operations included a powerful missile strike on the U.S. military base at Al-Udeid in Qatar and extensive attacks targeting positions across the occupied Palestinian territories. The...

Scientists have confirmed the rediscovery of Attenborough's long-beaked echidna, a species previously thought to be extinct for over 60 years.This ancient, egg-laying mammal was found deep within the rainforests of Indonesia.It is scientifically known as Zaglossus attenboroughi and named after the legendary naturalist David Attenborough.Echidnas, characterized by their spiky fur and beaks, are often referred to as "living fossils" due to their ancient lineage, believed to have originated around 200 million years ago during the time of dinosaurs...In 2023, during an Oxford University expedition to the remote Cyclops Mountains — located 2,000m (6,561ft) above sea level — a glimmer of...

Three British nationals could face death by a firing squad after they allegedly smuggled about a kilogram – over two pounds – of cocaine onto the island of Bali in Indonesia. The Associated Press reported that prosecutor I Made Dipa Umbara said 28-year-old Jonathan Christopher Collyer and 29-year-old Lisa Ellen Stocker were arrested Feb. 1, after customs officers stopped them at the X-ray machine when they found suspicious items disguised as food packages inside their luggage. Umbara told the District Court in Denpasar during a court hearing on Tuesday that a lab test result confirmed 10 pouches of "Angel Delight"...

A rare “dinosaur fish,” once believed to have disappeared 70 million years ago, has been filmed in the wild by divers in the Indonesian archipelago. The Indonesian coelacanth (Latimeria menadoensis) was captured on camera in its natural habitat, marking a breakthrough for marine exploration. The discovery was made in October 2024 during a deep-sea mission led by Alexis Chappuis of UNSEEN Expeditions. Using special breathing equipment, Chappuis and fellow diver Alexandre Leblond descended to 152 meters along a volcanic slope in the Maluku Islands, where they spotted the elusive creature at a depth of 144 meters. Long-lost species returned to...

China has “enforced maritime management and exercised sovereign jurisdiction” over an uninhabited reef in the disputed South China Sea, planting the country’s flag on the tiny sand bank just kilometers from a key Philippine military outpost. Photographs released by Chinese state-run media on Saturday showed China Coast Guard officers unfurling the flag as part of an effort to effectively seize Sandy Cay reef, which Beijing calls Tiexian Jiao, earlier this month. The reef, located in the flash point Spratly Island chain, is also claimed by Taiwan, Vietnam and the Philippines. Sandy Cay also sits just over 3 kilometers from Thitu...

Out of the blue (seemingly), the Russians have approached Indonesia and asked for, of all things, basing rights for their strategic bombers. Jane’s, a respected source of strategic intelligence, said, “Jakarta has received an official request from Moscow, seeking permission for Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS) aircraft to be based at a facility in Indonesia’s easternmost province… In the request, Russia seeks to base several long-range aircraft at the Manuhua Air Force Base, which shares a runway with the Frans Kaisiepo Airport, documents that have been presented to Jane’s reveal.” The article implied that in recent years, Russian TU-95 Bombers have...

The BRICS group of nations—Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa—has long aimed to challenge Western-controlled financial systems and reduce the world’s reliance on the US dollar. Now, that mission is getting an unexpected push, thanks to new tariff policies introduced by US President Donald Trump. BRICS Bloc Gains Momentum Amid US Trade Setbacks Trump has declared what he calls “Liberation Day,” a move that marks one of the biggest protectionist trade shifts since the 1930s. These new tariffs target both enemies and allies, and are expected to slow trade, increase prices in the US, and put brakes on global...

Bangkok -- Search teams in Myanmar recovered more bodies from the ruins of buildings on Friday, a week after a massive earthquake killed more than 3,100 people, as the focus turns toward the urgent humanitarian needs in a country already devastated by a continuing civil war. United Nations humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher, who is also the emergency relief coordinator, will visit the area on Friday in an effort to spur action following the March 28 quake. Ahead of the visit, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres appealed to the international community to immediately step up funding for quake victims “to match the...