■ South Korea
Men eat boss' pedigree dog
Three South Korean dog meat lovers were facing a US$70,000 lawsuit after cooking and eating their employer's pedigree dog, a news report said yesterday. The men, all in their 50s and employed at a car-hire firm, killed and served up the dog in a traditional Korean soup dish during the employer's absence from the company parking lot where the animal was tethered, Yonhap news agency reported. The owner said he would sue the three, claiming the dog was a Jindo, an expensive Korean pedigree breed, the news agency said. Police were also investigating the case.
■ Japan
Radiation found in water
Radioactive water from a leak in a nuclear reactor has been found at the same power station where five workers died in an accident last month, a Japanese power firm said yesterday. The 54cm3 of water was discovered late Thursday at Kansai Electric Power's Mihama plant some 350km west of Tokyo, the company said. The water, which had leaked from a cooler at a reactor at the plant contained radiation levels that were not dangerous, the firm said. "The water only contained about one one-hundred-millionth of the radiation level someone is naturally exposed to over a year," said Kansai spokesman Hiroshi Ogawa.
■ Afghanistan
Militants fire rocket at Karzai
Two men have been arrested for trying to kill Afghan President Hamid Karzai by firing a rocket at his helicopter during his first election campaign trip outside the capital, officials said yesterday. The men, aged between 20 and 23, were captured just after the unsuccessful rocket attack in the southeastern town of Gardez on Thursday, after they tried to flee by motorcycle, said Interior Ministry spokesman Lutfullah Mashal. Taliban guerrillas, who have vowed to disrupt Afghanistan's first ever direct presidential polls on Oct. 9 next month, have claimed responsibility.
■ Hong Kong
Murder called mercy killing
A Hong Kong man was jailed for two years for pushing his blind, paralyzed father into the sea and drowning him in what has been called a mercy killing, reports said Friday. Madam Justice Clare-Marie Beeson said mercy killing could not be accepted as an excuse for homicide, according to the South China Morning Post. The court heard that Yam Yuen-ming, 47, took his 84 year-old father from his nursing home in September, telling the nurse he wanted to take him to a medical appointment. Instead he strapped the elderly man into a wheelchair and pushed him into Victoria Harbour.
■ United Kingdom
Protestors released on bail
Eight men arrested Wednesday after penetrating the House of Commons to protest legislation against fox hunting were released yesterday on police bail, a spokesman said. The eight men, including five who burst into the Commons chamber in the worst breach of parliamentary security in living memory, walked out of a police station in central London, he said. The eight men, apparently posing as construction workers, slipped into the British parliament as 10,000 supporters of fox hunting demonstrated on the streets outside against legislation to ban the bloodsport.
■ France
Test scam discovered
France has been forced to reform the written part of its driving exam because driving schools have been using an electronic system to send correct answers to candidates. Suspicious of the soaring pass rate at some schools, police began investigating test centers in May. In one exam raid last week, they found the answer. At the start of the test candidates would discreetly ring a corrupt school staff member and leave the phone on. The contact would assess which of 20 ready-prepared multiple-choice highway code exams was being read out, and transmit a radio signal at the correct answer, vibrating a small device hidden in the candidates' socks.
■ Germany
Tomato paste protects skin
Forget those pricey suntan lotions: concentrated tomato paste protects from sunburns, a German nutritionist said Thursday. "It's a success," said Helmut Sies, a nutritionist from the University of Duesseldorf, at the symposium held by the German Nutrition Society. Daily consumption of 40g of tomato paste over the span of ten weeks helped prevented sunburn in a test study, said Sies. The tomato paste miracle lies in the redness of the tomato which is created by lycopin, which is also found in oranges and corn.
■ United States
Rock legend dead at 55
Johnny Ramone, centerpiece of legendary punk band The Ramones that inspired a generation of rock musicians, has died after losing a five-year battle against prostate cancer. The guitarist, who was 55, died Wednesday in his Los Angeles home, according to the group's website, leaving just one surviving member of one of the most influential punk rock outfits. "Our dear friend Johnny has died," said the announcement on www.ramonesworld.com. The guitarist was the third founding member of the band to die in three years, following singer Joey Ramone's 2001 death from lymphatic cancer and bass guitarist Dee Dee Ramone's death from a drug overdose a year later.
■ United States
Tiger owner jailed
A New York tiger owner was jailed on Thursday for keeping his pet in his apartment. Yates had been free on bail since his arrest last year, when the 400-pound tiger was found in his seven-room apartment. Goodman referred to Yates' "inability to tell the truth" and "his delusional fixation that he has a special gift for dealing with wild animals." Yates pleaded guilty to a charge of reckless endangerment in July and will be held until sentencing on Oct. 7. The tiger was shipped to an animal refuge in Ohio, but Yates says he hopes to get his tiger back and plans to open an animal sanctuary.
■ Serbia
Fugitive publishes book
Top Balkan war crimes fugitive Radovan Karadzic published his fourth book of political writings in Belgrade on Thursday despite the NATO-backed manhunt for him in neighboring Bosnia. Titled Charity and Appeals, the book is a compilation of "acts of charity, appeals and letters" by the Bosnian Serb nationalist leader during that country's brutal inter-ethnic war, Beta news agency reported. Karadzic ally Slavenko Terzic, a Serb nationalist historian and
co-editor of the book, said Karadzic had submitted the material in October 2001. Terzic said he hoped it would help to "correct the false image" about the war.
■ United Kingdom
Tougher penalties urged
British Home Secretary David Blunkett wants to intensify a crackdown on alcohol-fueled crime by ensuring courts hand offenders the toughest sentences possible. Blunkett, writing in yesterday's Sun newspaper, also wants heftier fines for pub landlords and off-license establishments which sell alcohol to people under 18. Alcohol fuels 44 percent of all violent crime
in Britain, and 70 percent
of Accident and Emergency hospital admissions at peak times are due to excessive alcohol consumption, according to the British Crime Survey. Blunkett said he had asked the Sentencing Guidelines Council to review the advice it gives to courts on prison terms.
■ United States
Nerve agent hard to kill
A project to destroy nearly 1,100 tonnes of a deadly nerve agent stockpiled in Indiana could take longer than expected after tests showed much of the agent contains
a chemical that renders it difficult to eradicate, military officials said. Army scientists had drafted a plan to destroy the VX nerve agent stockpiled at the Newport Chemical Depot, but recent tests determined that half of the stockpile contains a chemical stabilizer that may require eight to 14 hours longer to destroy each batch, meaning the project could take longer than the two-and-a-half years originally anticipated. VX is
a liquid with the consistency
of mineral oil that can kill
a healthy adult male with a single pinpoint droplet.
■ United States
Rick James' drug cocktail
Rick James, the flamboyant funk musician who died suddenly last month, had nine drugs in his system including cocaine, methamphetamine, valium and vicodin, according to a coroner's report. James, 56, died in his sleep on Aug. 6 in his Los Angeles home of a heart attack, but the drugs in his system likely contributed to the organ's failure, the report said. James, best known for his 1981 hit Super Freak, suffered from diabetes, had a pacemaker and had been in fragile health after a stroke in 1998. He had been hooked on crack cocaine
and once proclaimed himself
an "icon of drug use and eroticism." The coroner
listed nine drugs, which
also included prescription medications for anxiety, pain relief and heart failure.
■ Iran
Nuke agency turns up heat
US and European negotiators at a meeting of the UN atomic watchdog agency have agreed on a draft resolution meant
to deprive Iran of technology that could be used to make nuclear weapons which
sets an indirect deadline on Tehran. The next meeting of the board of governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency will decide "whether or not further steps are required." Diplomats familiar with the text said the phrase was shorthand for possible referral to the UN Security Council if Iran defies conditions in the resolution.
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