CHINA
Man denied his final wish
A man who texted police to donate his body and organs to science before hanging himself was denied his final wish because he had not applied in advance. “I have decided to donate my body and all my organs to charity. When you receive my message, I will already be dead. Sorry for bothering you,” the message to police read according to Xinhua news agency. The man, surnamed Wang, was later found hanging from an air conditioning unit outside his house in Hangzhou, in the eastern province of Zhejiang, it reported. Wang, 30, suffered from muscular dystrophy, police said. A wheelchair was found by his side with a walking stick and two notes. He felt he had suffered enough, but wanted to make a final contribution to society, Xinhua said. “My last and biggest wish is to donate all my useful organs and body to charity. I hope you respect my choice,” it cited one of the notes as reading, but the local branch of the Chinese Red Cross refused to accept the donation as Wang had not applied in advance or taken the necessary checkup, Xinhua added.
AUSTRALIA
Millipedes suspects in crash
Black Portuguese millipedes were the main suspects in a rear-end collision between two trains on Tuesday after hundreds of the tiny creatures were found squashed in a slippery mess on the track. “Millipedes are one of the factors we are going to take into account,” said David Hynes, spokesman at the Public Transport Authority of Western Australia. Six passengers were treated for stiff necks after a train pulling into a station at Clarkson, 40km north of Perth, ran into a stationary one, the train company said. “What happened in previous instances is trains which were traveling at speed have gone over an infestation, crushed them and made the tracks slimy. The train loses traction and the train has slipped,” Hynes said.
AFGHANISTAN
Fishermen kill six children
Security forces have arrested eight policemen for accidentally killing six children when firing a rocket into a river to catch fish, officials said yesterday. The incident took place on Friday in the Doshi district of the northern province of Baghlan when policemen on the bank of a river fired a rocket-propelled grenade into the water. “The rocket went astray and hit a place where children were playing, killing six and wounding two others,” the interior ministry said in a statement. “Eight police personnel accused of misusing government weapons that killed these children have been arrested and handed over to military prosecutors for investigation,” it said. Using explosives to kill and catch fish is not uncommon in Afghanistan. In some parts of the country people even use electrical generators and bare wire to catch fish, posing an extreme danger to swimmers.
UNITED KINGDOM
Police hunt grave robbers
Police are hunting criminals who apparently tried to dig their way into a couple’s grave to steal jewelry that had been buried with them. The diggers spent a night excavating a hole a meter long and a meter deep next to the plot where Henry and Betty Brazil were laid to rest. They tried to disguise their work by placing two boxes upside down in the hole and covering them with soil, presumably planning to return to finish the job, but relatives of the Brazils spotted the apparent attempted grave robbing at the cemetery in Gloucester and police were called. Relatives are now standing guard at the grave to deter the offenders from returning.
GERMANY
Boy finds mummy in attic
Police, prosecutors and forensics experts are facing a mystery after a 10-year-old boy found a human mummy in a sarcophagus in a corner of his grandparents’ attic. A CT scan has revealed a well-preserved human skull, with an arrow sticking out of the left eye socket, and large parts of a skeleton with the arms crossed over the chest, the newspaper Kreiszeitung has reported. The boy’s father, Lutz-Wolfgang Kettler, said his own father, who died 12 years ago, traveled to North Africa in the 1950s and may have brought back the mummy as a grisly souvenir. Pathologist Andreas Nerlich of Munich’s Bogenhausen hospital told news Web site Spiegel Online that, while the skull and the bones are real, the mummy is “a fake, made from one or several human bodies.” Police and prosecutors have taken note of the case in the town of Diepholz, Lower Saxony state, and are waiting for more information on where the body came from before looking into the possibility of modern-age foul play.
UNITED STATES
Family finds shipwreck gold
A Florida family who spend their time together hunting for treasure struck it rich over the weekend, hauling up an estimated US$300,000 worth of gold from an historic wreckage in the Atlantic Ocean. Brent Brisben, whose company owns the rights to the wreckage, said Rick and Lisa Schmitt, and their grown children Hillary and Eric, found gold chains and coins from the wreckage of a convoy of 11 ships that went down in a hurricane off the coast of Florida in 1715 en route from Havana to Spain. Briben’s company bought the rights to the wreck site from the heirs of legendary treasure hunter Mel Fisher in 2010 and allows others, including the Schmitts, to search under subcontracting agreements.
UNITED STATES
Surfboard pierces windshield
A man was driving along a Honolulu freeway over the weekend when a surfboard crashed through the windshield just inches from his face, leaving him with only scratches on his face and arms. Jerrin Ching was driving on the H-1 freeway on Sunday morning when the red surfboard came out of nowhere and pierced through the glass, he told KHON-TV. Witnesses told police the surfboard fell off an overpass and bounced off a school bus. Ching said he on his way to pick up a friend at the University of Hawaii, when “all of a sudden I see this red thing come out of nowhere and turns out it was a surfboard. And it just crashed through my windshield.” It is not known who the board belongs to, or where it came from. “Can you please claim your board, and I don’t know, pay for the windshield or something?” Ching said. “Because you almost killed me.”
CANADA
Taser incident investigated
Ontario’s police watchdog is investigating an incident in which an 80-year-old woman was struck by police with a Taser and fractured her hip. Special Investigations Unit spokeswoman Monica Hudon on Tuesday said three police officers approached the woman at about 3:30am on Wednesday last week as she walked along a road in Mississauga, Ontario. Hudon said the officers spoke with the woman until “at some point” an officer fired his Taser. Hudon said the woman fell to the ground and was rushed to hospital for treatment of a fractured hip, among other injuries. The province announced on Aug. 28 it would permit officers to carry Tasers.
An endangered baby pygmy hippopotamus that shot to social media stardom in Thailand has become a lucrative source of income for her home zoo, quadrupling its ticket sales, the institution said Thursday. Moo Deng, whose name in Thai means “bouncy pork,” has drawn tens of thousands of visitors to Khao Kheow Open Zoo this month. The two-month-old pygmy hippo went viral on TikTok and Instagram for her cheeky antics, inspiring merchandise, memes and even craft tutorials on how to make crocheted or cake-based Moo Dengs at home. A zoo spokesperson said that ticket sales from the start of September to Wednesday reached almost
‘BARBAROUS ACTS’: The captain of the fishing vessel said that people in checkered clothes beat them with iron bars and that he fell unconscious for about an hour Ten Vietnamese fishers were violently robbed in the South China Sea, state media reported yesterday, with an official saying the attackers came from Chinese-flagged vessels. The men were reportedly beaten with iron bars and robbed of thousands of dollars of fish and equipment on Sunday off the Paracel Islands (Xisha Islands, 西沙群島), which Taiwan claims, as do Vietnam, China, Brunei, Malaysia and the Philippines. Vietnamese media did not identify the nationalities of the attackers, but Phung Ba Vuong, an official in central Quang Ngai province, told reporters: “They were Chinese, [the boats had] Chinese flags.” Four of the 10-man Vietnamese crew were rushed
CHINESE ICBM: The missile landed near the EEZ of French Polynesia, much to the surprise and concern of the president, who sent a letter of protest to Beijing Fijian President Ratu Wiliame Katonivere called for “respect for our region” and a stop to missile tests in the Pacific Ocean, after China launched an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). In a speech to the UN General Assembly in New York on Thursday, Katonivere recalled the Pacific Ocean’s history as a nuclear weapons testing ground, and noted Wednesday’s rare launch by China of an ICBM. “There was a unilateral test firing of a ballistic missile into the Pacific Ocean. We urge respect for our region and call for cessation of such action,” he said. The ICBM, carrying a dummy warhead, was launched by the
As violence between Israel and Hezbollah escalates, Iran is walking a tightrope by supporting Hezbollah without being dragged into a full-blown conflict and playing into its enemy’s hands. With a focus on easing its isolation and reviving its battered economy, Iran is aware that war could complicate efforts to secure relief from crippling sanctions. Cross-border fire between Israel and Hezbollah, sparked by Hamas’ attack on Israel on Oct. 7 last year, has intensified, especially after last week’s sabotage on Hezbollah’s communications that killed 39 people. Israeli airstrikes on Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon followed, killing hundreds. Hezbollah retaliated with rocket barrages. Despite the surge in
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