■ Australia
Harriet going strong at 175
One of the world's oldest living animals, Harriet the tortoise, celebrated her 175th birthday yesterday with a pink hibiscus flower cake at her retirement home at the Australia Zoo, north of Brisbane. The zoo, where Harriet has spent the past 17 years, says the Giant Galapagos Land Tortoise was collected by British scientist Charles Darwin in 1835, although some historians have disputed this. There is no doubt however over the age of Harriet -- who for more than a century was thought to be a male and named Harry -- and she is recognized by Guinness World Records as the world's oldest living chelonian, or reptile with a shell of bony plates.
■ Australia
Labor laws draw protests
More than 200,000 people blocked the streets in Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide and Brisbane to protest planned new labor laws yesterday, defying warnings of hefty fines in a show of anger over the centerpiece of the government's fourth term. The protests were loudest in Melbourne, where police said more than 150,000 people walked off the job to support union-organized rallies to oppose the labor reforms currently before parliament. In Sydney, up to 30,000 people marched behind a fire truck and Korean drummers, blocking traffic and bringing parts of the city center to a standstill.
■ Kazakhstan
Ali G isn't funny in Astana
The Foreign Ministry threatened legal action on Monday against British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, who wins laughs by portraying the central Asian state as a country populated by drunks who enjoy cow-punching as a sport. Cohen portrays a spoof Kazakh TV presenter, Borat, in his Da Ali G Show. Cohen appears to have drawn official ire after he hosted the annual MTV Europe Music Awards show in Lisbon earlier this month as Borat. "We do not rule out that Mr. Cohen is serving someone's political order designed to present Kazakhstan and its people in a derogatory way," a Foreign Ministry spokesman said. "We reserve the right to any legal action to prevent new pranks of the kind."
■ Hong Kong
Giant truffle helps charity
A group of gourmets has paid 95,000 euro (US$111,000) for a 1.2kg Italian white truffle at an auction, and the winning bidders donated the delicacy to a charity. The group of Hong Kongers outbid other competitors to win the prized delicacy in a satellite-linked auction, held simultaneously on Sunday in the territory, London and Italy. The group bought the truffle to donate it to Mother's Choice, a charity that cares for pregnant girls. Mother's Choice resold the truffle to a Taiwanese man, who bought it for about HK$725,000 (US$93,600).
■ India
Ants devour woman's eye
A woman receiving treatment for diabetes at a state-run hospital in Kolkata lost one of her eyes after ants nibbled away at it, officials said yesterday. The woman, recovering from a post-surgery infection, shrieked for help as the ants attacked her on Sunday night, but nurses told her it was normal to feel pain from the infection. Her family discovered the eye was missing on Monday.
■ Russia
Putin softens on Kuril isles
Russian President Vladimir Putin will next week call for the joint economic development of the disputed Kuril islands with Japan despite a political impasse on the issue, the Mainichi Shimbun reported yesterday. Putin, who was due to meet Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in Japan on Monday, plans to propose cooperation in developing marine resources and in other areas, the daily said, quoting unidentified Russian diplomatic sources. It said Moscow wanted to show it was ready to focus on economic ties with Tokyo despite a hardline stance on the Kuril islands. A Japanese foreign ministry official said that Tokyo would not change its stance on the islands, but indicated that Japan was ready to look at economic cooperation that does not involve the Russian claim.
■ Russia
Grenade-thrower hurts five
A Russian man angered at his repeated arrests threw a grenade late Monday at a police patrol station, injuring five officers. Some of the injured sustained life-threatening wounds, a police spokesman told the Interfax news agency. The suspect holed up in an apartment near the site of the attack in the Ural Mountains city of Yekaterinburg and said his motive was revenge, explaining that the police had jailed him numerous times and had ruined his life.
■ Netherlands
Sparrow shot over dominoes
A sparrow knocked over 23,000 dominoes in the Netherlands, nearly ruining a world-record attempt before an exterminator shot it dead on Monday, the state news agency reported. The unfortunate bird flew through an open window at an exposition center in Leeuwarden where employees of a television company have worked for weeks setting up more than 4 million dominoes in an attempt to break the Guinness World Record for falling dominoes on Friday night. Only a system of 750 built-in gaps in the chain had prevented the bird from knocking most or all of the dominoes over ahead of schedule, "Domino Day" organizers said.
■ Ireland
Nursing home lifts `spirits'
A nursing home has hit on a cheering way to keep up the spirits of its elderly patients -- by providing its own pub. St Mary's Hospital in County Monaghan believes ready access to a good pint may help its patients (average age 85) actually live longer. "We would say the whole social aspect of life does extend the years -- it means the patients aren't bored to death," Rose Mooney, assistant director of nursing said. The pub had also led to a rise in the number of visitors, she said. Having its own bar made the hospital, which has about 140 patients, unique in Ireland, she said.
■ Italy
No smoking `Sunday'
A stunned Italian actor had to stub out the cigarette he had lit up on stage after a spectator complained, forcing the theater to change the script of an Arthur Miller play to make it smoke-free."This had never happened to me in more than 300 performances,"said Sebastiano Lo Monaco. Italy has banned lighting up in all enclosed public places since January. Lo Monaco was smoking, in line with the script, while playing the main character Sunday in Miller's A View from the Bridge at a theater in Mestre, when a woman from the audience shouted "Put out that cigarette." The performance resumed with a modified script and a non-smoking protagonist.
■ United States
Minister guilty of extortion
A self-described minister was convicted of trying to blackmail New York Yankees slugger Gary Sheffield and his wife by claiming he had a video showing her having sex with R&B singer R. Kelly. A federal jury on Monday convicted Derrick Mosley, 39, of two counts of extortion and two counts of wire fraud for allegedly plotting to extort money from Sheffield and gospel singer DeLeon Richards-Sheffield. Assistant US Attorney Clarence Butler said Mosley asked Sheffield's business agent for US$20,000 to destroy a tape that Mosley claimed showed Richards-Sheffield having sex with Kelly before she married Sheffield.
■ United States
Teen-marrier charged
A 37-year-old woman was charged with child molestation after being accused of having a sexual relationship with a 15-year-old boy whom she married last week. The woman also is allegedly pregnant with the boy's child, his grandmother and guardian told reporters on Monday. "You hear about stuff like this from the TV, but it's not reality," Judy Ann Hayles said. "But [this] happened. And this won't be over because a baby is on the way." Lisa Lynnette Clark was arrested Wednesday and remained in custody Monday. A preliminary hearing is set for Nov. 30. Hayles filed a police report on Oct. 6 when she learned from a friend that Clark was pregnant.
■ United states
Death driver not indicted
A grand jury declined to indict a bus driver in connection with the deaths of 23 passengers killed in a vehicle fire as they fled Hurricane Rita in September. The bus caught fire on Sept. 23 from a malfunctioning back wheel. After the fire started, oxygen tanks used by the patients on the bus began exploding. The sheriff's department had said Juan Robles Gutierrez, 37, a Mexican immigrant, did not inspect the bus on the 16-hour trip from Houston as Rita approached, and didn't help people when the fire broke out. But Robles' attorney, George Shaffer told Tuesday's editions of the Houston Chronicle that his client "did everything within his power to minimize the damage and loss of life."
■ United states
New NY bag tests begin
Police have introduced a new anti-terrorism tool to thwart potential subway bombers while reducing the intrusiveness of random bag searches: explosives detectors. The portable detection devices, tested at two subway stops on Monday, are designed to chemically analyze swabs taken from the outside of bags for traces of explosives, police said. Commuters in New York have experienced random bag searches since the July terrorist attacks in London.
■ United States
Kyrgyzstan deals probed
During the US-led war in Afghanistan in 2001, Washington made deals for jet fuel supplies to a US air base in Kyrgyzstan with two companies linked to relatives of the then-Kyrgyz president, the New York Times said yesterday. The deals, which may have benefited Askar Akayef and his family by hundreds of millions of dollars, are under investigation by Kyrgyz prosecutors and the FBI, the daily said. The Kyrgyz government insists the US knew the two companies they were dealing with had ties with the Akayev family. An FBI report given to Kyrgyz prosecutors, a copy of which was also handed to the New York Times, said the two companies may have been involved in money laundering through New York accounts.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
China would train thousands of foreign law enforcement officers to see the world order “develop in a more fair, reasonable and efficient direction,” its minister for public security has said. “We will [also] send police consultants to countries in need to conduct training to help them quickly and effectively improve their law enforcement capabilities,” Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong (王小洪) told an annual global security forum. Wang made the announcement in the eastern city of Lianyungang on Monday in front of law enforcement representatives from 122 countries, regions and international organizations such as Interpol. The forum is part of ongoing