■JAPAN
Commuters list complaints
Taking the train and want to avoid annoying fellow passengers? Keep conversation to a whisper, turn down your iPod and put your cellphone on vibration mode, a recent survey by the railway association showed. Many foreigners who ride on the country’s vast network of subways and commuter trains complain about the pushing and shoving that accompanies getting into the train and the reluctance to give up seats for senior citizens and pregnant women. But for Japanese commuters, noise is the biggest issue, with loud conversation and music from headphones the top two offenders and cellphone ringtones in fourth place, a survey by the Association of Japanese Private Railways showed.
■MALAYSIA
Hotel tip unmasks fraudster
Police arrested a Lebanese man allegedly carrying fake currency with a face value of US$66 million after he tipped hotel staff with a US$500 note, an official said on Friday. The largest US note currently in wide circulation is a US$100 bill. But police found bundles of US$1 million, US$100,000 and US$500 notes in the man’s hotel room in Kuala Lumpur on Sunday, said Izany Abdul Ghany, head of the city’s commercial crime unit. Hotel staff alerted police after a housekeeper received a US$500 note tip and found out it was fake when she tried to convert it to local currency at a money changer, Izany said.
■NEW ZEALAND
Police get odd calls
Police are getting hot under the collar over emergency calls including a woman whose husband didn’t spray air freshener after using the toilet and another complaining of pressure to attend a family wedding. The Dominion Post newspaper reported yesterday that police in the North Island town of Wairoa responded to an emergency call from a 51-year-old woman who hung up after police answered the phone. When police arrived at her house, she complained her husband had forgotten to spray the toilet with air freshener after a visit, police said. The police restored harmony in the household and did not lay charges over the call.
■MARIANA ISLANDS
Inmate called in for massage
The governor of the US-administered islands is feeling the heat after ordering the temporary release of a jailed suspect to give him a massage. Benigno Fitial, the most senior politician in the western Pacific territory, demanded that Chinese masseuse Qing Mei-cheng be set free on Jan. 8 to treat him for back pain. The masseuse was taken from the local prison, where she was being held on people smuggling charges, to the governor’s mansion before being returned to jail. “I made this request because this was an unusual situation where I needed to address the extraordinary pain I was experiencing,” Fitial said in a statement received yesterday.
■CANADA
‘Chinese’ Buffett broke
A man who dubbed himself a “Chinese Warren Buffett” and who allegedly defrauded investors of millions of dollars is now broke and will need legal aid to defend his fraud charges, his lawyer said on Thursday. Tang Weizhen (唐煒臻), 51, made a brief court appearance on Thursday, but his lawyer said he would not be representing Tang for long since his client did not have the funds to pay him. Tang was taken into police custody late on Wednesday after returning to Toronto from China. Toronto police had issued an arrest warrant for Tang, who had made arrangements to surrender to authorities last month, but did not show up.
■UNITED KINGDOM
Handbags get lighter: study
Technological advances have led to a sharp fall in the weight of women’s handbags, research from department store chain Debenhams has revealed. Women’s handbags now weigh an average of 1.5kg, 57 percent less than the average of two years ago, Debenhams said in an e-mailed statement on Thursday. A new generation of smaller, lighter multipurpose gadgets such as Apple’s iPhone and Research in Motion’s Blackberry have replaced heavy laptops, old-fashioned mobile phones, music players and organizers, Debenhams said.
■RUSSIA
Porn on road show
Drivers in downtown Moscow squinted in disbelief as an electronic highway billboard blazed a two-minute pornographic video instead of its regular advertising clips. Late-night traffic on one of the capital’s busiest roads slowed on Thursday as a couple’s explicit escapades appeared on the 9m-by-6m display. Some people took pictures of the sight with their mobile phones and posted them on the Internet. Passerby Alyona Prokulatova said she was “so shocked that I couldn’t even shoot video or take a picture of it.” The screen’s owner, 3 Stars, said that a hacker attack was likely to blame. Police were investigating the incident.
■UNITED KINGDOM
Ski center snowed in
A ski center in the Scottish Highlands was forced to close on Friday because of too much snow during Britain’s coldest winter in 30 years. The CairnGorm Mountain ski center had to bring in diggers to clear the deep drifts that had built up on the slopes and approach road during two days of blizzards. Scotland, which does not always have the most reliable snowfall for its winter sports, has been one of the nation’s worst hit areas during a freezing few weeks. “It’s a bit like buses,” said Barry Gromett, a Met Office forecaster. “You wait for a number of winters for skiing snow without any luck, and then it all arrives at once.”
■SPAIN
Man leaves riches to royalty
A businessman who died last year has left his fortune to members of the royal family, a source in the royal palace said on Friday. In his will, Juan Ignacio Balada Llabres asked that his estate be divided into two parts, with 50 percent going to the eight grandchildren of King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia and the rest to Crown Prince Felipe and his wife Letizia to create a foundation, the source said. Llabres died on Nov. 18 on the island of Menorca, and his executor contacted the members of royal family earlier this month to notify them of his wishes. The source said Prince Felipe and his wife had “never had any contact” previously with Llabres.
■UNITED KINGDOM
Wild boar trash for food
Some of the first wild boar to roam free in England for 300 years have been raiding rubbish bins, attacking dogs and digging up green spaces in villages scattered around England’s first national forest park. Recent snow and icy weather has interrupted rubbish collection service in the Forest of Dean, leaving tempting treats in local bins that have attracted the boar, which ordinarily forage for shoots, leaves, bulbs, worms and carrion. Some areas in the forest have not seen garbage collection since before the Christmas holidays. Ecologist Martin Goulding said that scavenging was a natural activity for wild boar and that a rich harvest of food from the bins will encourage more boar to target trash cans.
■CUBA
Patients’ death sparks probe
Twenty-six patients at a Havana psychiatric hospital have died as a result of cold weather in the past week, prompting an investigation into possible negligence, the government said on Friday. “We have seen an increase in deaths among patients in the last week,” a government statement said. “They are related to the long spell of cold weather that has occurred.” A Health Ministry commission that investigated the deaths identified “various deficiencies related to the lack of timely adoption of measures.” Those responsible were to be prosecuted. Hospital employees who asked not to be named said the patients lacked food and blankets because they had been stolen.
■UNITED STATES
Dennis Hopper to divorce
Cancer-stricken actor Dennis Hopper has filed for divorce from his wife of nearly 14 years, court records showed on Friday. Hopper, 73, who was diagnosed with prostate cancer last year, filed his petition to divorce Victoria Hopper in Los Angeles Superior Court on Thursday. The couple married on April 12, 1996, and separated on Tuesday, the petition said, citing “irreconcilable differences” for the split. Hopper is seeking joint legal and physical custody of the couple’s daughter, Galen, 6.
■URUGUAY
Iglesias says no to sex
Julio Iglesias may have a reputation as a famous lover, but he told a concert audience he hasn’t had sex in 15 years. During a performance in Punta del Este, he said that when he first performed there at age 24, he was “like a rabbit.” The singer said he had a “superstition, a quirk or whatever, that I couldn’t go on stage to sing if I didn’t make love first.” But the 66-year-old singer said “I gave that up completely 15 years ago.” Iglesias’ publicist, Paula Montoli, didn’t comment on whether the singer was celibate, but said his comments were intended to be lighthearted and “ironic.”
■UNITED STATES
Hunters cause nuclear scare
A pair of fowl hunters sparked a brief lockdown of a Texas nuclear weapons plant on Friday, officials said. “They were just doing what people do around here,” Carson County Sheriff Tam Terry said. The sheriff’s office got a call around 7:20am from an employee of B&W Pantex who saw two men getting out a vehicle dressed in camouflage and carrying guns a couple of kilometers from the plant. The men were found in a nearby field setting up goose decoys and a blind. They provided identification showing that they were Pantex employees, Terry said. No charges will be filed and it appears that the men had permission from the owner of the land to hunt there.
■UNITED STATES
Sea turtles going home
Hundreds of endangered sea turtles are being released back into the Atlantic Ocean now that Florida’s weather has warmed enough. Officials rescued nearly 3,000 turtles from frigid waters in the past week, plucking them from the ocean, lagoons and rivers as air temperatures dipped to nearly 0ºC along the coast. The turtles — which weigh up to 180kg — were found across Florida as the chilly temperatures sent them into a cold stress, leaving them stunned and largely motionless, the perfect prey for predators. Now, after a week of treatment, including soakings in heated pools and oxygen therapy, the turtles are headed back to the wild. Trucks full of turtles arrived on Thursday at several Florida beaches, where they were hand-placed in the surf for their journey home.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
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
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