News Headlines - 30 October 2018

▽South Korea court orders Japan firm to compensate wartime forced labourers - The Straits Times

South Korea’s top court ruled on Tuesday (Oct 30) that Japan’s Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp should compensate four South Koreans for their forced labour during World War Two, when Japan occupied Korea, Yonhap reported... The court ruled that the former labourers’ right to reparation was not terminated by a 1965 treaty normalising diplomatic ties, rejecting the claim by Tokyo, Yonhap said.
Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono said on Tuesday that the South Korean court’s order was “unthinkable”, and the ruling overturned the legal basis for bilateral friendship since 1965.

▽Sony forecasts big jump to record annual profit on winning gaming strategy | Reuters

Japan’s Sony Corp boosted its annual profit outlook by 30 percent to a record level after a strong second-quarter, propelled by popular game titles like “Marvel’s Spider-Man” as well as growing demand for its online gaming services.

▽Twitter to remove 'like' tool in a bid to improve the quality of debate

Twitter is planning to remove the ability to "like" tweets in a radical move that aims to improve the quality of debate on the social network.
Founder Jack Dorsey last week admitted at a Twitter event that he was not a fan of the heart-shaped button and that it would be getting rid of it “soon”.
The feature was introduced in 2015 to replace “favourites”, a star-shaped button that allowed people to bookmark tweets to read later.

▽NASA Solar Probe Becomes Closest Spacecraft to the Sun - Geek.com

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe now holds the record for closest approach to the Sun by a human-made object.
The spacecraft on Monday passed within 26.55 million miles of the Sun’s surface, beating the previous achievement, set by the German-American Helios 2 in April 1976.
Expect a lot more broken records as the Parker Solar Probe mission continues, prepared to make a final close approach of 3.83 million miles from the Sun’s surface in 2024.

▽Police rescue animals from 'hellish' Albanian zoo | The Japan Times

Albanian police on Sunday broke open cages at a private zoo and removed 11 animals including three lions and a bear being kept in “hellish” conditions, animal welfare workers said.
After the owner of the zoo at Fier, around 100 km (60 miles) south of the capital Tirana, allegedly refused to cooperate, officers forcibly entered areas where the animals were kept to allow vets access, an AFP correspondent at the scene reported.