JAPAN
Experts get glimpse of squid
A giant squid that swam into a port has given enthusiasts and experts a rare glimpse of the mysterious creature before it was guided back out to sea. The massive invertebrate, 4m in length, was discovered by fishermen on Thursday last week at a port in the city of Toyama on the northwestern coast. It was guided by a diver into deeper seas about seven hours later. “Its suckers were so strong that I felt some pain,” Akinobu Kimura, who runs a dive shop in Toyama, said on TV Asahi. “Even though I was trying to let it escape [from the port], it wrapped around my body and clung to my arm.” A curator at the Uozu Aquarium who visited the port and took underwater photographs of the squid was surprised at its size. “It was unexpectedly beautiful, its body glowing red,” he told broadcaster TBS. Giant squids are sometimes caught in fishing nets, though filming a live one is rare.
JAPAN
Red panda escapes from zoo
A zoo scrambled all of its staff yesterday to track down a missing red panda, a spokesman said, finally recovering her nearby. About 20 zoo workers and three police dogs joined the hunt for the missing creature, called Sumire, after she disappeared from her enclosure on Wednesday. The zoo had warned anyone who spotted her not to try and catch her themselves. “Red pandas are not violent animals, but they may scratch you or bite you when they feel threatened,” it said in a statement. They finally captured Sumire in an area behind the zoo, which is on the outskirts of Mount Fuji. “She was found high up on a bamboo tree in the backyard, munching on its leaves,” the spokesman said. “Apples are her favorite food, though.” Sumire is not the first animal to make a break for freedom in the nation. In 2012, a penguin on the run from a Tokyo aquarium outwitted authorities for 82 days before being caught.
MALAYSIA
Actress, son free to go home
An Australian actress who was detained after allegedly kidnapping her son is to be allowed to return home with no charges filed against her, a senior police official said on Wednesday. Eliza Szonert was taken into police custody last week for allegedly grabbing her son while he was with her separated partner at a restaurant early last month. “She can leave Malaysia for home with her son. We have investigated the case and the deputy public prosecutor has decided that there will be no prosecution against her,” Kuala Lumpur Police Chief Tajuddin Mohamad Isa said. “Our concern is for the well-being of the child.” Szonert, who acted in the popular TV soap opera Neighbours, was engulfed in controversy after the alleged snatching was caught on video.
INDIA
Rat forces plane to return
A “suspected rat sighting” in the cabin forced an Air India plane carrying more than 200 passengers to return to Mumbai almost three hours into a flight to London, the airline said yesterday. Air India said it had decided to turn back the flight “keeping passenger safety in mind,” even though the rodent’s presence was not confirmed. Rats pose a serious threat to the safety of flights as they can chew through wires and damage internal controls. “Our engineering team is investigating the incident,” an airline statement said. “The aircraft with the suspected rodent will be fumigated as per procedure in such cases of rodent sighting.” It is not the first time an Air India flight has been grounded by rodents. In July, a plane en route to Milan, Italy, had to return to New Delhi after a suspected rat sighting.
BELGIUM
Police orgy revealed
Soldiers and police officers in Brussels held an orgy while the city was in lockdown over fears of a Paris-style attack by Islamist extremists, according to media reports. Two policewomen and eight soldiers are said to have engaged in group sex at a police station in the Brussels neighborhood of Ganshoren while colleagues hunted for terror suspects. The police station was near Molenbeek, where anti-terror raids had been taking place. Police spokesman Johan Berckmans told De Standaard that 15 to 20 soldiers slept at the station for two weeks during the operation in November so they did not have to travel far at the end of their shift. “When they left, they organized a small party to thank the police in the area,” the spokesman told newspaper La Derniere Heure. “We have launched an investigation to find out what exactly happened.”
SWEDEN
Refugee center ‘haunted’
The Migration Agency says 35 asylum seekers have asked to be relocated from a refugee center because they believe it is haunted by ghosts. Migration Agency officials on Wednesday said the asylum seekers were spooked by flickering lights and noise in the plumbing system at the facility in Grannaforsa, a small village in Smaland Province. Magnus Petersson, the local Migration Agency manager, said 35 of the 58 people living in the shelter came to the agency’s regional office on Tuesday, demanding to be relocated. Petersson said they reluctantly returned at the end of the day after being told there were no alternatives. He said there were probably natural explanations to the phenomena that frightened them, such as faulty electrical switches and creaking noises caused by rapid changes in temperature.
CANADA
Santa robs jewelry store
A man dressed as Santa Claus robbed a small-town jewelry store at gunpoint on Christmas Eve, before dashing away in a Hummer, police said on Wednesday. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police said the red-and-white-garbed robber entered a jewelry store in Stettler, Alberta, late on on Thursday afternoon last week. He demanded jewelry and diamonds from a clerk and left with a bag of them. No one was hurt. An employee at the store declined to comment. Wearing a Santa suit might have been a strategic move by the robber, said Sergeant Phil Penny, who said he had seen other robbers wear garish sweaters and wigs. He said robbers might choose such costumes to distract victims from noticing other identifying details. It is “something flamboyant, something weird that the normal victim would focus on,” he said. The black Hummer sport utility vehicle used by the suspect was found on Monday in a Stettler neighborhood.
CANADA
Turbulence injures 21
Turbulence on an Air Canada flight from China injured multiple passengers on Wednesday, forcing it to land in Calgary, Alberta, the airline said. Twenty-one passengers were transferred to hospitals from the airport, it said in a statement. Air Canada flight 88 departed from Shanghai and was headed to Toronto, carrying 332 passengers and 19 crew. The airline said it would be making arrangements to accommodate the other passengers, including those continuing on to Toronto, and that the incident was being investigated. There was no immediate indication of what caused the turbulence.
CONDITIONS: The Russian president said a deal that was scuppered by ‘elites’ in the US and Europe should be revived, as Ukraine was generally satisfied with it Russian President Vladimir Putin yesterday said that he was ready for talks with Ukraine, after having previously rebuffed the idea of negotiations while Kyiv’s offensive into the Kursk region was ongoing. Ukraine last month launched a cross-border incursion into Russia’s Kursk region, sending thousands of troops across the border and seizing several villages. Putin said shortly after there could be no talk of negotiations. Speaking at a question and answer session at Russia’s Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Putin said that Russia was ready for talks, but on the basis of an aborted deal between Moscow’s and Kyiv’s negotiators reached in Istanbul, Turkey,
In months, Lo Yuet-ping would bid farewell to a centuries-old village he has called home in Hong Kong for more than seven decades. The Cha Kwo Ling village in east Kowloon is filled with small houses built from metal sheets and stones, as well as old granite buildings, contrasting sharply with the high-rise structures that dominate much of the Asian financial hub. Lo, 72, has spent his entire life here and is among an estimated 860 households required to move under a government redevelopment plan. He said he would miss the rich history, unique culture and warm interpersonal kindness that defined life in
A French woman whose husband has admitted to enlisting dozens of strangers to rape her while she was drugged on Thursday told his trial that police had saved her life by uncovering the crimes. “The police saved my life by investigating Mister Pelicot’s computer,” Gisele Pelicot told the court in the southern city of Avignon, referring to her husband — one of 51 of her alleged abusers on trial — by only his surname. Speaking for the first time since the extraordinary trial began on Monday, Gisele Pelicot, now 71, revealed her emotion in almost 90 minutes of testimony, recounting her mysterious
Thailand has netted more than 1.3 million kilograms of highly destructive blackchin tilapia fish, the government said yesterday, as it battles to stamp out the invasive species. Shoals of blackchin tilapia, which can produce up to 500 young at a time, have been found in 19 provinces, damaging ecosystems in rivers, swamps and canals by preying on small fish, shrimp and snail larvae. As well as the ecological impact, the government is worried about the effect on the kingdom’s crucial fish-farming industry. Fishing authorities caught 1,332,000kg of blackchin tilapia from February to Wednesday last week, said Nattacha Boonchaiinsawat, vice president of a parliamentary
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