PAKISTAN
Paramilitary chief fired
The military yesterday removed the chief of the paramilitary Rangers over the filmed killing of an unarmed man in a public park that shocked the nation. Security forces shot dead Sarfaraz Shah, 22, in a Karachi park on Wednesday last week over the robbery accusations. His family has demanded justice, insisting he was an innocent student. The Supreme Court demanded on Friday that the government remove within three days Major General Aijaz Chaudhry, head of the paramilitary in Sindh Province, and Sindh police chief Fayyaz Leghari, over the killing. Police have arrested six paramilitary soldiers who will be tried in connection with the killing, officials said. Widely aired footage of the killing showed a clean-shaven man wearing black trousers and a navy shirt pleading for his life as a soldier cocked his rifle at his neck, then shot him twice in the hand and thigh. As his blood poured onto the ground, the man begged for help from soldiers — who appeared to do nothing but watch — until he fell unconscious.
PAKISTAN
Woman paraded naked
A mother was forcibly paraded naked through a village after her sons were accused of sleeping with a married neighbor who became pregnant, police said yesterday. The incident happened after neighbor Mohammad Salman grew suspicious that the woman’s sons slept with his wife in Neelor Bala village, 100km north of Islamabad, police official Akhtar Nawaz said. Enraged Salman and his brothers went to confront the suspects, who were identified only as Rashid and Kazim, but they had fled, leaving behind their mother, Nawaz said. “They dragged her out, tore up her clothes and forced her to walk naked on the street,” the police official said. “No one has come to lodge a formal complaint.” An investigation is under way and two people have been taken into custody for questioning, he added.
MALAYSIA
Neighbors sign peace pact
A handshake wasn’t enough for two neighbors embroiled in a lengthy and bitter feud sparked by complaints over barking dogs — the two actually signed a peace treaty. The three-year battle began when one of the men complained to the police in Johor state about his neighbor’s noisy dogs, the Star newspaper reported. The dog owner retaliated by playing loud music at night, throwing cans of paint into his neighbor’s house and driving his car into the gate. His neighbor filed a counter complaint about the music. When both men decided to end the feud recently, they opted for a signed “memorandum of understanding” to keep each other in check. One of the main points in the peace deal, brokered by a public complaints bureau, is that the dog owner has to find a way to minimize barking at night.
INDIA
Gandhi’s glasses missing
A pair of round-framed spectacles belonging to independence icon Mahatma Gandhi have gone missing from a museum, officials said. Staff at the Sevagram Ashram, a religious retreat about 75km from the city of Nagpur, noticed that the glasses had disappeared as they made preparations to mark the anniversary of its founding. Gandhi first arrived at the ashram in the mid-1930s. The Quit India resolution calling for independence from the British was passed there in July 1942. Ashram manager Aakash Lokhande told the Press Trust of India news agency on Monday it was unclear when the spectacles went missing. Police are aware of the matter but no formal complaint has been lodged, he added.
KOSOVO
Two indicted for organ trade
An EU prosecutor has indicted a Turkish and an Israeli national for involvement in an international network that falsely promised poor people money for their kidneys and then transplanted the organs into rich buyers, the EU’s rule of law mission said on Monday. Turkish citizen Yusuf Sonmez and Israeli Moshe Harel were charged last week for “trafficking in persons, organized crime and unlawful exercise of medical activity,” the mission, known as EULEX, said in a statement. Sonmez and Harel are considered at large by EU authorities and Interpol has issued a warrant for their arrest. EU prosecutor Jonathan Ratel said the victims were promised up to US$20,000 for their kidneys, but were never paid, while recipients were required to pay between US$115,000 and US$143,000. The victims came from Moldova, Kazakhstan, Russia and Turkey, and they lived in “extreme poverty or acute financial distress.”
ISRAEL
Suitcase killers get life
The mother and grandfather of a four-year-old girl whose body was found in a suitcase at the bottom of a Tel Aviv river were sentenced on Monday to life imprisonment for the murder that shocked the nation. The 2008 killing of Rose Pizem sparked a national debate on child abuse. Police investigators said Ronny Ron, the girl’s grandfather, and Marie-Charlotte Renault-Pizem, her mother, fell in love after she separated from his son, whom she had married as a teenager in France. The father returned to France with Rose, but her mother won a French court order for their daughter to live with her and the grandfather in Israel, the investigators said. The indictment said Renault-Pizem and the grandfather found Rose difficult to handle and he killed her in his vehicle, dismembering her body and dumping it in a suitcase in Tel Aviv’s Yarkon River.
GERMANY
Eco-friendly mosque planned
A small Muslim community is pioneering renewable energy sources by planning to build a mosque with wind turbines in its minarets. The 2.5 million euros (US$3.6 million) project would see the mosque in Norderstedt, near Hamburg, become one of the first to turn the minaret, the place from which the muezzin calls the faithful to prayer, into a wind-fueled power source. The eco-friendly building is the brainchild of Hamburg architect Selcuk Unyilmaz, who has long incorporated energy efficiency into his work. “My design combines the modern with the traditional, so I wanted to give the minarets a contemporary function,” he said. The wind turbines will be housed in two 22m minarets and Unyilmaz plans to install a pair of 1.5m glass rotor blades in each tower. At certain times of the day light will be beamed at the blades to create a kind of light show.
BELGIUM
Solar-powered takeoff
Swiss solar-powered aircraft Solar Impulse was attempting to reach Paris from Brussels yesterday after a previous flight was aborted because of technical problems, its team said. The plane took off on Saturday for its second international flight between the capitals, but pilot Andre Borschberg turned back after a series of glitches. “Solar Impulse will attempt to exploit a narrow weather window between two rain fronts to take off from Brussels on Tuesday,” a statement said. The craft is expected to reach Le Bourget north of Paris at about 9pm, where it will be the guest of honor at the International Aviation and Space Salon that opens on Monday. The ultimate goal of the team is to attempt a round-the-world tour in five stages in 2013 or 2014.
UNITED STATES
Nigerian guilty of ‘slavery’
A Nigerian woman has been convicted in Georgia of human trafficking and several other charges after forcing two women to work unpaid for her for years, in what prosecutors called “a case of modern-day slavery.” Bidemi Bello, 41, was convicted by a federal jury on Friday of eight counts. “This was a case of modern-day slavery hidden within an expensive home in an upscale neighborhood,” Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia Sally Quillian Yates said. According to evidence and testimony presented at the trial, the two women were separately recruited in Nigeria by Bello and brought to Georgia to work as her nanny. Bello had promised to send the young women to school and in the case of one victim, had promised to pay her as well. However, the testimony showed that once in Georgia, Bello became verbally and physically abusive to both young women, who were forced to sleep on the floor even though her upscale home had multiple bedrooms and bathrooms. They were given little to eat and forced to work unreasonably long days in harsh conditions.
PERU
Giant Jesus sparks dismay
President Alan Garcia’s plans to build the world’s tallest Christ statue in Lima has angered local residents who fear the soaring monument will mar the city’s skyline. Garcia, who said he has personally donated US$37,000 to finance the project, said the 37m statue is a “personal dream.” “This figure can bless Peru and protect Lima,” he said about the project, which is also being funded by Brazilian companies. Lima Mayor Susana Villaran has expressed dismay over the location of the statue on a hill overlooking Lima’s bay, which forms a 20km cove along the city’s western edge. Villaran said she intends to speak with Garcia and push for other sites for the Christ statue. The statue, which is to be inaugurated on June 29, is expected to surpass the 36m tall Christ statue in Swiebodzin, Poland, completed in November last year — currently the world’s tallest.
GUATEMALA
Decapitation film uncovered
Officials say they found a video of the decapitation of a prosecutor in the cellphone of an alleged Zetas cartel member captured earlier this month. The 50-second video recorded on May 24 purportedly shows now-detained Mexican suspect Salvador Arguelles Briones cutting prosecutor Alan Stwolinsky’s head off with a large knife. Photos in the cellphone show Arguelles allegedly holding another decapitated head and a heart close to his mouth as if about to eat it. Arguelles was arrested on June 4 with 14 others in connection with Stwolinsky’s murder. His killing is believed to have been retaliation for helping seize 434kg of cocaine from the Zetas.
CAYMAN ISLANDS
Swimmer links islands
An Australian woman has apparently become the first person to swim the nearly 112km between Grand Cayman Island and Little Cayman in the Caribbean. The Department of Tourism said Penny Palfrey completed the swim in 40 hours and 41 minutes. The department said in a statement Palfrey is the first person to make the journey without assistance. She had no wet suit or shark cage and stayed in the water for breaks. The 48-year-old from Townsville, North Queensland, was hospitalized for observation when her swim ended on Sunday night. She was the first woman to swim the Alenuihaha Channel from Hawaii to Maui and the first person to swim from Santa Barbara Island to Point Vincente off California.
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
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
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