Whether it is dodging the issue of weapons of mass destruction or evading the imbroglio over the recount in Florida, the two most prominent scions of the Bush dynasty have a knack for braving doubts about their credibility. \nBut while US president George Bush and his brother Jeb, the Florida governor, have made it through some tough questioning, the president's younger brother, Neil, may not be so lucky. \nIn a court deposition, taken in March and released this week, Neil claims that attractive women came to his hotel door looking for sex while he was on business trips in Hong Kong and Thailand. And as a big-hearted Texan, Neil, the third of five Bush children, merely did as he was asked. \n"You have to admit it's pretty remarkable for a man to go to a hotel room door and open it and have sex with her," said his ex-wife's lawyer, Marshall Davis Brown. \n"It was very unusual," Bush replied. He insists he didn't know them, did not see them afterwards and didn't pay them. \n"Were they prostitutes?" he was asked. \n"I don't know," he said. \nBush, 48, divorced his wife, Sharon, in April after 23 years of marriage. The split came after a bitter dispute with another couple, Maria and Robert Andrews, whom they met several years earlier. \nSharon, who is the subject of a US$850,000 defamation suit after she alleged that Bush was the father of the Andrews' two-year-old son, has called on Neil Bush and Andrews to take paternity tests. Bush and Maria Andrews are now a couple. \nOn Friday last week a Texas judge ordered Sharon Bush to allow one of their daughters, Ashley, 14, to accompany Neil and Maria to France for Thanksgiving. \n"They don't even celebrate Thanksgiving in France," said a friend of Sharon's. \nThe deposition also shed light on Bush's business dealings and ability to land fat contracts with little expertise. \nThe hotel trysts took place while Bush was working as a consultant for Grace Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp, which is backed by the son of former Chinese leader, Jiang Zemin, for which he was paid US$2 million in stock options over five years. \nIt is not the first time that he has been involved in corporate controversy. In the late 1980s he was director of Denver-based Silverado Savings & Loan, which collapsed at a cost to taxpayers of US$1 billion. At the time he denied any wrongdoing but was sanctioned by the federal government for his part in the failure. \nDuring the deposition Brown asked: "Now, you have absolutely no education background in semiconductors, do you Mr Bush?" \n"That's correct," Bush said. \nBrown also questioned him about work for Crest Investment Corp, where he was paid US$5,000 a month for work that totalled no more than four hours a week. Bush said he provided Crest with "miscellaneous consulting services." \n"Such as?" asked Brown. \n"Answering phone calls when the other co-chairman called and asked for advice," Bush said.
Over a few hours under gray skies, dozens of combat planes and helicopters roar on and off the flight deck of the USS Nimitz aircraft carrier, in a demonstration of US military power in some of the world’s most hotly contested waters. MH-60 Seahawk helicopters and F/A-18 Hornet jets bearing pilot call signs such as “Fozzie Bear,” “Pig Sweat” and “Bongoo” emit deafening screams as they land in the drizzle on the Nimitz, which is leading a carrier strike group that entered the South China Sea two weeks ago. US Rear Admiral Christopher Sweeney, who is commanding the group, said the tour
Sitting in a lotus position, four men weave glittering beads through gold thread on an organza sheet, carefully constructing a wedding dress that would soon wow crowds at Paris Fashion Week. For once, the French couturier behind the design, Julien Fournie, is determined to put these craftsmen in the spotlight. His new collection, which showed in Paris on Tuesday, was entirely made with fabrics from Mumbai. He said that a sort of “design imperialism” means that French fashion houses often play down that their fabrics are made outside France. “The houses which don’t admit it are perhaps afraid of losing their clientele,” Fournie
A court in Thailand sentenced a 27-year-old political activist to 28 years in prison on Thursday for posting messages on Facebook that it said defamed the country’s monarchy, while two young women charged with the same offense continued a hunger strike after being hospitalized. The court in the northern province of Chiang Rai found that Mongkhon Thirakot contravened the lese majeste law in 14 of 27 posts for which he was arrested in August last year. The law covers the king, queen and heirs, and any regent. The lese majeste law carries a prison term of three to 15 years per incident for
INSTABILITY: The country has seen a 33 percent increase in land that cultivates poppies since the military took over the government in 2021, a UN report said The production of opium in Myanmar has flourished since the military’s seizure of power, with the cultivation of poppies up by one-third in the past year, as eradication efforts have dropped and the faltering economy has led more people toward the drug trade, a UN report released yesterday showed. Last year, the first full growing season since the military wrested control of the country from the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in 2021, saw a 33 percent increase in Myanmar’s cultivation area to 40,100 hectares, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime report said. “Economic, security and governance disruptions
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