■SOUTH KOREA
Baby gender ban lifted
The Constitutional Court overturned a ban on doctors telling parents the gender of unborn babies, saying on Thursday the country has grown out of a preference for sons and that the restriction violates parents’ right to know. The government introduced the ban in 1987 to try to prevent abortions of female fetuses in a country that had traditionally favored sons in the widespread Confucian belief that males carry on family lines. Abortion has also been illegal but practiced widely.
■AUSTRALIA
Pest controller eats bugs
A pest controller who got lost in the desert while prospecting for gold survived by turning for help to the bugs he usually kills — and eating them. Theo Rosmulder, 52, managed to stay alive in the harsh West Australian desert for five days by knocking the tops off termite mounds and “getting stuck into them”, the Australian newspaper reported. “It’s quite funny that the things that I kill to make a living are the things that kept me alive,” said Rosmulder, who was eventually found by Aboriginal trackers. Police said the part-time prospector was in a “particularly good condition for the ordeal” when he was found about 10km from his group’s campsite about 130km north of Laverton.
■AUSTRALIA
Rudd has convict ancestry
One of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s ancestors was a street urchin sentenced to death for stealing a dress and underwear, researchers said on Thursday. And his paternal fourth great-grandfather, Thomas Rudd, was transported to Australia in 1801 to serve a seven-year sentence for “unlawfully acquiring a bag of sugar”, according to a new family history. Far from being the embarrassment it might have been just a couple of decades ago, the discovery is likely to give Rudd’s image a boost as convict ancestry is something of a badge of honor in modern times.
■PHILIPPINES
Communists kill three
Communist guerrillas have killed three soldiers and burned a telecom facility in related attacks in the north, the military said yesterday. The New People’s Army (NPA) set fire to the site near the town of Pinukpuk on Wednesday and ambushed an infantry unit sent to investigate, the soldiers’ battalion commander Lieutenant Colonel Antonio Lastimado said. The ambush occurred on the same day near the town of Balbalan, in the Cordillera mountain range, he said in a written report. Three soldiers were killed and a fourth was wounded. The NPA, 5,000 strong, has been waging an armed campaign in the Philippines since 1969.
■SOUTH KOREA
Scientist told not to clone
The government yesterday barred disgraced scientist Hwang Woo-suk from resuming his research into cloned human embryonic stem cells. Hwang has been on trial for more than two years on charges of breaking the law on research ethics and for misusing 2.8 billion won (US$2.8 million) in state funds and private donations. He was once hailed as a national hero for bringing the country to the forefront of work on cloning and stem cell research aimed at finding cures for illnesses that current medicine cannot adequately treat. While on trial, Hwang has returned to the lab to resume work on animal cloning with Sooam Biotech Research Foundation, that has cloned specialist sniffer dogs, endangered breeds and even occasional pets for private clients.
■MONTENEGRO
Former soldiers charged
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