Hokkaido government ordered to compensate former Russian sailor over sting operation
(Mainichi Japan) March 20, 2010
http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20100320p2a00m0na011000c.html

SAPPORO -- The Sapporo District Court ordered the Hokkaido Prefectural Government on Friday to pay a former Russian sailor 500,000 yen for causing him emotional distress in connection with a 1997 undercover sting operation.

The 40-year-old Russian had sought damages totaling 23.1 million yen from the national and prefectural governments for emotional distress caused by his arrest and imprisonment for gun possession after a sting operation and false evidence given by investigators in his court proceedings.

According to the sentence, in November 1997, the Russian man was approached by a Pakistani man who offered to exchange a used car for a gun. When the plaintiff tried to hand off the gun at Otaru port in the Hokkaido city of Otaru, he was arrested by Hokkaido police investigators.

Cebu City raises alarm as HIV hits young women
Written by Wilfredo Rodolfo III / Reporter
Friday, 19 March 2010 19:30

THE Cebu City government has expressed concern on the growing number of local HIV cases after a survey conducted early this year showed there are already 85 carriers, 20 cases more than the 2007 level.

Dr. Ilia Tac-an of the city health office said the results of the last count are alarming. Since the city started its HIV monitoring in 1989, there was just an average of four new cases a year. In the last two years, the average surged to 10 new cases annually.

The victims are also getting younger: They are aged between 15 to 33 years old, and 78 percent of them are females.

“Our youngest victim is a 15-year-old high-school student from one of the city’s night high schools,” said Tac-an, the program officer for the city’s anti-HIV program.

Most of the new victims in the city are freelance sex workers, but Tac-an also said there is a growing trend of HIV cases among men having sex with other men. Surprisingly, commercial sex workers and night-establishment workers are the most careful as they only had one new case since 2009.

Taca-an, however, said the city’s area of concern regarding the spread of AIDS is not on unprotected sex, but on drug use. Almost all of the new cases were using drugs using secondhand syringes and needles.

No sweetheart deal with Harbour Centre–SBMA
Written by Henry Empeño / Correspondent
Thursday, 18 March 2010 21:01
http://businessmirror.com.ph/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&i...

SUBIC BAY FREE PORT—The controversy on the joint-venture agreement between the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) and Harbour Centre Port Terminal Inc. (HCPTI) is not a sweetheart deal, as some critics picture it to be.

Instead, it is “a case of a disgruntled suitor who didn’t get the girl,” SBMA Administrator Armand Arreza said in a media briefing here on Tuesday night.

Giving the assurance that the SBMA-HCPTI agreement was aboveboard and, more important, still subject to challenge by interested bidders, Arreza reiterated that the HCPTI proposal is still the best scheme so far.

“Another company tried to submit a proposal, but we really can’t consider it because it is inferior to what HCPTI offered. But because of this, the SBMA has been under fire ever since,” Arreza rued.

According to a fact sheet prepared by the SBMA, the terms of the agreement with HCPTI are most beneficial to the government. These include fixed- and guaranteed-revenue share, annual variable-revenue share, project cost and development commitments and committed minimum cargo volume per year.

http://ph.news.yahoo.com/afp/20100319/tap-cameroon-china-kidnap-release-...

YAOUNDE (AFP) - – Seven Chinese hostages who were freed by an armed gang in Cameroon's southwest Bakassi region arrived "traumatised" Thursday in Yaounde, the capital, Chinese source said.

The seven fishermen went straight to the Chinese embassy, where ambassador Xue Jinwei received them over lunch and listened to their six-day ordeal, a Chinese diplomat said.

"Even if they weren't assaulted they were traumatised", a source close to the Chinese embassy said on condition of anonymity. "Some want to go home others want to stay, but they are still hesitating."

The Chinese diplomat said that it would be up to the private Chinese company that employed the men, Dalian Beihai, to decide whether they would be repatriated or not.

They were kidnapped on March 12 off the Bakassi peninsula, which is rich in fish stocks and believed to have substantial oil reserves, and they were freed on Wednesday and taken by boat to the port of Limbe.

They spent the night in the economic capital, Douala.

By James Regan

http://ph.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20100319/tbs-cyclone-australia-0cd41eb.htm...

SYDNEY, March 19 - A tropical cyclone forced Australia's second-biggest coal port to close on Friday, bringing millions of tonnes of coal shipments to a halt and threatening to damage thousands of acres of sugar-cane fields.

Australia's Dalrymple Bay coal terminal ceased operations due to the approaching storm, which is packing winds of more than 150 kilometres per hour, a terminal spokesman said, adding that the port might have to evacuate staff.

"We've ceased operations and our last ship has sailed," the spokesman said, adding it would be Monday at the earliest before the terminal could be expected to reopen.

Australia is the world's biggest exporter of coal, most of it shipped out of Dalrymple in the northeast and Newcastle further south, and is also the third-largest exporter of sugar.

Dalrymple Bay predominately handles exports of metallurgical coals mined in the Bowen Basin and used in steelmaking, though it also exports thermal coal employed in power generation.

The terminal typically operates around the clock, handling up to 85 million tonnes a year.

By Jerry E. Esplanada
Philippine Daily Inquirer First Posted 11:46:00 03/19/2010 Filed Under: Crime, Kidnapping, Foreign affairs & international relations, Waterway & Maritime Transport, Hijacking (General)

http://globalnation.inquirer.net/news/breakingnews/view/20100319-259627/...

MANILA, Philippines – Six Malaysians have been released by a group of bandits who early this week hijacked their vessel and brought them to an undisclosed location on the island-province of Tawi-Tawi.

Malaysian authorities on Friday relayed the information to Rear Admiral Wilfredo Tamayo, commandant of the Philippine Coast Guard.

Reports reaching Tamayo said the hostages and their trawler were released "after payment of ransom" to the bandits.

The fishermen have returned safely to their homeport in Sandakan in the eastern Malaysian state of Sabah.

The identities of the bandits have yet to be determined, said Lieutenant Commander Armando Balilo, head of the PCG public affairs office.

Last Wednesday, Malaysian authorities alerted the PCG on the reported hijacking of a Sandakan-based fishing trawler off Tigabu Island near the Malaysian-Philippine border.

The PCG said the vessel was on its way to Sandakan when it was seized by four armed men.

Spanish fishing boats repel pirate attack—owners
Agence France-Presse
First Posted 06:54:00 03/20/2010
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/world/view/20100320-259777/Spa...

MADRID—Armed, private security guards aboard two Spanish fishing boats Friday repelled an attack from pirates in the Indian Ocean, the boats' owner said.

The incident occurred southwest of the Seychelles, when the two tuna trawlers, the Taraska and Ortube Barria, were attacked by pirates aboard two boats, a spokesman for the Albacora company, Ricardo Garcia, told Spanish national radio.

"Two fast pirates boats approached intending to seize" the fishing boats, after which there was "an exchange of gunfire" and the pirates fled, he said.

No one was hurt and there was no damage in the incident, he added.

It was the latest of several such incidents involving Spanish fishing boats in the past month in the Indian Ocean, where dozens of attacks on passing ships have occurred.

Last year another Spanish tuna fishing vessel, the Alakrana, and its crew of 36 were taken hostage for more than a month off the coast of Somalia, where pirates have bases.

They were freed after paying a ransom of four million dollars (three million euros), according to the Somali pirates who had captured them.

Men's group march vs condom use set Saturday in Manila
03/20/2010 | 07:47 AM
http://www.gmanews.tv/story/186604/mens-group-march-vs-condom-use-set-sa...

Pro-life march and a boycott against contraceptive products will highlight the actions of the country’s biggest organization of Catholic men against condoms and artificial contraception.

The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) said the Knights of Columbus (KC) will start marching early Saturday to seek an end to government’s aggressive contraceptive campaign.

“We challenge the government to redefine its attitude to contraceptives," KC Luzon deputy Alonzo Tan, who is organizing a rally in Manila, said on the CBCP Website.

Tan said he expected some 5,000 to 6,000 protesters to march from Intramuros to Rajah Sulayman Park in Malate, Manila, on Saturday morning.

Protest organizers also expect participation to be higher than last year in Metro Manila alone.

Last year, thousands of “Knights" packed the streets of major cities from Luzon to Mindanao in a massive show of their clout.

The rallies come as lawmakers in Congress were debating on a measure that seeks to control the country’s growing population through promotion of contraceptives such as condoms and pills.