$163 million: Man confesses to historic arson
Police said today a 69-year-old man upset over a land dispute has admitted setting the fire in Seoul that destroyed the 14th-century gateway considered South Korea’s top cultural treasure.
The suspect in the arson at the Namdaemun gate, identified only by his family name, Chae, was arrested late Monday on Ganghwa Island, west of Seoul.
The suspect “has confessed his crime,” said Kim Young-soo, head of a police station handling the case in Seoul.
The fire broke out Sunday night and burned down the wooden structure at the top of the Namdaemun gate, which once formed part of a wall that encircled the South Korean capital. The structure collapsed as hundreds of firefighters attempted to get the blaze under control, officials said. The gate’s large stone base remained intact.
Kim said the man had been charged in 2006 with setting fire to the Changgyeong Palace in Seoul, which caused $4,230 in damage.
CAMOPI, French Guiana
French troops will fight gold diggers
France will send 1,000 troops to rid French Guiana of illegal gold diggers, the president announced Monday, saying they were endangering both the environment and the food chain in the South American territory.
President Nicolas Sarkozy, visiting France’s largest overseas territory, promised a “fight without mercy.”
Troops from mainland France and the Antilles will begin the “exceptional operation” next week and will stay as long as necessary, Sarkozy said.
Unauthorized panning, in which toxic mercury is used, endangers the environment and risks contaminating the food chain through fish.
“We must not be content with destroying the illegal sites, which start up a few weeks later. We have to durably destroy the networks feeding the sites and attack the commanders and those laundering the product of this illegal activity,” Sarkozy said.
JERUSALEM
Town sues Google over map comment
An Israeli town is suing Internet giant Google for slander over a posting by a user of its worldwide mapping service that claims the town was built on the ruins of an Arab village, an official said Monday.
Google Earth user Thameen Darby inserted a note on the map saying Kiryat Yam, a town of 40,000 on the Mediterranean coast just north of Haifa, was built on the location of the Arab village Ghawarina. Darby has inserted at least 10 such notes over Google’s map of Israel.
“This obviously cannot be true, because Kiryat Yam was founded in 1945” before the war, said town official Naty Keyzilberman, who filed a slander complaint against Google with Israel’s police. Officials from Kiryat Yam deny Arabs were displaced when the town was formed.
A Google spokesman said Google Earth depends on user-generated content that reflects what people contribute, not what Google believes is accurate. He insisted the altered map is not illegal and said Google’s policy is not to remove such postings.