■ South Korea
Officials sent to prison
Two officials from South Korea's main opposition party were convicted and sentenced to prison yesterday for receiving illegal funds from the country's flagship airline and other companies ahead of the 2002 presidential election. A Seoul district court convicted Kim Young-iel, former secretary general of the Grand National Party, and Suh Jung-woo, an ex-lawyer for the party's presidential candidate, of taking 1 billion won (US$844,000) from Korean Air, Yonhap news agency said.
■ Japan
Talks on abductees touted
Japan may hold high-level talks with North Korea in Pyongyang tomorrow to try to resolve questions about kidnapped Japanese and pave the way for a visit by Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi to the reclusive communist state, a Japanese newspaper said yesterday. Japan's top government spokesman said Tokyo wanted to hold talks as soon as possible but that no date had been set. "There is absolutely no agreement with the North Korean side on things such as specific dates," Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda said.
■ Japan
Taiwanese suit rejected
A Japanese court yesterday threw out a Taiwanese lawsuit against Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi for repeatedly visiting a Tokyo shrine that honors Japan's military dead, including convicted war criminals. The 236 plaintiffs, including lawmakers and bereaved families of World War II veterans from Taiwan, sued Koizumi, the Japanese government and the shrine last year. They claimed that the visits violated Japan's constitutional separation of religion and state and caused them psychological suffering. Osaka District Court rejected the compensation demands of ?10,000 (US$88) each, court spokesman Masahiko Fujimura said.
■ Hong Kong
Beijing softens on migrants
Beijing has agreed for the first time to look into the plight of families separated by immigration restrictions that left some members in Hong Kong and others in China, an affected family member and a pro-Beijing politician said yesterday. Immigration from China to Hong Kong has been one of the trickiest issues to confront the territory since it was returned to China from Britain in 1997. Hong Kong people with sons and daughters in China met with a top official from the Chinese government's representative office on Sunday, and he took the unprecedented step of agreeing to relay their concerns to Beijing, one of the parents, Chow Kwok-fai, said.
■ China
Dissident jailed for 5 years
A court yesterday sentenced a US-based dissident to five years in prison on charges of spying for Taiwan. Yang Jianli (楊建利), who lives in suburban Boston, was also convicted of illegal border crossing after a trial in a Beijing court, the official Xinhua News Agency said. Yang, a Chinese citizen with permanent US residency, was detained on April 26, 2002, while trying to board a flight in the city of Kunming using a false ID card. He had been in China meeting laid-off workers when arrested. Last month, members of the US Congress issued a letter addressed to Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) calling Yang's detention "extraordinarily inhumane." It wasn't clear how Taiwan might be connected to the charges.
■ United States
Powell gets Scottish heraldry
In Secretary of State Colin Powell's long and distinguished career, he has served among the eagles and the lions of international statecraft. In Britain, he would have been dubbed Sir Colin by now. So Powell has arranged for the next best thing: a coat of arms, in memory of his late father, Luther Theophilus Powell, who was born in Jamaica and thus a subject of the British Commonwealth, and his mother, Maud Ariel McKoy, whose family hailed from Scotland. The Lord Lyon, which bestows coats of arms in Scotland, is expected to approve a coat of arms designed by the Heraldry Society and featuring a lion, an eagle, crossed swords and four stars, symbolizing Powell's status as a retired four-star general. Over all is the banner saying, "Devoted to Public Service."
■ Germany
Royals `newsworthy': court
A court in Germany Wednesday ruled that this week's Danish royal wedding can be broadcast live on public television -- over objections of a viewer who said it was "not proper news at all." The ruling by Mainz Administrative Court means national broadcaster ZDF can carry live coverage of today's royal nuptials between Danish Crown Prince Frederik and Australian Mary Donaldson. The court dismissed a complaint by a viewer who objected to ZDF's plans to pre-empt its regularly scheduled news bulletins and public-affairs programming in favor of the royal wedding. The judge threw out the case, noting that other German networks, including public broadcaster ARD, were also planning live coverage of what the magistrate called "a legitimately newsworthy live event."
■ United States
Nader receives endorsement
Ralph Nader won the endorsement of the Reform Party on Wednesday, giving him access, if he accepts, to the presidential ballot in the seven states where the party still has legal status. The states include the crucial battlegrounds of Florida and Michigan, where Nader could conceivably swing the presidential election if the voting is close. He would have had to collect more than 92,000 signatures to get on the Florida ballot alone and the Reform Party's action, which is essentially the party's nomination, relieves him of that requirement. Nader is not yet on the ballot in any state.
■ Greece
Small bomb explodes
A makeshift explosive device went off outside an Athens branch of Alpha Bank early yesterday, causing minor damage and no casualties three months before the Olympic Games, police said. They said a second home-made bomb made of gas canisters was located in a bag placed outside an HSBC bank branch, across the road from the Alpha bank in the suburb of Voula, but had not exploded. Last week three explosive devices damaged a central Athens police station, raising concerns over the Games' safety, despite the Greeks' record 1 billion euro security plan.
■ Yemen
Assassination plot foiled
Yemeni authorities foiled a terrorist plot to assassinate the US ambassador in Sanaa last year, Yemen's interior minister said Wednesday. Interior Minister Rashad al-Eleimi, addressing parliament, said that 195 terrorist suspects are in Yemeni custody for the bombing of USS Cole, the French oil tanker Limburg and an assassination attempt against US Ambassador Edmund Hull. Yemen had never previously made public such a plot. Al-Eleimi didn't elaborate.
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