■ Japan
Masked man shoots at cars
A masked man traveling on an expressway in western Japan opened fire at two cars from his vehicle early yesterday and sped away. No one was injured. The attacker shot at a car carrying a young couple as they tried to overtake the assailant's vehicle in Wakayama prefecture at around 3am yesterday. Another car carrying a family of four was shot at from behind 15 minutes later by what appeared to be the same man, who fled south down the Hanwa Expressway. Bullets smashed windows on both cars but did not injure people inside.
■ South Korea
Island visit may rekindle row
A group of South Korean lawmakers plan to visit a chain of rocky islets off the country's east coast next week in a move that could rekindle a territorial row with Japan. The 18 members of the parliamentary defense committee will visit Dokdo, called Takeshima in Japan, on Oct. 5, in what an aide said was "just a symbolic move." Tempers flared earlier this year between Seoul and Tokyo over the ownership of the islets -- halfway between the countries -- after a Japanese local council designated a special day on its calendar to bolster Japan's ownership. Seoul has controlled the islets since after the Korean War.
■ Thailand
Man robbed of fake jeans
Two thieves robbed a man at knifepoint to steal his jeans and shoes, but they ended up with a pair of fake Levi's. Watcharaphong Khaewka, a 21-year-old office worker, filed a complaint with police saying that the two men put a knife to his neck and forced him to take off his jeans and sport shoes. "The attackers did not touch the money, watch and other valuables on the victim. They just took his jeans and sport shoes and let the victim walk home in his underwear," police said. "The victim fears that the thieves will come to hurt him when they find out that the jeans were fake ones that he bought from Chatuchak Market," police said.
■ Wallis island
Feud over island's throne
At stake is the throne of Wallis island, a tiny South Pacific outcrop with a population of 10,000 and a stone house for a royal palace. But trouble in the French territory, north of Fiji, started in January when 87-year-old King Tomasi Kulimoetoke's grandson was sentenced to 18 months in jail for killing a pedestrian in a drink-driving incident. He fled to the palace, from where the king threatened to expel French officials who tried to make an arrest, insisting tribal justice should take precedence over French law. The grandson surrendered after four months but the incident outraged a rival clan who want the French to stay. They set up their own "government" and said they would crown a new king on Sunday. Last week France, which dispatched 18 officers to bolster the local force, prepared to send in riot squad reinforcements from New Caledonia. In response, the king's supporters stormed the airport and prevented their arrival by blocking the runway with concrete blocks and coconut tree trunks.
■ Macau
Election turnout high
Nearly six out of 10 registered voters turned out to choose a new group of legislators in the former Portuguese colony. A total of 128,829 people -- 58.4 percent of the electorate cast their ballots to elect 12 new legislators on Sunday. Macau, which reverted to Chinese sovereignty in 1999 after 450 years of Portuguese rule, has limited democracy under a "one country two systems" model.
■ France
Anti-terror raids net nine
Police detained nine people yesterday in the Paris area and in Normandy in an anti-terror crackdown on a group suspected of having ties to fundamentalist Algerian militants, officials said. TV station LCI said the group was suspected of planning attacks in France. The sweep was part of an anti-terror investigation opened in July, officials said. Those detained were suspected of being members of the Salafist Group for Call and Combat, an Algerian militant group known by its French initials GSPC, which has declared its allegiance to al-Qaeda.
■ United Kingdom
Police request BBC tapes
Police have asked the BBC to turn over unaired tapes of interviews with two Muslim extremists whom officials hope to prosecute for inciting violence, the network said on Sunday. London's Metropolitan Police have asked for unedited tapes of interviews with Abu Uzair and Abu Izzadeen, both British-based clerics who appeared on the network's Newsnight program last month, a BBC spokeswoman said. The spokeswoman said the network had given police tapes of its broadcast. At issue were those segments that did not air.
■ United Kingdom
Museum pulls artwork
The Tate Britain museum has removed a work made up of sacred texts from Christianity, Judaism and Islam torn and mounted on glass to avoid offending religious sensibilities following the July transit bombings, the museum said Sunday. The museum said it was particularly concerned that John Latham's piece God Is Great could upset Muslims. It pulled the work from an exhibition of Latham's art despite his objection. "Having sought wide-ranging advice, Tate feels that to exhibit the work in London in the current sensitive climate, post July 7, would not be appropriate," the museum said in a statement released to reporters.
■ Ireland
`Barber's clinics' popular
Dozens of men are flocking to the Baldy Barbers in Blackpool, a suburb of Cork city, southern Ireland, to take part in a unique health project encouraging men to focus more on their health. The project, organized by the Health Service Executive's Health Promotion Unit, is modeled on a project first tried in betting shops and pubs in England. Visits to a general practitioner in Ireland cost US$61 minimum and many men may feel that they are killing two birds with one stone by having themselves checked out in the "barber's clinic," where an appointment is not necessary.
■ Russia
Arrest warrant dropped
Russian military prosecutors have canceled an arrest warrant against Ukraine's ex-prime minister and "orange revolution" leader Yulia Tymoshenko after she travelled to Moscow to give evidence, the Russian prosecutor's office said yesterday. "The international arrest warrant against Yulia Tymoshenko has been cancelled," the prosecutor's office said in a written statement. "Over the weekend she voluntarily came to the general prosecutor's office and gave testimony essential to the investigation. "Tymoshenko will come to the general prosecutor's office to aid investigations in the future too," the statement continued.
■ United States
Violent crime rate stays low
Reports of violent crime in the US last year stayed at the lowest level since the government began compiling statistics 32 years ago, but males, youths and those of more than one race were victimized at higher rates than others, the US Justice Department said. There were 24 million violent crimes and property crimes last year, about the same rate as the previous year. The highest victimization rate -- the number of victims of violent crime for every 1,000 people 12 and older -- was for people of two or more races, with a level of 51.6 per thousand. Blacks had a higher victimization rate, 26 per thousand, than whites, at 21 per thousand.
■ Mexico
Thousands gather for big hug
More than 14,000 people in Ciudad Juarez, on the US-Mexico border, embraced and held on tight on Sunday for a 15-minute "Giant Hug," that attempted to set a new Guinness World Record. Mayor Hector Murguia led the gathering, which took place in the shadow of a Mexican flag close to a bridge leading over the border and into neighboring El Paso, Texas. The embrace began with the cry "Mexico, Mexico, Mexico" around midday.
■ United States
Flawed safety vests probed
Federal prosecutors are investigating whether a maker of bulletproof vests endangered lives, including that of US President George W. Bush. A whistle-blower from the company, Second Chance Body Armor Inc, testified this month that the Secret Service tested and bought some of the defective vests for the president and first lady Laura Bush. The Pentagon also obtained the same armor for elite troops. Many sales occurred well after Second Chance had been alerted that the Japanese-made Zylon synthetic material in the vests was degrading faster than expected, allowing bullets to potentially penetrate the armor, according to the whistle-blower's testimony.
■ Canada
French citizenship given up
The next governor general of Canada is giving up her dual French citizenship as she prepares to take up her post. Michaelle Jean said that she was making the move given the duties she will be assuming, including the title of commander and chief of the Canadian Forces. Jean, a Quebec-based journalist and filmmaker whose family fled dictatorship in Haiti when she was a child, is set to become Canada's first black vice-regal, and at age 48, one of its youngest when she succeeds Adrienne Clarkson today. She acquired French citizenship when she married filmmaker Jean-Daniel Lafond, who was born in France.
■ United Kingdom
9/11 arrest went too far
Scotland Yard went over the top when police arrested an Algerian wrongly suspected of having given flying lessons to four of the 9/11 terrorists, the Times reported. A letter from the FBI to Scotland Yard dated Sept. 17, 2001, six days after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, said British police should not arrest Lotfi Raissi and the matter should be handled "as expeditiously and discreetly as possible." "The FBI requests that Raissi NOT BE alerted to the US government's interests at this time," the letter said, with the words "not be" in black capital letters and underlined. On Sept. 21, however, at 3am the police smashed down Raissi's door where he lived in Colnbrook, west of London and arresting him at gunpoint. Taken away naked in a police car, Raissi was held for five months until magistrates rejected all the accusations against him.
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