CHINA
Plane takes off without OK
China Eastern Airlines pledged on Wednesday to improve its crews’ English skills after one of its flights took off from a Japanese airport without authorization. The airline did not say what caused the error, but pledged to “further improve the English communication skills of our flight crews to assure flight safety,” suggesting it may have been a misunderstanding. The airline also said it was cooperating with an investigation by Japanese authorities into Monday’s incident, in which its pilot took off from Osaka airport without clearance from air traffic controllers. The plane, which was carrying 245 passengers, took off without incident and landed safely in Shanghai, the China Daily reported. The latest incident comes after the privately-owned airline Juneyao said in August one of its pilots had refused to give up his landing slot to a passenger plane that issued a distress call to say it was running out of fuel. The pilot of the Qatar plane had alerted air traffic control at Shanghai’s Hongqiao airport that it had just five minutes’ worth of fuel left after it was diverted from Shanghai Pudong airport.
CHINA
Mekong patrols to start
China and Southeast Asian neighbors would start coordinated patrols of the violence-troubled Mekong River by the middle of this month, the Ministry of Public Security said, after a meeting that also agreed to let Beijing send advisors to Myanmar and Laos. The announcement followed an uproar after 13 Chinese sailors were killed on the river in October when their two boats were attacked in the “Golden Triangle,” where the borders of Myanmar, Thailand and Laos meet in a region notorious for drug smuggling. Nine Thai soldiers later turned themselves in over the killings.
IRAQ
Car bomb kills 10 at market
A car bomb in a market in confessionally mixed Diyala Province, north of Baghdad, killed 10 people and wounded at least 20 yesterday, medical and security officials said. “We counted 10 bodies and at least 20 wounded in the explosion of a car bomb parked near a vegetable market in Khalis,” an Iraqi army colonel said, speaking on condition of anonymity. The casualty toll was confirmed by a medic at the main hospital in the Diyala provincial capital, Baquba. “We received 10 bodies and admitted 25 wounded. Two policemen were among them,” said Firaz al-Dulaimi, a doctor. The deaths came just weeks before US troops are scheduled to a complete a withdrawal from Iraq that has raised concerns about the ability of Iraqi forces to maintain security.
INDONESIA
Shots fired in Papua protest
Security forces opened fire at a separatist flag-raising ceremony in the restive Papua region yesterday, on the 50th anniversary of the region’s claim to independence. About 500 protesters had watched a traditional dance and started cheering and running in a large circle when the region’s Morning Star flag was raised on a bamboo pole, a reporter at the scene witnessed. About 120 police and soldiers, along with a military truck, stormed the crowd and opened fire after the main flag was raised. Police detained two protesters after kicking and punching them on the ground. Papuan youth activist leader Markus Haluk said two people had been shot, but a Mimika District deputy police chief denied the shootings, saying police merely fired warning shots into the air.
SINGAPORE
Pirates release tanker
Somalian pirates released a chemical tanker owned by Singapore shipping company Glory Ship Management, but broke an agreement to release all the crew, keeping four South Korean seamen including the captain captive, the company said yesterday. MT Gemini, the 29,871 tonne chemical tanker, was carrying crude palm oil from Indonesia when it was hijacked 215 days ago off the east African coast, the company said in a statement. “The pirates on 30 November released 21 of the 25 crew on board but took four South Korean seamen, including the captain, ashore at the last moment despite earlier promises to release the entire all-man crew,” Glory said.
FRANCE
Somalian pirates jailed
Five pirates captured by French commandos in 2008 were sentenced to between four to eight years in jail by a Paris court on Wednesday for their role in hijacking a yacht in the Gulf of Aden that year and kidnapping two French citizens. The trial was the first of four to be held in France in a bid to increase the number of Somalian pirates brought to justice. The men on trial were aged 21 to 36, with the prosecutor asking for jail sentences of between six to 16 years for attacking the yacht Carre d’As in September 2008, and holding Jean-Yves Delanne and his wife, Bernadette, for ransom for 10 days until they were freed by French commandos.
FRANCE
China to lend panda pair
China and France have agreed a high-level deal for Beijing to lend two giant pandas to a French zoo for 10 years starting from early next year, the zoo’s director said on Wednesday. The pair will be the first pandas sent to France since the death of Yen Yen in 2000, who was given to former French president Georges Pompidou in the 1970s along with another panda, who died shortly after arriving.
UNITED STATES
Baseline Killer gets death
An Arizona jury has sentenced a man convicted of being the Phoenix area’s Baseline Killer to death, agreeing with prosecutors that the murders he committed were especially cruel. Jurors reached the verdict on Wednesday, about a month after finding 47-year-old Mark Goudeau guilty of the nine murders and 58 other charges, including kidnapping and rape. Goudeau had been serving a 438-year sentence in a 2005 sexual assault case tied to the Baseline Killer attacks, but only recently became eligible for the death penalty after the murder convictions. Police named the series of killings and other crimes after Baseline Road in south Phoenix where many of the earliest attacks happened.
UNITED STATES
No bail for hair cutters
A federal magistrate in the state of Ohio has denied bond to four of seven men accused of hair-cutting attacks on fellow Amish and ruled that their cases can go before a grand jury. US Magistrate George Limbert in Youngstown made the rulings following hearings on Wednesday. The men were charged with hate crimes last week after federal agents raided the compound of their breakaway Amish group. Three others face similar hearings today. Authorities accuse the men of forcibly cutting the beards and hair of Amish men and women and taking their photos. The Amish believe the Bible instructs women to grow hair long and men to grow beards and stop shaving once married. Authorities say the men carried out attacks in September, October and last month outside Bergholtz in eastern Ohio.
UNITED STATES
Put condoms in porn: group
A group that wants porn actors to wear condoms during film shoots said on Wednesday it has gathered more than 64,000 valid voter signatures to put the issue on the ballot in Los Angeles — about 23,000 more than the law requires. The city’s San Fernando Valley is the heart of the multibillion-US dollar US porn industry. The AIDS Healthcare Foundation has made a number of unsuccessful efforts — through state legislation, lawsuits and complaints to regulators — to require condoms in adult films. “We believe these performers deserve the health and safety protections already afforded them under existing law, and that all levels of government need to be involved in this workplace safety issue,” foundation president Michael Weinstein said. To get on the city’s ballot in June, advocates must turn in 41,183 signatures. If passed, the measure would require porn producers to agree to have their actors use condoms in adult films shot in Los Angeles in order to obtain permits to film in the city.
ARGENTINA
Transsexuals get recognition
Argentina’s Security Ministry is allowing transsexual members of federal police and security forces to be recognized under the gender that they’ve adopted. The new ministry resolution also lets transsexuals wear the uniforms and use the facilities matching their adopted gender. The order affects members of the federal, naval and airport police and the gendarmerie. Argentina has been at the forefront in widening gender rights. Last year it became the first Latin American country to legalize same-sex marriage. The Chamber of Deputies approved a bill on Wednesday allowing all transvestites and transsexuals to be recognized by the gender of their choice.
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
‘POLITICAL EARTHQUAKE’: Leo Varadkar said he was ‘no longer the best person’ to lead the nation and was stepping down for political, as well as personal, reasons Leo Varadkar on Wednesday announced that he was stepping down as Ireland’s prime minister and leader of the Fine Gael party in the governing coalition, citing “personal and political” reasons. Pundits called the surprise move, just 10 weeks before Ireland holds European Parliament and local elections, a “political earthquake.” A general election has to be held within a year. Irish Deputy Prime Minister Micheal Martin, leader of Fianna Fail, the main coalition partner, said Varadkar’s announcement was “unexpected,” but added that he expected the government to run its full term. An emotional Varadkar, who is in his second stint as prime minister and at
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