■ United States
Reagan deteriorates
Ravaged by Alzheimer's disease, former US president Ronald Reagan is no longer able to speak or feed himself and does not recognize his family, People magazine said on Thursday. It said that the US' 40th president, now 92, spends his days confined to a hospital bed in a small room in his Los Angeles mansion with his wife almost constantly at his bedside. The emotional and physical strain is taking a heavy toll on the increasingly-frail Nancy Reagan, 82, who fiercely protects her ailing husband's dignity to the extent that even their closest friends are barred from seeing him, the magazine said.
■ United States
House arrest for mother
A woman who nursed her infant while driving at 105kph on the Ohio Turnpike was sentenced to three months' house arrest for violating child-restraint laws. Catherine Nicole Donkers, 29, was also fined US$300 on Thursday. The judge delayed the sentence for one month so she could pursue an appeal. Donkers was found guilty in August of three traffic-related charges. She was found not guilty of child endangerment. Donkers said her husband ordered her by cell phone to breast-feed their seven-month-old daughter to save time while she drove on the turnpike on May 8. Police stopped Donkers after a trucker who saw her holding the baby on her lap called police.
■ Boliviabr />
Terror suspects arrested
Bolivia's state news agency said authorities in La Paz detained 16 Muslims on Thursday after a tip-off from French police that some of them were planning to hijack a plane and attack targets in the US. It quoted Interior Minister Alfonso Ferrufino as saying most of those arrested were Bangladeshis and that they were detained at Viru Viru airport near the southern Bolivian city of Santa Cruz. Prosecutor Jaime Solis said nine of
the detainees would be deported, but he did not
say to where.
■ Italy
EU dignitary criticized
Britain's Europe minister Denis MacShane has called on European Commission chief Romano Prodi to either give up his job or his ambition of returning to Italian politics, The Guardian said yesterday.
"It is not acceptable that
the commission should have a president who is not dedicated 100 percent to the questions of Europe, but who is instead seen as a leader of the opposition in exile," MacShane was quoted as telling the newspaper.
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