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World News Quick Take

■ China
Poor to get HIV treatment
China says it will provide free treatment to thousands of impoverished HIV and AIDS patients to help combat the spread of the disease. About 5,000 HIV and AIDS patients with "financial difficulties" will receive free treatment through next year, Executive Vice Health Minister Gao Qiang was quoted as saying by the Xinhua News Agency on Thursday night. They include urban dwellers and people in the poverty-stricken countryside, Xinhua said, but did not elaborate on how the government is going to decide on who doesn't pay. Gao, who spoke at a closed-door World Economic Forum event in Beijing, said China's AIDS prevention efforts to date have fallen short. Currently, 80,000 of the 840,000 people in China who are HIV-positive have AIDS, Gao said.

■ China
`Space Hero' gets badge
China's pioneering astronaut was yesterday dubbed a "Space Hero" in a ceremony celebrating the country's first manned space launch. Yang Liwei (楊利偉) was awarded a badge of honor at the celebration attended by China's leaders and thousands of space officials and servicemen, including President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) and Premier Wen Jiabao (溫家寶), the official Xinhua News Agency reported. Former president Jiang Zemin (江澤民), chairman of the military commission, presented Yang with the badge and "Space Hero" certificate.

■ Hong Kong
Man lived with wife's corpse
A grieving husband in northern China has slept with his wife's corpse for the past eight years, a news report said yesterday. Police in Tangshan, Hebei province, said Xie Yuchen's wife died in 1995 after suffering a cerebral hemorrhage but he never reported her death. Instead, he told neighbors she was recuperating at home, according to the Hong Kong edition of the China Daily newspaper. The neighbors eventually became suspicious and called police, who found the now-mummified corpse of Xie's wife in the couple's bed.

■ Hong Kong
Dead husband found
A 39-year-old American woman was detained here yesterday after her husband's body was found in an underground storeroom in their house, a police spokeswoman said. The woman was detained for enquiries after police found the body of her 40-year-old American husband wrapped in a carpet and plastic sheets in an underground storeroom, rented by the woman at their residential unit in Aberdeen, police said. The woman had earlier reported to police that she had been assaulted by her husband on Nov. 12. She was taken to hospital for a medical check but disappeared from the hospital. The woman was later located at home, after a colleague of the deceased reported his disappearance.

■ India
Seven people burnt alive
Seven people, including three children, were burnt alive in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh after goats belonging to one of the victims strayed into another man's field, it was reported yesterday. The house they were in was locked and set on fire in Dostumpur village, about 100km south of Lucknow, the Indian Express newspaper reported. The incident was sparked when two goats belonging to one of the victims strayed into the field of the man accused of torching the house. The owner of the goats was first beaten at the scene, then assailants returned late Wednesday night and rounded up the goat owner's family and friends.

■ Saudi Arabia
Police raid more militants
Two Muslim militants blew themselves up during a police raid in the holy city of Mecca on Thursday, hours after another militant was shot dead in Riyadh as authorities cracked down on suspected al-Qaeda activists. It was the second action against militant hideouts this week, and came shortly after the US and Britain warned of possible terror attacks in Saudi Arabia during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan. Saudi state television said security forces surrounded two "important wanted terrorists" in Mecca and opened fire after being shot at by the militants.

■ Colombia
Police arrest traffickers
Colombian and US anti-drug authorities on Thursday arrested 16 suspected drug traffickers accused of shipping three tonnes of cocaine per month to the US, police said.
Colombian officers and US Drug Enforcement Administration agents made the arrests during 23 raids in four Colombian cities. The suspected smugglers, believed to have links with illegal right-wing militias, are wanted in US courts on drug charges. President Alvaro Uribe has stepped up the extradition of accused traffickers to the US.

■ Mozambique
Rats sniff out land mines
A Belgian research project for detecting land mines, using specially trained sniffer rats, will be launched next week when the first batch of rodents are sent on their first assignment to Mozambique. African giant-pouched rats were trained over three years to sniff out explosives at a test site in Tanzania. They spent two months in field trials among heavily mined areas of Mozambique. Scientists involved in the project said that rats were in many ways better mine hunters than dogs: "They learn quicker and do not get so personally attached to the owner, so they're easier to transfer to another trainer," said scientist Christophe Cox.

■ Mauritania
Opposition leader arrested
The northwest African desert state of Mauritania was set to vote in a presidential election yesterday, hours after police briefly detained the leading opposition candidate, accusing him of plotting a coup. Mohamed Khouna Ould Haidallah, a former head of state, and six close associates were arrested Thursday on the eve of the poll. According to the state prosecutor they were planning to "change the government by violence and insurrection." The prosecutor said Ould Haidallah and his campaign director, Ismael Ould Amar, were questioned and then freed several hours after they were detained. However, the five others were still in police custody.

■ Russia
Soros Foundation expelled
The Moscow Soros Foundation was expelled early yesterday from its offices by around 40 men in camouflage representing the owner of the building who claimed the group had not paid the rent, a report said. The men, accompanied by a group of youths, stormed the Moscow offices of the Open Society institute of US billionaire George Soros late Thursday, forcing the staff to leave, before taking away documents and other goods in trucks. They then came out with boxes of pornographic pictures which they strewed in front of the building in the presence of representatives of the building's owner, the report said.

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