■UNITED STATES
Postal service honors Hope
Bob Hope already has been named an “honorary veteran” by the government, but on Wednesday the Postal Service said it would give the late comedian another honor — a commemorative stamp. It will be released in the spring and its image will be revealed on Monday at New York’s Ellis Island, a former entry point for immigrants that Hope passed through when he came to the country from England in 1908 with his family.
■UNITED STATES
Police arrest armed man
A man who mentioned the White House and other landmarks before boarding a Washington-bound commuter train with an assault rifle was captured on Wednesday after breaking an ankle while running from two officers, police said. Police said they arrested Asa Seeley, 25, before the commuter train left the West Baltimore station for the nation’s capital, 56km to the southwest. An unlicensed taxi driver flagged down Officer Joshua Corcoran near the station about 7am on Wednesday after dropping off a passenger he had refused to drive to Washington, Police Commissioner Frederick Bealefeld said.
■PERU
Chinese ‘Bill Gates’ booed
Jack Ma (馬雲), a Chinese Web entrepreneur sometimes called his country’s “Bill Gates,” was jeered on Wednesday by angry textile workers in Lima who saw him as the negative personification of a China-Peru free trade agreement (FTA). Around 200 traders in the Gamarra district gathered to protest a visit by Ma, who had been invited to speak to them by Production Minister Elena Conterno, on the sidelines of an APEC meeting there. “Get out of here!” the vendors yelled as more than 20 riot police formed a line between them and Ma. Many considered their livelihoods threatened by the inflow of cheaper Chinese-made goods. One of the protesters, a woman in her 50s who gave her first name as Luz, said she saw the Chinese businessman as the dark side of the FTA whose negotiations were concluded on Wednesday. “Sooner or later,” she said, her country would be filled “with badly made, cheap Chinese products.”
■VENEZUELA
Officials firm Zimbabwe ties
Caracas and Zimbabwe have signed a cooperation deal to strengthen ties in energy, agriculture, economic and social affairs and culture, a government statement said on Wednesday. The government has in recent years upped its involvement in Africa, and has ties with all 54 countries on the continent. Once hailed as a model economy, Zimbabwe’s fortunes have nose-dived since 2000 when Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe seized white-owned farms and handed them over to landless blacks, often with no farming skills.
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