■ China
Snail poisoning saga ends
All 160 people who contracted meningitis after eating undercooked snails at Beijing restaurants have recovered and have been released from hospitals, a news report said yesterday. The meningitis cases occurred since late June and were blamed on undercooked giant Amazonian snails that carried the parasite angiostrongylus cantonensis, which can cause meningitis. Most were infected after eating at the Chinese capital's Shuguo Yanyi Restaurant. The government hasn't said where else diners were infected or how many restaurants were involved. Earlier reports said two of the patients were under age 13. Health authorities reportedly inspected hundreds of Beijing restaurants after the outbreak.
■ China
Ex-legislator executed
A former member of China's legislature was executed on charges of rape, weapons possession and misappropriating US$15 million, a news report said yesterday. Sang Yuechun (桑粵春) was executed on Friday in the northeastern province of Jilin. Sang, president of Jigang Industrial and Trade Group Corp and a former deputy to China's legislature, the National People's Congress, was convicted of taking bribes, rape, weapons possession and misappropriating 120 million yuan (US$15 million), the Xinhua news agency said.
■ China
Mass murderer apprehended
Chinese police have arrested a man accused of slaying 13 people after a massive manhunt in the country's northeast, state media reported yesterday. Shi Yuejun (石悅軍) killed eight people in rural Jilin Province a week ago and killed five more while on the run from police, the China Daily reported. Shi left another four injured, three seriously, the report said. The dead included four members of the same family, according to earlier local newspaper reports. The 37-year-old professional pig butcher was finally caught on Friday in a cornfield near his hometown after a hunt involving 14,000 people, including 2,000 police.
■ Malaysia
Crackdown on illegal aliens
Malaysia will continue to arrest illegal aliens despite a critical lack of space at detention centers throughout the country, news reports said yesterday. "If they have to sleep on floors right next to one another, so be it," Home Affairs Minister Radzi Sheikh Ahmad said. "But we do not feel nice about making them do this, so we need to find more space for them." As of Thursday, 7,467 alleged illegal aliens were held at 15 centers nationwide, including 1,482 women and 303 children. The majority are Indonesians, he said. Radzi said the situation could become worse early next year because Malaysia plans to launch a major operation to round up illegal aliens.
■ Japan
Condolence money
A wealthy Japanese businessman accused of killing British woman Lucie Blackman sent ¥100 million (US$850,000) to the former British Airways flight attendant's family, Kyodo news agency reported yesterday. Quoting defense lawyers for Joji Obara, charged with killing Blackman in 2000, Kyodo said the Japanese man had sent the "condolence money" to her family in Britain. A millionaire property developer, Obara, 54, is accused of drugging, raping and killing Blackman, who had been working at a hostess bar in Tokyo's Roppongi entertainment district.
■ Belgium
Broadband in EU schools
Almost all schools in the EU have access to the Internet and just over two-thirds have high-speed, broadband connections, the European Commission said on Friday. However, it said the broadband picture is mixed across the 25 EU nations, ranging from 90 percent of schools in Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, Estonia and Malta to under 35 percent in Greece, Poland, Cyprus and Lithuania. By comparison, 95 percent of US public schools have a broadband connection, said the survey, which assessed the use of information technologies in European schools. The survey found that the number of pupils sharing computers connected to the Internet ranges from 3.8 to 5.5 in Denmark, Britain and Luxemburg to as many as 19 in Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Portugal and Greece.
■ Gaza
IDF destroys Hamas home
An Israeli airstrike destroyed the home of a local Hamas leader in the southern Gaza Strip late on Friday, officials said. There were no reports of casualties. The owner of the home, a senior member of Hamas' military wing in the area, received a call from the army approximately 15 minutes ahead of the blast telling him to evacuate the building, Hamas officials said. The Israeli army confirmed the airstrike, saying it had targeted a weapons storage facility. It said it warned people to stay away from the structure ahead of the attack to avoid civilian casualties.
■ United States
Elderly woman rams bus
A 90-year-old motorist went through a red light and rammed a school bus hard enough to knock it over, injuring 11 children, authorities said. One child was in critical condition, and the car's driver was also taken to hospital, officials said. The bus was struck while carrying the learning-disabled students to the Palmdale Learning Plaza in the Antelope Valley northeast of Los Angeles, authorities said. California Highway Patrol Officer Henry Roth said the elderly woman driving a Lincoln Continental failed to stop at a red light and struck the bus broadside.
■ United States
Bomb hoax author jailed
A Mexican man who hoaxed US officials last year by inventing a plot by Chinese nationals to release a "dirty bomb" in Boston was sentenced on Friday to three years in federal prison. Jose Ernesto Beltran Quinonez, 34, pleaded guilty in May to one count of passing on false information about a terror attack to federal officials. According to court documents, Beltran called California Highway Patrol dispatchers in January last year to report that a nuclear warhead would be smuggled within four days through a tunnel connecting Mexicali and Calexico, California.
■ United States
White House snubs Borat
Borat, the fictional TV reporter from Kazakhstan, may have gotten under the skin of Kazakh officials but on Thursday he couldn't get past the gates of the White House. Secret Service agents turned away British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, in character as the boorish, anti-Semitic journalist, when he tried to invite "Premier George Walter Bush" to a screening of his upcoming movie, Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan. Cohen's stunt was timed to coincide with an official visit by Kazakhstani President Nursultan Nazarbayev.
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