Verbatim

‘I express my sympathy toward the comfort women and apologize for the situation they found themselves in.’
SHINZO ABE, Japanese Prime Minister, referring to wartime sex slaves, in his most vocal apology since he came under fire in early March for saying there was no evidence that the Japanese military coerced women in occupied nations into sexual services during World War II

‘The day I’m able to explain to you North Korean thinking is probably the day I’ve been in this process too long.’
CHRISTOPHER HILL, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State, after North Korea’s delegation walked out of six-party talks aimed at ending Pyongyang’s nuclear program last week in Beijing

‘I don’t want that to be my legacy.’
ELIZABETH EDWARDS, wife of Democratic U.S. presidential hopeful John Edwards, who will continue to pursue the presidency despite the return of his wife’s cancer, saying she doesn’t want to deny him the opportunity to be President

‘It suddenly dawned on me that most people running from the law don’t eat out, they order pizza.’
CYNTHIA BROWN, of the Butler County Child Enforcement Agency in Ohio, on her inspiration for placing wanted posters of child-support scofflaws on local pizza boxes in an effort to turn up the heat on deadbeat dads and moms

‘One must unfortunately note that Europe seems to be going down a road which could lead it to take its leave from history.’
POPE BENEDICT XVI, warning that Europe appears to be losing faith in its own future, calling some Europeans’ desire to have fewer children “dangerous individualism”

‘You and your smarmy pundits—and the smarmy pundits you have in your pocket—can take your war and shove it.’
SEAN PENN, actor, about President George W. Bush, at a March 24 town-hall meeting in Oakland, California

‘I hope we manage to get [the Iranians] to realize they have to release them. If not, then this will move into a different phase.’
TONY BLAIR, British Prime Minister, on the seizure by Iran of 15 Royal Navy personnel whom the Iranian government claims were trespassing in Iranian waters

‘I cannot undertake this mission alone. This is a partnership, a partnership project I have with the people of Hong Kong.’
DONALD TSANG, following his March 25 re-election as Hong Kong’s Chief Executive. The election—in which only a committee of 795 business and community leaders could vote—has been criticized for denying universal suffrage to Hong Kong’s citizens

Numbers
RETIREMENT
430 million Projected number of people in China who will be past retirement age by 2050—roughly a third of the country’s population
$1.5 trillion Pension money already owed to millions of Chinese workers laid off by the state in the last decade

HEALTH
200 Weight, in kilograms, that new stretchers installed in Australian ambulances are capable of carrying, to accommodate the growing number of obese passengers
67% Proportion of Australian men who are overweight

AIR TRAVEL
$16 billion Estimated savings, including cheaper ticket prices for international airline passengers, that an “open skies” aviation deal aimed at liberalizing transatlantic travel could deliver over the next five years
3.5 million Estimated tons of additional CO2 emissions the “open skies” deal would create annually. Weeks before agreeing to the airline deal, European leaders had pledged to cut overall greenhouse-gas emissions by 20% by 2020

CONNECTIVITY
31 million Estimated number of U.S. households that do not have Internet access and do not intend to sign up for Internet service in the next 12 months. 44% of these respondents say they don’t feel they have any need for the Internet
54% Percentage of U.S. Web users who say the Internet played a major role as they helped another person cope with a major illness