■ Germany
Breeder's brush with death
A German dog breeder's attempt to brush his prize Rottweiler's teeth ended in a trip to the emergency ward on Tuesday -- when the animal savaged the man's arm. As the 60-year-old Karlsruhe man approached the dog with a special canine tooth brush, it lunged at him with fangs flashing, severing arteries in his right arm, according to police. He survived only by "playing dead," at which point the Rottweiler lost interest and returned to its pen. Reeling from loss of blood, the injured man summoned help and was rushed to hospital. "If he hadn't pretended to be dead," a police officer said, "he might actually be dead now."
■ Italy
SS officer dies during trial
A former SS officer charged with the 1944 murder of 11 civilians in northern Italy died on Tuesday in Germany, a day after his main trial opened in Italy. Johannes Karl Schiffmann, 94, did not leave his old-age home in Lower Saxony to attend the trial and died at home, justice officials in the northern Italian town of La Spezia said. The charges were based on war crimes documents that resurfaced in 1994 and gave details of nearly 700 war crimes carried out by Germany's National Socialists and Italian Fascists between 1943 and 1945.
■ Italy
Mafia in dock after `suicide'
More than 20 years after the death of the banker Roberto Calvi was dismissed as suicide, four people, including a jailed Mafia boss, went on trial on Tuesday in Rome, charged with his murder. The case of the man known as "God's banker" remains one the most extraordinary of recent decades -- a whodunnit involving the Vatican, Cosa Nostra, rogue freemasons, financiers and politicians. Only one of the four defendants, Flavio Carboni, was in court to hear the charges. The Sardinian businessman told reporters: "I know as much about Calvi's murder as I do about the killing of Jesus Christ." Calvi was found hanging under Blackfriars bridge in London in June, 1982.
■ United States
Saddam tells no secrets
Former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein is not giving up much useful information under interrogation but he is talking to his captors, a senior US official said on Tuesday. Asked whether the US was getting any "worthwhile intelligence" from Saddam, Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage said in an interview on a Philadelphia radio station: "I occasionally see the debriefs and he's a pretty wily guy, and he's not giving much information I've seen, but he seems to be enjoying the debate." US authorities are interrogating Saddam at an undisclosed location in Iraq.
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