STATUS UPDATES
A week in which a billionaire got huffy, a Mugabe got hired and a mom got her due
HAILED The appointment of a woman as a referee in Germany’s top soccer league. The German soccer federation announced Bibiana Steinhaus will referee games next season. German media compared the moment to the country electing its first female chancellor. Steinhaus, 38, hails from Bad Lauterberg in northern Germany, the Guardian reports, and works as a police officer in Hannover.
HONOURED The mother of a quadriplegic student after she attended every class with him and took his notes while he pursued his Master of Business Administration. Chapman University in California awarded Judy O’Connor an honorary degree. O’Connor, a retired school teacher, pushed her son, Marty, in his wheelchair for him to receive his degree during commencement.
LET LOOSE Unidentified objects, that flew across the southern border from North Korea and caused a stir. South Korean forces fired warning shots at the objects Tuesday after they flew across the Demilitarized Zone dividing the two countries. “The objects were in the shape of a balloon . . . (and) flew in the wind’s direction before disappearing,” a South Korean military official told CNN.
APPOINTED Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe’s daughter, to the country’s censorship board. Bona Mugabe, 27, will help decide what people can watch on TV. The board has been known for banning films and art seen as too sexually explicit or critical of the regime. Actor Silvanos Mudzvova called the appointment the “final nail in the coffin” for artistic freedom, the BBC reported.
INSULTED Russian anti-Putin activist Alexei Navalny. Russian billionaire Alisher Usmanov renewed his online attacks against Navalny. (Navalny is seeking to become president, while Usmanov is seeking to take control of British soccer club Arsenal.) After a video tirade this month, he added a new clip with the charming title “I spit on you again.” It was not laudatory.
SHAMED A man at a wedding in southern Vietnam who was booed offstage while performing karaoke — and then murdered a fellow guest. Nguyen Ngoc Diep, 44, allegedly went on a stabbing spree after another guest mocked him and stole the microphone, the Guardian reported. The man who snatched the mic was hospitalized, while a third man who tried to intervene was fatally stabbed.
REINED IN Weeks after L.A. cops opened fire from a helicopter to end a standoff with an armed suspect, police leaders discussed guidelines at a Police Commission meeting. Los Angeles Police Department asst. Chief Beatrice Girmala said a situation must meet a number of highly specific conditions before cops consider opening fire from above, the L.A. Times reports. What a relief.
RESIGNED The interim president of Puerto Rico’s largest public university. Nivia Fernandez stepped down just hours before she was ordered to end a student strike, or face jail. A judge had threatened to arrest her if she did not present a plan to reopen the university. Students forced it to close two months ago to protest $450 million (U.S.) in proposed budget cuts.