■ Hong Kong
Family used forceps on maid
Members of a doctor's family have gone on trial accused of punishing their Indonesian maid by using biopsy forceps to grip her breasts and nipples, a news report said yesterday. Dr. Chung Chong-fai, 32, his wife Lee Lai-ping, 28, and his mother-in-law Law Yee-lin, 60, allegedly used forceps on the maid to punish her when she repeatedly fell asleep at work. They would allegedly grip the breasts and nipples of the 22-year-old woman in the forceps as well as slapping her face and pinching her, the South China Morning Post reported. The maid told the court she was forced to work long hours and got only three hours' sleep every night, making her drowsy during the day when she would be punished for dozing.
■ Philippines
Four wounded by policeman
Four people were wounded yesterday when a rookie policeman accidentally fired his service firearm at Manila's Ninoy Aquino International Airport, an official said. Chief Superintendent Andres Caro, director of the police aviation security group, said the accident occurred at the departure area. He said police officer Gregorio Lazo Gale was sending off his wife at the airport, and had taken out the magazine of his 45-calibre pistol. "But when checking the gun, he accidentally fired it, with the bullet hitting the floor, causing splinters that hurt four bystanders," Caro said.
■ Malaysia
Coalition wins by-election
The ruling National Front coalition won a key by-election in the Muslim heartland after a recount yesterday, narrowly beating the hardline Islamic party that rules Kelantan state. The recount in Tuesday's poll for the Pengkalan Pasir state assembly seat showed the coalition -- which controls the federal government and every other state -- winning by 134 votes. The ballot was widely seen as a test of multiracial Malaysia's appetite for fundamentalist Islam. Coalition leaders hailed it as a victory for their moderate brand of Islam, which promotes development, against the policies of the Pan-Malaysia Islamic Party.
■ Japan
Girl escapes from `lock up'
An 18-year-old girl in Fukuoka has spent her entire life locked in her home, Japanese media reports said on Tuesday. The girl, who was not identified, was brought to the attention of the police after a passerby noticed her wandering around a park in her bare feet, despite the chilly temperatures. She is now in the custody of the authorities, a Fukuoka police spokesperson said. The girl ran away after her mother beat her for watching television. The reports said the mother had sequestered her child because she was ashamed of an illness the girl suffered as a toddler, which left her only 120cm tall. The mother has been fined ?100,000 (US$827).
■ China
Moon realtor shut down
A company's efforts at selling plots of land on the moon was a "beautiful" idea but fraudulent and illegal, a government watchdog has ruled. The firm, known as "Lunar Embassy," had managed to sell tracts of the moon for 298 yuan (US$37) per 0.4 hectares before being shut down in late October, the China Daily reported yesterday. Lunar Embassy chief Li Jie took the case to Beijing's commercial watchdog, urging that the suspension of his company's license be lifted. "There is not a law or regulation that prohibits the selling of land on the moon," the China Daily quoted him as saying in his application to the hearing.
■ Norway
Man recovers stolen card
When Vegard Sjaastad delivered a pizza near the western town of Aalesund, there was something familiar about the customer's credit card. It was his card, and had been stolen the day before. Sjaastad, who manages a Peppes Pizza restaurant, was training a new driver on Monday, and they delivered the pizzeria's "Film Package": a pizza, soft drinks, and the film Mr. and Mrs. Smith on DVD. A man with a credit card answered the door, and clearly did not recognize Sjaastad from the picture embossed on all Norwegian Visa cards. "I wasn't going to play hero. I'm pretty calm by nature. I just accepted the card and said `I hope you enjoy the meal,' as we always say," he said.
■ Northern Ireland
Bank employee charged
An employee of a Belfast bank whose family was taken hostage by robbers was charged with robbery himself yesterday, a potential breakthrough in the police's nearly year-old probe into the UK's biggest-ever bank raid. Chris Ward, 24, was expected to be arraigned on one count of robbery at Laganside Magistrates Court in Belfast yesterday. The Police Service of Northern Ireland said Ward had been charged while in police custody in connection with the £26.5 million (US$50 million) raid on Dec. 20 last year on the central vault of the Northern Bank, where Ward worked.
■ Germany
Schroeder polishing English
Former German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder is reportedly improving his English-language skills and sinking a few pints of beer in a small town on the border of England and Wales, reports in Germany said on Tuesday. Schroeder, who left office last month, is taking intensive lessons in the small Welsh town of Montgomery in an 18th century country house, the reports said. The Web site of the company offering courses at the house promises lessons "for business and professional people." Schroeder, 61, was also reported to be occasionally enjoying a pint at the local pub, The Dragon Hotel.
■ Czech Republic
Tourist files suit
A British tourist who was seriously injured when a Christmas tree fell on him in Prague two years ago filed a lawsuit on Tuesday against the municipal authorities. Malcom Tuffin is seeking 1.8 million koruna (US$73,270) in damages. Tuffin has still not recovered from the injuries he sustained when the tree fell on him on Dec. 6, 2003. The 30m tall tree was knocked down by high winds at a traditional Christmas market. Tuffin suffered back and leg injuries. According to police investigation the accident was not caused by human error. Prague City Hall had offered to buy a specially modified car for Tuffin or to pay to him US$16,500 as a gesture of good will, but the offer was rejected.
■ Nigeria
Couple escape stoning
An Islamic court on Tuesday acquitted two men accused of homosexuality, lifting the threat of a stoning. Judge Mustapha Sani Saulawa told the court that the prosecution had not brought enough evidence to convict the pair. "Even if there is prima facie evidence the prosecution needs four witnesses to the crime you are accused of," he told the defendants. Kabir Yusuf, 40, and Usman Sani, 18, were arrested on June 19 in a public toilet in the northern city of Katsina. The police alleged that they had been having sex, but could produce no witnesses.
■ United States
Teen held over cheesy plot
A woman allegedly tried to hire a hitman to rob and kill some men who she believed had a block of cocaine in their house, police said. However, the block turned out to be cheese, and the hitman was an undercover police officer. The woman was in the Memphis, Tennessee home of the intended victims last week when she mistook a block of cheese for cocaine -- inspiring the idea to hire someone to break into the home, take the drugs and kill the men, police said. Jessica Sandy Booth, 18, was arrested on four charges of attempted murder and four counts of soliciting a murder, the Commercial Appeal reported on Tuesday. ``Four men were going to lose their lives over some cheese,'' Lieutenant Jeff Clark said.
■ United States
Republican wins House seat
A Republican state lawmaker won the race to fill a vacant congressional seat in California and voters threw the Spokane, Washington, mayor out of office amid allegations he used a city computer to woo gay men over the Internet. California state Senator John Campbell will succeed Republican Christopher Cox, who represented the Orange County district in the House for 17 years before resigning to head the Securities and Exchange Commission. Spokane Mayor James West tried to fend off allegations that he offered a City Hall internship to an 18-year-old man he met in an Internet chat room, but voters overwhelming supported removing him from office.
■ Italy
Alert doesn't stop flame
Rome's Ciampino airport reopened yesterday after a bomb alert was declared over just hours before a plane carrying the Olympic flame was due to land. "The airport has reopened," said a police official at the airport. Police had started searching the airport before 7am after receiving an anonymous call saying there was a bomb in the building. Ciampino, located on the southern edge of Rome, is the city's second airport and mainly used for private and military flights. The Olympic flame was due to arrive there from Greece at around 10am ahead of the Winter Games to be held in Turin from Feb. 10 to 26.
■ United States
Plame retiring from CIA
Valerie Plame, the CIA agent at the center of the leak investigation which produced an indictment of a White House aide, is leaving the CIA, friends said on Tuesday. Plame was outed as an undercover agent in a syndicated newspaper column, an act that may have violated secrecy laws. "Friday is her last day," Larry Johnson, a former CIA officer who trained with Plame in the 1980s said. "Her ability to operate as a clandestine officer was completely finished. Among some people at the CIA she was both pariah and leper, something you didn't want be around, someone who it was unhealthy to be around."
■ Israel
Likud chief defects
The beleaguered right-wing Likud party suffered a new blow on Tuesday when its acting chairman, Cabinet minister Tzahi Hanegbi, defected to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's new Kadima party. Hanegbi, a minister without portfolio, became the sixth member of the Cabinet to follow Sharon out of Likud as part of the continuing turmoil in Israeli politics in the run-up to a March general election. Kadima had called a press conference where Hanegbi was expected to formally declare his move but Kadima party sources and the Likud leadership confirmed his switch.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
UNREST: The authorities in Turkey arrested 13 Turkish journalists in five days, deported a BBC correspondent and on Thursday arrested a reporter from Sweden Waving flags and chanting slogans, many hundreds of thousands of anti-government demonstrators on Saturday rallied in Istanbul, Turkey, in defence of democracy after the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu which sparked Turkey’s worst street unrest in more than a decade. Under a cloudless blue sky, vast crowds gathered in Maltepe on the Asian side of Turkey’s biggest city on the eve of the Eid al-Fitr celebration which started yesterday, marking the end of Ramadan. Ozgur Ozel, chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which organized the rally, said there were 2.2 million people in the crowd, but
JOINT EFFORTS: The three countries have been strengthening an alliance and pressing efforts to bolster deterrence against Beijing’s assertiveness in the South China Sea The US, Japan and the Philippines on Friday staged joint naval drills to boost crisis readiness off a disputed South China Sea shoal as a Chinese military ship kept watch from a distance. The Chinese frigate attempted to get closer to the waters, where the warships and aircraft from the three allied countries were undertaking maneuvers off the Scarborough Shoal — also known as Huangyan Island (黃岩島) and claimed by Taiwan and China — in an unsettling moment but it was warned by a Philippine frigate by radio and kept away. “There was a time when they attempted to maneuver
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