CHINA
Boat sinks off Macau
A boat carrying at least 10 people thought to be illegal immigrants has sunk off the coast of Macau, authorities said yesterday, with the rescue operation hampered by strong currents. Macau’s marine department said that four people had managed to swim to safety, but the rest were missing. There were at least 10 people on board and the boat was “suspected to be linked with illegal immigration,” a statement from Macau’s government information service said. The boat sank off the luxury Grand Coloane Resort at 5:50am. The four who had swum to safety were two men and two women who were then arrested, the Apple Daily newspaper in Hong Kong said. Some media reports said there were 19 people on the boat, including three crew.
CHINA
Ivory imports suspended
The government has announced a one-year ban on the import of African ivory carvings ahead of next week’s visit by Britain’s Prince William, a strong critic of the ivory trade. The country will halt approval for imports until late February next year, Xinhua news agency reported on Thursday, citing the State Forestry Administration, which regulates the trade. The ban will affect carvings acquired after 1975, it added. Prince William has previously been critical of the country over its consumption of ivory, while animal rights groups say the country’s growing appetite for the contraband material has fueled a surge in poaching in Africa. “The move is to protect African elephants, and the one-year timeframe is designed to assess the effects,” Xinhua said. More than 20,000 African elephants were killed for ivory in 2013, a Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species monitoring program showed, leaving a population believed to be about 500,000.
SOUTH KOREA
Gunman kills three, self
A gunman shot and killed three people yesterday before he was found dead at a home in a city near the capital, Seoul, in the second such incident in three days, police officials said. Shooting incidents are rare in the country, which tightly controls gun possession, and the two deadly shootings this week will likely trigger a debate on whether the country should tighten its control on hunting weapons that can be legally owned. A police official from Hwaseong City, who did not want to be named, citing office rules, said the victims included a policeman who was one of the first officers to arrive at the scene. The official said the suspect, 75, is believed to be the brother of an 86-year-old victim, whose wife, 84, was also dead. The suspect was found dead with a gunshot wound in what the police believed to be a suicide. The daughter-in-law of the dead couple managed to escape by jumping from a second-floor window before alerting the police.
UNITED STATES
Picasso found in Newark
A Picasso painting missing from Paris for more than a decade has resurfaced in Newark, New Jersey, where it had been shipped under false pretenses as a US$37 holiday-themed “art craft.” The 1911 painting, La Coiffeuse, was unearthed in December last year in a FedEx shipment from Belgium. The canvas had been smuggled out of a storeroom of the Centre Georges Pompidou, the Paris museum and arts center, and its whereabouts had not been known. On Thursday, Loretta Lynch, the US attorney for the Eastern District of New York, filed a civil complaint to forfeit the Picasso and return it to France. Its shipping papers described it as a US$37 “art craft/toy” and also read “Joyeux Noel,” French for “Merry Christmas.”
UNITED STATES
Sterilization pay approved
Virginia is to pay the handful of survivors of a forced sterilization program US$25,000 each in compensation under a measure approved by the state’s legislature on Thursday. Virginia forcibly sterilized those it viewed as social misfits or mentally deficient, among others from the mid-1920s to the mid-1970s, when the program officially ended. More than 8,000 people were sterilized. The compensation plan was part of an amended two-year, US$96 billion budget package approved by the Republican-dominated legislature. Only about 11 people who underwent sterilization are known to be still alive and the fund totals US$400,000.
BRAZIL
Unexpected clusters found
Astronomers said yesterday they had found two star clusters forming in a remote part of our Milky Way galaxy where such a thing was previously thought impossible. Seen from above, the Milky Way has arms of stars, gas and dust flailing out in a spiral shape from the center. Stars normally form inside clumps of gas in so-called giant molecular clouds, found in the inner part of the galactic disk, a statement from Britain’s Royal Astronomical Society said. Each of the clouds contains several gas clumps, which means that most stars, possibly all of them, are created together in clusters. However, using NASA’s Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer space telescope, a team led by Denilso Camargo of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul in Porto Alegre, Brazil, found giant molecular gas clouds far outside the central galaxy, and not only that, one of the remote clouds “unexpectedly” contained two star clusters, the statement said.
UNITED STATES
Nyong’o’s dress stolen
The US$150,000 pearl-studded, custom-made Calvin Klein dress worn by Oscar-winning actress Lupita Nyong’o at this year’s Academy Awards has been stolen, police said on Thursday. The gown, embellished with 6,000 natural white pearls, was stolen from Nyong’o’s room at the London Hotel in West Hollywood on Wednesday, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department in West Hollywood said. “Ms Nyong’o was not in the room at the time of the theft,” Deputy John Mitchell said.
UNITED STATES
Johansson defends Travolta
Scarlett Johansson defended John Travolta and called the image of him kissing her on the Academy Awards red carpet “an unfortunate still-frame from a live-action encounter that was totally sweet and totally welcome.” In an exclusive statement to The Associated Press on Thursday, Johansson said: “There is nothing at all strange, creepy or inappropriate about John Travolta.”
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
‘POLITICAL EARTHQUAKE’: Leo Varadkar said he was ‘no longer the best person’ to lead the nation and was stepping down for political, as well as personal, reasons Leo Varadkar on Wednesday announced that he was stepping down as Ireland’s prime minister and leader of the Fine Gael party in the governing coalition, citing “personal and political” reasons. Pundits called the surprise move, just 10 weeks before Ireland holds European Parliament and local elections, a “political earthquake.” A general election has to be held within a year. Irish Deputy Prime Minister Micheal Martin, leader of Fianna Fail, the main coalition partner, said Varadkar’s announcement was “unexpected,” but added that he expected the government to run its full term. An emotional Varadkar, who is in his second stint as prime minister and at
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia