US: Stranger Things, Netflix’s sci-fi horror series, is awash in 1980s nostalgia, with Kate Bush’s 1985 song Running Up That Hill topping the 2022 music charts. The Duffer Brothers, the show’s creators, debut Pennhurst Mental Hospital for the Criminally Insane in season four (which is also mentioned in season one). Teenage sleuths Robin and Nancy enter Pennhurst, where they are …

INDONESIA: Indonesia and the United Arab Emirates signed a free trade deal on Friday (Jul 1), enhancing economic links between the two countries. The agreement, signed during Indonesian President Joko Widodo’s visit to Abu Dhabi, eliminates or significantly reduces taxes on most commodities exchanged between the Muslim countries. A reduction or elimination of duties on Emirati petrochemical and rubber products …

JAPAN: Temperatures in eastern Japan have been at their hottest since records began, forcing the government to advise residents to conserve electricity as much as possible, while keeping air conditioners on in order to remain safe. There will be a scorching weekend for those who live in and around Tokyo, as temperatures rose above 35 degrees Celsius for the seventh …

US: Living cells may be seen for the first time thanks to fluorescent sensors, which can label and picture a wide variety of chemicals. Since their signal is lost when they are implanted too deeply, they are normally only employed in cells grown in a lab dish or in tissues close to the skin’s surface. Engineers at MIT have recently …

JORDAN: Jordan’s emergency assistance coordinating agency announced late Monday that the deadly gas that leaked from a container near Aqaba, killing at least 12 people and wounding 260 others, was chlorine. One of the surrounding CCTV cameras captured the container being transported by a crane before it dropped and released a cloud of yellow gaseous material into the port, which …

CANADA: Randy Bachman, a Canadian rock singer who has been grieving for his stolen guitar for nearly 50 years, has finally been reunited with the instrument after an alert fan tracked it down in Japan. They say you never forget your first love. He was in Tokyo on Friday for the emotional transfer, 46 years after his beloved orange Gretsch …

TAIWAN: On the 25th anniversary of Hong Kong’s handover to Chinese administration, Taiwan Premier Su Tseng-chang declared that freedom in the city had “vanished” and that China had failed to live up to its pledges of 50 years without change. John Lee, a former Hong Kong security head, is being sworn in as Hong Kong’s new leader by Chinese President …

INDIA: Experts predict that India’s ban on many single-use plastics on Friday (Jul 1) will encounter tremendous challenges from unprepared firms and consumers who are unwilling to pay more for products. A third of the country’s four million tons of plastic waste is thrown away and ends up in waterways and landfills, which frequently catch fire and contribute to air …

BRAZIL: Disinformation regarding President Jair Bolsonaro and ex-leader Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is having a big influence three months before the Brazilian presidential election. Verifying information has become even more difficult as a result of the proliferation of fake news, the emergence of new social media platforms, and the proliferation of ever-more-complex content. Between January and June, AFP fact-checked …

NORTH KOREA: In a statement released on Friday (Jul 1), North Korea blamed South Korea for the country’s first outbreak of COVID-19, claiming that patients had come into contact with “foreign substances” near the border. The North instructed citizens to “vigilantly deal with alien items coming by wind and other climate phenomena and balloons in the areas along the demarcation …