■ South Korea
Unidentified boat repelled
South Korea said an unidentified boat briefly crossed into its waters from the north in the Yellow Sea yesterday but turned back half an hour later after its navy broadcast several warning messages. A statement by Seoul's Joint Chiefs of Staff said the boat had crossed back over the so-called Northern Limit Line at 9:46am. It gave no details of the craft. Four days ago, South Korea fired warning shots to chase off what it said was a North Korean naval ship which had crossed the disputed maritime border between the hostile states. Pyongyang said later the ship was a Chinese fishing boat.
■ India
Gunmen attack separatists
Unidentified gunmen attacked a group of Indian separatists meeting at a hotel in neighboring Bangladesh, leaving up to 25 dead, police in India said on Saturday. Dhaka's Police Commissioner Ashraful Huda, however, said he had no reports of such an incident. But G.M. Srivastava, police chief of the northeastern Indian state of Tripura said, "A group of Indian insurgents were apparently holding a meeting at a hotel in Dhaka's Segun Bagicha area when gunmen attacked and killed up to 25 of them." Tripura shares a 850km porous border with Bangladesh. Indian security forces say several separatist rebel groups in the country's northeast have bases inside Bangladesh, from where they stage hit-and-run attacks on Indian targets.
■ Nepal
Bomb kills one, injures three
One person was killed and three were injured when a bomb planted on the roadside near a bus stand exploded yesterday morning at Koteshwor district of Nepal's capital, Kathmandu, police said. "A man was killed while three others walking on the road were injured in the explosion," a police spokesman said. Police suspect Maoist rebels to be behind the blast. The spokesman said further details of the incident were awaited. The rebels have been fighting for a communist republic in Nepal since 1996 and the uprising has so far claimed more than 9,500 lives.
■ Australia
Racists deface synagogue
A Perth synagogue was defaced with anti-semitic graffiti and plastered with posters promoting a far-right fringe group, police said yesterday. The Perth Hebrew Congregation synagogue was targeted on Saturday, a police spokesman said on condition of anonymity. Several other buildings, including a police station and a medical center, were also hit in Perth, the capital of Western Australia. The graffiti was "anti-Jewish, anti-African, anti-everything and everywhere that was hit was attacked with a similar nature," the spokesman said. The buildings were also plastered with hundreds of posters promoting the Australian Nationalist Movement, a far-right hate group with little political influence.
■ Australia
Albanian royal's wife dies
Susan, the Australian wife of Leka, the pretender to the Albanian throne, died on Saturday from a heart condition, a spokesman for the family said. "Her Majesty Susan I Zog is no longer with us," spokesman Fluturak Germenji announced in a short statement. She was 63. Born Susan Barbara Cullen-Ward, she married King Leka in Biarritz in October 1975 after meeting him at a Sidney dinner party. They have a son, also named Leka, who is expected to begin studies this year at Britain's Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst.
■ United Kingdom
DJ admits to fraud
Kevin Huffer decided he would keep claiming unemployment payments despite landing a new job -- hosting a popular daily
radio show. It took fraud officials three years to notice the scam as Huffer presented the mid-afternoon slot on Radio Solent in Southamp-ton. Throughout his stint
on the show, Huffer claimed Jobseekers' Allowance as well as other benefits entitled to those without jobs, the Sunday Mirror newspaper said. He also claimed money given to single parents despite
having re-married two
years previously, the report added. Last week he admitted a series of fraud charges in court, and
will be sentenced later this month.
■ United states
Jailed for forgetfulness
A man who returned a
rental car allegedly forgot
to take along 88 bags of heroin he had left in the
car. Employees of an Enterprise Rent-A-Car agency in Pennsylvania called police and reported finding the drugs hidden under a layer of napkins
in the car's console, author-ities said. Police tracked down the man from a wallet he also left behind in the
car. An Enterprise spokes-man said people often
leave bizarre things in
rental cars, but this was
the first time he had heard
of heroin.
■ United States
Alligator used in assault
A Florida man hit his girlfriend with a 1m-long alligator and threw beer bottles at her during an argument in the couple's mobile home, authorities said. David Havenner, 41, was ordered held without bond on Saturday on misdemeanor charges of battery and possession of
an alligator. The alligator, which Havenner had been keeping in his bathtub, was turned over to Florida wildlife officials. Nancy Monico, 39, told investi-gators that Havenner beat her with his fists, then grabbed the alligator and swung it at her as she
tried to escape, a sheriff's spokesman said.
■ United States
Nagasaki bomb pilot dies
Charles Sweeney, a retired US Air Force general who piloted the plane that dropped an atomic bomb
on Nagasaki in the final
days of World War II, has died at age 84. Sweeney
died Thursday at Massachu-setts General Hospital in Boston, a hospital spokes-woman said. She did not disclose the cause of death. Sweeney was 25 when he piloted the B-29 bomber
that attacked Nagasaki
on Aug. 9, 1945, three days after the Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on Hiro-shima and six days before Japan surrendered. About 70,000 people were killed
in the explosion of the
bomb. It was the first
bomb Sweeney ever
dropped on an enemy target.
■ United States
Obscenity charge dropped
An obscenity charge has been dropped against Texas resident Joanne Webb, who received nationwide atten-tion when she was arrested for selling two sex toys to undercover police officers posing as a couple. A judge dismissed the case against Webb, Johnson County Attorney Bill Moore said
on Friday in a statement. Webb, a former teacher, started selling erotic toys and other products last
year by hosting parties for housewives who feel more comfortable buying marital aids in a private home than at an adult bookstore or on the Internet. If convicted, she could have been sentenced to a year in jail.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At 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
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