Our editors will be looking ahead today to these developing stories ...
Bruised in election, People Power meet the media
The radical pan-democratic party People Power, which managed to win back only one of its two district council seats in Sunday's elections, and none of the seats 60 other candidates stood for, will hold a press conference. Thirty-six of the 62 candidates challenged Democratic Party candidates and another nine took on the Association for Democracy and People's Livelihood in retaliation for the groups' compromise on last year's electoral reform. People Power lawmaker Wong Yuk-man admitted yesterday that the election outcome was undesirable.
Japan's arrest of boat captain complicates diplomacy
Tensions have risen between Japan and China since the detention on Sunday of a Chinese skipper off Japan's southwest. Now the question is how the incident will affect Foreign Minister Koichiro Genba's meeting this week with his Chinese counterpart, Yang Jiechi. They are supposed to discuss the timing and details of Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda's first trip to China in late December. But the Japanese coastguard's arrest of the captain of a Chinese fishing boat that allegedly intruded into Japanese territorial waters seems to have cast a shadow over the preparatory meeting.
Nuclear watchdog's report focuses on Iranian arms
A new report from the UN atomic watchdog this week would provide fresh evidence of Iran's nuclear weapons drive, diplomats said as Israel stoked speculation about a possible pre-emptive strike. Previous International Atomic Energy Agency assessments have centred on Iran's efforts to produce fissile material - uranium and plutonium - that can be put to peaceful uses such as power generation, but also be used to make nuclear weapons. The intelligence update, which diplomats say will be go to agency members as early as today, will focus on Iran's alleged efforts to put radioactive material in a warhead and develop missiles to deliver it.
