■THAILAND
General told to dance
A maverick general who has threatened to bomb anti-government protesters and drop snakes on them from helicopters has been reassigned as an aerobics teacher, the Bangkok Post said on Friday. Major-General Khattiya Sawasdipol, a Rambo-esque anti-communist fighter more commonly known as Seh Daeng, reacted with disappointment to his new role as a military instructor promoting public fitness at marketplaces. “The army chief wants me to be a presenter leading aerobics dancers. I have prepared one dance. It’s called the ‘throwing-a-hand-grenade’ dance,” he said.
■PHILIPPINES
Arroyo’s husband stays put
The ailing husband of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo will stay in a Japanese hospital longer to undergo more tests after suffering severe stomach pains during a flight to Peru, a senior official said yesterday. Interior Secretary Ronaldo Puno said the doctors of Jose Miguel Arroyo have arrived in Japan to conduct the tests. Puno said Mr. Arroyo was in stable condition. The 62-year-old Jose Miguel Arroyo was among the entourage of his wife who will attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders’ summit in Lima. The plane carrying President Arroyo and her entourage made an emergency landing in Osaka late on Friday.
■AUSTRALIA
Malouf wins literary prize
Author David Malouf has beaten Nobel laureate J.M. Coetzee and Japan’s Haruki Murakami to win Australasia’s richest literary prize. Malouf won the inaugural US$68,000 Australia-Asia Literary Award for The Complete Stories. “The Complete Stories is a rich feast of subtle tales which sum up the intense joys and sadness that fill even the most ordinary lives — we were all moved by this fine collection,” judging panel chair Nury Vittachi said. Vittachi, Hong Kong-based founder of the Asia Literary Review was joined on the judging panel by Melbourne literary critic Peter Craven and Pakistani-born author Kamila Shamsie.
■JAPAN
Student violence hits record
Reported cases of violence involving primary and secondary school students hit an all-time high last year with an increase in children who cannot control themselves, a government report said. The number totaled 52,756 cases in the past academic year to March, up 18 percent from 12 months ago, the education ministry said in an annual survey released this week. The survey covered 40,000 schools for students from the first to 12th year of education. Of the cases, 28,396 involved violence between students and 6,959 were targeted at teachers, the report said. There were 15,718 cases of vandalism. Cases involving students at primary schools jumped 37 percent to a record 5,214. Cases at junior high schools for the seventh to ninth years rose 20 percent to 36,803 and those at senior high schools were up 4 percent to 17,039, both totals being all-time highs.
■HONG KONG
Hungry monkey gives chase
A 46-year-old hiker was recovering in hospital yesterday after falling 20m into a reservoir while running away from a monkey trying to steal her food. The woman was hiking with friends on Friday when a large adult monkey tried to snatch a bag of nuts she was carrying, said a spokesman for the emergency services team who rescued her. She ran away and tumbled down a steep bank before ending up in the reservoir. The woman was taken to hospital with injuries to her head, arms and legs.
■GERMANY
Woman jailed for dead baby
A court jailed a woman for three-and-a-half years on Friday for killing her live baby by putting the newborn in a chest-style home freezer. The woman, 21, sobbed as she told the court in Rottweil that she had not been aware she was pregnant and had wanted to make it seem as if the sudden birth in May had never happened. After the solitary birth at home, she had put on her overalls and gone to her regular job in a factory in the town of Horb am Neckar in the Black Forest region. Judges ruled she intended to kill the child and convicted her of manslaughter.
■UNITED KINGDOM
Murder suspect makes offer
The man accused of murdering former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko in London said in a newspaper yesterday he was prepared to return to be questioned about the case. Andrei Lugovoi, a Russian lawmaker and an ex-KGB agent, told the Times that he was considering sending his friend, Dmitry Kovtun, who was one of the last people to meet Litvinenko before he fell ill, to meet detectives. Litvinenko, a fierce critic of then Russian president Vladimir Putin, died two years ago today, poisoned by the radioactive substance polonium. The Times said Lugovoi pledged he would also consider returning after Kovtun, if Kovtun was allowed to visit London without the risk of being extradited to Germany.
■GERMANY
Officials allow Scientology
Authorities are dropping their pursuit of a ban on Scientology after finding insufficient evidence of illegal activity, security officials said. Domestic intelligence services would continue to monitor the group, the officials said on Friday. The local branch of the Los Angeles-based Church of Scientology has been under observation by domestic intelligence services for more than a decade. Top security officials asked state governments in December to begin gathering information on whether they had sufficient grounds to seek a ban. The country has said it considers Scientology to be in conflict with the principles of the nation’s Constitution, calling it less a church than a business that uses coercion to take advantage of vulnerable people.
■ZIMBABWE
Annan, Carter cancel visit
Former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan cancelled a planned visit to Zimbabwe yesterday after being denied entry into the country by President Robert Mugabe’s government. Annan, former US president Jimmy Carter and Nelson Mandela’s wife, Graca Machel, who are part of a group of prominent figures and former statesmen called The Elders, planned to visit Zimbabwe to assess the humanitarian situation. “We had hoped to go to Zimbabwe this morning but we had to cancel because the government has made it clear they will not cooperate,” Annan told reporters in Johannesburg.
■IRAN
Israeli ‘spy’ executed
An Iranian charged with spying for Israel has been executed in, the Fars news agency reported yesterday. Ali Ashtari was hanged on Monday after he confessed to spying for the country’s archenemy, a spokesman for the intelligence service said. Ashtari was sentenced to death in June by a revolutionary court for spying for the “Zionist regime.” The verdict was later confirmed by the Supreme Court. Espionage convictions usually carry death sentences or heavy jail terms because, based on Islamic law, the convicts are “mohareb,” or enemies of God.
■ARGENTINA
Suspect shoots self on TV
A former police chief charged with abuses during the 1976-1983 military dictatorship shot himself in the head on Thursday during a television interview on the roof of his home, as police were closing in for an arrest. Mario Ferreyra, 63, died on his way to hospital in northern Tucuman province, where he was charged with human rights violations when he worked at a secret weapons-depot-turned-detention center in the same region during the dictatorship. His house was surrounded by police on Thursday, but Ferreyra clambered atop a water tower in his building where he was interviewed on Friday by a reporter and camera crew of Cronica TV. After denying taking part in any prisoner abuse and claiming he was the target of persecution by the government, Ferreyra unexpectedly drew a gun from his pocket, put it to his head and fired. The shocked camera crew kept rolling as the man lay bleeding on the water tower.
■MEXICO
Probe finds flaw in training
Investigators said on Friday they had found evidence of irregularities in the training records of at least one of the pilots handling a jet that crashed earlier this month, killing the interior secretary. Investigators had previously pointed to instability caused by the wake turbulence of a larger plane as the likely cause of the Nov. 4 crash of the Learjet 45. However, they also say the pilots appeared unfamiliar with flight controls or procedures, and on Friday officials filed an administrative complaint with the federal office overseeing public servants. Transportation Secretary Luis Tellez said the training records showed the lack of a qualified instructor and improperly registered qualifying hours of flight. Tellez did not say who was named in the complaint, but he said the probe would focus on government officials who are supposed to oversee compliance with pilot flight-training and certification.
■UNITED STATES
Kentucky executes inmate
An inmate who resisted all appeals to stop his execution was put to death for murdering two young children. Marco Allen Chapman was given a lethal injection in Kentucky’s first execution in nine years. The 37-year-old pleaded guilty in 2004 to killing seven-year-old Chelbi Sharon and six-year-old Cody Sharon in their home in an attack that wounded their mother and another child. Chapman asked to be executed and fought for the right to fire his attorneys to clear the way. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” Chapman said to witnesses before his execution. Carolyn Marksberry, who survived Chapman’s attack in 2002 along with her daughter Courtney, said in a statement that the execution may allow her two slain children to “truly rest in peace.”
■UNITED STATES
Autumn babies at risk
Babies born four months before the peak cold and flu season have a 30 percent higher risk of developing asthma, researchers said on Friday, suggesting that these common infections may trigger asthma. “All infants are exposed to this and it is potentially preventable,” said Tina Hartert, director of the center for Asthma Research at Vanderbilt University, whose study appears in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. She said it has been known for some time that infants in the Northern Hemisphere born in the fall are at higher risk of developing asthma, but the study is the first to tie this trend to peak viral activity in winter. Hartert and colleagues studied the medical records of 95,000 infants and their mothers in Tennessee.
DIALOGUE: US president-elect Donald Trump on his Truth Social platform confirmed that he had spoken with Xi, saying ‘the call was a very good one’ for the US and China US president-elect Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) discussed Taiwan, trade, fentanyl and TikTok in a phone call on Friday, just days before Trump heads back to the White House with vows to impose tariffs and other measures on the US’ biggest rival. Despite that, Xi congratulated Trump on his second term and pushed for improved ties, the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said. The call came the same day that the US Supreme Court backed a law banning TikTok unless it is sold by its China-based parent company. “We both attach great importance to interaction, hope for
‘GREAT OPPRTUNITY’: The Paraguayan president made the remarks following Donald Trump’s tapping of several figures with deep Latin America expertise for his Cabinet Paraguay President Santiago Pena called US president-elect Donald Trump’s incoming foreign policy team a “dream come true” as his nation stands to become more relevant in the next US administration. “It’s a great opportunity for us to advance very, very fast in the bilateral agenda on trade, security, rule of law and make Paraguay a much closer ally” to the US, Pena said in an interview in Washington ahead of Trump’s inauguration today. “One of the biggest challenges for Paraguay was that image of an island surrounded by land, a country that was isolated and not many people know about it,”
‘FIGHT TO THE END’: Attacking a court is ‘unprecedented’ in South Korea and those involved would likely face jail time, a South Korean political pundit said Supporters of impeached South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol yesterday stormed a Seoul court after a judge extended the impeached leader’s detention over his ill-fated attempt to impose martial law. Tens of thousands of people had gathered outside the Seoul Western District Court on Saturday in a show of support for Yoon, who became South Korea’s first sitting head of state to be arrested in a dawn raid last week. After the court extended his detention on Saturday, the president’s supporters smashed windows and doors as they rushed inside the building. Hundreds of police officers charged into the court, arresting dozens and denouncing an
CYBERSCAM: Anne, an interior decorator with mental health problems, spent a year and a half believing she was communicating with Brad Pitt and lost US$855,259 A French woman who revealed on TV how she had lost her life savings to scammers posing as Brad Pitt has faced a wave of online harassment and mockery, leading the interview to be withdrawn on Tuesday. The woman, named as Anne, told the Seven to Eight program on the TF1 channel how she had believed she was in a romantic relationship with the Hollywood star, leading her to divorce her husband and transfer 830,000 euros (US$855,259). The scammers used fake social media and WhatsApp accounts, as well as artificial intelligence image-creating technology to send Anne selfies and other messages
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