■ PAKISTA
Music shops bombed
Bombs ripped through several music and video shops yesterday, wounding at least three people, officials said. The injuries occurred when a blast hit a CD and video shop in the main bazaar of the garrison town of Kohat, which has seen several attacks in recent months blamed on Pakistani Taliban militants. Bombs destroyed two dozen businesses, including around eight music shops, in Miranshah, the main town in the tribal-ruled Taliban stronghold of North Waziristan, officials and residents said.
■INDONESIA
‘Blue Energy’ is just diesel
A plan backed by Indonesia’s president to turn water into cheap and limitless energy has run aground, with tests showing the wonder fuel is diesel, a report said on Tuesday. Government scientists revealed that tests on “Blue Energy,” purportedly made from water, showed it was diesel from state oil company Pertamina, the Jakarta Post reported. The energy “breakthrough” grabbed headlines after its inventor, Joko Suprapto, managed to convince President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono he could separate hydrogen from water and turn it into diesel. The plan was exhibited at the UN climate change conference in Bali in December with the president’s blessing.
■JAPAN
Kids ‘foreign’ no longer
The Supreme Court yesterday ruled that it is unconstitutional to deny nationality to children born out of wedlock to foreign mothers, saying it was discriminatory to consider the parents’ marital status. The ruling, which ended years of court battles, could lead to citizenship for hundreds of “illegitimate” children in Japan, which is home to many foreign entertainers.
■ UNITED STATES
Team claims bird flu break
Hong Kong researchers are claiming a breakthrough in bird flu treatment with a cocktail of drugs they say may be effective in treating the virus in humans. Their findings were published yesterday in the US science journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The researchers claim the cocktail increased survival rates by fourfold when tested on mice infected with H5N1. The cocktail includes an antiviral called zanamivir, or Relenza, and two anti-inflammatory agents celecoxib and mesalazine. They say the antiviral agent successfully suppressed the virus while the other two drugs reduced the effects of the so-called “cytokine storm” — the severe immune response triggered by the virus that can kill H5N1 patients. The team said it was the first breakthrough in 10 years and the first time a treatment had worked on mice when treatment was delayed for more than 48 hours.
■UNITED KINGDOM
Gas stations target thieves
Gas station owners are turning to tire-spikes to stop drivers from escaping without paying. When a car attempts to move away from the pump without paying, a sensor will alert the cashier to activate the device. Red lights flashing warning signs and loudspeaker announcements alert drivers that their tires will be destroyed if they attempt to leave. The spikes, embedded at the entrance as well as the exit, spring up and penetrate the rear wheels, deflating them in about 10 seconds. The system leaves a metal tube with a unique identification number embedded in the tire, allowing police to link the vehicle with the theft. The system was invented by Jaginda Singh, whose family-owned gas station was almost driven out of business by fuel thefts, the Times said.
■NETHERLANDS
Mooning eclipsed by window
Utrecht police say a 21-year-old Dutch man is recovering after a “mooning” on Sunday morning that went horribly wrong. The man and two others had run down a street with their pants pulled down in the back “for a joke.” At one point the 21-year-old “pushed his behind against the window of a restaurant” that broke and resulted in “deep wounds to his derriere,” the police said in a statement on Tuesday. The trio were detained after the incident, but cafe owner decided not to press charges after the men agreed to pay for the broken window.
■SPAIN
Police criteria questioned
Medical experts are urging the government to revise the list of reasons for exclusion from the Civil Guard police force, which for men include having a high-pitched voice or just one testicle, a newspaper said on Tuesday. Candidates who suffer from psoriasis, stuttering, diabetes, migraine or sexually transmitted diseases can also be rejected, El Pais said. “It is possible to reject a candidate with a benign tumor, a scar or a deformity that affects his looks,” the newspaper said. It cited the case of a man who was refused entry in 2003 due to a birthmark on his face, which officials said would make him too recognizable.
■UNITED KINGDOM
Oranges are too much fuss
Britons are too busy to eat oranges in their lunch breaks nowadays and are opting instead for “easy to peel” fruit like satsumas, a survey found. For the third year in a row, orange consumption has fallen. It was down 2 percent at some 600 million compared with the previous year, market researchers TNS said. Consumption of satsumas rose 35 percent over the past year to about 460 million.
■ UNITED STATE
Man tackles robber
The young woman probably thought the 71-year-old man, whose friend was in a wheelchair, would make an easy target. She was wrong. Harry Kopenis chased and tackled the 22-year-old woman he says robbed him at a cash machine in Kingston, Pennsylvania. Then, with help from his friend in a wheelchair, he held her until police arrived. Police charged Erin Vanmatre with robbery, harassment and other offenses. Vanmatre, who was on probation for conspiracy to commit theft, was locked up on US$10,000 bail. It wasn’t clear if she had an attorney. Kopenis said he was not sure how he was able to catch Vanmatre, considering he suffered a stroke five years ago and is on various prescription medications. He pointed to the sky and said, “It was a source up there who gave me the energy.”
■BRAZIL
Criminal loses luxury cell
With a plasma TV, a DVD player, US$172,000 in cash, gym equipment, two refrigerators and a couple of guns, Genilson Lino da Silva had everything he needed for a luxurious life — in his prison cell. It came to an end on Monday when his cell was raided in a police operation in Salvador against drug traffickers. Officials said Da Silva was serving time as the biggest drug trafficker in Bahia state. He was reported as saying the money in his cell was from old robberies and gambling in prison. “We will investigate if the leaders of the prison were conniving in this,” said Paulo Gomes, a state prosecutor.
■UNITED STATES
Drugs found in tacos
A corrections officer who had been making frequent takeout food deliveries to the county jail was caught sneaking syringes inside tacos and marijuana under chili, authorities said. Jordan Michael Waller, 25, tried to enter the Miller County jail with three pizzas at 3am on Saturday, said Mike Liles, a county investigator. Twenty minutes later, Waller brought in what appeared to be a large bag containing chili and tacos, Liles said. A jail sergeant became suspicious, searched the food and found marijuana that had been formed into three round patties under some chili and a couple of syringes inside tacos. Waller was searched and found to also be carrying methamphetamine and drug paraphernalia, Liles said.
■UNITED STATES
Actor Ferrer passes away
Actor and filmmaker Mel Ferrer, who was once married to Audrey Hepburn, has died in California at age 90, a family spokesman said on Tuesday. “Mel Ferrer passed away yesterday morning at the family ranch in Carpinteria,” in California’s Santa Barbara region 150km north of Los Angeles, family spokesman Mike Mena said. Born in 1917 in New Jersey of a Cuban father and a US mother, Ferrer made his debut on Broadway in 1938, after studying at Princeton University. He also edited a Vermont newspaper, wrote a children’s book and rose to become a producer and director in radio and television before his acting debut on screen in Lost Boundaries in 1949. After serving as an assistant to director John Ford on the film The Fugitive, he directed several movies, including Green Mansions in 1959 with Anthony Perkins and Audrey Hepburn, whom he wed in 1954, his fourth of five wives. He also produced the hit Wait Until Dark in 1967, which starred Hepburn. His marriage with Hepburn ended the next year. They had one child, Sean, born in 1960.
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
‘POLITICAL EARTHQUAKE’: Leo Varadkar said he was ‘no longer the best person’ to lead the nation and was stepping down for political, as well as personal, reasons Leo Varadkar on Wednesday announced that he was stepping down as Ireland’s prime minister and leader of the Fine Gael party in the governing coalition, citing “personal and political” reasons. Pundits called the surprise move, just 10 weeks before Ireland holds European Parliament and local elections, a “political earthquake.” A general election has to be held within a year. Irish Deputy Prime Minister Micheal Martin, leader of Fianna Fail, the main coalition partner, said Varadkar’s announcement was “unexpected,” but added that he expected the government to run its full term. An emotional Varadkar, who is in his second stint as prime minister and at
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