■ Japan
Death sentences confirmed
A court yesterday upheld death sentences for two ex-cult members convicted in a 1995 nerve gas attack on Tokyo's subways that killed 12 people and injured thousands. The Tokyo High Court rejected the appeals of Toru Toyoda, 36, and Kenichi Hirose, 40, who were sentenced to death by hanging by a lower court in 2000, court spokesman Sadakazu Takagi said. The two were among five Aum Shinrikyo members who released sarin gas on subway trains on March 21, 1995. The high court also upheld a ruling of life imprisonment for Shigeo Sugimoto, 45, who drove the getaway car for a third attacker.
■ Japan
Fischer asks to be released
Former world chess champion Bobby Fischer has asked to be released from custody at a Tokyo detention center while he appeals against a move to deport him, a Canadian advising Fischer said yesterday. Fischer, 61, wanted by Washington for defying sanctions by playing a match in Yugoslavia in 1992, was detained at Tokyo's Narita airport on July 15 when he tried to leave for the Philippines on a passport US officials said was invalid. "He has asked for provisional release, which is discretionary, but which we would hope for immediately," said John Bosnitch, a Tokyo-based communications consultant and journalist.
■ Australia
Acid killers in court
Five men appeared briefly in court yesterday charged with murdering another man by forcing him at gunpoint to swallow hydrochloric acid. Accountant Dominic Li, 45, died on Jan. 2 last year after suffering almost three weeks of agony after he was forced to drink the acid in front of his wife and 14-year-old son at their home in the Sydney suburb of Concord. Police believe the killing was part of a "bungled contract assault-murder" over the proceeds of a drug deal, a statement of facts tendered to the Central Local Court said. The five accused, aged from 24 to 39, were charged with murder and conspiring to conflict grievous bodily harm.
■ Australia
Anglican bishop defrocked
A former Anglican bishop who seduced a schoolgirl 50 years ago is set to become the first clergyman in Australia to be defrocked, reports said yesterday. Donald Shearman, 77, had sex with the girl regularly when he was a boarding house master and she a boarder in his care between 1954 and 1956. Brisbane Archbishop Phillip Aspinall is expected to strip Shearman of his holy orders in a public ceremony in St. John's Cathedral next month, the Sydney Morning Herald reported. Aspinall's predecessor, Peter Hollingworth, was forced to resign as governor-general last year after he said that the girl, then 14, had seduced the minister.
■ South Korea
More defectors arrive
The second wave in the biggest mass defection of North Koreans to South Korea arrived yesterday on a flight from an unidentified Southeast Asian country, bringing the total in the two-day airlift to nearly 460. The group of 227 North Koreans arrived at Incheon International Airport on a chartered Korean Air plane arranged by the South Korean government, a news agency said. South Korean government officials have been reluctant to confirm the arrival and have declined to reveal the country they came from, but news reports said that 230 arrived on Tuesday.
■ Israel
Wall to be rerouted
Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz on Tuesday agreed to a limited rerouting north of Jerusalem of the contro-versial security barrier being built in the West Bank in spite of international protests. Mofaz gave the green light to "a plan aimed at modifying the route of the barrier in line with principles laid down by [Israel's] supreme court," a statement issued by the defense ministry said. However, Mofaz made reservations on 10 points of the planned route, the ministry said, without giving details. The ministry at the same time ordered construction of the barrier south of Jerusalem to be sped up. The supreme court ruled on June 30 that the West Bank barrier's current path violates the rights of Palestinians living near Jerusalem and should be altered.
■ Colombia
Guerrillas free bishop
Marxist guerrillas freed a Roman Catholic bishop unharmed three days after he was abducted in an effort to use him to deliver a political message to authorities, officials said. But Bishop Misael Vacca Ramirez said on Tuesday he was never given a message because an army rescue operation cut his captors off from their commanders, who had prepared the statement. Vacca Ramirez, the bishop of Yopal, was released close to where he was taken hostage on Saturday in remote northeastern mountains. "I was treated well. At no moment did anybody show me disrespect," Vacca Ramirez, 48, told reporters.
■ Iran
Polygamist jailed
Former culture minister Attaollah Mohajerani has been arrested and jailed for not registering polygamy, the daily Etemad reported yesterday. While already married, Mohajerani had reportedly started an affair with another woman named Mahsa Yussefi, and even promised her marriage -- legal under Islamic laws if approved by the first wife. The report, initially carried by the conservative news service Fars, had yet to be confirmed by other sources. His official wife, Jamileh Kadivar, a former reformist member of parliament and an advocate of women's rights, has so far denied all allegations against her husband and branded them as a dirty campaign by his conservative opponents to block his political career.
■ United Kingdom
Channel fined for porn
British media regulators on Tuesday fined a porno-graphic satellite television channel ?50,000 (US$92,080) for broadcasting graphic sex too early in the evening. Digital Television Production aired the sexually explicit images of simulated intercourse and orgasm between 8:30pm and 10pm on April 8 on its XplicitXXX service on a free-to-air basis to promote the normally encrypted channel.
■ Netherlands
Charity sued for ransom debt
The Dutch government is suing aid agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) for repayment of a ransom the Netherlands paid for the release of one of the medical group's workers kidnapped in Russia, it said on Tuesday. The Dutch last month threatened to take legal action after the medical charity failed to repay a ransom reported to be around 1 million euros (US$1.2 million) paid to Russian kidnappers to free Dutch aid worker Arjan Erkel after 20 months. The Netherlands asked for the cash back in May, admitting that it had paid a ransom and angering MSF, one of the most active foreign organizations in the Caucasus.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
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