Top News Stories –
Hatton Garden heist: £20,000 reward offered by police –
A £20,000 reward has been offered for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the gang responsible for the Hatton Garden heist. On BBC One’s Crimewatch, Det Supt Craig Turner, head of the Flying Squad, appealed for witnesses to the burglary, which took place over Easter. New CCTV images of the thieves entering and leaving Hatton Garden Safe Deposit Ltd have been released. The contents of 56 safe deposit boxes were taken in the raid. Items were removed from the premises in wheelie bins and bags during the raid in Central London. No arrests have yet been made. [BBC]
Hatton Garden road sign
Student continues Sahara marathon on broken leg but still beats Sir Ranulph Fiennes –
A student broke his leg while competing in the ‘toughest race on earth’ – but still kept going for another 100 miles to overtake the explorer Ranulph Fiennes. James Tuffnell, 20, stumbled down a sand dune on the fourth day of the six-day Marathon Des Sables, a 155 mile ‘ultramarathon’ across the Sahara desert, shattering his ankle and fracturing his tibia. Despite his injuries he carried all his own supplies including food, water and sleeping materials for the length of the race in 50 degree heat. [Daily Telegraph]
James Tuffnell [@JamesTuffnell – Twitter]
Japan: Low-level radiation in drone found on PM’s roof –
A drone carrying a tiny amount of radioactive material has been found on the roof of the Japanese prime minister’s office in Tokyo. The four-propeller device was found on top of the building on Wednesday morning [22 April], and was carrying a container of liquid which was marked with a radiation warning symbol, the public broadcaster NHK reports. The 50cm (20in) wide drone was also equipped with a small camera. Police say “minute” levels of radiation were detected on the drone, which they think is likely to be radioactive caesium, but that the amount is too low to be harmful to human health. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe wasn’t in the building at the time, as he’s currently in Indonesia. [BBC] In January 2015 the prime minister called the footage of Islamic State hostage Kenji Goto apparently holding a photograph showing the body of fellow captive Haruna Yukawa “outrageous and unacceptable”.
Japanese prime minister Shinzō Abe
Video of the Day –
6 Craziest Extinctions ever – from ASAP Science –
List of the day –
30 Funniest Opening Lines in Books 1-10 (From Shortlist.com)
| Title | Author | Opening Line | |
| 1 | Breaking Up | Bill Manville | “I don’t know how other men feel about their wives walking out on them, but I helped mine pack.” |
| 2 | Thank You For Smoking | Christopher Buckley | “Nick Naylor had been called many things since becoming the chief spokesman for the Academy of Tobacco Studies, but until now no one had actually compared him to Satan.” |
| 3 | The Restaurant At The End Of The Universe | Douglas Adams | “In the beginning, the universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.” |
| 4 | I, Partridge:We Need To Talk About Alan | Alan Partridge | “When I was 8 years old, I suffered a nosebleed so profuse and generous I bolted from the schoolyard and sought solace in the first class countryside of Norfolk.” |
| 5 | The Lost Continent | Bill Bryson | “I come from Des Moines. Somebody had to.” |
| 6 | The Crow Road | Iain Banks | “It was the day my grandmother exploded.” |
| 7 | Pride & Predudice & Zombies | Seth Grahame-Smith | “It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains.” |
| 8 | Wake in Fright | Kenneth Cook | “He sat at his desk, wearily watching the children file out of the room, reflecting that, this term at least, it was reasonable to assume that none of the girls was pregnant.” |
| 9 | Clown Girl | Monica Drake | ”Balloon Tying For Christ was the cheapest balloon manual I could find.” |
| 10 | Wild Wood | Colin Meloy | “How five crows managed to lift a twenty-pound baby boy into the air was beyond Prue, but that was certainly the least of her worries.” |
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Other News Stories –
- Armed conflicts and attacks
- The Prime Minister of France Manuel Valls claims that five terrorist attacks have been “foiled” in France in recent months. (France 24)
- War in Afghanistan (2015–present)
- The United States advises that a counterterrorism operation on the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan has killed American and Italian al-Qaeda hostages Warren Weinstein and Giovanni Lo Porto. (AP via ABC News)
- Two other American citizens working with al-Qaeda, Adam Yahiye Gadahn and Ahmed Farouq, are also killed in special operations in the same area. (CNBC)
- Business and economy
- Bloomberg News reports that Comcast will walk away from its $45 billion takeover for Time Warner Cable. (Bloomberg)
- The NASDAQ Stock Market sets a new record high for the first time since the dot com bubble collapsed in 2000. (Wall Street Journal)
- Law and crime
- Libor scandal
- Deutsche Bank pays $2.5 billion to settle an investigation by the United States and the United Kingdom related to manipulation of the Libor or London Interbank Offered Rate. It will also plead guilty in a US court case. (Wall Street Journal)
- Petraeus scandal
- Former United States Army general and Director of the Central Intelligence Agency David Petraeus pleads guilty of sharing classified information with his biographer and lover. He is given two years probation and a $100,000 fine. (The Guardian)
- Politics and elections
- Djoomart Otorbaev resigns as the Prime Minister of Kyrgyzstan. (World Bulletin)
- The United States Senate confirms Loretta Lynch as the Attorney General of the United States. Lynch will be the first African-American woman to hold the position. (New York Times)
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