World Tour
Malaysia A court sentenced former PM Najib Razak to up to 12 years in prison after finding him guilty of crimes involving the multibillion-dollar looting of the 1MDB state investment fund that brought down his government two years ago. Najib has vowed to appeal and told under oath from the dock before the sentencing that he was unaware of the graft.
Egypt Authorities have released Adel Sabri, editor of Masr al-Arabia, an independent news website, after more than two years in pre-trial detention. He was arrested in April 2018 after publishing a New York Times report which said voters in Egypt’s presidential elections were bribed. Abdel Fattah el-Sisi won a second four-year term after contenders had been arrested or pressured into withdrawing.
NASA With eight Mars landings, the space organisation is ready with its newest rover. The spacecraft Perseverance is NASA’s biggest and brainiest Martian rover yet, with latest landing tech and more cameras and microphones to provide unprecedented close-ups of Mars. This summer’s third mission to Mars, after the UAE’s Hope orbiter and China’s orbiter-rover, will be launched on July 30.
Foreign hand
Pablo Picasso was one of the most fecund artists of the 20th century—his genius found expression in paintings (through several celebrated ‘periods’, ranging from post-impressionism to cubism), sculptures, murals, work on ceramics, even theatre design. No permanent art collection in all the galleries of the world is complete without a Picasso.
The removal of a pair of concrete murals by the Spanish master was completed on July 28 from a government building in Norway’s capital Oslo, which was being pulled down. Opinions were divided over whether to spare what some considered an architectural masterpiece, while others said it was ugly. The so-called Y-block will be replaced by a modern and safer construction after the government headquarters were targeted in June 2011 by Norwegian mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik. He first set off a bomb at the nearby office of the prime minister, since demolished, where eight people died. He then went to Utoya island and killed 69 more in a shooting spree. The total cost of the removal of the murals—to be preserved and installed elsewhere—and the demolition is estimated at 59 million kroner ($6.4 million).
The artworks include the Fisherman, a Picasso drawing sandblasted on a 250-tonne section of the building’s front that was removed, as well as a piece by Norwegian sculptor Carl Nesjar. A second, smaller Picasso work, the floor-to-ceiling drawing The Seagull, was located in the lobby and removed too. For some, the building, dating back to 1969, stands as a painful reminder of the terror attack that left a scar on Norwegian psyche, though it suffered little structural damage. To others, it is a post-modernist masterpiece by Norwegian architect Erling Viksjoe. Some also say that by razing the building, officials are symbolically finishing Breivik’s job.
The office block, shaped like a ‘Y’, housed the education ministry until July 2011. The adjacent H-Block, a 1958 design by Viksjoe, was home to the prime minister’s offices until Breivik blew up a van parked at its base, loaded with explosives. The demolition had been at a standstill since 2014 due to a series of postponements, chiefly because of the protests. The Y-block could have been repaired but the government argued that it was still vulnerable to attacks because of its location. Breivik, who was convicted of mass murder and terrorism in 2012 and given a 21-year prison sentence, claimed to be the commander of a secret Christian military order plotting an anti-Muslim revolution in Europe.
