UNITED STATES
Library lifts Twain book ban
A Massachusetts library has put the Mark Twain work Eve’s Diary back on the shelf more than a century after it was banned. The Charlton Public Library’s trustees this week unanimously voted to return the book to circulation, reversing the board’s 1906 decision to ban the 1905 short story. Trustee Richard Whitehead said the move was made to coincide with the American Library Association’s Banned Books Week. The story was written from the perspective of the biblical Adam and Eve. It was banned because trustee Frank Wakefield objected to nude illustrations of Eve.
ITALY
‘Living statue’ ban mulled
Culture officials in Rome are mulling a ban on “living statues,” arguing that dressing up in costume and standing on the street to solicit spare change has no artistic merit, media reported on Friday. “Living statues demonstrate no artistic activity, to the extent that they can’t be compared to mimes, and they amount to a veritable racket,” said Federico Mollicone, deputy culture head in Rome’s mayorship. The proposed ban is part of a broader bill from Mollicone’s office, which aims to regulate activity on Rome’s streets, reports said. Under the proposal, street musicians could have their instruments or speakers confiscated, and “deafening” music would be banned after 10pm.
UNITED STATES
Former drug czar jailed
A federal judge in Miami on Friday sentenced Bolivia’s former anti-drug czar to 14 years prison on drug trafficking charges, court sources said. General Rene Sanabria, who was Bolivian President Evo Morales’s top anti-drug official from 2007 to 2008, was arrested in Panama in February and extradited to Miami to face the charges. US District Judge Ursula Ungaro also sentenced Sanabria’s accomplice, Marcelo Foronda, to nine years in prison. According to trial testimony by the US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), last year Foronda made contact with US agents posing as Colombian drug traffickers who offered to distribute cocaine in Florida. Sanabria agreed to make sure the shipment was protected. In September last year, 144kg of cocaine was shipped to Miami.
COLOMBIA
Coal mine death toll rises
The death toll from an explosion at a coal mine in the north, believed to have been caused by an accumulation of methane gas, has risen to seven, authorities said on Friday. The country’s mining regulator Ingeominas had last put the death toll from Wednesday’s incident at El Diamante mine in the town of Socha at three. Emergency personnel subsequently retrieved the bodies of four more miners who had been trapped under the rubble, Ingeominas said.
UNITED STATES
US$16 muffin claim denied
Auditor claims of a whopping US$16 per muffin at a US government seminar are half-baked, the global hotel chain Hilton said on Friday. In a report, auditors at the Justice Department said the muffins were among several “extravagant and potentially wasteful” food items served at the training conference in August 2009 at the Capital Hilton in Washington. Not true, Hilton Worldwide shot back in a statement. “In Washington, the contracted breakfast included fresh fruit, coffee, juice, muffins, tax and gratuity, for an inclusive price of US$16 per person,” said the corporate parent of the Hilton, Conrad and Waldorf Astoria hotels. The inspector general’s office of the Justice Department said it stood by the 148-page report.
OPTIMISTIC: A Philippine Air Force spokeswoman said the military believed the crew were safe and were hopeful that they and the jet would be recovered A Philippine Air Force FA-50 jet and its two-person crew are missing after flying in support of ground forces fighting communist rebels in the southern Mindanao region, a military official said yesterday. Philippine Air Force spokeswoman Colonel Consuelo Castillo said the jet was flying “over land” on the way to its target area when it went missing during a “tactical night operation in support of our ground troops.” While she declined to provide mission specifics, Philippine Army spokesman Colonel Louie Dema-ala confirmed that the missing FA-50 was part of a squadron sent “to provide air support” to troops fighting communist rebels in
PROBE: Last week, Romanian prosecutors launched a criminal investigation against presidential candidate Calin Georgescu accusing him of supporting fascist groups Tens of thousands of protesters gathered in Romania’s capital on Saturday in the latest anti-government demonstration by far-right groups after a top court canceled a presidential election in the EU country last year. Protesters converged in front of the government building in Bucharest, waving Romania’s tricolor flags and chanting slogans such as “down with the government” and “thieves.” Many expressed support for Calin Georgescu, who emerged as the frontrunner in December’s canceled election, and demanded they be resumed from the second round. George Simion, the leader of the far-right Alliance for the Unity of Romanians (AUR), which organized the protest,
ECONOMIC DISTORTION? The US commerce secretary’s remarks echoed Elon Musk’s arguments that spending by the government does not create value for the economy US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick on Sunday said that government spending could be separated from GDP reports, in response to questions about whether the spending cuts pushed by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency could possibly cause an economic downturn. “You know that governments historically have messed with GDP,” Lutnick said on Fox News Channel’s Sunday Morning Futures. “They count government spending as part of GDP. So I’m going to separate those two and make it transparent.” Doing so could potentially complicate or distort a fundamental measure of the US economy’s health. Government spending is traditionally included in the GDP because
Hundreds of people in rainbow colors gathered on Saturday in South Africa’s tourist magnet Cape Town to honor the world’s first openly gay imam, who was killed last month. Muhsin Hendricks, who ran a mosque for marginalized Muslims, was shot dead last month near the southern city of Gqeberha. “I was heartbroken. I think it’s sad especially how far we’ve come, considering how progressive South Africa has been,” attendee Keisha Jensen said. Led by motorcycle riders, the mostly young crowd walked through the streets of the coastal city, some waving placards emblazoned with Hendricks’s image and reading: “#JUSTICEFORMUHSIN.” No arrest
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