Oct. 26, 2009 (Xinhua News Agency) -- Xinhua Asia-Pacific news summary at 1000 GMT, Oct. 26
SEOUL -- Hwang Woo-suk, a disgraced stem cell researcher in South Korea, was found guilty by the Seoul Central District Court on Monday.
The 56-year-old scientist was convicted of embezzlement of state and civilian donations to his research team, but found no guilty of fraud. Hwang, who was once honored as South Korea's "top scientist", has been found fabricated in his two papers published in U.S.-based journal of Science in 2004 and 2005. (SKorea- Scientsit)
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WELLINGTON -- The Marshall Islands parliament on Monday elected the speaker, Jurelang Zedkaia, as the Pacific island country's fifth president.
The vote for Zedkaia was 17-15, giving him the bare one-vote minimum needed to win the presidency in the 33-seat parliament, Radio New Zealand International reported. (NZ-Marshall-President)
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MANILA -- Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. said Monday he is resigning from his post in two or three weeks to concentrate on his presidential bid.
The administration party has fielded Teodoro as its standard bearer in next year's presidential elections. (Philipppines- President-Election)
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TOKYO -- Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama of the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) Monday opened the nation's parliament, the Diet, for the first time since his party swept the Aug. 30 election, calling for politicians to listen to the electorate and for politics to change.
Delivering his speech to rapturous applause from his party, many of whom were elected for the first time in August, Hatoyama said the party should "create a politics of fraternity" and focus more on social welfare spending, while eliminating such practices as "amakudari," which sees senior bureaucrats take jobs in semi- public companies after retiring from their government jobs. (Japan- Diet)
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KABUL -- Another helicopter of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) crashed in west Afghanistan Monday leaving 10 dead and injuring 26 others, a press release of the military alliance said.
"Today an International Security Joint Force helicopter went down due to unconfirmed reasons in western Afghanistan," the press release added. (Afghanistan-Chopper-Crash)
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SEOUL -- South Korea's finance minister on Monday predicted the Korean economy may post positive annual growth this year based on the upbeat economic data released by the central bank.
"The third-quarter growth is a 'surprise'," Finance Minister Yoon Jeung-hyun told a forum held in central Seoul, referring to the Bank of Korea (BOK)'s earlier report that the country's gross domestic product (GDP) expanded 2.9 percent during the third quarter from three months earlier. (SKorea-Growth)
