■Afghanistan
Additional troops considered
The British government will not rule out sending more troops to troubled provinces in Afghanistan where security is still lacking and the Taliban are reappearing. Earlier this week it said it was sending a detachment of about 70 soldiers to Mazar-i-Sharif, in the north, in addition to the 300 it has in the capital, Kabul. Officials said sending further troops to Mazar was possible, but stressed that the number would not be significant. On Wednesday seven Afghan soldiers were killed in a clash with the Taliban, who are said to have lost 40 dead, about 30km north-east of the border town of Spin Boldak.
■ Australia
Labor sets vote for June 16
Australia's main opposition party planned a leadership election on June 16 after internal tensions prompted incumbent Simon Crean to call for a vote. His predecessor Kim Beazley said he would challenge Crean for the party leader post. The Labor Party has struggled to dent the popularity of Prime Minister John Howard, whose conservative coalition government came out solidly in support of his decision this week not to retire as previously expected. Many Labor lawmakers are worried about their chances in the next national election, set for next year. Howard has been prime minister since 1996.
■ Thailand
Students allegedly jabbed
Parents at a primary school in central Thailand have complained to education authorities and police over a teacher who allegedly jabbed 16 of his fifth-grade students with a hypodermic needle as punishment for not doing their homework, a news report said yesterday. The parents at Wat Ban Daen School in Banphot Phisai district of Nakhon Sawan province, 200km north of Bangkok, accused the teacher, Sumonporn Anusornpanya, 58, of threatening the students with further punishment if they told anyone about their ordeal. "I noticed a blood stain on my daughter's school blouse when she returned home on Tuesday," The Nation newspaper quoted a parent as saying.
■ Singapore
Man jailed for `hideous' act
A man who carved his name on his girlfriend's chest with a shard of glass and brutalized her with a fluorescent tube was sentenced to three years and five months in a Singapore jail, plus 12 strokes of the cane, news reports said yesterday. In sentencing 23-year-old Pravin Kumar, district Judge Salima Ishak described his actions as "hideous" and degrading to women. "You left a mark of crime on her," The Straits Times quoted the judge as saying. Kumar had pleaded guilty to two charges of causing hurt with offensive weapons, committed on Sept. 14 on a fifth-level staircase in a car park.
■ Australia
Drug theft tax deductible
If one drug dealer steals from another can the latter claim for the loss against tax? Yes. A court in Australia ruled yesterday that in the drug trade a bad deal is a legitimate expense and so can be offset against income tax. The appeal went against the Australian Tax Office (ATO), which argued unsuccessfully that it would be bad public policy to classify stolen money as tax deductible. The ATO also argued that in accepting that there had been a theft the court would be relying solely on the word of a convicted criminal as there was no evidence that any such thing took place.
■Iraq
`Is `Chemical Ali' alive?
The Iraqi military commander known as "Chemical Ali" for his role in using chemical weapons against the Kurdish minority may still be alive, US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on Thursday. American officials had previously speculated that the Iraqi commander, Ali Hassan al-Majid, had been killed in a bombing raid in Basra in April. A cousin of Saddam Hussein, Majid has been accused of war crimes for unleashing mustard gas against civilians in 1988. Rumsfeld said Thursday that he did not know the status of Chemical Ali, whom American troops had been tracking before the bombing.
■ Russia
Gas blast kills 11
An explosion ripped through an apartment house in the Chechen capital Grozny early yesterday, killing at least 11 people, officials said. The chief regional prosecutor said the blast was probably caused by a natural gas leak. Gas explosions are common in apartment buildings across Russia, causing many fatalities. Chechnya's Deputy Emergencies Minister Akhmed Dzhairkhanov said the bodies of 11 victims were pulled from the rubble -- eight children, two women and one man. The Interfax news agency said several of the dead were members of one family.
■ United States
Theme park shows slums
A new US theme park opening today will offer visitors a first-hand look at the slums that millions of people around the world call home. Visitors will walk through a shantytown similar to those in Africa, Asia or Latin America of huts cobbled together from scrap lumber and sheets of tin and corrugated iron. The "Living in Poverty Area" is situated at the entrance of the new theme park in Americus, Georgia, built by Habitat for Humanity, a non-profit group that builds homes for poor people worldwide. Habitat volunteers, who include former US president Jimmy Carter, travel across the US and to developing countries, where they live with local families while building homes.
■ United States
City pays for shooting
The US city of San Francisco has agreed to pay US$500,000 to the family of a mentally disturbed French student who was shot 10 times by police in a cinema. The family of 23-year-old Idriss Stelley had filed a civil rights lawsuit against the West Coast city's police, alleging that officers used excessive force when they opened fire on him after he drew a knife in a cinema in 2001. In the suit, the student's mother, Mesha Monge-Irizarry, claimed her son was obviously disturbed and posed no threat to other people but said officers were not properly trained to deal with mentally ill suspects.
■ Georgia
UN staff kidnapped
The search continued yesterday for four UN staff, including one Danish and two German military observers, who were kidnapped by gunmen in the Caucasus republic of Georgia.
Deputy secretary of the Georgian security council, Dshemal Gachokidse, said all forces are working for the release of the hostages. The Dane, Germans and a local interpreter were abducted on Thursday in the demarcation zone between Georgia and its breakaway province of Abkhazia.
■France
Toulouse sex scandal grows
The scandal over alleged links between top officials in Toulouse and France's most notorious serial killer deepened Thursday when a news magazine revealed allegations that the former mayor, Dominique Baudis, had a sexual relationship with the murderer, Patrice Alegre. Because Baudis, head of CSA, the broadcasting watchdog, has vigorously denied being involved in sex and drug orgies organized by Alegre, newspapers have only published a partial account of the information leaking from lawyers close to the case. But L'Express reported that a judicial inquiry in Toulouse, closed to the public, was told that Baudis, a former television newsreader, was known as Nenette and had met the convicted killer at a city hotel for sado-masochistic sessions.
■ Congo
French forces arrive in Bunia
An advance party of French troops arrived in Congo's embattled Bunia town yesterday in the first deployment of a 1,400-strong rapid reaction force mandated to stop bloodletting among rival militias, UN officials said. The UN says about 500 civilians have been massacred in inter-ethnic fighting in and around Bunia in the northeastern Ituri region in the past two weeks and 50,000 killed since 1999. Two planeloads of French soldiers flew in to Bunia's airport shortly after dawn, Colonel Daniel Vollot, commander of a separate UN peacekeeping force in Bunia, told reporters.
■ United Nations
US seeks to extend deal
In an effort to avoid a replay of the most contentious confrontation at the UN before the Iraq crisis, the US said Thursday it will seek an extension of a deal to exempt US peacekeepers from prosecution by the new international war crimes tribunal. Last year's battle pitted the world's lone superpower against countries around the world, including its closest European allies and neighbors Canada and Mexico. It ended in July, when the Security Council agreed to exempt from arrest or trial peacekeepers from the US and other countries that have not ratified the treaty establishing the International Criminal Court.
■ Canada
Police in a haze over pot
Authorities in Ontario said Thursday that police will stop charging people for possessing small amounts of marijuana until the federal government or the courts clarify confusion in drug laws. Recent court decisions have thrown out cases of possession of marijuana, while proposed federal legislation will make possession of less than 15g similar to a traffic violation. This left police officers "in a position of uncertainty to whether simple possession of marijuana is an offense at all," said Julian Fantino, chief of Toronto police.
■ United Kingdom
Drug abusers' kids at risk
Up to 350,000 children in Britain have at least one parent who is a problem drug user, government advisers said Thursday. Many are suffering "hidden harm" from poverty, abuse, poor health and disrupted education. The children often fend for themselves and look after their parents and siblings. The UK's Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, conducted this first official attempt to quantify the offspring of addicts. It hopes the results, which paint a "depressing but not unexpected" picture, will jolt mainstream health, social, education and child protection services, as well as specialist drug services.
Agencies
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