■ China
Tainted milk recalled
Authorities in southern China ordered an emergency recall of a company's milk powder after it sickened more than 150 school-children, state media reported. Children at three kindergartens in Guizhou province suffered vomiting, diarrhea and fever earlier this month after drinking milk made from the powder, which contained staphy-lococcus bacteria, the reports Monday said. China has been cracking down on low-quality milk powder after at least a dozen infants died from malnutrition blamed on counterfeit baby formula. In Guizhou, health authorities urged buyers to immediately stop drinking Shanhua-brand milk.
■ Singapore
Gory graphics for smokers
Every time smokers in Singapore reach for a cigarette, they will see graphic color images of a cancerous lung, a dying baby, a brain oozing blood or a patient on his deathbed in the latest drive to cut smoking, a newspaper said yesterday. Starting in August, the six images, to be printed on cigarette packages, will also include diseased gums and a family suffering secondhand smoke in silence, the Straits Times reported. Tobacco com-panies were given a year to implement the new rules after they were passed in parliament in August. Below the images will be written health warnings such as "Smoking can cause a slow, painful death" and "Smoking harms your family."
■ Australia
Appeal fails in alcohol suit
A woman who went to a club for a champagne breakfast but ended up staying the whole day and getting drunk lost an appeal to hold the club responsible for an accident that befell her on the way home. Rosellie Cole, 45, failed in her appeal that said the South Tweed Heads Rugby League Football Club was not responsible for what happened once she left the club. Cole, whose blood-alcohol count would have put her five times over the legal limit for driving, was hit by a car while walking home from the club and seriously injured. She had claimed compensation, saying the club should have refused to serve her after it was obvious she was drunk.
■ Thailand
Sex tycoon acquitted
A court yesterday acquitted Thailand's best-known sex tycoon on charges of employing underage girls as prostitutes in his massage parlors, handing him a legal victory ahead of his election bid for Bangkok mayor. The Bangkok Criminal Court ruled there was insufficient evidence to convict Chuwit Kamolvisit, who shot to prominence last year by going public with claims he had plied the police for years with expensive gifts and free services as payoffs to stop them from harassing him. Chuwit hoped to turn his popularity -- stemming from the embarrassment that the largely disliked police were put through -- by starting a political party and later announcing he would run for mayor in August elections.
■ India
Sikkim has highest ATM
An Indian bank, which operates what it bills as the world's highest ATM in Sikkim, is hoping the cash dispenser will ring in business once a trade route to China is reopened. The automatic teller machine, set up at an altitude of 4,023m along the route that links the Tibetan capital, Lhasa, to Sikkim's capital, Gangtok, runs on a generator when its fuel is not frozen. In its six months of operation, only soldiers deployed on the border have used the ATM.
■ United States
Japanese astronauts ready
Three Japanese were among NASA's newest crop of astronauts, the first class selected in four years. On Monday, the Japanese and 11 Americans were sworn in at the Johnson Space Center. Basic flight instruction, which will be taught at Pensacola Naval Air Station in Florida, is the first portion of their training program. The Japanese astronauts said they want to contribute to an international project to build a space station. "We, as Japanese, want to make a contribution,'' Naoko Yamazaki. 33, told Kyodo News by telephone after attending the ceremony.
■ United States
Ringleader pleads guilty
The ringleader in the nation's deadliest immigrant-smuggling scheme pleaded guilty in connection with the deaths of 19 people abandoned in a sweltering truck trailer. Karla Patricia Chavez, 26, could get up to life in prison without parole at sentencing Sept. 13. The Honduran woman pleaded guilty Monday to conspiring to harbor and transport illegal immigrants in a manner that led to their deaths. Prosecutors said they will recommend a lighter sentence for Chavez if she cooperates against others in the case, including the truck driver, Tyrone Williams, who could get the death penalty.
■ France
Murderer gets 30 years
A 54 year-old Spanish drifter was given 30 years in jail by a French court Monday for the rape and murder of British schoolgirl Caroline Dickinson in a Brittany youth hostel eight years ago. Francisco Arce Montes, who was described in court as a serial offender with a string of convictions and arrests across Europe dating back to the early 1980s, was told he will not be eligible for parole for at least 20 years. The prosecution had asked for life. The verdict by the nine-member jury brought to a close one of France's most notorious murder cases.
■ Canada
Publishing magnate dies
Jack McClelland, who headed one of Canada's most influential publishing houses, died at age 81. Under his leadership, McClelland and Stewart became the biggest name in Canadian publishing. The company and its head became a strong voice for Canadian culture and a national identity. The list of authors who rose to fame under McClelland's influence reads like a Who's Who of Canadian literature: Margaret Atwood, Mordecai Richler, Pierre Berton, Farley Mowat, Leonard Cohen and Peter C. Newman, to name a few.
■ United States
Fruit may protect vision
Eating fruit regularly earlier in life may help ward off macular degeneration, the leading cause of vision loss in older adults, a study said on Monday. But the report said there appeared to be no strong protective effect from vegetables, vitamins or carotenoids -- the compounds that make some fruits and vegetables red, orange or yellow -- as some earlier research had suggested. The study from Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston looked at data from 77,562 women and 40,866 men who were followed for from 12 to 18 years as part of long-term studies tracking them for a variety of health issues. It found that both men and women who consumed three or more servings of unspecified fruit a day had a 36 percent decreased risk of developing macular degeneration.
■ Dr Congo
UN unable to verify reports
Authorities arrested eight more security-force members in connection with a failed coup attempt last week, while UN officials complained they could not reach an area near the Rwanda border to investigate new reports of violence. Local correspondents for UN-funded radio in Congo reported skirmishes Monday between pro-government Mayi Mayi militia fighters and renegade ex-rebels 40km north of the city of Bukavu, on Congo's far eastern border with Rwanda. But members of the UN's 10,800-strong peacekeeping force couldn't confirm the latest clashes because mines and armed groups were blocking UN officials from reaching the area, UN spokesman Sebastien Lapierre told the reporters in Bukava.
■ Iraq
More Lebanese captured
Two more Lebanese men employed by companies working in Iraq have been kidnapped there by groups seeking ransom payments for their release, the Lebanese daily newspaper As-Safir reported yesterday, quoting diplomatic sources in Beirut and Baghdad. The paper said the men -- named by security sources as Georges Fernando and Jamil Dib -- were abducted on Monday. It also confirmed that a third man, shown earlier in a video screened by an Arabic-language TV station had been held for the past month.
■ United States
God stays in pledge
Millions of American children will continue to start their school day by pledging allegiance to "one nation, under God" after the US Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a challenge to the oath from the father of a 10-year-old girl. Michael Newdow, a Californian atheist, had sued Congress, US President George W. Bush and others to remove the words from the pledge. He argued that the phrase contradicted the first amendment of the US constitution, which guarantees that government will not "establish" religion. But in its decision the Supreme Court dodged the issue of the separation of church and state, and instead chose to dismiss the case on the grounds that the father, who is in a custody case with the girl's mother, had not established the right to speak for the child.
■ European Union
Prodi successor sought
Germany and France said on Monday they were working very closely on finding a successor to Romano Prodi as head of the EU Commission and expected a candidate to be named soon. "I expect the Irish presidency will make a proposal that can be agreed on," German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder told a news conference following a meeting in the western German town of Aachen with French President Jacques Chirac.
■ United States
Writer, neighbor slain
Los Angeles police on Monday arrested a man suspected of decapitating an elderly Hollywood screenwriter before taking his head as a grisly trophy and slaughtering his neighbor. The killer murdered the 91-year-old scriptwriter Richard Lees in his home on Sunday before leaping a garden fence with the severed head and slaying his next victim, retired doctor Morley Engelson, 67. Police said they had brought Kevin Graff, 27, into custody in connection with the grisly double murder just minutes after making a public appeal for information. Lees had written scripts for the US comedy show Abbott and Costello and for the western series Rawhide and a number of B-movies.
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
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
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