UNITED KINGDOM
Driver hits police station
Police arrested a man on suspicion of drunk driving on Friday after he crashed his car into their police station. Officers at Frodsham police station near Liverpool did not have to go far to find their suspect after the car was left with its front end resting on the outside wall. The suspect is thought to have lost control of the vehicle in a neighboring parking lot at about 12:20am. The local Cheshire Police force tweeted about the incident. “Man arrested for #drinkdrive after losing control on a car park and crashing into Frodsham police station. #epicfail,” a first tweet said. It was followed by: “Male in Frodsham kindly handed himself in for drink driving #drivenintostationwall.” A 49-year-old man was arrested and released on bail.
GERMANY
Team avoid flock of models
Sharing a hotel with 400 Russian models apparently is not every athlete’s idea of a good time. Third-division soccer team Duisburg said they changed the hotel booking for their winter training camp in Turkey next week after learning that the hotel is hosting a pageant of Russian models. Duisburg said that the club want to “prepare calmly” for their matches and the original hotel might also have been overbooked. The team will be staying at another hotel in the Mediterranean city of Antalya’s Lara District from Thursday to Jan. 16.
LITHUANIA
Obsolete note finds niche
The nation abandoned the litas on Thursday when it became the 19th nation to adopt the euro, but at least one of the old bills is still in vogue, a gay activist said on Friday. Vladimir Simonko, cofounder of the Lithuanian Gay League, told reporters that the 10 litas note — which features two pilots in uniform — was being traded in gay circles in Western Europe for as much as ￡10 (US$15.30), which is about four times its value at the current exchange rate. For Simonko, the note created interest among foreigners “because it shows two handsome men in uniform. One finds oneself wondering why they are two and what their relationship is.” The aviators who lent their faces to the note are Steponas Darius and Stasys Girenas. In 1933, the pair attempted a nonstop flight from New York to Kaunas, Lithuania. They crashed 37 hours into the flight, after crossing the Atlantic Ocean, and are revered in Lithuania as heroes.
UNITED KINGDOM
Applicants eager to get shot
About 10,000 people from around the world have applied to be shot at as a paintball bullet tester, the British company posting the job advert said on Friday. UKPaintball, which has more than 60 paintballing venues in Britain, said it was stunned by the response to its search for a “human bullet impact tester.” Candidates from as far away as the US, Canada and India have applied for the ￡40,000-a-year job testing the impact of paintballs. “This incredible response is the last thing we expected when we posted the ad,” UKPaintball owner Justin Toohig said. “We couldn’t have predicted that so many people in the UK and beyond would want to get shot for a living.” Applicants have cited a range of different skills to prove they were up to the job, including one who said he was fat, so would be easier to hit, he said. “We’ve had individuals hoping to secure the job including an ex-army soldier boasting previous experience of guns and weaponry ... and an ex-magician’s assistant who was once almost shot for real in an illusion that went horribly wrong,” Toohig added. “It’s going to be a real struggle attempting to whittle down the thousands of applicants to just one.”
EL SALVADOR
Homicides increase 57%
Authorities say homicides increased 57 percent in El Salvador last year to 3,912. National Police Commissioner Mauricio Ramirez Landaverde on Friday said that there were 412 killings last month, an average of 13 a day. That was nearly double from the same month in 2013. Ramirez Landaverde attributed the sharp increase to the dissolution of a pact among the country’s criminal gangs. In March 2012, leaders of the gangs Mara Salvatrucha MS13 and Barrio 18 agreed to reduce violence, and homicides fell to an average of five a day. The gangs are fighting over territories where they extort businesses and traffic drugs. In 2013, El Salvador reported 2,492 homicides, while it listed 2,543 in 2012.
UNITED STATES
Girl survives plane crash
A seven-year-old girl survived a plane crash that killed four people, walking away from the wreckage disoriented and reporting the crash to a local resident, authorities said. The small Piper PA-34 reported engine trouble and lost contact with air traffic controllers as it was flying over the southwestern part of Kentucky about 5:55pm on Friday, authorities said. About half an hour later, a Lyon County resident called police and told dispatchers that a girl had walked to his home and said she had been involved in a plane crash, Sergeant Dean Patterson of said. About two hours later, authorities found the crash site in a heavily wooded area near Kentucky lake. They discovered four bodies, including the pilot and the three passengers.
UNITED STATES
No new charges for gunman
The man who shot a presidential spokesman during a 1981 assassination attempt on former president Ronald Reagan will not face new murder charges, even though the victim’s death last year was ruled a homicide, prosecutors said on Friday. Prosecutors had weighed whether to charge John Hinckley in the death of White House press secretary James Brady, who died in August aged 73, more than three decades after he was shot in the head. Brady had been gravely wounded and was left wheelchair-bound and with brain damage. Hinckley, who after the shooting said he was trying to impress actress Jodie Foster and was charged with attempted assassination of the president and other crimes, was found not guilty by reason of insanity. Federal prosecutors said they could not charge Hinckley because a jury had already found him not guilty by reason of insanity. Further, before 1987, Washington courts followed a “year-and-a-day rule,” where a homicide prosecution could only be brought if a victim died in that time frame after an attack.
UNITED STATES
Man unstuck from zipline
A man stuck dangling from a zipline about 24m above a Las Vegas street for nearly an hour is back on the ground after being rescued by firefighters. Las Vegas Fire and Rescue spokesman Timothy Szymanski said firefighters rescued the rider from SlotZilla at the downtown Fremont Street Experience shortly after 3pm on Friday. He said a passer-by called at 2:34pm to report a man stuck above Fourth Street since about 2pm. He said SlotZilla workers stayed with the man while he was suspended and tried to bring him down, but eventually asked firefighters to reach him. The US$40 “zoomline” rides involve flying over Fremont Street superhero-style, facing the ground. Fremont Street Experience spokeswoman Lauren Silverstein said a team is investigating the incident.
A new online voting system aimed at boosting turnout among the Philippines’ millions of overseas workers ahead of Monday’s mid-term elections has been marked by confusion and fears of disenfranchisement. Thousands of overseas Filipino workers have already cast their ballots in the race dominated by a bitter feud between President Ferdinand Marcos Jr and his impeached vice president, Sara Duterte. While official turnout figures are not yet publicly available, data from the Philippine Commission on Elections (COMELEC) showed that at least 134,000 of the 1.22 million registered overseas voters have signed up for the new online system, which opened on April 13. However,
EUROPEAN FUTURE? Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama says only he could secure EU membership, but challenges remain in dealing with corruption and a brain drain Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama seeks to win an unprecedented fourth term, pledging to finally take the country into the EU and turn it into a hot tourist destination with some help from the Trump family. The artist-turned-politician has been pitching Albania as a trendy coastal destination, which has helped to drive up tourism arrivals to a record 11 million last year. US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, also joined in the rush, pledging to invest US$1.4 billion to turn a largely deserted island into a luxurious getaway. Rama is expected to win another term after yesterday’s vote. The vote would
ALLIES: Calling Putin his ‘old friend,’ Xi said Beijing stood alongside Russia ‘in the face of the international counter-current of unilateralism and hegemonic bullying’ Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) yesterday was in Moscow for a state visit ahead of the Kremlin’s grand Victory Day celebrations, as Ukraine accused Russia’s army of launching air strikes just hours into a supposed truce. More than 20 foreign leaders were in Russia to attend a vast military parade today marking 80 years since the defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II, taking place three years into Russia’s offensive in Ukraine. Putin ordered troops into Ukraine in February 2022 and has marshaled the memory of Soviet victory against Nazi Germany to justify his campaign and rally society behind the offensive,
Myanmar’s junta chief met Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) for the first time since seizing power, state media reported yesterday, the highest-level meeting with a key ally for the internationally sanctioned military leader. Senior General Min Aung Hlaing led a military coup in 2021, overthrowing Myanmar’s brief experiment with democracy and plunging the nation into civil war. In the four years since, his armed forces have battled dozens of ethnic armed groups and rebel militias — some with close links to China — opposed to its rule. The conflict has seen Min Aung Hlaing draw condemnation from rights groups and pursued by the
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