■ CHINA
Yang Jianli back in US
A Boston-based Chinese democracy campaigner has returned home after serving five years in a Chinese prison for stealing into the country and spying for Taiwan, a Web site and his brother said yesterday. Yang Jianli (楊建利), a permanent US resident with doctorates from Harvard and Berkeley universities was released from prison in April, but Chinese authorities refused to issue him a passport, grant him residency status or allow his Chinese-American wife to visit him in Beijing. The 44-year-old Yang flew from Beijing to San Francisco en route to Boston last Saturday accompanied by a diplomat from the US embassy in Beijing, his brother said. Yang stole into China in 2002 on a friend's Chinese passport.
■ PHILIPPINES
Earthquake hits Mindanao
A strong 6.5-magnitude earthquake hit the southern Philippines yesterday, the US Geological Survey said. The quake's epicenter was reported to be 209km southeast of the town of Mati on Mindanao Island. Mylene Carols of the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology said the quake was felt along the east coast of the island, but there were no reports of damage or injuries. "The quake's epicenter was out at sea and not on land," she said. "From our initial reports it was about 10km below the surface," she said, adding that no tsunami warning haD been issued. "There is only a small chance of a tsunami because we use magnitude seven and below as our cutoff point," the institute's Angelito Lunuza said. "Although we have not issued a tsunami warning, we have asked all our stations along the east coast to monitor any changes in sea levels just in case," he said.
■ PAKISTAN
Suicide bomber kills three
A suicide bomber killed three paramilitary soldiers and wounded 18 yesterday in the latest incident in a wave of violence in the northwest of the country, police said. "A bomber rammed an explosive-laden car into a Frontier Corps checkpost and killed three soldiers," said Mahmood Alam, a police officer in Thal town, 300km west of Islamabad, in North West Frontier Province, referring to a paramilitary force.
■ AUSTRALIA
US sailor pleads guilty
A US sailor pleaded guilty yesterday to soliciting an Australian child for sex over the Internet in a police sting operation. David Wayne Budd, 28, was arrested at Sydney's airport in June after he held an online conversation with a police detective posing as a 14-year-old girl. The sailor, who lives with his wife and child in San Diego, California, had flown 1,200km south from Queensland state, where he was participating in joint US-Australian military exercises, to meet his fictitious victim. Appearing before the Parramatta Local Court yesterday, Budd pleaded guilty to using the Internet to groom a child for sex. The charge carries a maximum penalty of 12 years in prison.
■ CHINA
Workers' Mandarin woes
About 70 percent of the country's estimated 200 million migrant workers have difficulty speaking Mandarin, though most are required to use it in their jobs, state media reported yesterday. Most prefer to speak in one of the country's numerous local dialects, and about 70 percent of them found it hard to speak Mandarin, the official Xinhua news agency said, citing a Ministry of Education report on the country's language situation last year. Less than 3 percent of the workers had access to language training, though 80 percent were required to speak Mandarin by their employers, Xinhua said.
■ INDIA
Bollywood star released
The Supreme Court released Bollywood star Sanjay Dutt on bail yesterday, citing a technicality weeks after he was convicted for illegally possessing guns tied to the 1993 Mumbai bombings, news reports said. Dutt received bail because the Mumbai court that convicted him had not yet provided him with a copy of his sentence, the Press Trust of India (PTI) news agency reported. Five other people convicted in the same case were also granted bail on the same technicality. All will have to return to prison once they are given copies of the sentence, PTI said. Dutt was convicted last November and sentenced on July 31 to six years in prison for illegally possessing three automatic rifles and a pistol.
■ CHINA
Factory accident kills 14
At least 14 people died and 59 injured when a container spilled molten aluminum with a temperature of 900oC at a factory, state media reported yesterday. Xinhua news agency said the accident on Sunday night at a plant affiliated to the Weiqiao Pioneering Group Co in Zouping County, Shandong Province, cracked walls, smashed windows and caused the roof of the factory to blow right off. The 59 injured workers were hospitalized, but Xinhua did not say how serious their injuries were. It was not immediately clear exactly how the 14 died. Industrial accidents are common in China, where safety measures have not always kept pace with rapid economic development. Industrial accidents killed more than 127,000 people in China in 2005.
■ FINLAND
Ancient chewing gum found
A 5,000-year-old piece of chewing gum -- one of the oldest ever to be discovered -- has been found by a British archaeology student. The discovery of the Neolithic gum, made from birch bark tar, was made by Sarah Pickin, 23, during a dig. The gum had tooth prints in it. Trevor Brown, her tutor at the University of Derby, said: "Birch bark tar contains phenols, which are antiseptic compounds. It is generally believed that Neolithic people found that by chewing this stuff if they had gum infections it helped to treat the condition." He said it was particularly significant because of the well defined tooth prints. Pickin said she was delighted to find the gum and was excited to learn more about its history.
■ UNITED KINGDOM
Spain accused of torture
The family and legal team of a British resident jailed in Spain as a terror suspect claim that he is the victim of the Spanish equivalent of Guantanamo Bay. Mohammed Fahsi has been detained for more than 18 months after being arrested by Spanish police who claimed to have struck a blow against a recruiting network that was sending suicide bombers to Iraq. Fahsi, 40, was granted residency in Britain two years ago after marrying a Nottingham primary school teacher, Khadija Podd. They have three children. She said: "They detained him and the other members of the legal mosque association which worked in tandem with the town council, near Barcelona," said Podd who has been married to Fahsi for 10 years.
■ UGANDA
Citizens asked for advice
The government plans to ask citizens countrywide to recommend measures to take against rebels and others responsible for the killings and brutality during the 20-year insurgency in the north of the country, the internal affairs minister said on Sunday. Government negotiators and those from the rebel Lord's Resistance Army group have taken a break from peace talks in Juba, the regional capital of southern Sudan, to consult their respective sides on the next item on the agenda: how to reconcile the people of the northern part of the country, and how to punish those responsible for atrocities. The talks have been delayed to allow consultations to continue.
■ ISRAEL
Holocaust grants decided
The government and Holocaust survivors have struck a deal on a special allowance for Israelis who lived through the Nazi genocide. The agreement reached on Sunday followed weeks of criticism that the government had abandoned the 240,000 survivors who live in Israel. The deal will guarantee Israelis who survived the Nazi ghettos and concentration camps a monthly stipend of 1,200 shekels (US$284), according to a statement from the office of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. In addition, survivors will receive tax discounts and other benefits calculated according to their income, the statement said.
■ TURKEY
Gul fails in presidency vote
The country's new parliament, divided along party lines, could not elect a president yesterday as frontrunner Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul failed to secure the two-thirds of votes needed in a first round of voting. Gul, a devout Muslim, is expected to emerge victorious in further voting next week, when a simple majority is all that is needed.
■ GERMANY
Eleven injured on film shoot
Eleven people were injured when they fell off the back of a truck during the shooting of Tom Cruise's latest film in Berlin, police said yesterday. In Valkyrie, Cruise plays Claus von Stauffenberg, who fronted the failed attempt by a group of largely military conspirators to assassinate Adolf Hitler in July 1944. The 11 fell from the truck when a side panel burst open as it drove around a corner in central Berlin on Sunday evening, police said. One of them was seriously hurt and had to remain in hospital. Filming was halted after the accident.
■ UNITED STATES
Missing body recovered
The body of a man missing since an interstate bridge collapsed into the Mississippi River in Minneapolis, Minnesota, has been recovered, bringing the confirmed death toll to 12, authorities said. The Hennepin County medical examiner's office on Sunday identified the remains as Scott Sathers, 30. Sathers worked in enrollment services at Capella University and was on his way home from work on Aug. 1, using his usual route, when the Interstate 35W bridge crumpled amid evening rush hour traffic. Divers continued to search for the last person on the list of missing, Greg Jolstad, 45.
■ UNITED STATES
Memorial stones replaced
A set of 32 small stones that became a focal point for the grieving Virginia Tech campus following April's shooting spree that killed 32 people were replaced with much larger rocks in a solemn ceremony in Blacksburg, Virginia, on Sunday. The ceremony was on the eve of the start of classes for the fall semester yesterday. The new, 136kg stones engraved with each victim's name in front of an administration building will serve as an intermediate memorial remembering the largest shooting in modern US history while officials look for a permanent site elsewhere on the main campus.
■ TURKEY
Hijacker trained by al-Qaeda
One of two men who hijacked a plane heading for Istanbul from northern Cyprus was trained in camps run by al-Qaeda militants and planned to flee to Afghanistan, Turkish media reports said yesterday. The hijackers surrendered and released their hostages after forcing the Atlas Jet plane to land in southern Turkey on Saturday with the threat of a "bomb" which turned out to be modelling clay with wires attached. Officials said the pair had demanded to be taken to Tehran.
■ IRAN
Chant claim controversy
A politician has provoked controversy by suggesting that the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, leader of the country's Islamic revolution, wanted to drop its signature chant, "Death to America." The claim is made by former president Hashemi Rafsanjani in the newly-published latest volume of his memoirs, entitled Towards Destiny. Rafsanjani discloses that a decision was made during Iran's 1980 to 1988 war with Iraq, when he was speaker of the Iranian parliament and one of Khomeini's closest confidants. Recollecting a parliamentary session on July 4, 1984, he writes: "Mr Imam-Mousavi [a member of Parliament] came and proposed dropping the slogan `Death to America' and `Death to the Soviet Union.' I said we have decided in principle. The Imam [Khomeini] has agreed but we are waiting for a chance." The slogan was adopted during the 1979 to 1981 takeover of the US embassy in Tehran.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
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
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in