■MALAYSIA
Anger over nude race
The producer of a Danish reality TV show has apologized to Muslim-majority Malaysia for shooting a nude scene on a southern island earlier this month, a report said yesterday. Photographs of contestants from Expedition Robinson, the Danish version of the Survivor series, taking part in a nude race were published recently on the front page of a Malay-language tabloid, prompting authorities to launch an investigation. Malaysia has strict film regulations that ban obscenity. Scandinavian production house Strix Television AB, which produces the show, said a nude race was not part of the script, the Star newspaper reported. A female contestant who refused to take off her clothes was kicked off the show. Strix has fired the director, the report said.
■NEW ZEALAND
Quake hits remote islands
A 6.7 magnitude earthquake hit the Kermadec Islands in the South Pacific yesterday, but no tsunami warning was issued and there were no reports of injury or damage. The quake struck at 12:53pm local time, some 270km southwest of Raoul Island at a depth of just 10km, according to New Zealand geological agency GNS Science. The islands are about 1,000km northeast of New Zealand. The islands have no permanent population.
■CHINA
Eleven missing at sea
Rescuers are searching for 11 people missing after a ship capsized off the northeastern coast. CCTV reported yesterday that one body had been found. Divers were searching the ship for other bodies or anyone who might have survived the accident in an air pocket. The boat was transporting sand when it foundered in rough seas off the coast of northeastern Liaoning Province on Thursday night.
■AUSTRALIA
Court halts kangaroo cull
A court suspended a government program to kill 7,000 kangaroos on federal land near Canberra on Thursday, halting efforts to thin a mushrooming population of the marsupials that authorities say are threatening endangered species. Animal activists challenged the government’s contention that thousands of common eastern grey kangaroos must be slaughtered to protect endangered plants, reptiles and insects. Population control through vasectomies and oral contraceptives remain experimental alternatives. Civilian marksmen had killed 4,000 kangaroos over nine nights since last week. Australian Capital Territory Administrative Appeals Tribunal President Linda Crebbin suspended the shooting permits until a panel could hear conflicting scientific evidence early next month.
■CHINA
Doctors remove old bullet
Doctors in Chongqing have cut a bullet out of a woman’s face 42 years after it lodged there, local media said on Friday. The 3.3cm bullet was removed from He Wenying (何文英), 65, on Thursday at a hospital in the city, the Chongqing Evening News reported. The bullet apparently hit He when it ricocheted through a thin wall during a fight in 1967 between rival factions of Red Guards during the Cultural Revolution. The stray bullet lodged in the right side of He’s face between her jaw and ear. It was first found by doctors in He’s remote home town in 1978, but surgery failed to remove it. After complaining of pain in her face and head for 30 years, He sought medical help again last week when the pain worsened and spread to her whole body, the report said.
■CHINA
Theme park draws criticism
A sex theme park in Chongqing that exhibits naked human sculptures, giant genitals and boasts a sex technique workshop is stirring up howls of protest, state press said on Friday. “Love Land,” billed as the country’s first-ever sex theme park, is scheduled to open in October, but detractors hope the project will never see the light of day, the China Daily reported. Besides displays on sex history and techniques, the park boasts a giant rotating statue of the lower portion of a nearly naked woman bent over at the waist.
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