■ CHINA
Four panda cubs born
Four giant panda cubs have been born within just 14 hours, giving a rare boost to the population of the endangered species, Xinhua news agency said on Sunday. Nine-year-old Qiyuan gave birth to a pair of twin female cubs late on Saturday at the Chengdu Panda Breeding Research Center in Sichuan Province, Xinhua said. Little more than an hour later, eight-year-old Chenggong gave birth to another cub. Eight-year-old Zhuzhu gave birth on Sunday.
■ PHILIPPINES
Fragments found in probe
Investigators found fragments that appear to bolster the theory that an oxygen tank exploded on a Qantas jet, forcing it to make a dramatic emergency landing with a car-sized hole in its fuselage, an official said yesterday. Neville Blyth, a senior investigator from the Australian Transport and Safety Bureau, told a news conference that a valve and other small fragments would be tested to determine if they came from the tank. He said the fragments were found close to where the missing tank was stored beneath the passenger cabin. The jet had to make an emergency landing in Manila on Friday.
■ JAPAN
Porn peddlers busted
Tokyo police arrested 11 people yesterday on suspicion of selling pornography and confiscated a record of more than 130,000 videos, some depicting sex with children, officials and reports said. Police arrested 53-year-old Takahiro Oyama and 10 others for the attempted distribution of nearly 133,000 pornographic DVDs and videocassettes, a police official said. Oyama told police he made ¥1.56 billion (US$14.4 million) in five years of selling sex tapes through the Internet and via mail order, public broadcaster NHK said. Japan banned the production and sale of sexually arousing material involving children below 18 in 1999 after coming under international criticism for being a major producer of child pornography.
■ PHILIPPINES
Deal reached with MILF
Manila and Muslim rebels have agreed to sign a crucial accord on an expanded Muslim homeland next month after ironing out the kinks in Malaysian-brokered peace talks, officials said yesterday. Government negotiator Rodolfo Garcia reached the agreement with his Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) counterpart in Malaysia after working out differences in the process to set up a future Muslim homeland, presidential peace process adviser Hermogenes Esperon said. The two sides agreed to sign the accord early next month, he said.
■ JAPAN
Heavy rains cause problems
Heavy rain caused floods and mudslides in the center of the country yesterday, prompting the evacuation of more than 50,000 people, officials said. The downpour overflowed the banks of the Asano River, sending brown water gushing into Kanazawa city, flooding houses and leading officials to issue the evacuation order, a city spokesman said. “We haven’t had such heavy rain for years,” he said. Heavy rain also fell in nearby Toyama Prefecture, where a 53-year-old man was seriously injured after being covered by a mudslide while driving near a tunnel, a police official said. More than 100mm of rain fell in the region, the national weather agency said.
■ UKRAINE
Storms, floods kill 13
Severe storms and floods in the Carpathian Mountains killed 13 people in Ukraine and another five people in neighboring Romania, officials said on Sunday. Two other people were missing in Ukraine. Five days of heavy rain near the Prut and Dniestr rivers caused floods that damaged more than 21,000 houses, Ukraine’s Emergency Ministry said in a statement. Ukrainian officials evacuated more than 8,000 people and reported that over 300 towns and villages were left without electricity. The government said damage is estimated at more than US$300 million.
■ UNITED KINGDOM
Cameron gets his bike back
Opposition leader David Cameron has been reunited with his stolen bicycle thanks to a tabloid newspaper and a supporter of the rival Labour Party, the paper reported on Sunday. The Conservative party leader, often photographed riding his bike to work at the House of Commons, realized that it was stolen after he left it outside a supermarket near his west London home on Wednesday evening. The Sunday Mirror said it located the bicycle — dumped in a nearby street — with the help of 60-year-old resident Ernest Theophile, who enlisted neighborhood youths to trace it. Theophile was identified by the paper as a staunch supporter of Britain’s left-leaning Labour Party. “You never want to see anyone have their bike nicked [stolen] — not even a Tory,” he was quoted as saying.
■ GERMANY
Scientists tout obesity cure
Tests on animals show that a traditional herbal remedy could usher in a cure for obesity and heart disease, German scientists said. They believe that the herbal extract could be incorporated into a food supplement which may not only reduce obesity, but also lessen the risk of developing type 2 diabetes and coronary heart disease. In a paper delivered at the current meeting of the Society for Experimental Biology in Marseille, France, Nils Roos from the Max Rubner Institute in Germany, says the extract is from Tabebuia impetiginosa, commonly known as Pink Ipe, a deciduous tree, native to Central and South America, and related to magnolias. Roos and his team have shown that Tabebuia extract can reduce levels of triglycerides.
■ YEMEN
Suicide bomb kills officer
Al-Qaeda in Yemen has claimed responsibility for a suicide car bomb that killed a policeman in eastern Yemen. In a statement posted on Sunday on an Islamic Web site, the terror group said Friday’s attack was carried out by “martyr Ahmed bin Said bin Omar al-Mishjari” against “slaves and the apostate guards” in Hadramawt Province. The policeman was killed when a suicide car bomber rammed a vehicle into the Interior Ministry’s regional headquarters. Eight others were injured.
■ UNITED KINGDOM
Fire destroys Grand Pier
A fierce fire has destroyed a historic seaside pier in western England, quickly reducing the major tourist attraction to a flaming wreck. The Grand Pier, built in 1904, is listed as a historic monument. Its entertainment complex includes rides, a go-cart track, a bar and a cafe. Television footage showed a fire spreading quickly through the partly wooden structure, sending a massive column of smoke into the clear sky above Weston-super-Mare, a resort town 225km west of London. There were no immediate reports of any casualties.
■ Jamaica
Sand goes missing
Police are investigating the theft of more than 500 truckloads of sand from a private beachfront property. Deputy Mines Commissioner Laurie Henry says authorities have submitted samples of sand from nearby areas they believe was stolen from the beach in the northwest parish of Trelawny. The 26-hectare property owned by a development company lies near a protected environmental area that includes mangroves and a limestone forest. Police Corporal Patrick Chin said on Friday that no one has been arrested. Those found guilty could face up to a year in prison. Illegal sand mining is common in the island’s eastern region. The sand is often sold and used in construction.
■ United states
Flooding hits New Mexico
About 300 people were evacuated from homes, campgrounds and a recreational vehicle park in New Mexico on Sunday and a helicopter was sent to rescue others after flooding caused by the remnants of Hurricane Dolly. The Rio Ruidoso went over its banks about midnight, said Tom Schafer, Ruidoso’s emergency management coordinator. A police helicopter was sent to rescue people reported to be standing on buildings and vehicles, state Department of Public Safety spokesman Peter Olson said. A dive team was also sent to rescue people from the flooded areas, he said. Earlier, four people were rescued after being trapped by rising water, but no one was seriously injured, Schafer said.
■ United states
Cops nab Hollywood star
Indiana Jones co-star Shia LaBeouf was arrested on suspicion of drunk driving on Sunday after an early morning car accident in which he was injured, authorities said. The 22-year-old actor was driving a pickup truck that was involved in a collision at a street intersection in Hollywood, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Sergeant Scott Wolf said. “It was immediately apparent to officers responding on the scene that LaBeouf was intoxicated and he was subsequently placed under arrest,” Wolf said.
■ United states
Obama sees doctor
Barack Obama, back home after a tour of Afghanistan, the Middle East and Europe, saw a doctor at the University of Chicago Medical Center on Sunday night to deal with a sore hip. “His hip has been sore from basketball for a few weeks, so he’s going to see an orthopedic doctor,” Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs said. As he left the hospital, Obama told reporters: “I had small X-rays. Everything’s OK. I think I’m going to be good in about a week.” Obama is a lifelong basketball player, and he squeezes in a game every now and then on the campaign trail. At one stop during his overseas trip, he shot baskets with US troops in Afghanistan.
■ United states
Pardoned ex-soldier dies
A day after the Army formally apologized for the wrongful conviction of 28 black soldiers in a riot and lynching in Seattle in 1944, one of the soldiers died. Congressman Jim McDermott says 83-year-old Samuel Snow died on Sunday. Snow came to Seattle to hear the formal apology delivered on Saturday by Ronald James, assistant secretary of the Army for manpower and reserve affairs. But he missed the ceremony at Discovery Park because he was admitted to Virginia Mason Hospital with an irregular heartbeat. Snow’s son, Ray Snow, says receiving the long-delayed honorable discharge left his father at ease.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
ENTERTAINMENT: Rio officials have a history of organizing massive concerts on Copacabana Beach, with Madonna’s show drawing about 1.6 million fans last year Lady Gaga on Saturday night gave a free concert in front of 2 million fans who poured onto Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro for the biggest show of her career. “Tonight, we’re making history... Thank you for making history with me,” Lady Gaga told a screaming crowd. The Mother Monster, as she is known, started the show at about 10:10pm local time with her 2011 song Bloody Mary. Cries of joy rose from the tightly packed fans who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the vast stretch of sand. Concert organizers said 2.1 million people attended the show. Lady Gaga
SUPPORT: The Australian prime minister promised to back Kyiv against Russia’s invasion, saying: ‘That’s my government’s position. It was yesterday. It still is’ Left-leaning Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese yesterday basked in his landslide election win, promising a “disciplined, orderly” government to confront cost-of-living pain and tariff turmoil. People clapped as the 62-year-old and his fiancee, Jodie Haydon, who visited his old inner Sydney haunt, Cafe Italia, surrounded by a crowd of jostling photographers and journalists. Albanese’s Labor Party is on course to win at least 83 seats in the 150-member parliament, partial results showed. Opposition leader Peter Dutton’s conservative Liberal-National coalition had just 38 seats, and other parties 12. Another 17 seats were still in doubt. “We will be a disciplined, orderly
RSS