While You Were Sleeping: 5 stories you might have missed, Jan 14
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Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio (left) and US President Joe Biden walk towards the Oval Office for a bilateral meeting.
PHOTO: NYTIMES
US strongly committed to Japan’s defence, praise for reforms
US President Joe Biden told Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Friday that the United States remained strongly committed to its alliance with Japan and praised Tokyo’s “historic” defence reforms.
Mr Kishida is in Washington on the last stop in a tour of the Group of 7 industrial powers and has been seeking to bolster long-standing alliances amid rising concern in Japan, and the US, about mounting regional security threats from China, North Korea and Russia.
In a meeting at the White House, Mr Biden called it a “remarkable moment” in the US-Japan alliance and said the two nations had never been closer.
Mr Kishida thanked Mr Biden for US work on regional security and said: “Japan and the United States are currently facing the most challenging and complex security environment in recent history.”
UN nuclear agency says stepping up presence in Ukraine
REUTERS
The United Nations’ nuclear watchdog announced on Friday it was boosting its presence in Ukraine to help prevent a nuclear accident during the current conflict.
The International Atomic Energy Agency said it will soon have a permanent presence at all five of Ukraine’s nuclear facilities, including Chernobyl, the plant closed after a 1986 disaster.
IAEA chief Rafael Grossi will visit Ukraine next week to get the operation under way, the agency added in a statement.
$2,000 for ice cream? Bolsonaro credit bill raises eyebrows
AFP
More than US$21,000 (S$27,000) splurged at a modest restaurant – US$10,700 spent at a bakery in a single day.
The public release on Friday of ex-president Jair Bolsonaro’s official credit card expenditures is raising eyebrows in Brazil.
More than 27.6 million reais – more than US$5 million at today’s exchange rate – was charged to the far-right president’s card during his four-year term, according to account statements published on Friday on a government website.
Prince Harry says he left most damaging claims out of memoir
Getty Images via AFP
Prince Harry left out revelations about his family in his memoir, saying he did not want “the world to know because I don’t think they would ever forgive me,” according to an interview published by the Daily Telegraph on Friday.
The prince told the UK broadsheet that he has enough material to write another book, mostly focused on his relationship with his brother Prince William and father King Charles III, in comments likely to further unsettle the royal family.
After months of anticipation and a blanket publicity blitz, Harry’s book Spare went on sale Tuesday as royal insiders hit back at his scorching revelations.
Marisa Abela to portray British singer Amy Winehouse
British actress Marisa Abela will portray Amy Winehouse in a biopic about the late singer, with filming due to begin in London on Monday, production and distribution company Studiocanal has said.
Called Back To Black and directed by British filmmaker Sam Taylor-Johnson, the movie will focus on Winehouse’s “vibrant years living in London in the early aughts and her intense journey to fame”.
The six-time Grammy Award winner died from alcohol poisoning at her north London home on July 23, 2011. Winehouse, who struggled with drink and drug problems through much of her career, was 27 years old.
