AUSTRIA
Free sex vs brothel taxes
A brothel is offering a summer special that competitors will find hard to match: free sex. Its owner calls it his way of protesting a tax squeeze. “Effective immediately: Free Entrance. Free Drinks. Free Sex,” the Pascha bordello writes on its Web site. The Oesterreich daily quotes owner Hermann Mueller as saying he would pay the women working for him to make up for the money they would normally get from clients. A woman answering the telephone at the establishment confirmed the offer on Sunday. She refused to identify herself. Prostitution in Austria is legal and regulated. Mueller, who runs other brothels in Germany and Austria, says he is pushing back against what he says is unfair taxation of nearly 4 million euros (US$4.5 million) in the past decade.
MEXICO
Calderon’s wife seeks office
The wife of former president Felipe Calderon says she intends to run for president in the 2018 election. In a video posted online on Sunday, Margarita Zabala said she wants to build a movement of citizens who have lost faith with politicians. Zabala has been a campaigner in the National Action Party (PAN) of her husband, who ended his six-year term on Dec. 1, 2012. PAN is the main opposition party, but lost seats in June 7 midterm elections and is facing internal restructuring and a leadership overhaul. Zabala said the party needs to find “a national leader of consensus” and narrow the gap between politicians and voters.
UNITED STATES
Collision kills MC Supreme
Rapper MC Supreme, best known for his 1990 single Black in America, has died in a car crash in Malibu, California. Los Angeles County coroner’s officials said 47-year-old Dewayne Coleman was killed on Saturday when a pickup truck slammed into parked car on the shoulder of the Pacific Coast Highway. Coleman was pronounced dead at the scene; a female passenger in his car was taken to a hospital with unspecified injuries. Coleman released Black in America on the compilation album We’re All in the Same Gang. It featured the hit antiviolence song that shares the album’s name by the West Coast Rap All-Stars. The pickup driver was arrested on suspicion of drunk driving.
UNITED STATES
Shark attacks shock town
Two teens at the beach were badly mauled in separate shark attacks less than two hours apart on Sunday in waters off Oak Island, North Carolina. A girl aged about 14 was attacked shortly after 4pm, receiving grave wounds to her left arm and leg before a man swimming nearby heard her screams and came to her aid, Oak Island Mayor Betty Wallace told reporters. Wallace said the girl ended up losing part of her arm and might lose her leg as well. About 90 minutes later and about 3.2km farther east along the same beach, a 16-year-old boy was bitten by a shark as authorities were responding to the first incident, she said. That attack cost the boy his left arm, the mayor said. Wallace said she had no details about the circumstances of either attack, including how far from shore the swimmers were. Wallace said shark encounters had been virtually unheard of there, adding that a longtime resident could not recall a single one in 36 years. “I do not want everybody to think this is one of those areas where you really have to worry about shark bites,” Wallace said. “However, for the foreseeable future, people have to be extra vigilant.”
‘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