■ Japan
Abe's rating drops further
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's approval rating has fallen to a new low as voters expressed concern over a scandal beleaguering one of his Cabinet ministers, the Nikkei Shimbun said yesterday. The business daily said 43 percent of respondents expressed support for Abe, down from 49 percent in a similar poll conducted last month. Abe's disapproval rate rose to 45 percent from 41 percent, marking the first time since he took office last September that the figure has exceeded his approval rating, the paper said. Voter concern over a scandal involving huge, unexplained expenses for a rent-free office linked to Agriculture Minister Toshikatsu Matsuoka appeared to have been a main factor behind the plunge in support, the paper said. The Nikkei contacted 901 people nationwide by telephone for its poll last Friday to Sunday.
■ Japan
Gold heist nets US$1.7m
Three masked men dragged a hefty block of gold bullion weighing about 100kg from a museum in central Japan, police said on Sunday. The block of gold, estimated at about ?200 million (US$1.7 million) was placed in a safe and exhibited with the safe's door open so that visitors to the museum could touch it, owner of the gold, Hisao Nakahagi, 59, said. "The gold was exhibited on the second floor, which was monitored by a security camera from the first floor," he said. "An employee on the first floor heard a noise from upstairs and rushed up there," he said. The men pushed the employee aside, dragged the gold in a bag downstairs, and drove away with a fourth accomplice, he said.
■ China
Ship collision kills eight
Eight bodies were recovered after two cargo ships collided in the East China Sea, state media reported yesterday. Twelve sailors were rescued while another nine were still missing from the weekend collision, which sank one of the ships, the Xinhua news agency said. The collision occurred off Zhejiang Province between a cargo ship from China and a Hong Kong-registered vessel. The Hong Kong ship, with 29 crew aboard, sank immediately.
■ China
Pyramid scam uncovered
Police in Beijing have arrested 14 people accused of cheating victims of a total of 1.6 billion yuan (US$200 million) in a pyramid scheme, the Xinhua news agency said yesterday. The suspects, who work for a wood company, are accused of cheating victims by promising high returns on sales of woodland, it said. The report gave no details of how the scam worked. Police also seized cars, real estate and some of the revenues from the pyramid scheme, Xinhua said. People convicted of running pyramid schemes can face prison terms of at least five years and be forced to repay up to five times the profits of the illegal business, it said.
■ Sri Lanka
Four rebels gunned down
Government commandos gunned down four Tamil Tiger rebels in the eastern part of the nation yesterday, the military said, in the latest violence to hit the country's volatile east. The elite Special Task Force soldiers were on foot patrol when they came across a group of guerrillas. "There was a confrontation and four terrorists are confirmed killed," military spokesman Brigadier Prasad Samarasing said. Weapons were recovered from fleeing rebels, he said. The Tigers are fighting to create a separate homeland in the north and northeast for minority ethnic Tamils.
■ United Kingdom
Police hunt killers of boy
Police are hunting the killers of a 15-year-old boy who was stabbed to death on an east London street, detectives said yesterday. A 16-year-old died across town in a similar attack less than a week ago. London's Metropolitan Police are looking for two young men who were seen running away from the boy, who was attacked on Saturday evening. The teenager, who has not been named, died from a stab wound to the leg, police said. Last week, 16-year-old Kodjo Yenga died after he was stabbed in the heart on a residential street in west London.
■ Egypt
Sudan rejects ICC
Sudan has decided to suspend all cooperation with the International Criminal Court (ICC) in response to its accusations that Sudanese officials were involved in war crimes in Darfur, the justice minister and a pro-government newspaper said on Sunday. Sudan has long refused to hand over suspects to the international court for trial on Darfur war crimes. Still, Khartoum has cooperated with the court on some levels, in particular by allowing its investigators to visit Sudan several times in recent years. The government did not specify whether it would no longer grant them entry.
■ Egypt
Opposition boycotts debate
Opposition lawmakers in Cairo boycotted the start of a parliamentary debate on constitutional amendments they say will further tighten President Hosni Mubarak's grip on power. Mubarak is seeking a slate of 34 changes in the Constitution, part of what his government calls a program of democratic and economic reform. But the opposition, which makes up about a quarter of the 454-seat parliament, has denounced the changes, saying they do not guarantee free elections and make permanent tough anti-terror powers that the president can use against his opponents. The changes come at a time that the US, Mubarak's top ally, has reduced public pressure on Cairo to bring greater democracy.
■ Armenia
Gas line formally opened
President Robert Kocharian and his Iranian counterpart yesterday were to formally open the first stretch in Armenia of a natural gas pipeline. Kocharian and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad are to open the 40km section in the town of Meghri, just over the border from Iran. Under the first stage of the project, Iran is to deliver up to 400 million cubic meters of gas a year; when the pipeline is completed and extends to the capital, Yerevan, the volume could rise to 2.5 billion cubic meters a year.
■ United Kingdom
Army helicopter crashes
A British army helicopter crashed on Sunday night near a Northern Ireland border base, and several soldiers and police aboard were reported injured, none critically. The crash occurred in a field near the British army helipad in Crossmaglen in South Armagh, a Northern Ireland border region long known as a power base for the outlawed Irish Republican Army. The British army headquarters in Northern Ireland said all the injured were hospitalized but were not in life-threatening condition. It said the cause of the crash -- which happened during heavy winds and sporadic hail and rainstorms -- was under investigation.
■ United States
Man sues over cat bite
A nasty bite on the hand that a Flushing, Michigan, man got from his sister's Siamese cat is worth US$122,400. A jury on Friday awarded Michael Sabo, 57, the money for an injury he got when the cat, Randy, bit his right hand in March 2004. Sabo's fingers swelled so much that they looked like "plump hot dogs," his attorney, Tom Pabst, told the Flint Journal newspaper, and an infection put Sabo in a hospital for three weeks. He had to pay thousands in medical bills. Pabst said Sabo's sister, Jean Toney, had warned people not to pick up Randy because he had bitten people before, but the newspaper said the cat leapt into Sabo's lap.
■ United States
Country singer killed
An up-and-coming country singer was struck and killed as he walked along a Texas interstate service road, and the driver is being held on an intoxicated manslaughter charge, officials said. Buck Jones, who released an album called Lucky Star in 2005, was struck from behind early Saturday off Interstate 30, authorities said on Sunday. Jones, 33, of Nashville, Tennessee, had blown a tire and was looking for a mile marker so road assistance crews could find him, promoter and co-producer Billy Block said in a statement.
■ United States
Bald eagles nest in city
Wildlife authorities have found the first bald eagle nest in Philadelphia in more than 200 years and hope the occupants will produce offspring, Pennsylvania officials said. The nest "demonstrates the resilience of this species and its apparent growing tolerance to human activity," Dan Brauning, a supervisor with the state Game Commission, said in a statement on Friday. Officials are not disclosing the nest's exact location, to avoid disturbing it, but it is being closely monitored, the commission said.
■ United States
Nude ecological protest
Scores of protesters shed their clothes and hugged trees in a bid to save a grove of oak trees slated to be chopped down to make way for new buildings on the University of California, Berkeley campus. On Saturday, 78 bare-bottomed activists -- some first-time nudists, others lifelong exhibitionists -- joined a half-dozen protesters who have been living in the trees since December. University administrators want to cut down more than 30 oaks near Memorial Stadium to make way for a US$125 million sports training facility. After activist groups sued to halt the project, a preliminary injunction was issued by a judge on Jan. 29 that prevents the university from breaking ground or removing any trees. A trial is expected later this year. "This is an activity I am proud to support," said Debbie Moore, cofounder of a local nude theater troupe called the X-plicit Players. "Besides, I never turn down a chance to take off my clothes."
■ United States
Jail protest ends peacefully
More than 100 inmates awaiting federal immigration hearings staged a peaceful protest to complain about conditions in their New Jersey jail and ended it hours later, satisfied. Monmouth County undersheriff Ted Freeman said 132 inmates on Sunday refused to eat or participate in activities because they wanted, among other things, more food and Spanish-speaking officers, and for a TV set to be fixed. "The warden has been meeting with them all day, and their concerns have been met," Freeman said. He did not expect food servings to change, saying all inmates get three meals a day. And while the TV had been replaced, Freeman said he did not know how the request for more Spanish-speaking officers would be resolved.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion