■ China
Rights activist sentenced
A Shanghai court has sentenced local activist Xu Zhengqing, a campaigner against government land grabs and evictions, to three years in jail for disturbing the peace, court documents showed yesterday. Xu, who has been in custody for eight months, was prosecuted last month for "picking quarrels and provoking fights" after he travelled to Beijing to try to petition the government. "His behavior constitutes the crime of picking quarrels and provoking fights and should be punished according to the law," the court documents said. Xu's wife said they would appeal the sentence, describing it as "really, really tough."
■ China
Writer's jail term upheld
A court has upheld a five-year prison sentence for dissident writer Zhang Lin (張林), his wife and a rights body said yesterday. Zhang had been sentenced in July for subversion over his Internet essays. The Chinese Rights Defenders group said Zhang was re-tried behind closed doors following his appeal and the court later told Zhang's wife that the original verdict had been upheld. "The courts have not judged according to law. It's just pure vengeance," his wife told reporters by telephone. Zhang again pleaded his innocence in the second trial and said he planned to appeal to the Supreme Court, she said.
■ Papua New Guinea
Pfizer to help AIDS patients
The Australian branch of pharmaceutical giant Pfizer said yesterday it will provide free and unlimited supplies of an anti-fungal medication to help treat AIDS patients in Papua New Guinea. At a joint news conference in Brisbane, Australia held with visiting Papua New Guinea Prime Minister Michael Somare, Pfizer announced it would send free supplies of Diflucan, an anti-fungal medicine used to treat AIDS-related illnesses, to the island nation. Papua New Guinea is facing one of the largest AIDS epidemics in the Asia-Pacific region with an estimated 1.7 percent of the country's adults living with HIV. It is the only country in the region where the disease has moved into the general population and the only nation the UN fears will reach sub-Saharan Africa proportions.
■ Hong Kong
Tsang faults gay sex ruling
Chief Executive Donald Tsang (曾蔭權) has clashed with the territory's homosexual community by suggesting the age of consent for gay sex is a moral issue, a news report said yesterday. Tsang told students at the weekend that he disapproved of sex between males as young as 16 in response to a High Court ruling which lowered the age of consent. Tsang, a devout Catholic, told his audience he believed the "privatization" of moral standards had become a danger to society, implying he did not approve of the ruling. Joseph Cho, head of a Hong Kong gay pressure group, told yesterday's South China Morning Post: "Actions performed privately should not be criminalized.
■ Nepal
Journalists oppose new law
Journalists said yesterday they would fight a new law that increases the penalty for criticizing King Gyanendra to two years in jail. The law also bars private radio stations from broadcasting news and makes it a crime to criticize the royal family. "We are going to file the case at the Supreme Court on Tuesday. The new laws not only violate the press rights guaranteed by the Constitution but also several decisions held by the courts in favor of press freedom," Balram Baniya of the Federation of Nepalese Journalists said.
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