NEW ZEALAND
Man to go out with a bang
A man’s ashes will be fired from a cannon over Wellington Harbour during a ceremony to mark Captain James Cook’s birthday. The ashes of Alfonse Kennedy Goss, known as AK, 58, who died last year from cancer, will be fired from an artillery piece by his friends from the Wellington Cannon Society, newswire.co.nz reported.
AUSTRALIA
iPod blamed for sex assault
A sex attack victim said on Thursday she might have been able to avoid the assault if she had not been distracted by her iPod. The victim, named only as “Kate,” urged other women to use MP3 players with caution after she was knocked down and sexually assaulted just 100m from her Melbourne home earlier this month. “I was listening to my iPod and in my thoughts I was already at home so I didn’t pay attention,” she said. “It’s a very bad idea, because you listen to the songs that you like, you’re thinking about things and you don’t pay attention to what’s happening around you. It’s a very bad thing.” A passing car disturbed the attacker, who then fled. “When I am walking on the street now I always pay attention to what’s happening around me,” she said. Campaigners in the country have warned road users of “Death by iPod” after a pedestrian was knocked down and killed last month in Sydney, following the death of a Melbourne cyclist in June.
YEMEN
Tribesmen kidnap Swede
Tribesmen kidnapped the Swedish technical director of a cement works in the troubled southern province of Abyan late on Thursday, a security official said. Four men abducted the Swede at gunpoint as he was leaving the plant in the provincial capital Zinjibar to travel to the main southern city of Aden, the official said yesterday. The kidnappers are believed to be members of the Maraqish tribe, which has been campaigning for the release of a clansman who is on death row in the capital Sanaa, the official added. Yemen’s powerful tribes often kidnap foreigners for use as bargaining chips in disputes with the central government. Of about 200 foreigners seized in Yemen over the past decade, almost all have been released unharmed.
UNITED STATES
Woman kills baby for game
A Florida woman, angry because her baby’s crying was interrupting her game of Farmville on Facebook, has pleaded guilty to murder after shaking the infant to death, a newspaper reported on Thursday. Alexandra Tobias, 22, of Jacksonville, entered the plea in the January death of three-month-old Dylan Edmondson before Circuit Judge Adrian Soud on Wednesday, the Florida Times-Union said.
UNITED STATES
High-speed rail plan boosted
The US government on Thursday pumped in an additional US$2.4 billion to develop high-speed rail projects as it moves toward building the US’ first nationwide next-generation program. US President Barack Obama’s administration announced that 54 high-speed rail projects in 23 states will share the US$2.4 billion to continue developing the intercity passenger rail service. The US Department of Transportation received 132 applications from 32 states in the second round of awards, for a total of US$8.8 billion, more than three times the funding available. “Demand for high-speed rail dollars is intense and it demonstrates just how important this historic initiative is,” US Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said in a statement.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not