Month: July 2014

At least 24 people were killed in a stampede at a beachside concert celebrating the end of Ramadan in Guinea’s capital, news agency AFP said, with Guinea’s Presidency declaring a week of mourning after what it described as a “tragic drama”. A statement from the Presidency said the incident occurred at a beach in the Ratoma neighbourhood of the capital, Conakry. The stampede, which occurred during celebrations to mark the end of the holy fasting month of Ramadan in mainly Muslim Guinea, comes at a time when health workers are already stretched by an outbreak of Ebola.

By Adam Jourdan and Clare Baldwin SHANGHAI/HONG KONG (Reuters) – When inspectors visited Shanghai Husi Food Co Ltd earlier this summer, the production line at the plant now at the centre of an international food scandal appeared in good order, with fresh meat being handled by properly-attired workers and supervisors keeping a watchful eye over the process. On July 20, following an undercover local TV report that alleged workers used expired meat and doctored food production dates, regulators closed the factory, which is part of OSI Group LLC, a U.S. food supplier. Police have detained five people including Shanghai Husi's head and quality manager. The scandal – which has hit mainly big foreign fast-food brands including McDonald's Corp and Yum Brands Inc, which owns the KFC and Pizza Hut chains – underlines the challenges facing inspectors in China's fast-growing and sprawling food industry.

Australian budget airline Jetstar apologized on Wednesday after a crew member told passengers on a flight from the Gold Coast tourist strip, including some returning from a popular music festival, to flush away “anything you shouldn’t have”. The warning from the flight attendant that sniffer dogs and quarantine officers were on standby in Sydney prompted a rush to the plane’s toilets, News Ltd reported. Jetstar, owned by Qantas Airways Ltd, said it discussed the matter with the crew member involved, who made the announcement over the plane’s PA system. The airline said the flight attendant had taken a routine announcement about Australia’s strict quarantine regulations, which prevent some plant and fruit materials being transported between states, too far.

The teenager sits quietly in a Mumbai rehab clinic, a victim of India's emerging fad for the drug crystal meth, which experts say is spurred by loopholes in the country's giant chemical industry. While meth has long been a scourge across east and southeast Asia, staff at the rehab centre in Mumbai's Masina Hospital say it only surfaced as a concern in the city in the past 18 to 24 months. Of late we had a small (addicted) boy aged 14 come in and he opened our eyes," said Ali Gabhrani, director of the centre. India is home to one of the world's biggest chemical industries and is a major source of key meth ingredients ephedrine and pseudoephedrine, which are both legally used in medication such as decongestants.