■TONGA
Searchers find sunken ferry
Searchers believe they have found the wreck of a Tongan ferry that sank last week, but naval divers would be unable to recover nearly 100 bodies that may be trapped inside, police said yesterday. Police commander Chris Kelley said the wreck appeared to be intact and lying upright on the sea floor at a depth of 110m. “I must emphasize the onsite team have not visually confirmed the identity of the vessel but the sonar information is such, along with other evidence, that we have a high level of confidence it is the Princess Ashika,” Kelley said in a statement. But he said the New Zealand and Australian naval dive team would be unable to recover any bodies after confirmation of the wreck’s identity by a robotic submarine with video equipment due to arrive at the weekend because neither navies “have the capabilities to conduct recovery operations beyond 60 meters.”
■SOUTH KOREA
Cloned dog sniffs out drugs
A cloned sniffer dog has proved itself smarter than the average pup by detecting drugs at Incheon International Airport just weeks after starting service, officials said yesterday. The dog, named Tosun, detected 3g of narcotics in an envelope stored in a tightly zipped bag, the Korea Customs Service said in a statement. It was the first such achievement by a cloned animal on government service. “It is a great achievement,” Kim Dae-keun, a customs official working in the narcotics-related department, told Yonhap news agency. “Compared with ordinary sniffers, which have to undergo a longer period of getting accustomed to working conditions, Tosun made a marked score less than a month after being deployed.” Tosun is one of seven dogs cloned in late 2007 by scientists at Seoul National University from a renowned Canadian-born sniffer dog.
■CHINA
Women face ID problem
A group of Chinese women who traveled to South Korea for cosmetic surgery baffled immigration officers on their return home when their new looks did not match their passport photos. The 23 women, aged 36 to 54, had bigger eyes, higher noses and slimmer chins than shown in their passports, the China Daily reported yesterday. “After they took off their huge hats and big sunglasses following our request, we saw them looking different, with bandages and stitches here and there,” Shanghai Hongqiao Airport officer Chen Tao told the paper. “We had to compare their uncorrected parts with their photos very carefully,” he said. The identification process on Sunday took several minutes per woman, instead of the usual average of 45 seconds. “After they passed the identification, we asked them all to renew their passports immediately,” he told the daily.
■CHINA
Factory shut after poisoning
Authorities have closed a factory in the northwest that is suspected of causing lead poisoning in more than 300 children, Xinhua news agency said yesterday. The sick children all live near the Changqing industrial park in Shaanxi Province, and parents have pointed at a lead and zinc smelting plant inside. The Changqing County Government was supposed to help relocate villagers living close by in 2006, but the plan is running behind schedule. “Of all the 581 families that should have been relocated by now, only 156 have moved to new homes,” Changqing Town chief Pu Yiming said. The government has pledged to relocate the remaining families within the next two year, the report added.
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