JAPAN
Cabinet resigns for reshuffle
Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda sacked five members of his Cabinet yesterday, bowing to opposition demands for ministerial scalps as he sought cross-party support for a crucial tax hike. Noda called on the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) to back a bill that would double sales tax to try to tackle Japan’s debt mountain, currently twice its GDP. Defense minister Naoki Tanaka and transport minister Takeshi Maeda lost their jobs and Noda named Takushoku University professor Satoshi Morimoto as the new defense minister, while the new transport minister will be his party’s chief of upper house affairs, Yuichiro Hata. Noda also sacked agriculture, forestry and fisheries minister Michihiko Kano, whose involvement in a spy scandal with a Chinese diplomat has proved an embarrassment. Justice minister Toshio Ogawa and postal services minister Shozaburo Jimi were also removed.
PAKISTAN
Wedding bus crashes
At least 23 wedding guests, including six children, were killed and 60 injured when a bus plunged into a ravine near Islamabad, police said yesterday. The driver lost control of the vehicle late on Sunday at a sharp bend near Narr village, around 25km east of Islamabad. The bus was carrying 97 people to Chakwal District, 100km south of the capital, after a wedding. The bus was accompanying the bride and groom, who were traveling in a separate vehicle.
MONGOLIA
Former PM’s trial delayed
A court agreed yesterday to delay former president Nambaryn Enkhbayar’s corruption trial after he sought more time to study the case against him. Prosecutors have gathered about 5,000 pages of documents against Enkhbayar, his son Batshugar said in a phone interview from Ulan Bator. Enkhbayar, who was prime minister from 2000 to 2004 and president from 2005 to 2009, argues that the corruption accusations against him are meant to derail his bid to run in parliamentary elections later this month. The charges include privatizing a hotel for his own benefit and misappropriating television equipment donated to a Buddhist monastery. The case was delayed until June 12, Batshugar Enkhbayar said. Mongolia’s electoral commission ruled yesterday that Enkhbayar may not run for parliament, saying that he didn’t have enough education or experience to be a member, according to Batshugar Enkhbayar. His Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party planned to file an appeal today, his son said.
VIETNAM
War sites opened to US
The government yesterday agreed to open three new sites for excavation by the US to search for troop remains from the Vietnam War, the minister of defense told US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta during a meeting. The announcement came as Panetta and Vietnamese Defense Minister Phuong Quang Thanh exchanged artifacts collected during the war — letters written by a US soldier who was killed that had been kept and used as propaganda and a diary belonging to a Vietnamese soldier. US officials said this is the first time an exchange of war artifacts has occurred. The two defense leaders agreed to return the papers to the families of the deceased soldiers. Vietnamese officials said they would open the three previously restricted sites that the Pentagon believes are critical to locating troops missing in action.
UNITED STATES
‘Truman’ delusions studied
Two psychiatrists in the US have just published a paper called The Truman Show Delusions, in which brothers Joel and Ian Gold describe the cases of five psychiatric patients with experiences similar to the 1998 film, in which Jim Carrey’s character Truman Burbank is the unwitting star of a carefully controlled reality show. Three of the patients referenced the film directly. This is more common than you would think, says Peter Byrne, director of public education at the Royal College of Psychiatrists, who has treated people with such experiences. “Psychosis is a mixture of delusions — beliefs that are false, which arrive without any evidence or logic — but often also hallucinations, usually voices. It is true that some young people, because their experience includes reality TV, which is everywhere, and [CCTV] cameras, which are also everywhere, thanks to [former British prime minister] Tony Blair and co, then hear a commentary about themselves and assume it’s some kind of reality TV show.”
UNITED STATES
Obama signs sick note
When 11-year-old Tyler Sullivan went back to school yesterday, he had the ultimate excuse note for missing class one day last week — written and signed by President Barack Obama. Sullivan played hooky on Friday to see Obama in action during a visit to a Honeywell factory in Golden Valley, Minnesota. When the president finished his speech, the schoolboy took advantage of a chance to meet him. “I was sitting in the front row,” Sullivan told local TV station KARE. “I was pretty excited.” “I had a chance to shake his hand,” the boy said, adding that the president asked him about missing class. Obama then took out an official presidential notepad and jotted down the following, sealed with his signature: “Mr Ackerman — Please excuse Tyler ... He was with me! Barack Obama.” Sullivan said he hoped the note would hold up — and that it would impress his friends.
CANADA
Tuition protests continue
Hundreds of people took to the streets late on Sunday to protest planned university tuition hikes that have riled up residents. Between 200 and 500 demonstrators marched in downtown Montreal in the 41st nightly street protest, banging pots and pans and demanding cancellation of the increases. As before, police have declared the march illegal because no itinerary has been provided, but they watched the event calmly, without making any arrests.
UNITED STATES
Parker plans Obama dinner
Sex and the City star Sarah Jessica Parker is borrowing a tactic from the George Clooney fundraising book, planning a campaign dinner for President Barack Obama and offering a chance to win two tickets with US$3 online donations. Parker, who is married to actor Matthew Broderick, sent an e-mail to supporters and appeared in an advertisement on Sunday’s MTV Movie Awards telling people of the online donations and tickets to the affair at her New York home. “I’m hosting this event on June 14th because there is so much at stake this year and I want to keep doing what I can,” she wrote in the e-mail. “I hope you’ll help me welcome President Obama and the First Lady to New York.” Clooney hosted a dinner last month at his home, where about 150 people paid US$40,000 a ticket to see the president. The event raised nearly US$15 million, with more than half coming from small-amount donors who entered an online ticket raffle by pledging donations of US$3 or more.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in 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
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