CHINESE ‘CANNIBAL’ KILLER EXECUTED
BEIJING: A Chinese serial killer said to have chopped up his victims and sold the flesh at a market was executed on Thursday, state media reported, after a court found him guilty of murdering 11 people.

News reports from China and Hong Kong said Zhang Yongming, 57, sold the remains to unsuspecting consumers near his home village in southwest China. The killer, who was previously jailed for murder and released in 1997, “cut his victims into pieces to cover his tracks” and was sentenced to death by a court in the southwestern city of Kunming in July. Hong Kong newspaper The Standard had said police discovered human eyeballs preserved inside wine bottles and pieces of what appeared to be human flesh hanging up to dry when they entered Zhang’s home. Police feared that Zhang had fed human flesh to his three dogs while selling other parts on the market, calling it “ostrich meat”, according to The Standard. Cannibalism is a particularly sensitive subject in China. It was practiced as a survival tactic during periods of mass starvation, including in the wake of the Great Leap Forward, a failed industrialization drive launched in the late 1950s.

12 KILLER WHALES TRAPPED IN CANADA ICE IN DANGER
MONTREAL: Twelve killer whales could be in imminent danger after getting trapped by ice in the Hudson Bay off the shore of northern Quebec, the Canadian broadcaster reported. Video posted on the CBC website showed the giant sea mammals taking turns to breathe by popping up through a small patch of open water amid fields of white ice. The federal government is sending a team of experts Thursday to investigate whether and how the whales can be saved. AFP