■ Pakistan
Attack death toll rises
Three more soldiers died of their wounds, taking the toll from a suicide attack on a local army soccer team to 12, the military said in a statement. The attack took place on Monday in a high security area of the garrison city of Kohat in North West Frontier Province, which borders Afghanistan. The players were on a public road in the area when they were blown up. Nine were reported dead at the time of the attack. "Later, three critically injured also succumbed to their injuries," the military said in a statement late on Monday.
■ SRI LANKA
Tigers overrun military post
Tamil Tiger rebels overran a military outpost in the north yesterday, killing at least five government soldiers, the rebels said. The Tigers mounted the offensive at Weerapuram in the district of Vavuniya just outside their de facto mini-state, the Tiger's Rasiah Ilanthiriyan said in a statement. "At least five Sri Lanka armed forces men were killed and others fled," the statement said, adding that the guerrillas did not suffer any casualties. There was no immediate reaction from the military, which has claimed killing at least 327 rebels since Dec. 1.
■ JAPAN
Gun laws to be reviewed
The government will review gun control laws following last week's deadly shooting at a sports club, Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda said on Monday. A man opened fire on Friday night at a private gym in Sasebo, killing two people and injuring six. "No matter what the reason is, we should not let such a crime happen at any cost," Fukuda said. "There must be problems with usage standards or ways to control [guns]," Fukuda told reporters. The gunman, unemployed 37-year-old Masayoshi Magome, fired 10 shots and briefly took 10 people hostage before fleeing and turning the gun on himself in an apparent suicide.
■ BANGLADESH
Court to try war crimes case
A court on Monday accepted the first case since 1975 accusing people of war crimes during the war that led to the country's independence. The complaint, filed by a former guerrilla fighter who said his uncle and two cousin comrades were murdered in the 1971 conflict, accused two officials of a major political party, Jamaat-e-Islami, and 11 other people. The accused included Matiur Rahman Nizami and Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid, the chief and secretary-general of Jamaat-e-Islami respectively. The complaint said they were commanders of al-Badar, a local auxiliary force of the Pakistan army in 1971.
■ SYRIA
Opposition activists nabbed
The government has detained four members of a secular opposition grouping, intensifying a week-old crackdown on dissent, the Syrian League for the Defense of Human Rights said on Monday. Security forces in Hama picked up Fidaa Horani, a 42-year-old gynecologist who chairs the Damascus Declaration grouping on Sunday and sent her to the capital, the rights group said. On Monday, the authorities detained three more members -- writer Ali Abdullah and doctors Walid Bunni and Mohammed Yaser al-Iti. Seven members of the grouping have now been detained since Dec. 9.
■ CANADA
Dubai pardons UN official
A Canadian UN official who advised Afghanistan on eradicating opium poppy crops was granted amnesty by the ruler of Dubai on Monday, six months after he was sentenced to four years in prison for smuggling and drug possession. Bert Tatham, 35, of Vancouver, was arrested April 23 during a one-hour stopover at the Dubai International Airport, for having a half a gram of hashish and two poppy bulbs. His attorney, Saeed Al-Gailani, said at the arraignment in June that Tatham accidentally carried a small amount of drugs because part of his job was to collect "tons of drugs every day" in Afghanistan. "His trousers must have mistakenly picked up the tiny quantity of hashish," al-Gailani said, adding Tatham was taking the poppy bulbs to Canada "for experiments and education." Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum pardoned Tatham and 376 other inmates this week.
■ GERMANY
Failed bombing trial opens
One of the two main suspects in last year's failed train bombings went on trial in Duesseldorf yesterday for attempted murder. Youssef Mohammed el-Hajdib, a 22-year-old Lebanese, is accused of attempting to blow up two commuter trains in July last year along with Jihad Hamad. The bombs' triggers went off, but the explosives failed to detonate and nobody was harmed. El-Hajdib was arrested the following month in Kiel; Hamad fled to Lebanon, where he was found guilty yesterday of planting bombs on two trains in Cologne. The Beirut Criminal sentenced him to 12 years hard labor in jail. It also convicted el-Hajdib in absentia, sentencing him to life in prison.
■ UNITED KINGDOM
Lunar land prices skyrocket
Internet searches for lunar land prices show the cost of buying an acre of the moon has risen 40 percent since the start of this year, UBS told clients in a tongue-in-cheek analysis. Lacing a year-end note with a little holiday cheer, the investment bank said its "esoteric research" of news reports suggests lunar property trends may even be an indicator of US house prices.
■ UNITED STATES
Good drivers rewarded
Motorists in the suburban California city of Rancho Cordova may be in for a surprise if they spot flashing red lights in their rearview mirrors over the holiday season. Police are stopping law-abiding motorists and rewarding their good driving with US$5 Starbucks coffee gift cards. A traffic officer came up with the idea to "promote the holiday spirit and enhance goodwill between the traffic unit and the motoring public," police Sargent Tim Curran said. Local businesses donated money to buy the gift cards.
■ UNITED STATES
Student fabricates attack
A Princeton University junior who claimed to have been beaten by two men in black ski caps for his conservative views acknowledged on Monday that he made up the attack, said police officials in Princeton, New Jersey. The student, Francisco Nava, 23, told police that he was attacked on Friday night, two days after he and three other students belonging to a conservative group, the Anscombe Society, had received threatening e-mail messages, according to the university. On Monday, when confronted by police about inconsistencies in his story, Nava acknowledged that he inflicted scratches and bruises on his own face because of "underlying personal issues" and that he had not received any threatening e-mail, Detective Sergeant Ernie Silagyi said.
■ UNITED STATES
Student graduates at 87
A 50-year gap in his higher education didn't stop Clarence Garrett. After returning to college in spring of last year as a full-time student, Garrett completed course work at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and was awarded his bachelor's degree at commencement ceremonies on Sunday -- at the age of 87. "We are not sure if Clarence Garrett is the oldest to ever graduate from UWM, but we do know that there had not been a graduate for some time who was born when the president was Woodrow Wilson," Chancellor Carlos Santiago said.
■ UNITED STATES
Money given to give away
A bank is giving its full-time employees US$1,000 each and part-time employees US$500 each. There's one condition -- use it for people in need. State Bank & Trust chief operating officer Michael Solberg said the payments are part of a US$502,000 "Pay it Forward" initiative. "We're going to really see some huge impact on our community," Solberg said. Employees were told not to use the money for themselves, their families or families of other bank employees. The bank asked employees to document the good deed with a videocam. The deadline is June 30.
The Philippines yesterday said its coast guard would acquire 40 fast patrol craft from France, with plans to deploy some of them in disputed areas of the South China Sea. The deal is the “largest so far single purchase” in Manila’s ongoing effort to modernize its coast guard, with deliveries set to start in four years, Philippine Coast Guard Commandant Admiral Ronnie Gil Gavan told a news conference. He declined to provide specifications for the vessels, which Manila said would cost 25.8 billion pesos (US$440 million), to be funded by development aid from the French government. He said some of the vessels would
CARGO PLANE VECTOR: Officials said they believe that attacks involving incendiary devices on planes was the work of Russia’s military intelligence agency the GRU Western security officials suspect Russian intelligence was behind a plot to put incendiary devices in packages on cargo planes headed to North America, including one that caught fire at a courier hub in Germany and another that ignited in a warehouse in England. Poland last month said that it had arrested four people suspected to be linked to a foreign intelligence operation that carried out sabotage and was searching for two others. Lithuania’s prosecutor general Nida Grunskiene on Tuesday said that there were an unspecified number of people detained in several countries, offering no elaboration. The events come as Western officials say
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
RSS