INDONESIA
Religious fanatics jailed
A court yesterday sentenced religious fanatics who killed three members of a minority Muslim sect in a frenzied mob attack to between three and six months in jail. Dani bin Misra, a 17-year-old who smashed a victim’s skull with a stone, received three months for manslaughter. Idris bin Mahdani, who led the mob of more than 1,000 Muslims in the February attack, was convicted of illegal possession of a machete and received five months and 15 days in jail. Twelve people stood trial, but none faced murder charges in what human rights activists said was a travesty of justice in the world’s most populous Muslim-majority country. Ahmadiyah, unlike mainstream Muslims, do not believe Mohammed was the last prophet and are regarded as heretics and blasphemers by conservatives in places like Indonesia and Pakistan.
PHILIPPINES
More bodies recovered
Disaster officials say more bodies have been recovered from flood waters and landslides in the north of the country. The discoveries raise the death toll from a storm to 35. Civil Defense Administrator Benito Ramos said 25 fishermen remain missing, nearly all of them from one boat that sank in the center of the country. Ramos said yesterday that among the bodies rescuers have recovered were those of two government mines bureau staffers and the two police officers with them. The weather bureau said Tropical Storm Nock-ten was heading to southern China with maximum winds of 95kph.
AUSTRALIA
Smoke makes jet do U-turn
An Air Canada plane bound for Vancouver was forced to dump fuel and return to Sydney yesterday after crew reported smoke coming from an oven in the galley, the airline said. The Boeing 777 aircraft landed safely without incident, according to a Sydney Airport spokesman. Air Canada’s general manager for Australia and New Zealand Jeannie Foster was quoted by local media as saying the plane returned to Sydney as a precaution, denying earlier reports of a fire. “A crew member saw smoke come out of the oven in the galley and informed the captain. The captain took the precaution to return to Sydney ... No emergency was declared. There was no fire, only smoke,” she was quoted as saying on Sky News.
SOUTH KOREA
Two killed in plane crash
The pilot and co-pilot of an Asiana Airlines cargo plane were killed when the aircraft caught fire and crashed yesterday off the southern island of Jeju, officials said. Investigations were focusing on whether inflammable material in the hold of the Boeing 747-400 sparked the blaze. The plane left the country’s main international airport at Incheon at 3:05am bound for Shanghai’s Pudong airport, but about an hour after takeoff the pilot radioed Chinese air traffic controllers in Shanghai and said that a fire had broken out in the hold and that the plane had to divert to Jeju, transport ministry officials said.
NEW ZEALAND
Missing teen confirmed dead
A teenager missing since the shootings on Norway’s Utoeya island was confirmed yesterday to have been killed in the massacre. “It is with great sadness and pain that today we got the message we have feared would come through. Our beloved daughter Sharidyn Meegan Ngahiwi Svebakk-Bohn is confirmed dead,” her parents said in a statement. Sharidyn, 14, is believed to be the youngest victim among the 68 people killed by a gunman last week.
UNITED KINGDOM
Workers look for high pay
Workers put pay above job satisfaction when changing jobs, in a reversal of priorities from last year, a survey showed on Wednesday. The survey of 2,000 employees by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development showed 54 percent of workers see pay as the main reason for wanting to change jobs, whereas last year 61 percent cited job satisfaction as their priority. In an environment of pay freezes, high inflation and slow growth, 36 percent of those surveyed reported a decline in the quality of life in the past six months, the institute said. In the survey, 18 percent said they almost or almost always run out of money before payday, and the same proportion said they find paying the bills a constant struggle, the institute said.
SOUTH AFRICA
Drink spiller found guilty
A man was found guilty of assault on Wednesday for spilling a whiskey and water drink near President Jacob Zuma at the country’s premier horse race last year, local media reported. Charges were laid against Daryl Peense, a betting agent, after an incident at the Durban July horse race a year ago in which he allegedly spilled his drink over Zuma from a balcony. Peense was found guilty of assault on Wednesday and sentencing has been postponed to Sept. 7, SAPA news agency reported, citing a National Prosecution Authority spokeswoman. His attorney told the court earlier that Peense was drunk at the time and only a small quantity of whiskey was spilled from his glass.
RUSSIA
ISS to be de-orbited in 2020
Moscow plans to de-orbit the mammoth International Space Station (ISS) in a controlled descent into the Pacific in 2020, a top space official said on Wednesday. Vitaly Davydov, the deputy head of Russia’s federal space agency, Roscosmos, said that the station “cannot be left in orbit” after it stops operation. He said in a Web-posted statement that the station would have to be de-orbited in a “planned crash so that there is no space junk left behind.” The colossal station that cost billions is the biggest orbiting outpost ever built and can sometimes be seen from the Earth with the naked eye. It now consists of more than a dozen modules built by the US, Russia, Canada, Japan and the European Space Agency. Moscow sank its Mir space station in the Pacific in 1998 after five years in operation.
UNITED STATES
Tape sheds light on case
The recording of a phone conversation between a New York maid who has accused the former IMF chief of attempted rape and a jailed friend proves she is not after money, her lawyer said on Wednesday. Nafissatou Diallo “never said the words” attributed to her by a newspaper that Dominique Strauss-Kahn had a lot of money, her lawyer Kenneth Thompson told reporters, adding that she also had the right to pursue a civil lawsuit. “I’m telling you that certain things were said that were merged together in this quote that was given to the New York Times,” Thompson told reporters. He was speaking after Diallo, 32, and her lawyer spent eight hours with the prosecutors at the Manhattan district attorney’s office on Wednesday amid questions about her credibility. The French politician and former head of the IMF has denied seven charges of attempted rape and sexual assault arising out of the incident in his Sofitel hotel suite on May 14. Diallo went public for the first time on Sunday saying she wanted justice as the case against Strauss-Kahn, 62, appeared to crumble and also to clear her name.
UNITED STATES
Hero pooch show to air
Film star Ewan McGregor and actress and animal rights campaigner Betty White will join Whoopi Goldberg and other stars on a panel to judge a new heroic dog award show, the Hallmark Channel said on Wednesday. The American Humane Association is bringing the celebrities on board for its inaugural “Hero Dog Awards,” a TV contest which recognizes “thousands of specially trained dogs giving comfort to people every day,” the association said. The winning dogs will also get to attend their own red carpet awards gala. Canine movie star Rin Tin Tin will be given a special legacy award, presented to one of his doggie descendants.
CANADA
War crimes suspect held
Ottawa on Wednesday announced the arrest of a Peruvian suspected of complicity in war crimes — the fourth such arrest since the government issued a list of 30 wanted foreign fugitives last week. Henry Pantoja Carbonel, 53, was taken into custody in the Toronto area thanks to “tips and information” provided by the public, public safety minister Vic Toews told a press conference. The minister did not explain the crimes allegedly committed by the Peruvian national, who was in custody pending extradition.
UNITED STATES
Playboy show irks watchdog
A TV watchdog group on Wednesday accused NBC of glamorizing the porn industry in its upcoming new drama series The Playboy Club and urged NBC affiliates around the US not to air it. In letters to NBC’s local TV stations, the 1.3 million member Parents Television Council said the drama “glorifies and glamorizes this insidious industry” and that pornography destroys families and exploits women. The Playboy Club, which is due to debut on Sept. 19 in the 10pm timeslot, is set in the early 1960s and centers around the lives of Playboy Bunnies and customers of the original Playboy Club in Chicago. It is described by NBC as a “provocative new drama.”
GUATEMALA
Drug threat to election
Drug traffickers pose a serious threat to general elections in September, President Alvaro Colom said in an interview published on Wednesday in Mexico. The nation has stepped up a military clampdown on drug traffickers after 27 farm workers were found decapitated in Peten Department in May in a crime blamed on Mexico’s Zetas drug gang. During the elections, drug gangs “will try to recover their influence at a local level, in parliament, in the presidency, at all levels,” Colom told Mexico’s La Jornada daily. “We’ve put more than 6,400 people with links to drug trafficking in jail ... seven out of 10 members of Guatemalan drug cartels are behind bars ... and they don’t like that.” Elections will be held on Sept. 11 for a new president and vice president.
UNITED STATES
Woman hit in face by arrow
An 80-year-old US woman who was enjoying a doughnut at her kitchen table was hit in the face by a stray arrow apparently shot by a neighbor honing his archery skills, police said on Wednesday. The woman, great-grandmother Margaret Shofner, calmly pulled the arrow out of her jaw on Tuesday morning and put it on her table. She did not require hospitalization and was not sure at first what hit her. Police found nearby resident Robert Joiner, 26, still practicing his bow and arrow shots an hour after the incident. He was charged with second-degree assault and armed criminal action, police said. He was released on US$25,000 bail.
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