■ Singapore
Elderly sex pest jailed
A 74-year-old man who molested a female passenger and then dashed off a bus was jailed for six months, news reports said yesterday. Ng Choon Kang fled at a bus stop with driver Tan Chuan Huat, 44, in pursuit. Tan caught Ng and drove to an interchange, where Ng was arrested. A district court heard on Thursday that Ng and the 46-year-old victim were on board the bus on Sept. 22, 2004, the Straits Times reported. The woman felt a hand brush around her body and under her armpit. She turned to see Ng pull his hand away. She shouted at the assailant and informed the driver. Ng was brought to court in April last year but jumped bail. He was caught again earlier this month.
■ China
Ministry targets plagiarism
The Education Ministry has set up a body to fight academic fraud and plagiarism following a string of scandals at universities, news reports said yesterday. The commission will set guidelines for investigating and punishing academic fraud, the official Xinhua News Agency said. China has suffered a series of scandals in recent months over high-profile academics who were accused of lying about their credentials or faking research.
■ China
`Radical' petitions banned
Beijing plans to pass tougher regulations on people who lobby authorities over grievances, making it an offense to take radical actions when making their voices heard, state media said yesterday. The draft regulations would ban them from drawing the ban them from drawing the attention of officials by threatening to commit suicide or inflict self-harm the Beijing Daily Messenger reported.
■ Australia
Drug-packed condoms found
Customs officers thought something was fishy when they inspected a man's luggage and found jars of pickled fish. Closer inspection found 39 condoms of heroin inside the fish. Officers at Adelaide airport in South Australia "became suspicious about pickled fish fillets inside jars found in the passenger's luggage" on Wednesday, a customs statement said. "Closer inspection revealed a number of condoms sewn inside the fish pieces," said the statement on Thursday. A 32-year-old Australian man returning from Cambodia was arrested and will be charged with importing more than 2kg of heroin, customs said.
■ Cambodia
Video phones banned
Prime Minister Hun Sen yesterday banned video-capable mobile phones to curb the dissemination of pornography, heeding a request from his wife. Bun Rany, along with the wives of several other senior government officials, recently urged Hun Sen to prohibit the use of more technologically advanced third-generation phones in the impoverished country because they can be used to spread obscene images. In a petition addressed to Hun Sen on May 19, Bun Rany argued that obscene images have "gravely negative consequences for social morality" and could increase the "sexual exploitation of women and children and other vices that would cast our society as a very dark one."
■ Malaysia
Suu Kyi's release urged
Kuala Lumpur yesterday urged the military junta of Myanmar to free pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi when her detention expires today, saying she poses no threat to Myanmar's stability. "I don't think it is beneficial for Myanmar to keep her indefinitely. One of the best ways is, rather than renew the detention, is to release her," Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar told reporters. He praised the junta's recent decision to allow UN envoy Ibrahim Gambari to meet with Suu Kyi, her first meeting with a senior UN official in two years.
■ South Korea
US may accept refugees
The US government has decided to allow four North Korean asylum seekers staying at a US diplomatic mission in China to travel to the US, a South Korean newspaper reported yesterday. China agreed in "secret negotiations" with the US to allow the North Koreans to leave the country, the newspaper Chosun Ilbo reported, citing unidentified diplomatic sources. Washington is considering bringing them to the US via a third nation, the newspaper said.
■ United Kingdom
Egg preceded chicken
Which came first, the chicken or the egg? According to a scientist it was the egg, British newspapers reported yesterday. The key to the age-old question apparently lies in the fact that since genetic material does not change throughout an animal's life, the first bird that evolved into a chicken must have initially existed as an embryo inside an egg. Professor John Brookfield of Nottingham University concluded that because of this, the living organism inside the eggshell would have had the same DNA as the chicken it turned into.
■ Israel
Abbas defense stepped up
In response to the mounting threats against the life of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Israeli Defense Minister Amir Perez approved on Thursday the transfer of weapons from nearby Arab states to the Palestinian Presidential guard, Israel Radio reported. Several weeks ago, reports flagged a threat to Abbas' life from the militant Islamic Jihad organization. While the Islamic organizations throughout the Palestinian territories appear to have increased their strength and bolstered their weapons cache by smuggling supplies across the border with Egypt, the permit is expected to expand the president's security detail.
■ Russia
Putin lashes out at US
President Vladimir Putin on Thursday returned to his feud with the US when he declared that Washington is in no position to deliver lectures after the invasion of Iraq. "We see how the United States defends its interests, we see what methods and means they use for this," he said at a summit in Sochi. "When we fight for our interests, we also look for the most acceptable methods to accomplish our national tasks, and I find it strange that this seems inexplicable to someone."
■ United Kingdom
Watchdog slams drug trial
The government's drugs watchdog on Thursday criticized the company behind the Parexel drug trial which left six men seriously ill, and urged caution in the use of the entire class of drug tested on the volunteers. In its final report, the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency said Parexel failed to follow some "best practice" clinical procedures and kept shabby patient records while testing the drug, TGN1412, on humans at a research facility in London. Despite this, the extreme adverse reaction the men experienced, including swelling so severe that one patient resembled "the elephant man," was most probably due to an "unpredicted biological action of the drug in humans," the agency said.
■ Cameroon
HIV traced to chimpanzees
Scientists searching for the origin of HIV believe they have tracked its original source to two colonies of chimpanzees in the southeast of the country. Researchers and scientists from England, France and the US searched for signs of the simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV), a virus similar to HIV that infects monkeys and chimpanzees, in 10 chimpanzee populations throughout Cameroon. Tests revealed an SIV strikingly similar to HIV that causes AIDS in humans in the two colonies. "This is where it probably all started. We've got these viruses in south-east Cameroon, which are so close to HIV, and it's difficult to envisage there could be any which could be closer." said Paul Sharp, a professor of genetics at Nottingham.
■ United States
Senate confirms Hayden
The US Senate on Friday, with broad bipartisan support, confirmed Air Force General Michael Hayden as the new director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Senators approved the nomination of Hayden by a vote of 78 to 15, The support was much broader than anticipated when President George W Bush appointed Hayden to fill the vacancy. Hayden, who is serving as deputy to US intelligence chief John Negroponte, headed the National Security Agency when a controversial surveillance programme was put ir, objections from opposition Democrats and some Republicans over the programme never became an issue during the confirmation process.
■ United States
Zoellick to step down
Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick intends to resign after barely 15 months in the job, aides said on Wednesday. From his first days at the State Department, Zoellick has chafed at his subordinate position, frequently remarking that he was finding the adjustment difficult after running his own office during four years as US trade representative, which is a Cabinet position. Aides noted that Zoellick could still change his mind. He has told associates he would like to be treasury secretary and would stay in the administration if given that job.
■ United States
Hoffa search slows
FBI teams on Thursday sifted by hand through dirt from a chest-deep hole in the ground in an intense search for the body of labor leader Jimmy Hoffa three decades after his disappearance. Investigators worked by hand to sort through soil under the foundation of a barn and could be seen photographing and videotaping potential evidence on the Hidden Dreams Farm in Milford Town, near Detroit. The investigation was triggered by a tip from Donovan Wells, 75, a federal prisoner serving time for marijuana trafficking who lived on the farm at the time of Hoffa's disappearance.
■ United States
Defendant attacks lawyer
A man charged with murder in Massachusetts was so angry with his lawyer's performance he attacked the attorney in court, trying to strangle him as a shocked judge looked on, Boston radio reported on Wednesday. "I think he just didn't like the way some of the rulings the judge was making was going yesterday morning," attorney Bruce Carroll told WBZ Radio of the Tuesday morning attack by defendant John Gomes in Boston's Suffolk Superior Court. Several officers intervened before the 1.8m, 113kg Gomes was separated from Carroll, the radio reported.
■ Peru
Politician's caravan attacked
Two people were wounded by gunshots and another three injured by blows in a confusing incident on Thursday in Cuzco as the campaign caravan of ex-president Alan Garcia was heading to the city's airport, police said. Leaders of Garcia's Aprista party accused supporters Ollanta Humala, his opponent in next month's presidential runoff, of attacking the caravan. Garcia was not hurt and continued on to the airport to take a flight back to Lima. Cuzco police chief Jairo Vazquez told reporters that the only details he could confirm were that two people had been wounded by gunshots and three others injured from blows. Vazquez said one of the wounded said he was a Humala supporter. According to polls, Garcia has a lead of at least 10 percentage points.
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
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
A prominent Christian leader has allegedly been stabbed at the altar during a Mass yesterday in southwest Sydney. Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel was saying Mass at Christ The Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley just after 7pm when a man approached him at the altar and allegedly stabbed toward his head multiple times. A live stream of the Mass shows the congregation swarm forward toward Emmanuel before it was cut off. The church leader gained prominence during the COVID-19 pandemic, amassing a large online following, Officers attached to Fairfield City police area command attended a location on Welcome Street, Wakeley following reports a number