IN BRIEF (Page 8)

United States

$4.7b awarded in baby powder lawsuit

US pharmaceutical giant Johnson& Johnson was ordered to pay out nearly $4.7 billion on Thursday in damages in a lawsuit representing 22 women and their families who alleged a talcum powder sold by the company contained asbestos and caused them to suffer ovarian cancer. The damages include $550 million in compensation and over $4.1 billion in punitive damages. J&J said it was "deeply disappointed in the verdict". It is the latest twist in a matter that has seen several thousand lawsuits filed against J&J.

Italy

Rare intervention in migrant standoff

President Sergio Mattarella has made a rare intervention in Italian politics to end a dispute within the ruling coalition over a migrant boat, angering right-wing Interior Minister Matteo Salvini. Mattarella contacted Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte on Thursday to express his concern about the plight of 67 migrants rescued at sea and brought to a Sicilian port. Salvini had refused to allow them to disembark. The ship had been brought to the port of Trapani with the approval of the transport minister, but Salvini ordered that no one should leave the boat until alleged violent conduct by some of the migrants had been investigated.

Australia

Canberra opposes commercial whaling

Australia has ruled out supporting Japan's attempt to resume its whaling program. The Japan Fisheries Agency revealed on Thursday that it would propose restructuring the International Whaling Commission in September so as to make it easier to lift its moratorium on commercial whaling. Josh Frydenberg, Australia's minister for energy and the environment, on Friday vowed to oppose any proposals that would pave the way for restarting commercial whaling.

India

Student pushed to death during drill

Indian police have arrested a drill instructor who pushed a university student from the second floor of a building to her death during a bungled training exercise, officials said on Friday. Horrified onlookers watched as the 19-year-old struck a concrete landing after being shoved off a ledge by the instructor. A crowd of students positioned below with a crash net could only watch as the young student cracked her head violently in the awkward fall before tumbling to the ground. The whole incident was captured on video and provoked outrage after the footage went viral on social media.

Japan

Foreign trainees in Fukushima cleanup

Four Japanese companies made foreign trainees who were in the country to learn professional skills take part in decontamination work after the Fukushima nuclear disaster, the government said on Friday. The discovery is likely to revive criticism of the foreign trainee program, which has been accused of placing workers in substandard conditions and jobs that provide few opportunities for learning. A powerful earthquake in March 2011 spawned a huge tsunami that led to meltdowns at the Fukushima nuclear plant, causing the world's worst such accident since Chernobyl in 1986.

AFP - Xinhua - Reuters - AP

(China Daily 07/14/2018 page8)