■ Nepal
Referee, activists shot
Maoist rebels waging a war against Nepal's government have shot dead a former assistant referee of world football association FIFA and two political activists, police said yesterday. Maoists kidnapped ex-football referee Narendra Bahadur Basnet, who was an army officer, on Friday from his home near Pokhara, a top tourist destination around 225km west of Kathmandu, police said. The rebels also shot dead political activists belonging to the Nepali Congress and the pro-India Nepal Sadhbawana Party on Friday, police said. Police said they had no information about the motives for the killings but Maoists rebels frequently target army personnel and government sympathisers.
■ China
Kidnapped toddlers rescued
Police in south China's Guangdong Province have rescued 18 kidnapped toddlers, saving them from being sold to childless couples, state media said yesterday. The rescue operation, which also led to the arrest of four suspects, was conducted in cooperation with law enforcers from southwestern Yunnan, the children's impoverished home province, according to Xinhua news agency. The toddlers, aged between one and four, were put up in an office building in Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong, while authorities sought to trace their parents, the agency reported.
■ Australia
Bikers set fast-food record
More than 100 motorcyclists aboard Harley Davidsons rode in the back door and out the front of a restaurant in outback Australia to win a mention in the Guinness Book of World Records, news reports said yesterday. The 127 bikes converged on Bojangles Restaurant and Saloon on Saturday to set a record and raise money for the Flying Doctor Service. Restaurant owner Avril Vaughan said husband Chris had come up with the ride-through idea to coincide with a National Hog Association rally in the Northern Territory town of Alice Springs.
■ Hong Kong
Another phone explodes
A mobile phone user in Hong Kong was injured when his Nokia exploded in his hand, a news report said yesterday. The explosion happened seconds after the man took the Nokia 6150 out of his pocket after realizing it was getting hot, the Sunday Morning Post reported. He suffered hand injuries and was treated by an ambulance crew at the scene in Hong Kong's Tsz Wan Shan district on Saturday, the newspaper said. The incident is the third of its kind in the past three months in Hong Kong. All three cases are believed to have been caused by unauthorized batteries being put in the handsets.
■ South Korea
Envoy prepares for talks
China's special envoy on North Korea arrived in South Korea yesterday to discuss preparations for new talks aimed at resolving a drawn-out standoff over Pyongyang's nuclear drive, reports said. Ning Fukui will hold talks with South Korean officials and fly to Tokyo tomorrow for similar meetings, the Yonhap news agency said. Ning met with his US counterpart Joseph DeTrani in Beijing last week. DeTrani reaffirmed a key Washington demand that all Pyongyang's nuclear programs must be addressed if the talks were to succeed.
■ United States
Cage marries again
Months after actor Nicolas Cage met a new love in a sushi restaurant, the star of Leaving Las Vegas, Moonstruck and Con Air married the 20-year-younger former waitress Alice Kim, a spokesman for the 40-year-old actor confirmed Saturday. The marriage ceremony, the third for the Oscar winner, took place Friday at a northern California ranch. Cage and the Korean-American Kim met in February when Kim served Cage at a Japanese restaurant outside Los Angeles. A short time later, the Hollywood star proposed. The marriage was the first for Kim.
■ United States
Las Vegas to fix stinky street
Along with neon lights and casinos, the downtown area of Las Vegas has become known for the "Stench of Fremont Street" -- and city officials are fed up. "I'm not a connoisseur," said City Engineer Charlie Kajkowski. "But it smells." The stink emanating from the storm sewers has plagued the area around the Fremont Street pedestrian mall for a decade, and every time the city has thrown time, effort and deodorizer at the problem, the "sewer-type" aroma has just returned. On Wednesday, City Council is to consider a US$100,000 consulting contract aimed at finding the source of the olfactory offense.
■ Cyberspace
New virus spreading
A new variant of the Bagle virus is spreading quickly around the world on computers connected to the Internet, reports the Munich-based magazine PC Professionell. The latest variant, dubbed Bagle.AI, attaches itself to e-mail on infected computers and sends itself to all e-mail addresses contained in a user's address book. The virus is different from many in that it is able to shut down some types of security features of computers, including some antivirus scanners. Called Beagle.AI by some antivirus makers, the virus cannot infect your computer if you don't open the e-mail attachment that contains the virus.
■ United States
Tiger caught in Queens
After escaping from the circus, a white tiger alarmed picnickers and motorists Saturday on what for him apparently was a calm, kilometer-long stroll through an unfamiliar urban jungle. The animal, named Apollo, was safely recaptured in the Queens section of the city -- but not before the sight of him on the Jackie Robinson Parkway caused a multi-car accident. Four adults and one child suffered minor injuries. When the tiger lay down on a nearby street, six police officers with guns drawn created a perimeter around it, Captain John Durkin said. The tiger's trainer arrived and coaxed it back into his cage. "They did some type of signal, and the tiger jumped into the cage," Durkin said. "The tiger was taken into custody without incident."
■ United States
Monument starts tour
The Ten Commandments monument banished from Alabama's state judicial building began a national tour on the back of a flatbed truck on Saturday -- starting outside the courthouse where the teaching of evolution was put on trial almost 80 years ago.
"The [American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)] is still the enemy," said June Griffin of Dayton, an outspoken advocate for displays of the Ten Commandments in government buildings. The ACLU was among the groups who had challenged the monument.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not