JAPAN
Break-in addict arrested
Police yesterday said that they had arrested a man who reportedly admitted to breaking into more than 1,000 homes in an unconventional way of relieving stress. Police took the 37-year-old into custody on Monday on suspicion of trespassing on a property in Dazaifu, a police spokesman told reporters. “Breaking into other people’s homes is a hobby of mine, and I have done it more than 1,000 times,” the Mainichi Shimbun quoted the unnamed man as saying. “I get so thrilled that my palms sweat when wondering if someone will discover me or not, and it relieves some stress,” he told police, according to the newspaper.
Photo: AP
AUSTRALIA
Police officer found guilty
A police officer who shocked a 95-year-old nursing home resident with a Taser was found guilty of manslaughter in court yesterday. A jury found Kristian White guilty in the trial in Sydney after 20 hours of deliberation. White, who is on bail, could get up to 25 years in prison when he is sentenced. Clare Nowland, a great-grandmother who had dementia and used a walker, was refusing to put down the steak knife she was holding when the officer discharged his Taser at her in May last year. Nowland fell backward after White shocked her and died a week later in hospital. Police said at the time that Nowland sustained her fatal injuries from striking her head on the floor, rather than directly from the device’s debilitating electric shock.
Photo: AFP
PHILIPPINES
Complaint filed against VP
Police yesterday said that they had filed a complaint against Vice President Sara Duterte and several of her security detail over an incident at the lower house of Congress. The complaint is for direct assault, disobedience and grave coercion during an incident at the lower chamber and a hospital, the Philippine National Police (PNP) said in a statement. Duterte has been the subject of a heated congressional inquiry into the spending of her office as vice president and education secretary, during which she has clashed with lawmakers. “The PNP remains steadfast in its commitment to uphold justice and ensure that all individuals are held accountable under the law, regardless of their position,” police chief Rommel Francisco Marbil said. Duterte has been furious over the detention at the complex of the lower house of her aide, who is also facing a House inquiry. The aide was later transferred to a government hospital for medical attention. On Saturday, Duterte said she had contracted an assassin to kill President Ferdinand Marcos Jr, his wife and the speaker of the House, if she herself were killed. Law officials on Tuesday summoned Duterte for questioning over the statements. She said her words had been twisted to create a false narrative that Marcos’ life was under active threat, calling her remarks a “conditional act of revenge.”
UNITED STATES
Trump names trade envoy
President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday named Jamieson Greer his trade envoy, a key figure in implementing the incoming administration’s economic agenda, particularly a plan to use tariffs to raise revenue and help bring in more manufacturing. Trump also picked Kevin Hassett as his top economic adviser. “Jamieson played a key role during my First Term in imposing Tariffs on China and others to combat unfair Trade practices,” Trump said of Greer. Later, Trump named health economist Jay Bhattacharya to lead the National Institutes of Health, the nation’s leading medical research agency.
South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol on Tuesday declared martial law in an unannounced late night address broadcast live on YTN television. Yoon said he had no choice but to resort to such a measure in order to safeguard free and constitutional order, saying opposition parties have taken hostage of the parliamentary process to throw the country into a crisis. "I declare martial law to protect the free Republic of Korea from the threat of North Korean communist forces, to eradicate the despicable pro-North Korean anti-state forces that are plundering the freedom and happiness of our people, and to protect the free
The US deployed a reconnaissance aircraft while Japan and the Philippines sent navy ships in a joint patrol in the disputed South China Sea yesterday, two days after the allied forces condemned actions by China Coast Guard vessels against Philippine patrol ships. The US Indo-Pacific Command said the joint patrol was conducted in the Philippines’ exclusive economic zone by allies and partners to “uphold the right to freedom of navigation and overflight “ and “other lawful uses of the sea and international airspace.” Those phrases are used by the US, Japan and the Philippines to oppose China’s increasingly aggressive actions in the
A string of rape and assault allegations against the son of Norway’s future queen have plunged the royal family into its “biggest scandal” ever, wrapping up an annus horribilis for the monarchy. The legal troubles surrounding Marius Borg Hoiby, the 27-year-old son born of a relationship before Norwegian Crown Princess Mette-Marit’s marriage to Norwegian Crown Prince Haakon, have dominated the Scandinavian country’s headlines since August. The tall strapping blond with a “bad boy” look — often photographed in tuxedos, slicked back hair, earrings and tattoos — was arrested in Oslo on Aug. 4 suspected of assaulting his girlfriend the previous night. A photograph
‘KAMPAI’: It is said that people in Japan began brewing rice about 2,000 years ago, with a third-century Chinese chronicle describing the Japanese as fond of alcohol Traditional Japanese knowledge and skills used in the production of sake and shochu distilled spirits were approved on Wednesday for addition to UNESCO’s Intangible Cultural Heritage list, a committee of the UN cultural body said It is believed people in the archipelago began brewing rice in a simple way about two millennia ago, with a third-century Chinese chronicle describing the Japanese as fond of alcohol. By about 1000 AD, the imperial palace had a department to supervise the manufacturing of sake and its use in rituals, the Japan Sake and Shochu Makers Association said. The multi-staged brewing techniques still used today are
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