■ Thailand
Terrorist plans uncovered
Terrorists are plotting attacks next year at tourist resorts across Thailand, according to documents found in the house of a fugitive leader of the country's Islamic insurgency, a senior security official told reporters. The rebels also planned to turn three Muslim-dominated provinces in Thailand's south into a base for international terrorist groups, he said. The plans indicate the insurgents want to broaden a conflict in the south that has killed more than 570 people this year. The documents were seized earlier this year from the house of Masae Useng, a former Islamic school teacher who the government accuses of masterminding a separatist plan for Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat provinces.
■ Australia
Salami smuggler intercepted
A Swiss student has been fined A$4,000 (US$3,057) for trying to smuggle a salami into Australia. Dylan Pascal Graves, a Swiss national studying English in Western Australia state, was caught with the salami hidden in his luggage at Perth International Airport last month after a routine search by customs officials. Australia has strict quarantine laws, and customs officials inspect all incoming flights for agricultural pests and food that could carry diseases. Graves twice told customs officials that he was not carrying any food, but an X-ray revealed 400g of salami concealed in his luggage. He was charged with making a misleading statement to an officer and knowingly importing prohibited food into the country.
■ Macau
Gambler jumps to his death
A gambler threw himself to his death inside a new Las Vegas-owned casino in Macau after losing more than US$400,000 at the tables, police said yesterday. The man jumped 20m to his death on Wednesday evening from an indoor, third-floor walkway inside the Sands casino, set up by Sheldon Adelson, who runs the Venetian casino in Los Angeles. Police said that witnesses saw him jump over a 1m high barrier, then walk along a ledge on the walkway. He jumped to his death as security guards raced toward him, a spokesman said.
■ China
`Harmful' Web sites closed
China has shut down 1,287 Web sites which spread "harmful information" on religious cults, superstition and pornography, a government Internet watchdog said yesterday. Among those closed were 1,129 pornographic sites and another 114 "which promoted gambling, superstitious activities and cult propa-ganda," said the official Reporting Center for Illegal and Harmful Information. The center said the crackdown was in response to public complaints made over its Web site in a campaign which started in June. "The reporting center will make it a priority to target illegal Web sites on gambling, fraud and superstition," it said. China often uses the word "superstition" to refer to religions.
■ China
Eight die in explosion
A family of seven and a guest were killed when a powerful explosion ripped through a private home in central China yesterday, state media reported. The blast occurred at 2am in the household of a farmer surnamed Li in Nanqiao township, Hunan Province, Xinhua reported. "Police are investigating at the moment. It's probably a criminal case, and not an accident," a township official said. The explosion was so powerful that a resident in a neighboring building was injured, according to Xinhua.
■ Israel
US presses Israel on drones
The US has demanded Israel confiscate Chinese-owned drone aircraft that were sent to Israel for an upgrade, an Israeli military official said Wednesday. The demand puts Israel in the awkward position of having to either defy the US, its main ally, or China, a market with growth potential for Israeli high-tech and military exports. The argument centers on a shipment of Harpy drones that Israel sold to China in the early 1990s. The planes are designed to destroy radar stations or anti-aircraft batteries. China shipped the unmanned attack planes back to Israel earlier this year for a technological upgrade.
■ Spain
Baker wins huge lottery
The winning tickets came from a place called "Luck" and that is what they brought a small southern Spanish village, which on Wednesday discovered it had won ?100 million (US$192 million) in the world's largest lottery. Beas de Segura, a village of 8,000 inhabitants in the poor region of Jaen, triumphed in the annual El Gordo lottery thanks to the local baker, who bought a half-share in the winning number and sold it on to friends, family and neighbors in smaller fractions. The baker, Juan Antonio Herrera, had bought his share of the ticket from what has become Spain's most popular official lottery shop, "The Golden Witch" in the small north-western village of Sort, whose name means "luck" in Catalan.
■ United Kingdom
Mayor's benefits rejected
The unpaid mayor of a small English town has applied for unemployment benefits, but been rejected since he spends too much time at mandatory civic events, The Daily Telegraph said yesterday. Roy Miller lost his full-time job at a print factory, which closed at the weekend after laying off its 400 employees. Miller, who is 53 and married with two children, was refused the ?55 pounds (US$106 dollars) per week handed out to other sacked employees, because of his unpaid mayoral activities. "It's an insult. I might be the number-one citizen, but I still have bills and a mortgage to pay like all the other workers," he said.
■ United Kingdom
Government outfoxes ban
The British government has negotiated a secret legal deal that will allow fox hunting to continue next year, despite a ban passed in parliament, The Times newspaper alleged on Thursday. The attorney general, Lord Peter Goldsmith, has agreed not to oppose any request for an injunction to the ban from the pro-hunting lobby group Countryside Alliance, the newspaper said. The law banning the blood sport of fox hunting was pushed through parliament last month and is due to come into force on Feb. 18.
■ Sudan
Ceasefire holds in Darfur
The cease-fire declared this week by government and rebel forces in the west Sudanese region of Darfur appears to be holding, a senior African Union official said Wednesday. But the UN and aid groups report continuing insecurity. "We have not heard of any fighting between the belligerents," the senior AU political officer in Sudan, Jean Baptiste, said in a phone call from his office in Khartoum. The Sudanese government said Monday it was ordering its troops in three areas of Darfur to observe an immediate cease-fire.
■ United States
Forest rules to be eased
Managers of the nation's 155 national forests will have more leeway to approve logging and other commercial projects with less formal environmental review under a new Bush administration plan, reporters learned. The long-awaited plan will overhaul application of the landmark 1976 National Forest Management Act, which sets the basic rules for management of the US' 74.6 million hectares of forests and grasslands and protects forest wildlife.
■ Mexico
Taco grease bus on tour
Ecologists toured Mexico City taco stands and sushi bars on Wednesday to refuel an old school bus with waste cooking oil that will power the next leg of a green-awareness tour from California to Costa Rica. The bus, which ran on avocado oil during a week-long drive down from the US border, is being used to prove that vehicles can run on recycled fuels that pollute less than gasoline as it chugs around oil refineries, factories and eateries collecting vegetable oil. "We're running low, we have to score some oil today," said environmentalist Zak Zaidman as crew members called around the greasiest-sounding eateries in the city's phone directory. The eye-catching 1974 white bus' diesel engine has been modified to run on the more viscous food oil.
■ United States
Christmas begets Festivus
When a church group put a nativity scene on public property, officials warned it might open the door to other religious -- and not-so-religious -- displays. They were right. Since the nativity was erected in Polk County, displays have gone up honoring Zoroastrianism and the fake holiday Festivus, featured on the hit TV show Seinfeld. The Polk County Commission voted to permit the nativity scene to remain across the street from the courthouse, as well as to make that area a public forum. But the commission insisted that unless someone claims a particular display, it would be removed. By Wednesday evening, no one had claimed the Festivus display, and the commission said it would come down; a woman claimed the Zoroastrianism display, which was to stay.
■ Cuba
Students protest against US
Police shut down two blocks of Havana's coastal highway Wednesday as Cuban art students and cartoonists painted the road outside the US diplomatic mission with "anti-imperialist" images, the latest in a spat over Christmas decorations. One group painted a colorful cartoon of an aggressive-looking eagle with an enormous "B" on its chest on the asphalt. American officials declined to comment Wednesday on the painting in the road. The row began last week when James Cason, chief of the U.S. Interests Section, ignored orders by the Cuban government to remove Christmas decorations including a sign reading "75" -- a reference to 75 Cuban dissidents arrested in a crackdown last year.
■ United States
Marine's family fights Yahoo
The family of a US Marine killed last month in Iraq is facing off against Internet giant Yahoo to gain access to his e-mail account. The family of Lance Corporal Justin Ellsworth says it wants to preserve the e-mails in a scrapbook dedicated to his memory. Ellsworth, 20, died Nov. 13 in Iraq. But Yahoo, which hosts the account, has refused to allow the family access to the account, citing its policy that all e-mails are private and can not be shared with third parties.
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
‘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
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese