■Australia
Robber takes baby along
An eight-month-old baby in Australia got an early taste of playing cops and robbers when his father staged a hold-up and took him along for the ride, police said yesterday. A masked, knife-wielding man robbed a fast-food restaurant and escaped with his son in the front seat of a stolen getaway car. He then dumped the car and walked with the child to a nearby bar where he started drinking. The man appeared to be on drugs, and tried to swallow some unidentified pills after the bar staff called police. Police took the man, to the Royal Perth Hospital and looked after the baby until they found his mother.
■ Nepal
Rebels agree to talks
Maoist rebels agreed to resume peace talks with Nepal's government after it satisfied two of their three key demands, including the release of jailed rebel leaders, a peace broker said. The rebels did not set a date for the much-delayed third round of peace talks but announced their intention to rejoin the negotiations in a letter to the government from top leader Prachanda. The government, which has asked rebels to begin talks within two weeks, fulfilled two key rebel demands Tuesday by releasing three rebel leaders and handing over a list with the status of 36 rebels reported missing by the guerrillas. The government continued to reject a third demand that it withdraw its army back to its bases, but pledged that troops would not attack the rebels.
■ Thailand
Summit prompts clean-up
Stray dogs and homeless people will be barred from central Bangkok as part of official preparations for the APEC summit in October, the city's governor was quoted yesterday as saying. Bangkok Governor Samak Sundaravej said homeless people sleeping rough in the city's central Sanam Luang area and other historic sites could not be tolerated. "Our city is not Calcutta," the Bangkok Post quoted Samak as saying. "We must not allow such an eyesore. They must not be there at all times, not just during the APEC summit." Samak said stray dogs would be rounded up from Bangkok's historic central area and sent to a shelter in the eastern province of Sa Kaew.
■ Cambodia
King rules out intervention
Cambodia's King Norodom Sihanouk said yesterday he would not become involved in the political brawling following last weekend's national elections. He said in a letter to the nation that the three main political parties would have to resolve the issue of a new coalition government on their own. "The King should not intervene in political issues. The three parties and the people have a duty to solve their problems," he said. The Cambodian People's Party expects to win 73 seats in the 123-seat National Assembly, short of the two-thirds majority required to govern.
■ Afghanistan
US forces engage guerrillas
US helicopter gunships killed four guerrillas in southern Afghanistan and allied troops forced another group to flee into Pakistan after attacking a US base, a US spokesman said on Friday. The guerrillas were killed by two AH-64 Apache gunships after a group of 15 opened fire on a coalition special forces patrol from a ridgeline north of the town of Kandahar on Thursday. In another incident, a coalition special forces team came under small-arms fire from three guerrillas near their base at Spin Boldak. There were no coalition casualties in either incident.
■Croatia
Show-off bitten by dog
A drunken Croatian exhibitionist nearly lost his genitals when the owner's dog bit him, the official news agency HINA said Thursday evening. The man, 36, was visibly intoxicated when he stopped in front of a woman's house. When he opened his fly and put his private parts inside the fence, her dog came from the other side and bit him. The terrified man somehow managed to separate his genitals from the dog, but suffered serious injuries. The man will be fined for "insulting moral feelings of the citizens" and "violating public order," police said.
■ France
Youths vandalize cemeteries
Six French youths have been placed in preventive detention in connection with the desecration of two Commonwealth war cemeteries in northern France, police said Thursday. Three 15-year-olds were blamed for smashing and overturning 45 gravestones at the cemetery in Saint-Aubert, which houses the graves of British, Canadian and New Zealand troops who fought during World War I. Three other teenagers, aged 16, 17 and 18, were believed to be responsible for smashing 12 headstones at a British war cemetery in Quesnel, near Amiens, over the past 10 days. They could face a year in prison and fines of up to 15,000 euros (US$16,850) each if found guilty.
■ United States
Whites paid to worship
It's a special offer for this month only: a race-based bonus in the name of integration, diversity and the good Lord himself. A church in Louisiana will pay white people to attend its services, offering US$5 per hour for those who attend its Sunday services and US$10 for anyone who comes on Thursday. "Our churches are too segregated and the Lord never intended for that to happen. It's time to do something radical," said Bishop Fred Caldwell, of the Greenwood Acres Full Gospel church in Shreveport. Under Caldwell's scheme white visitors will have to register when they arrive at the service after which he will pay them from his own pocket.
■ United Kingdom
Panel asked to probe claims
An inquiry into the suicide of weapons adviser David Kelly should examine whether Defense Ministry bosses threatened to take away his pension after he gave an unauthorized press interview, an opposition leader said yesterday. Lord Hutton, an appeals judge, planned to start his investigation into the circumstances leading to Kelly's death with a preliminary hearing yesterday. The scientist was at the center of a bitter dispute over the government's handling of intelligence on Iraqi weapons.
■ Argentina
Cashiers must wear diapers
Supermarket cashiers in Argentina are being forced to wear diapers to keep them from taking toilet breaks at work, a union says. Female cashiers in western Mendoza province must wear adult diapers in case "cold, nerves, pressure or stress" provoke incontinence, union official Jorge Cordova told local news agency Diarios y Noticias on Thursday. Cordova refused to name the supermarket, but he did say the chain is backed by foreign capital, said Sandra Varela, Mendoza's labor subsecretary. "In seventeen years as a labor lawyer, I've never heard anything like this before," Varela said.
Agencies
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was