■ PAPUA NEW GUINEA
Hundreds mourn Kabui
Hundreds of mourners have filled a cathedral for the state funeral of the first president of the autonomous island of Bougainville. Joseph Kabui died on Saturday of a suspected heart attack. His funeral yesterday was attended by top Papua New Guinea officials and others. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a statement that the 54-year-old Kabui was a skilled mediator and peacemaker who had a genuine concern for the future of his people. Kabui had been president since May 2005. He led the Bougainville Revolutionary Army during the 1990s until a deal in 1997 granted wide autonomous powers to his island. Kabui is survived by his wife, Rose, and four children.
■ THAILAND
Separatists kill three in Yala
Suspected separatists have killed three people in the southern part of the country, including a senior police officer whose body was set on fire in front of his frantic wife, police said yesterday. A group of militants in a pick-up truck followed Somkid Taptimsri, a 44-year-old deputy investigator in Yala Province, to his father-in-law’s house and shot him on Monday evening, local police said. They then doused his body and his car with petrol and set him on fire as his wife tried to call for help, police said. Yesterday morning, a 25-year-old former soldier and his 20-year-old friend were killed in a drive-by shooting in nearby Narathiwat province, local authorities said.
■ NORTH KOREA
State denounces terrorism
Pyongyang on Tuesday stressed its opposition to all forms of terrorism, describing such attacks as a threat to human life and international stability. The communist state is pressing for its removal from a US list of state sponsors of terrorism in return for its efforts to shut down its nuclear weapons program. North Korea “will firmly maintain its consistent stand of opposing all forms of terrorism and any support to it and fulfill its responsibility and duty in the struggle against terrorism as a dignified member of the United Nations, in the future, too,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.
■ JAPAN
Unlicensed firefighter fired
A firefighter lost his job after city officials found out he had been driving ambulances and firetrucks for over 20 years without a driver’s license, an official in Takaoka City, central Japan, said yesterday. The case came to light when the firefighter in his 40s, who had been working for the city for over 25 years, hesitated to show his driver’s license during a regular inspection last week, said Shigeru Sawasaki, a Takaoka City official. “He was acting awkward when the inspection took place on the fifth,” Sawasaki said. “And when the inspector took the driver’s license and checked, it belonged to a family member.”
■ HONG KONG
Ambulance called over bite
A squeamish Hong Kong animal lover was rushed to hospital by ambulance after being bitten on the finger by his pet hamster, emergency services said yesterday. The 20-year-old rang 999 after the hamster nipped him on his finger at his home as he stroked him in the city’s Tin Shui Wai district at 3am on Monday. An ambulance was sent to take him to hospital where he was treated and later discharged after minor treatment, a police spokesman said. Government advertising campaigns have been launched in Hong Kong to try to stop people misusing the free emergency services in the wealthy city of 6.9 million.
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