Tokyo / AFP Tokyo was hit by a major blackout on Wednesday that temporarily knocked out power to a total 580,000 homes and some big office and government buildings, while two train lines were also brought to a halt. Officials said the power outage could be traced to a fire at a facility run by utility Tokyo Electric Power. …

  Bloomberg Daewoo Shipbuilding & Marine Engineering Co., the world’s second-largest shipbuilder, plans to eliminate 3,000 jobs, or 24 percent of its workforce, this year as part of a restructuring plan to improve its financials. Daewoo is receiving applications for a voluntary retirement program until Oct. 21, the Geoje, South Korea-based company said an e-mailed statement Wednesday. The company had …

  SINGAPORE / AP The wealthy city-state of Singapore — with its flourishing trade, orderly life and almost non-existent crime — is hardly a place one would associate with illegal trade. But a new report by a reputed organization reveals that in fact the country has a poor record of preventing just that. The new Economist Intelligence Unit released a …

  Bloomberg Singapore Press Holdings Ltd., (SPH) Southeast Asia’s biggest newspaper publisher by market value, plans to merge two of its tabloids to form a new free-distribution publication as part of a restructuring effort, three people with knowledge of the matter said. The publisher is planning to merge The New Paper and My Paper, they said, declining to be identified …

  Geneva / AFP The UN’s rights chief warned on Wednesday that Donald Trump’s statements pointed to a “dangerous” figure emerging on the world stage if he won the US presidency. At a press conference in Geneva, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said he was “not keen or intent on interfering in any political campaign.” …

  BAGHDAD / AP Tensions between Turkey and Iraq continued to escalate on Wednesday as Iraq’s prime minister rejected Turkish claims that their forces must be included in an operation to retake the militant-held city of Mosul. “We will liberate our land through the determination of our men and not by video calls,” Haider Al Abadi said on his Twitter account, …

  Bloomberg IS has dug trenches and rigged roads and buildings with explosives ahead of a US-led coalition offensive to dislodge the militants from their stronghold in Mosul in northern Iraq. “We’re certainly well aware that this is going to be a difficult challenge, a difficult operation,” U.S. Defense Department spokesman Capt. Jeff Davis said. He also said that IS …

  Bujumbura / AFP Burundi’s lower house of parliament on Wednesday overwhelmingly voted to withdraw from the International Criminal Court (ICC), which is carrying out a preliminary probe into atrocities committed during an 18-month political crisis. “The ICC is a tool being used to try and change power” in Burundi, charged Aloys Ntakirutimana, a lawmaker with the ruling CNDD-FDD, during a …

  Juba / AFP South Sudan’s government was on Wednesday forced to deny President Salva Kiir had died, following days of rumours over his health that have heightened tensions in the capital Juba. “This is a mere lie, there is nothing as such, Salva Kiir has not even been sick,” Information Minister Michael Makuei Lueth told journalists in Juba, slamming “wild …

  Brussels / AFP EU officials on Wednesday urged nearly a dozen laggard member states to accelerate their preparations to join by 2018 a bloc-wide system to share passenger information to help detect terrorists. Spurred by a wave of extremist attacks in France and Belgium, the European Parliament in April adopted the Passenger Name Record (PNR) system after resolving privacy concerns …