■ New Zealand
Former minister charged
Former New Zealand immigration minister Tuaraki John Delamere was committed yesterday for trial on 10 charges of fraud and forgery brought by the Serious Fraud Office in Wellington. Delamere, who set himself up as an immigration consultant after losing his seat in parliament in 1999, is alleged to have organized a fraudulent system involving Chinese business people wanting to settle in New Zealand using holes in policy he had introduced as minister.
■ China
Divination 4,500 years old
New evidence suggests fortune telling has a history of at least 4,500 years in China, state media reported on Wednesday. Archeologists arrived at this conclusion after they unearthed a jade tortoise and an oblong jade article in an ancient tomb in Lingjiatan village, east China's Anhui Province, Xinhua news agency reported. "They were obviously not objects used in daily life, nor adornment, but instruments used in religious activities," said Gu Fang, an expert with the jadeware research committee under the China Society of Cultural Relics.
■ Japan
Empresses recommended
A panel on imperial succession in Tokyo was set yesterday to formally recommend that women and their children be allowed to ascend the ancient Chrysanthemum Throne -- saving Japan's male heir-deprived royal family from a succession crisis. The recommendation that Japanese law be revised to give the first-born child of either sex the right to head the world's oldest hereditary monarchy goes to Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, who has said he plans to submit a bill based on the report to Parliament next year. Japan's imperial family hasn't produced a male heir for 40 years, and Crown Prince Naruhito and Crown Princess Masako's only child, three-year-old Aiko, is a girl.
■ Malaysia
MPs `behaving like monkeys'
European lawmakers who visited parliament in Kuala Lumpur were treated to heated exchanges on Wednesday when a government legislator accused his opposition rivals of behaving "like monkeys" and embarrassing the nation in front of foreigners. The uproar began while a delegation from the European Parliament was observing a debate in Malaysia's lower house of parliament about the country's growing backlog of court cases, said Lim Kit Siang, the top opposition leader in parliament. Government legislator M. Kayveas became irritated when Lim and other opposition members interrupted his explanation of the issue, prompting him to accuse them of "acting like monkeys in a circus."
■ Singapore
Housewife jailed for abuse
A Singaporean housewife was jailed for 10 months for abusing her Indonesian maid on a record 79 occasions, media reports said yesterday. Sazarina Madzin, 29, had admitted hitting her maid, Wiwik Setyowati, 22, all those times in less than a year and threatening to kill her once. The irony was not lost on Nor Azlan Sulaiman, Sazarina's husband and an active volunteer with the Red Cross. "I have played a part in helping thousands of Indonesians, but here, because of what my wife did, there will be one Indonesian who will never be able to forgive me," The Straits Times quoted Azlan as saying in reference to the maid.
■ Franch
Rapper may face jail
A French court agreed on Wednesday to consider a complaint brought by a conservative member of parliament against the rapper Monsieur R for referring to France as a slut in a song. The court in Melun, south of Paris, said it would rule early next year on the complaint filed by Daniel Mach of Pyrenees Orientales, who said he had the backing of 150 other parliament members but was bringing the action "on my own personal account, because I feel assaulted by these insults. They are a real attack on the dignity of France and of the state." Mach was the latest in a long line of people to object to French rap lyrics since the early 1990s.
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