MUMBAI, India

Amir Ajmal Kasab, allegedly the only survivor among the terrorists who struck Mumbai in November, should receive a death sentence, police said. Maharashtra Home Minster Jayant Patil called the charges against Kasab “the rarest of rare cases,” the Press Trust of India reported. At least 173 people were killed in the attacks.

SINGAPORE

A Singapore court has sentenced a serial molester who preyed on children and teenagers in lifts to nine years in jail, media reports said. Ong Wee Siong, 27, who admitted to six charges, will also be caned 18 times, the online edition of Straits Times newspaper said. The married man followed his victims, girls aged between 8 and 17, into the lifts and then molested them, it said.

TOKYO, Japan

The U.S. Embassy in Japan has advised Americans to avoid bars and clubs in central Tokyo’s Roppongi nightlife area, saying on its website that there had been a sharp rise in cases of Americans being served spiked drinks. “Typically, the victim unknowingly drinks a beverage that has been secretly mixed with a drug that renders the victim unconscious for several hours, during which time large sums of money are charged to the victim’s credit card or the card is stolen outright,” the Embassy said.

BEIJING, China

The 10-year-old daughter of a Chinese man who killed his wife with a hammer has appealed to the court to commute his death sentence. Wang Junbao, a village doctor from central Henan province, killed his 31-year-old wife, Feng Li, in March 2007. He was sentenced to death in December 2007. His daughter, Jin Jin, wrote to the Supreme People’s Court suggesting the death sentence be commuted. “I have lost my mother and I cannot afford to lose my father,” she was quoted as saying.

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia

A reticulated python at the Cave of Reptiles at Batu Caves outside the Malaysian capital laid more than 160 eggs over two days. This is believed to be the first time such a large number of eggs has been laid by a python in captivity, said Arun Raveendran, who owns the snake. The 25-year-old snake weighs about 115kg. “Normally reticulated pythons lay 30 to 40 eggs with a maximum of up to 100 eggs,” he said.

BANGKOK, Thailand

Thailand tightened up border trade to stop smugglers bringing trying to take advantage of the subsidized prices paid by the government to help local farmers, officials said. Tonnes of rice, corn and tapioca have been intercepted coming from neighbouring countries, as profiteers sought to pass their goods off as Thai farm products to benefit from intervention prices, traders said. In January the government set up or renewed several farm intervention programs, trying to prop up commodity prices by buying grain at above-market prices.

NEW DELHI, India

An 18th-century carpet commissioned by an Indian maharajah has become the world’s most expensive rug after selling at auction in Qatar for $5.8 million. Sotheby’s says the price fetched by the famed Pearl Carpet of Baroda broke a record of $5.4 million set last year for a silk Isfahan carpet, The Peninsula, Qatar’s English-language daily, reported. The rug was created using an estimated 2 million natural seed pearls.

TAIPEI, Taiwan

Taiwan’s economic woes are causing an increasing number of the island’s residents to search for work in China, a job placement agency said. According to the 104 Job Bank, an average of 22,000 Taiwan job seekers a day are contacting the placement agency, asking for jobs in China, up 20 per cent from February and up 30 per cent year-on-year. In March the company offered 5,300 jobs in China so far, one job for every four job seekers wishing to work in China.

TOKYO, Japan

Japanese authorities declared the cherry blossom season open in Tokyo last weekend, with the blooming date getting earlier due to what some experts say is the effect of global warming. Millions of Japanese wine and dine each year at parties under the cherry trees. A meteorological agency official confirmed more than 10 buds on a designated Somei-Yoshino cherry tree at Yasukuni shrine came into bloom.

Vietnamese officials have attacked a U.S. Supreme Court decision not to hear an appeal of a lawsuit against the American manufacturers of the toxic defoliant Agent Orange that was thrown out by lower courts. Vietnam’s Miniastry of Foreign Affairs spokesman, Le Dung, said earlier “the Vietnamese people are completely disgusted’’ with the U.S. court decision. Large numbers of Vietnamese were exposed to the defoliant when U.S. forces sprayed it on jungles during the Vietnam war.