■ China
Satellite fails
A Chinese communications and broadcast satellite has failed less than a month into orbit due to the inability to deploy its solar panels and communications antennae, Sino Satellite Communi-cations said yesterday on the company Web site. The satellite, launched on Oct. 29 from Sichuan Province, was designed to serve live TV signals and digital broadband multimedia systems in China, Macau and Taiwan. Sinosat said the satellite was still in orbit and otherwise functioning normally.
■ Japan
Who to mend relations with?
China topped a list of countries with which the Japanese public most want to improve relations, a poll released yesterday showed. The US was second, followed by South Korea, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun said. China has replaced the US as Japan's top trade partner, as Beijing has emerged as a global economic powerhouse. After South Korea, Europe -- excluding the UK -- was followed by India, the poll said. Russia and the UK were named as the sixth and seventh nations with which the Japanese believe Tokyo should put most effort into improving relations, the Nihon Keizai said.
■ Philippines
Tropical storm approaches
Tropical Storm Durian entered Philippine territory yesterday with weather forecasters warning it could develop into a "super typhoon" before it makes landfall. As of 10am, the eye of the storm was 870km east of Samar island, packing maximum winds of 95kph and gusts of up to 120kph, the Philippine weather bureau said. The storm -- named after the pungent fruit native to Southeast Asia -- was moving in a northwest direction and expected to reach metropolitan Manila by Friday morning. "This could become a typhoon or super typhoon before it makes landfall," forecaster Nathaniel Cruz said.
■ North Korea
Pyongyang ready for talks
Pyongyang is prepared to return to six-country talks on its nuclear weapons program at any time now that it has "gained a defensive position" with a nuclear test, a senior envoy of the communist state said yesterday. But Kim Kye-gwan told reporters on arrival for talks in Beijing that Pyongyang still had differences to narrow with the US, which has squeezed its external sources of financing for more than a year. "After the nuclear test, we have gained a defensive position against those who are trying to suppress us. Now we are in a very confident position and so we are ready to come back to the talks any time," Kim told reporters.
■ South Africa
Court fines `pregnant' man
A man on Monday was fined by a local court for playing hooky from work and trying to cover it with a fake gynecologist's certificate attesting he was pregnant and needed a week off. A magistrate's court in Vereeniging, near Johannesburg, fined 27-year-old Charles Sibindana 1,000 rand (US$140), the SAPA news agency reported. Sibindana stole a medical certificate from a health center used by his pregnant girlfriend but was apparently unaware that only women consulted gynecologists.
■ Medicine
Age perceptions shifting
Cosmetic surgery is altering not just how people look but how they feel by changing perceptions of middle age, a study showed on Monday. Global research group AC Nielsen surveyed people in 42 countries and found 60 percent of US citizens, the world's biggest consumers of cosmetic surgery and anti-aging skin care, believe their sixties are the new middle age. On a global scale, three out of five consumers believed forties was the new thirties. "Our forties are being celebrated as the decade where we can be comfortable and confident in both personal and financial terms. The majority of global consumers really believe life starts at forty," AC Nielsen Europe President and CEO Frank Martell said.
■ United Kingdom
Politicians face big bill
A bill for thousands of pounds was racked up on a cellphone stolen from the Scottish parliament, officials said on Monday. The cellphone was for use by staff during weekends or while out of the office. It went missing in January 2004, when lawmakers and staff moved into the new parliament building in Edinburgh. But the alarm wasn't raised until this years when Vodafone warned of excessive use, and by then, the bill had reached ?50,000 (US$97,000). A spokeswoman for the parliament said the big charges were made in the early part of this year. The police have begun an investigation.
■ Germany
Berlin ho-hoping for Santas
Berlin is facing an acute shortage of Santas just a month before Christmas, the head of a Father Christmas placement agency said on Monday. The director of the Heinzelmaennchen agency, which provides Santas to thousands of families every Christmas Eve, said he was having trouble getting enough qualified help. "We prefer chubby men, of course, ideally with a real beard but we're not picky and take what we get," said Rene Heydeck, whose official title is Ober-Weinachtsmann (chief Santa Claus). The Santas, many of whom are students, earn 28 euros (US$37) a visit for bringing a sack of presents provided by the parents into each home and handing them out.
■ United Kingdom
Artists track stuffed bears
Two artists prowled the country in search of stuffed polar bears -- and uncovered 34 of the proud Arctic icons discarded in stockrooms or languishing in stately homes. The result is "Great White Bear" -- a new photo exhibition that explores mankind's fascination with the magnificent creatures and underlines the fragility of their future. Mark Wilson and his Icelandic partner Bryndis Snaebjornsdottir spent three years tracking down and photographing their elusive quarry everywhere from dusty museum basements to a hotel's glass showcase.
■ United States
Trial opens in child deaths
A 24-year-old mother's mental illness may have led her to toss her three young boys into chilly San Francisco Bay, but lawyers disagreed about whether the act was first-degree murder. LaShuan Harris is on trial in the deaths of her three children in October last year. She has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. During opening statements on Monday, the prosecutor warned jurors that while Harris' motive may have been delusional, her actions were not. Defense lawyer Teresa Caffese said her schizophrenic client heard voices telling her to sacrifice her children to God.
■ Canada
Baby in freezer a no-no
A man who could not figure out how to deal with his girlfriend's feverish 10-month-old daughter put the baby into a freezer to cool her down, the Charlottetown Guardian newspaper reported on Friday. Derrick Hardy, 21, faces charges of criminal negligence and assaulting the infant, who was rescued when her mother came home, the paper said. The Canadian Broadcasting Corp said the mother found the girl crammed into the freezer alongside ice cubes and hamburger meat. Hardy said he had left the door ajar but the mother said it had been closed when she returned.
■ United States
Child abuse trial opens
Discipline will be a key issue in the trial of adoptive parents accused of locking some of their 11 special-needs children in cages. Michael Gravelle, 57, and Sharen Gravelle, 58, of Wakeman, Ohio, are charged with 16 counts of felony child endangering and eight misdemeanor child endangering charges. Sharen Gravelle's attorney, Ken Myers, blames authorities for inflaming the media and the public by saying the children were held in cages. Myers said the children slept in enclosed beds that were necessary to keep the children from harming themselves or one another. Opening statements in their trial were scheduled for yesterday.
■ United States
Quake rocks California
A magnitude-4.1 earthquake rattled California's central coast on Monday night, but there were no immediate reports of injuries or damage, authorities said. The quake was centered about 6km west of Paso Robles, or about 153km southeast of Monterey, according to a preliminary report by the US Geological Survey. It was followed three minutes later by a magnitude-2.1 aftershock. San Luis Obispo County Sheriff's Sergeant Jason Nefores said his department had not received any calls about injuries or damage. The quakes were near the location of a magnitude-6.5 earthquake in Dec. 2003 that killed two women.
■ Colombia
Cab driver outwits robber
A taxi driver got the better of an armed robber by rolling his cab over an embankment -- with the assailant still inside. The driver, whom police identified as Isidro, 66, suffered a stab wound from the would-be thief, 16, who landed in hospital with multiple fractures, police said on Monday. Isidro's wife said her husband's wound was slight, but he feared the thief would kill him and so rolled his hack toward the embankment and jumped to safety. The robber wanted to take the driver's income for that day, some US$40, Santander Province police chief Alvaro Miranda said, adding that the incident took place in Bucamaramanga, Colombia's fifth-largest city.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was