■AUSTRALIA
Navy faces sex ring inquiry
Officials have launched an investigation into allegations that sailors on board a navy ship were running a sex competition during an overseas deployment last year. The Defense Department says the inquiry that began yesterday comes after an initial investigation was found to be biased. Three sailors from the HMAS Success were sent home last May after reports emerged that sailors were competing to have sex with the most number of female crew mates. The investigation will look into allegations that dollar values were assigned to each woman on board and that sailors could win extra money if they had sex with a female officer or a lesbian.
■PHILIPPINES
Police face murder charges
Prosecutors have filed murder charges against 25 policemen who allegedly pumped 80 bullets into a van carrying a man and his seven-year-old daughter while chasing suspected robbers two years ago, officials said yesterday. The Justice Department said it found probable cause to indict the 25 officers in the death of Alfonso de Vera, 53, and his daughter after witnesses testified that police indiscriminately fired at the van without determining who was inside. The officers were chasing suspected bank robbers in a Manila residential area in December 2008 when they strafed de Vera’s van, the indictment said. When de Vera left the vehicle with his fatally wounded daughter, the policemen followed and shot him in the head, the Justice Department said. The policemen have said the civilians were caught in crossfire. The independent Commission on Human Rights said in January that police not only displayed incompetence but also showed “blatant disregard for standard operating procedures, brazen police brutality and reckless disregard for human rights.”
■SOUTH KOREA
Attacks lead to travel alert
Seoul on Thursday issued a travel advisory for Russia following attacks that left one South Korean student dead and another seriously injured. The foreign ministry said on its Web site it was placing the country under a level one travel alert until May 31, meaning Koreans are advised to take extra precautions. Last month a South Korean student was killed by youths in the Siberian city of Barnaul. On Sunday a South Korean student was critically wounded in an attack in Moscow. South Korean media have said the Siberian incident seemed to be racially motivated and they suspected the Moscow attack was as well.
■THE NETHERLANDS
Nurses blast sex demands
A union representing Dutch nurses was to launch a national campaign yesterday against demands for sexual services by patients who claim it should be part of their standard care. The union, NU’91, is calling the campaign “I Draw The Line Here,” with an advert that features a young woman covering her face with crossed hands. The union said in a statement on Thursday that the campaign follows a complaint it had received in the last week from a 24-year-old woman who said a 42-year-old disabled man asked her to provide sexual services as part of his care at home. The young woman witnessed some of the man’s other nurses offering him sexual gratification, the union said. When she refused to do the same, he tried to dismiss her on the grounds that she was unfit to provide care.
■GERMANY
Romeo arrested on balcony
A woman, fearful that a burglar was trying to break into her second-story apartment, called police after she heard someone climbing up to her balcony shortly after midnight, police said on Thursday. Police discovered the “burglar” was a man carrying flowers and a bottle of wine who turned out to be the woman’s boyfriend, but then arrested him on an outstanding warrant. Korbach police spokesman Volker Koenig said the man jumped down from the balcony and tried to escape, but was quickly tackled by police. “He nevertheless gave the police who were taking him to jail the bottle of wine as a gesture of thanks for the friendly treatment after the arrest,” Koenig said.
■UNITED KINGDOM
MPs face day in court
Three ministers of parliament (MP) from the ruling Labour party and an opposition Conservative member of the House of Lords (a peer) charged with theft over their parliamentary expenses claims are to fight to keep their cases out of the criminal courts by attempting to invoke a 320-year-old law protecting them under parliamentary privilege. Elliot Morley, David Chaytor, Jim Devine and Lord Hanningfield appeared on Thursday at City of Westminster magistrates court in central London to plead not guilty to charges of false accounting under the Theft Act 1968. The cases were committed to London’s Southwark crown court after lawyers argued they raised issues of “high constitutional importance.” If convicted, the four face a maximum sentence of seven years’ imprisonment.
■PARIS
Court rules against Renaults
A court ruled on Thursday against three pensioners appealing for ownership of Fouquet’s, an iconic Paris restaurant on the Champs Elysees, in a legal battle that has gone on for half a century. Pierre, Michel and their sister Lina Renault were told by a court in 2007 they were the legal owners of the building housing the famous restaurant and other businesses, valued at 70 million euros (US$95 million). A year later, a judge overturned that ruling, prompting the pensioners to appeal, saying they had more documents proving their ownership. Their appeal was rejected in yet another judgment on Thursday. The Renaults argue that the building, currently the property of the Cafe de Paris restaurant company, was left to their family following the death of the Countess Octavia de Coetlogon in 1865. The countess, who died childless, left the property to a cousin, who in turn bequeathed it to the Renaults’ grandparents. The Cafe de Paris group has owned the building since 1930 and says the Renaults’ claim is baseless.
■UNITED STATES
Court bars brothel ads
A federal appeals court on Thursday upheld a Nevada law that bars legal brothels that operate in some of the state’s rural areas from advertising by newspaper, leaflets and billboards in Las Vegas, Reno and other places where prostitution is illegal. Nevada Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto hailed the ruling by the 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals panel in San Francisco, while a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Nevada promised to appeal. The laws had been challenged by the ACLU, a Nye County brothel called the Shady Lady Ranch and two newspapers: the High Desert Advocate and Las Vegas City Life. Prostitution is illegal in Clark and Washoe counties — which include Las Vegas and Reno — and three other Nevada counties. Ten Nevada counties authorize prostitution by local ordinance.
■UNITED STATES
Court upholds God’s money
A federal appeals court upheld the use of the words “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance and “In God We Trust” on currency, rejecting arguments on Thursday that the phrases violate the separation of church and state. The San Francisco-based 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals panel rejected two legal challenges by Sacramento atheist Michael Newdow, who said the references to God were unconstitutional and infringe on his religious beliefs. The same appeals court caused a national uproar and prompted accusations of judicial activism when it decided in Newdow’s favor in 2002, ruling that the pledge violated the First Amendment prohibition against government endorsement of religion. Former president George W. Bush called the 2002 decision “ridiculous,” senators passed a resolution condemning the ruling and Newdow received death threats.
■UNITED STATES
New York mulls salt ban
Over the past few years, New York has gained a reputation for taking the health of its citizens seriously, or nannying them, depending on your point of view. Now a member of the city’s legislative assembly has gone a step further by introducing a bill that would ban the use of salt in restaurant kitchens in the city. Bill A10129 would forbid the city’s chefs from using salt in any of their recipes. The ban’s proposer, Felix Ortiz, a Democratic member from Brooklyn, says it would give consumers the choice about whether to add salt to their meal. Restaurants trying to sneak a bit of sodium chloride on to the plate would be fined US$1,000 every time they were caught. The idea of an outright ban, except for salt shakers on diners’ tables, has led to raised eyebrows across the city, which prides itself on its cuisine. “If state assemblyman Felix Ortiz has his way,” the Daily News said, “the only salt added to your meal will come from the chef’s tears.”
■UNITED STATES
Obama gives away prize
President Barack Obama has made good on a promise to give his US$1.4 million in Nobel Peace Prize money to charity, releasing on Thursday the names of the organizations that will benefit. Obama put Fisher House, an organization that provides housing for the families of those being treated at major military and Veterans Affairs medical centers, at the top of the list, with a US$250,000 donation. Fisher House was followed by the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund, the project his two immediate predecessors are running to raise money for relief and reconstruction efforts in Haiti, which will get US$200,000.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of