AUSTRALIA
Muslims protest ‘Charlie’
Hundreds of Muslims rallied in Sydney on Friday night to protest against what they see as negative media coverage of their religion and against the French magazine Charlie Hebdo’s depictions of the Prophet Mohammed. Police said that 14 people were moved on from the rally for breaching the peace, but no one was charged and the event was peaceful. Some of the about 800 demonstrators in the Muslim enclave of Lakemba held placards with the slogan: “Je suis Muslim,” French for “I am Muslim.” The slogan was a response to Charlie Hebdo’s latest front cover that depicts a tearful Prophet Mohammed holding a sign saying “Je suis Charlie.” The edition was the first since the Jan. 7 terrorist attack on the satirical publication’s Paris office that left 12 dead. Organizers of the “Our Prophet, Our Honor” rally said it was intended to be “a peaceful and respectful event” to counter what they termed negative media coverage of Islam and the magazine’s lampooning of Mohammed. Muslim leader Sufyan Badar told the crowd that demonstrations in support of Charlie Hebdo used freedom of speech as a smoke screen for underlying issues. “In reality, free speech is one of the many political tools that are used to maintain dominance over the Muslims,” Badar said.
INDIA
Police detain alleged spy
Police arrested a 35-year-old man on Friday in the eastern state of Odisha, accusing him of passing military secrets to Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency. Police said that Ishwar Chandra Behera was passing on information about missile activities conducted at a unit of India’s Defence Research & Development Organisation, where he worked as a cameraman. “He was providing vital information related to missile tests and other military activities to an ISI agent for the past eight to 10 months,” Odisha Inspector General of Police A.K. Panigrahi told reporters in the state capital, Bhubaneswar. “He confessed that he had met an [ISI] agent in Kolkata a number of times.” India accuses elements in Pakistan’s army and ISI of shielding or working with militant groups, which Islamabad denies. Tensions between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan, which are also at odds over the disputed region of Kashmir, have risen since Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi called off peace talks in August last year. Troops on both sides have exchanged fire across the border in recent months. Police said they that found a substantial amount of money had been transferred to Behera’s bank account from several places, including Abu Dhabi and Mumbai. They are investigating whether he was assisted by anyone else. “We had information that his activities are suspicious and he should be watched... He confessed he is in touch with the ISI agent and is passing on very vital information,” Panigrahi said.
BULGARIA
Officials catch smugglers
Customs officials seized 2 million endangered baby eels concealed in the luggage of two Chinese men arriving from Spain, officials said on Friday. The tiny baby eels, or elvers, are seen by some consumers as a specialty, fetching 500 euros (US$560) per kilogram in Europe and up to 1,300 euros in Asia, the customs agency said. However, European eels (Anguilla anguilla) are classified as a critically endangered species. Their sale is heavily regulated in the EU and they cannot be exported outside the bloc. The eels, in water-filled bags inside eight polystyrene boxes in the men’s checked luggage, weighed 45kg, meaning the haul could potentially have sold for almost 60,000 euros.
UNITED STATES
‘Ghandi’ beer rebranded
A brewery is no longer to use the name and likeness of former Indian leader Mohandas Gandhi on one of its beers following complaints that the marketing is offensive, Connecticut State Representative Prasad Srinivasan said on Friday. The label on New England Brewing Co’s Gandhi-Bot India pale ale has a cartoon image depicting a robot version of Gandhi, who favored prohibition. The Connecticut-based company apologized earlier this month to anyone who found it insensitive. In a statement, the brewery said it decided to rebrand the beer following meetings with Indian-American business owners, temple leaders and state officials, including Srinivasan. The statement was posted on Srinivasan’s Web site. “After careful consideration we feel that renaming Gandhi-Bot is the right move,” the brewery said in the statement. New England Brewing’s head brewer did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment. The company said in a statement that the beer itself would remain the same.
VATICAN CITY
Pope urges low-key parties
Pope Francis has told his new cardinals to keep the partying to a minimum — and their egos in check — when they are formally elevated at a Vatican ceremony next month. In a letter written to the 20 new princes of the church published on Friday in the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano, the pontiff warned the cardinals to avoid the type of ostentatious festivities that “stun worse than grappa on an empty stomach.” Traditionally, new cardinals are feted with lavish parties, often funded by well-meaning parishioners, in Rome after the ceremony where they receive their red hats. Some of the cardinals to be installed on Feb. 14 hail from countries that have never had one, including Myanmar and Tonga.
UNITED STATES
WWII lawsuits dismissed
Holocaust survivors and victims’ heirs cannot sue Hungary’s national bank and railway in the US over the alleged theft of cash, art and other assets from Hungarian Jews until they first exhaust their legal options in Hungary itself, a federal appeals court ruled on Friday. The unanimous decision by a three-judge panel of the 7th US Circuit Court of Appeals upholds a lower court’s dismissal of the lawsuits filed in the Northern District of Illinois in 2010. More than 500,000 Hungarian Jews died in the Holocaust during World War II, many forced to buy tickets for trains that carried them to Nazi concentration camps outside Hungary.
UNITED STATES
‘Radicalized’ teen jailed
A court on Friday jailed a “radicalized” Colorado teenager intercepted by the FBI when she attempted to join her fiance to fight in Syria with the Islamic State group, formerly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. Shannon Conley, 19, is to serve four years in prison for providing and attempting to provide material support and resources to Islamic State fighters and other extremist groups including al-Qaeda, the Department of Justice said. Conley, who struck a plea bargain with prosecutors, had expressed a desire to wage violent jihad after meeting a man on the Internet who claimed to be an active member of the Islamic State in Syria. “The defendant in this case got lucky,” US Attorney John Walsh said. “The FBI arrested her after determining that she had been radicalized and planned to travel to Syria to support the brutal foreign terrorist organizations operating there.”
PARLIAMENT CHAOS: Police forcibly removed Brazilian Deputy Glauber Braga after he called the legislation part of a ‘coup offensive’ and occupied the speaker’s chair Brazil’s lower house of Congress early yesterday approved a bill that could slash former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro’s prison sentence for plotting a coup, after efforts by a lawmaker to disrupt the proceedings sparked chaos in parliament. Bolsonaro has been serving a 27-year term since last month after his conviction for a scheme to stop Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva from taking office after the 2022 election. Lawmakers had been discussing a bill that would significantly reduce sentences for several crimes, including attempting a coup d’etat — opening up the prospect that Bolsonaro, 70, could have his sentence cut to
A powerful magnitude 7.6 earthquake shook Japan’s northeast region late on Monday, prompting tsunami warnings and orders for residents to evacuate. A tsunami as high as three metres (10 feet) could hit Japan’s northeastern coast after an earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 7.6 occurred offshore at 11:15 p.m. (1415 GMT), the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) said. Tsunami warnings were issued for the prefectures of Hokkaido, Aomori and Iwate, and a tsunami of 40cm had been observed at Aomori’s Mutsu Ogawara and Hokkaido’s Urakawa ports before midnight, JMA said. The epicentre of the quake was 80 km (50 miles) off the coast of
China yesterday held a low-key memorial ceremony for the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) not attending, despite a diplomatic crisis between Beijing and Tokyo over Taiwan. Beijing has raged at Tokyo since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi last month said that a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan could trigger a military response from Japan. China and Japan have long sparred over their painful history. China consistently reminds its people of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, in which it says Japanese troops killed 300,000 people in what was then its capital. A post-World War II Allied tribunal put the death toll
A passerby could hear the cacophony from miles away in the Argentine capital, the unmistakable sound of 2,397 dogs barking — and breaking the unofficial world record for the largest-ever gathering of golden retrievers. Excitement pulsed through Bosques de Palermo, a sprawling park in Buenos Aires, as golden retriever-owners from all over Argentina transformed the park’s grassy expanse into a sea of bright yellow fur. Dog owners of all ages, their clothes covered in dog hair and stained with slobber, plopped down on picnic blankets with their beloved goldens to take in the surreal sight of so many other, exceptionally similar-looking ones.
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