GEORGIA
Prime minister resigns
Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili on Wednesday announced his resignation without explaining his reasons. Garibashvili is an ally of billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili, whose Georgian Dream party routed supporters of former president Mikhail Saakashvili in a 2012 election. He has served as prime minister of the former Soviet nation since November 2013. Garibashvili did not immediately specify the reason behind his resignation as he made the announcement, but offered some self-praise, saying that “we have returned freedom and dignity to our citizens.” The media had speculated that Garibashvili would step down to focus all his energy on the campaign for Georgian Dream in parliamentary elections next November. The party’s popularity has steadily fallen as voters have been disappointed by the nation’s worsening economic situation. In contrast, support for Saakashvili’s United National Movement has risen and some recent polls indicated that it has caught up with Georgian Dream or even overtaken it in popularity.
SAUDI ARABIA
Hospital fire kills 25
A fire ripped through a hospital yesterday, killing at least 25 people and injuring 107, the authorities said. The blaze broke out in the intensive care unit and the maternity department of the Jazan General Hospital in the kingdom’s south, the civil defense agency said on Twitter. It said in an update later that the fire had been extinguished and an investigation was under way into the cause. Twenty-one civil defense teams had assisted in putting out the blaze, it added. Al-Riyadh daily quoted a civil defense spokesman as saying that the agency was alerted of the fire at 2am.
UNITED KINGDOM
Moscow critic mulls asylum
Top Russian opposition leader Mikhail Khodorkovsky on Wednesday said he might apply for political asylum after Moscow issued an international warrant for his arrest. Khodorkovsky, once Russia’s richest man but later imprisoned for 10 years after falling foul of Russian President Vladimir Putin, told the BBC the Russian leader still saw him as a threat. “Definitely I’m considering asking for asylum in the UK,” said the Kremlin critic, who already spends much of his time in London. “I’m considered by President Putin as a threat, economically, because of the possible seizure of Russian assets abroad, and politically, as someone who will potentially help democratic candidates in the coming 2016 elections.”
AUSTRIA
DJ punished for prank
A radio station has punished one of its show hosts after he locked himself in the studio only to play the song Last Christmas, a cult hit from the 1980s by British band Wham, 24 times in a row. Only after the man’s daughter called the studio to beg her father to stop because the song made everyone “mad” did he finish his one-song marathon, according to a video on Youtube. Timm Bodner, programming head of the station Antenne Kaernten in the province of Carinthia, said on Wednesday that the 27-year-old disc jockey barricaded the studio on Friday last week with a wooden stick to play the prank on his listeners. “In general, it was funny, but there must be consequences,” Bodner said in a telephone conversation. “As a consequence he will have to work tomorrow on Christmas and on New Year’s eve.”
JAPAN
Reporter said held hostage
The government is seeking information after reports a freelance journalist is being held hostage in Syria and has been threatened with execution, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said yesterday. Paris-based Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said this week that, according to information it had received, an armed group holding journalist Yasuda Jumpei hostage had started a countdown for an unspecified ransom to be paid and had threatened to execute or sell him to another group if their demands were not met. RSF said in a statement on its Web site that Yasuda was kidnapped in July by an armed group in an area controlled by the militant Nusra Front, al-Qaeda’s Syria wing, shortly after entering the nation earlier that month. Suga spoke in response to a question about the RSF statement at a news conference.
JAPAN
Reactors’ restart approved
The Fukui Distrcit Court has given the go-ahead for the restart of two nuclear reactors after its operator said in an appeal they were safe. The court in April accepted an injunction request by a group of residents saying a massive earthquake exceeding the facility’s quake resistance standards could cause disaster similar to the Fukushima Dai-ichi crisis following the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami. The lifting of the injunction yesterday paves the way for a resumption of the Takahama No. 3 and No. 4 reactors, operated by Kansai Electric Power Co. It had already obtained the approval of safety regulators and town and prefectural assemblies. Two of the nation’s 43 workable reactors are currently back online.
CHINA
Ex-media head jailed
A Shanghai court yesterday jailed the former president of a major news organization for four years after finding him guilty of extortion and fraud. Shanghai prosecutors last year arrested Shen Hao (沈顥), president of 21st Century Media and publisher of influential business daily 21st Century Business Herald, on counts of extortion, bribery and misappropriation of funds. The court found that Shen demanded money from companies in exchange for covering up bad news or for reporting positive stories, Xinhua news agency reported. Shen was also fined 60,000 yuan (US$9,260), the report said. Calls to the newspaper seeking comment were not answered. A trend toward greater commercialization in media — still controlled heavily by the state — has put pressure on companies to generate greater profits. The investigation into the 21st Century Business Herald came amid a crackdown at state broadcaster China Central Television, where some senior executives have also been targeted.
RUSSIA
Coal a welcome reward
Shedding the pounds in Siberia can come with a particularly welcome reward — coal. Yelena Salnikova, a nurse from a small town of Berezovskoye, on Wednesday received a truck full of the stuff from authorities in the coal-rich region of Kemerovo for losing 30 kilos. The dispatch means that Kemerovo’s long-serving governor, Aman Tuleyev, has made good on his promise earlier this year to award locals with 1.5 tonnes of coal for every 10 kilos lost. Salnikova said on television that the 5-tonne truck of coal would help her heat her home for at least half the long Siberian winter even if temperature falls below minus-30°C.
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in 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
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was