■ India
Man's tongue cut off
Suspected Muslim militants yesterday chopped off the tongue of a villager whom they suspected of being a police informer in Jammu and Kashmir state, news reports said. A group of heavily armed militants kidnapped Abdul Majeed from his village in Doda district and took him to a forest where he was tortured, PTI news agency reported citing official sources. The sources said the militants later chopped off Majeed's tongue and let him go. He was found lying unconscious near the forest by a group of local people who took him to a hospital.
■ Hong Kong
Speed-eater reigns again
Japan's champion speed-eater devoured 100 roast pork buns in 12 minutes in the final round of an eating contest in Hong Kong on yesterday. Takeru Kobayashi, 27, plowed through the Chinese steamed buns to easily beat five other local contestants, pocketing a cash prize of HK$20,000 (US$2,574). First runner-up Johnny Wu, 34, finished 47 buns. Kobayashi, who weighs just 65kg, said the palm-sized buns posed more of a challenge than the 83 vegetarian dumplings he downed in eight minutes on Saturday. The Japanese speed-eater is the five-time international hot dog-eating champion, and holds the world record after wolfing down 53 1/2 frankfurters in 12 minutes.
■ Australia
Firm gives away chocolate
Some 20,000 chocolate bars were handed out free in Sydney yesterday as the makers set out to recover from a extortion bid which forced the recall and destruction of millions of candy bars. Chocolate-maker Masterfoods was forced to withdraw its Mars and Snickers bars from sale across New South Wales state including Sydney on July 1 after receiving threatening letters and a contaminated candy bar from an extortionist. It was later revealed that Sydney's Star City casino was the principal target of the extortion bid, which is still being investigated by police.
■ Thailand
PM, Muslim leaders in talks
Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra met yesterday with Muslim leaders and local authorities in a province along the Malaysian border that has suffered the brunt of 19 months of deadly unrest. "The talks were about how to prevent and suppress violence," Thaksin told reporters, adding that he would deploy security reinforcements if needed. Thaksin said the government may give local authorities more power to help deal with the violence. He made the surprise two-day tour of three volatile provinces in the Muslim-majority region amid fresh intimidation, in the form of anonymous handwritten leaflets threatening to kill or chop off the ears of people who work on Fridays, the Muslim holy day.
■ Australia
Warship hunters get funding
Australia's government will help fund a search for a warship mysteriously lost during World War II off the country's remote northwest coast with all 645 people on board, Prime Minister John Howard said yesterday. The HMAS Sydney II sank in 1941 after it came under fire from a German Armed Merchant Cruiser, which the Australian Navy believes had claimed to have been a harmless Dutch merchant ship. Howard pledged A$1.3 million (US$985,000) to a team already trying to locate the ship, which would be used to conduct a sonar search of the seabed with a suitable vessel, state of the art sonar equipment and experienced personnel.
■ United Kingdom
Airline to resume service
British Airways pressed ahead yesterday to resume normal service, two days after the end of a crippling ground-crew walkout that had stranded more than 100,000 passengers during the peak of the summer travel season. The airline said it expected 85 percent of its short-haul flights and 80 percent of its long-haul flights would leave yesterday from Heathrow airport -- a similar figure to Saturday -- and that it had reduced the backlog of stranded luggage from 30,000 pieces to 10,000. Passengers disrupted by the more than 24-hour walkout were being rebooked onto flights or offered the chance to travel on another airline.
■ Mexico
Temblor shakes the coast
A 5.4 magnitude earthquake on Saturday rocked the southern Pacific coast of Mexico, 370km south-southwest of Mexico City. The earthquake struck the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca at 9:52pm local time and could be felt in Mexican City, where building swayed lightly. There were no immediate reports of damages or injuries near the epicenter in towns along the Oaxaca coast.
■ Russia
Officers killed in Chechnya
Three officers were killed in the southern region of Chechnya in the early hours yesterday. The men were responding to an attack on the home of a local official when they were caught in an explosion. Colonel Alexander Kayak, military commander of the Chechen region of Urus-Martan, died along with two fellow officers. Two other soldiers were seriously injured. The local official's house was burned down but he was not hurt. His son was taken away by the attackers but managed to escape. Separatist forces have been fighting pro-Moscow forces in Chechnya for more than a decade. Clashes occur on an almost daily basis, both in Chechnya and the neighboring regions of Dagestan and Ingushetia.
■ United States
Elephant pitches first ball
The ceremonial first pitch at a West Michigan Whitecaps baseball game was full of surprises. Not only was Friday's pitch thrown by an elephant, but the ball went straight to catcher Chris Robinson's mitt. Fans and players cheered the 9-foot (4m)-tall, four-ton African elephant named Laura after she flipped the ball high and wide. "I've never caught an elephant before," Robinson said. "She had pretty good life on her fastball. It tailed a little bit." Whitecaps right-hander Andrew Kown said, "I couldn't believe how far and how hard she throws it." "If an elephant can [throw a strike], we should be able to do it." Laura, the 23-year-old elephant shared the silver screen with Jim Carrey in Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls.
■ Spain
Ban on Basque rally upheld
A court on Saturday upheld a ban on a rally called by an outlawed Basque separatist party that is accused of being part of the armed group ETA. The Batasuna party had planned to hold the march yesterday in San Sebastian. On Wednesday, the Basque Interior Ministry banned the demonstration on grounds that, as an outlawed party, Batasuna was barred from holding rallies. The ministry also said previous demonstrations by the party had resulted in violence. Batasuna appealed to the Superior Court of the Basque country, and on Saturday the court sided with the ministry. Batasuna leader Arnaldo Otegi said Friday, however, it would go forward regardless of the court's ruling.
DEBT BREAK: Friedrich Merz has vowed to do ‘whatever it takes’ to free up more money for defense and infrastructure at a time of growing geopolitical uncertainty Germany’s likely next leader Friedrich Merz was set yesterday to defend his unprecedented plans to massively ramp up defense and infrastructure spending in the Bundestag as lawmakers begin debating the proposals. Merz unveiled the plans last week, vowing his center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU)/Christian Social Union (CSU) bloc and the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) — in talks to form a coalition after last month’s elections — would quickly push them through before the end of the current legislature. Fraying Europe-US ties under US President Donald Trump have fueled calls for Germany, long dependent on the US security umbrella, to quickly
RARE EVENT: While some cultures have a negative view of eclipses, others see them as a chance to show how people can work together, a scientist said Stargazers across a swathe of the world marveled at a dramatic red “Blood Moon” during a rare total lunar eclipse in the early hours of yesterday morning. The celestial spectacle was visible in the Americas and Pacific and Atlantic oceans, as well as in the westernmost parts of Europe and Africa. The phenomenon happens when the sun, Earth and moon line up, causing our planet to cast a giant shadow across its satellite. But as the Earth’s shadow crept across the moon, it did not entirely blot out its white glow — instead the moon glowed a reddish color. This is because the
Romania’s electoral commission on Saturday excluded a second far-right hopeful, Diana Sosoaca, from May’s presidential election, amid rising tension in the run-up to the May rerun of the poll. Earlier this month, Romania’s Central Electoral Bureau barred Calin Georgescu, an independent who was polling at about 40 percent ahead of the rerun election. Georgescu, a fierce EU and NATO critic, shot to prominence in November last year when he unexpectedly topped a first round of presidential voting. However, Romania’s constitutional court annulled the election after claims of Russian interference and a “massive” social media promotion in his favor. On Saturday, an electoral commission statement
Chinese authorities increased pressure on CK Hutchison Holdings Ltd over its plan to sell its Panama ports stake by sharing a second newspaper commentary attacking the deal. The Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office on Saturday reposted a commentary originally published in Ta Kung Pao, saying the planned sale of the ports by the Hong Kong company had triggered deep concerns among Chinese people and questioned whether the deal was harming China and aiding evil. “Why were so many important ports transferred to ill-intentioned US forces so easily? What kind of political calculations are hidden in the so-called commercial behavior on the
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