China Mobile Communications Corp., owner of the world’s biggest phone company by subscribers, settled a lawsuit filed by a customer alleging the carrier abused its market position to charge users fees.

Zhou Ze, a lawyer with the Beijing Wentian Law Firm who sued China Mobile under the nation’s new anti-monopoly law, said today the company agreed to pay him 1,000 yuan ($146). He had originally asked for 1,200 yuan for the two years worth of 50 yuan monthly fees he was charged.

China Mobile’s lawyer, Xue Junfu, of the Beijing Jinde Law Firm said the payment was acknowledging the company’s gratitude for Zhou’s suggestions, not a reimbursement. The settlement agreement and Zhou’s withdrawal of his lawsuit was announced by Beijing’s No. 2 Intermediate People’s Court Oct. 23.

Rainie Lei, Hong Kong-based spokeswoman for China Mobile Ltd., the company’s mobile-phone unit, declined to comment on the case.

China Mobile, which had 508.4 million subscribers at the end of September, cut call fees and raised handset subsidies to attract 15.24 million users in the third quarter as it expands in lower-income rural areas to fend off mounting competition from China Telecom Corp. and China Unicom (Hong Kong) Ltd.

In a separate case on Oct. 23, Shanghai’s No. 1 Intermediate People’s Court dismissed an abuse of dominance case filed by Beijing Sursen Electronic Technology Co. Ltd. against Shanda Interactive Entertainment Ltd. and Shanghai Xuanting Entertainment Information Technology Ltd., according to London-based law firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP.

The years-long scandal of Hwang Woo-suk, a former Seoul National University professor charged with fraudulent stem cell research, reached the end of its first chapter yesterday as the court handed down a suspended sentence of two years.

"Though Hwang fabricated the DNA photographs in his 2004 paper and the stem cell charts in his 2005 paper, he cannot be seen as having thus defrauded his sponsors or the public," said the ruling judge of the Seoul Central Court yesterday. The scientist received 2 billion won ($1.7 million) in research funds from corporations by displaying his seemingly successful research papers.

"The money was voluntarily donated by the corporations, regardless of the contents of Hwang's papers," ruled the court.

The prosecution and the court, however, decided that the scientific authenticity of Hwang's papers was to be judged by scientific circles and not by the court.

The scientist was also declared guilty of embezzling part of the money for personal use and illegal egg cell-trading by using borrowed name accounts, said the court.

More than 6,000 people crowded outside a Tokyo courthouse Monday as Japanese actress Noriko Sakai pleaded guilty to drug use and prosecutors sought a prison sentence in a trial that has caused a media frenzy.

The 38-year-old Sakai was among the first Japanese actresses to gain popularity in Asia, and her arrest in August threatened to shatter her wholesome image.

The scandal has dominated headlines for months in Japan, and authorities have said they will crack down on drug use in the entertainment industry.

Prosecutors accused Sakai of inhaling amphetamines in July on the southern island of Amami Oshima, where she went with her husband and their son to view a lunar eclipse. Investigators also found a tiny amount of the drug in her Tokyo condominium. Sakai was arrested after turning herself in, following a weeklong disappearance.

A Malibu man has pleaded guilty to failing to report more than $1 million he transferred to a Swiss bank account.

John McCarthy formally pleaded guilty on Tuesday to one count of failing to file a Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts report. He faces up to five years in prison and fines totaling $250,000 when he is sentenced on Jan. 28.

McCarthy was the first person to be named publicly after the Swiss and U.S. governments reached a deal in August to settle American demands for the identities of suspected tax dodgers. The Internal Revenue Service is seeking more than 52,000 names from UBS AG, but both governments wouldn't say how many names will be revealed.

Prosecutors say McCarthy funneled the money to a UBS account with the help of a Swiss lawyer and bank officials.

Kuwait's highest court granted women the right to obtain a passport without their husband's approval, the case's lawyer said Wednesday, in the latest stride for women's rights in this small oil-rich emirate.

Unlike with highly conservative neighbors like Saudi Arabia, women in Kuwait can vote, serve in parliament and drive — and now can obtain their own passports.

In many countries in the region, women cannot travel or obtain a passport without the consent of their male guardian.

Attorney Adel Qurban, whose case the court was ruling on, said the landmark decision "freed" Kuwaiti women from the 1962 law requiring their husband's signature to obtain a passport.

His client, Fatima al-Baghli, is one of thousands of women who have been petitioning courts for this right.

The court found the article in the decades-old law "unconstitutional" because it goes against the principal of equal rights for men and women.

A former British spy is asking Britain's Supreme Court to overturn a decision by domestic intelligence agency MI5 to block him from publishing a book about his career.

Lawyers for the former MI5 officer, who is not named in court documents, told a hearing Monday that he is seeking a judicial review of the decision.

Britain's government says publishing the book could threaten national security.

In a famous case in 1998, Britain's government lost a three-year campaign to ban publication of "Spycatcher," a memoir by ex-MI5 officer Peter Wright.

Former MI5 chief Stella Rimmington published an autobiography in 2001, after the government censored some sections and said it regretted and disapproved of her decision to write the book.

A top suspect accused of forming secret death squads and orchestrating the killings of thousands during Rwanda's 1994 genocide pleaded not guilty on Wednesday to war crimes charges.

Idelphonse Nizeyimana, Rwanda's former deputy intelligence chief, entered his plea at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda after being captured in Uganda earlier this month.

"I am not guilty," Nizeyimana, 46, said each time the four counts of war crimes charges was read out to him. A trial date will be set later.

Nizeyimana is accused of ordering the killing of children, hospital patients, priests and even an elderly and revered African queen.

More than 500,000 members of the Tutsi ethnic minority and moderates from the Hutu majority were slaughtered during the 100-day Rwandan genocide in 1994.

Until his capture, Nizeyimana had been on the run for 15 years with a bounty on his head. He was believed to have hidden in the jungles of eastern Congo, where he belonged to a Rwandan Hutu militia called the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda that continues to commit atrocities.