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World News Quick Take

■KYRGYZSTAN

US base voted down

Parliament voted yesterday to close a US military base that serves as a key supply route for coalition forces in Afghanistan. The vote to close the US air base at Manas passed parliament by a wide margin, with 78 out of a total 81 lawmakers present voting for the closure. One member of parliament voted against and two abstained. The base closure would strain US supply lines at a time when US President Barack Obama is preparing to nearly double the 36,000-strong force in Afghanistan.



■INDIA

Boy marries dog

An infant boy was married off to his neighbors’ dog by villagers who said it would stop the groom from being killed by wild animals, officials and witnesses said on Wednesday. Around 150 tribespeople performed the ritual in a hamlet in the state of Orissa’s Jajpur District after the boy, who is less than two years old, grew a tooth on his upper gum. The Munda tribe see this as a bad omen in young children and believe it makes them prone to attacks by tigers and another animals. The groom, Sagula, was carried by his family in procession to the village temple, where a priest solemnized the marriage between Sagula and his bride Jyoti, a witness said. The boy will still be able to marry a human bride.



■CHINA

Ao hit with new charges

Jailed former Macau minister Ao Man Long (歐文龍) appeared in court on Wednesday on 28 new charges of accepting bribes, money laundering and abuse of power, a Hong Kong newspaper reported. Ao, former secretary for transport and public works, chose to remain silent as a judge in Macau’s Court of Final Appeal read out charges alleging that he had benefited from land sales and the bidding of public works projects, the South China Morning Post reported online.



■HONG KONG

Macau blocks photographer

The South China Morning Post said it had lodged a “strongly worded” protest after one of its journalists was denied entry to Macau. Photographer Felix Wong was barred despite carrying a Macau government permit, the paper said, adding that Wednesday’s incident was apparently the first of its kind. “The South China Morning Post is extremely concerned by what it sees as a serious infringement of the freedom of the press,” it said in a statement on Wednesday. The newspaper said it had sent letters to the Macau government demanding an apology. Wong, who was to cover the corruption trial of former minister Ao Man Long, was briefly detained before last year’s Beijing Olympics for kicking a police officer as he was dragged away from photographing a chaotic ticket line.



■SOUTH KOREA

Man convicted of rape

A court on Wednesday handed down a landmark verdict, convicting a man of raping a transsexual woman. The court in the southern port of Busan sentenced the 28-year-old to three years in prison but suspended the sentence for four years. It also ordered him to do 120 hours of community service. The man was found guilty of raping the 58-year-old after breaking into her home in Busan last August. In its ruling quoted by Yonhap news agency, the court said the victim should be considered a woman because she had maintained normal sexual relations with her partner since her sex-change operation in 1974. The criminal code does not recognize the concept of homosexual rape.



■UNITED KINGDOM

Take it to the Kissing Zone

If you like kissing, and you find yourself at Warrington Bank Quay railway station, just keep walking. For under new rules there, couples will be forbidden from expressing their love in front of the building and asked to take it instead into a designated Kissing Zone. The initiative has provoked mild outrage among some travelers, who fear a return to the 1970s and 1980s when “no petting” signs, with helpfully suggestive diagrams, were posted at swimming pools to control the sexual urges of bathers.



■UNITED KINGDOM

Terry Pratchett knighted

Fantasy author Terry Pratchett has been knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for services to literature. The British writer received the knighthood at a ceremony at Buckingham Palace on Wednesday wearing a top hat and morning suit. The 60-year-old British writer is known for his Discworld series of novels and has sold more than 55 million books worldwide. He announced last year that he has early onset Alzheimers.



■RUSSIA

Guards fire at ship

Border guards repeatedly fired at a cargo ship that hit trouble off its Far Eastern coast over the weekend with the loss off several crew members, prosecutors were quoted as saying yesterday. Officials said the ship, the Sierra Leone-flagged, China-owned New Star with 10 Chinese crew and six Indonesians on board, was in Russian waters illegally and repeatedly ignored warnings to stop. “The investigation into the shooting on the foreign ship is being led by military prosecutors,” Alexander Selentsov, an official from prosecutors in the Far Eastern city of Vladivostok, told the Interfax news agency. “The captain of the New Star was repeatedly asked to stop through radio communication, flares, a flag and warning shots. But the foreign ship did not stop,” he said. He said border guards then received an order from the Federal Security Service “to open fire on the ship.” “The order was carried out after warnings on the radio. Only then did the New Star stop,” he said. The Kommersant newspaper reported that 500 rounds were fired at the bow and stern of the vessel. It said the survivors claim the firing caused the ship’s problems rather than bad weather. Eight crew were killed in the incident while the other eight were rescued by Russian forces and taken to hospitals for treatment, Russian news agencies said.



■UNITED KINGDOM

‘Ripper’ release unlikely

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said on Wednesday it was very unlikely that “Yorkshire Ripper” Peter Sutcliffe would ever be released from prison after a newspaper reported he had now been classified low risk. The Sun, citing an unnamed source, said Sutcliffe could be transferred from Broadmoor top security mental hospital because doctors say he is no longer dangerous. The move, it added, could lead to the eventual release of the man who butchered 13 women in the 1970s and 1980s. However, Brown said: “I don’t think he will ever be released. Any prisoner held under the Mental Health Act will only be downgraded, as is suggested might happen, if the Mental Health Tribunal, which is independent, is satisfied that it’s safe to do so.” Sutcliffe, 62, was jailed for life in 1981 for 13 murders and seven attempted murders during a five-year killing spree. The Bradford truck driver mainly targeted prostitutes and was dubbed the Yorkshire Ripper — after London’s infamous Victorian “Jack the Ripper” — because he mutilated and dismembered his victims’ bodies.



■UNITED STATES

Cancer-link genes found

Scientists have identified two genetic mutations they believe are linked to the most common types of brain cancer and longer survival times, research published on Wednesday said. Researchers at Johns Hopkins and Duke universities discovered variations in the IDH1 and IDH2 genes that are associated with three quarters of the most common types of cancer tumors, known as gliomas. It is hoped the findings can open the way to more successful treatment of the disease. Patients with these types of mutations can survive at least two times longer than those with other genetic variations, said the research, which was published in yesterday’s edition of the New England Journal of Medicine.



■UNITED STATES

Man shoots himself in church

A man shot himself to death in front of a cross inside TV evangelist Robert Schuller’s Crystal Cathedral on Wednesday as a group of Canadian visitors was being told about the church’s suicide prevention program. The man entered at about 9:45am, handed a note and his driver’s license to two ushers, walked to the cross and then shot himself in the head as he appeared to be praying, Senior Pastor Juan Carlos Ortiz said. The man used a semiautomatic handgun, police Lieutenant Dennis Ellsworth said. The Orange County coroner’s office identified the man as Steve Smick, 48.



■UNITED STATES

Taro research ban mulled

A permanent ban on any research or alteration of the sacred taro plant is being considered by Hawaii legislators. The House Hawaiian Affairs Committee on Wednesday unanimously approved a statewide prohibition on development, testing, planting or importation of genetically modified taro. The proposal reopens the debate on how to best protect the crop used to make the starchy food poi. Taro farmers and Native Hawaiians want it to remain pure, but scientists warn that disease could wipe it out unless they take action. “Taro has been grown for 50,000 years and it’s the root of Hawaiian culture,” said Jim Cain, a Waipio Valley taro farmer.



■UNITED STATES

Rourke mourns dead pet

Oscar contender Mickey Rourke forgot about an impending awards show after one of his beloved chihuahuas, Loki, died at the age of 18. Loki was the leader of Rourke’s pack of miniature dogs and his death on Monday came days after Rourke, 56, credited Loki and his other dogs with saving his life by providing companionship when he considered suicide during a protracted lull in his career. “I sort of self-destructed and everything came out about 14 years ago or so,” Rourke, 56, told US interviewer Barbara Walters ahead of the Oscars. “The wife had left, the career was over, the money was not an ounce. The dogs were there when no one else was there,” he said.



■UNITED STATES

Mammoth find in LA

The nearly complete skeleton of a massive Columbian mammoth who died during the last ice age has been dug out of a construction site near the La Brea Tar Pits in downtown Los Angeles, a remarkable find even in the fossil-rich area, scientists said on Wednesday. The mammoth, dubbed “Zed” by researchers at the Page Museum at the La Brea Tar Pits, likely died in his late 40s some 40,000 years ago and was found near an unprecedented treasure trove of fossils that workers stumbled upon while digging the foundation for an underground parking garage.


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