JAPAN
Cabinet resigns for reshuffle
Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda sacked five members of his Cabinet yesterday, bowing to opposition demands for ministerial scalps as he sought cross-party support for a crucial tax hike. Noda called on the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) to back a bill that would double sales tax to try to tackle Japan’s debt mountain, currently twice its GDP. Defense minister Naoki Tanaka and transport minister Takeshi Maeda lost their jobs and Noda named Takushoku University professor Satoshi Morimoto as the new defense minister, while the new transport minister will be his party’s chief of upper house affairs, Yuichiro Hata. Noda also sacked agriculture, forestry and fisheries minister Michihiko Kano, whose involvement in a spy scandal with a Chinese diplomat has proved an embarrassment. Justice minister Toshio Ogawa and postal services minister Shozaburo Jimi were also removed.
PAKISTAN
Wedding bus crashes
At least 23 wedding guests, including six children, were killed and 60 injured when a bus plunged into a ravine near Islamabad, police said yesterday. The driver lost control of the vehicle late on Sunday at a sharp bend near Narr village, around 25km east of Islamabad. The bus was carrying 97 people to Chakwal District, 100km south of the capital, after a wedding. The bus was accompanying the bride and groom, who were traveling in a separate vehicle.
MONGOLIA
Former PM’s trial delayed
A court agreed yesterday to delay former president Nambaryn Enkhbayar’s corruption trial after he sought more time to study the case against him. Prosecutors have gathered about 5,000 pages of documents against Enkhbayar, his son Batshugar said in a phone interview from Ulan Bator. Enkhbayar, who was prime minister from 2000 to 2004 and president from 2005 to 2009, argues that the corruption accusations against him are meant to derail his bid to run in parliamentary elections later this month. The charges include privatizing a hotel for his own benefit and misappropriating television equipment donated to a Buddhist monastery. The case was delayed until June 12, Batshugar Enkhbayar said. Mongolia’s electoral commission ruled yesterday that Enkhbayar may not run for parliament, saying that he didn’t have enough education or experience to be a member, according to Batshugar Enkhbayar. His Mongolian People’s Revolutionary Party planned to file an appeal today, his son said.
VIETNAM
War sites opened to US
The government yesterday agreed to open three new sites for excavation by the US to search for troop remains from the Vietnam War, the minister of defense told US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta during a meeting. The announcement came as Panetta and Vietnamese Defense Minister Phuong Quang Thanh exchanged artifacts collected during the war — letters written by a US soldier who was killed that had been kept and used as propaganda and a diary belonging to a Vietnamese soldier. US officials said this is the first time an exchange of war artifacts has occurred. The two defense leaders agreed to return the papers to the families of the deceased soldiers. Vietnamese officials said they would open the three previously restricted sites that the Pentagon believes are critical to locating troops missing in action.
UNITED STATES
‘Truman’ delusions studied
Two psychiatrists in the US have just published a paper called The Truman Show Delusions, in which brothers Joel and Ian Gold describe the cases of five psychiatric patients with experiences similar to the 1998 film, in which Jim Carrey’s character Truman Burbank is the unwitting star of a carefully controlled reality show. Three of the patients referenced the film directly. This is more common than you would think, says Peter Byrne, director of public education at the Royal College of Psychiatrists, who has treated people with such experiences. “Psychosis is a mixture of delusions — beliefs that are false, which arrive without any evidence or logic — but often also hallucinations, usually voices. It is true that some young people, because their experience includes reality TV, which is everywhere, and [CCTV] cameras, which are also everywhere, thanks to [former British prime minister] Tony Blair and co, then hear a commentary about themselves and assume it’s some kind of reality TV show.”
UNITED STATES
Obama signs sick note
When 11-year-old Tyler Sullivan went back to school yesterday, he had the ultimate excuse note for missing class one day last week — written and signed by President Barack Obama. Sullivan played hooky on Friday to see Obama in action during a visit to a Honeywell factory in Golden Valley, Minnesota. When the president finished his speech, the schoolboy took advantage of a chance to meet him. “I was sitting in the front row,” Sullivan told local TV station KARE. “I was pretty excited.” “I had a chance to shake his hand,” the boy said, adding that the president asked him about missing class. Obama then took out an official presidential notepad and jotted down the following, sealed with his signature: “Mr Ackerman — Please excuse Tyler ... He was with me! Barack Obama.” Sullivan said he hoped the note would hold up — and that it would impress his friends.
CANADA
Tuition protests continue
Hundreds of people took to the streets late on Sunday to protest planned university tuition hikes that have riled up residents. Between 200 and 500 demonstrators marched in downtown Montreal in the 41st nightly street protest, banging pots and pans and demanding cancellation of the increases. As before, police have declared the march illegal because no itinerary has been provided, but they watched the event calmly, without making any arrests.
UNITED STATES
Parker plans Obama dinner
Sex and the City star Sarah Jessica Parker is borrowing a tactic from the George Clooney fundraising book, planning a campaign dinner for President Barack Obama and offering a chance to win two tickets with US$3 online donations. Parker, who is married to actor Matthew Broderick, sent an e-mail to supporters and appeared in an advertisement on Sunday’s MTV Movie Awards telling people of the online donations and tickets to the affair at her New York home. “I’m hosting this event on June 14th because there is so much at stake this year and I want to keep doing what I can,” she wrote in the e-mail. “I hope you’ll help me welcome President Obama and the First Lady to New York.” Clooney hosted a dinner last month at his home, where about 150 people paid US$40,000 a ticket to see the president. The event raised nearly US$15 million, with more than half coming from small-amount donors who entered an online ticket raffle by pledging donations of US$3 or more.
School bullies in Singapore are to face caning under new guidelines, but the education minister on Tuesday said it would be meted out only as a last resort with strict safeguards. Human rights groups regularly criticize Singapore for the use of corporal punishment, which remains part of the school and criminal justice systems, but authorities have defended it as a deterrent to crime and serious misconduct. Caning was discussed in the parliament after legislators asked how it would be used in relation to bullying in schools. The debate followed stricter guidelines on serious student misconduct, including bullying, unveiled by the Singaporean Ministry of
As evening falls in Fiji’s capital, a steady stream of people approaches a makeshift clinic that is a first line of defense against one of the world’s fastest-growing HIV epidemics. In the South Pacific nation — a popular tourist destination of just under a million people — more than 2,000 new HIV cases were recorded last year, a 26 percent increase from 2024. The government has declared an HIV outbreak and described it as a national crisis. “It’s spreading like wildfire,” said Siteri Dinawai, 46, who came to be tested. The Moonlight Clinic, a converted minibus parked in a suburban cul-de-sac in Suva, is
A MESSAGE: Japan’s participation in the Balikatan drills is a clear deterrence signal to China not to attack Taiwan while the US is busy in the Middle East, an analyst said The Japan Self-Defense Forces yesterday fired a Type 88 anti-ship missile during a joint maritime exercise with US, Australian and Philippine forces, hitting a decommissioned Philippine Navy ship in waters facing the disputed South China Sea, in drills that underscore Tokyo’s rising willingness to project military power on China’s doorstep. The drill took place as Manila and Tokyo began talks on a potential defense equipment transfer, made possible by Japan’s decision to scrap restrictions on military exports. The discussions include the possible early transfer of Abukuma-class destroyers and TC-90 aircraft to the Philippines, Japanese Minister of Defense Shinjiro Koizumi said. Philippine Secretary of
A South Korean judge who last week more than doubled former South Korean first lady Kim Keon-hee’s prison sentence was found dead yesterday, police said. Shin Jong-o was found unconscious at about 1am at the Seoul High Court building, an investigator at the Seocho District Police Station in Seoul said. Shin was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead, he said. “There is no sign of foul play in the death,” the investigator added. Local media reported that Shin had left a suicide note, but the investigator said there was none. On Tuesday last week, Shin presided over 53-year-old Kim’s appeal trial, finding her guilty
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