■ Uzbekistan
Tashkent rocked by bomb
An explosion blamed on a terrorist attack ripped through the Uzbek capital Tashkent yesterday, officials said. News reports said at least two people were killed and about 20 injured. Uzbek Foreign Ministry spokesman Ilkhom Zakirov said there were "several terrorist acts," that arrests had been made and an investigation was under way. He confirmed there were casualties but gave no further details. At least one of the blasts occurred around 9am at the Chorsu market in the Old City, said a spokesman for the National Security Ser-vice. Russia's ITAR-Tass news agency reported that according to initial infor-mation, a suicide bomber had blown herself up and that two people were killed and about 20 injured. It said its reporter had witnessed the explosion and reported that people had been thrown several meters by the blast.
■ Hong Kong
Teen in `mobile rage' attack
A 14-year-old girl flew into a rage and chased her mother around their apartment with a knife and wooden pole after she confiscated the teen's mobile phone, a police spokeswoman said yester-day. The terrified mother locked herself in the bed-room and police arrived at the scene on Saturday to see the girl in a frenzy, hacking at the door with the knife. "They had to use pepper spray to subdue the girl before they could rescue the mother," the spokes-woman said. The mother sustained slight injury to her arm, but no charges were filed.
■ China
Panel upholds sentence
A special judicial panel in Heilongjiang Province has upheld the ruling in the so-called BMW case, state media reported yesterday. A wealthy woman, Su Xiuwen, was driving her BMW last October, when a farmer taking his onion cart to market bumped into the car. Su became enraged, hit the farmer, then drove her car into the crowd. The farmer's wife was killed. A local judge ruled that the death was an accident and gave Su a two-year suspended sentence. But word of the case spread quickly through the Internet, triggering outrage and speculation that Su got off lightly because she was wealthy and her family had connections. The official New China News Agency reported yesterday that the special panel found the allegations of corruption and influence peddling were "groundless." The panel also determined that Su had not intended to kill Liu but was just a bad driver.
■ Vietnam
Marital row sparks suicide
A man committed suicide by self-immolation in southern Vietnam after an argument with his wife last Thursday, police said yesterday. Duong Hoai Phong, 28, a cafe owner, was arguing with his wife over their business when he took a bottle of gasoline from a street stall, poured it on himself and lit a match, said a police officer in Soc Trang. Phong died on Saturday in a Ho Chi Minh City hospital, the officer said. A neighbor said the couple argued every day.
■ Japan
Elephant dung a hot item
Elephant dung at Tennoji Zoo in Osaka Prefecture is a hot item for gardeners, zoo officials said yesterday. The zoo started giving away the dung once a month last June, after letting it compost. The free dung became so popular that the zoo bought a com-posting machine and began offering up 2kg of compost a week to the first 100 takers. The zoo's two elephants produce 120kgs of dung a day.
■ France
Saddam gets a lawyer
Jacques Verges, a French lawyer who has made his name representing controversial defendants, said on Sunday he had been contacted by Saddam Hussein's family to act for the former Iraqi dictator during his trial. But Verges, who defended the Nazi leader Klaus Barbie and the Venezuelan terrorist Carlos the Jackal, said he doubted whether Saddam would ever appear in the dock. "My concern is not the trial," he told the radio station France Inter. "My concern is they'll kill him before it." Verges said Saddam's nephew, Ali al-Tikriti, had written to him authorizing him to defend Saddam.
■ United States
Buddhist in goat trouble
Vermont state officials are investigating a man whose goats and his religious convictions against killing them have collided in a possibly inhumane and definitely stinky way. There were three goats on the farm Chris Weathersbee's mother bought seven years ago. Now there are 300 -- including 70 living in his house, much of which is covered with a mix of goat droppings and hay. Authorities last month raided the farm in Corinth, about 32km southeast of Montpelier, and seized 44 deemed unhealthy. Weathersbee, 63, admits he cannot afford to give the herd sufficient care, but he refuses to get rid of the animals.
■ Lithuania
French singer jailed
A Lithuanian court yesterday sentenced French singer Bertrand Cantat to eight years in prison for fatally beating his actress girlfriend Marie Trintignant, in a case that has riveted France. Cantat, the 40-year-old lead singer of the group Noir Desir, remained stone-faced as the three-judge panel found him guilty of causing the death of Trintignant, 41, during a fight in their Vilnius hotel room last July. Trintignant died nearly a week later on August 1 of swelling to the brain. "According to the judges' opinion, the guilt of the accused is indisputable," the presiding judge said.
■ United States
Old man to get police award
A 92-year-old man will be considered for a police award because he helped wrestle a suicidal man from the edge of a bridge and restrained him until police arrived. George Kouloheras was driving to a grocery store Saturday when he stopped his car to help Bob Michalczyk pull the distraught man off the bridge's railing. The suicidal man was not identified. "I jumped him from behind and this other fellow got him from the front," Kouloheras said. "I got him down and sat on him. He wanted to get up, but I told him `no, no. Stay down.'" Kouloheras has been a hero before. Eighty years ago, as a 12-year-old Boy Scout, he rescued an infant from a burning building.
■ Ivory Coast
Fresh protests planned
Ivory Coast's opposition has called for fresh protests yesterday, raising fears of more violence just days after security forces cracked down on an attempted rally in the main city Abidjan. Police said on Sunday the death toll from Thursday's aborted rally and subsequent raids by security forces in some neighborhoods of Abidjan had risen to 37. The opposition said in a statement more than 300 people were killed. The opposition coalition, which includes rebels holding the north of the country, urged its militants on Sunday to "stage peaceful demonstrations in each city of the nation from Monday."
■ Spain
ETA may call ceasefire
The Basque separatist group ETA may be about to call a ceasefire in response to the Islamist terror attacks in Madrid and the subsequent change in government, according to sources in Spain's northern Basque country. With the 190 deaths caused by the Madrid train bombings provoking revulsion against terrorism, while also making ETA's attacks look insignificant, many analysts believe the weakened separatist group is considering a truce in its 35-year campaign of violence. "I and many others think, that given the situation ... ETA is obliged to call a cease-fire," said Julen Madariaga, an ETA founder now distanced from the group.
■ Spain
Socialists see first-vote win
The Socialists will have enough votes in Parliament next month for Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero to be named prime minister on the first try, a top party official said yesterday. "We're talking with all the political groups," Jose Blanco, Zapatero's campaign coordinator, said in a broadcast interview. "Some already have shown their intention to support the Socialist party in the investiture session." The Spanish Socialist Workers Party defeated the ruling Popular Party in general elections March 14, winning 164 seats in parliament, 12 seats short of majority. The Socialists could form a minority government with the parliamentary votes they already have.
■ United Kingdom
Peter Ustinov dies
Oscar-winning British actor Peter Ustinov, renowned as being one of the world's most entertaining raconteurs and mimics, has died at the age of 82. "He died last night in Switzerland," his London agent, Steve Kenis, said yesterday. "I shall remember him for always seeing the bright side of everything." Just 18 months ago, Ustinov said in an interview he was happy to work until he dropped "as long as I can be guaranteed that I won't know in advance when it's going to happen." Ustinov, who spoke more than half a dozen languages, won Oscars for his roles in the films Spartacus and Topkapi But he led a richly varied life as a playwright, novelist, film director and goodwill ambassador for the UN Children's Fund.
■ Israel
Hamas leader denounces US
The new Hamas leader, Abdel Aziz Rantisi, on Sunday called US President George W. Bush the enemy of Muslims and said God had declared war on the US. Hamas has long said its battle is with Israel, and has directed its attacks, and most of its heated oratory, against it. But since Israel's killing last week in the Gaza Strip of the Hamas leader Sheik Ahmed Yassin, the Islamic movement has issued bitter denunciations of the US, though it has stopped short of saying it will strike at US targets.
■ Israel
Sharon son given court order
Israel's supreme court yesterday ordered Premier Ariel Sharon's son, Gilad, to hand over to the police all documents relating to two alleged bribery affairs involving the premier, Israeli media reported. The court order came a day after the state prosecutor recommended the premier be indicted for allegedly accepting nearly US$2 million in bribes from two businessmen. One of the businessman, David Appel, himself already charged in January, paid Gilad Sharon hundreds of thousands of dollars at the end of the 1990s, allegedly to win support of then foreign minister Sharon for the construction of a resort on a Greek island.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
‘DELUSIONAL’: Targeting the families of Hamas’ leaders would not push the group to change its position or to give up its demands for Palestinians, Ismail Haniyeh said Israeli aircraft on Wednesday killed three sons of Hamas’ top political leader in the Gaza Strip, striking high-stakes targets at a time when Israel is holding delicate ceasefire negotiations with the militant group. Hamas said four of the leader’s grandchildren were also killed. Ismail Haniyeh’s sons are among the highest-profile figures to be killed in the war so far. Israel said they were Hamas operatives, and Haniyeh accused Israel of acting in “the spirit of revenge and murder.” The deaths threatened to strain the internationally mediated ceasefire talks, which appeared to gain steam in recent days even as the sides remain far
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of