Portal:Current events/2013 May 3

Current events of May 3, 2013 (2013-05-03) (Friday)

Arts and culture

• The world's largest rubber duck is moved to Hong Kong. (ABC)

Business and economics

• The Stockholm School of Economics, one of Sweden's most prestigious universities, is hit by scandal amidst revelation that Justin Jenk, one of its top officials, had forged CMC documents about his conviction of insider trading in Greece. (Dagens Industri) (Swedish)

Disasters

• 2013 Savar building collapse
  • The death toll from the 2013 Savar building collapse in Bangladesh rises to 519. (The Associated Press)
  • Bangladesh's finance minister, Abul Maal Abdul Muhith, downplays the impact of last week's factory-building collapse on his country's garment industry, saying he didn't think it was "really serious", hours after the 500th body was pulled from the debris. (AP via News24)
  • A top investigator probing the Bangladesh garment factory disaster says that the vibration from four huge generators placed on the roof of the building had caused it to collapse. (AFP via News24), (BBC)
• A U.S. KC-135 tanker aircraft on its way to Afghanistan crashes in northern Kyrgyzstan after a mid-flight explosion. (The Globe and Mail), (BBC)

Law and crime

• Brian Shivers is acquitted of any involvement in the 2009 Massereene Barracks shooting. Mr. Shivers, who has cystic fibrosis, has his life sentence overturned, having been jailed since January 2012 in what his solicitor describes as a miscarriage of justice. (BBC) (RTÉ)

• Chaudhry Zulfiqar Ali, a prosecutor with Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency leading the prosecution of former President Pervez Musharraf over alleged involvement in the assassination of Benazir Bhutto is shot dead on the way to court in Islamabad. (The Guardian)

Politics and elections

• Labour's Emma Lewell-Buck retains the South Shields Parliamentary seat for the party following Thursday's by-election, but with a reduced majority after the UK Independence Party secures almost a quarter of the votes cast. (BBC)
• The UK Independence Party wins 140 seats at the 2013 United Kingdom local elections, achieving 25% of the votes in areas where it fielded candidates. The result is the Eurosceptic party's most significant to date. (BBC)
• Results of the 2013 UK local elections show gains for Labour and UKIP and losses for the Liberal Democrats and the Conservative Party.BBC

Science and technology

• Google now recognizes Palestine as a country, instead of redirecting to the Palestinian territories. (FOX) (BBC)