INDIA
Mogul gives villages billions
Technology mogul Azim Premji has announced he will donate nearly US$2 billion to fund education and development programs in villages in one of the largest charitable donations in the country’s history. Premji, chairman of Wipro Ltd, India’s third-largest software services exporter, said on Wednesday he would transfer 213 million shares worth 88.4 billion rupees (US$1.95 billion) in the company to the Azim Premji Foundation by Tuesday. The trust is controlled by Premji, and he will continue to retain the voting rights of the transferred shares, the foundation and the company said in separate statements.
The foundation will use the new infusion of money to fund education programs and other initiatives in rural India as well as a new university it is establishing in Bangalore.
THAILAND
Passport forgery ring busted
Authorities in Thailand say at least some of the suspects arrested this week in Spain and Thailand in connection with an international ring that provided forged passports to terrorists may have passed fake documents to the perpetrators of the 2004 Madrid bombings. Authorities in Bangkok said yesterday the 10 suspects — seven in Spain and three in Thailand — belong to a group that received stolen passports, doctored them in the kingdom and then distributed them to terror groups.
UNITED KINGDOM
War crimes law changed
London sought to soothe strained ties with Israel on Wednesday by publishing an amendment to a law that puts visiting officials at risk of arrest for alleged war crimes. Foreign Secretary William Hague said the change would ensure that private arrest warrants for offenses under certain international laws, including as the Geneva Convention, would first have to be approved by the chief prosecutor. The move was welcomed by Israel, whose politicians and officials have been targeted by warrants brought by local pro-Palestinian campaign groups.
HONG KONG
Jewelers buy bogus bullion
Jewelers and pawn shops have been hammered by a gold scam after unwittingly buying hundreds of ounces of bogus bullion, the Financial Times reported yesterday. “It’s a very good fake,” Haywood Cheung (張德熙), president of the Chinese Gold and Silver Exchange Society, the territory’s gold exchange, told the paper. Cheung said jewelers and pawn shops have discovered at least 200 ounces of fake bullion — worth about US$280,000 — so far this year. Among the fakes was a specimen with a pure gold coating that masked a complex alloy with similar properties to the precious metal, suggesting fraudsters used sophisticated techniques and equipment, the report said.
UNITED STATES
Man linked to slaying dies
A man police called a “person of interest” in the slaying of Hollywood publicist Ronni Chasen shot and killed himself at a Los Angeles residential hotel on Wednesday as Beverly Hills detectives served a search warrant, authorities said. The detectives were serving the warrant at the Harvey Apartments in Hollywood at about 6pm when the man shot himself, police said. The man, whose name was not released, died at the scene. Beverly Hills police Chief David Snowden told The Associated Press in an e-mail that the man “was a person of interest only” in Chasen’s death.
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