■ Indonesia
Rights group wants justice
Indonesians deserve to know whether the country's powerful intelligence agency was involved in the murder of a top human-rights campaigner, a US-based rights group said yesterday after US lawmakers joined international calls for justice. Munir Said Thalib, an outspoken critic of the Indonesian military, was fatally poisoned on a flight to Amsterdam in September last year. President Bambang Susilo Yudhoyono appointed a fact-finding team to investigate whether the armed forces or intelligence agency were involved. The team's report, which was completed six months ago, implicated top officials from the State Intelligence Agency.
■ China
Man sues over death row
A Chinese man is suing a regional court for sentencing him to death and putting him in jail for nearly 600 days for a murder he says that he was tortured into confessing. Zhou Rukou, 51, on Tuesday filed a suit against the Intermediate People's Court and the prosecutor's office of Yancheng City in eastern Jiangsu Province, after the murder and robbery charges that kept him in jail for 567 days were dropped in April, the China Daily reported. Zhou said he was tortured by 12 policemen into confessing.
■ China
Activist sues officials
A blind social activist who was put under house arrest and repeatedly beaten after exposing the forced sterilization of women in east China has filed a lawsuit against two local officials, his lawyer said yesterday. He filed a lawsuit on behalf of Chen, also a self-educated "barefoot" lawyer, at the Yinan County People's Court against the township's deputy head and another local official for inflicting grievous bodily harm.
■ Hong Kong
Potter fans appeal to author
Ten thousand Harry Potter fans in Hong Kong have signed a petition pleading with author J.K. Rowling to visit and give them a reading, a news report said yesterday. The appeal from pupils at schools across the city was sent through the organizers of the Hong Kong Book Festival which starts on Nov. 19, the South China Morning Post reported. Festival director Peter Lam told the newspaper: "Harry Potter books, both the ordinary English edition and the Chinese translation, have sold very well in Hong Kong. "Ms Rowling has never been to Asia. We are inviting her to come to the book festival."
■ Japan
Thief nets ¥2 from temple
A Japanese man has been arrested and charged with stealing from a Buddhist temple box. His booty: ¥2 (less than US$0.02). Shoji Kondo, 27, was nabbed on Oct. 24 after turning over the donations box in Kobe, police said yesterday. When he was caught, he had taken ¥2 from the box, but told police he thought they were ¥100 coins -- enough to buy a can of juice. Kondo was indicted for theft on Nov. 2, and police said he was charged because he had repeatedly stolen money from temple offertory boxes.
■ Singapore
Student's final wish granted
The final wish of a 12-year-old boy who lost his battle with cancer came true when the hearse carrying his coffin visited his primary school one last time, teachers said yesterday. At Leon Gomez's wake on Tuesday, many of the more than 50 students and teachers at Ang Mo Kio school were in tears and carried small bouquets that they placed next to his coffin. Leon's father, Leonard Gomez, 55, told the Straits Times that even when his son was very ill and in a lot of pain, the boy would smile when he talked about his teachers, classmates and lessons. "He loved school," Gomez was quoted as saying. "His dying wish was to be taken back one last time."
■ Japan
China's planes encroach
Japanese fighter jets have been scrambled 30 times to turn away Chinese planes approaching Japan's airspace in the last six months, more than twice the 13 times in the same period last year, officials said yesterday. The increased defensive posture reflects the growing tensions between Japan and China, which are squabbling over interpretations of their wartime past, undersea gas deposits and ownership of East China Sea islands. An Air Self Defense Force spokesman said fighter jets had scrambled in response to what were believed to be Chinese military planes.
■ India
Baby-for-debt incident aired
A bizarre sequence of events filled TV screens after a poor family, the Sharmas, from a Delhi suburb, took a loan of 15,000 rupees (US$330) from a moneylender, Mahendra Rajput. Pramod Sharma did so apparently to pay for his daughter's birth. With no repayment in sight, it is alleged Rajput took Sharma and his wife to court, where he got their signatures on blank papers. After the formalities he kept six-week-old Aman. On the Hindu festival of Diwali Rajput visited Sharma and gave the couple 5,000 rupees, saying he had sold their child for 20,000 rupees, and that his share of the deal was 15,000 rupees. The story made it on to a TV news program with an Oprah-style debate between the protagonists. Gupta told the Guardian he had thought the child was dying and needed care. He said the baby had been returned to the family.
■ United States
Shooter gets life sentence
A man who shot and killed six hunters in Wisconsin after he was caught trespassing has been sentenced to life in prison, local media reports said on Tuesday. Hmong immigrant Chai Soua Vang, 37, had claimed that he shot the hunters in self-defense because they used racial slurs and fired on him first, making him fearful of his life. However, two survivors testified during trial that only one of the hunters was carrying a gun and denied Vang's claim that the slain man shot first. The court was told that Vang shot two hunters in the back last fall while chasing them through the woods and killed the rest where they stood or lay.
■ United States
Couples win US$340 million
Two Oregon, Washington, couples stepped forward on Tuesday to claim a US$340-million lottery jackpot, the second largest in US history. In a televised news conference, the couples discussed their new wealth. Their winning ticket was the only one that matched the winning numbers -- 7, 21, 43, 44, 49 and 29, which were picked in the Oct. 19 drawing. Frances Chaney, who accepted the winnings at a broadcast announcement, said it was "providential" that her many moves around the US had brought her to Oregon, where she bought the winning ticket, along with her husband and another couple.
■ United States
Nobel Prize winner jailed
A California court sentenced Nobel Prize winner John Robert Schrieffer to two years in prison on Monday for killing a man and seven others in a car accident, the Lompoc Record reported. On Sept. 24 last year, Schrieffer, 74, hit a van carrying eight people with his speeding Mercedes-Benz. The physicist has a history of speeding, the deputy district attorney told the judge during the trial. Schrieffer, who in 1972 shared the Nobel Prize for physics for his work on superconductivity, was convicted of vehicular manslaughter with gross negligence. He was driving with a suspended license.
■ The Netherlands
Cars towed to avoid theft
Amsterdam police are initiating a new policy of towing away parked cars in which valuable items such as laptops, mobile phones and portable navigation systems are visible inside, the Volkskrant reported yesterday. The owners will be able to retrieve their vehicles free of charge from a nearby car pound. The policy is aimed at cutting the number of vehicle break-ins in the Dutch capital, and police justified the measure as saving police time in the long run. Authorities said about 70 thefts from parked vehicles are reported every day. The number has fallen since last year but is still too high, in the view of the police.
■ United Kingdom
Uninsured vehicles seized
British police forces will be able to seize and even destroy cars being driven by uninsured drivers as part of a crackdown that started on Tuesday. Under the new powers, officers will be able to use automatic number plate recognition cameras, linked to a database with details of all vehicles registered in the UK, to spot cars being driven without insurance. The Department of Transport estimates there are around two million uninsured drivers on Britain's roads, costing every law-abiding motorist an extra £30 (US$52) on their insurance premium.
■ Portugal
Reverend apprehended
A 78-year-old priest was arrested after he drove through a police road barrier, narrowly missing a child, in an effort to make it to mass on time, the daily Correio da Manha said on Tuesday. The Reverend Joao Bastos ignored police orders to stop in the northern town of Argoncilhe on Sunday and kept driving, saying he was running late for the 11am service. Five police officers chased after the priest and managed to stop his Mercedes, but had to drag him out of the car as he refused to leave the vehicle, the paper said. He was taken to a local police station where he was charged with civil disobedience and released.
■ Iraq
Suicide bomb kills police
Seven policemen were killed and nine people were wounded, including three civilians, when a suicide car bomb hit a police patrol north of Baghdad yesterday, medical and army sources said. The attack took place in the city of Baquba, a mixed Shiite and Sunni city 65km north of the capital. Baquba is the capital of Diyala province which has seen considerable violence linked to sectarian tensions in the run-up to Dec. 15 elections.
■ Russia
No more room at summit
A senior aide to President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that he will probably not invite emerging economic powerhouses such as China and India to next year's meetings of the Group of Eight (G8) nations. Russia will assume the rotating presidency of the elite forum next year, which has eight members, though some developing nations have been present as observers at recent G8 summits. There are increasing calls to include Brazil, China, India and South Africa to better reflect shifting world economic power. The G8 summit will be held in July in St Petersburg, with finance ministers meetings scheduled for February and then in late May or early June.
■ United Kingdom
Le Carre picks up `dagger'
Britain's crime writers' club on Tuesday awarded its "Dagger of Daggers" to John Le Carre, picking The Spy Who Came In From The Cold as their top book of the last 50 years. "I was most touched by this unexpected award," Le Carre said after his 1963 novel fought off tough competition from such classics as Martin Cruz Smith's Gorky Park. But Le Carre, 74, did not attend the Golden Jubilee awards ceremony, explaining "I am sorry that my new novel prevents me from being present." Le Carre's latest novel The Mission Song, is to be published next September.
■ United States
Gonorrhea infections decline
Gonorrhea rates in the country have fallen to their lowest level on record, but rates of two other sexually transmitted diseases, syphilis and chlamydia, are rising, officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Tuesday. The rates, though of concern, are low compared with years ago. Still, an estimated 19 million new infections of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) occurred last year at estimated health care costs of US$19 billion, the officials said. Many cases of the three bacterial diseases go undetected, while many diagnosed cases are not reported. STDs can cause serious, painful and sometimes life-threatening complications like pelvic inflammatory disease and infertility among women and difficulty urinating among men.
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered
Former US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi said if US President Joe Biden had ended his re-election bid sooner, the Democratic Party could have held a competitive nominating process to choose his replacement. “Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said in an interview on Thursday published by the New York Times the next day. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said. Pelosi said she thought the Democratic candidate, US Vice President Kamala Harris, “would have done
Farmer Liu Bingyong used to make a tidy profit selling milk but is now leaking cash — hit by a dairy sector crisis that embodies several of China’s economic woes. Milk is not a traditional mainstay of Chinese diets, but the Chinese government has long pushed people to drink more, citing its health benefits. The country has expanded its dairy production capacity and imported vast numbers of cattle in recent years as Beijing pursues food self-sufficiency. However, chronically low consumption has left the market sloshing with unwanted milk — driving down prices and pushing farmers to the brink — while
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