■ AUSTRALIA
Court orders halt to whaling
The Federal Court yesterday ordered Japan to stop hunting and killing whales anywhere around its coastline or off Australian Antarctic territory. The ruling, in a case brought by the Humane Society International, comes with a Japanese whaling fleet sailing in Antarctic waters, where they plan to kill about 1,000 whales this season. Judge James Allsop found that the Japanese whaling firm, Kyodo Senpaku Kaisha Ltd, had killed Antarctic minke whales and fin whales in the Australian Whale Sanctuary in contravention of the law.
■ CHINA
Ex-official sentenced to die
A former government official was sentenced to death yesterday for ordering his driver to kill his mistress, a court official and state media said. Xinhua news agency said the Beijing No. 1 Intermediate People's Court handed down the sentence to Xu Zhiyuan, a former vice chairman of a government advisory body in Fangshan District for murder and bribe taking. A court official who would identify himself only by his surname Niu confirmed the sentence but would not give any details. Xinhua said Xu, 55, had an affair with a woman from the district government office since 1999, but started arguing with her. In January last year he ordered his driver, Liu Xiaoming, to kill her and burn the body.
■ CHINA
Students banned from finals
A university has banned 440 students from sitting their finals because they owe more than 14 million yuan (US$2 million) in tuition fees, accusing them of using the money to invest, Beijing Times said yesterday. China has sought to bridge a yawning wealth gap between affluent cities and the impoverished countryside by waiving compulsory education fees for rural students, but a college education still remains out of reach for most. But the Hebei University of Technology said some of the students who had not paid their dues were using the tuition money to make investments, the report said.
■ INDIA
Search on for skier
Authorities in Indian Kashmir have intensified the search for a Norwegian skier who has been missing for a week in the region's top ski resort, officials said yesterday. "Helicopters, sniffer dogs and police on snow-scooters are searching Gulmarg and surrounding areas," senior tourism official Sarmad Hafiz said. "We have also sought help from the army." The northern resort of Gulmarg is famed as one of the world's top destinations for extreme and off-piste skiing. Franciska Rogne, 26, left her hotel on Jan. 8 with her skiing gear and has not been seen since.
■ GERMANY
Holocaust denier convicted
The former lawyer for a well-known Holocaust denier was convicted of incitement in Germany on Monday for denying the genocide and sentenced to three-and-a-half years in prison. Sylvia Stolz was also banned by the court from practicing law for five years. "Stolz has a basic reflex to make far-right statements," Judge Rolf Glenz said in handing down the sentence. During the trial, Stolz called the Holocaust "the biggest lie in world history." Stolz was also convicted of charges of disparaging the country and its symbols and insulting the court. Stolz represented Ernst Zundel in his first trial in Germany, which collapsed after she was banned from the proceedings on grounds she was trying to sabotage them.
■ GERMANY
Oops, wrong bottle
A man in the northeastern town of Gross Godems was being treated for serious burns on Monday after accidentally setting his apartment ablaze when he mixed up a bottle of gasoline with alcohol, police said. The 56-year-old apparently grabbed the wrong bottle and took a swig from the gasoline flask, then spat it out when he realized his mistake. The gas hit a lit cigarette, sparking the fire, police said. The man's name was not released.
■ GERMANY
Man throws self out window
A man threw himself out of an apartment window along with a Christmas tree during a late-night attempt to dispose of his festive decorations. The man fell 7m after he lost his balance throwing the tree onto the street on Saturday, police in the western city of Moenchengladbach said. The tree did not break the victim's fall. "There's a TV advert showing people having fun throwing their old Christmas trees out the window," police spokesman Willy Thevessen said on Monday. "But you're not supposed to jump with them." The man was taken to hospital in critical condition with severe head injuries after witnesses saw him fall.
■ ISRAEL
Housing project begun
Authorities have started building 60 new housing units in a settlement in east Jerusalem, the Haaretz newspaper reported yesterday, a move likely to raise tensions with the Palestinians just as they begin to tackle the thorniest issues of their conflict. The paper said the homes were being constructed in Maaleh Hazeitim, in the Ras al-Amud area of east Jerusalem, which the country occupied and annexed in 1967 after the Arab-Israeli war. It said 51 Jewish families already live in the neighborhood, built on land bought 15 years ago by US millionaire Irwin Moskowitz.
■ AUSTRIA
Body has rake in its head
The body of a young man was found in an elegant Vienna square with a rake embedded in his head, police said on Saturday. Cleaners on their way to work at Vienna's famous Albertina Museum made the gruesome discovery at a building site on the adjacent square of the same name, a police statement said. A trail of blood indicated that the man had been involved in a fight on the square after midnight on Friday and was dragged to the construction area, where he was repeatedly struck in the head with a rake from the site, it said. Police were examining film from a nearby surveillance camera for any sign of the assailant or assailants.
■ MEXICO
Boy shoots sister
A seven-year-old boy accidentally shot and killed his four-year-old sister during a game of cops and robbers in southern Mexico, a spokeswoman for the state Attorney General's office said on Monday. The boy took a loaded gun that belonged to his father, a state police officer, from a table and pointed it at his sister's head, pulling the trigger as part of their game, according to the spokeswoman. Both parents were taken into custody to be investigated for negligence in the town of Tuxtla Gutierrez, she said.
■ UNITED STATES
Catnapping law hits snag
Achieving equality for cats is not as easy as it sounds. Virginia state lawmakers found that out when a legislative panel wrangled over a proposal to make stealing a cat a felony -- the same as for swiping a dog. Unable to find a solution, the panel's chairman chose members to work on the bill. Catnapping is a misdemeanor, punishable by as much as a year in jail. Dognappers can get as many as 10 years.
■ UNITED STATES
Postal plane crashes
Crews searched in rough seas on Monday for the pilot of a twin-engine plane carrying US mail that crashed into the ocean. Debris from the Beechcraft 1900, with only the pilot aboard, was spotted in the water by the crew of a boat from Coast Guard Station Kauai in Hawaii nearly four hours after the plane was last seen on radar, the Coast Guard said. The cause of the crash was being investigated. Ian Gregor, a spokesman for the Federal Aviation Administration said no distress call was received before the crash. The plane, carrying about 1,900kg of mail. Some of the mail was recovered and will be delivered, Postal Service spokesman Duke Gonzales said.
■ UNITED STATES
Deportations to rise
The US expects to deport more than 200,000 immigrants this year who are serving time in prisons and jails across the country, the top US immigration enforcement official said. The move to speed the deportation of foreign-born criminals aims to help federal and state prisons reduce the costs of housing immigrants, Julie Myers, head of the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency, told the New York Times. Illegal immigration has emerged as one of the most passionate topics in the campaign for the US presidential election. Last year the ICE sent 276,912 immigrants to their home countries, including many who had never been arrested for crimes, but were deported for civil immigration violations, the newspaper reported.
■ UNITED STATES
Clinton prefers dancing
Asked to choose what reality TV program she would prefer to compete on, Hillary Rodham Clinton chose the popular Dancing With the Stars. "In my dreams I would be on America's Next Top Model but in reality I would have to choose my limited talents and of them dancing is better than singing," Clinton said on Monday during a taping of The Tyra Banks Show. "You do not want me to sing." She also suggested a nationwide contest for a title for her husband, former president Bill Clinton, should she win the nomination and be elected the nation's first female president. "Here are some of the things that have been suggested, like `First Mate,'" Hillary Clinton said. "His Scottish friends say `First Laddy,' but we need ideas. I'll just keep calling him Bill.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
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