UAE
Six kidnappers sentenced
A court has sentenced six Iranians, three of them in absentia, to life in prison for kidnapping a British businessman who went missing in Dubai in 2013, newspapers reported yesterday. Abbas Yazdi, a businessman of Iranian descent who owns a general trading company in Dubai, disappeared in June 2013. His wife, Atena, told a local newspaper at the time that she feared he may have been kidnapped by Iranian intelligence officers. Iran has denied any role in Yazdi’s disappearance. Prosecutors in Dubai have said the defendants attacked and drugged Yazdi and smuggled him out of the nation to Iran through a port in the UAE emirate of Sharjah. The Gulf News identified the three who stood trial as “R.A.,” aged 32; “K.G.,” 52; and “N.A.,” 55, and said they had denied the charges of kidnapping, assault and theft. It identified the three convicted in absentia as “H.B.,” “B.N.” and “I.N.” The newspaper added that a further defendant, identified as “S.H.,” who had planned the kidnapping, died in custody.
HUNGARY
Village for rent — cheap
A small village will let you become deputy mayor for a few days. Megyer, population 18, has put itself up for rent to companies and tourists. For 210,000 forints (US$785) a day, a renter gets seven guesthouses that sleep 39 people, four streets, a bus stop, a barn, a chicken yard, six horses, two cows, three sheep and 4 hectares of farmland — along with the possibility of temporarily being named deputy mayor. The deal aims to revitalize the hamlet, which dates back to at least the 11th century and is 190km southwest of Budapest. Mayor Kristof Pajer on Wednesday said that the silence of the remote countryside was its main attraction. “We offer all sorts of programs to our guests, but most are simply captivated by the surroundings and the quiet,” said Pajer, a 42-year-old engineer. “Once they sit out in the meadow with a bottle of rose wine, nothing else matters.” As deputy mayors, renters can rename the village streets to their liking — for the duration of their stay, Pajer added.
GUATEMALA
Portillo home from US jail
Former president Alfonso Portillo, 63, returned home on Wednesday after serving time in a US prison for money laundering in a graft scandal involving Taiwan. “I am so happy to be home in Guatemala with my daughter Gabriela, with [his ex-wife] Evelyn and my family,” he said. Portillo served his time at a US federal prison in Colorado. He had been extradited to the US in May 2013 and a year later was convicted of laundering US$2.5 million in bribes from Taiwan so that Guatemala would maintain political recognition of Taiwan rather than Beijing.
UNITED STATES
NY raid ends in suicide
A raid on a New York maraschino cherry factory led to the discovery of a marijuana operation and the suicide of the factory owner, local media outlets reported. Arthur Mondella, 57, owner of the family-run Dell’s Maraschino Cherries in Brooklyn, excused himself to officers, headed to the restroom and fatally shot himself, reports said. Investigators were about to find marijuana being grown and sold from a cellar hidden behind a fake wall at the plant, one of the US’ largest processors of maraschino cherries. New York police officials confirmed Tuesday’s incident, but gave no additional details. Local tabloids reported that officers seized 36kg of cannabis and hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash. Before shooting himself once in the head, Mondella reportedly told his sister: “Take care of my kids.”
SOUTH Korea
Adultery law struck down
The country’s highest court struck down a decades-old law banning adultery, a statute that critics said is anachronistic and infringes on personal freedom. The law had been enacted in 1953 to protect women in a male-dominated society where divorce was rare and had made marital infidelity punishable by jail. “The law is unconstitutional as it infringes people’s right to make their own decisions on sex and secrecy and freedom of their private life, violating the principle banning excessive enforcement under the constitution,” Constitutional Court Justice Seo Ki-seok said, reading an opinion representing five justices. Seven members of the nine-judge panel deemed the law to be unconstitutional.
AFGHANISTAN
Avalanches kill 186
More than 180 people have been killed in the north in some of the worst avalanches in 30 years, officials said yesterday, with heavy snow set to last for two more days after an unusually dry winter led to fears of drought. Officials warned of an imminent humanitarian emergency in areas most severely hit by the bad weather, with snow sweeping through villages and blocking off roads. Abdul Rahman Kabiri, acting governor of the mountainous province of Panjshir, said 186 people were killed and more than 100 injured in the avalanches.
JAPAN
Minister denies wrongdoing
Minister of Education Hakubun Shimomura denied taking improper contributions yesterday, three days after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s agriculture minister stepped down amid accusations over donations from a sugar company. Shimomura told parliament he was deeply angered by an “untrue” article in a weekly magazine that said he may have breached the law by raising funds through regional support groups that were not registered for that purpose. Shukan Bunshun magazine said the groups regularly invited Shimomura to give speeches and attend gatherings that members paid to attend.
AUSTRALIA
US$50m of ice discovered
Two men from Malaysia and Hong Kong have been charged with smuggling more than 100kg of crystal methamphetamine, or ice, worth A$65 million (US$50 million) into Sydney in a shipping container from China, authorities said yesterday. The men, whose names have not been released, were to appear in a Sydney court yesterday on various drug charges, Australian Federal Police and Australian Customs and Border Protection Service said in a joint statement. They face potential life prison sentences if convicted.
JAPAN
Pen to sell for US$4,400
Luxury marque Montblanc is to sell fountain pens made from a “miracle pine” tree that survived the 2011 tsunami, for a hefty US$4,400, an official said, with just 20 percent of takings donated to local people. The news comes as Japan readies to mark the fourth anniversary of the disaster that claimed more than 19,000 lives. The Swiss pen and watch maker had used wood from the only tree left standing when a forest of 70,000 was flattened in Rikuzentakata. The so-called “miracle pine” was later found to be dying and underwent ¥150 million (US$1.5 million) of reinforcement to prop it up. When the city cut down the tree, Rikuzentakata Mayor Futoshi Toba asked Montblanc to use salvaged wood to make pens to ensure the “disaster remains in people’s minds,” a city official said.
MONEY MATTERS: Xi was to highlight projects such as a new high-speed railway between Belgrade and Budapest, as Serbia is entirely open to Chinese trade and investment Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic yesterday said that “Taiwan is China” as he made a speech welcoming Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to Belgrade, state broadcaster Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) said. “We have a clear and simple position regarding Chinese territorial integrity,” he told a crowd outside the government offices while Xi applauded him. “Yes, Taiwan is China.” Xi landed in Belgrade on Tuesday night on the second leg of his European tour, and was greeted by Vucic and most government ministers. Xi had just completed a two-day trip to France, where he held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron as the
With the midday sun blazing, an experimental orange and white F-16 fighter jet launched with a familiar roar that is a hallmark of US airpower, but the aerial combat that followed was unlike any other: This F-16 was controlled by artificial intelligence (AI), not a human pilot, and riding in the front seat was US Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall. AI marks one of the biggest advances in military aviation since the introduction of stealth in the early 1990s, and the US Air Force has aggressively leaned in. Even though the technology is not fully developed, the service is planning
INTERNATIONAL PROBE: Australian and US authorities were helping coordinate the investigation of the case, which follows the 2015 murder of Australian surfers in Mexico Three bodies were found in Mexico’s Baja California state, the FBI said on Friday, days after two Australians and an American went missing during a surfing trip in an area hit by cartel violence. Authorities used a pulley system to hoist what appeared to be lifeless bodies covered in mud from a shaft on a cliff high above the Pacific. “We confirm there were three individuals found deceased in Santo Tomas, Baja California,” a statement from the FBI’s office in San Diego, California, said without providing the identities of the victims. Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson and their American friend Jack Carter
CUSTOMS DUTIES: France’s cognac industry was closely watching the talks, fearing that an anti-dumping investigation opened by China is retaliation for trade tensions French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday hosted Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at one of his beloved childhood haunts in the Pyrenees, seeking to press a message to Beijing not to support Russia’s war against Ukraine and to accept fairer trade. The first day of Xi’s state visit to France, his first to Europe since 2019, saw respectful, but sometimes robust exchanges between the two men during a succession of talks on Monday. Macron, joined initially by EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, urged Xi not to allow the export of any technology that could be used by Russia in its invasion