MALAYSIA
Bad translation mangles site
The defense ministry yesterday blamed the use of Google Translate for the mangled English that appeared on its Web site sparking online ridicule. The translations from Malay into English included dress guidelines for ministry staff that prohibited “clothes that poke eye” — a reference to revealing attire. Another section of the ministry’s Web site said that after the 1957 independence from Britain, the new government took “drastic measures to increase the level of any national security threat.” Snickering people passed the bungled translations around via social networking sites. The passages have since been removed from site.
NEW ZEALAND
Baby abductor charged
A woman who fooled her family into believing she was pregnant has been charged with abduction after allegedly walking into a hospital and stealing a newborn baby, police said yesterday. Neha Narayan was arrested after she was found with the baby heading for the hospital car park where her partner was waiting to take her home with what he believed was their own child. Police spokeswoman Ana-Mari Gates-Bowey told reporters Narayan faked her pregnancy for nine months before telling her partner to drop her off at Auckland’s Middlemore hospital as she was due to give birth. Inside the hospital, the 24-year-old was able to roam the maternity ward. At one stage she was found holding a baby, which she said she was comforting, and later she was handed a baby by a hospital staff member who believed she was the mother, Gates-Bowey said.
CHINA
Wen to visit Middle East
Premier Wen Jiabao (溫家寶) will this week visit Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, the foreign ministry said yesterday, amid mounting international tensions over oil-rich Iran. The country is under pressure to secure the energy supplies it needs to keep its booming economy going. Wen will hold talks with leaders of the three Arab nations and attend the World Future Energy Summit in Abu Dhabi during his six-day trip, foreign ministry spokesman Liu Weimin (劉為民) said in a statement.
MALAYSIA
Smuggled tusks seized
The government seized elephant tusks worth 2.4 million ringgit (US$760,000) from South Africa in the first haul of smuggled ivory destined for the Southeast Asian country, officials said yesterday. The tusks, weighing about 500kg, were discovered during inspections at the busy Port Klang in Selangor state, Azis Yacub, the state’s customs director, said in a statement. Recently, the country has seized several large shipments of African ivory, but all were destined for other countries, making Friday’s haul “an unusual development,” according to wildlife trade monitoring network TRAFFIC.
INDONESIA
Man dies of H5N1
A 24-year-old man infected with bird flu died in Jakarta, the health ministry said yesterday, in the country’s third fatal case in three months. “Test results from the man who died confirmed that he was infected with bird flu,” health ministry head of communicable diseases Tjandra Yoga Aditama said. The man likely contracted the H5N1 avian influenza virus from pet pigeons living around his house, Aditama said. The Jakarta Post reported that the man died on Saturday after being rejected by a hospital specializing in bird flu and had on New Year’s Eve been misdiagnosed by two other hospitals with a gastric infection and dengue fever.
Agencies
UNITED KINGDOM
Celebrity sorry for stealing
A celebrity chef has apologized after he was caught shoplifting from a supermarket. Antony Worrall Thompson was caught stealing cheese and wine from a Tesco store in Henley-on-Thames, west of London. In a statement posted on his Web site on Monday, the 60-year-old said he was sorry “for all my recent stupid and irresponsible actions.” He said he would seek treatment and apologized to Tesco staff. The Sun newspaper reported that he stole cheese and wine. Thames Valley Police issued Worrall Thompson with a formal caution — a written rebuke for a crime. Worrall Thompson will not face further charges, but the caution can be mentioned in court if he offends again.
GREECE
Picasso stolen from gallery
A Pablo Picasso painting gifted to the country by the Spanish-born master was stolen from the National Gallery in Athens early on Monday with two other important artworks, prompting scorn from the police minister. Woman’s Head, a 1939 oil on canvas, had been given by Picasso to the state in 1949 in recognition of the country’s resistance to Nazi Germany, police said in a statement. The back of the painting reads in French: “For the Greek people, a tribute by Picasso.” Mill, a 1905 oil painting of a windmill by Dutch abstract artist Piet Mondrian, was also stolen, along with a sketch of St Diego de Alcala by 16th--century Italian artist Guglielmo Caccia, better known as Moncalvo, police said. “I am very sorry, because an artwork of huge value was stolen,” Citizen’s Protection Minister Christos Papoutsis told reporters, referring to the Picasso. Papoutsis termed the gallery’s security arrangements “non-existent” and noted that a private security company hired to supplement the building’s sole guard “took hours” to respond to the break-in.
LIBYA
Suspect arrested for murder
Authorities have arrested a suspect in the killing of a French former serviceman in Tripoli, LANA news agency reported on Monday, saying the murder had no political motive. LANA, citing the interior ministry, said Mohammed al-Kurdi, 28, had been arrested as the “suspected killer” for the murder of former serviceman Hugues de Samie. “The [arrested] criminal is a drug addict and his motive was theft. There are no political motives,” LANA said. “The interior ministry said there were no political motives behind the murder of the French citizen in the Zawiet al-Dahmani neighborhood of Tripoli.” The French foreign ministry on Monday confirmed the killing of de Samie, 60, who had a long military career.
NIGERIA
Three killed in general strike
Trade unions began a second day of nationwide strikes yesterday to protest against the removal of fuel subsidies, as President Goodluck Jonathan and workers remain in deadlock after three people were killed on the first day of demonstrations. The fuel regulator announced on Jan. 1 that subsidies on imports of motor fuel would end immediately, more than doubling the price of gasoline to about 150 naira (US$0.93) a liter and sparking protests across the country. Police shot dead at least two protesters and wounded more than two dozen on Monday after firing live ammunition and tear gas to disperse protesters in the commercial hub Lagos and the largest northern city of Kano. Tens of thousands marched the streets in demonstrations up and down Africa’s most populous nation and banks, gas stations and domestic airports were closed.
UNITED STATES
Theft ringleader sentenced
The leader of a crime ring that combined pickpocketing, identity theft and costumes to steal more than US$700,000 from banks is headed to prison for nine to 18 years. Arthur Franklin didn’t speak at his sentencing on Monday. The 47-year-old pleaded guilty in October last year to conspiracy, grand larceny and other charges. The Manhattan district attorney’s office said some conspirators stole victims’ wallets. Then associates working at a Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, collection agency covertly tapped a credit database to get victims’ personal information. Prosecutors said other schemers then dressed up as the victims, posed as them at banks and withdrew thousands of US dollars.
UNITED STATES
Slave-math under fire
Suburban Atlanta school officials are deciding whether to discipline teachers who gave third-grade students math homework with word problems about slavery. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) has called for the firing of the nine teachers involved. One of the math problems reads: “Each tree has 56 oranges. If eight slaves pick them equally, then how much would each slave pick?” Another was: “If Frederick got two beatings each day, how many beatings did he get in one week?” Gwinnett County schools spokeswoman Sloan Roach said on Monday that the district is working with the school principal to address the problem after parents complained about the worksheets.
UNITED STATES
Base lockdown after theft
Army authorities ordered about 100 troops on lockdown after night-vision goggles and other high-tech gear worth US$600,000 was stolen from a base in Washington state, officers said on Monday. The lockdown restricts the soldiers to their barracks, showers and work place and bars them from venturing off of Joint Base Lewis-McChord until army criminal investigators complete their work, a spokesman said.
UNITED STATES
Ex-soldier charged
A former soldier was charged on Friday with attempting to provide material support to al-Shabaab in Somalia by trying to join its ranks. Federal prosecutors in Maryland said Craig Baxam was arrested on Friday. Prosecutors said Baxam, 24, left the US last month and was arrested by Kenyan authorities, who suspected he was traveling to Somalia to join al-Shabaab. He was interviewed by FBI agents in Kenya and arrested on his return to Maryland.
UNITED STATES
Execution drug defended
Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning produced documents on Monday he said contradicted claims that state officials had been conned into buying stolen doses of an execution drug. The Nebraska Department of Correctional Services announced in November last year it had obtained sodium thiopental, one of three drugs needed to carry out executions by lethal injection, from Swiss company Naari AG. Nebraska plans to use the drug to execute Michael Ryan for a 1985 slaying. However, Ryan’s attorney claims the doses Nebraska recently bought were supposed to be used only for “test and evaluation” as an anesthetic in Zambia and not sold. Bruning said the e-mails and financial statements released on Monday show the Indian drug broker, Harris Pharma LLP, bought the drug from Naari and then sold doses to Nebraska.
Far from the violence ravaging Haiti, a market on the border with the Dominican Republic has maintained a welcome degree of normal everyday life. At the Dajabon border gate, a wave of Haitians press forward, eager to shop at the twice-weekly market about 200km from Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince. They are drawn by the market’s offerings — food, clothing, toys and even used appliances — items not always readily available in Haiti. However, with gang violence bad and growing ever worse in Haiti, the Dominican government has reinforced the usual military presence at the border and placed soldiers on alert. While the market continues to
An image of a dancer balancing on the words “China Before Communism” looms over Parisian commuters catching the morning metro, signaling the annual return of Shen Yun, a controversial spectacle of traditional Chinese dance mixed with vehement criticism of Beijing and conservative rhetoric. The Shen Yun Performing Arts company has slipped the beliefs of a spiritual movement called Falun Gong in between its technicolored visuals and leaping dancers since 2006, with advertising for the show so ubiquitous that it has become an Internet meme. Founded in 1992, Falun Gong claims nearly 100 million followers and has been subject to “persistent persecution” in
ONLINE VITRIOL: While Mo Yan faces a lawsuit, bottled water company Nongfu Spring and Tsinghua University are being attacked amid a rise in nationalist fervor At first glance, a Nobel prize winning author, a bottle of green tea and Beijing’s Tsinghua University have little in common, but in recent weeks they have been dubbed by China’s nationalist netizens as the “three new evils” in the fight to defend the country’s valor in cyberspace. Last month, a patriotic blogger called Wu Wanzheng filed a lawsuit against China’s only Nobel prize-winning author, Mo Yan (莫言), accusing him of discrediting the Communist army and glorifying Japanese soldiers in his fictional works set during the Japanese invasion of China. Wu, who posts online under the pseudonym “Truth-Telling Mao Xinghuo,” is seeking
‘SURPRISES’: The militants claim to have successfully tested a missile capable of reaching Mach 8 and vowed to strike ships heading toward the Cape of Good Hope Yemen’s Houthi rebels claim to have a new, hypersonic missile in their arsenal, Russia’s state media reported on Thursday, potentially raising the stakes in their attacks on shipping in the Red Sea and surrounding waterways against the backdrop of Israel’s war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The report by the state-run RIA Novosti news agency cited an unidentified official, but provided no evidence for the claim. It comes as Moscow maintains an aggressively counter-Western foreign policy amid its grinding war on Ukraine. However, the Houthis have for weeks hinted about “surprises” they plan for the battles at sea to counter the