■CHINA
Thousands arrested for porn
More than 5,000 people were arrested in a crackdown on Internet pornography last year, officials said, vowing tougher online policing in the New Year as a key element of “state security.” China maintains strict censorship of the Internet to curb what the government deems to be unhealthy content, including porn and violence — an effort that has become known as the “Great Firewall of China.” Authorities last month offered rewards of up to 10,000 yuan (US$1,465) to Internet users who report Web sites that feature pornography. Figures published by the Ministry of Public Security late on Thursday showed that 5,394 people were arrested last year under the Internet porn crackdown and 9,000 illegal porn-related sites were shut down.
■CHINA
Explosives maker sentenced
An explosives maker has been sentenced to death for supplying an illegal iron mine camouflaged as a wild boar farm with material that ignited in the tunnels, killing 26 miners, state media said. Xinhua news agency said Gao Huailiang was sentenced on Thursday by an intermediate court in Handan, a major mining area in Hebei Province, for making, selling and transporting illegal explosives. Twenty others were also sentenced to prison time for running the mine, which was hidden behind high walls and purported to be a wild boar farm, or for supplying it with homemade explosives, the report said.
■CHINA
Abbot refutes reports
The abbot of the ancient Shaolin temple — famous for its kung fu monks — has refuted reports that the monastery will go public as part of a travel joint venture, Xinhua news agency reported. Shi Yongxin (釋永信) — known as the “CEO of Shaolin” for aggressively pursuing commercial ventures since taking over as abbot a decade ago — also said the temple would not be a shareholder in the new firm created to promote tourism. The temple’s core functions are to “organize religious activities to meet the demand of religious followers,” Xinhua quoted Shi as saying at a press conference in Henan Province. The abbot said that the temple’s “legal rights and interests” would not be affected by the creation of the new tourism firm.
■JAPAN
Population falls by 75,000
Japan’s population fell by an estimated 75,000 people last year, the biggest fall since World War II amid soaring elderly welfare costs, data released yesterday showed. The welfare ministry estimated 1,069,000 Japanese citizens were born last year on Japanese soil, while 1,144,000 died. It marked the third straight year of population decline for Japan, whose seniors enjoy increased life expectancy while many young people continue to defer starting a family because of the burden on their lifestyles and careers.
■PHILIPPINES
Mayon alert may be lowered
Volcanologists yesterday said they may lower the alert level around the Mayon volcano in the coming days amid signs it appeared to be in a lull, three weeks after it began spewing ash and lava. The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology said no ash explosion was observed over the past 24 hours and rumblings have lessened significantly. If no significant events occur during the next few days, the agency said it would “consider the possibility of lowering the alert level.” About 50,000 people living within an 8km radius of Mayon were evacuated after the institute raised the alert level to four on Dec. 20.
■UNITED KINGDOM
Wulfrunians slam guidebook
Wolverhampton city council leader Neville Patten slammed travel guide book publisher Lonely Planet after the West Midlands city was ranked the fifth-worst city in the world based on feedback from its Web site users. Patten told the BBC it was obvious Lonely Planet had not visited and described Wolverhampton as “progressive.” Detroit in the US was voted the worst city, followed by Accra in Ghana, Seoul in South Korea and Los Angeles. Lonely Planet said Wolverhampton was so bad it had not even made it on to the reviews of cities on its site. However, a number of local celebrities leapt to the city’s defense. Soul singer Beverley Knight, 36, who grew up in the city, told British tabloid the Sun: “To think it is worse than war-torn Kabul, in Afghanistan, and cities with slums in India, is just a joke. I’m not saying it’s blessed with stunning looks but, boy, does it have personality. I can’t think of a better evening than cheering on Wolves at the Molineux Stadium. And the city has brightened the world in ways the Lonely Planet guides never will.”
■UNITED KINGDOM
Morrison hacked
In hindsight, it does seem unlikely that the famously private — some would say curmudgeonly — Van Morrison would have chosen to bugle the news that he had joined Mick Jagger, Paul McCartney and Rod Stewart in becoming a father again in late middle age. Or that he would have cooed online that the child was “the spitting image of his daddy.” Or, come to think of it, that Van the Man would have bestowed upon the helpless infant the name George Ivan Morrison III. So it was not altogether surprising to discover on New Year’s Eve that, despite a slew of features and discussions on the reproductive habits of 60-something rockers over the last few days, the reports were, as Morrison himself put it, “completely and utterly without foundation.” The Belfast-born singer interrupted what a family friend termed a “lovely quiet family Christmas” to release a statement on Thursday rubbishing the widely picked-up story. He said the hoax was the result of some mischievous hacking into the site, the second time in three months.
■SPAIN
Thieving cop dismissed
The Supreme Court has upheld the dismissal of a highway patrolman who confessed to stealing a dead man’s credit card and using it to buy gasoline, go shopping and eat at restaurants. The court said the officer’s behavior was “utterly incompatible” with his responsibility as a public servant to protect people and their property. The Civil Guard officer acknowledged using the credit card 69 times after taking it from a man who died in a road accident in the northwest Galicia region in 2002. He spent 1,323 euros (US$1,900), but returned the money after getting caught.
■RUSSIA
Saunas could be fatal
Authorities urged revelers celebrating the New Year in saunas on Thursday night to refrain from popping open the champagne until they have left the steam houses, warning it could prove fatal. “I would like to make the following recommendation: Drink after being in the sauna, not when inside,” Interfax news agency quoted Emergencies Minister Sergei Shoigu as saying on New Year’s Eve. “Maybe this sounds funny ... But many people die in saunas,” he said. Enthusiastic sauna visitors often drink beer or vodka in the wood-paneled huts and hold alcohol-fueled New Year’s celebrations in the thousands of steam rooms and bath houses across the country.
■UNITED STATES
Young Disney busted again
A 42-year-old grandson of Walt Disney pleaded not guilty to charges of illegal possession of guns and drugs on Wednesday in a California court and was remanded in custody, authorities said. Patrick Disney Miller, who already has a 2005 conviction for drug possession, was detained on Dec. 9 after police searched his home in the Los Angeles suburb of Woodland Hills, prosecutors said. Miller had been freed on US$35,000 bail, but at Thursday’s arraignment the judge raised the amount to US$550,000 and Miller was taken into custody. Miller was originally charged with a single felony count, but prosecutors on Wednesday filed 19 additional felony charges against him. Police allegedly recovered an arms cache comprising 13 handguns, a rifle and an illegal assault rifle during the search. Various drugs were also found. As a result of his 2005 conviction, Miller is barred from owning guns or ammunition, prosecutors said. Miller is the youngest child of Diane Disney Miller, who is Walt Disney’s only biological daughter.
■UNITED STATES
Police not a taxi service
Authorities say a Florida man who called police claiming that he had been beaten and shot at was hoping the tale would get him a ride to a bar. Instead, Gregory Oras, 37, is facing charges of misusing the emergency call system and battery of a law enforcement officer. The St Petersburg Times said an arrest report says Oras called police three times before his arrest early on Tuesday in Oldsmar, northwest of Tampa. He told the dispatchers he had a broken nose and bleeding ears, and said people were shooting at him. Authorities say he was actually looking for a ride to another bar. The report also says Oras kicked a sheriff’s deputy in the knees and a Taser was used to subdue him.
■UNITED STATES
Woman in cremation mix-up
A grieving family learned their 95-year-old great-grandmother had been cremated when they found a stranger’s body in her casket, and a funeral home is being investigated in the incident. Relatives of Aurelie Tuccillo noticed the wrong body when they arrived at the Buckmiller Brothers Funeral Home in Prospect, Connecticut, for calling hours on Tuesday night. Police said Wednesday that state and local officers found Tuccillo had “inadvertently been cremated.”
■UNITED STATES
Fugitive on reality show
Police say a man who appeared in a Discovery Channel reality show about crab fishing off Alaska is wanted for three bank robberies and has been arrested. Police in Illinois say they arrested 23-year-old Joshua Tel Warner early on Thursday on the Oregon bank robbery warrant after a vehicle he was riding in was pulled over for a routine traffic stop. He was being held on US$30,000 bail in the Tazewell County Jail. Police in Oregon say he is the same Josh Warner who appeared as a greenhorn deckhand on the king crab fishing boat Wizard in Deadliest Catch earlier this year.
■UNITED STATES
Inmates paid to shovel snow
Washington paid prison inmates to shovel sidewalks, crosswalks and bus stops after the biggest December blizzard in the city’s history, the Department of Corrections said on Thursday. Two work crews comprising 20 prisoners convicted of minor offenses were deployed around the city on Dec. 18 and 19, along with two prison guards to watch over them, DOC spokesman Michon Parker said. Each inmate was paid US$7.50 per hour for their work, he added.
In the sweltering streets of Jakarta, buskers carry towering, hollow puppets and pass around a bucket for donations. Now, they fear becoming outlaws. City authorities said they would crack down on use of the sacred ondel-ondel puppets, which can stand as tall as a truck, and they are drafting legislation to remove what they view as a street nuisance. Performances featuring the puppets — originally used by Jakarta’s Betawi people to ward off evil spirits — would be allowed only at set events. The ban could leave many ondel-ondel buskers in Jakarta jobless. “I am confused and anxious. I fear getting raided or even
Kemal Ozdemir looked up at the bare peaks of Mount Cilo in Turkey’s Kurdish majority southeast. “There were glaciers 10 years ago,” he recalled under a cloudless sky. A mountain guide for 15 years, Ozdemir then turned toward the torrent carrying dozens of blocks of ice below a slope covered with grass and rocks — a sign of glacier loss being exacerbated by global warming. “You can see that there are quite a few pieces of glacier in the water right now ... the reason why the waterfalls flow lushly actually shows us how fast the ice is melting,” he said.
Eleven people, including a former minister, were arrested in Serbia on Friday over a train station disaster in which 16 people died. The concrete canopy of the newly renovated station in the northern city of Novi Sad collapsed on Nov. 1, 2024 in a disaster widely blamed on corruption and poor oversight. It sparked a wave of student-led protests and led to the resignation of then-Serbian prime minister Milos Vucevic and the fall of his government. The public prosecutor’s office in Novi Sad opened an investigation into the accident and deaths. In February, the public prosecutor’s office for organized crime opened another probe into
RISING RACISM: A Japanese group called on China to assure safety in the country, while the Chinese embassy in Tokyo urged action against a ‘surge in xenophobia’ A Japanese woman living in China was attacked and injured by a man in a subway station in Suzhou, China, Japanese media said, hours after two Chinese men were seriously injured in violence in Tokyo. The attacks on Thursday raised concern about xenophobic sentiment in China and Japan that have been blamed for assaults in both countries. It was the third attack involving Japanese living in China since last year. In the two previous cases in China, Chinese authorities have insisted they were isolated incidents. Japanese broadcaster NHK did not identify the woman injured in Suzhou by name, but, citing the Japanese
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