■MALAYSIA
Rare otter photographed
Asia’s most endangered otter, a species not seen in the wild in Borneo for a decade, has been caught on camera for the first time, conservationists said yesterday. Researchers using camera traps photographed the elusive hairy-nosed otter in the Deramakot forest in Sabah State last year, but it took some time to confirm its identity. The otter had not been seen in Sabah for a century. The last specimen known in Borneo was an animal found killed by a car in 1997 in Brunei.
■NEW ZEALAND
Teen survives 16-story fall
A 15-year-old boy has survived with minor injuries after falling 16-stories from the balcony of his family’s apartment onto a concrete floor, the New Zealand Herald reported yesterday. The teenager fell about 50m, dropping through a carpark roof that may have broken his fall before he hit the concrete. Another tenant raised the alarm after seeing the boy fall past his window. He was described as in a stable condition in an Auckland hospital with a broken wrist, broken rib, gashed leg and internal injuries, the paper reported.
■CHINA
TV language war erupts
Hundreds of people protested in Guangzhou on Sunday to demand the government halt efforts to push aside Cantonese. The protest was prompted by plans to switch most programming on Guangzhou TV stations to Mandarin, feeding fears that the government wants to phase out Cantonese in official settings. The network has said it will continue to broadcast in both languages, but protesters said there were already plenty of Mandarin channels for people to watch and say that a decline in the use of Cantonese will also erode the area’s cultural heritage.
■INDIA
Than Shwe visits Bodhgaya
Myanmar’s reclusive military ruler Than Shwe toured one of Buddhism’s holiest shrines yesterday on a state visit amid protests in New Delhi and condemnation from rights groups. The general, accompanied by his wife, visited the Mahabodhi Temple in Bodhgaya, which stands next to the spot where Buddha is said to have gained enlightenment. Than Shwe will be accorded a full state welcome in New Delhi today — an event that has aroused controversy given his junta’s human rights record. A crowd of about 100 pro-democracy Burmese demonstrators gathered in New Delhi, shouting slogans and carrying posters that labeled the general “a murderer of innocent people” and a military dictator. They later burned a large poster of him in military uniform.
■CHINA
Zijin accused of graft
Zijin Mining Group offered cash to journalists covering a toxic spill at a mine it operates in the southeast, state media said yesterday, in an apparent bid to gain favorable coverage. Poisonous waste water from the Fujian Province copper mine operated by Zijin — the nation’s top gold producer — has contaminated a major river in the area, killing off about 1,900 tonnes of fish. An unnamed business magazine was offered 60,000 yuan (US$8,850) by Zijin earlier this month after it sent reporters to cover the leak, the China Business News and the China Youth Daily said. They cited the chief of the unnamed magazine’s Fujian bureau. Journalists from at least six other media organizations were offered envelopes containing thousands of yuan in cash, in some cases delivered by Zijin staff to hotel rooms where journalists stayed, the reports said. One journalist quoted a Zijin official as saying the money “was a note of appreciation for our hard work,” China Business News said. Zijin denied the allegations, according to the reports.
■PAKISTAN
Plotter did meet Taliban
The government acknowledged yesterday that the Pakistani-American who pleaded guilty to a New York bomb plot met the country’s Taliban commander, just days after footage emerged of them hugging. Faisal Shahzad last month pleaded guilty in a New York court to the bomb bid and warned of more attacks on the US until it leaves Muslim lands. Sky News broadcast a video last week showing Shahzad and Hakimullah Mehsud, commander of the nation’s umbrella Taliban faction, shaking hands, smiling and hugging sometime before the failed May 1 attack. “He visited Pakistan seven times and he met Hakimullah Mehsud and also met other people, those so-called leaders of the Taliban,” Interior Minister Rehman Malik told reporters.
■PHILIPPINES
Hunt on for suspected killer
Police were hunting for a man yesterday suspected of murdering three foreigners in separate attacks inside gated communities this month, authorities said. The victims — an American, a Canadian and a Briton — were among nine people believed to have been killed by 28-year-old Mark Dizon in the northern city of Angeles, police said. “We are conducting a massive manhunt for his arrest,” Angeles police chief Danilo Bautista said. Dizon, a computer technician and reflexologist, would befriend his victims and gain their trust before entering their communities on the premise that he was going to repair their computers, Angeles Mayor Edgardo Pamintuan told reporters at the weekend.
■UNITED STATES
Bear takes car on joyride
A bear got into an empty car, honked the horn and then sent it rolling 38m into a thicket, a Colorado family said. Ben Story, 17, said he and his family were asleep in their home south of Denver when the bear managed to open the unlocked door of his 2008 Toyota Corolla early on Friday and climbed inside. A peanut butter sandwich left on the back seat is probably what attracted the bear, Story said. Once inside, the bear must have knocked the shifter on the automatic transmission into neutral, sending the car rolling backward down the inclined driveway and into the thicket, Story said. The door apparently slammed shut when the car jolted to a stop, he said, trapping the bear inside. Neighbors had called emergency police dispatchers, and deputies freed the bear by opening the door with a rope from a distance. The bear then ran into the woods. Story said he would need a new car because the bear trashed the interior trying to get out.
■UNITED STATES
Poop stops rock band
Rock band Kings of Leon said they were forced to abandon a concert in St Louis, Missouri, at the weekend after three songs because pigeons kept pooping on them from the rafters. The band left the stage at the Verizon Wireless Amphitheater on Friday after bass player Jared Followill was hit in the face by one dropping. “Jared was hit several times during the first two songs. On the third song, when he was hit in the cheek and some of it landed near his mouth, they couldn’t deal any longer,” the Nashville band’s publicist, Andy Mendelsohn, said in a statement. “It’s not only disgusting — it’s a toxic hazard. They really tried to hang in there.” Drummer Nathan Followill apologized on Twitter to fans of the Grammy-winning band, which is made up of three Followill brothers and their cousin Matthew who plays lead guitar. “So sorry St Louis. We had to bail, pigeons s***ing in Jared’s mouth and it was too unsanitary to continue,” he wrote. “Don’t take it out on Jared ... Sorry for all who [traveled] many miles.”
■JORDAN
Lettuce lady creates stir
An animal rights activist has caused a stir in Amman by covering herself in lettuce in a quirky attempt to persuade Middle Eastern meat lovers to go vegetarian. Crowds quickly gathered to gawk at the lettuce lady, but police were not amused. Officers briefly arrested the activist, Amina Tarek, and a colleague from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. The pair stood in a square along one of the city’s trendiest streets and held a placard reading “Let vegetarianism grow on you.” Tarek said she wanted Jordanians “to turn over a new leaf.” Police held them for three hours, saying they had not obtained permission for Sunday’s protest. The activists said they had approval.
■FRANCE
Decca signs on nuns
Decca Records said a group of Benedictine nuns would record an album for the British label. The nuns of the Abbaye de Notre Dame de l’Annonciation near the southern city of Avignon were chosen after a worldwide search for female Gregorian chant performers. Their debut album, Voices — Chant from Avignon — will feature an ancient style of the Gregorian Chant that the nuns at convent sing at least eight times a day starting before dawn. This style of music first gained a popular audience through Enigma’s run of chart successes in the 1990s. The album release is planned for November.
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
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