NEPAL
Yadav to be treated in Japan
President Ram Baran Yadav was to fly to Japan yesterday for medical treatment after he was diagnosed with intestinal problems, a spokesman said. The 70-year-old fell ill two days earlier and was admitted to a hospital in the capital late on Saturday, his press adviser, Rajendra Dahal, told reporters. X-rays showed a dark “stain in his large intestine,” Dahal said. “The doctors suggested to us to seek treatment abroad. So he is leaving for Japan this afternoon for further treatment.” Yadav was elected president by parliament in July 2008 after the 240-year-old monarchy was abolished.
NEW ZEALAND
Briton survives 15-story drop
A British man who survived a fall from a 15th-story apartment balcony was “extraordinarily” lucky to be alive, officials said yesterday. The 20-year-old, identified by local media as Tom Stilwell from Brighton, was in a stable condition after his plunge on Sunday morning, Auckland Central Hospital said. Police said he found he was locked out of his 14th-floor apartment when he returned home from going out with friends. He woke a neighbor on the 15th floor, telling her he wanted to clamber down from her balcony onto his own. The neighbor, Geraldine Bautista, said the man appeared “tipsy” and she allowed him into her apartment, intending to point out to him how foolhardy his plan was. Instead, she said he immediately tried to lower himself from her balcony and slipped as she tried to grab him. “I thought I was dreaming. It happened so fast. It happened within seconds,” she told the New Zealand Herald. St John Ambulance medical director Tony Smith said the man’s fall was broken by an adjacent roof, although he still dropped 13 stories. “Survival from falls of that height are extraordinarily unusual,” he said. Stilwell suffered back and neck fractures as well as internal injuries, a broken wrist and grazes, but was awake and able to laugh about his ordeal, his roommate, Beth Goodwin, told Fairfax Media.
AUSTRALIA
Scammers rake in millions
Australians were fleeced out of more than A$93 million (US$90 million) last year by scammers, and officials yesterday said they believe it was just the tip of the iceberg. The money lost on scams was up 9 percent from the previous year with a big jump in online shopping scams, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission said in a new report. The biggest fraud was people being asked to pay to access a share in a sum of money they are told they are owed, with gullible Australians handing over more than A$30 million. This was followed by A$23.3 million being sent to someone they think they are in an online relationship with, but is in fact a con. Online shopping fraud, using increasingly sophisticated fake logos, e-mails or Web sites, raked in more than A$4 million.
EGYPT
Morsi makes allies governors
President Mohamed Morsi put Islamist allies in key positions across the country as he braces for protests on the first anniversary of his inauguration at the end of the month. Seven of the new governors listed by the state news agency are members of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party. The newly appointed Luxor Governor Adel Mohamed al-Khayat is a member of the Building and Development Party, established by Al Gamaa al-Islamiya, an Islamist group that was involved in attacks in Luxor that killed about 60 tourists in the late 1990s, but later renounced violence.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
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