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Gu Kailai gets suspended death sentence for Briton’s murder
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New Zealand flags early Afghan exit
‘Apple peel can stave off high BP’
Tributes paid to Tony Scott
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Gu Kailai gets suspended death sentence for Briton’s murder
Beijing, August 20 Besides the suspended sentence, which after two years could be converted into a life imprisonment, 54-year-old Gu, wife of Bo Xilai, was deprived of political rights for life, state-run Xinhua news agency reported. The Hefei City Intermediate People's Court, which conducted a one-day trial on August 9, also sentenced her orderly Zhang Xiaojun to nine years for helping her to administer cyanide to British businessman Neil Heywood on November 13. The murder took place in Chongqing city headed by Bo. In another development, the Hefei Municipal Intermediate's People's Court also sentenced four top police officials of the city with varied sentences for helping Gu to cover up the murder. The four included former deputy chief of Chongqing's Public Security Bureau, Li Yang, former chief of the bureau's criminal section, Wang Pengfei, former chief of the bureau's technical detection team and Wang Zhi, former executive deputy chief of the Public Security Sub-bureau. Guo Weiguo and Li Yang were sentenced to 11 years and seven years, respectively, while both Wang Pengfei and Wang Zhi were sentenced to five years. The four helped Gu in showing Heywood's death as natural and later cremated his body to wipe out any traces of evidence. In its verdict the court said Gu chose to act against Heywood as he threatened her son Bo Guagua who was studying in London as they had conflicts over economic interests. Unofficial reports said Heywood threatened to harm Guagua if Gu failed to give $22 million. Heywood had threatened Guagua in e-mails, which made Gu fear for her son's personal safety and decide to murder Heywood, the court said. Significantly, there was no reference to Bo any where in trial even though he was accused of covering up the murder. According to the verdict, Gu administered cyanide to Heywood with the help of Zhang at a hotel. She made him drink alcohol first and when he collapsed, she poured the poison into his mouth, which caused his death, the judgment said. The court ruled that Gu Kailai's criminal offence was odious and led to serious consequences. She played the main role in the joint offence and was the principal criminal.
— PTI
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South American nations back Ecuador’s asylum for Assange
Quito, August 20 Foreign Ministers of UNASUR expressed their solidarity with Ecuador in a joint declaration issued Sunday following an emergency meeting in the Ecuadorian city of Guayaquil, Xinhua reported. The document conveyed the UNASUR's support for the government of Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa, and reiterated the sovereign right of a country to grant asylum. It said it "strongly condemns the threat of the use of force between countries". The document stated that Britain's threat to force its way into the embassy goes against the 1961 Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations and the 1963 Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, agreements that continue to be in force today. The UNASUR called on Ecuador and Britain to pursue dialogue and negotiation within the framework of international laws with regard to Assange, who has been staying at Ecuador's embassy in London since June 19. The UNASUR became the second regional organisation to throw its support behind Ecuador. Member nations of the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas issued a joint statement expressing their "emphatic support" for Ecuador and censure for the "intimidating threats" from the British government. Together, the two organisations represent nations such as Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Cuba, Ecuador, Guyana, Nicaragua, Peru, Surinam, Uruguay and Venezuela, and several Caribbean islands. — IANS
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Dictator’s daughter to run for S Korea presidency
Seoul, August 20 Veteran politician Park Geun-Hye, who also lost her mother to a gunman, secured a landslide 84 per cent of the vote to easily see off four male challengers at the primary of the conservative New Frontier Party. Opinion polls show her as current favourite to win the presidency in the December 19 vote. Park, now 60, had narrowly lost out to Lee Myung-Bak in the party's 2007 primary. Lee went on to become president but the country's leaders are restricted to a single five-year term. Beaming broadly, Park accepted a bouquet of flowers from party leaders and promised to secure the presidency and create a country "full of dreams and hope". She reiterated a commitment to "economic democratisation", in a country with a growing wealth gap and high youth unemployment, and said she would work to improve welfare schemes and create jobs. Park promised to make a clean and transparent government, eradicate corruption that has tarnished Lee's administration, and safeguard the nation against external threats. "I, Park Geun-Hye, will not tolerate any actions that threaten our people or damage our sovereignty," she said in an acceptance speech. Park is the daughter of Park Chung-Hee, who seized power in a coup in 1961 and was assassinated by his own spy chief in 1979. Her father won wide respect for transforming the poor war-ravaged nation into an economic juggernaut, but is also reviled in some quarters for his human rights abuses. Park Geun-Hye's mother was also killed by a gunman, a pro-North Korean agent who shot the first lady in 1974 while aiming for the president.
— AFP
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Mobile service back in four Pak cities
Pakistan today restored cellular services in four major cities, including Lahore and Karachi, after briefly suspending them to prevent terrorist attacks with bombs triggered by mobile phones.
Millions of people in Lahore, Multan, Karachi and Quetta were unable to use their mobile phones from 8 pm yesterday as cellular operators suspended all services in most parts of these cities on the directions of the Interior Ministry. Though some services were restored in parts of these cities early this morning, they were again suspended between 7 am and 10 am as special prayers for Eid-ul-Fitr were held across the country. All services were restored by this afternoon. The move was criticised by people across Pakistan, who said they were unable to wish friends and relatives on the occasion of Eid. Many Pakistanis took to social networking sites to criticise Malik and the suspension of mobile services, saying people would be unable to contact police or rescue services in any emergency. "We have done it to stop bombings using mobile phones," Malik said during an interaction with reporters when he made a surprise inspection of security at a market in Islamabad late last night. He said the Interior Ministry had made arrangements to suspend cellular services in Islamabad too in the event of any
emergency. (With inputs from PTI)
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New Zealand flags early Afghan exit
Wellington, August 20 Prime Minister John Key said three soldiers, two men and one woman, died instantly when an "enormous" blast destroyed their humvee Sunday morning as a New Zealand convoy was on patrol in Bamiyan province. The attack was the deadliest experienced by New Zealand forces in Afghanistan and brings to 10 their total fatalities since deploying in Bamiyan in 2003, with five recorded this month alone. Key described the deaths as a huge loss and revealed that New Zealand was now looking at withdrawing its 145-member provincial reconstruction team (PRT) in Bamiyan in early 2013, rather than late next year. He said discussions about an early exit began before August 4, when two soldiers were killed and six wounded in a gunfight northwest of Do Abe, near the site of the latest attack. "The timing of the withdrawal has not been affected by the loss of the five soldiers we have endured," he told reporters. Key said he understood the recent deaths had stirred debate in New Zealand about the country's role in Afghanistan but the military could not manage an orderly transition to local authorities in Bamiyan if it left too early.
— AFP
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‘Apple peel can stave off high BP’
London, August 20 Researchers from Nova Scotia Agricultural College tested the peel and fleshy fruit of apples. The peel was found to be up to six times more effective in inhibiting an enzyme ACE, known to cause hypertension and high blood pressure. — ANI
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Los Angeles, August 20 The man behind movies like “Beverly Hills Cop II” and “True Romance”, was seen leaping from the bridge on Sunday. He was 68. A suicide note was found in his car, but the contents of it are not yet fully known. — Reuters
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