News in Brief
BEIJING (Reuters) -- A warming of ties between the United States and North Korea does not mean China will reach out to Taiwan for a similar summit, the Chinese government said on Wednesday.
Singapore, the site of this week’s historic summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, is also where Chinese President Xi Jinping held a landmark meeting with Taiwan’s then president Ma Ying-jeou in 2015.
But Ma Xiaoguang, spokesman for China’s Taiwan Affairs Office, dismissed the suggestion that the Trump-Kim summit could lead to a similar thawing between China and Taiwan.
"The Taiwan issue is purely an internal Chinese affair. Its nature is entirely different to North Korea-U.S. relations,” Ma told a regular news briefing in response to a question.
"Taiwan and the mainland both belong to one China, and relations across the Taiwan Strait are not state-to-state ties.”
***
SINGAPORE (Reuters) -- The U.S. State Department mistakenly made Singapore part of neighboring Malaysia in a note issued in connection with Tuesday’s North Korea-U.S. summit and published on its website, sparking snide comments on social media.
The mistake came in a transcript of a briefing U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo gave Monday. It gave the venue as "JW Marriott, Singapore, Malaysia.” The error was rectified later to remove the reference to Malaysia.
"Well, U.S. State Department still thinks Singapore is in Malaysia,” said Twitter user @BrioS_BRxV. "Just 53 years and a bad break-up off.”
The island of Singapore was once part of Malaysia but they were separated acrimoniously in 1965, clouding diplomatic and economic dealings for years.
Malaysia’s The Star newspaper reported the error in a post on its Facebook page with the title "How to offend Singaporeans and Malaysians at the same time.”
***
PALMA, Spain (AFP) -- A Spanish court has given the king's brother-in-law, Inaki Urdangarin, five days to report to jail after he lost his appeal against a graft conviction and prison sentence, a judicial source said Wednesday.
The former Olympic handball player and husband of Princess Christina has been sentenced to five years and 10 months in jail in a case which caused uproar in Spain and tainted the royal family's image.
The 50-year-old had been found guilty last year of embezzling millions of euros (dollars) between 2004 and 2006 from a non-profit foundation he headed on the island of Majorca.
On Wednesday, Urdangarin flew from Switzerland where he lives in exile with his family to Majorca to appear in court.
At the Palma courthouse he was met by a horde of journalists and some people who shouted "thief" at him, an AFP photographer reported.
***
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sexual harassment is rampant in U.S. academic science, and colleges and universities that train new scientists need a system-wide culture change so women won't be bullied out of the field, a national advisory group said Tuesday.
In fact, it's time to treat sexual harassment as seriously as research misconduct, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine concluded in recommendations aimed at U.S. institutions of higher education and the groups that fund them.
Assault or unwanted sexual advances are making #MeToo headlines but don't tell the whole story, the report found. Most common in science is what the National Academies termed gender harassment, a hostile environment rife with sexist commentary and crude behavior that can negatively impact a woman's education and career, as well as her mental and physical health.
***
PARIS (AFP) -- An 18th-century Chinese vase forgotten for decades in a shoe box in a French attic sold for 16.2 million euros ($19 million) at Sotheby’s in Paris Tuesday – more than 30 times the estimate.
Experts at the auction house said the exquisite porcelain vessel was made for the Qing dynasty Emperor Qianlong and had set a guide price of a much more modest 500,000 euros.
"This is a major work of art, it is as if we had just discovered a Caravaggio,” Olivier Valmier, the Asian arts expert at the auction house, told reporters before the sale. The vase, which was in perfect condition, "is the only known example in the world bearing such detail,” he added.
Rare porcelain from the Qian period has been going for astronomical prices recently. A bowl made for Qianlong’s grandfather sold last April by Sotheby’s in Hong Kong went for $30.4 million.
***
ATHENS (Reuters) -- Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras was accused on Wednesday of surrendering part of his nation's identity, as a deal he struck to settle a name dispute with Macedonia prompted a barrage of criticism from opposition politicians and media.
Under the agreement announced by Athens and Skopje on Tuesday, the Balkan state known as Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" would henceforth be called the "Republic of Northern Macedonia".
The accord would open the way for the small nation's eventual membership of the European Union and NATO, currently blocked by Greece's objections to its current name.
But conservative opposition leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis called it "deeply problematic", because the majority of Greeks were against it and Tsipras lacked the political legitimacy to sign it.
Singapore, the site of this week’s historic summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, is also where Chinese President Xi Jinping held a landmark meeting with Taiwan’s then president Ma Ying-jeou in 2015.
But Ma Xiaoguang, spokesman for China’s Taiwan Affairs Office, dismissed the suggestion that the Trump-Kim summit could lead to a similar thawing between China and Taiwan.
"The Taiwan issue is purely an internal Chinese affair. Its nature is entirely different to North Korea-U.S. relations,” Ma told a regular news briefing in response to a question.
"Taiwan and the mainland both belong to one China, and relations across the Taiwan Strait are not state-to-state ties.”
***
SINGAPORE (Reuters) -- The U.S. State Department mistakenly made Singapore part of neighboring Malaysia in a note issued in connection with Tuesday’s North Korea-U.S. summit and published on its website, sparking snide comments on social media.
The mistake came in a transcript of a briefing U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo gave Monday. It gave the venue as "JW Marriott, Singapore, Malaysia.” The error was rectified later to remove the reference to Malaysia.
"Well, U.S. State Department still thinks Singapore is in Malaysia,” said Twitter user @BrioS_BRxV. "Just 53 years and a bad break-up off.”
The island of Singapore was once part of Malaysia but they were separated acrimoniously in 1965, clouding diplomatic and economic dealings for years.
Malaysia’s The Star newspaper reported the error in a post on its Facebook page with the title "How to offend Singaporeans and Malaysians at the same time.”
***
PALMA, Spain (AFP) -- A Spanish court has given the king's brother-in-law, Inaki Urdangarin, five days to report to jail after he lost his appeal against a graft conviction and prison sentence, a judicial source said Wednesday.
The former Olympic handball player and husband of Princess Christina has been sentenced to five years and 10 months in jail in a case which caused uproar in Spain and tainted the royal family's image.
The 50-year-old had been found guilty last year of embezzling millions of euros (dollars) between 2004 and 2006 from a non-profit foundation he headed on the island of Majorca.
On Wednesday, Urdangarin flew from Switzerland where he lives in exile with his family to Majorca to appear in court.
At the Palma courthouse he was met by a horde of journalists and some people who shouted "thief" at him, an AFP photographer reported.
***
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sexual harassment is rampant in U.S. academic science, and colleges and universities that train new scientists need a system-wide culture change so women won't be bullied out of the field, a national advisory group said Tuesday.
In fact, it's time to treat sexual harassment as seriously as research misconduct, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine concluded in recommendations aimed at U.S. institutions of higher education and the groups that fund them.
Assault or unwanted sexual advances are making #MeToo headlines but don't tell the whole story, the report found. Most common in science is what the National Academies termed gender harassment, a hostile environment rife with sexist commentary and crude behavior that can negatively impact a woman's education and career, as well as her mental and physical health.
***
PARIS (AFP) -- An 18th-century Chinese vase forgotten for decades in a shoe box in a French attic sold for 16.2 million euros ($19 million) at Sotheby’s in Paris Tuesday – more than 30 times the estimate.
Experts at the auction house said the exquisite porcelain vessel was made for the Qing dynasty Emperor Qianlong and had set a guide price of a much more modest 500,000 euros.
"This is a major work of art, it is as if we had just discovered a Caravaggio,” Olivier Valmier, the Asian arts expert at the auction house, told reporters before the sale. The vase, which was in perfect condition, "is the only known example in the world bearing such detail,” he added.
Rare porcelain from the Qian period has been going for astronomical prices recently. A bowl made for Qianlong’s grandfather sold last April by Sotheby’s in Hong Kong went for $30.4 million.
***
ATHENS (Reuters) -- Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras was accused on Wednesday of surrendering part of his nation's identity, as a deal he struck to settle a name dispute with Macedonia prompted a barrage of criticism from opposition politicians and media.
Under the agreement announced by Athens and Skopje on Tuesday, the Balkan state known as Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" would henceforth be called the "Republic of Northern Macedonia".
The accord would open the way for the small nation's eventual membership of the European Union and NATO, currently blocked by Greece's objections to its current name.
But conservative opposition leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis called it "deeply problematic", because the majority of Greeks were against it and Tsipras lacked the political legitimacy to sign it.