Asia-Cast

Asia Cast for Thursday 24th January

In this Bulletin

- Japenese gangster admits to killing Mayor
- Thaksin Shinawatra’s wife pleads not guilty and
- Heavy snow in China kills at least 16 people

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In Japan, an alleged gangster has admitted to shooting the mayor of Nagasaki last April.

Tetsuya Shiroo, 60, shot Itcho Ito near an election campaign office in the city on 17 April.

On the first day of his trial, Mr Shiroo told the Nagasaki court: “I apologise to Mayor Itcho Ito and his family from the bottom of my heart.”
The main issue in the trial is expected to be whether or not Mr Shiroo intended to kill Mr Ito.

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Former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan is due to meet Kenya’s President Mwai Kibaki on Thursday to try to end a post-election crisis after persuading the opposition to call off further street protests.

Following talks with Annan, the opposition said late on Wednesday it would halt planned demonstrations against Kibaki’s disputed Dec. 27 poll victory.

Previous protests have ended in rioting and bloody clashes with security forces.

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The wife of removed Thai PM Thaksin Shinawatra has pleaded not guilty to corruption in a Bangkok court.

Pojamarn Shinawatra and her husband both face charges relating to two separate financial cases.

The pair went into exile overseas after the military seized power in 2006, accusing Mr Thaksin of corruption.

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Heavy snow has left more than 16 people dead and brought transport chaos to large areas of central and eastern China, state media said.

Worst hit is Hubei province, where crops have been destroyed and roads blocked by the heaviest snow seen in the area for 16 years.

More than 7.8 million people there have been affected by the weather, a local official told Xinhua news agency.

The snow is delaying people returning home for the Lunar New Year holiday.

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China admits it is facing serious power shortages as severe cold weather continues to cause unusually high demand for electricity.
Thirteen regions have already started to ration power supplies, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

It said coal reserves were down to emergency levels and stockpiles were only high enough to generate power for the whole country for eight days.

China’s economic boom has led to surging demand for electricity.

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Thousand of Shanghai residents have been peacefully protesting against a proposed magnetic levitation train (Maglev) throughout the past three weeks.

Official CCP mouthpiece The Jiefang Daily called the demonstrations “street politics,” and accused them of damaging social harmony in Shanghai.

This is the first time since the Tiananmen Square Massacre in 1989 that the Shanghai authorities have reacted on a protest with an editorial article.

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Today the Holiday Wonders show will be performing in Minneapolis as well as performing for the second time in San Fransisco before continuing across four continents, performing to audiences in over 60 cities.

Once again the Spectacular continues to delighted audiences who express their feelings of delight and astonishment after watching the shows.

The spectaculars depict traditional Chinese values that have been suppressed in China over decades of communist rule and continue to receive rave reviews from audiences of previous shows.

The international community is learning what the real China is all about while the Chinese audiences are reconnecting with China’s traditional culture.

For show information please visit http://holidaywonders.net/index_at.php
“Asia Cast… keeping you across the top headlines from Asia and the World.”