NEWS OF THE DAY
From Across the Globe
1 Iraq reforms: Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said Wednesday that he will seek a popular mandate to change the country’s constitution amid widespread calls to fight corruption and curtail government spending. The announcement came as Islamic State militants ambushed a military convoy in Iraq’s western Anbar province, killing at least 14 soldiers.
2 Taliban attack: Taliban insurgents dressed in police uniforms and driving in a police car attacked a checkpoint in southern Afghanistan’s restive Helmand province on Wednesday, killing 14 police officers, an Afghan official said. The attack, the latest in a stepped-up campaign by the Taliban targeting Afghan forces and government institutions, underscores the tenaciousness of their insurgency even as the group is plagued by infighting and rivalries following last month’s announcement of the death of its longtime leader, Mullah Mohammad Omar.
3 Rebel attack: Turkey’s military says Kurdish rebels attacked a military outpost in southeast Turkey, triggering a clash that left a soldier and two militants dead. The military said rebels of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK on Wednesday fired shots and rockets at the post near the mainly Kurdish city of Diyarbakir. The soldier died of his wounds in hospital while four others were injured. Turkey has seen a sharp increase in violence in recent weeks with Kurdish rebels attacking Turkish security forces and the military conducting air strikes against PKK targets in northern Iraq and southeast Turkey.
4 Indonesia shake-up: Less than 10 months into his term, President Joko Widodo on Wednesday fired four Cabinet ministers, including crucial members of his economic team, in a much-anticipated reshuffle that reflected growing frustration with his government’s struggles to improve the country’s sluggish economy. The economy is growing at its slowest pace since 2009, with gross domestic product rising only 4.7 percent year on year in the second quarter. The currency, the rupiah, is at its lowest level against the dollar since the late 1990s.
5 Copter crash: A U.S. Army helicopter crashed while landing on a Navy ship during training Wednesday off Japan’s southern island of Okinawa, injuring seven people and damaging the aircraft, officials said. The H-60 helicopter made a hard landing on the Red Cloud cargo vessel around 20 miles east of Okinawa. The cause of the crash is under investigation. Okinawa is home to most of the tens of thousands of U.S. troops in Japan.
6 London bomb: For 70 years, a 500-pound German aerial bomb laid deep beneath a three-story terraced house in east London, an area heavily bombarded during World War II’s Battle of Britain. The dangerous device was discovered this week by contractors on a building site. Locals were asked to stay away, while the British army’s bomb disposal experts were called in to defuse the bomb. Seven decades on, Londoners are still feeling the effects of the Blitz.