World Briefs

Two Dutch college students hitched a last-minute ride to Washington on the private jet of British entrepreneur Richard Branson in the hope of joining the crowds hailing Barack Obama, a Dutch news agency reported.

Mr Branson was a guest speaker at an Amsterdam congress yesterday, and participants were able to ask questions by sending text messages from their mobile phones, which were shown on a large screen.

"Will you take along two poor students to Obama?" the students' text message read, to which Mr Branson immediately said yes, ANP agency reported.

Japan's Obama town parties for inauguration

Temple bells tolled, fireworks were set off and residents danced the hula in the cold Japanese city of Obama yesterday to celebrate the inauguration of Barack Obama, who became the first black US President.

The party began several hours ahead of the inauguration ceremony in the sleepy fishing town in western Japan, which has turned into the nation's leading cheerleader for Mr Obama.

Over a hundred Obama fans flocked to a local Buddhist temple to celebrate the inauguration in Hawaiian style, as a tribute to Mr Obama's birthplace.

A group called "Obama Girls and Boys", made up of seven local men and 15 women, danced the hula while others joined to sing a song dedicated to Mr Obama and the city of Obama.

"I've been waiting for this day for so long. We are very happy for President Obama - the new world leader," Chikako Shimizu, who heads the Obama Girls", told Reuters.

Learning English from Obama speech textbook

President-elect Barack Obama's speeches are proving a best-seller in Japan - as an aid to learning English.

An English-language textbook, The Speeches of Barack Obama, has sold more than 400,000 copies in two months, a big hit in a country where few hit novels sell more than a million copies a year.

Japanese have a fervour for learning English and many bookstores have a corner dedicated to dozens of journals in the language, many of them now featuring the new US leader's face.

"Speeches by presidents and presidential candidates are excellent as listening tools to learn English, because their contents are good and their words are easy to catch," said Yuzo Yamamoto of Asahi Press, which produced the best-selling text book.

"Obama's is especially so. His speeches are so moving, and he also uses words such as 'yes, we can,' 'change' and 'hope' that even Japanese people can memorise," he said.

Pilot jailed after trying to fake death

A pilot accused of attempting to avoid financial fraud charges by faking his death has been transferred from a hospital bed to a jail cell in northern Florida, authorities said yesterday.

Marcus Schrenker, 38, parachuted out of his plane over Alabama and let it crash in Florida a week ago, investigators said. He was arrested a day later at a campsite and taken to a hospital with wounds to his wrists that apparently resulted from a suicide attempt.

Police said Mr Schrenker was transferred on Sunday to the Escambia County Jail in Pensacola from a hospital in Florida's capital, Tallahassee. He faces federal charges of making a false distress call and purposely crashing a plane.

Mr Schrenker was wanted in Indiana on financial fraud charges alleging he misled consumers who invested money in his wealth management companies and misappropriated hundreds of thousands of dollars of their money.

Last Monday, he radioed a distress call from his single-engine Piper, reporting that the plane's cracked windshield had imploded and that he was bleeding profusely.

Authorities dispatched two rescue helicopters, a Coast Guard cutter and two military F-15 fighter jets. When the jets caught up with the plane, the windshield was intact, the door was open and there was no sign of the pilot, investigators said.

Mannequin in army dress found on Gaza beach

A mannequin discovered by Palestinians on a Gaza beach may have been used by Israeli forces as a decoy to draw fire from gunmen, an Israeli military expert said.

The head-and-torso figure, dressed in an army shirt and rigged with electric wires, was described by some Palestinians as a "robot" that had helped Israeli commandos storm ashore and kill 10 Hamas guerillas during Israel's 22-day Gaza offensive.

But Itay Gil, who trains various Israeli commando units, said the rubber dummy could have been used to dupe Palestinian snipers into opening fire so they could be identified and killed.

"It could be that this dummy was a decoy mounted on an Israeli boat or vehicle, to draw the first volley and deny the enemy the element of surprise," he said. "Anything's possible."

Dogs welcome at homeless shelter

A shelter in the Belgian city of Liege has opened its doors to dogs this winter to persuade their homeless owners to come in from the freezing cold.

The city's social welfare agency has agreed to house about eight homeless people with their pets at a local soccer club when it is freezing outside. Michel Faway, secretary-general of the agency, said the programme started because many homeless people refused to come inside without their dogs no matter how cold it got.

The project has been a success. All eight beds have been filled on the nights when the service was offered.