■ Iran
Seven police die in shootout
Bandits killed seven policeman and wounded nine in a gun battle on the country's lawless southeastern borders, the official IRNA news agency reported yesterday. Haydarali Nouraee, governor of the southeastern city of Zahedan, told IRNA the policemen were ambushed as they headed to arrest Derasheh Bakhsh, a prominent bandit leader who remains on the run. Iran is one of the world's key narcotics thoroughfares, carrying drugs to Europe from Afghanistan, which produces 85 percent of the world's opium. Some 3,300 Iranian forces have died in gun battles with bandits and traffickers since the 1979 Islamic revolution and the borders with Pakistan and Afghanistan resemble a war zone, dotted with forts, trenches and ramparts.
■ Japan
Underwater volcano erupts
An underwater volcano has erupted near a remote Pacific island off southern Japan, spewing a column of steam 1,000m into the sky, Japan's Coast Guard said yesterday. The coast guard sent a plane to investigate the eruption about 1,400km south of Tokyo after it was spotted on Saturday by a member of Japan's armed forces stationed on the nearby island of Iwojima. The coast guard has issued a warning to shipping in the area and plans to conduct a further investigation today, a spokesman said.
■ South Korea
Police stop migrants, snakes
South Korean police, in an unusual joint operation yesterday, arrested six Chinese illegal immigrants and seized thousands of illegally imported snakes from the same boat. Police rounded up the six, all Korean-Chinese in their 30s, upon their arrival on the west coast and seized 133 10kg boxes of snakes from the boat. "The six were aboard the ship carrying thousands of snakes," said Min Chang-ki, an investigator with Taean marine police. "Two, who had been expelled before for illegal immigration, will be imprisoned while the other four will be repatriated soon after investigations."
■ Philippines
Luxury SUV explodes
A luxury sports utility vehicle exploded along a major highway in the Philippine capital yesterday, injuring four people, police said. Investigators immediately ruled out terrorism in the incident along EDSA highway in Manila's suburban city of Quezon, noting that personal grudge was emerging to be a motive. Senior Superintendent James Brillantes said Patrick Aguirre-Dy was driving the vehicle when it exploded just outside a shopping mall. Aguirre-Dy, his 55-year-old mother, and sister were able to flee the vehicle but suffered burns and bruises. Blast shrapnel also slightly injured the driver of a nearby car. Brillantes said the Aguirre-Dys were the wife and children of a Filipino-Chinese businessman who died in a similar incident last year.
■ China
Japanese tourism declines
The number of Japanese tourists to China has fallen sharply since the eruption of anti-Japanese protests, with travel firms expecting as much as a 60 percent drop during the upcoming holiday season. In a survey of six major travel firms on China-bound tourist figures, the Japan Association of Travel Agents found a significant drop in demand after April's anti-Japan rallies in China, the Sankei Shimbun daily reported.
■ United Kingdom
Napoleon learned English
Former French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte was desperate to learn English after surrendering to the British, an exhibition opening Thursday at the National Maritime Museum in London in London is to show. Napoleon -- apparently eager to learn English to find out what the British press was writing about him -- found progress hard going. While in exile in January 1816, Napoleon wrote: "My wife shall come near to me, my son shall be great and strong of he will be able to trink (sic) a bottle of wine at dinner I shall [toast] with him." Fondation Napoleon historian Peter Hicks said the French emperor steeled himself to the job in hand. "He was not necessarily anti-English," Hicks added. "He had to fight because it was the enemy of France."
■ Russia
State may control alcohol
President Vladimir Putin yesterday called for greater state control over the Russian hard alcohol industry, decrying what he said was rampant production of poor quality alcohol that kills some 40,000 Russians annually. Putin said the government should make the alcohol industry a state monopoly. Alcoholism is widespread in Russia and is believed to be contributing to the drop in the country's life expectancy rate among men.
■ United Kingdom
Brown vows moral crusade
British finance minister Gordon Brown, declaring the fight against poverty "the greatest moral crusade of our times," vowed on Saturday to work for more debt relief, aid and trade reform for poor nations. He was speaking at a Christian Aid rally in Edinburgh."Ours must now become the greatest moral crusade of our times," Brown said, adding there could be no justice for the poor while rich countries subsidized their agricultural products, giving poor states no chance of competing with them. "This is more than a week's work at the G8. It is a lifetime's work across the world," he said.
■ United Kingdom
`Congestion charge' levied
Hoping to drive even more cars off the road, the capital is raising its "congestion charge" to eight pounds (US$14.16) today, up from the previous five pounds (US$8.85). Drivers who pay for a month or more in advance get a 15 percent discount. Transport for London, the body responsible for the capital's transportation system, says the five pound charge has reduced the number of vehicles on the road by 15 percent, cut accidents and curbed pollution. "Obviously traffic has eased," said self-employed parcel delivery man Gary Rickwood. "But it's a lot of money ... It's not like I'm socializing; I'm trying to work."
■ Saudi Arabia
Alleged top al-Qaeda killed
A man believed to have been a senior member of the al-Qaeda terror network was shot dead by Saudi Arabian security forces in Riyadh Sunday, the Saudi Interior Ministry said. Younis al-Hiary was killed in clashes that took place during raids on two houses in the eastern part of the Saudi capital. Al-Hiary, 36, was a Moroccan citizen and was on a recently released list of most- wanted terror suspects in Saudi Arabia. Saudi forces took into custody three other suspects during the raids but did not release information on their identities. Six security force personnel were injured in the clashes. The kingdom last week released a list of 36 men wanted in conjunction with terrorist activities.
A US YouTuber who caused outrage for filming himself kissing a statue commemorating Korean wartime sex slaves has been sentenced to six months in prison, a court in Seoul said yesterday. Johnny Somali, 25, gained notoriety several years ago for recording himself doing a series of provocative stunts in South Korea and Japan, and streaming them on platforms such as YouTube and Twitch. South Korean authorities indicted Somali — whose real name is Ramsey Khalid Ismael — in 2024 on public order violations and obstruction of business, and banned him from leaving the country. “The court has sentenced him to six months in
Former Lima mayor Rafael Lopez Aliaga, a Peruvian presidential hopeful, gathered hundreds of supporters in Lima on Tuesday and gave authorities 24 hours to annul the first round of the country’s election over allegations of fraud. Lopez Aliaga is locked in a tight three-way race with two other candidates for second place in Sunday’s vote. The election runner-up wins a ticket to June’s presidential run-off against front-runner Keiko Fujimori. “I am giving them 24 hours to declare this electoral fraud null and void,” said Lopez Aliaga, surrounded by a crowd of several hundred supporters. “If it is not declared null and void tomorrow,
Four contenders are squaring up to succeed Antonio Guterres as secretary-general of the UN, which faces unprecedented global instability, wars and its own crushing budget crisis. Chile’s Michelle Bachelet, Argentina’s Rafael Grossi, Costa Rica’s Rebeca Grynspan and Senegal’s Macky Sall are each to face grillings by 193 member states and non-governmental organizations for three hours today and tomorrow. It is only the second time the UN has held a public question-and-answer, a format created in 2016 to boost transparency. Ultimately the five permanent members of the UN’s top body, the Security Council, hold the power, wielding vetoes over who leads the
A humanoid robot that won a half-marathon race for robots in Beijing on Sunday ran faster than the human world record in a show of China’s technological leaps. The winner from Honor, a Chinese smartphone maker, completed the 21km race in 50 minutes and 26 seconds, said a WeChat post by the Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area, also known as Beijing E-Town, where the race began. That was faster than the human world record holder, Ugandan Jacob Kiplimo, who finished the same distance in about 57 minutes in March at the Lisbon road race. The performance by the robot marked a significant step forward
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