■SOUTH KOREA
'Widow' scammer caught
A woman who held a funeral for her husband after claiming he was lost at sea scammed insurers out of US$800,000 before he was found alive and well, police said yesterday. The fraud in the southeastern town of Tongyeong is part of an increasing trend of bogus claims, insurers say. It began in March 2006 when she told police that her husband had failed to return from a fishing trip, a police spokesman in the nearby city of Changwon said. The husband had left his boat adrift and sneaked back ashore on a different boat as a major sea search was launched. He went to ground for some three years elsewhere in the country as his wife successfully filed claims totaling 1.1 billion won (US$800,000) with six insurance firms. She even held a funeral for her spouse, receiving the customary condolence cash payments from mourners.
■JAPAN
Woman sentenced to death
The Supreme Court sentenced a woman to death yesterday for killing four people and making more than 60 ill by poisoning a large pot of curry at a summer festival in 1998, a case widely covered in domestic media. The incident shocked the nation, where crime rates are relatively low and mass killings extremely rare. Public broadcaster NHK reported the Supreme Court upheld a lower court death sentence on Masumi Hayashi, 47, for the crime that took place in the western city of Wakayama. The Supreme Court called the crime “cruel and despicable,” NHK said. Prosecutors charged Hayashi became enraged after being shunned by her neighbors and put arsenic in the curry when she was alone in the garage where it was being prepared, media said.
■NEW ZEALAND
Tourist angered by 'Eskimo'
A New Zealand lolly called an Eskimo and in the stereotypical shape of an Inuit person has angered a Canadian tourist who says it is an insult to her people, a newspaper reported yesterday. Seeka Lee Veevee Parsons, 21, an Inuit from Canada’s Nunavut Territory, told the Taranaki Daily News that the word Eskimo, used by confectionery manufacturer Cadbury/Pascall in its popular lolly mix, was unacceptable because it had negative racial connotations. Eskimo means “eater of raw meat,” she said, and the correct term for her people is Inuit. Parsons said she would send packets of the lollies to both Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and her grandfather, an Inuit tribal elder in the Nunavut Territory, presumably to encourage a protest. She said that New Zealanders would not like to see confectionery in the shape of indigenous Maoris and if anything the lollies should be shaped like a seal, the Inuits’ main source of food.
■THAILAND
Toes lead to robbery suspect
Police have arrested a suspected thief who left his toes at the scene of the crime, media reports said yesterday. Atthapol Maenkrathok, 42, was arrested over the weekend at a hospital in Uttaradit Province where he was being treated for a severed foot. Police said Atthapol was charged with robbing a woman of her cash and a US$1,000 gold necklace on the overnight train from Chiang Mai to Bangkok on April 7, the Bangkok Post reported. Investigators linked Atthapol to the theft after finding his bag of tools on the train, including an identification card, and five of his severed toes on the train track in Uttaradit, 380km north of Bangkok. Atthapol told police he had snagged his foot under the wheels while jumping off the train in Uttaradit.
■RUSSIA
Indonesian skipper convicted
A court in the far eastern Primorye region yesterday sentenced an Indonesian captain to three months in jail over a shipping incident that left eight sailors dead, the RIA-Novosti news agency reported. Adi Nazvira was convicted of unlawfully crossing the Russian border by a court in Nakhodka, a Russian port on the Pacific where the incident involving the Sierra Leone-flagged New Star took place in February. The ship, with 10 Chinese and six Indonesians on board, was fired on by Russian border guards after it left Nakhodka. Eight of the sailors drowned when the captain ordered the evacuation of the vessel and their rescue boat sunk amid bad weather, although the exact circumstances of the incident are disputed.
■ISRAEL
Israel eyes Phalanx system
The government wants to buy a US radar-guided cannon to shoot down short-range rockets and mortar bombs fired at the Jewish state by Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, Haaretz reported yesterday. The Raytheon Phalanx system, designed to shred incoming shells after spotting their launch, could complement the Israeli Iron Dome system that fires small interceptor missiles and is due to be deployed on Gaza’s border next year. Phalanxes currently in production are earmarked for US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, but Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak would ask the Pentagon to free up one unit — costing US$25 million — for Israel, Haaretz said. “The goal is to create a situation where as many rockets as possible launched at Israel are intercepted,” Barak was quoted as saying by the newspaper, which said the minister would travel to Washington in June to propose the Phalanx purchase.
■UNITED KINGDOM
Quiet birthday for the Queen
Queen Elizabeth II was to mark her 83rd birthday yesterday with a low-key day at Windsor Castle, Buckingham Palace said. The queen’s London office said the monarch had nothing special planned or any public engagements scheduled, but she would probably go through the stack of official papers she receives as head of state. She has long done that every day of the year, except Christmas. “As always, the queen will be working,” her spokesman said on condition of anonymity, in line with palace policy. A royal salute will be fired at noon in Hyde Park in central London to mark the occasion by the King’s Troop of the Royal Horse Artillery. The queen’s birthday is celebrated twice a year — once privately, on her actual birthday, and again with an official national celebration in June.
■SOUTH OSSETIA
OSCE observers detained
The pro-Russian breakaway region of South Ossetia has detained several observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) for illegally crossing the Georgian-South Ossetian border, a separatist official said yesterday. “OSCE representatives were detained on South Ossetian territory for illegal border crossing,” Irina Gagloyeva said, without giving further details. She was unable to say how many observers had been held. An OSCE spokeswoman confirmed separately that two OSCE military observers had been detained by South Ossetian forces. Since 1992, 28 military observers from the Vienna-based organization have been based in Georgia and conducting patrols in South Ossetia. But since Russia’s brief war with Georgia last year, the separatist authorities have denied the observers access to their region and Moscow has blocked the renewal of the mission’s mandate in Georgia.
■UNITED STATES
Bodies found in hotel
Staff at a suburban Baltimore, Maryland, hotel unlocked a guest door and discovered the bodies of a man, two women and a teenage girl, authorities said, without naming the cause of death. The four were related and police were not looking for any suspects, Baltimore County Police Corporal Michael Hill said. It was unclear whether the deaths might have been the result of a murder-suicide. Hill said the victims were not from the Baltimore area and police were trying to contact the next of kin. Autopsies were planned for yesterday, and police didn’t release their identities. The hotel staff made the discovery on Monday after the room occupants didn’t check out when expected from the Sheraton Baltimore North Hotel.
■UNITED STATES
Kids lie about addiction
A study has found that almost one in 10 kids who play video games shows classic signs of addiction, lying about their habit, failing in efforts to cut back and even stealing to buy games. The study by Douglas Gentile, a psychology professor at Iowa State University, was published in the journal Psychological Science and used data from a Harris Poll of nearly 1,200 children aged eight to 18. The survey found that 88 percent of kids played video games at least occasionally and on average children played 13 hours of video games a week. Addicted gamers were far more likely to be boys. They reported having trouble paying attention in school, received poorer grades and had more health problems.
■UNITED STATES
Millions living with paralysis
Nearly 2 percent of the population, or more than 5.5 million people, have some kind of paralysis, a survey published yesterday found. The largest group, 29 percent, were paralyzed or partly paralyzed by stroke, the survey by Anthony Cahill of the University of New Mexico and colleagues found. Spinal cord injuries affected 23 percent, the telephone survey of 33,000 people found. The study was paid for by the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation, set up by the actor who was paralyzed in a horse-riding accident in 1995 and died in 2004.
■UNITED STATES
Web spies breach jet project
Computer spies have repeatedly breached the Pentagon's costliest weapons program, the US$300 billion Joint Strike Fighter project, the Wall Street Journal reported yesterday. The newspaper quoted current and former government officials familiar with the matter as saying the intruders were able to copy and siphon data related to design and electronics systems. The spies could not access the most sensitive material, the paper said. The Journal quoted former US officials as saying the attacks seemed to have originated in China.
■UNITED STATES
FBI in mall spying scandal
Two FBI workers are accused of using surveillance equipment to spy on teenage girls as they undressed and tried on prom gowns at a charity event at a mall in West Virginia. The FBI employees have been charged with conspiracy and committing criminal invasion of privacy. They were working in an FBI satellite control room at the mall when they positioned a camera on temporary changing rooms and zoomed in for at least 90 minutes on girls dressing for the Cinderella Project fashion show, Marion County Prosecutor Pat Wilson said on Monday. Gary Sutton and Charles Hommema face fines and up to a year in jail on each charge if convicted.
When Shanghai-based designer Guo Qingshan posted a vacation photo on Valentine’s Day and captioned it “Puppy Mountain,” it became a sensation in China and even created a tourist destination. Guo had gone on a hike while visiting his hometown of Yichang in central China’s Hubei Province late last month. When reviewing the photographs, he saw something he had not noticed before: A mountain shaped like a dog’s head rested on the ground next to the Yangtze River, its snout perched at the water’s edge. “It was so magical and cute. I was so excited and happy when I discovered it,” Guo said.
Chinese authorities said they began live-fire exercises in the Gulf of Tonkin on Monday, only days after Vietnam announced a new line marking what it considers its territory in the body of water between the nations. The Chinese Maritime Safety Administration said the exercises would be focused on the Beibu Gulf area, closer to the Chinese side of the Gulf of Tonkin, and would run until tomorrow evening. It gave no further details, but the drills follow an announcement last week by Vietnam establishing a baseline used to calculate the width of its territorial waters in the Gulf of Tonkin. State-run Vietnam News
TURNAROUND: The Liberal Party had trailed the Conservatives by a wide margin, but that was before Trump threatened to make Canada the US’ 51st state Canada’s ruling Liberals, who a few weeks ago looked certain to lose an election this year, are mounting a major comeback amid the threat of US tariffs and are tied with their rival Conservatives, according to three new polls. An Ipsos survey released late on Tuesday showed that the left-leaning Liberals have 38 percent public support and the official opposition center-right Conservatives have 36 percent. The Liberals have overturned a 26-point deficit in six weeks, and run advertisements comparing the Conservative leader to Trump. The Conservative strategy had long been to attack unpopular Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, but last month he
Four decades after they were forced apart, US-raised Adamary Garcia and her birth mother on Saturday fell into each other’s arms at the airport in Santiago, Chile. Without speaking, they embraced tearfully: A rare reunification for one the thousands of Chileans taken from their mothers as babies and given up for adoption abroad. “The worst is over,” Edita Bizama, 64, said as she beheld her daughter for the first time since her birth 41 years ago. Garcia had flown to Santiago with four other women born in Chile and adopted in the US. Reports have estimated there were 20,000 such cases from 1950 to
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