■ China
US poll a duckwalk?
Bony Kerry? Spicy Bush? Customers at a restaurant in Foshan, Guangdong Pro-vince, are expressing their opinions about the US election by choosing duck dishes named after the candidates. The restaurant has put up a banner urging customers to "come in, participate and select the candidate of your choice," according to the Yangcheng Evening News. The Bush duck is a spicy concoction to match his "war-mongering personality," the newspaper said, and Kerry duck is a bonier version with sauce in line with his "keen-witted and capable nature." So far, Kerry duck is ahead with 53 percent, while Bush duck trails with 47 percent.
■ China
Boys walk 150km to flee dad
Two young brothers walked 150km to escape their father's beatings and live with their grandfather, the Hong Kong edition of the China Daily said yesterday. Li Chao, 10, and Li Lei, seven, walked for nine days from their home in Guiyang, Guizhou Province along the railway line to Zunyi, Gui-yang Province, then sneaked aboard a train bound for Chongqing near where their grandfather lives. The boys were found on the train by police and taken off to be returned to their father. They told the police they wanted to live with their grandfather who "never beats us."
■ Hong Kong
Illegals on `two bullets' tours
Illegal immigrants from Vietnam are being given bullets and knives to ensure they get a prison stay if they are caught, the South China Morning Post said yester-day. Carrying the bullets and knives guarantees they will not be deported but will instead go to jail where they can earn US$50 a month for doing prison labor. That is way above average salary in Vietnam and ensures migrants can repay the smugglers for the cost of their passage. Judge Fergal Sweeney said at a court case on Tuesday that smugglers were arranging what he called "two bullet tours" to Hong Kong via China, the paper reported. Sweeney jailed Nguyen Van Hien, 21, for 21 months for illegal entry and possessing weapons. Hien told the court he had been promised a jail term if he was caught after paying US$190 to be smug-gled into the territory. Sweeney said he was tempted to send Hien straight back to Vietnam to discourage others but that it would be unfair to people already sent to jail.
■ China
Mine death toll mounts
The death toll from the worst coal mine accident in four years rose to 129 yesterday, the government said, as rescuers searched for 19 missing miners. Rescuers looking for the missing workers have had to dig through rubble and drain water from a 1,200m-long at the Daping Mine near Zhangzhou. Officials still have not said what caused the Oct. 20 blast.
■ The Philippines
Top fugitive under arrest
Police said yesterday they have arrested an alleged kidnapper and hired gun who is considered the country's most wanted criminal suspect. Ricardo Peralta, leader of the Red Vigilante gang, was arrested outside a shopping mall in the northern city of San Fernando late on Tuesday, national police chief Edgar Aglipay said. Peralta will face trial for several cases of murder and kidnapping, Aglipay said. Peralta's gang is suspected to be behind the gangland-style killing of several suspected drug traffickers in 2000 as well as a string of kidnapping cases.
■ Aistralia
Missing tourist found dead
A middle-aged British woman was found dead in outback Australia yesterday after disappearing from a resort near Uluru, the iconic desert monolith once known Ayers Rock. The body of 52-year-old Ethel Hetherington was discovered by a group of Aboriginal people by the side of a track around 50km southeast of Yulara, where she had been on holiday with a cousin since Oct. 6. Hetherington was last seen late on Monday in Yulara and police mounted a ground and air search on Tuesday after she was reported missing. A police spokeswoman said forensic police were at the scene and investigations into the cause of death were under way.
■ Israel
Officer arrested in shooting
Israeli military police on Tuesday arrested a commander accused by comrades of riddling the body of a Palestinian schoolgirl with bullets after fellow soldiers killed her. A military police unit investigating the death of 13-year-old Iman al-Hamas in the southern Gaza Strip on Oct. 5 arrested the company commander after finding that his account of the incident was false, the army said. Hamas was hit about 20 times near an Israeli military outpost on her way to school in Rafah, a refugee camp on Gaza's border with Egypt that has seen frequent violence during a 4-year-old Palestinian uprising. The army launched an investigation after unidentified soldiers from the outpost told Israeli media that after their initial volley killed the girl, the commander went out and fired into her body repeatedly.
■ Zimbabwe
S African union expelled
Police expelled a South African trade union team early yesterday in defiance of a court order allowing them to stay until the afternoon, union officials said. "They have been kicked almost like evil spirits out of that country," Congress of South African Trade Unions secretary general Zwelinzima Vavi told South African state television. President Robert Mugabe's government on Tuesday ordered the union team to be deported, accusing it of meddling. Harare had ordered the union to stay away.
■ United Kingdom
Rockers pay tribute to DJ
Some of the country's most successful rock musicians Tuesday paid tribute to John Peel, the veteran BBC Radio 1 DJ, whom they credited with having played a crucial part in their rise to fame. Damon Albarn, frontman of Blur, said: "John Peel's patronage was for me, like countless other musicians, one of the most significant things that happened to us in our careers." His sentiments were echoed by Feargal Sharkey, former lead singer of the Undertones, one of whose songs was Peel's favorite. Peel, who was 65, died of a heart attack in the Peruvian city of Cuzco where he was enjoying a working holiday with his wife Sheila.
■ Germany
EU overpays for renovation
Sloppy construction controls led to the EU being vastly overcharged for renovation of the bloc's flagship Commission headquarters, a German newspaper said yesterday. An EU anti-corruption agency report obtained by the Sueddeutsche Zeitung daily said 180 million euros (US$230 million) in overcharges were paid for renovating the Berlaymont building in Brussels, which houses the European Commission.
■ United States
Drivers `drunk' on tea
California prosecutors are cracking down on kava-drinking motorists who are driving under the intoxicating influence of the herbal tea. Following their first successful conviction in June, San Mateo County prosecutors have filed three other cases, after about a dozen motorists had been pulled over in recent years, said San Mateo Deputy District Attorney Chris Feasel on Monday. Kava, while not considered as a drug by federal health officials, is classified by the US Food and Drug Administration as a nutritional supplement that can be used to relieve anxiety. Motorists under the influence of Kava had a "thousand-yard stare," Feasel said. "They're drooling on themselves sometimes, their motor function is so bad," he added.
■ United States
B-movie greats recognized
Zsa Zsa Gabor and Sonny Chiba reached the heights of low-budget filmmaking as they were among those selected by cinephiles around the world for induction into the B-Movie Hall of Fame. Chiba, the Japanese icon of martial-arts flicks including Gangster Cop (1970) and The Street Fighter (1974), and Hungarian-born glamor girl Zsa Zsa Gabor, of such campy films as The Girl in the Kremlin (1957) and The Queen of Outer Space (1958), were among 10 artists and 10 films honored Monday.
■ Canada
Environment record attacked
The Canadian government is not doing enough to protect the environment because of a lack of leadership and political will, a senior official said in a scathing report released on Tuesday. Johanne Gelinas, Canada's commissioner of the environment, said some salmon populations were in trouble and that Ottawa had no idea whether initiatives to cut oil pollution and improve air quality were working. "Why is progress so slow? After all, the mandates and commitments are there, the knowledge of what to do and how to do it is there, and we know it can be done," she said in a statement accompanying the annual report.
■ Chile
Bush accused of war crimes
Chileans opposed to the Iraq war have accused US President George W. Bush of war crimes in a criminal complaint lodged on Tuesday, less than a month before he is scheduled to visit the country. The suit asks local courts to invoke international human rights treaties ratified by both countries and arrest Bush and members of his Cabinet for questioning during their visit to Santiago for a summit of Asia Pacific leaders Nov. 19-21. The courts usually take a few days to decide whether to accept this type of complaint and assign a judge who then has power to call people for questioning before deciding whether to indict. Filing criminal suits by civilians is common in Chile.
■ Colombia
Outlaw ex-officer killed
Colombian troops on Tuesday killed a former US-trained Colombian army officer accused of murdering a state official and who later joined an outlawed paramilitary group, the army said. Former Colombian Army Major David Hernandez, who five years ago became a leader of the right-wing United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia, or AUC, was killed in a clash between army troops and more than 100 AUC fighters in northern Colombia, said Colonel Nestor Raul Espitia, commander of the army's 10th Brigade. Army troops, backed by attack helicopters, killed a total of five paramilitaries, Espitia said.
‘SHORTSIGHTED’: Using aid as leverage is punitive, would not be regarded well among Pacific Island nations and would further open the door for China, an academic said New Zealand has suspended millions of dollars in budget funding to the Cook Islands, it said yesterday, as the relationship between the two constitutionally linked countries continues to deteriorate amid the island group’s deepening ties with China. A spokesperson for New Zealand Minister of Foreign Affairs Winston Peters said in a statement that New Zealand early this month decided to suspend payment of NZ$18.2 million (US$11 million) in core sector support funding for this year and next year as it “relies on a high trust bilateral relationship.” New Zealand and Australia have become increasingly cautious about China’s growing presence in the Pacific
The team behind the long-awaited Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile yesterday published their first images, revealing breathtaking views of star-forming regions as well as distant galaxies. More than two decades in the making, the giant US-funded telescope sits perched at the summit of Cerro Pachon in central Chile, where dark skies and dry air provide ideal conditions for observing the cosmos. One of the debut images is a composite of 678 exposures taken over just seven hours, capturing the Trifid Nebula and the Lagoon Nebula — both several thousand light-years from Earth — glowing in vivid pinks against orange-red backdrops. The new image
ESPIONAGE: The British government’s decision on the proposed embassy hinges on the security of underground data cables, a former diplomat has said A US intervention over China’s proposed new embassy in London has thrown a potential resolution “up in the air,” campaigners have said, amid concerns over the site’s proximity to a sensitive hub of critical communication cables. The furor over a new “super-embassy” on the edge of London’s financial district was reignited last week when the White House said it was “deeply concerned” over potential Chinese access to “the sensitive communications of one of our closest allies.” The Dutch parliament has also raised concerns about Beijing’s ideal location of Royal Mint Court, on the edge of the City of London, which has so
With a monthly pension barely sufficient to buy 15 eggs or a small bag of rice, Cuba’s elderly people struggle to make ends meet in one of Latin America’s poorest and fastest-aging countries. As the communist island battles its deepest economic crisis in three decades, the state is finding it increasingly hard to care for about 2.4 million inhabitants — more than one-quarter of the population — aged 60 and older. Sixty is the age at which women — for men it is 65 — qualify for the state pension, which starts at 1,528 pesos per month. That is less than US$13
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