News Headlines - 07 May 2019

▽Pompeo makes unannounced trip to Iraq to discuss tensions with Iran - CNNPolitics

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made an unannounced trip to Iraq on Tuesday after abruptly canceling a planned trip to Berlin amid escalating tensions with Iran.
The top US diplomat met with Prime Minister Adil Abd al-Mahdi, President Barham Salih and other officials while on the ground in the Iraqi capital in a roughly four-hour visit, according to the pool traveling with Pompeo.

▽Turkey's election board orders rerun for Istanbul mayor - CNN

Turkey's election board has ruled in favor of a revote for Istanbul's new mayor -- just weeks after the opposition candidate won the contest -- in a decision denounced by opposition leaders as "plain dictatorship."
The country's Supreme Election Council (YSK) announced its 7-4 decision on Monday due to allegations of electoral fraud, after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's party lost the race by a razor-thin margin.

▽Miss America, Miss Teen USA and Miss USA Are All Black Women for the First Time - The New York Times

Last week, for the first time, black women wore the crowns of all three major pageants simultaneously.
Cheslie Kryst, 28, won the Miss USA contest, and Kaliegh Garris, 18, won Miss Teen USA. They joined Nia Franklin, 25, who was crowned as the 2019 Miss America in September.

▽Emperor Naruhito and Japan's lonely republicans - BBC News

After Japan was defeated, Hirohito, who sat on the Chrysanthemum Throne from 1926 to 1989, renounced his divinity.
Under the constitution written by the US, Japan became a constitutional monarchy with the emperor kept on as "symbol of the state" who is forbidden from being involved in politics... In the later years of Hirohito's reign, anti-monarchy feelings were more pronounced. Leftist radicals carried out occasional small attacks on places associated with the emperor.
But his son Akihito, who abdicated this Tuesday because of his age and ill health, succeeded in establishing the royal family as a symbol of peace after coming to the throne in 1989.

▽Wild raccoon moves into German zoo, can't be thrown out by law | The Japan Times

The German daily Rhein-Neckar-Zeitung reported Friday that zoo staffers recently discovered the uninvited guest inside the raccoon enclosure, where he seemed to be getting along fine with the seven original residents.
The newspaper reported that the interloper - nicknamed Fred - can expect free board and lodgings for life because European Union rules forbid him from being released back into the wild. Under a 2015 EU directive, raccoons are considered an invasive alien species that might pose a threat to European plants and animals.
Wild raccoons in Europe are the descendants of animals that escaped from fur farms decades ago.