Cuban cigar sales rise

By the numbers

Cuban cigar sales rose 7 percent to $402 million in 2007, the government-run tobacco company Habanos said Wednesday. Cuban cigars make up 80 percent of the world cigar market, not counting the United States, which has had a trade embargo banning Cuban products since 1962. Spain, France, Germany, Switzerland and Cuba's domestic market remained top consumers of Cuban cigars last year, Habanos Vice President Manuel Garcia said. The company does not reveal how many individual cigars it sells a year, but the total is believed to be between 150 million and 160 million. Garcia spoke at the 10th annual Habanos Festival in Havana.

Honors

Ford statue OK'd

A statue of former President Ford is scheduled to be placed in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda. Rep. Vernon Ehlers, R-Mich., said Thursday that a plan for the statue had been approved by the Joint Committee on the Library, which oversees the placement of the statues. The Gerald R. Ford Foundation will pay for the statue's design, creation and transport. It's unclear when the statue will be unveiled. Ford died in late 2006.

People

Pacemaker planned

Nobel laureate and former Polish President Lech Walesa, 64, was treated for a clogged coronary artery and will have a heart pacemaker implanted today, doctors said. He was resting Thursday, a day after doctors at the Methodist DeBakey Heart and Vascular Center in Houston implanted a stent into the artery, a hospital spokeswoman said. Doctors said they planned to place the pacemaker today.

Boy George in court

Former Culture Club singer Boy George, 46, pleaded not guilty Thursday in London to the charge of false imprisonment. Audun Carlsen, 28, claims Boy George handcuffed him to a wall after he went to the singer's apartment as a photo model last April. George, real name George O'Dowd, is due to stand trial in November.

Critters

No more pashminas?

At least 600 rare Himalayan goats — famed for their pashmina wool, also known as cashmere — have died and thousands face starvation after their desert habitat was blanketed with snow during the region's worst snowfall in three decades, authorities said Thursday. More than 100,000 of the goats have faced starvation as winter stocks of fodder ran out after snow covered pastures in the remote Ladakh region near the border with China last month.

Oops

Not dead yet

Uriel Little's name is among those on the granite monument in St. Bernard Parish in Louisiana that lists people killed by Hurricane Katrina. The only problem, if that's the term: Little is alive. "Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated," Little, 76, said recently, paraphrasing a famous Mark Twain quote. People have complained about misspelled names since the monument was put up speedily in time for Katrina's anniversary in 2006, but Little is the first case of mistaken identity among the 132 names of people who died in the storm. Little said he's not worried about the error. "They can leave my name on there if they want," he said, adding, "I know that I'm still alive, and that's what counts."

Passages

Mike Smith, 64, the lead singer of the Dave Clark Five, died of pneumonia Thursday outside London, two weeks before the British Invasion band was to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in the United States.

Herschel "Speedy" Haworth Jr., 85, who played lead guitar on the 1950s country-music show "Ozark Jubilee" and had hits with the original Porter Wagoner Trio, died Tuesday in his Springfield, Mo., home. The singer and guitarist had been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease and broke his hip last year.

Today in History

1960: The first Playboy Club, featuring waitresses clad in "bunny" outfits, opened in Chicago.

1968: President Lyndon B. Johnson's National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders (also known as the Kerner Commission) warned that racism was causing America to move "toward two societies, one black, one white — separate and unequal."

1968: The discovery of the first pulsar, a star which emits regular radio waves, was announced by Dr. Jocelyn Bell Burnell in Cambridge, England.

Today's Birthdays

Actress Michele Morgan, 88. Actor James Mitchell, 88. Actor Alex Rocco, 72. Actor Dennis Farina, 64. Actor Antonio Sabato Jr., 36. Rapper Ja Rule, 32.

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