Mid Day International News

Man had toothpick in stomach for 25 years
India has 153000 millionaires: Report
Egyptian businessman pleads guilty to 'kissing, groping' NY hotel maid
French woman marries her dead fiance!
Outrage over porn pictures found in Malaysian mosque
US woman with 'world''s largest natural breasts' faces daily teasing
Woman faces 'death by beheading' for allegedly killing baby
Blair personal details hacked
Bruce Lee museum shelved in Hong Kong
Wills-Kate cancel trip down under
NY gays run to the Altar

Man had toothpick in stomach for 25 years

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A 65-year-old man in Sweden had been suffering from stomach pain for 25 years. He recently found out there was a toothpick lodged in his stomach all this time.

Ove Sohlberg said the pain began around 25 years ago after surgery for stomach ulcers, Fox News reported.

"I felt like there was something in there and I was in constant pain," he said.

Sohlberg said he had been admitted to hospital more than 100 times since then.

Recently, surgeons removed a six-cm-long wooden toothpick from his abdomen.

Sohlberg, from Lycksele in northern Sweden, said he believed the object was left in his body from the operation a quarter of a decade ago.

"It seems a pity I had to live with it for so many years," he said.

India has 153000 millionaires: Report

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India has moved into 12th spot in the list of countries with most millionaires. India has 153,000 millionaires, a report by Capgemini and Merrill Lynch Wealth Management has revealed

The U.S has the most millionaires at around three million and China ranks fourth with 535,000 millionaires. Japan is in second and Germany is third.

Asia, with 3.3 million has the highest number of high net-worth millionaires followed by Europe's 3.1 million.

Africa showed the biggest increase in the number of millionaires by region with growth of 11.1 percent, while India entered the top 12 country rankings for the first time, with 153,000. The number of millionaires in China grew by 12 percent to 534,500.

"While over half of the global high-net-worth individuals still reside in the top three countries, the concentration is fragmenting," Herbert Hensle, vice-president and head of Capgemini''s Swiss office was quoted as saying by The China Daily.

Growth in the number of global millionaires slowed from 17 percent in 2009, when wealth rebounded following the credit crisis that sent stock indices to their worst annual losses since the Great Depression and slashed the value of real estate holdings, hedge-fund and private-equity investments.

Egyptian businessman pleads guilty to 'kissing, groping' NY hotel maid

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Egyptian businessman Mahmoud Abdel Salam Omar has pleaded guilty to kissing and groping a hotel maid at the Pierre hotel, and faces a possible seven-year prison term besides a five million dollar lawsuit

Omar admitted on Friday that he had smooched the hotel maid on the lips, and groped her breasts inside his 900 dollar-a-night room at The Pierre, the New York Daily News reports.

As part of his plea before Manhattan Criminal Court Judge Rita Mella, Omar paid 250 dollars in fines, had to perform five days of community service, and was ordered to stay out of trouble for a year.

Omar, the former chairman of the Egypt's Bank of Alexandria and the Federation of Egyptian Banks, was also slapped with a five million dollars lawsuit in the Manhattan Federal Court.

She "sustained serious and permanent personal injuries, along with humiliation, shame, indignity, damage to reputation and suffered emotional distress," the suit said.

Lori Cohen, a lawyer for the businessman, however said that the maid brought the allegations with the intention of earning a huge amount.

"Service of a five million dollar lawsuit speaks to her motivation from the beginning - loudly and clearly," Cohen added.

She also said that her client will not make any settlement with the maid, and that he had already finished his community service by serving vegetables at a local soup kitchen.

Omar was arrested on May 30 after the unwelcome encounter inside Room 1027 at the swanky E. 61st St. hotel.

French woman marries her dead fiance!

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A woman in France is so in love with her fiance that two-years after he was killed in a car crash she married him

Karen Jumeaux, 22, was permitted by an obscure law to wed Anthony Maillot, after she proved that they had already planned the ceremony.

They had got engaged after meeting in 2007 and had a baby boy in 2009 " shortly before Maillot died aged 20.

Jumeaux, who wore a white dress for the ceremony witnessed by family and friends, held the wedding in Dizy-le-Gros, eastern France, after president Nicolas Sarkozy granted her request.

"Anthony was my first and only love and we were together for four years," the Sun quoted her as saying.

"We expected to bring up our son together. I never wanted to do it alone, but fate decided otherwise. Now I am his wife and I will always love him," she added.

But a French legal expert said if she ever wanted to re-marry, she would have to get a divorce.

Outrage over porn pictures found in Malaysian mosque

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Chief Imam of the State Mosque Yusuff Ahmad has lodged a police report after pornographic pictures were found among the pages of 11 copies of the Surah Yassin at Georgetown in Malaysia

Ahmad lodged the report at the Kampung Baru police station in Air Itam, the Star reports.

The pornographic pictures were found by a security guard who had wanted to read the books after zohor prayers at around 4.30 pm on the same day.

State deputy police chief Senior Assistant Commissioner Datuk Abdul Rahim Jaafar said they were investigating the case under Section 295 of the Penal Code for defiling a place of worship.

US woman with 'world''s largest natural breasts' faces daily teasing

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Having the world's largest breasts comes with a cost, revealed an 52-year-old American woman who has faced mockery and bullying since childhood because of her extra assets

Annie Hawkins-Turner, who has been endowed with the title by the Guinness Book of World Records, stated her daily plight of listening to cruel taunts because of her chest size.

"When I go out of my house I have to think about what my day is going to be like and who is going to attack me today," the Daily Mail quoted the mother of two as speaking at the UK breakfast show 'This Morning'.

"Every day someone teases me that doesn''t know me. They make fun of me and there''s no reason. I''m human like everybody else," she said.

"I''m just blessed in different ways than other people. It affects my son very badly because people stare," she added.

Turner, who would be a 102ZZZ in regular bra sizing, is unable to perform even daily tasks such as driving without inconvenience.

She also stated that "kids are some of the worst people in the world when it comes to picking on people. I was teased a lot."

Woman faces 'death by beheading' for allegedly killing baby

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A woman in Saudi Arabia is poised to be executed by beheading in front of a crowd of people for allegedly killing a baby in her care

The young maid, Rizana Nafeek, was arrested in May 2005 on charges of murdering a four-month-old baby who was in her care.

Sri Lankan born Nafeek, who alleges she was a teenager at the time of the incident, has vehemently denied all allegations against her, saying that she had desperately tried to save the child, who choked while she was looking after it.

Nafeek's mother Rafeena said that her daughter moved to Saudi Arabia looking for a job, and ended up becoming a domestic worker. She was later asked to take care of the baby, a task which Rafeena thought her daughter was of incapable of handling.

Just weeks into her employment tragedy struck and the infant choked while he was being fed, she added.

Human Rights groups have criticised the Saudi Arabian authorities for misquoting the maid's date of birth while handling her case.

The authorities have her date of birth as 1982, while her birth certificate states that she was born in 1988, making her 17 at the time of the alleged incident, the Daily Mail reports.

"It would be outrageous if Rizana Nafeek were to be executed for this crime. It appears that she was herself a child at the time and there are real concerns about the fairness of her trial," Amnesty International's Middle East Director Malcolm Smart said.

Blair personal details hacked

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Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair's personal details have been stolen by computer hackers.

Details of a file containing Blair's National Insurance number and the addresses of friends, colleagues and relatives began circulating on micro-blogging site Twitter even contact details for relatives of the former Premier and his wife Cherie were also included.

A member of a group of computer hackers known as Team Poison tweeted: "Tony Blair's private info is getting leaked tonight, so is his personal advisors CV and UK MPs & Lords who supported the war in Iraq."

Bruce Lee museum shelved in Hong Kong

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Hong Kong has shelved plans to turn Bruce Lee's old home, which later became a rundown love hotel, into a museum dedicated to the martial arts legend, the government said yesterday.

Fans of the icon have long called for a museum in Lee's hometown and the idea appeared set to become reality after the wealthy owner of Lee's former home entered into talks with city officials two years ago to hash out a museum blueprint.

Chinese tourists pose for a photo in front of a statue of Bruce Lee in Hong Kong yesterday

Long after Lee's death, the property turned into a love hotel that was rented to amorous couples.

"Despite our efforts, we are unable to reach a consensus with the property owner over the scope of the restoration," Hong Kong's Commerce and Economic Development Bureau said in a statement.

Officials did not elaborate, but billionaire philanthropist Yu Panglin had insisted that the property would only be donated for a museum if it was expanded to include a cinema, library and martial arts training centre.

"I'm really in favour of (the museum). It could be great for Hong Kong and great for my father and his legacy."

Wills-Kate cancel trip down under

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Duke and Duchess of Cambridge call off their visit to Australia to avoid accusations of meddling in New Zealand's election

Anyone hoping to see Prince William and his new bride Kate on Aussie shores will have to wait because of the Kiwi election.

Prince William and Kate hand out operational medals to members of the Irish Guards. The ceremony was the couple's last engagement before they go to Canada at the end of the month

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge were due to visit Australia during a trip to the Rugby World Cup in New Zealand in October.

But they have cancelled their plans to avoid accusations of meddling in New Zealand politics and royal officials say you can't visit one country without the other.

With the election set down for November 26, Prime Minister John Key faced criticism that he would exploit the royal visit for political gain.

A royal source said the trip had been canned, meaning Australians would have to wait for their first glimpse of the couple.

"You can't really go to Australia without going to New Zealand so it's all been put on hold," the insider said.

Following the rule
As a rule, the royal family avoids visiting Commonwealth countries during general elections so as not to be seen to be showing favour to one political party.

Key, who leads the conservative National Party, met the couple during the royal wedding and had raved about Kate's desire to make the journey south.

At the time he said, "The first thing Kate said was she wants to visit New Zealand. She's keen to come down and we'll hopefully encourage her to come and visit us sometime very soon, so that was great."

It seemed like a sure thing after Prince William, the vice patron of the Welsh Rugby Union, expressed his desire to visit the country to watch the World Cup, which runs from September 9 to October 23.

Unofficial visit
Key suggested he come on an unofficial "private visit" to get around the election issue. A skeptical Opposition Leader, Phil Goff, accused Key in April of trying to use the visit to boost his popularity.

"The responsibility is really on John Key to respect the constitutional protocol by not using the visit for self-promotion or electioneering, which means he has got to behave very carefully," Goff said.

The royal couple set off for Canada and the US on Thursday.

NY gays run to the Altar

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Moments after state Senate cast a dramatic vote in favour of same-sex marriages, gay couples rush to get hitched

Gay New York couples were whipped into a wedding-planning frenzy yesterday, shopping for engagement rings, ordering cakes and booking event halls in a mad rush to marry their partners just hours after it became legal.

The scramble to the altar came amid a wild weekend of celebration that hits a climax with yesterday's annual Gay Pride Parade, which is expected to draw record crowds for the march down Fifth Avenue from Midtown to Christopher Street.

Revellers celebrate in front of the historic gay bar The Stonewall after the passing of a bill legalising gay marriage in New York

"It's going to be wild," said City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, a powerful gay-rights activist. "I think it's going to be electric and thrilling."

The New York Police Department said it will have a beefed-up presence at the march.

"We have additional resources that will be deployed," said Police Commissioner Ray Kelly. "The parade ends, but the celebration continues, and it continues into Monday morning, quite frankly."

The historic approval of same-sex marriage by the state Legislature also quickly proved a wind fall for the city wedding industry.

Jason Mitchell (30) and his partner, Michael Zahler, (27) booked the popular Angel Orensanz Center on the Lower East Side for a Memorial Day Weekend bash next year.

"We got engaged three weeks ago, and we were anxious to book the venue before the legislation passed because of the crowds," said Mitchell, an event planner at the members-only Soho House. "We had it down as a commitment ceremony, and I can't wait to call and tell them to change it."

Bakeries and event planners were working overtime to keep up with the flood of overjoyed couples.

At City Cakes on West 18th Street, owner Marc Matthias received his first same-sex wedding-cake order during a busy afternoon yesterday.

"We've gotten calls and calls and e-mails flooding in," he said. "People have just been waiting for this occasion."

Event planner Sarah Pease said her phone was ringing off the hook with requests to help engineer the picture-perfect proposal befitting the historic event.

"It's going to open a lot of new doors in the industry," she said. ome couples woke up early to go ring shopping after partying Friday night.

"I already know the ring I want," said grad student Justin Daniels on his way to pick out the bauble with his fianc �, Wally Kramm, a registered nurse. "We want white-gold David Yurman bands."

Of the Tweets

IT PASSED! Marriage equality in New York! Yes! Progress! Thank you everyone who worked so hard on this! A historic night!
Neil Patrick Harris