JAPAN
Kobayashi factory searched
Health officials yesterday raided a factory producing health supplements that they say have killed at least five people and hospitalized more than 100 others. About a dozen people wearing dark suits solemnly walked into the Osaka plant of Kobayashi Pharmaceutical Co in the raid shown widely on Japanese TV news. The Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare and the City of Osaka jointly inspected the factory in Osaka that had made the supplements containing beni-koji, or red fermented rice, suspected of having caused health damage, a ministry official said. The ministry could search other locations, they added. The factory, which made the product until December, had been closed due to aging facilities, Japanese media said.
MALAYSIA
‘Allah’ socks spark attack
A Molotov cocktail was yesterday thrown into a convenience store in Kuantan district in the eastern state of Pahang just before dawn, police said, after the chain’s top executives were charged with hurting religious feelings for selling socks with the word “Allah” printed on them. Photographs of the socks on sale at a KK Supermart store sparked outrage on social media among Muslims who viewed the association of Allah with feet as offensive. KK Supermart founder and chairman Chai Kee Kan and his wife Loh Siew Mui, a company director, were on Tuesday charged with wounding religious feelings, along with three representatives of its supplier, state news agency Bernama reported. All pleaded not guilty. Police have not yet identified a suspect in yesterday’s attack.
UNITED STATES
China chip rules revised
Washington on Friday revised rules aimed at making it harder for China to access US artificial intelligence (AI) chips and chipmaking tools, part of an effort to hobble Beijing’s chipmaking industry over national security concerns. The rules, released in October last year, seek to halt shipments to China of more advanced AI chips designed by Nvidia and others as Washington cracks down on Beijing over concerns its advancing tech sector could help boost China’s military. The new rules, which are 166 pages long, go into effect on Thursday. They clarify, for example, that restrictions on chip shipments to China also apply to laptops containing those chips. The Department of Commerce, which oversees export controls, has said it plans to continue updating its restrictions on technology shipments to China as it seeks to bolster and fine-tune the measures.
UNITED STATES
Louis Gossett Jr dies
Louis Gossett Jr, the first black man to win a best supporting actor Oscar for his performance as a hard-man drill instructor in An Officer and a Gentleman, has died. He was 87. Gossett’s family said he died on Thursday night in Los Angeles without stating the cause, multiple US media outlets including CBS News reported. An Officer and a Gentleman also netted the actor a Golden Globe, and he later picked up another supporting actor Globe for The Josephine Baker Story, as well as an Emmy for the eight-part smash-hit miniseries Roots. Gossett chronicled his experiences as a trailblazing black actor in his memoir, An Actor and a Gentleman, including his first trip to Los Angeles in the 1960s when he was pulled over by police four times during a single car journey. “The only time I was really free was when the director said ‘action’ in front of a camera or on the stage and that’s when I flew,” he told the LA Times in 2008.
DIALOGUE: US president-elect Donald Trump on his Truth Social platform confirmed that he had spoken with Xi, saying ‘the call was a very good one’ for the US and China US president-elect Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) discussed Taiwan, trade, fentanyl and TikTok in a phone call on Friday, just days before Trump heads back to the White House with vows to impose tariffs and other measures on the US’ biggest rival. Despite that, Xi congratulated Trump on his second term and pushed for improved ties, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. The call came the same day that the US Supreme Court backed a law banning TikTok unless it is sold by its China-based parent company. “We both attach great importance to interaction, hope for
‘GREAT OPPRTUNITY’: The Paraguayan president made the remarks following Donald Trump’s tapping of several figures with deep Latin America expertise for his Cabinet Paraguay President Santiago Pena called US president-elect Donald Trump’s incoming foreign policy team a “dream come true” as his nation stands to become more relevant in the next US administration. “It’s a great opportunity for us to advance very, very fast in the bilateral agenda on trade, security, rule of law and make Paraguay a much closer ally” to the US, Pena said in an interview in Washington ahead of Trump’s inauguration today. “One of the biggest challenges for Paraguay was that image of an island surrounded by land, a country that was isolated and not many people know about it,”
‘FIGHT TO THE END’: Attacking a court is ‘unprecedented’ in South Korea and those involved would likely face jail time, a South Korean political pundit said Supporters of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol yesterday stormed a Seoul court after a judge extended the impeached leader’s detention over his ill-fated attempt to impose martial law. Tens of thousands of people had gathered outside the Seoul Western District Court on Saturday in a show of support for Yoon, who became South Korea’s first sitting head of state to be arrested in a dawn raid last week. After the court extended his detention on Saturday, the president’s supporters smashed windows and doors as they rushed inside the building. Hundreds of police officers charged into the court, arresting dozens and denouncing an
CYBERSCAM: Anne, an interior decorator with mental health problems, spent a year and a half believing she was communicating with Brad Pitt and lost US$855,259 A French woman who revealed on TV how she had lost her life savings to scammers posing as Brad Pitt has faced a wave of online harassment and mockery, leading the interview to be withdrawn on Tuesday. The woman, named as Anne, told the Seven to Eight program on the TF1 channel how she had believed she was in a romantic relationship with the Hollywood star, leading her to divorce her husband and transfer 830,000 euros (US$855,259). The scammers used fake social media and WhatsApp accounts, as well as artificial intelligence image-creating technology to send Anne selfies and other messages
RSS