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World News Quick Take

■CHINA

Birth defects increase

The number of newborns with birth defects in many parts of the country is rising rapidly as women have children later in life and environmental pollution takes its toll, state media reported yesterday. In Beijing, the rate of physical abnormalities — such as congenital heart defects or cleft lips — last year was 170 per 10,000 births, nearly twice the rate recorded in 1997, the China Daily newspaper reported. Quoting the Beijing municipal health bureau, the report said better diagnostic techniques and monitoring capabilities have contributed to the upswing. In Guangdong, a major industrial hub, the birth defect rate rose from 186 per 10,000 births in 2003 to 249 four years later. In Zhejiang, the rate nearly doubled during the same period, from 115 per 10,000 births to 208. Nationwide, between 4 percent and 6 percent of the 20 million babies born every year have defects, it said.



■JAPAN

Fishermen release dolphins

A fishing town that holds a well-known annual hunt to kill and sell dolphins for meat has released 70 of the animals from its first catch of the season following an international outcry, a conservationist group said yesterday. The outcry has been growing against the hunt in Taiji since award-winning US documentary The Cove this year showed dolphins being herded into an inlet and killed by fishermen with spears. The hunt kills about 2,000 dolphins a year, and residents say it is part of their tradition and a way of getting food. The released dolphins were part of a catch of about 100 on Sept. 9.



■CHINA

Urumqi schools reopen

Schools have reopened in western Urumqi city after being closed for 10 days in the wake a spate of syringe attacks caused panic and protests in the streets. Local authorities closed the schools and imposed traffic controls in the city on Sept. 4 after mass demonstrations. All primary and middle school classes resumed on Monday, the Xinhua news agency said late on Monday.



■MALAYSIA

Indonesian to be caned

An Islamic court has sentenced an Indonesian man to be caned and jailed for drinking alcohol, weeks after triggering a furore by ordering a woman to be caned for the same offense. The Shariah High Court in central Pahang state on Monday sentenced odd-job worker Nazarudin Kamaruddin, 46, to six strokes of the cane and one year’s imprisonment, a court official confirmed. The judge told the New Straits Times that Nazarudin had dishonored the holy month of Ramadan. Nazarudin, a permanent resident of Malaysia, said he had bought a bottle of samsu, a cheap local liquor, to share with friends at a restaurant.



■HONG KONG

Apartment sets record

A one-bedroom flat in a luxury development has sold for a record US$3.16 million in a sign that the city’s property slump is over, a news report said yesterday. The 23 ping (75.8m2) apartment in the city’s Tsimshatsui district has 54.8m2 of useable living space once walls and partitions are discounted, the South China Morning Post reported. The flat is on the 54th floor of a 64-floor development called The Masterpiece, Hong Kong’s second-tallest residential building, and is the smallest unit in the development. An estate agent told the newspaper that the buyer, a Hong Kong businessman, paid nearly US$42,000 per square meter because of the flat’s location and its views over Victoria Harbour.



■NORWAY

Government wins re-election

Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg declared victory yesterday for his center-left coalition in a tight parliamentary election and said his Labour Party would sit down with its two junior partners for talks. With 99.9 percent of votes counted, Stoltenberg’s coalition holds a slim but unassailable majority in parliament over the center-right, which had tried to woo voters with promises of tax cuts and more private initiative in the economy. The Labour-led Cabinet won 86 of parliament’s 169 seats, one less than they won four years ago but good enough to be the first government to win re-election in 16 years.



■RUSSIA

Turbine fault caused flood

A flood at the nation’s largest hydroelectric plant last month that killed 74 people was caused by a fault in a turbine, Interfax reported on Monday, citing the industrial safety watchdog. “The cause was of a technical nature and was related to the working of the second turbine,” said Nikolai Kutin, head of the industrial safety agency Rostekhnadzor. “The automatic system broke down and was no longer able to control the plant.” Speculation on the cause of the Aug. 17 disaster in Siberia had focused on ageing equipment at the power plant and whether it had been maintained properly. An inquiry into the tragedy would seek to establish why no backup system was installed, Kutin said.



■EGYPT

Border shootings defended

The government defended its use of lethal force against African migrants trying to cross illegally into Israel, saying on Monday that it does so only as a last resort and to fight criminal activity in the politically sensitive area. Amnesty International says Egyptian border guards have fatally shot nearly 40 migrants trying to enter Israel since the start of last year. Foreign Ministry spokesman Hossam Zaki said the guards first shout over loudspeakers, then fire warning shots, but don’t always have the chance to identify the infiltrators.



■GERMANY

Motorcyclist loses case

A court said on Monday that a motorcyclist who collided with a drunken pedestrian during the Munich beer festival was partly to blame because she should have expected the road to be full of partygoers. The female biker, who was driving at a legal speed of between 40kph and 50kph hit a man who was crossing the road on a red light during the beer fest that attracts millions of revelers every year. The court ruled she “was 50 percent responsible” for the accident. “During the October festival there are, it is well known to the authorities, a large number of drunk people on the streets at night, who can not always be trusted to observe the rules of the road,” the court said. “The motorcyclist should have adjusted her speed to be able to avoid these people.” The woman was ordered to pay half of the damages and her bid for compensation for minor injuries sustained in the accident was refused.



■SOUTH AFRICA

Police foil cash heist

Police shot dead six people in a foiled cash heist on Monday, drawing praise from the country’s new police chief for a job “well done,” a spokeswoman said. Police were notified by security guards that their transit van was being trailed and arrived as gunmen opened fire on the van, the police spokeswoman said. “Police retaliated and a shoot-out out ensued between the police and the suspects. Six of the armed robbers were fatally wounded,” she said. A police officer was shot in both legs and airlifted to hospital.



■UNITED STATES

Bail set for kidnapper

A judge on Monday set bail at US$30 million for a California man accused of kidnapping a girl and holding her captive for 18 years. El Dorado County Superior Court Judge Douglas Phimister cited the serious nature of the charges, injuries to the girl and the fact that Phillip Garrido was on parole at the time of the alleged abduction. Garrido, 58, and his wife, Nancy Garrido, 54, are accused of kidnapping 11-year-old Jaycee Dugard from her home near South Lake Tahoe in 1991 then holding her captive in a backyard jumble of tents and sheds for nearly two decades. Authorities say Phillip Garrido fathered two daughters with Dugard. Nancy Garrido continues to be held without bail.



■CANADA

Man arrested for fraud

A Canadian man was arrested and another was believed to be at large in Honduras after police said they broke up a pyramid scheme that allegedly bilked thousands of investors worldwide out of at least US$100 million between 1999 and last year. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) arrested and laid fraud charges against Milowe Allen Brost, 55, on Sunday after a three-and-a-half-year investigation. Charges have also been laid against another suspect — Gary Allen Sorenson, 66 — who is believed to be out of Canada. The RCMP allege that the pair set up Syndicated Gold Depository SA, which was supposed to lend money to Merendon Mining Corp Ltd, with the promise of a high rate of return and tax advantages to entice investors.



■UNITED STATES

Relics returned to China

Customs officials on Monday turned over to China fossils dating from as early as 100 million years ago that included bones of a saber-toothed cat, a partial skull of a dinosaur called a Psittacosaurus lujiatunesis and eggs of several other dinosaurs. The undocumented relics had been shipped in two loads and were confiscated by customs agents in Chicago, Illinois and Richmond, Virginia, the Homeland Security Department said. A department announcement said the fossils were found during routine inspection of arriving cargoes. Some are suspected of being intentionally brought in in violation of US import laws, the department said.



■UNITED STATES

Ex-Carter secretary dies

Jody Powell, who served as press secretary to former US president Jimmy Carter, died on Monday. He was 65. Powell, who started a Washington public relations firm, Powell Tate, after leaving the White House, died of a heart attack at his home in Maryland, the Washington Post said. Powell served as press secretary to Carter when he was elected governor of Georgia in 1970 and he held the same position throughout Carter’s 1977-1981 term in the White House. President Barack Obama’s press secretary Robert Gibbs said he was “deeply saddened” to learn of Powell’s death.



■MEXICO

Bolivian in hijacking jailed

A court has ordered a Bolivian preacher kept in jail during the investigation into sabotage and kidnapping charges in the hijacking of a jetliner from the resort city of Cancun. The Attorney General’s Office said a federal court issued the order on Monday for Jose Flores. Flores has said he does not regret threatening to detonate a fake bomb aboard an Aeromexico plane last week. He said he was acting on a divine revelation and wanted to warn President Felipe Calderon an earthquake could occur in 2012.
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