■ China
Dolphins to move to reserve
China is to relocate the last white-flag dolphins, which are on the verge of extinc-tion, to a protected nature reserve to stop them dying out. The world's rarest dolphins, which number less than 100, are only found in China and cannot be reared artificially, the Xinhua news agency quoted scientists as saying. The dolphins live in the Yangtze river, but overfishing, dam-building and environmental degrad-ation have caused their population to fall from about 400 in the 1980s to less than 100. Zoologists this year gained preliminary approval from Beijng to move the dolphins to a wetland nature reserve called Tian'ezhou islet in Shishou, Hubei Province, Xinhua said.
■ Malaysia
No sanctuary against rape
An elephant sanctuary in Malaysia is under inves-tigation following allegations that foreign women were raped and sexually assaulted by park workers. An unspecified number of alleged victims filed complaints with their governments after returning from volunteer work at the sanctuary, the New Sunday Times newspaper reported, citing unidentified sources. The newspaper specifically mentioned Canadian women as being among those allegedly assaulted and a travel advisory on the Web site of Canada's Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade noted that several Canadians have reported "serious problems" at the Kuala Gandah sanc-tuary in Malaysia's central Pahang State.
■ China
Uighur charges reviewed
Germany is to send federal police to China to review terrorism allegations against two anti-Beijing groups with their headquarters on German soil, the news magazine Der Spiegel said Saturday. The Uighur groups have spoken out against Chinese rule in the Turkic-speaking, mainly Islamic Central Asian region of Xinjiang. China objected strongly to them holding a convention in Munich in May. Spiegel said two experts on terrorism would leave within days for the Uighur Autonomous Region to meet with Chinese officials. China has declared four Uighur separatist groups to be terrorist.
■ Philippines
Water supply tunnel clogged
Mud and logs washed down by recent storms which lashed the northern Philip-pines and left some 1,800 people dead or missing, have blocked the main water supply tunnel to the capital Manila, the government said yesterday. The 13km tunnel bringing water to the Angat Dam, which supplies 90 percent of Manila's 12 million residents, could take four months to clear, the government said in a statement. Authorities have warned that unless the damage can be repaired within that time frame, Manila runs the risk of water shortages in the summer.
■ Thailand
Anti-noise campaign in clubs
Harking to the advice of Thailand's king, authorities have launched an anti-noise campaign in the capital's bars, pubs and discotheques to protect the eardrums of the nation's youth. Deputy Prime Minister Purachai Piumsombun and Bangkok Governor Apirak Kosayod-hin have given nightspots until Saturday to lower their noise output to at least 90 decibels, considerably below the 190 norm at present, The Nation newspaper said. The campaign comes on the heels of a speech delivered by Thai King Bhumibol Adulyadej on Dec. 4, when he said hearing problems would affect Thai teenagers' ability to learn.
■ United States
US teens having less sex
Young Americans are less sexually active now than their counterparts of the mid-1990s and are using contraceptives more regularly, a study out this week found. The Department of Health and Human Services found the proportion of never-married females aged 15-17 who had ever had sexual intercourse dropped from 38 percent in 1995 to 30 percent in 2002. In 1995 at age 18-19, 68 percent had had intercourse, compared with 69 percent in 2002. "For male teens, the percent of those who were sexually experienced dropped significantly in both age groups: from 43 percent to 31 percent at age 15-17, and from 75 percent to 64 percent at age 18-19," the study said.
■ United States
Bush puts on some weight
US President George W. Bush was found in good health and pronounced "fit for duty" after an annual physical that also showed that the 58-year-old chief executive is now, as he rather sheepishly conceded, "a little overweight." "I obviously have gone through a campaign where I probably ate too many doughnuts, if you get my drift," said the usually trim Bush, who pledged to drop some weight in the new year. "But other than that, I feel great," he said upon leaving the National Naval Medical Center outside Washington.
■ United Kingdom
Diary of real Bridget found
The 80-year-old private scribblings of a British teenager dubbed the "real-life Bridget Jones" will go on sale across the country next week. The diary of 17-year-old Ilene Powell chronicles three months of her life in 1925, and reveals a twin obsession with dieting and men, much like the fictional heroine of the hit book and film series Bridget Jones' Diary, The leather-bound pocket book was found inside a bag of books donated last month to the Oxfam charity's bookshop in Bristol, Powell's hometown in southwest England. The diary offers a glimpse of life in Britain during the giddy "Roaring Twenties" decade and has generated media interest around the world as well as calls from filmmakers and publishers, suggesting to Oxfam its huge fundraising potential and prompting the charity to publish the book.
■ Romania
Polls open for run-off
Romanian Prime Minister Adrian Nastase and popular Bucharest Mayor Traian Basescu faced off in a presidential election runoff yesterday seen as key for the Balkan country's EU accession path. After inconclusive Nov. 28 elections for a new president and parliament, Romania needs a strong government to lead it through a mountain of reforms necessary for its planned 2007 EU entry.
■ Spain
`Toilet paper note' honored
A Bolivian lawyer has won a human rights award for a 32-year-old scrap of toilet tissue -- the paper on which he penned a writ seeking examination of his case while jailed under a right-wing dictatorship. The Spanish Bar Association honored Reynaldo Peters on Friday for his ingenuity in using a candle to heat up a dried ball point pen cartridge, composing a writ of habeas corpus destined for a Bolivian judge, and sneaking it out of prison with dirty laundry his wife took home to wash. Peters had been jailed in 1972 by the regime of Bolivian dictator Hugo Banzer over his membership in an opposition party.
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