Conservation: US President Donald Trump called elephant hunting a "horror show" and strongly suggested he will permanently block imports of elephant trophies from two African nations - Zambia and Zimbabwe - despite his Administration's earlier approval of the practice. Following strong bipartisan criticism of the Administration's decision to allow imports of trophy carcasses for the first time since the practice was halted under the Obama Administration, Trump had moved to put the imports on hold. Today, Trump said on Twitter that he would announce a final decision this week. He suggested that he does not buy the argument advanced by pro-hunting advocates within his Interior Department that the imports help protect endangered African elephants. Trump wrote that he would be "very hard pressed to change my mind that this horror show in any way helps conservation of Elephants or any other animal."
India: Two endangered Asian elephants were hit and killed by a passenger train near the city of Gauhati in northeastern India. Wildlife warden Prodipta Baruah said the elephants were part of a herd of about 15 that had ventured into the area in search of food before dawn. Baruah said the other elephants crossed the track and the final two were attempting to cross when the train struck them. Wildlife workers and veterinarians arrived to perform autopsies on the elephants before burying them in nearby pits. Gauhati is in Assam state, which is home to several thousand wild Asian elephants.
Indonesia: An anti-graft commission has arrested a top politician who for weeks has evaded questioning over his alleged role in the theft of US$170 million of public money. Attempts to detain Setya Novanto took an unexpected twist when he was hospitalised after being involved in a car crash. Novanto's lawyer said he was badly injured, but Corruption Eradication Commission spokesman Febri Diansyah said that an independent panel of doctors has concluded there is no need for his continued hospitalisation. Diansyah said Novanto was moved to a detention centre. He is accused of being among 80 people who used the introduction of a US$440 million electronic identity card system to steal more than a third of the funds.
Chile: Conservative billionaire businessman Sebastian Pinera has won Chile's presidential election, but will now have to face leftist candidate Alejandro Guillier in a run-off on December 17. The 67-year-old took 36.6 per cent of the vote with 99 per cent of votes tallied. Independent senator Guillier, 64, who represented outgoing President Michelle Bachelet's centre-left coalition, received 22.6 per cent of the vote. Journalist Beatriz Sanchez, whose party Frente Amplio includes ecologists and left-wing liberals, came third with 20.2 per cent. About 14 million people were eligible to cast their ballots in the vote for Chile's president, the 155 members of the Chamber of Deputies and part of the Senate.
United States: The White House says the true cost of the opioid drug epidemic in 2015 was US$504 billion, or roughly half a trillion dollars. In an analysis to be released tomorrow, the Council of Economic Advisers says the figure is more than six times larger than the most recent estimate. The council said a 2016 private study estimated that prescription opioid overdoes, abuse and dependence in the US in 2013 cost US$78.5 billion. Most of that was attributed to health care and criminal justice spending, along with lost productivity. The council said its estimate is significantly larger because the epidemic has worsened, with overdose deaths doubling in the past decade, and that some previous studies didn't reflect the number of fatalities blamed on opioids, a powerful but addictive category of painkillers.
