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World News Quick Take

■ Japan
Tropical storm kills again
Nearly a dozen people were missing and another was found dead yesterday after a tropical storm pummeled its way through northern Japan. Etau -- rated a typhoon until it was downgraded Friday to a tropical storm -- hit Japan's northernmost main island of Hokkaido early yesterday. It weakened further and was classified as a "tropical depression" as it moved off into the Pacific Ocean, the Meteorological Agency said.

■ China
Japan taken to task
China has taken Japan to task over the injuries of dozens of people in northeastern Heilongjiang province after they dug up chemical weapons left by the retreating Japanese army nearly 60 years ago, the foreign ministry said yesterday. Beijing urged Japan to seriously deal with the accident that left at least 36 people injured -- three seriously, in Qiqihar city after the weapons were discovered on Monday. According to China's foreign ministry Web site, the director of the ministry's Asia department Fu Ying called in Japan's ambassador to China on Friday and lodged the protest.

■ China
Mass death sentence passed
Twenty-six convicted criminals were collectively sentenced to death in China's southern city of Guangzhou as part of a government effort to clear a back-log of cases awaiting verdict, state press reported yesterday. The 26 criminals were mostly convicted of "drug trafficking and other heinous crimes," and were sentenced to death on Saturday, the China News Service reported. The collective death sentence was delivered under heavy security at the Guangzhou municipal court with some 150 armed police and security guards maintaining order, the report said.

■ Australia
Boy dodges meteorite
A suspected meteorite narrowly missed a 10-year-old boy when it smashed into his driveway in southwest Australia, his mother said yesterday. Jennifer Elliss said her son, Anthony, was playing outside his home in Safety Bay, about 50km south of Perth, on Thursday when he noticed an oddly shaped object in the sky about the size of a bird heading toward him. He ducked behind a car to avoid being hit, then watched as it smashed into their driveway and shattered, she said. "I heard something hit the bitumen and then Anthony came inside and said there were rocks coming out of the sky," Elliss told reporters. "He then handed me a piece and it didn't look like a normal rock -- it was dull on the inside and silver on the outside and looked as if it had melted."

■ Hong Kong
Gorilla thief steals bananas
A man dressed in a gorilla costume snatched a bunch of bananas from an elderly woman's shop in downtown Hong Kong, prompting her to chase the thief, police and Hong Kong media said yesterday. Eighty-year-old Tse Lai slipped and fell while pursuing what she initially thought was a ghost. "I didn't realize that it was a gorilla at first. All I saw was something big and black with a lot of hair," the South China Morning Post quoted her as saying. "I thought I saw a ghost so I tried to drive it away with a broom." Tse was treated for shock and later discharged, the Post said. Police spokeswoman Carrie So said the man in the gorilla suit, who was not identified, was hired by a film company to stage the prank. After the incident, police questioned the company's manager but made no arrests, she said.

■ United States
Bush massages fund-raisers
President Bush interrupted his vacation for two hours on Saturday afternoon to massage 350 of his most prodigious campaign fund-raisers at a soggy barbecue down the road from his ranch. The fund-raisers, who had each collected at least US$50,000 for Bush's re-election campaign by June 30, were also greeted by Karl Rove, Bush's chief political adviser, and Ken Mehlman, the Bush-Cheney campaign manager. The barbecue, at Stan and Kathy Hickey's Broken Spoke Ranch three and a half miles down Prairie Chapel Road from Bush's property, was what Bush calls a "friend-raiser," meaning no contribution was required for entry.

■ United States
Mass breast-feed no record
To the sounds of slurping, gurgling and the occasional howl, 684 women and their children held a mass breast-feed in Berkeley, California on Saturday to mark World Breast-feeding Week. The number fell short of the 1,130 women of last year's nurse-in, which set a mark listed in the Guinness Book of World Records. But the group was happy to have trounced a weak challenge by counterparts in Australia, who could only muster 48 women a few days earlier. The the event was mainly held to promote breastfeeding, done by only an estimated one-third of American mothers.

■ Canada
Forest fire under control
An estimated 3,500 people displaced for more than a week by a forest fire in the mountains of British Columbia were allowed to return home on Saturday. Officials declared the town of Barriere, about 300km northeast of Vancouver, safe enough to reopen, as crews made progress containing the fire that has scorched more than 180km2 of woodlands. The blaze destroyed more than 60 homes in the area causing at least US$5.75 million in residential damage, but firefighters were able to keep the flames away from most of Barriere's houses. Several businesses and a saw mill that was one of the region's biggest employers were also destroyed.

■ Italy
Tourists to get fined
Tired tourists, beware. If you visit the cathedrals of Florence or Venice and afterwards want a minute's rest on their steps or pavements, you may be hit with a fine. Jarred by criticism that city councils around Italy were not keeping back-packing day trippers in line, both cities have begun fining those who do not behave with decorum around churches. The 50-euro (US$56.50) fines apply to the areas around Florence's cathedral, the Duomo, and the Basilica of St Mark in St Mark's Square in Venice.

■ United Kingdom
Instant literature
The Reduced Shakespeare Company won acclaim chopping the Bard down to digestible soundbites. Now it's taking on the history of western literature in 90 minutes. All The Great Books (Abridged), being performed to packed houses at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, is a literature student's dream -- Ulysses and War and Peace summed up in an instant. The company, with its origins in Californian street theatre in 1981, is now a literary travelling circus with three troupes touring the globe and shows translated into 16 languages. Its shows -- from Shakespeare to the Bible, from the Millennium to the History of America -- are now being performed for an eighth year in London.

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