CHINA
Officials fired over vaccines
Authorities have fired or demoted 357 local government officials for poor performance as they deal with the fallout from a nationwide public health scandal over the sale of improperly handled vaccines. Along with punishing the officials, Beijing has ordered measures to tighten supervision over the storage and distribution of vaccines, Xinhua news agency and other state media outlets reported yesterday, citing a document from the State Council. In all, 192 criminal cases have been filed nationwide and 202 people detained as part of the sweeping probe, which found 45 groups involved in “improper vaccine trading,” the media reports said. Drug wholesalers will also be forbidden from selling vaccines, and vaccines will be traced from production to usage, with special rules enacted for refrigeration and transport, the reports said. The scandal erupted last month when the Food and Drug Administration announced it had discovered nine companies were reselling improperly stored or expired vaccines, meaning an unknown number of children may have received shots that provided no health benefits and could cause side effects.
MALAYSIA
Huge ivory trove destroyed
The government yesterday destroyed 9.5 tonnes of elephant ivory it had seized over the years, which authorities hope will help deter smugglers who have long used the country as a transshipment point. The huge pile of African elephant tusks, estimated to be worth US$20 million, was first fed into in an industrial crusher to be pulverized, and then incinerated in a giant furnace in Port Dickson in the south. The country has previously announced that 4,624 ivory tusks were confiscated between 2011 and 2014.
VIETNAM
Addicts flee rehab camp
About 450 drug addicts have escaped from a rehabilitation center where many were held for compulsory treatment, an official said yesterday. The detainees attacked guards, climbed walls and broke down the main gate at the center in Ba Ria Vung Tau Province late on Wednesday. “We have brought 150 patients back, while search efforts are under way for nearly 300 others,” said Le Thi Trang Dai, director of the provincial labor department. The government enforces a compulsory treatment program for the nation’s estimated 140,000 drug addicts. Addicts can also voluntarily enter the centers to undergo rehabilitation treatments. The escapees were a mix of compulsory and volunteer admissions, Dai said. Local authorities are urging families to bring back runaway patients so they can complete their treatment, she said. US-based Human Rights Watch has denounced the conditions in the rehab centers, calling them “forced labor camps” where inmates do not receive proper healthcare and are often subjected to physical violence. A UN expert has recommended they be closed.
CHINA
GM crops to be planted
The country will “facilitate” the planting of genetically modified (GM) corn and other plants on an industrial scale in the next five years, officials said, after not authorizing any new commercial GM crops for a decade. The controversial science is a key trade issue with the US, whose biotechnology giant Monsanto is a global leader in the field, while its rival Syngenta has agreed a US$43 billion takeover offer by state-owned firm ChemChina. Only two GM crops are currently commercially cultivated in the country — a type of cotton approved in 1996, and a virus-resistant papaya authorized in 2006.
ISRAEL
New settler homes approved
The government has approved plans for more than 200 new settler homes in the occupied West Bank, adding to a sharp increase in settlement projects so far this year, a non-governmental organization said yesterday. The government has given the green light for the plans for at least 229 homes to move forward and they are now at various stages in the technical process, said Hagit Ofran, a spokeswoman for settlement watchdog Peace Now. Settlement building projects must pass through five administrative stages before winning final approval from Minister of Defense Moshe Yaalon. Peace Now said that the number of West Bank settlements the government plans to build more than tripled in the first quarter of this year compared with the same period last year.
UNITED STATES
Napster head funds research
Tech billionaire Sean Parker on Wednesday announced a US$250 million grant to fund research aimed at breakthroughs in cancer treatment through immunotherapy. Parker, the founder of music-sharing service Napster and an early investor and executive at Facebook, is to create a center for immunotherapy — which aims to use the body’s immune system to fight the disease — collaborating with six US-based cancer research institutions. “We are at an inflection point in cancer research and now is the time to maximize immunotherapy’s unique potential to transform all cancers into manageable diseases, saving millions of lives,” said Parker, who last year created the Parker Foundation. “We believe that the creation of a new funding and research model can overcome many of the obstacles that currently prevent research breakthroughs.
UNITED STATES
Teen jailed for two years
A judge on Wednesday sentenced a Texas teenager who used “affluenza” as a defense in a deadly drunk-driving accident — and then fled to Mexico to evade his probation officer — to two years in prison. Ethan Couch, 19, was ordered to serve four consecutive sentences of 180 days in prison, or a total of 720 days — one for each person killed in the 2013 accident. Judge Wayne Salvant, whose verdict was televised, said he could revise the sentence in two weeks after prosecutors and defense attorneys submit written arguments. In 2013, Couch — who was 16 at the time — crashed his pickup into a group of pedestrians and another vehicle. Beyond the dead, several others were seriously injured. He had a blood-alcohol level nearly three times the legal limit for an adult. The son of millionaire parents made headlines during his trial when a psychologist testifying on his behalf claimed he suffered from “affluenza.” The term, coined from affluence and influenza, implied that financial privilege made him unable to understand the consequences of his actions.
UNITED KINGDOM
Loch Ness ‘monster’ a prop
A marine robot deployed in the waters of Scotland’s Loch Ness was though to have found the remains of a monster, but it turned out to be a prop from a movie shot in 1970. The robot, belonging to Norwegian offshore oil company Kongsberg Maritime, is drawing up the first high-resolution map of the 230m deep lake in a project named “Operation Groundtruth.” “Although it is the shape of ‘Nessie,’ it is not the remains of the monster that has mystified the world for 80 years,” said VisitScotland, a Scottish tourism agency that is backing the project.
‘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