Four hospitalised after ham slice fight
Four people were on Saturday hospitalised in Italy after a dispute over the thickness of a supermarket’s ham slices turned violent, the Ansa news agency said in a report.
The row broke out when a 50-year-old woman shopping in the Tuscany town of Livorno in central Italy protested that the ham slices being cut by a counter assistant were too thick.
A scuffle unfolded involving the shop assistant’s father as well as the woman’s husband and two sons.
Police were called and three ambulances were also sent to the scene.
The shop assistant, the disgruntled ham shopper and her husband all suffered bruises and were treated in hospital.
The shopkeeper’s father was also hospitalised after feeling ill. (AFP)
Capitalist styles
Cosmetic surgery, skinny jeans and hoop earrings are in fashion in North Korea as the pursuit of female beauty remains unbound by the communist state’s chronic food shortages.
Daily NK, a North Korea-specific internet newspaper, quoted sources in the North saying that although facelifts are illegal state surgeons are performing cosmetic surgeries in secret in return for bribes. Doctors receive 2,000-3,000 North Korean won ($14-21) for an upper eyelid surgery which can remove excess fatty deposits that appear as puffiness, it said.
“Upper eyelid surgeries and cosmetic tattoos on eyebrows, lips and the corners of eyes are widespread in North Korea,” a source from Pyongyang was quoted as saying.
“Many women want plastic surgeries regardless of deprivation and food shortages,” the source added. (AFP)
Taliban funds
A Florida imam and two of his sons have been arrested accused of providing £31,000 to the Pakistani Taliban, designated by the US State Department as a terrorist organisation.
Hafiz Muhammed Sher Ali Khan, 76, was arrested after morning services at the Miami Mosque, also known as the Flagler Mosque, where he is an imam. One of his sons, Izhar Khan, 24, an imam at the Jamaat Al-Mu’mineen Mosque in nearby Margate, Florida, was arrested after morning services there.
Another son, Irfan Khan, 37, was detained at his hotel room in Los Angeles, California, around the same time. Also named in the indictment are three others at large in Pakistan – Hafiz Khan’s daughter, grandson and an unrelated man, all three of whom are charged with handling the distribution of funds. (PA)
Graham on the mend
Doctors say the Rev Billy Graham is responding well to antibiotics as he recovers from pneumonia, but he is still too weak to leave a North Carolina hospital.
Merrell Gregory with Mission Hospital in Asheville said the 92-year-old evangelist remained in a fair condition and would spend another night in hospital.
Rev Graham was admitted to the hospital on Wednesday after suffering from sweating, coughing and breathing difficulty. (PA)
Donkey work
It took 37 days and a group of determined animal lovers, but a donkey from Iraq is now a US resident.
Smoke, who became a friend and mascot to a group of US Marines living in Iraq’s Anbar province nearly three years ago, arrived in New York this week aboard a cargo jet from Turkey.
After being quarantined for two days, he was released and began a road trip to Omaha, Nebraska, where he is destined to become a therapy animal. (PA)
Wee scare
A dog that wasn’t quite house trained has been blamed for a bomb scare at a New York court.
The trouble began when 19-year-old Melvin Ruffin arrived at a court complex in Central Islip following a long bus ride from his home in Bellport.
During the trip, another passenger’s Chihuahua urinated on his backpack, so he stashed it in some bushes while he went inside to answer a disorderly conduct charge. But a retired police officer saw the bag, alerted security and the bomb squad was called in. (AP)