World News Quick Take

■ China
Lawyer sues party official
An Icelandic lawyer has filed a lawsuit against visiting Chinese official Luo Gan, accusing the top Communist Party leader of torture and genocide in the crackdown on Falun Gong, the group said yesterday. Ragnar Adalsteinsson, a renowned Icelandic human-rights lawyer, filed the action Thursday with the State Criminal Prosecutor in Iceland, Bogi Nilsson. Luo has orchestrated the four-year campaign against the spiritual group as head of the party's Politics and Law Commission, China's top police and judicial organ, and is in Iceland on a two-day visit as part of an ongoing four-nation tour of Europe.

■ South Korea
Official beaten up
A South Korean official was beaten and seriously injured by opponents of a government plan to build a nuclear waste dump in their province, police said yesterday. Kim Jong-gyu, chief administrator of Buan County in the southwestern province of North Jeolla, was being treated in hospital for a broken nose, two fractured costal bones and a punctured lung, police said. Kim was mobbed by some of the 500 local residents who heard him deliver a speech defending his decision to host the waste dump in return for economic gains for the county. Some 30 policemen dragged him from the angry protesters who also overturned Kim's car and set it on fire.

■ Japan
Centenarians on the increase
The number of Japanese aged at least 100 rose to 20,561 this year, a new record in the world's longest-living nation, the government said yesterday. The figure was up by 2,627 from last year and includes all Japanese who will have celebrated their 100th birthday by the end of September, the Health Ministry said in an annual study released ahead of a national holiday next week honoring the country's elderly.

■ AUstralia
Rain brings relief
Widespread over the last two months snapped a two-year drought plaguing much of Australia's grain growing regions and should result in a bumper harvest, the government said yesterday. The Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics said if rainfall continues and no serious frost damage is suffered, total winter crop production would increase to 37.1 million tonnes this season, some 21.6 million tonnes above last season's drought-ravaged crop.

■ Cambodia
Plug pulled on daredevil TV
It may be standard fare in America, but strait-laced Cambodia has decided it cannot stomach any more Fear Factor-style television. Brave, Brave or not, the war-scarred Southeast Asian nation's first bite at daredevil programming, has been ordered off the air after just four screenings for being too racy. "I am writing a letter to the TV station to tell them to avoid such a crazy game in the future," said Information Minister Lu Laysreng. "It is a dirty game. It might be OK in America, but it is not proper for Cambodian culture," he said. "Children are always watching TV and they sometimes copy what they see." Like hit US gameshow Fear Factor, the program has caused a stir among traditionally staid Cambodians who have been able to tune in to villagers crawling through swamps, eating bowls of live crickets or plunging their arm into a box of leeches -- all in pursuit of a US$15 prize.

■ Nigeria
Bus crash kills over 100
Three and a truck collided Monday in central Nigeria, killing more than 100 people in the impact and the fiery explosion that followed, authorities said. State television showed charred remains of some victims of the accident, which happened shortly after midnight Sunday about 100km outside the capital, Abuja. Circumstances of the accident were unclear. Authorities said the buses all had been carrying passengers on long-distance journeys, and said one was carrying 70 passengers. Samuel Adetoye, police commissioner of Kogi state, where the accident occurred, asked families who had relatives traveling in the area to visit hospital morgues to try to identify the dead.

■ United Kingdom
EU concerns linger
Britain not sign the proposed European constitution unless its concerns over issues including taxation and defense are resolved, the government said yesterday as it prepared to formally declare its position on the draft treaty. Foreign Secretary Jack Straw insisted the treaty, which aims to streamline decision making in the EU when it expands by accepting 10 new member states next year, would not erode Britain's sovereignty, but would shift power back to member states. But he said the government would not give up its veto on areas such as defense, foreign policy, social security and taxation and would debate such issues further at an intergovernmental conference which begins next month.

■ France
Heat-wave report released
A scathing French government report Monday blamed hospital under-staffing during summer holidays, chronic bureau-cratic snags and a dearth of elderly care for the 11,400-plus death toll in this summer's killer heat wave. The report, ordered by the Health Ministry, pointed to disarray and lack of communication between weather officials, emergency services and hospitals, and said that a "massive" exodus of doctors vacation last month left many elderly to fend for themselves.

■ Canada
Rain aids firefighting effort
Rain Monday on areas of British Columbia for the first time in months, dousing some of the heat in the western Canadian province hit by the worst forest fires in 50 years, local authorities said. Improved conditions around the town of Kelowna, in the south of the province, allowed 4,250 evacuees to return to their homes, the town hall said in a statement.

■ United States
Tea may block skin cancer
Tea, the cup that tones up the immune system, could soon be more than just a drink. Compounds of black and green tea could be used in a lotion to ward off skin cancer, new research indicates. A team from the University of Minnesota in Austin told the American Chemical Society in New York on Monday that tea contains chemicals that block formation of non-melanoma skin tumors. Sunblock prevents the skin from absorbing dangerous ultraviolet radiation from the sun. But the polyphenols in tea get to work after the skin has been exposed to excessive sunlight. Researchers have linked tea with protection against lung cancer, and a team at Harvard earlier this year reported that the brew of antioxidants and other chemicals in tea seemed to stimulate the human immune system far more effectively than coffee.