■ Philippines
'John Wayne' up for election
A hugely popular film actor known as the John Wayne of the Philippines dealt President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo a formidable challenge yesterday by confirming his starring role in next May's election. Other candidates from the fragmented opposition and several independents have vowed to run, but Fernando Poe Jr appears to be the one to beat after scoring a slim lead over newsreader-turned-senator Noli de Castro at the top of a recent opinion poll. Poe, a high school dropout with no political experience and close friend of ousted president and former movie star Joseph Estrada, said he accepted his nomination to be the standard bearer for one opposition coalition.
■ India
Rebels' families released
Bhutan will hand over to India wives and children of Indian rebels caught in the Himalayan kingdom during a week-old military offensive, officials said yesterday. The Buddhist kingdom, wedged between India and China, last week launched its biggest offensive to push out an estimated 3,000 militants, who are fighting against New Delhi's rule across the border in India's northeast. "Bhutanese officials have informed us they would hand over wives and children of militants who are now in their custody," a senior Indian intelligence official said.
■ China
Alleged rape draws crowd
Eight men were arrested over the weekend for allegedly gang raping a woman in front of 200 revellers at a disco in Zhuhai, about 50km west of Hong Kong. The men were seized after police intercepted two taxis driving away from the Rolling Stone Disco following a complaint from the woman. A Zhuhai police spokesman confirmed the attack had occurred and eight suspects were in custody, a media report said. One witness said the woman was attacked in the main area of the disco. She was pinned to a sofa, stripped naked by four of the attackers and repeatedly raped in front of about 200 people, The Standard reported on Monday.
■ Laos
Pupils flunk urine tests
The government of Laos expressed its alarm yesterday over the results of its first widespread urine testing at primary and secondary schools, in which about 8.6 per cent of the students tested positive for methamphetamine. "It's very alarming that drugs are entering the schools," Dr. Thienthien Polsena, director of the government's Anti-Narcotics Committee, was quoted as saying in a broadcast by Radio Vientiane. The government-run radio said urine tests on 1,644 students from five primary and secondary schools in the central province of Savannakhet found 141 students had methamphetamine in their systems. Students whose urine tests were positive would be sent to reeducation centers, he said.
■ Australia
Students sobering up
Beer-swilling nights are becoming a thing of the past for Australian university students as they drink less and save money to pay off their growing personal debt and student fees, bar owners say. Even celebrations to mark the end of exams aren't as wild as they used to be, said Peter Linden, a bar manager at Melbourne University. "Having a Uni bar is no longer a license to print money," Linden said in the Sydney Morning Herald. "You don't see the kind of student that you did 10 to 15 years ago. They are more focused on degrees than they are having fun," he said.
■ South Africa
AIDS activist murdered
An AIDS activist in South Africa was gang raped and then beaten to death after telling her attackers she was infected with the HIV virus, it has emerged. Police said on Sunday that two men had been arrested on charges of participating in the rape and murder of Lorna Mlosana, 21, in the township of Khayelitsha outside Cape Town. "After they finished, the lady told them she was HIV positive, and then they took her outside and killed her," said Inspector Lunga Ntsinde. Police are seeking at least one other suspect but a witness said up to five men took turns attacking Mlosana after they had followed her into a toilet near a tavern.
■ Israel
Elite commandos say no
About a dozen reservists from the Israeli army's top commando unit declared on Sunday that they would no longer serve in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Israeli media reported, reflecting growing unease with Israel's hard-fisted policy in the Palestinian areas. Thirteen reservists, including three officers, from Sayeret Matkal signed a letter to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, declaring, "We cannot continue to stand silent," charging that Israeli military activities in the West Bank and Gaza Strip are depriving "millions of Palestinians of human rights" and endangering "the fate of Israel as a democratic, Zionist and Jewish country." Sayeret Matkal is the top commando unit in the Israeli military and its most prestigious.
■ Belgium
Antibubbles created in beer
Belgian scientists have put a different kind of fizz into physics. They have studied that fleeting mystery of the foaming tankard -- the antibubble. Antibubbles move down the glass instead of up. Stephane Dorbolo and colleagues at the University of Liege and the College de France reported online yesterday in the New Journal of Physics that they found out how to create antibubbles in a variety of liquids, including water dosed with washing-up liquid. They repeated the phenomenon in a glass of Belgian beer, thus confirming, according to the Institute of Physics in London, "what British real ale drinkers have claimed for a long time: that Belgian beer is a lot like dishwater."
■ United States
Stewart curses legal woes
Style icon Martha Stewart has bemoaned her legal troubles and upcoming trial for an insider trading scandal in a rare television interview. "It's the saddest holiday ever. It's an unwelcome time for me, very unwelcome," Stewart told CNN television. Stewart could face as much as 30 years in prison if convicted of charges against her of securities fraud, obstruction of justice, making false statements and lying to the FBI. The criminal trial gets underway on Jan. 12.
■ United States
Obese bears like junk food
Bears need lots of fat to survive winter hibernation. But enough is enough, say US scientists who blame a ballooning black bear pudginess on their love of and access to human junk food. A study by the Wildlife Conservation Society found that 59 black bears followed in the Lake Tahoe region of the western state of Nevada weighed nearly a third more than bears living in wild areas -- and were a third less active. The scientists blamed the obesity trend on the availability of discarded hamburgers, chicken, French fries and other junk food in dumpsters behind fast food restaurants, shopping centers and suburban homes.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was