JAPAN
Haircutting laws relaxed
The nation has relaxed laws on haircutting to allow barbers and stylists in areas affected by the earthquake and tsunami to clip and style at evacuation shelters or makeshift shops, a report said yesterday. The current law bans barbers and beauticians from cutting hair anywhere other than authorized shops, apart from for housebound customers or weddings. The government has relaxed the regulations for a period of about two years starting this month, the Yomiuri Shimbun said. Many hairdressers’ shops were damaged or destroyed in the March 11 quake and tsunami. The measure covers barbers and beauticians who cannot run their businesses as before or who are living in shelters due to the quake, the paper said.
EAST TIMOR
Refugee center in doubt
Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao said yesterday he opposed an Australian proposal to establish a regional refugee center in the country. “I have never accepted it,” he said on the sidelines of a ruling party conference in Dili. Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard raised the idea last year as a way of stemming the flow of asylum seekers who travel via Indonesia to northern Australia in rickety boats. Her government says negotiations are ongoing. The only person in the tiny country who has spoken in favor of the idea is President Jose Ramos-Horta. A spokesman for the president said any such center would have to be established with the backing of ASEAN, which East Timor is hoping to join and the UN.
SAUDI ARABIA
Media restrictions imposed
King Abdullah has imposed new media controls and threatened hefty fines and closure of news organizations allegedly undermining national security, press reports said yesterday. Under a decree issued on Friday, the media will be prohibited from reporting anything that contradicts the Islamic Shariah law or serves “foreign interests and undermines national security.” The decree requires publishers to stick “to objective and constructive criticism that serves the general interest,” media reports said, adding that violators face fines of up to 500,000 riyals (US$133,000). In addition to a threat to close publishers who violate the decree, the authorities can also ban a writer for life from contributing to any media organization.
SOUTH KOREA
Live-fire exercises scheduled
The nation’s military will stage live-fire artillery exercises in the coming week on two frontline islands including one hit by deadly North Korean shelling in November, a news report said yesterday. A defense ministry spokesman said that regular military exercises would be carried out on the two islands, but declined to give further details on the timing or whether live-fire drills will be carried out. Dong-A Ilbo daily said marine troops will fire K-9 self-propelled howitzers, Vulcan cannons and 81mm mortars deployed on Baengnyeong and Yeonpyeong islands, both located near the tense Yellow Sea border. About 10 US military regiment and battalion commanders will attend the exercises as observers, it said. In November, North Korea responded to a South Korean live-fire artillery drill from Yeonpyeong Island by shelling the island, killing four people. Tuesday’s drills will be the second live-fire exercise on the two islands this year. The previous drills passed without incident despite threats from the North to hit back.
SPAIN
City restricts swim suit use
Tourists in Barcelona who wander off the beach onto the streets in just their swim suits — or even less — will now face stiff fines. The city hall voted on Friday to ban “nudity or virtual nudity in public places” and limit swim suits to swimming pools, beaches, adjacent roads and beach walks. Nudists who stray off their designated areas of the beach will be subject to fines of 300 euros to 500 euros (US$450 to US$750). Those who wander into the streets in bikinis, swimming trunks or swimsuits face fines of 120 euros to 300 euros. Authorities in the city, where the port and the beach areas are adjacent to the historic old town, earlier this year put up posters discouraging such behavior.
? MEXICO
Teen denied royal wedding
Estibalis Chavez staged a hunger strike and flew twice to London in her quest to see Britain’s Prince William and Kate Middleton tie the knot. However, there was no fairy tale ending on Friday for the teenager, whose widely publicized desperate quest drew both sympathy and scorn from her countrymen. Chavez, 19, said British immigration officials in London turned her away at the airport on Thursday, saying she didn’t have enough money for a safe place to stay for her trip. Officials gave a similar reason for deporting her when she first tried to enter the UK on April 22. “They didn’t let me enter because they thought I was crazy,” Chavez said by telephone on Friday from Spain. Chavez staged a hunger strike outside the British embassy in Mexico City for 16 days in a failed bid to wrangle an invitation to the wedding.
UNITED STATES
Tobacco firms win lawsuit
Philip Morris USA and other major tobacco companies won a lawsuit on Friday filed by 37 Missouri hospitals seeking more than US$455 million for treating sick smokers. Philip Morris USA was one of six tobacco companies involved in the lawsuit. The hospitals had claimed cigarette companies delivered an “unreasonably dangerous” product. They were seeking reimbursement back to 1993 for treating sick smokers who had no insurance and did not pay their bills. A call to the attorney representing the hospitals, Kenneth Brostron, was not immediately returned. Philip Morris USA and Lorillard Inc were supportive of the verdict. “The jury agreed with Philip Morris USA that ordinary cigarettes are not negligently designed or defective,” Murray Garnick, Altria Client Services senior vice president and associate general counsel, said in a statement.
UNITED KINGDOM
Royal Wedding takes race
It was a good day for a royal wedding, even on one of the nation’s horse tracks. The aptly named Royal Wedding won a race at Fontwell on Friday, with the 4-1 shot holding off Take A Mile to win by 12 lengths just hours after Prince William married Kate Middleton at Westminster Abbey. The Nick Gifford-trained horse won at Fontwell in February and was invited back to race on the same day as the royal nuptials. “It’s been the plan to run for about two months and we are delighted it’s all worked out,” Gifford said. “I’m delighted and a bit relieved he won after we’ve had so much publicity. We just didn’t want him to do anything stupid like fall at the first [fence] or anything like that.” Bookmakers weren’t quite as happy, however, saying they had been showered with bets on the popular horse.
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