SPAIN
King Juan Carlos falls
Spain’s King Juan Carlos has tripped and fallen while visiting army headquarters in Madrid, but the 74-year-old monarch did not appear to be seriously hurt. Thursday’s accident occurred on a stone staircase, and the king got up and carried on with his duties, although his nose appeared red and sore, a spokesman for the Royal Palace said on condition of anonymity, in keeping with regulations. In April, the monarch underwent hip replacement surgery after tripping on stairs and fracturing bones while on an elephant hunting trip in Botswana. The safari was widely criticized in Spain as exorbitant during the country’s economic crisis.
UNITED STATES
Mayweather freed from jail
Boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr was released from a Las Vegas jail early yesterday after serving two months of a three-month sentence in a misdemeanor domestic battery case. The undefeated boxer walked out of the Clark County Detention Center in darkness to resume his boxing career. Mayweather’s lawyers and personal physician said in court documents that jail food and water did not meet Mayweather’s dietary needs, and lack of exercise space in a cell of fewer than 30m2 threatened his health and fitness. The 35-year-old boxer pleaded guilty last year to reduced charges stemming from a hair-pulling, arm-twisting attack on his former girlfriend. The plea deal allowed him to avoid trial on felony charges that could have gotten him up to 34 years in prison.
UNITED STATES
Two tried over Matisse work
A Cuban American man and a Mexican woman pleaded not guilty in Miami on Wednesday to trying to sell a US$3 million Matisse that vanished mysteriously from a Venezuelan museum a decade ago. Marcuello Guzman, a 46-year-old Cuban resident of Miami, and Ornelas Lazo, a 50-year-old from Mexico City, denied in court that they conspired to transport and sell the original Matisse, Odalisque in Red Pants. Venezuelan authorities realized in 2003 that the painting hanging in the Museum of Contemporary Art in Caracas was actually a fake. The exact date of the theft is unknown, though December 2002 has been suggested. The indictment accuses Guzman of negotiating the sale of the Matisse for about US$740,000 during several meetings with undercover FBI agents. The painting has been valued by experts at US$3 million. Undercover FBI agents posing as buyers recovered the Matisse last month in Miami and arrested the two suspects, who appeared at Wednesday’s federal court hearing in handcuffs and leg shackles. A new hearing will be set within 30 days. Each accused faces up to 10 years in jail.
PERU
Fujimori rules out pardon
Former president Alberto Fujimori, who is serving a 25-year sentence for human rights violations, has ruled out seeking a pardon, his lawmaker son Kenji Fujimori said. “My father renounces the idea of a pardon because he knows he is innocent and there are no clear and positive signs from the government,” the younger Fujimori said on Wednesday. His decision “is a hard blow for us, especially in light of his health,” he said. The former president, who is serving out his sentence at a police base in eastern Lima, suffers from cancer of the tongue, but receives regular treatment and the cancer is under control. The 74-year-old was found guilty in April 2009 of two death-squad massacres in 1991 and 1992 that killed 25 people, and the kidnapping of a journalist and a businessman.
FIJI
Queen’s birthday axed
The government has dumped Queen Elizabeth II’s official birthday from its list of annual public holidays, saying it is no longer relevant to the former British colony. Prime Minister Voreqe Bainimarama, who seized power in a 2006 coup, said on Tuesday that dropping the queen’s birthday from the calendar would also boost national economic productivity. The move to ditch the holiday, normally celebrated in early June, came after the government announced last year that it was dropping the queen’s likeness from its coins and replacing it with local flora and fauna. The queen’s birthday is still a public holiday in many other former British colonies like Australia and New Zealand, although not in Britain itself.
INDIA
‘Jism 2’ not porn
Jism 2, a new Indian movie titled after the Hindu word for “body,” stars a hardcore porn actress. However, the filmmakers insist it is not porno. Bollywood is certainly not ready for that. The film, which opened yesterday, is pushing the ever-widening sexual boundaries enjoyed by many in urban areas. It shows no frontal nudity. Government censors monitoring a film industry that long refused to show onscreen kissing would never clear that. Yet with its oil massages and fantastic lingerie, it promises to be one of the most graphic films in Bollywood history. However, traditionalists angry with the growing sexual freedoms have torn down the film’s risque poster, led a crackdown on bars in Mumbai and even advocated an informal curfew for women.
YEMEN
Minister escapes 2nd attack
Gunmen strafed the car of Information Minister Ali Ahmed al-Amrani with bullets on Thursday, killing his bodyguard, but the official was not in the vehicle at the time, officials said. Amrani also escaped an assassination attempt on Jan. 31 as he was leaving government headquarters in Sana’a. Amrani used to be a member of former president Ali Abdullah Saleh General People’s Congress, but later joined the opposition in protest over Saleh’s deadly crackdown on anti-regime protests.
VIETNAM
US freedom critique denied
The government has protested a US report that accused it of abusing some of its citizens’ religious freedom. The US Department of State’s annual assessment of religious freedom around the world released this week said Vietnam has generally respected religious freedom, but continues to harass some followers, particularly Christians. Foreign Ministry spokesman Luong Thanh Nghi said in a statement late on Thursday that the report acknowledges progress, but contains erroneous information. He said Vietnam ensures full religious freedom for all.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At 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
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