Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has acknowledged for the first time that extrajudicial killings occurred on his watch, a concession that could buttress two criminal complaints filed against him at the International Criminal Court.

In what was described as a rambling speech to government officials outside the presidential palace Thursday, Duterte conceded that his “only sin is the extrajudicial killings,” according to the New York Times. He did not elaborate on his meaning.

Although he has claimed to have personally killed at least three people in the past, Duterte has long denied responsibility for extrajudicial killings that occurred as part of his administration’s brutal war on drugs. Officials claim that casualties of the drug war died as a result of resisting arrest.

The president’s latest remarks — during which he also invited the military to oust him should they feel he is not doing a good job — followed a drop in approval ratings amid high inflation and the rising cost o..

The first known case of a human infected with a version of the hepatitis E virus carried by rats was confirmed in Hong Kong Thursday.

According to University of Hong Kong (HKU) researchers, it remains unclear how the patient contracted rat hepatitis E, a genetically distinct form of the virus that was previously isolated in rodents.

The patient, a 56-year-old man, contracted a strain of hepatitis “highly divergent” from other strains affecting humans, the South China Morning Post reports. The man lives in a housing estate that had “evidence of rat infestation in the refuse bins,” according to HKU researchers.

“We postulate that contamination of food by infected rat droppings in the food supply is possible,” the researchers said. They also acknowledged that the virus’ transmission method remained unconfirmed.

An estimated 20 million people are infected with hepatitis E every year, according to the World Health Organization. The virus is a liver infection that can cause fever, abdomi..

(SKOPJE, Macedonia) — Macedonians have had a country to call their own for less than three decades. Now, the citizens of one of Europe’s youngest countries are being asked to weigh matters of national identity and national interest as they decide a fundamental question: what their homeland will be called.

A referendum set for Sunday in Macedonia seeks voter support for changing the Balkan nation’s name to North Macedonia. Greece has agreed to drop longstanding objections to neighboring Macedonia joining NATO and eventually becoming a member of the European Union, if the new name is approved.

The proposed “North” prefix might seem minor, but it touches a nerve in the former Yugoslav republic that declared independence in 1991, and in Greece, which has a province named Macedonia that was the birthplace of the ancient warrior king Alexander the Great.

After decades of tortuous and fruitless negotiations between Athens and Skopje, Macedonia’s prime minister agreed to the change to North..