■ China
Slaughterhouse shuttered
Health inspectors have shut down an illegal slaughterhouse in northeastern China for butchering sick pigs, part of a sweeping effort to contain an outbreak of pig-borne disease that has killed 38 people. Inspectors swooped on the unregistered abbatoir in the city of Gongzhuling in Jilin province this week and found it had been supplying meat to a sausage factory in the provincial capital, Changchun, which had also been shut down. "Inspectors found six to eight tonnes of pork in the underground slaughterhouse, and our tests showed at least one tonne came from pigs who had died of illness," Liu Tienan, head of the provincial health inspection bureau, told reporters.
■ China
13 miners die in blaze
Thirteen coal miners died in an underground fire at a pit in northern China's Hebei province, state press said yesterday. The blaze started late Wednesday when wooden support pillars in shafts at the Taodingshan Coal Mine in Handan county caught fire, said the Yanzhao Metropolis Daily. It did not say what sparked the fire. Thirteen workers were underground at the time and they were all found dead Thursday, it said, adding that the mine was operating illegally after being ordered to shut a year ago. Earlier this week China ordered more than 5,000 unlicensed coal mines to suspend operations for safety inspections in a bid to improve one of its most dangerous industries. China's mines are considered the most deadly in the world, with safety often sacrificed to supply the fuel that is driving the country's rapid industrialization and economic growth. Thousands of miners die every year.
■ Hong Kong
Diplomat urges democracy
The new top US diplomat in Hong Kong yesterday called for more democracy in the former British colony that returned to Chinese rule eight years ago. "The United States wants Hong Kong to succeed," US Consul General James Cunningham said, adding that Washington supported "a high degree of autonomy for Hong Kong and the expansion of democracy." The territory enjoys Western-style freedoms under an arrangement dubbed "one country, two systems," but it has limited democracy. The legislature is partially elected and the territory's leader is picked by a 800-member committee dominated by pro-Beijing figures.
■ Australia
Speargun killer gets life
A man who confessed to murdering his pregnant wife and baby girl with a speargun received two life jail sentences yesterday from a judge who called his actions "unspeakably callous." John Myles Sharpe, 38, was ordered to spend a minimum 33 years in prison for the murders of his New Zealand-born wife, Anna Kemp 41, and the couple's 19-month-old daughter Gracie. During his trial in February, Sharpe pleaded guilty to killing Kemp with two speargun shots to the head as she slept in their Melbourne area home in March last year. Sharpe, a former bank worker, told police he buried his wife's body in a shallow grave behind their home and then four days later shot and killed Gracie with four spears in an act of "irrational bloody madness."
■ Australia
Authorities plan use of SMS
Authorities in Sydney unveiled plans yesterday to use SMS messaging and emails to evacuate the city center in the event of a terrorist attack. Under the plan, modelled on how British police handled last month's bombings in London, an emergency command center will use SMS texting, email and telephones to alert security managers and fire wardens in some 1,500 buildings in Sydney's business district. Building managers would use public address systems and electronic messaging to direct people to one of three pre-determined "marshalling sites" set up in open areas around the city center.
■ Hong Kong
Opera house to stay open
The territory's only Cantonese Opera venue has won a reprieve after the landlord bowed to public pressure and abandoned a rent hike. The Sunbeam Theatre -- which holds over 300 performances a year -- looked set to close at the end of this month after 33 years and be turned into a shopping mall when faced with a rent increase of US$25,000 a month to US$51,000. However, following a meeting with theater operators and the Home Affairs Secretary Patrick Ho Chi-ping, the owner, Toyo Mall, backed down and agreed to allow the show to go on until 2009 at the same monthly rent.
■ Turkey
Kurdish rebels attack
Five Turkish soldiers were killed and seven injured when Kurdish rebels attacked a regional command headquarters in eastern Turkey in the early hours of yesterday, the Anadolu news agency reported. Guerillas from the Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK) armed with long-range rifles and rockets attacked the regional headquarters in the Semdinli district of Hakkari at around 12:40am. The firefight lasted around 15 minutes before the PKK rebels escaped. Meanwhile, newspapers yesterday reported that a soldier taken hostage by PKK rebels last night was released unharmed Thursday night.
■ Germany
Man in phone-sex shocker
A court in Germany convicted a man for fraud after he racked up huge phone bills phoning a sex hotline from work and split the proceeds with a woman working at the service, authorities said Wednesday. "He wasn't calling for the stimulation," said a spokesman for the court in the western city of Duesseldorf. The court handed the 38-year-old an eight-month suspended jail sentence for the ruse which he cooked up with the hotline worker while working for a local medical insurer. German media said the man had made more than 160 calls within half a year, at a cost to his company of almost 16,000 euros (US$19,700).
■ Portugal
Woman weds philanderer
An 81-year-old Portuguese woman plans to remarry her former husband, who is ten years older, on Thursday, more than three decades after she left him because of his womanizing, a daily newspaper reported. "He behaved badly and out of jealousy I left him after three years. Now he is more calm, he doesn't run around with other women," Silvina Azenha told Correio da Manha. "Despite everything he was always the big love of my life. In the 33 years that we were separated, we never stopped talking to each other," she added.
■ Russia
Immigration increasing
The number of Russians returning to their homeland is increasing for the first time since the mass emigration that followed the fall of the Soviet Union, some fleeing a tide of anti-Russian sentiment stirred by pro-Western revolutions across the country's former empire. Figures from the federal state statistics service for the first three months of this year show net migration into Russia has more than doubled compared with the same period last year. The service said that from January to March there was a net migration into Russia of 29,505 people. A total of 11,661 people was recorded in the same period of 2004.
■ N Ireland
Many injured in riots
At least 40 police officers were injured during rioting in north Belfast on Thursday night that followed the arrests of six men in connection with a feud between Protestant guerrillas, police said yesterday. The hijacked driver's cab of a truck was driven at police lines during the rioting, and petrol bombs, paint bombs and fireworks thrown during the disturbance. A number of other vehicles, including a bus, were stolen and burnt, police said. The rioting came after police made six arrests in connection with the recent murders of three men, part of a feud between extremists who want Northern Ireland to remain British-ruled.
OPTIMISTIC: A Philippine Air Force spokeswoman said the military believed the crew were safe and were hopeful that they and the jet would be recovered A Philippine Air Force FA-50 jet and its two-person crew are missing after flying in support of ground forces fighting communist rebels in the southern Mindanao region, a military official said yesterday. Philippine Air Force spokeswoman Colonel Consuelo Castillo said the jet was flying “over land” on the way to its target area when it went missing during a “tactical night operation in support of our ground troops.” While she declined to provide mission specifics, Philippine Army spokesman Colonel Louie Dema-ala confirmed that the missing FA-50 was part of a squadron sent “to provide air support” to troops fighting communist rebels in
PROBE: Last week, Romanian prosecutors launched a criminal investigation against presidential candidate Calin Georgescu accusing him of supporting fascist groups Tens of thousands of protesters gathered in Romania’s capital on Saturday in the latest anti-government demonstration by far-right groups after a top court canceled a presidential election in the EU country last year. Protesters converged in front of the government building in Bucharest, waving Romania’s tricolor flags and chanting slogans such as “down with the government” and “thieves.” Many expressed support for Calin Georgescu, who emerged as the frontrunner in December’s canceled election, and demanded they be resumed from the second round. George Simion, the leader of the far-right Alliance for the Unity of Romanians (AUR), which organized the protest,
ECONOMIC DISTORTION? The US commerce secretary’s remarks echoed Elon Musk’s arguments that spending by the government does not create value for the economy US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick on Sunday said that government spending could be separated from GDP reports, in response to questions about whether the spending cuts pushed by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency could possibly cause an economic downturn. “You know that governments historically have messed with GDP,” Lutnick said on Fox News Channel’s Sunday Morning Futures. “They count government spending as part of GDP. So I’m going to separate those two and make it transparent.” Doing so could potentially complicate or distort a fundamental measure of the US economy’s health. Government spending is traditionally included in the GDP because
Hundreds of people in rainbow colors gathered on Saturday in South Africa’s tourist magnet Cape Town to honor the world’s first openly gay imam, who was killed last month. Muhsin Hendricks, who ran a mosque for marginalized Muslims, was shot dead last month near the southern city of Gqeberha. “I was heartbroken. I think it’s sad especially how far we’ve come, considering how progressive South Africa has been,” attendee Keisha Jensen said. Led by motorcycle riders, the mostly young crowd walked through the streets of the coastal city, some waving placards emblazoned with Hendricks’s image and reading: “#JUSTICEFORMUHSIN.” No arrest
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