■SOUTH KOREA
DMZ water hits market
The nation’s newest bottled water comes from a place where nature has been unspoiled for decades due to razor-wire fences, land-mined fields and more than 1 million heavily armed soldiers standing guard. Its name is “DMZ 2km” and is bottled near the no-man’s-land Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) buffer that has divided the Korean Peninsula since the end of the 1950 to 1953 Korean War and is marketed to those who do not think of the area as the Cold War’s last frontier. “We decided on water from the DMZ because it’s different, and the environment there is untouched, so many people think it’s clean,” said Lee Sang-hyo, a spokesman for Lotte Chilsung Beverage Co, which started selling the water three months ago. A 500ml bottle sells for 600 won (US$0.50) and has DMZ on the label, along with a silhouette of a bird. Except for the rare secret military patrol or border incursion, the DMZ has been free of human activity since the end of the war, and has become a band of pristine nature. Environmentalists estimate there are about 2,900 different plant species, about 70 different types of mammals and 320 types of birds in the DMZ.
■INDONESIA
Obama statue unveiled
A bronze statue of US President Barack Obama as a child, dressed in shorts and a T-shirt, was erected in the Jakarta neighborhood where he used to play. The 100 million rupiah (US$10,600) statue, which was based on a picture of Obama taken during his childhood, depicts the future world leader wearing a large necklace with a butterfly perched on his outstretched hand. Ron Mullers, chairman of the group Friends of Obama, which paid for the statue, said: “It’s not a political act. It’s purely inspirational. We want kids to look at it and say ‘wow, he played around here and now he’s a world leader.’”
■CHINA
Kin suspected over injury
Doctors in the southwest have removed a needle from the brain of an 11-year-old girl, believed inserted after birth in an attempted murder by relatives who had wanted a boy, a report said yesterday. Rusted needle shards were detected by doctors in August after fruitless attempts by the girl’s mother over the years to find the cause of an apparent mental disability, the Sichuan Online news Web site reported. The girl, identified as “Ping Ping,” did not begin walking or talking until she was six, currently has the intelligence level of a three-year-old, and has suffered for years from unexplained fevers, it said.
■AUSTRALIA
Firefighters battle wildfires
More than 120 wildfires were burning in one state yesterday and forecasters warned of severe fire danger in parts of another as temperatures and winds increased across parts of the country’s south. Some fires in New South Wales were threatening rural towns. About 2,000 firefighters across the state were battling fires, many of which were started by lightning strikes on Tuesday.
■SOUTH KOREA
Taliban makes threats
The Taliban has threatened to retaliate against South Korea for its decision to send troops back into Afghanistan, a statement e-mailed to media outlets said. Seoul has pledged to send 350 troops next year to protect its civilian aid workers, a move the Taliban charged violates a pledge in 2007 to withdraw permanently in exchange for the release of 19 hostages. The 2007 pullout of the country’s 200 troops was previously planned, but followed closely after the hostage standoff.
■RUSSIA
START deal approaches
Moscow and Washington will sign a new nuclear arms deal shortly, the foreign ministry said on Wednesday. Sergey Lavrov sounded upbeat on Wednesday when asked about the prospects for a quick successor deal to the 1991 Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) I treaty that expired on Friday. Asked by a reporter whether the agreement could be igned by US President Barack Obama and President Dmitry Medvedev at the sidelines of the international climate summit in Copenhagen, Lavrov said: “The treaty will be signed soon.” He did not elaborate.
■GERMANY
Tigers maul circus trainer
A circus trainer was fighting for his life on Wednesday after being mauled by a trio of tigers during a performance in front of 170 horrified spectators, organizers and emergency services said. Christian Walliser, 28, stumbled in the enclosure containing the big cats on Tuesday evening and “as a spontaneous reaction” three of the five Bengali tigers took this as a signal to “play,” the Hamburg venue said in a statement. In the 30 seconds that it took circus employees to beat the animals back with fire extinguishers and hoses, the tigers ripped off Walliser’s left hand and inflicted serious head and upper body injuries.
■ITALY
Pizza gets trademark
Neapolitan-style pizza, which originated in the city of Naples, was awarded a EU trademark yesterday to help discourage cheaper imitations of the mozzarella-and-tomato-topped dish. A Brussels-based agricultural committee awarded pizza made in the Neapolitan tradition a so-called Traditional Guaranteed Specialty label, which means any pizza maker using the logo must adhere to a set of standards. “Anyone who claims they’re making real Neapolitan pizza will now face inspections,” said Antonio Pace, president of the Real Neapolitan Pizza Association. The decision was the latest example of EU efforts to protect foods from specific regions throughout the union, including Parma ham, Champagne and Roquefort cheese.
■GERMANY
Christmas cheers stop fine
A young woman who burst into tears when police fined her for speeding received an early Christmas present when another woman caught for the same offense paid the charge. Authorities in the western city of Aachen said the older driver was so moved by the woman’s crying at the police station that she pulled out her purse and handed over the money.
■UNITED KINGDOM
Van Dyck self-portrait sold
A self portrait by Anthony van Dyck painted in the months before he died sold for £8.3 million (US$13.53 million) in London, beating the previous auction record for his work, Sotheby’s said. The last-known portrait of the painter had been expected to sell for between £2 million and £3 million at Wednesday’s auction, Sotheby’s said. “This is the most important 17th century British portrait to come on the market in the last two decades. It was an opportunity we could not miss,” said the buyer, art dealer Philip Mould. The previous price paid for a Van Dyck was £3 million. The auction comes after two masterpieces by Raphael and Rembrandt smashed record prices on Tuesday, selling for £29.2 million and £20.2 million respectively at Christie’s in London. The 1508 drawing by Raphael was a record price for any work on paper sold at auction. Head of a Muse has only been seen once in public in the last 50 years and had not been put up for general auction for more than 150 years.
■UNITED STATES
Book returned after 60 years
A book has been mailed back to an Ohio library after six decades, accompanied by an anonymous letter of remorse. The biography Napoleon by Emil Ludwig recently arrived at Toledo’s main library, with a brief note that read: “I removed this book from your stacks in 1949 and did not check it out. I apologize. It’s an excellent book and in good condition.” The person who signed it “an ex-Toledoan” also wrote: “Carrying guilt for 60 years is a terrible thing,” the Blade newspaper reported. Library spokeswoman Rhonda Sewell said the package, with its Beverly Hills, California, postmark, came as a shock.
■UNITED STATES
Senator releases song
US Senator Orrin Hatch has written a song for Hanukkah, which one critic described on Wednesday as a US miracle and a catchy tune that breaks with the tradition of dreary music for the Jewish holiday. Hatch, a Mormon, collaborated on the song called Eight Days of Hanukkah with Jewish composer Madeleine Stone and recorded it in a studio in New York with Arab-American singer Rasheeda Azar. Having a “Mormon senator in a studio with an Arab singer and a bunch of New York Jewish background vocalists recording a Hanukkah song of his own making ... counts as a minor American miracle,” said Jeffrey Goldberg, who writes for the Atlantic. The song was released online on Wednesday, just in time for Hanukkah, which starts tonight.
■UNITED STATES
‘Holy’ cow born in Sterling
A holy cow in Connecticut, perhaps? Or maybe a divine bovine? A calf with a white marking on its forehead in the approximate shape of a cross was born last week at a dairy farm in Sterling, a small rustic town on the Rhode Island border. Owner Brad Davis told WFSB-TV he thinks the marking may be a message from above, though he’s still trying to figure out what that message might be. The mostly brown calf is half Jersey, half Holstein. Neighborhood children have named it Moses. The chairman of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Department of Dairy Science told the Norwich Bulletin newspaper it’s not unusual for a Holstein cow to have a white marking on its head.
■CANADA
General stirs abuse furor
The nation’s top general says there is evidence that a prisoner captured by the military in 2006 and handed over to Afghan authorities was abused. General Walt Natynczyk’s disclosure contradicts Canadian Defense Minister Peter MacKay’s repeated insistence that not a single case of torture of detainees could be proven. The revelation raises questions about whether Canada violated international law by continuing to transfer prisoners to Afghan custody after it had evidence of abuse. Opposition parties stepped up calls for MacKay’s resignation and are demanding a public inquiry.
■UNITED STATES
Duck killer gets probation
A driver who ran over and killed a mother duck walking her 12 ducklings across a Massachusetts mall parking lot has been sentenced to a year of probation. Witnesses said Joshua Linhares deliberately drove at the ducks in the Dartmouth Mall parking lot in June, turning sharply and speeding up. Surveillance video from nearby stores supported their account, the Standard-Times newspaper reported. The 25-year-old man testified he didn’t see the ducks because he was distracted by a woman waving her arms at him.
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was