■ AUSTRALIA
`Rudd's reputation intact'
The vast majority of citizens believe a drunken visit to a strip club by the man tipped to be their next prime minister simply proves he is "a normal bloke," an opinion poll showed yesterday. A remarkable 85 percent of voters, both men and women, saw opposition leader Kevin Rudd's escapade in a New York nightclub in those terms, according to a poll for the Herald Sun newspaper. The Labor Party leader had predicted he would suffer in opinion polls after admitting visiting the racy Scores nightclub in New York during a trip to the UN four years ago -- and being too drunk to remember much about it.
■ CHINA
Miners crawl to safety
Two brothers have crawled to safety after being trapped for nearly six days in a coal mine, state media said on yesterday. Rescuers and their family had given them up for dead after 130 hours underground after a tunnel collapsed, the China Daily said. Brothers Meng Xianchen (孟憲臣) and Meng Xianyou (孟憲有) were trapped while working at an illegal mine in Beijing's Fangshan District late on Saturday, Aug. 18. Two days later, rescue efforts were called off. "The miners' families were in despair, burning `ghost money' for the deceased at the entrance of the mine," the China Daily said. "The only people who didn't give up were the miners themselves" who started building a tunnel towards the entrance.
■ SOUTH KOREA
Fat animals going on diet
After almost a decade of the good life, tubby animals in a zoo are to go on a diet. Seoul Grand Park zoo, which had been feeding its charges according to 1998 guidelines, has decided to go back closer to nature, the JoongAng Daily reported yesterday. "Feeding the animals according to the 1998 guidelines made the animals overweight," Park Seon-deok, a member of the animal management team, was quoted as saying. The zoo will decrease the amount of processed food, to which the animals have become accustomed, and increase the amount of natural materials.
■ JAPAN
Internet murderers arrested
Three men who met on an Internet site that matches up criminals were arrested after battering a woman to death and abandoning her body in a forest, police and media said on yesterday. The three arrested men swapped details on a "crime mates" site through their mobile phones, Kyodo news agency reported, and agreed to kidnap a 31-year-old office worker as she walked home late on Friday night. They never told each other their names, and bashed the woman to death in a car park after she saw their faces, Kyodo said, adding the three robbed the woman of around ¥70,000 (US$601).
■ AFGHANISTAN
US regrets football drop
The US military yesterday expressed regret for a publicity campaign aimed at winning hearts and minds that ended up offending scores of Muslims. US troops on Friday dropped dozens of free footballs for soccer-mad children from helicopters in the southeast, all marked with flags of various countries. But the balls depicted the Saudi Arabian flag, which features the Islamic declaration of faith and includes the names of Allah and the prophet Mohammed. The idea of kicking something bearing their names is considered deeply offensive to Muslims.
■ BULGARIA
Wildfires kill two
Weekend wildfires killed two people in the southern part of the country, reduced hundreds of acres of meadows and forests to ashes and destroyed dozens of houses, officials said yesterday. Two elderly people died in a fire that burned down their house in the southern village of Prisadets, said Darina Stamatova, spokeswoman of the regional administration. A photographer on the scene said almost all houses in the villages of Prisadets, Varnik and Filipovo were destroyed by the flames. Emergency units were taking injured to nearby hospitals to be treated for burns and breathing problems.
■ RUSSIA
Ten arrested in probe
Prosecutors have detained 10 people in connection with the killing of reporter Anna Politkovskaya and will soon charge them, the Itar-Tass news agency quoted the chief prosecutor as saying yesterday. "We have made serious progress in the Politkovskaya murder investigation," the agency quoted Prosecutor-General Yuri Chaika as saying. "Ten people have been arrested in connection with this case and literally, in the very near future, they will be charged with carrying out this grave crime." Politkovskaya was a fierce critic of President Vladimir Putin. Her murder last October brought a wave of international condemnation and prompted concern about press freedoms in the country.
■ UNITED KINGDOM
Camilla to miss service
Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, has announced that she will not attend Friday's memorial service marking the 10th anniversary of Princess Diana's death. She had accepted an invitation from her husband Prince Charles and his sons, Princes William and Harry, to attend the service. But some criticized that as inappropriate, since Camilla had had an affair with Charles when he was still married to Diana. "I'm very touched to have been invited by Prince William and Prince Harry to attend the thanksgiving service for their mother Diana, Princess of Wales," the duchess said in a statement on Sunday. "However ... I believe my attendance could divert attention from the purpose of the occasion, which is to focus on the life and service of Diana."
■ UNITED KINGDOM
Shooting suspects released
Four teenagers arrested in connection with the shooting death of 11-year-old Rhys Jones have been released without charge, and two more were released on bail, police said yesterday. Two boys, aged 16 and 19, were released on bail, while two others, aged 15 and 19, and two girls, 15 and 18, were released without charge, Merseyside police said. This leaves no one in police custody in connection with the death of Rhys, who was shot in the neck last Wednesday in the Croxteth area of Liverpool, apparently by a teen riding a bicycle.
■ UGANDA
Soldiers killed in crash
Seventy-one soldiers were killed and another 41 injured, many seriously, when their huge truck crashed into a concrete barrier at the side of a mountain road, a spokesman said yesterday. "It was a trailer and the soldiers were changing location from eastern Uganda. Apparently no one escaped unhurt," army spokesman Major Felix Kulayigye said. The crash, one of the country's worst in recent memory, happened late on Sunday in the nation's mountainous east, he said.
■ GUATEMALA
Menchu wraps up campaign
Trailing in the polls and short on funds, Nobel peace laureate Rigoberta Menchu closed her national campaign for the Sept. 9 presidential election on Sunday. Menchu was forced to halt her campaign earlier than the other main candidates due to a lack of funds. A survey in the Prensa Libre newspaper last week showed less than 3 percent of respondents would vote for her. Most Guatemalans are ethnic Mayans but Menchu has been unable to close the gap on front-runners Alvaro Colom, a left-leaning engineer, and right-wing retired General Otto Perez Molina. The pair are headed for a runoff vote in November.
■ COLOMBIA
FARC blamed for deaths
Gunmen raided a southern farm and killed nine people, including four children, in an attack which authorities blamed on the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Colonel Harold Martin Lara, chief of police in Putumayo state, told Caracol Radio on Sunday that the assailants belong to FARC. He said the owner of the farm where the two families had lived "received threats for refusing to pay bribes to the guerrillas." The farmers were killed after attending a church service near the town of Puerto Asis. A 13-year-old girl who was asleep at the time survived, Lara said.
■ UNITED STATES
`Designer estrogen' created
Researchers have designed a form of estrogen that can protect the brain against degeneration without increasing a woman's risk for breast or uterine cancer, according to a study released yesterday. The scientists suggest this "designer estrogen" could be used to treat brain deterioration in several conditions including Alzheimer's, Lou Gehrig's disease, multiple sclerosis and spinal cord injury. The experimental estrogen has only been tested on mice so far, but in those studies it halted the progress of the disease in mice infected with the animal version of the autoimmune disease MS. The animals also recovered their ability to walk again. The study was published in the journal the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
■ UNITED STATES
Student hugs 765 people
Kneeling for children and stretching to embrace taller people, college student Jordan Pearce believes she has hugged her way into the record books. Pearce, 18, said she hugged 765 people in less than an hour on Saturday and plans to send the results to Guinness World Records to be confirmed. "I feel like I'm on cloud nine," Pearce said after the last hug Saturday in Provo, Utah. To help certify the event, District Judge Lynn Davis and state Senator Curt Bramble counted the hugs, which required arms and hands wrapped around the person. One man spilled a drink on Pearce. A little girl refused to let go of her blue sucker, and a little boy kicked and screamed, not wanting to hug a stranger, the Daily Herald of Provo said.
■ UNITED STATES
Mine search continues
Federal and mine company officials said on Sunday that a seventh borehole was being punched into the Crandall Canyon mine in Utah and that a special robotic camera was being lowered into a hole drilled during previous efforts to find six miners trapped by an Aug. 6 cave-in. The camera is similar to one used to search within the wreckage of the World Trade Center after the Sept. 11 attacks. "The families are thrilled to hear this," said Colin King, a lawyer for the miners' families.
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