INDIA
Girl thrown from train
A five-year-old girl was thrown out of a moving train in Mumbai during an argument between her family and another passenger over sharing a seat, police said yesterday. The girl suffered head injuries when she landed on the tracks after the train had left the main Chhatrapati Shivaji Terminus. “A scuffle broke out over seating and the little girl was thrown out of the door. It happened in just a few seconds,” Mumbai railway police chief Tukaram Chavan said. “She’s receiving treatment and recovering. She was very lucky not to have been hit by another train.” A 19-year-old man had been arrested in connection with the incident. Newspapers said other passengers in the crowded train had beaten him up after the incident. “Had I known that the man was a maniac, I would have given him the seat instead of putting my daughter’s life in danger,” the girl’s father told the Hindustan Times.
AUSTRALIA
Cheetah delays flight
Passengers on a Qantas flight were delayed yesterday when the pilot reported difficulties in getting one passenger on board — a cheetah. “We’re sorry for the delay, but we’re having some problems loading the cheetah,” the pilot reportedly told passengers as the plane sat on the tarmac at Melbourne airport. Qantas said the Adelaide-bound flight was delayed for 36 minutes after ground staff had problems loading the pallet carrying the big cat, which was bound for a South Australian zoo.
BANGLADESH
Rat’s head found in curry
Police are investigating the chef at a canteen of a leading university in Dhaka after a student found a rat’s head in a bowl of chicken curry, sparking protests. The student made the gruesome discovery while eating lunch on Monday and fell sick immediately, said Chowdhury Muhammad Zakaria, the head of security at Rajshahi University. The incident led to protests by students at the school, the country’s second-largest with more than 25,000 students, who were already demonstrating about a recent hike in the price of canteen meals.
AUSTRALIA
Oprah cuddles koala
US talkshow queen Oprah Winfrey cuddled a koala as her “Ultimate Australian Adventure” swung into action. Winfrey touched down in Great Barrier Reef holiday spot Hamilton Island in her private jet before driving a golf buggy to a wildlife sanctuary, where she was mobbed by hundreds of cheering Australians on the first stop of her eight-day tour. “It’s beautiful. It’s a long trip but it’s worth it,” Winfrey said of her first impressions of Australia.
KAZAKHSTAN
Scientists must probe aging
President Nursultan Nazarbayev, 70, has instructed scientists at a newly opened research center to develop ways to reverse the aging process. Speaking to students on Tuesday at the recently inaugurated Nazarbayev University, he said the Center for Life Sciences’ priorities should include finding ways to artificially produce human tissue and rejuvenate the body. Earlier this year, Nazarbayev was effectively made leader for life, giving him the right to determine policies after he retires.
UAE
Box of animals doesn’t fly
A Saudi who flew in from Jakarta with snakes, parrots and a squirrel in his hand luggage has been arrested at Abu Dhabi airport, Emirati dailies reported on Tuesday. “The man was just about to board a plane at the capital’s airport when a member of staff noticed that something was moving inside a box he was carrying,” said an English-language paper, 7Days. “Inside were four snakes, two parrots and a squirrel, all alive and separated in different compartments inside the box.”
ROMANIA
Violinist says king is his dad
A German violinist has filed a lawsuit in Bucharest asking for former King Michael to take a paternity test, alleging he is his son. The 89-year-old former king will be called to court on April 20 to answer questions and take the test. Dieter Stanzeleit, 71, said on Tuesday he has copies of Romanian intelligence documents from 1939, 1951 and 1978 that attest to Michael marrying a British woman, and his existence. The royal family opposes his claims. Michael ruled Romania from 1927 to 1930, and again from 1940 until 1947 when he was forced to abdicate by the Communists. Stanzeleit was adopted by a German family after his mother was killed at the end of World War II.
GERMANY
Advent smokes snuffed
A sniffer dog called Lucky turned out to be anything but for a 21-year-old stoner in Munich arrested with a homemade Advent calendar with cannabis behind each little door instead of chocolate. Police knocked on his door to check the man’s driving license, but after noticing a small piece of cannabis on the kitchen table, they set Lucky to work to see if there was any more of the drug. “Behind every little door [on the calendar] was a small amount of cannabis in a matchbox, wrapped up in a colorful bow,” police said on Tuesday. “He said he had been given the calendar as a present.”
VATICAN CITY
Power output hits record
The tiny Catholic enclave is now by far the world’s most environmentally friendly state following the installation of giant solar power panels, the Vatican’s official daily said on Tuesday. “The Vatican has reached a small record in solar energy power production per capita: 200 watts at peak times ... per inhabitant, compared to 80 in Germany, the world leader in this field,” Osservatore Romano said. The Vatican City is the least populated sovereign state in the world, with a population of about 800 people. Osservatore Romano said the panels installed on the Paul VI conference hall two years ago had saved the Vatican almost 90 tonnes of oil equivalent. Pope Benedict XVI has been dubbed the “green pope” by the Italian media for his strong emphasis on defence of the environment. Earlier this month Vatican officials said they were thinking of using an electric-powered vehicle to replace the iconic popemobile.
UNITED STATES
Wife bites off hubby’s tongue
A 57-year-old Wisconsin woman bit off half of her 79-year-old husband’s tongue during a kiss and has been arrested, authorities said on Tuesday. The severed piece of tongue was recovered, and the man was taken to a hospital where doctors were trying to reattach it, Sheboygan, Wisconsin, police said. The woman was singing Christmas carols and blowing a New Year’s horn when police detained her after the incident on Monday. The man said his wife had been acting strangely in recent days, the police said.
UNITED STATES
Praying couple on trial
A couple who prayed for their sick toddler rather than take him to a doctor before his pneumonia death are on trial in Philadelphia, charged with involuntary manslaughter. Defense lawyers say Herbert and Catherine Schaible are being prosecuted because they are Christian fundamentalists and belong to a church that endorses faith healing. Catherine Schaible’s lawyer says prosecutors cannot prove the mother knew her two-year-old son, Kent, was facing death when he became ill in January last year. The boy died 10 days later of bacterial pneumonia. Prosecutors say a doctor’s visit could have saved him.
AUSTRIA
Man fined for N Korea sales
A Vienna court has fined an Austrian man 3.3 million euros (US$4.4 million) over the sale of luxury goods, including yachts, believed destined for North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, a court official said on Tuesday. The businessman, who was not named, was also handed a nine-month suspended sentence late on Monday for the dealings which violate an international trade embargo, court official Christian Gneist said. Working with a North Korean intermediary, the Viennese man tried to procure two yachts and received payment for them, Gneist said. Prosecutors also accused him of lining up top-end Mercedes-Benz cars and musical instruments, Austrian daily Kurier reported. The man pleaded guilty and told the court he had not realized what he was getting into, Kurier said.
UNITED STATES
Snails under attack
Who would want to harm the plastic, pink snails of Miami Beach? The Miami Herald reports that police are investigating the vandalism of several of the 45 giant art pieces displayed around South Beach as part of an international art fair. So far, at least eight have been targeted, including one that was thrown into Biscayne Bay. Galleria Ca’ d’Oro and the Cracking Art Group brought the snails to town ahead of the Art Basel Miami Beach fair.
UNITED STATES
FBI issues Barbie doll alert
The FBI says it recently issued an alert about a Barbie doll with a hidden video camera that could be used to produce child pornography, but stressed that the toy has not been linked with any reported crimes. FBI spokesman Steve Dupre said on Tuesday the alert was meant only for law enforcement agencies to advise them not to overlook “Barbie Video Girl” during any searches. The FBI said that “the alert’s intent was to ensure law enforcement agencies were aware that the doll — like any other video-capable equipment — could contain evidence and to not disregard such an item during a search.” The doll has an LCD screen on its back and shoots video through a lens hidden in Barbie’s necklace. Jim Silver, a toy industry analyst said the controversy has been overblown. “It’s a doll, for Pete’s sake,” he said.
AFGHAN CHILD: A court battle is ongoing over if the toddler can stay with Joshua Mast and his wife, who wanted ‘life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness’ for her Major Joshua Mast, a US Marine whose adoption of an Afghan war orphan has spurred a years-long legal battle, is to remain on active duty after a three-member panel of Marines on Tuesday found that while he acted in a way unbecoming of an officer to bring home the baby girl, it did not warrant his separation from the military. Lawyers for the Marine Corps argued that Mast abused his position, disregarded orders of his superiors, mishandled classified information and improperly used a government computer in his fight over the child who was found orphaned on the battlefield in rural Afghanistan
NEW STORM: investigators dubbed the attacks on US telecoms ‘Salt Typhoon,’ after authorities earlier this year disrupted China’s ‘Flax Typhoon’ hacking group Chinese hackers accessed the networks of US broadband providers and obtained information from systems that the federal government uses for court-authorized wiretapping, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported on Saturday. The networks of Verizon Communications, AT&T and Lumen Technologies, along with other telecoms, were breached by the recently discovered intrusion, the newspaper said, citing people familiar with the matter. The hackers might have held access for months to network infrastructure used by the companies to cooperate with court-authorized US requests for communications data, the report said. The hackers had also accessed other tranches of Internet traffic, it said. The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs
STICKING TO DEFENSE: Despite the screening of videos in which they appeared, one of the defendants said they had no memory of the event A court trying a Frenchman charged with drugging his wife and enlisting dozens of strangers to rape her screened videos of the abuse to the public on Friday, to challenge several codefendants who denied knowing she was unconscious during their actions. The judge in the southern city of Avignon had nine videos and several photographs of the abuse of Gisele Pelicot shown in the courtroom and an adjoining public chamber, involving seven of the 50 men accused alongside her husband. Present in the courtroom herself, Gisele Pelicot looked at her telephone during the hour and a half of screenings, while her ex-husband
EYEING THE US ELECTION: Analysts say that Pyongyang would likely leverage its enlarged nuclear arsenal for concessions after a new US administration is inaugurated North Korean leader Kim Jong-un warned again that he could use nuclear weapons in potential conflicts with South Korea and the US, as he accused them of provoking North Korea and raising animosities on the Korean Peninsula, state media reported yesterday. Kim has issued threats to use nuclear weapons pre-emptively numerous times, but his latest warning came as experts said that North Korea could ramp up hostilities ahead of next month’s US presidential election. In a Monday speech at a university named after him, the Kim Jong-un National Defense University, he said that North Korea “will without hesitation use all its attack
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