■ Philippines
'John Wayne' up for election
A hugely popular film actor known as the John Wayne of the Philippines dealt President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo a formidable challenge yesterday by confirming his starring role in next May's election. Other candidates from the fragmented opposition and several independents have vowed to run, but Fernando Poe Jr appears to be the one to beat after scoring a slim lead over newsreader-turned-senator Noli de Castro at the top of a recent opinion poll. Poe, a high school dropout with no political experience and close friend of ousted president and former movie star Joseph Estrada, said he accepted his nomination to be the standard bearer for one opposition coalition.
■ India
Rebels' families released
Bhutan will hand over to India wives and children of Indian rebels caught in the Himalayan kingdom during a week-old military offensive, officials said yesterday. The Buddhist kingdom, wedged between India and China, last week launched its biggest offensive to push out an estimated 3,000 militants, who are fighting against New Delhi's rule across the border in India's northeast. "Bhutanese officials have informed us they would hand over wives and children of militants who are now in their custody," a senior Indian intelligence official said.
■ China
Alleged rape draws crowd
Eight men were arrested over the weekend for allegedly gang raping a woman in front of 200 revellers at a disco in Zhuhai, about 50km west of Hong Kong. The men were seized after police intercepted two taxis driving away from the Rolling Stone Disco following a complaint from the woman. A Zhuhai police spokesman confirmed the attack had occurred and eight suspects were in custody, a media report said. One witness said the woman was attacked in the main area of the disco. She was pinned to a sofa, stripped naked by four of the attackers and repeatedly raped in front of about 200 people, The Standard reported on Monday.
■ Laos
Pupils flunk urine tests
The government of Laos expressed its alarm yesterday over the results of its first widespread urine testing at primary and secondary schools, in which about 8.6 per cent of the students tested positive for methamphetamine. "It's very alarming that drugs are entering the schools," Dr. Thienthien Polsena, director of the government's Anti-Narcotics Committee, was quoted as saying in a broadcast by Radio Vientiane. The government-run radio said urine tests on 1,644 students from five primary and secondary schools in the central province of Savannakhet found 141 students had methamphetamine in their systems. Students whose urine tests were positive would be sent to reeducation centers, he said.
■ Australia
Students sobering up
Beer-swilling nights are becoming a thing of the past for Australian university students as they drink less and save money to pay off their growing personal debt and student fees, bar owners say. Even celebrations to mark the end of exams aren't as wild as they used to be, said Peter Linden, a bar manager at Melbourne University. "Having a Uni bar is no longer a license to print money," Linden said in the Sydney Morning Herald. "You don't see the kind of student that you did 10 to 15 years ago. They are more focused on degrees than they are having fun," he said.
■ South Africa
AIDS activist murdered
An AIDS activist in South Africa was gang raped and then beaten to death after telling her attackers she was infected with the HIV virus, it has emerged. Police said on Sunday that two men had been arrested on charges of participating in the rape and murder of Lorna Mlosana, 21, in the township of Khayelitsha outside Cape Town. "After they finished, the lady told them she was HIV positive, and then they took her outside and killed her," said Inspector Lunga Ntsinde. Police are seeking at least one other suspect but a witness said up to five men took turns attacking Mlosana after they had followed her into a toilet near a tavern.
■ Israel
Elite commandos say no
About a dozen reservists from the Israeli army's top commando unit declared on Sunday that they would no longer serve in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, Israeli media reported, reflecting growing unease with Israel's hard-fisted policy in the Palestinian areas. Thirteen reservists, including three officers, from Sayeret Matkal signed a letter to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, declaring, "We cannot continue to stand silent," charging that Israeli military activities in the West Bank and Gaza Strip are depriving "millions of Palestinians of human rights" and endangering "the fate of Israel as a democratic, Zionist and Jewish country." Sayeret Matkal is the top commando unit in the Israeli military and its most prestigious.
■ Belgium
Antibubbles created in beer
Belgian scientists have put a different kind of fizz into physics. They have studied that fleeting mystery of the foaming tankard -- the antibubble. Antibubbles move down the glass instead of up. Stephane Dorbolo and colleagues at the University of Liege and the College de France reported online yesterday in the New Journal of Physics that they found out how to create antibubbles in a variety of liquids, including water dosed with washing-up liquid. They repeated the phenomenon in a glass of Belgian beer, thus confirming, according to the Institute of Physics in London, "what British real ale drinkers have claimed for a long time: that Belgian beer is a lot like dishwater."
■ United States
Stewart curses legal woes
Style icon Martha Stewart has bemoaned her legal troubles and upcoming trial for an insider trading scandal in a rare television interview. "It's the saddest holiday ever. It's an unwelcome time for me, very unwelcome," Stewart told CNN television. Stewart could face as much as 30 years in prison if convicted of charges against her of securities fraud, obstruction of justice, making false statements and lying to the FBI. The criminal trial gets underway on Jan. 12.
■ United States
Obese bears like junk food
Bears need lots of fat to survive winter hibernation. But enough is enough, say US scientists who blame a ballooning black bear pudginess on their love of and access to human junk food. A study by the Wildlife Conservation Society found that 59 black bears followed in the Lake Tahoe region of the western state of Nevada weighed nearly a third more than bears living in wild areas -- and were a third less active. The scientists blamed the obesity trend on the availability of discarded hamburgers, chicken, French fries and other junk food in dumpsters behind fast food restaurants, shopping centers and suburban homes.
An American scientist convicted of lying to US authorities about payments from China while he was at Harvard University has rebuilt his research lab in Shenzhen, China, to pursue technology the Chinese government has identified as a national priority: embedding electronics into the human brain. Charles Lieber, 67, is among the world’s leading researchers in brain-computer interfaces. The technology has shown promise in treating conditions such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis and restoring movement in paralyzed people. It also has potential military applications: Scientists at the Chinese People’s Liberation Army have investigated brain interfaces as a way to engineer super soldiers by boosting
Indonesian police have arrested 13 people after shocking images of alleged abuse against small children at a daycare center went viral, sparking outrage across the nation, officials said on Monday. Police on Friday last week raided Little Aresha, a daycare center in Yogyakarta on Java island, following a report from a former employee. CCTV footage circulating on social media showed children, most younger than two, lying on the floor wearing only diapers, their hands and feet bound with rags. The police have confirmed that the footage is authentic. Police said they also found 20 children crammed into a room just 3m by 3m. “So
Jailed media entrepreneur Jimmy Lai (黎智英) has been awarded Deutsche Welle’s (DW) freedom of speech award for his contribution to Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement. The German public broadcaster on Thursday said Lai would be presented in absentia with the 12th iteration of the award on June 23 at the DW Global Media Forum in Bonn. Deutsche Welle director-general Barbara Massing praised the 78-year-old founder of the now-shuttered news outlet Apple Daily for standing “unwaveringly for press freedom in Hong Kong at great personal risk.” “With Apple Daily, he gave journalists a platform for free reporting and a voice to the democracy movement in
PHILIPPINE COMMITTEE: The head of the committee that made the decision said: ‘If there is nothing to hide, there is no reason to hide, there is no reason to obstruct’ A Philippine congressional committee on Wednesday ruled that there was “probable cause” to impeach Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte after hearing allegations of unexplained wealth, misuse of state funds and threats to have the president assassinated. The unanimous decision of the 53-member committee in the Philippine House of Representatives sends the two impeachment complaints to deliberations and voting by the entire lower chamber, which has more than 300 lawmakers. The complaints centered on Duterte’s alleged illegal use and mishandling of intelligence funds from the vice president’s office, and from her time as education secretary under Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. Duterte and the
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