■ United States
Woman sells `ghost' online
A woman's effort to assuage her 6-year-old son's fears of his grandfather's ghost by selling it on eBay has drawn more than 34 bids with a top offer of US$78. Mary Anderson said she placed her father's "ghost" on the online auction site after her son, Collin, said he was afraid the ghost would return someday. Anderson said Collin has avoided going anywhere in the house alone since his grandfather died last year. In a description titled "This isn't a joke," Anderson told Collin's story on eBay: "I always thought it was just normal kid fears until a few months ago he told me why he was so scared. He told me `Grandpa died here, and he was mean. His ghost is still around here!'" Lest the boy's fears scare off potential bidders, Anderson added, "My dad was the sweetest most caring man you'd ever meet."
■ Egypt
Arab-Israeli spy released
Israel has released six Egyptian students in exchange for Israeli businessman Azzam Azzam in a prisoner swap yesterday, Arab television Al Arabiya reported. "Israel has announced that the Israeli spy Azzam Azzam would reach Israel within one hour from now," the satellite channel's correspondent said but gave no details. Sources close to the Egyptians' families said the six had been released yesterday. Israel has been pressing for Azzam's release since an Egyptian court sentenced him in 1997 to 15 years in jail for spying.
■ Canada
Over 1,000 to go to Ukraine
More than 1,000 Canadians are planning to travel to Ukraine on a democracy mission to monitor the Dec. 26 revote of the annulled presidential election, the leader of a Ukrainian-Canadian organization said. In Alberta, where nearly 10 percent of the province's population has roots in Ukraine, turnout is expected to be strong for the planned 1,500-member mission, said the president of the Alberta Provincial Council of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress. "It touches all of us," Catherine Chichak said Saturday.
■ Iran
Site access discussed
Iran said yesterday it was not obliged to allow UN atomic energy agency inspectors to visit military sites alleged to be involved in secret nuclear weapons work, but that it was willing to discuss the issue. "It is not a matter of unlimited commitments and unlimited inspections," foreign ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told reporters when asked if International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) teams would be able to probe two suspect military facilities. The Vienna-based watchdog has asked Iran if it can visit the Parchin military base east of Tehran, where US officials have said the Iranians may be testing "high-explosive shaped charges with an inert core of depleted uranium" as a dry test for how a bomb with fissile material would work.
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