CHINA
Injured toddler ignored
More than a dozen passers-by ignored a two-year-old girl as she lay critically injured on a street in the southern city of Foshan after being run over first by a van and then a truck outside her family’s shop, Xinhua news agency said yesterday. Xinhua said a garbage collector who finally came to the girl’s aid, moving her to the curb and shouting for help, was ignored by several shopkeepers before he finally tracked down her mother who took her to hospital. Doctors said Yue Yue was in a coma and unlikely to survive the ordeal. Police have detained the drivers of both vehicles involved in the incident, Xinhua said.
CHINA
Bus crash kills 10
A tourist bus carrying many elderly passengers overturned on a winding highway in the south on Sunday, leaving 10 people dead and 33 injured, state media said. The bus carrying 49 people may have blown a tire, causing the vehicle to flip over into a ditch outside Zhangjiajie City, the reports said.
VIETNAM
Girl trampled by elephant
A circus elephant scooped up an 11-year-old girl with its trunk as she tried to feed it, threw her to the ground and trampled her to death, police said yesterday. Nguyen Thao Anh was offering sugarcane to the animal in the city of Lao Cai on Sunday when the attack happened, police officer Phan Van Quang said. Vietnam Circus Federation deputy director Nguyen Xuan Quang said the girl’s father had taken her in to feed the elephant, which was in a fenced compound with its legs chained. The father was talking on the phone when the attack happened, he said.
NEPAL
Controversial minister fired
The Maoist party said on Sunday it was removing a minister accused of involvement in the murder of a Hindu activist. Party leaders said parliamentary protests against land reforms minister Prabhu Sah were distracting from the peace process and had made his position untenable. Kashi Nath Tiwari, the president of Nepal’s Hindu Youth Association, was shot dead by three masked gunmen near his house in the town of Birgunj in June last year. Sah has been identified as a suspect in the killing, but state prosecutors have refused to lodge a case against him, citing a lack of evidence.
SOUTH KOREA
US$4 for war death
A woman has been offered a little more than US$4 in government compensation for the death of her brother during the Korean War. The woman was two years old when her brother was killed in combat in 1950, but never knew of his existence until told of his death by a neighbor, local media said, adding the woman’s mother has suffered from dementia. The family had not received any compensation until April when the soldier’s sister was awarded 5,000 won (US$4.33) under a law in effect during the war. The presidential Anti-Corruption and Civil Rights Commission has called the decision “incomprehensible” and urged the government to review it.
PHILIPPINES
Drill near Spratlys starts
About 3,000 Filipino and US marines yesterday started two weeks of military drills that will include a hostile beach assault exercise west of Palawan near the disputed Spratly Islands (南沙). US Marine 1st Lieutenant Nick Eisenbeiser said the exercises through Oct. 28 would focus on honing the military allies’ capability to ensure regional security and were not aiming at China or any nation as an imaginary target.
COLOMBIA
Women end no sex strike
The women of Barbacoas have ended a three-month, 19-day “crossed legs” strike of sexual abstinence aimed at getting a road to their isolated town paved, after officials pledged to invest in the project. “That night we devoted to our husbands. The desire was great and we took advantage of it,” Luz Marina Castillo, the leader of the protest, told Bogota newspaper El Tiempo in comments published on Sunday after the strike was lifted. Transport Minister German Cardona has pledged to invest an estimated US$21 million to pave the first 27km of the 57km road. At least 300 women began the strike on June 22.
UNITED KINGDOM
Passengers stuck on plane
Hundreds of air travelers were left stranded on Sunday after an incoming Air India flight was grounded for nine hours at London’s Gatwick Airport by a combination of fog and aviation rules. Police were called onto the Boeing 777 jet as tempers frayed among the 200 passengers after the airline prevented them from disembarking. The flight from Ahmedabad via Mumbai was due to arrive at Heathrow at 8am, but was diverted to Gatwick because of fog. The plane was unable to complete the 70km cross-city journey as aviation law limits the length of time for which flight crew are allowed to work in one shift. A replacement crew was shuttled across London, but reportedly got lost in Gatwick Airport.
VATICAN CITY
Pope gives up walking
Pope Benedict was wheeled up the main aisle of St Peter’s Basilica on a mobile platform at a ceremony on Sunday to spare him the unnecessary fatigue of walking, but the Vatican said there was no concern for his overall health. The 84-year-old pontiff stood on the platform as aides pushed it up the central aisle, which is about 100m long. He appeared to be in good health. He later used the same platform to leave the basilica. The platform, which has three steps and brass handles, was built to transport the late Pope John Paul II during the last five years of his life after he suffered a broken femur and had hip replacement surgery.
UNITED KINGDOM
Town gets ‘royal’ makeover
Wootton Bassett, the town which became a focal point for honoring soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, was on Sunday officially renamed with the prefix “Royal” in recognition of its efforts. Thousands lined the streets of the town in Wiltshire as Princess Anne handed over the Letters Patent on behalf of the Queen Elizabeth II. The sleepy town became known round the world for the dignified manner in which its residents lined the high street as a mark of respect to the army dead from Iraq and Afghanistan as the hearses passed bearing their bodies.
JORDAN
King Abdullah sacks Cabinet
King Abdullah yesterday sacked Prime Minister Marouf al-Bakhit, a conservative former army general and asked Awn Khaswaneh, an international jurist, to head a new government, a senior political source said. Khasawneh, 61, has been a member of the International Court of Justice since 2000, and was a former chief of the royal court and a legal advisor to the Jordanian team that negotiated the peace treaty with Israel in 1994. Bakhit’s government, which came to power in February after Abdullah sacked an unpopular prime minister after pro-reform street protests inspired by Arab uprisings, has been criticized for its inept handling of domestic problems, including preparations for elections.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At 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
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