■ CHINA
Fog disrupts transport
Thick fog blanketed Beijing yesterday, delaying flights out of the city and reducing visibility. Most flights out of Beijing's airport were delayed, said an official, who declined to give her name, at the Beijing Capital International Airport. All flights scheduled before 9am were postponed by one hour. Other flights were delayed by up to three hours as planes had to wait to be defrosted, CCTV reported. Flights later returned to normal, it said. Cars were forced to use headlights on inner city roads, and office buildings in Beijing's central business district were shrouded in fog. Visibility on roads was reduced to less than 500m in some urban areas
■ PHILIPPINES
Carolers banned from streets
At the risk of being called the Grinch, Manila administrators said yesterday that they were banning Christmas carolers from the capital's streets because they disrupt traffic. "The plan, controversial as it might be, is not done out of whim but rather for the safety of the children and the motorists," Metropolitan Manila Development Authority chief Bayani Fernando said, citing an incident last year in which a child caroler was run over by a speeding vehicle. He said that the ban applies to carolers and beggars in the streets, who often stop cars, beat their drums and tin cans and ask for money.
■ AUSTRALIA
US influence unwelcome
Australians believe that the hamburger and US slang are infringing on their culture and they are "not at all pleased" about it, a survey released yesterday said. The telephone poll of 1,213 people by the government-funded US Studies Center at the University of Sydney measured peoples' attitudes about their closest ally, the US. Asked to judge the influence of US culture on Australia, 67 percent of respondents said they were "not at all pleased" about the prevalence of US-style fast food in their country. They ranked fast food second only behind US foreign policy as an issue they were "very worried" about.
■ GAZA STRIP
Confiscated drugs burned
Hamas Islamists burned sacks of confiscated marijuana and cocaine on Sunday and said they had arrested dozens of dealers in a drugs crackdown. Police in Hamas-run Gaza said they had netted drugs -- including hashish and cocaine, heroin and ecstasy -- worth some US$4 million and arrested 115 dealers. Hamas said security forces loyal to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah faction allowed drug abuse to flourish before the Islamist group violently seized the coastal enclave in June. Senior West Bank-based Fatah official Ziad Abu Ain rebuffed the accusation.
■ UNITED KINGDOM
Zeppelin tickets go on sale
Led Zeppelin fans queued for hours on Sunday to get tickets for the iconic band's one-off comeback gig, amid tight security to prevent touts from cashing in on the eve of the concert. Amid growing anticipation ahead of yesterday evening's concert, Zeppelin frontman Robert Plant meanwhile fueled speculation that there could be further reunions with comments to a British newspaper. Only 20,000 lucky names were pulled out of a secret ballot to attend the band's first show in 19 years.
■ RUSSIA
Putin endorses Medvedev
President Vladimir Putin has backed First Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev as presidential candidate to replace him after he leaves office next year, Russian news agencies reported yesterday. "I fully support this candidacy," Putin was quoted as saying by Interfax after four parties, headed by the ruling United Russia, named Medvedev. "I have been very closely acquainted with [Medvedev] for 17 years and I completely and fully support this candidacy," Putin was quoted as saying.
■ UNITED STATES
Car hits `Santa' train
A car crashed into a train that was carrying mostly children to a visit with Santa Claus, killing two people in the car. No one was injured among the 67 passengers on the "Santa Express" train, authorities said. The crash happened on Saturday afternoon at a railroad crossing. Authorities said the crossing has a stop sign and a railroad crossing sign to warn drivers, but no warning lights. The Isabella County sheriff's department said the woman driving the car and one of her passengers were killed.
■ UNITED STATES
Storm cuts power
An ice storm slickened roads and sidewalks, grounded hundreds of flights and cut power to tens of thousands in a swath across the central US as even colder weather threatened. The wintry weather was expected to continue through midweek, and ice storm warnings stretched from Texas to Pennsylvania. Six traffic deaths were blamed on icy roads in Oklahoma. More than 130,000 customers lost power in Missouri, Oklahoma, Illinois and Kansas, utilities reported. Chicago's O'Hare International Airport canceled more than 400 flights. The airports in Kansas City, Missouri, and St. Louis also canceled several flights.
■ UNITED STATES
Cursing nun shocks school
The principal of St. Clare of Montefalco Catholic School had students stay after a Mass last month and informed the fifth through eighth-graders that she has a zero-tolerance policy for cursing. Just in case anyone was not sure what she was talking about, Sister Kathy Avery read off a list of the very words and phrases that she was banning. "It got a little quiet in church" during her talk, she told the Detroit Free Press. Some parents were shocked, but others applauded, the paper said.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not