JAPAN
Poo-powered bike unveiled
The nation’s best-known toilet maker, TOTO, yesterday unveiled a “poop-powered” motorcycle that can travel as far as 300km on a tank filled with animal waste. Billed as the world’s first waste-powered vehicle, the three-wheeler has a toilet in place of a regular seat and huge paper roll at the back. However, as a young female model climbed aboard for a test drive yesterday, the toilet giant was quick to point out that she would not supply the “gas.” “The biogas it uses as fuel is not made from human waste. It’s made from livestock waste and sewage,” company spokesman Kenji Fujita told reporters in a Tokyo suburb. The company — which makes toilets equipped with an array of features including heated seats, water jets with pressure and temperature controls, and ambient background music — has no plans to commercialize the motorcycle.
UKRAINE
Tymoshenko appeal denied
Kiev’s high court yesterday upheld former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko’s conviction and seven-year jail sentence for abuse of power linked to a disputed 2009 gas deal with Russia. “The judicial panel has ruled that the appeal filed by Tymoshenko is not subject to approval,” judge Olexander Elfimov told the court. The ruling by the nation’s highest court means that Tymoshenko has now exhausted her domestic legal recourse and is free to appeal her full case before the European Court of Human Rights. About 100 supporters of the 2004 pro-democracy Orange Revolution co-leader waved Tymoshenko’s Batkivshchyna (Fatherland) party flags during a quiet rally held outside the Kiev courtroom.
JAPAN
War papers to be released
Russia will release documents concerning thousands of Japanese held in labor camps after World War II which may provide clues about how and where they died, the government said on Tuesday. The documents, which will be handed over next year, were expected to reveal details of prisoners of war taken to camps after the war ended, according to the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare. About 575,000 Japanese soldiers and others were taken to Soviet labor camps in Siberia and Mongolia after the war. Most eventually returned home, but roughly 53,000 people were believed to have died in the camps with the fate of about 18,000 others unknown. “By analyzing the data, the records may shed light on who died where and how,” a ministry official said. “It may say something about those who died while being transported between labor camps. This kind of data has never been made available before.”
CHINA
Academics slam English use
A group of academics has said English-language abbreviations which have become part of everyday life should be struck from the country’s top dictionary. A letter signed by more than 100 academics condemned the inclusion of terms including NBA and WTO in the latest edition of the nation’s most authoritative dictionary, the Global Times daily reported yesterday. Acronyms and other abbreviations derived from English are widely used in the country, where millions of basketball fans refer to their favorite league as the NBA, rather than Mei Zhi Lan, the official Chinese translation. English abbreviations for international bodies such as the WTO are also widely used, while PM2.5, a measure of air pollution, has become a familiar term among urban residents, who are increasingly concerned about air quality.
UNITED STATES
Posh area to be sprayed
One of New York’s most expensive neighborhoods will be sprayed this week with pesticide to combat the West Nile virus, officials said on Tuesday. The city regularly sprays against the mosquito-borne disease, which has seen a surge in outbreaks this year. Tomorrow’s is notable because it will target Manhattan’s prestigious Upper West Side neighborhood and parts of Central Park. The Department of Health said in a statement that trucks would spray “a very low concentration” of pesticide and that “when properly used, this product poses no significant risks to human health.” However, it also urged people to stay indoors during the spraying and to remove clothes and children’s toys from outside. At least 41 people have died from the disease this summer, health officials said.
UNITED STATES
Bus-size tennis racket built
Talk about having a big serve: Wacky New Yorker Ashrita Furman has just built a tennis racket the size of a bus. Furman, who holds the record for the most Guinness World Records at one time — currently 151 — hopes his mammoth wooden racket will soon join the list. The contraption is an exact copy of the wooden one used by Billie Jean King in the 1970s, when she reigned over women’s tennis at tournaments like the US Open that kicked off in New York this week. The laminated wooden head, brown grip, red trim and inscriptions are a perfect match. The only difference is that the racket measures 15.2m in length and has a head 4.9m wide. Strings are made of water hose. “It’s 22.2 times bigger and done to scale,” Furman said. “We did try to display it at the US Open, but we were told that because it’s over 10 feet [3m] high, it’s considered a building.”
ARGENTINA
Argentines win world tango
Argentine dancers Facundo de la Cruz and Paola Sanz have won the ballroom competition at the 10th World Tango Championship, beating out 42 pairs of finalists from around the globe. “This is a magical moment,” Sanz, 29, said late on Monday. “My grandfather listened to a lot of tango, and I started to dance at free classes in my province” of Chubut, she said. Facundo de la Cruz, 26, originally from the province of Cordoba, said he learned to tango at first to be with his girlfriend. “I never listened to it,” he said, but it “quickly became a passion.” Forty-one other couples, including Belgians, Canadians, Russians, Americans, Japanese and contestants from across Latin America, performed in the finals at Buenos Aires’ Luna Park stadium, before 6,000 people. Buenos Aires Culture Minister Hernan Lombardi said the couple would travel to Paris at the end of the year before heading on to Japan, another world tango capital, for 40 days.
GERMANY
WWII bomb detonated
Explosives experts detonated the remains ofa 250kg World War II bomb in Munich on Tuesday evening, the DAPD news agency cited a police spokesman as saying. Still, burning debris caused fires in several nearby buildings that had been evacuated after the bomb was discovered on Monday in Schwabing District. Efforts to defuse the bomb failed and experts decided to pack it with explosives and detonate it rather than risk an uncontrolled explosion. Allied airplanes dropped millions of tonnes of ordnance on Germany during World War II in an effort to cripple the Nazi war machine. Tens of thousands of unexploded bombs are believed still to be lying in the ground in the country.
Australians were downloading virtual private networks (VPNs) in droves, while one of the world’s largest porn distributors said it was blocking users from its platforms as the country yesterday rolled out sweeping online age restriction. Australia in December became the first country to impose a nationwide ban on teenagers using social media. A separate law now requires artificial intelligence (AI)-powered chatbot services to keep certain content — including pornography, extreme violence and self-harm and eating disorder material — from minors or face fines of up to A$49.5 million (US$34.6 million). The country also joined Britain, France and dozens of US states requiring
Hungarian authorities temporarily detained seven Ukrainian citizens and seized two armored cars carrying tens of millions of euros in cash across Hungary on suspicion of money laundering, officials said on Friday. The Ukrainians were released on Friday, following their detention on Thursday, but Hungarian officials held onto the cash, prompting Ukraine to accuse Hungary’s Russia-friendly government of illegally seizing the money. “We will not tolerate this state banditism,” Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrii Sybiha said. The seven detained Ukrainians were employees of the Ukrainian state-owned Oschadbank, who were traveling in the two armored cars that were carrying the money between Austria and
Kosovar President Vjosa Osmani on Friday after dissolving the Kosovar parliament said a snap election should be held as soon as possible to avoid another prolonged political crisis in the Balkan country at a time of global turmoil. Osmani said it is important for Kosovo to wrap up the upcoming election process and form functional institutions for political stability as the war rages in the Middle East. “Precisely because the geopolitical situation is that complex, it is important to finish this electoral process which is coming up,” she said. “It is very hard now to imagine what will happen next.” Kosovo, which declared
MORE BANS: Australia last year required sites to remove accounts held by under-16s, with a few countries pushing for similar action at an EU level and India considering its own ban Indonesia on Friday said it would ban social media access for children under 16, citing threats from online pornography, cyberbullying, online fraud and Internet addiction. “Accounts belonging to children under 16 on high-risk platforms will start to be deactivated, beginning with YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Threads, X, Bigo Live and Roblox,” Indonesian Minister of Communications and Digital Meutya Hafid said. “The government is stepping in so that parents no longer have to fight alone against the giants of the algorithm. Implementation will begin on March 28, 2026,” she said. The social media ban would be introduced in stages “until all platforms fulfill their
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