■ China
Paper invented even earlier
The Chinese, who lay claim to inventing paper, were using it 100 years earlier than previously thought, state press said yesterday following a new discovery of an ancient scrap of the material. The 10cm2 piece of paper was found in Gansu Province and is believed to have been made in 8 BC -- 113 years earlier than the previously known first use of paper, Xinhua said. China was thought to have invented paper in 105 AD when Cai Lun (蔡倫) made it out of tree bark, cloth and fishing nets. The latest discovery was made from linen fibers and was inscribed with legible handwriting, Xinhua said, citing researchers at the Dunhuang Museum in Gansu.
■ China
Man kills wife's relatives
A man stabbed to death 10 people, including six children, in an attack on his wife's family before killing himself by drinking pesticide, state media said. Wang Changyi, upset over "family conflicts," stabbed the 10 last Tuesday while they slept in a remote village in Yunnan Province, Xinhua said on Tuesday. The victims included his wife's sister, brother and six of his nephews and nieces. His wife escaped with two children, while her mother was seriously wounded.
■ China
Disturbances down
Public order offenses fell slightly in the first half of the year, but there were still more than 39,000 protests, the Ministry of Public Security said yesterday. In January, the ministry put the total number of "public order disturbances, obstructions of justice, gathering of mobs and stirring up of trouble" at 87,000 last year, up 6.6 percent from 2004. But that trend appeared to reverse in the first six months of this year.
■ Cambodia
Dog BBQ sparks deadly fight
Police said yesterday that they were seeking a man accused of hacking his cousin to death after a family fight erupted when the man decided to celebrate pay day by roasting the family's dog and inviting friends over for the barbeque. The vice chief of Stung Sen police in central Kampong Thom Province, Yong Som, said that Nun Chouen, 51, had earned US$20 from itinerant work and had returned home to drunkenly slaughter the family dog for a celebration feast, devastating his nine children and sparking a fight with his wife. Som said Chouen's cousin-in-law, Long Soueng, 44, attempted to intervene after Chouen punished his wife for arguing by hacking off one of the legs of their stilted house, and Chouen then chopped Soueng with a machete, virtually decapitating him, before fleeing the scene.
■ Thailand
`Dundee' condoms face ban
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) was on Tuesday considering whether to ban a condom brand called "good penetration" because the name could be offensive to Thai culture, officials said. The FDA asked the government's cultural watchdog to investigate the name and decide whether or not it conformed to national norms and culture. The condom is called "Tom Dundee" in Thai. Dundee translates as good penetration, good support or good push. It is named after Tom Dundee, a Thai singer and actor who insists that his stage name has nothing to do with sex but was chosen after he watched the famous movie Crocodile Dundee starring Paul Hogan.
■ Malaysia
Thieves yank wrong machine
Three would-be thieves broke into a bank in northern Malaysia but failed to make off with any cash as they yanked out the wrong machine -- a check deposit machine instead of an automated cash dispenser, the national news agency Bernama reported yesterday. The three men broke into the entrance area of the bank in the northern town of Bukit Mertajam early yesterday, and tied a rope -- attached to two vehicles -- around a machine, police district investigation chief Chor Ah Sing said, according to Bernama. They jerked the machine off its hinges, sending it crashing to the ground floor, Chor added. The crashing sound alerted a security guard to the breach who chased them away.
■ North Korea
Women eating more dogs
Dog meat is increasingly popular among women in North Korea because the traditional Korean delicacy is believed to be good for the skin, a pro-Pyongyang newspaper in Japan reported yesterday. Dog meat has long been regarded as a stamina food in both Koreas, widely consumed on hot summer days in particular. North Korea is believed to have a greater variety of dishes with dog meat, known in the North as "sweet meat." South Korean gourmets who have tried the delicacy in the North, say Northern dishes taste better.
■ Indonesia
Second teen dies of bird flu
A 17-year-old Indonesian girl has died of bird flu, a health ministry official said yesterday, the second teenager to die of the disease this week. Tests by two local laboratories showed the girl was infected with the H5N1 bird flu virus, making her Indonesia's 44th confirmed bird flu death. The girl, from North Jakarta, died on Tuesday. She had been in contact with sick and dead fowl, the usual mode of transmission of the virus.
■ Hungary
Family team steal house
A mother and daughter have been accused of quite literally stealing a house in eastern Szabolcs-Szatmar-Bereg County, MTI news agency reported on Tuesday. According to Gergely Fulop, spokesman for the county police, the two women, aged 42 and 63, ripped apart an empty house, porch and all, over the course of several months and made off with the pieces. Fulop said that the women were also suspected of stealing the windows from of a neighboring house as part of their drive to collect material and build a property on their own land.
■ Russia
Moscow attacks guide book
Moscow officials have launched an attack on the Lonely Planet, saying the backpackers' guide portrays the Russian capital as a gangster-infested Gotham and presents an image of the city that is at least 15 years out of date. One television channel said the guide suggested that "life in the Russian capital is determined by the laws of the jungle. Foreigners are being warned: criminals, AIDS and mites are raging in Moscow and shops are full of fake vodka." Lonely Planet lauds Moscow's beauty and history in its 258-page guide, but notes the city is "riddled with corruption." Criticism of the book comes as city officials launch a US$27 million PR campaign.
■ Ethiopia
Hundreds killed in floods
Rescue workers recovered at least 11 bodies in their search for hundreds of people missing from killer weekend flash floods that devastated an eastern Ethiopian town, increasing the toll, officials said yesterday. The recovery brought the death toll from flooding in Dire Dawa and outlying areas to at least 211, but police said frantic rescue efforts were continuing as the chances of locating alive any of the around 300 people still unaccounted for were slim. Military and civilian divers joined the search in the now-receding waters of the Dire Dawa and Dechatu rivers that burst their banks on Saturday, expanding the operation 40km downstream.
■ Germany
Diction sparks bomb scare
A mumbling caller dialed a wrong number and left a panicked bank employee convinced that a bomb was on its way by express delivery, police said on Tuesday. The man had meant to call a firm in southwestern Germany that repaired pumps, but instead dialed a bank in Chemnitz, police said. He told the employee who answered the phone that he had sent a pump by DHL and asked for a "diagnosis." However, police said his diction was so poor that the woman believed he was sending a bomb -- "Bombe" in German, rather than "Pumpe." She asked the caller what number he had meant to dial before alerting police -- but missed the last figure.
■ United Kingdom
Mills-McCartney ties sour
Heather Mills McCartney laughed off being locked out of estranged husband Paul McCartney's London home, her spokesman said on Tuesday, but her divorce battle with the former Beatle appears to be turning sour. On Monday, police were called to McCartney's London residence when Mills' security guard climbed over the wall of his premises wall to let her in. The locks on the gates had been changed. "She was laughing about it," Phil Hall said, when asked about newspaper reports that Mills was angry. He confirmed that McCartney had frozen their joint bank accounts.
■ United States
Conjoined twins separated
Surgeons in Salt Lake City successfully separated conjoined twins on Tuesday morning in a 25-hour operation. Four-year-old Maliyah and Kendra Herrin had been joined at the abdomen, had one set of legs and shared a kidney. "Our little Maliyah is all done!" said a posting on the Herrin family's Web site at 8.20am on Tuesday. "We are so proud of her. We can't believe how strong she is. This is an absolute miracle!" Within an hour the reconstructive surgery on her sister's abdominal wall was completed and they were both moved out of the operating theater to sleep for the first time in separate beds. Surgeons planned to give each girl one leg and Kendra the kidney.
■ United States
Police chase doughnuts
When someone stole a truck full of doughnuts in Richland, Washington, police sprung into action. An all-points bulletin was issued moments after the theft of the Viera's Bakery van was reported early on Friday in Kennewick. A Benton County sheriff's deputy quickly spotted the truck. After a chase, Richland police got it to stop and arrested the driver, Steve Swoboda, 19, for investigation of auto theft and felony escape. Still intact was the entire load of glazed, sugar and cream doughnuts, as well as some apple fritters. "In 24 years in law enforcement I've never had a call like that," Richland police Captain Randy Barnes said.
■ United States
Nude protester charged
Gerald Lynn Kelley of Fort Payne, Alabama, decided to protest the war in Iraq by walking along a highway in a cowboy hat, boots -- and in the nude. Kelley, 52, was charged with public lewdness in the July 30 incident. He said he hopes the incident encourages people to speak out against the war. He said he realizes he broke the law and does not encourage streaking. "My dad told me years ago if you've got a stubborn mule, you've got to hit him across the head with a 2-by-4 in order to get his attention," he said. Kelley said he regrets a church event was occurring in a nearby park at the time of his protest. He said he marched in the opposite direction.
■ United States
Construction worker trapped
A construction worker on a project to demolish a downtown parking garage was trapped early on Tuesday when concrete collapsed onto his tractor, officials said. The worker was conscious and talking but was seriously injured, with tons of concrete pinning his legs inside his front-end loader, said Mike Sandulak, a division chief with the Phoenix Fire Department. Firefighters used wooden shoring and air bags to stabilize the building to prevent further collapse, and were working to cut reinforcing bars in the concrete to remove it, Sandulak said. He said there was no estimate on when they may be able to free the worker.
■ Brazil
Rio police kill seven
Police killed seven suspected drug traffickers in a shootout in a Rio de Janeiro slum on Tuesday, bringing to at least 11 the number of people killed since a gangland turf war flared up there a few days ago. Rio police spokesman Colonel Leonardo Tavares said an elite police squad known as Bope was greeted with automatic fire when it raided the hillside Vidigal slum not far from Rio's famous beaches on Tuesday night following an anonymous telephone tip-off. Two police officers were wounded. "They fired back and shot seven lowlifes," he said.
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
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
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