■ Spain
Police arrest sorry mugger
Police in Barcelona say they've arrested a well-dressed serial mugger who would target women, express remorse and ask them to spit at him. The 29-year-old man was arrested last week and is suspected of robbing 19 women in one month to finance a slot-machine addiction, the National Police in Spain's second largest city said. The suspect always used the same tactic: corner women in apartment building doorways or elevators and hold a box cutter to their throat, inspector Benjamin Blanco said. After taking money, the man would apologize, say he knew he was doing something bad and ask the women to spit at him, Blanco said. Some did, he added.
■ Ireland
Officials ban happy hour
It's official: There's no more "happy hour" in Ireland. Legislation designed to suppress heavy drinking in Irish pubs went into effect Monday. Among a range of new rules and penalties, it outlaws promotional discounts on alcoholic beverages that encourage excessive drinking. The Intoxicating Liquor Act -- drafted to address a steady rise in alcohol-fueled street violence -- also gives police new powers to impose fines on publicans and customers. For the first time, plainclothes police officers will we allowed to record whether bars are serving people who are obviously drunk, or refusing to serve them further drinks. Any bar deemed guilty of promoting drunkenness could be fined US$2,200 per offense.
■ Colombia
Guerrillas kill mayor
Suspected guerrilla fighters posing as police officers stabbed to death a mayor in southwestern Colombia, the nation's chief of police said on Monday. General Teodoro Campo said that the incident occurred early on Monday in Suaza, where four men wearing police uniforms arrived at the mayor's home. The Suaza mayor, Gentil Bahamon, let them in. He had received death threats from members of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia Colombia's largest guerrilla group, and hired bodyguards, who were absent when he was killed.
■ Russia
Hostages' families appeal
Lawyers for the families of people who died in last year's hostage-taking in a Moscow theater on Monday appealed to the European Court of Human Rights on behalf of 27 plaintiffs seeking compensation from the Russian authorities. The families are each seeking 50,000 euros (US$56,000) in damages for a breach of their right to justice, rather than for moral damage arising from the crisis itself. The three-day ordeal left 129 hostages dead, out of a total of around 800 -- most of them poisoned by a deadly gas pumped into the theater to subdue the hostage-takers before a pre-dawn raid on Oct. 26.
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