FRANCE
Legislator to be kicked out
President Nicolas Sarkozy’s party says it is kicking out a legislator who downplayed the persecution of gays during World War II and suggested homosexuals hold too much sway in the country. The head of the conservative party UMP, Jean-Francois Cope, said on Wednesday that lawmaker Christian Vanneste would be expelled because of his “deeply shocking and intolerable comments.” Cope says the party will finalize the decision at a meeting next week. In a video broadcast on a French Web site, Vanneste said gays are “at the heart of power” in the country and referred to “the legend of the deportation of homosexuals” during the war. Historians estimate that thousands of gay men were sent to Nazi concentration camps.
PAKISTAN
Bomber targets militia
A suicide bomber targeted volunteers in a pro--government militia yesterday, killing one person and wounding at least three others in an area troubled by Taliban violence, police said. The bomber was spotted by members of the lashkar and blew himself up after they chased and surrounded him in a market area of Dir town in the northwestern district of Upper Dir near the Afghan border. “One person was killed. He was the son of local lashkar chief Mutabar Khan and six people were wounded,” police official Mohammed Ayub said. Taliban and other Islamist insurgents routinely target members of tribal militias, known as lashkars, which support government security forces in fending off militant threats across northwest Pakistan.
IRAN
Engineers still captive
Seven Iranian engineers kidnapped near Syria’s embattled city of Homs in late December have not been released as previously reported, and remain captives, the foreign ministry said yesterday. “We hope to witness the freedom of the Iranian engineers and the rest of pilgrims soon,” ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast was quoted as saying by the Fars news agency. A week ago, the ministry announced that the seven, working on an electricity plant near Homs, had been released by their abductors. A previously unknown group calling itself the “Movement Against the Expansion of Shiism in Syria” claimed responsibility for their abduction in a statement received by AFP in Nicosia at the beginning of last month. Another distinct group of 11 Iranian pilgrims also remain captives in Syria.
NETHERLANDS
Mladic trial date moved
The Yugoslav war crimes tribunal on Wednesday pushed back by almost seven weeks the start of the long-awaited genocide trial of former Bosnian Serb military chief General Ratko Mladic. The UN court announced the trial would start May 14 instead of the previous provisional date of March 27 to allow Mladic’s lawyers more time to prepare. Mladic’s defense team says it needs until October to read through thousands of pages of evidence to prepare for the trial.
CZECH REPUBLIC
Snow causes traffic chaos
Almost 100 cars were involved in two massive pileups in heavy snowstorms on a major highway about 300km east of Prague on Wednesday, although passengers escaped serious injury. Police said about 40 cars crashed before midday. Two people escaped with light injuries. In another crash, dozens of vehicles, including a bus, collided about 100km southeast of the capital, police spokeswoman Dana Cirtkova said. Four bus passengers and a female driver were injured.
UNITED STATES
Clinton to attend G20 meet
US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton will travel to Mexico over the weekend for talks with G20 foreign ministers on international economic issues, the Department of State said on Wednesday. The chief US diplomat will attend a first G20 meeting for foreign ministers from tomorrow to Monday in the Mexican resort of Los Cabos, Department of State spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said. Clinton and her counterparts are set to tackle “global economic matters, including principles for the international economic system, green growth and sustainable development, food security and human development,” Nuland said.
BRAZIL
Conjoined twins separated
Conjoined twins Israel and Levi were separated successfully on Wednesday at the Maternity Hospital of Goiania in a surgery that lasted nearly 10 hours, the twins’ doctor said. The 14-month-old boys were joined at the hip and abdomen. They shared intestines, a bladder and genitalia, said pediatric surgeon Zacharias Calil, a specialist in separating conjoined twins. “It was very difficult, very complicated, but we managed [to separate them],” Calil said. The brothers “came through the surgery well.” Calil estimated Israel and Levi’s chances of recovery at 50 percent. The surgery cost about US$465,000, which was subsidized by the Goias State Government, the doctor said.
UNITED STATES
Judge refuses to step down
A judge on Wednesday refused to step down from the trial of a Roman Catholic clergyman accused of aiding priests who were sexually abusing children, brushing aside complaints by defense lawyers that she was biased against the defendant. Calling herself fair and impartial, Common Pleas Court Judge Teresa Sarmina denied the request by defense lawyers for Monsignor William Lynn that she step aside. The lawyers, in a petition filed last week, noted that Sarmina had said in an earlier hearing that “anybody that doesn’t think there is widespread sexual abuse within the Catholic Church is living on another planet.” They argued that the statement showed a bias against their client.
UNITED STATES
Hezbollah being watched
Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano says the activities of Iran-linked militant group Hezbollah are being closely monitored. Napolitano told lawmakers on Wednesday that her department had contacted Jewish organizations around the country and that it is working with the FBI and other law enforcement and intelligence agencies. She said there is no specific or credible threat against any organization or target in the US, which considers Hezbollah a terrorist group.
MEXICO
Police find six corpses
Police found six dismembered bodies in plastic bags on a road in the center of the country, authorities said on Wednesday. The prosecutor of Morelos State, which neighbors Mexico City, said the killings were likely due to a dispute between criminal gangs in the area. Pedro Luis Benitez said in a statement that the remains were found on a road between the resort city of Cuernavaca and Cuautla, both in Morelos. Local police, declining to be named, said residents alerted them to the remains and that a message lay nearby with apparent threats from the cult-like La Familia drug gang, based in western Michoacan State. Forensic investigators were seeking to identify the bodies.
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