■ Pakistan
Six killed in ambush
Gunmen ambushed nine men from a rival tribe in southern Pakistan yesterday, killing six of them and injuring the other three, police said. The shooting occurred in Jaffarabad, a small town about 360km northeast of Karachi, local police official Zahid Hussain said. The Lakhan tribesmen came under attack while they were going to a court for a hearing in a trial of two of their tribesmen over the murder two years ago of a rival Mehar tribesman. The gunmen fled and no one was arrested. Hussain said that police suspected Mehar tribesmen were behind the attack. Deadly family and clan rivalries are common in Pakistan's deeply conservative rural areas. Disputes that can go on for decades, claiming scores of lives, often center on property or family honor.
■ China
School evacuated after blast
More than 1,000 primary children were evacuated after a bomb exploded at a school in the southern Chinese province of Guangdong, state media reported yesterday. No-one was injured. The headmaster of the school in Foshan City received an anonymous phone call on Tuesday morning claiming that a bomb had been planted by a staircase, the Southern Metropolitan Daily reported. A minor explosion occurred soon after but no-one was injured and none of the school buildings was badly damaged. The children were quickly evacuated, it said.
■ China
Teen kills over homework
A Chinese teenager battered his mother to death with a hammer because he was fed up with her nagging him to do his homework, state media said yesterday. The 16-year-old high school student from Jintan City in Jiangsu Province admitted to police that he killed his mother on Sunday while she was asleep, the Jiangnan Times reported. The teenager said he took the drastic action because he had not done his homework and was afraid of being shouted at by his mother, who often beat and scolded him because of his poor academic record.
■ Nepal
Rebels storm TV station
Three heavily armed Maoist rebels stormed a television station in western Nepal, overpowered the guards and bombed transmitters, a police officer said yesterday. No one was injured in the overnight attack at the state-owned Nepal Television tower in Palpa, 300km west of Kathmandu. But TV transmission to several districts was cut off. "Two Maoists overpowered us and the third one went into the building. There was a big explosion soon after he came out," the police officer quoted one of the guards as saying.
■ Australia
Missing bushwalker found
A Colombian businessman who went missing for 10 days after going for a bushwalk in Australia has been found alive, rescuers said yesterday. Police said 47-year-old Ricardo Sirutis was located on Moreton Island off the eastern state of Queensland, conscious but suffering from dehydration. The head for South America of the Pfizer drug company failed to return from a day trip to the island on May 8. More than 100 troops and State Emergency Service volunteers had been mounting a major search. Service spokesman John Butler told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation that Sirutis is in a stable condition. He would be treated and then airlifted out to hospital. Sirutis was located about 3km from where he went missing.
■ Germany
`Dead' woman denied funds
A woman in her 80s said on Tuesday she had been ordered by her pension fund to produce a certificate to prove she was still alive. Martha Kruse called the Bundesknappschaft fund after her payments were suddenly stopped, only to be told by an employee: "Don't get upset, but you died on Jan. 28." The fund also asked payments made to the 82-year-old to be repaid. The employee would not accept the sound of the woman's voice as proof that she was still alive and asked her instead to produce a "life certificate." The perplexed Kruse was forced to go to the municipal authorities in her home town of Barsinghausen which agreed to make out the necessary document, charging her 4.80 euros (US$6) for the privilege.
■ United States
Man nabbed for bomb hoax
US federal agents Tuesday arrested a Pakistani-born man for allegedly falsely claiming that a terrorist was planning to blow up the British consulate in Toronto, Canada, officials said. The FBI arrested Bukhtiar Abdul Latif Katchi, 34, in Los Angeles on charges of maliciously and falsely claiming that an al-Qaeda operative was about to blow up the mission in Canada earlier this month. "He called police in New Jersey and stated that an individual who was a member of al-Qaeda was planning to blow up the British consulate in Toronto," FBI spokeswoman Laura Eimiller told reporters.
■ Greece
Firm's song `insults dignity'
The government on Tuesday sharply criticized a Greek telemarketing firm accused of obliging its employees to sing a company anthem every morning. "This is totally unacceptable," Labor Minister Panos Panayioto-poulos told state-run NET television. "This is an insult to the dignity of the workers there." A company employee made the allegation to the ministry, adding that workers -- under the threat of dismissal -- were also obliged to perform breathing a stretching exercises at the start of each day. Panayiotopoulos said labor inspectors visited the company at a southern Athens suburb Tuesday and that their findings would be forwarded to a public prosecutor for investigation.
■ United States
Man arrested for illicit sex
In a plea deal with prosecutors, a private school teacher caught living with a boy in Thailand avoided trial and will be sentenced under a section of federal law involving statutory rape. Gregory Alec Phillips, 35, formerly of Knoxville, pleaded guilty Tuesday in US District Court to "engaging in illicit sexual conduct in foreign places." Phillips is scheduled to be sentenced Sept. 12, The Knoxville News Sentinel reported. Phillips admitted that after moving to Thailand to teach at a private school, he began an affair with a 12-year-old Thai boy who moved into Phillips' home in Bangkok.
■ Italy
Police arrest terror suspects
Police detained several terror suspects yesterday, an official said. The suspects are accused of subversive association aimed at international terrorism, as well as illegal financing and dealing in false documents, General Giampaolo Ganzer of Italy's Carabinieri paramilitary police told RAI state radio. Police were targeting a group in Milan composed mainly of Tunisians and accused of planning attacks against Italian targets, RAI radio and news agency ANSA said.
Far from the violence ravaging Haiti, a market on the border with the Dominican Republic has maintained a welcome degree of normal everyday life. At the Dajabon border gate, a wave of Haitians press forward, eager to shop at the twice-weekly market about 200km from Haiti’s capital, Port-au-Prince. They are drawn by the market’s offerings — food, clothing, toys and even used appliances — items not always readily available in Haiti. However, with gang violence bad and growing ever worse in Haiti, the Dominican government has reinforced the usual military presence at the border and placed soldiers on alert. While the market continues to
An image of a dancer balancing on the words “China Before Communism” looms over Parisian commuters catching the morning metro, signaling the annual return of Shen Yun, a controversial spectacle of traditional Chinese dance mixed with vehement criticism of Beijing and conservative rhetoric. The Shen Yun Performing Arts company has slipped the beliefs of a spiritual movement called Falun Gong in between its technicolored visuals and leaping dancers since 2006, with advertising for the show so ubiquitous that it has become an Internet meme. Founded in 1992, Falun Gong claims nearly 100 million followers and has been subject to “persistent persecution” in
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‘SURPRISES’: The militants claim to have successfully tested a missile capable of reaching Mach 8 and vowed to strike ships heading toward the Cape of Good Hope Yemen’s Houthi rebels claim to have a new, hypersonic missile in their arsenal, Russia’s state media reported on Thursday, potentially raising the stakes in their attacks on shipping in the Red Sea and surrounding waterways against the backdrop of Israel’s war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The report by the state-run RIA Novosti news agency cited an unidentified official, but provided no evidence for the claim. It comes as Moscow maintains an aggressively counter-Western foreign policy amid its grinding war on Ukraine. However, the Houthis have for weeks hinted about “surprises” they plan for the battles at sea to counter the