■ Malaysia
PM's goats nabbed
Thieves stole two goats belonging to Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi from a government facility in northern Malaysia, a newspaper reported Saturday. The pair of Boer goats from Australia have lived under the care of the Penang state veterinary department since businessmen gave them to Abdullah a few years ago. Thieves broke into the department's compound and stole 13 goats, including the pair of Boers worth about 5,000 ringgit (US$1,300). Police were checking with abattoirs and breeding farms to trace the animals and thieves.
■ Hong Kong
Man slain in teahouse
Authorities in southern China have charged two Hong Kong men and four from the mainland with a millionaire's 2002 execution-style killing in a busy Hong Kong teahouse, a newspaper reported. Police haven't announced a possible motive for the slaying of Harry Lam, which prompted fears that Hong Kong gangsters could evade justice by fleeing to China. Lam was killed in the Luk Yu teahouse in Hong Kong on Nov. 30, 2002 when a lone gunman walked up and shot him in the head. Hong Kong is a Chinese territory, but border controls remain in place and the two sides have no arrangements for extraditing crime suspects.
■ Japan
3 missing in copter crash
Three Japanese airline employees are missing after their helicopter crashed into the sea on its way home from offering Christmas flights in a mainly Christian area of Japan, the coast guard said. The Robinson R44 Raven helicopter went missing in bad weather late Friday after leaving the southern city of Nagasaki for its home airport in Saga about 70 km away. The charter flight company employees were veteran pilot Hiroyuki Ubukata, 48, Sachiko Fujimitsu, 33, and Yuki Morita, 33. Coast-guard ships, navy vessels and fishing boats had found debris from the helicopter in the sea off the southern city of Kagoshima, the spokesman said. A black bag containing Fujimitsu's driver's licence had also been found. "Divers will soon start searching for any other clue," he said.
■ Pakistan
Bus crash in ravine kills 18
A speeding bus packed with passengers plunged into a deep ravine in eastern Pakistan yesterday, killing at least 18 people and injuring 39. The accident occurred near Jehlum, a small city about 100km southeast of Islamabad, Pakistan's capital. The driver lost control of the bus as it went around a sharp corner on the main highway. ?ief said. The bodies and injured have been transported to two nearby hospitals. The driver survived, but was in critical condition. Mohamood Ahmed, a doctor at the government-run hospital in Deena, said a total of 18 bodies had been counted at the two hospitals, while 39 others were being treated.
■ Indonesia
18 rebel villagers killed
Indonesian troops killed 18 suspected rebels in Aceh province, as violence continues despite Jakarta's claim seven months ago that security had improved, the army said yesterday. The guerillas were killed in separate clashes across the province on Friday, said army spokesman Ari Mulya Asnawi. Rebel spokesman Tjut Kafrawi denied the report, saying the dead were unarmed villagers who support the independence struggle. Both sides have been accused of committing human rights violations.
■ West Bank
Leadership campaign starts
The campaign to elect a successor to Yasser Arafat as Palestinian Authority president was to begin in earnest yesterday as frontrunner Mahmud Abbas prepared to unveil his manifesto. The official start of campaigning comes just over a fortnight before the residents of the West Bank, Gaza Strip and occupied east Jerusalem prepare to cast their ballots for only the second time. A total of seven candidates, four of them independents, are taking part in the Jan. 9 contest although only Abbas has a realistic chance of victory. The moderate former prime minister has already succeeded Arafat as chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization and has been chosen as the candidate of the dominant Fatah faction.
■ Russia
Arms to keep abreast of US
The government will keep pace with the US in nuclear weapons technology but not in the size of its strategic arsenal, Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said Friday according to Interfax news agency. "In a long historical perspective, nuclear parity will be preserved not only with the United States but also with the other countries with nuclear arms," he was quoted as saying. He said he was not referring to the "numbers of cluster warheads but the techno-logical potential -- the capacity of cluster warheads for extensive maneuvering, strategic range and high precision." Ivanov also said new long-range, nuclear-capable cruise missiles would be purchased for the country's air force next year. The new missiles had a range of more than 2,000km.
■ Iran
Victims of quake need help
The health and education of children in the Iranian city of Bam, devastated by a huge earthquake a year ago, must be the top priority for the government, the UN's Children's Fund said yesterday. Many of some 24,000 children who survived the disaster, which killed more than 31,000 people in the historic city, a World Heritage site, have suffered emotional trauma, UNICEF said. In addition, they have been forced to continue their education in make-shift classrooms after many schools were destroyed.
■ United Kingdom
Suspect's assets frozen
The government froze the assets on Friday of an Islamic group it suspects of acting on behalf of Saudi dissident Saad al-Fagih, named by the UN as a suspected al-Qaeda associate. "Chancellor Gordon Brown today instructed the Bank of England ... to direct all UK financial institutions to freeze any funds held for or on behalf of the entity, the Movement for Islamic Reform in Arabia," the government said in a statement. "The action has been taken because the Treasury has reasonable grounds for suspecting that the organization is acting on behalf of Saad al-Fagih," the statement added.
■ France
French nationals to get aid
Some 8,000 French nationals who fled unrest in the Ivory Coast are eligible to receive financial aid to help them resettle in France, the prime minister's office said Friday. Detailing an overall budget of 5 million euros (US$6.7 million) announced early this month, the office of Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin announced "exceptional aid" to cover initial expenses, for example 750 euros for a single person and 3,000 euros for a couple with a child.
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