UNITED KINGDOM
Woman demolishes factory
It was a daily reminder of the death of her father in an industrial accident, but a mother of two said she felt relief after she was given the chance to demolish the factory where he was killed. Sarah Griffiths won a competition to lead the demolition on Sunday of a tower owned by Campbell’s Soup food manufacturer. It was the site where her father, Mick Locke, was fatally scalded in 1995 in a steam accident. After she triggered the series of explosions which downed the factory in King’s Lynn, England, the 41-year-old Griffiths said the event had given her a “chance of closure.” The site was being cleared for a new commercial and retail development.
FRANCE
Two pandas welcomed
Two Chinese pandas got a red-carpet welcome on Sunday when they arrived in Paris for a new life in a country zoo after Beijing put aside its differences with France and extended the hand of bear diplomacy. The giant black and white bears arrived at Charles de Gaulle airport from Sichuan Province in the “Panda Express,” a Boeing 777 specially decorated with a panda motif. China’s ambassador to Paris, a French MP and zoo staff were on hand to greet the pair before they were whisked off in a truck with a police escort to their new home among the chateaux of the Loire valley. Huan Huan (Happy) and Yuan Zi (Chubby) are the first pandas sent to France since 1973, when Yen Yen — who lived till 2000 — was given to then-president Georges Pompidou along with another panda, which died shortly after arriving.
JAPAN
Naked corpse found
Tokyo police yesterday were investigating after finding the body of a naked man whose genitals had been sliced off with a kitchen knife, media reports said. The corpse of the 49-year-old man, who had been stabbed several times in the chest and stomach, was found lying on a bed in an apartment in the west of the city, NHK reported. The man’s genitals were discovered under the bed and a blood-covered knife was also found in the room, Jiji Press said, citing police sources. A spokeswoman for Tokyo Metropolitan Police confirmed that officers were investigating an unnatural death.
VIETNAM
Dissident released
Authorities have released a French-Vietnamese dissident who spent 17 months in jail after being convicted of attempting to overthrow the government. Lawyer Tran Vu Hai said yesterday that 56-year-old Pham Minh Hoang was freed from jail on Friday and would now serve three years of house arrest. Hoang holds dual citizenship. He was sentenced to three years in jail after an August trial in which he was found guilty of posting 33 articles criticizing the one-party Communist system, as well as of holding membership in a banned group and recruiting others to join it. An appeals court in November reduced his sentence to 17 months, citing his cooperation with police and his commitment to renounce the banned group.
AUSTRIA
Farmer crushed by cow
A farmer has died after being crushed by a cow, authorities in the northwestern Upper Austria province said. The accident happened early on Sunday as the 31-year-old woman worked at her farm, they said. She apparently was crushed against a trough or a wall by the animal and died of her injuries at the scene.
ISRAEL
War games postponed
Defense officials say Washington and Jerusalem have postponed their largest-ever war games to avoid aggravating mounting tensions between Iran and the international community. The missile defense exercise, “Austere Challenge 12,” was scheduled for April to improve defense systems and cooperation between the two forces. Defense officials said yesterday the drill would not take place before the second half of this year. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the decision, which they said was taken on Sunday.
IRAQ
Bomb targets minority group
A car bomb targeting an internally displaced persons camp for a tiny minority group near the main northern city of Mosul killed five people and wounded six others yesterday, officials said. The 8am blast in the town of Bartala, in Nineveh Province north of Baghdad, occurred inside the al-Ghadir camp housing displaced members of the Shabak community, a sect of Kurdish origin, according to an army official and a medic at Mosul General Hospital. The Shabak community numbers about 30,000 people living in 35 villages in Nineveh, and many want to become part of the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq. They speak a distinct language and largely follow a faith that is a blend of Shiite Islam and local beliefs.
CANADA
Liberals backs marijuana bill
The Liberal Party overwhelmingly passed a motion on Sunday proposing the legalization of marijuana on the last day of its national convention, at which Michael Crawley was chosen as its new leader. The motion says that, if elected, a Liberal government “will legalize marijuana and ensure the regulation and taxation of its production, distribution and use, while enacting strict penalties for illegal trafficking, illegal importation and exportation, and impaired driving.” Under the motion, the Liberals also promised an amnesty for all citizens previously found guilty of simple or minimal possession of marijuana and to clear the offenses from their criminal records. The motion passed with 77 percent of the vote.
SOMALIA
Crew freed after ransom
Pirates have freed the 18-man crew of a Maltese-flagged chemical tanker after the payment of a US$4 million ransom, the maritime editor of the Somalia Report said yesterday. Andrew Mwangura, an authoritative source on piracy, said the crew — three Turks and 15 Georgians — sailed to the Kenyan port of Mombasa in a tugboat after their release last week, while the tanker, the MV Olib G, was abandoned off the coast. The Greek-owned and operated chemical tanker was seized in the Gulf of Aden while on its final trip before the scrapyard, according to Mwangura, a former regional maritime official.
DENMARK
Danes slash catering budget
Copenhagen, which hosts the rotating presidency of the EU, will reduce servings of meat and serve tap water, rather than bottled water, at the summits it will host for the bloc’s leaders, TV2 reported. The government plans to spend about 35 million euros (US$44 million) on its six-month presidency compared with the 115 million euros that Poland spent during its term in the second half of last year, the broadcaster said, citing data from the foreign ministry.
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