Daily News Highlights – December 10, 2015 Edition

The Philippines began to study the new version of the draft Paris agreement that aims to ease the effects of climate change. “This agreement is very important to us because the Philippines is looked up to as the leader of vulnerable countries,” Philippine delegation head Emmanuel de Guzman said. The world’s most powerful country, the United States, on the other hand joined the “ambition coalition” to forge an ambitious deal against global warming.

Read this story from the Rappler team covering the negotiations in Paris.

Read this article, too, for more about the US and the “ambition coalition.”

The world’s first dengue vaccine won regulatory approval in Mexico on Wednesday, December 9, raising hopes that it could prevent more than 100 deaths there a year and eventually perhaps millions around the world. The Dengvaxia vaccine is being manufactured by French pharmaceutical giant Sanofi. The company has requested regulatory approval in 20 countries across Asia and Latin America, but Mexico was the first to give it the green light.

Read the full story on Rappler.

Saying he is a “nuisance candidate,” the Philippine Commission on Elections (Comelec) disqualified Rizalito David from running for president. The Comelec explained that David can’t fund his presidential bid. David is the man who requested a tribunal of senators and Supreme Court justices to disqualify Poe as senator. He lost this petition.

Read the full story on Rappler.

Rappler’s Marites Dañguilan Vitug profiles the lawyer who partly won against presidential bet Grace Poe in a petition before the Philippine Commission on Elections (Comelec). Lawyer Estrella Elamparo earlier convinced the Comelec’s Second Division to cancel Poe’s candidacy for president. In a 2-hour interview with Vitug, Elamparo denied she was paid to pursue this case.

Read her profile on Rappler’s “The Scrum.”

Manila Archbishop Luis Antonio Cardinal Tagle slammed “merciless” corruption as he opened the Holy Door of the Manila Cathedral. Tagle added, “Stop the exploitation and rape of women and children. Merciless!” Following the lead of Pope Francis in Vatican City, Tagle opened the Catholic Church’s Jubilee Year of Mercy in Manila. During the Jubilee Year, the Catholic Church urges more acts of mercy as it also opens more opportunities to seek forgiveness for sins.

Read the full story and watch the video on Rappler.

A Philippine court sentenced Rose Baladjay, known as the “queen” of a high-profile investment scam, to 7 years in prison. The court also said her husband, Saturnino, should suffer the same fate. On top of this, they woud have to pay complainants around P8 million ($169,654). The Baladjays have been found guilty of duping investors in a so-called pyramid scam in 2001.

Read the full story on Rappler.

Time magazine Wednesday, December 9, named German Chancellor Angela Merkel as its “Person of the Year 2015,” hailing her leadership during Europe’s debt, refugee and migrant crises, as well as Russia’s intervention in Ukraine. The magazine said the German chancellor had “stepped in” every time a serious crisis had threatened European statecraft this year.

Read the full story on Rappler.

The man accused of shooting dead 3 people at a family planning clinic in Colorado last month shouted in court Wednesday, December 9, that he was guilty, as he was formally charged, reports said. “I am guilty, there is no trial, I am a warrior for the babies,” Robert Lewis Dear reportedly yelled. Dear was charged with 179 counts, including murder, for the rampage that also left nine people wounded.

Read the full story on Rappler.

A third gunman involved in last month’s massacre at a Paris concert hall was identified Wednesday, December 9, as a Frenchman who had visited Syria, with his father saying he “would have killed him” if he had known his plans. Foued Mohamed-Aggad, 23, blew himself up in the bloodiest of the attacks on the French capital – at the Bataclan concert venue, where 90 young music lovers were killed. “I would have killed him myself beforehand,” his father, Said Mohamed-Aggad, told Agence France-Presse after French Prime Minister Manuel Valls announced the name of the assailant.

Read the full story on Rappler.

Australian entrepreneur Craig Wright has been identified by tech publications as one of the suspected secretive founders of online cryptocurrency Bitcoin, as a home reportedly belonging to him was raided as part of a tax probe Wednesday, December 9. Technology-focused websites Wired and Gizmodo have both suggested Wright is responsible, saying he fit the creator’s profile in nearly every detail, citing leaked documents.

Read the full story on Rappler.