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World News Quick Take

■ China
Hu lauds Musharraf
China and Pakistan reinforced their steadily warming ties on Monday, signing sweeping pacts on issues from family planning to defense just days after militants killed three Chinese engineers in Pakistan. President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) called visiting Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf "an old friend of the Chinese people" after the two exchanged tight handshakes and broad grins in Beijing's Great Hall of the People on Wednesday evening. Hours earlier, Musharraf apologized emotionally -- China is one of his country's main defense suppliers and trading partners -- over the drive-by shootings of three Chinese engineers by tribal militants in Pakistan. He said the incident brought "shame" on his country. "The man in the street [in Pakistan] loves the Chinese people," Musharraf told the chairman of the National People's Congress Wu Bangguo (吳邦國).

■ Hong Kong
Flight technology launched
The Hong Kong Observatory has developed a warning system which uses laser radar to detect low-level wind shear for pilots during take-off and landings, officials confirmed yesterday. The system is the world's first LIDAR alerting system for wind shear, the name given to a sudden change in direction or velocity of wind which can be dangerous during take-off and landings. It was officially unveiled on Monday although it has been operating at the international airport since the end of last year, continuously scanning the runway flight paths. The new LIDAR Wind Shear Alerting System scans the landing and take-off flight paths with a laser beam to measure the wind ahead of the aircraft, instantly transmitting alerts to pilots.

Legislator abuses wife
A district legislator, infuriated by what he believed was his wife's infidelity, forced her to chop off her little finger, a report said on Monday. The woman, 29, reported the incident to a women's center in Bali, saying that her husband had a history of mistreating her, the state news agency Antara reported. The 40-year-old man, a district legislator from the main Golkar party who was identified only as RP, threatened last month to pour acid into her ear unless she cut off her little finger and allowed him to drink her blood, the report said. She complied, presenting it to him in a blood-filled cup, which he reportedly took unflinchingly into their kitchen.

■ Japan
Clergyman abuses girls
A clergyman who sexually abused seven girls in his congregation, telling them they would languish in hell forever if they resisted, was sentenced to 20 years in prison yesterday, a court official said. Tamotsu Kin, 62, repeatedly abused the girls, who were aged from 12 to 16, in his office at the Central Church of Holy God in Kyoto prefecture, some 375km west of Tokyo, according to the court ruling, quoted by Kyodo news agency. The abuse went on from March 2001 to September 2004, the court ruling said.

■ Singapore
`Virtual orchestra' developed
Researchers are developing a computer game enabling players to conduct a symphony played by virtual musicians by using motion detection technology, the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) said yesterday. Music students will find the software useful in practicing how to wave a baton with the software tracking the movement and grading their skill, NTU's gameLAB director Tony Chan said. The technology can also be used in other types of games than the Virtual Orchestra, the researchers told the Straits Times. A player could eventually use it to navigate the environment in a 3D game and pull a trigger to shoot enemies.

■ New Zealand
Possums prefer `pot plants'
Police have an unusual ally in their annual crackdown on the country's illegal marijuana harvest -- possums. "They love it, absolutely love it," Detective John Nicholls, of Motueka, told the Nelson Evening Mail after returning from a week-long police and air force helicopter hunt for "pot plants" at the top of the South Island. He said one crop was "chewed to bits -- it was the worst I've ever seen." Growers use electric fences, cyanide paste and traps to keep out the furry animals which are protected in their native Australia but are officially declared a pest in New Zealand where they ravage trees and food crops.

■ Malaysia
Woman has eye of the tiger
A female tapper, working in a rubber estate in the central state of Pahang, escaped death when she engaged a tiger in a staring match in which the predator was the loser, a newspaper report said yesterday. "I was tapping a tree and was not aware of the tiger until it sank its teeth on my thigh," said Kaliyama, 57, who lived to relate her story to the Mandarin-language Sin Chiew national daily. "Being caught in an awkward position, with hands held high, all I could do was to shout ama ... ama." At this juncture, the tiger released its hold on her and stared at her instead. The staring match lasted several minutes with the tiger finally disappearing into the estate.

■ Germany
Dopey man charged
A 52-year-old man from the town of Darmstadt tried in vain to get a refund for 400 euros (US$475) worth of what he said was "bad marijuana" from his dealer before turning to the police for help, according to authorities. The police then charged the man with violating drugs possession laws and confiscated the 200g of marijuana he brought with him to the police station, according to a report in the Bild am Sonntag newspaper on Sunday. "It is un-usable," the man told police in the hope they would help him get his money back. Amounts of up to 30g of marijuana are allowed in most German states for private consumption.

■ United Kingdom
Brits pay price of texting
Mobile telephone text messaging has become so popular in Britain that millions of users now suffer injuries to their thumbs and fingers because of their love of keeping in touch, according to a survey yesterday. Over 93.5 million text messages are sent every day but all this digit action has lead to an explosion in people reporting cases of repetitive strain injury (RSI). 38 percent more people suffer from sore wrists and thumbs due to texting than five years ago and 3.8 million people now complain of text-related injuries every year.

■ United Kingdom
Technology hinders drivers
Fiddling around with in-car satellite navigation systems is causing motorists to lose concentration on the road, according to a survey yesterday. The new technology, rather than helping motorists, could be even more distracting than trying to read a map at the wheel, it added. One in 10 motorists with navigation systems set off on their journeys without bothering to program their route, and more than half admitted they then had to take their eyes off the road to input the details whilst driving. The survey of almost 2,000 people by Privilege Insurance found 19 percent of drivers who used their navigation system lost concentration compared to 17 percent reading a map.

■ United Kingdom
Police quiz actors
Four actors who play al-Qaeda suspects in a British movie that won a prestigious prize were detained by police at London-Luton airport as they returned from the Berlin Film Festival and questioned under anti-terror laws, alongside two of the former terrorism suspects they play on screen. They were returning last Thursday after the premiere of the film, The Road to Guantanamo. The film won the Silver Bear award for direction at Berlin on Sunday. Released in Britain next month, it depicts the alleged shackling, torture and other ill treatment a group of British detainees claim they suffered at the hands of the Americans.

■ United Kingdom
Diplomats deny BBC report
The Foreign Office on Monday denied a BBC report that worries about Thailand's reputation as a tourism destination stopped them from mentioning in a travel advisory how many British tourists were murdered in the country. After the New Year's Day death of Katherine Horton, diplomats considered revising the travel advisory for Thailand, according to e-mails the BBC said it obtained. But they worried there could be a "disproportionate impact" on Thailand's reputation if the murders were prominently mentioned. The Foreign Office said that economics are not a consideration when it comes to travel advice.

■ Bolivia
Reconciliation moves begin
La Paz on Monday said it had started a process aimed at improving relations with archrival Chile after the two countries broke off diplomatic ties nearly 30 years ago. The neighbors' conflict dates back to a 19th century war in which Chile won mineral-rich coastal territory, leaving Bolivia with no access to the Pacific Ocean. "A process has been started to carry forward a review and a study of the bilateral agenda between Bolivia and Chile," Bolivian Deputy Foreign Minister Mauricio Dorfler said. He added that Bolivian access to the ocean was an "objective that cannot be renounced."

■ Honduras
Killers send grim message
Unidentified killers shot dead a gang member and attached a note to his corpse criticizing talks planned between Honduras' government and two ultra-violent gangs terrorizing the country. The tattooed body of a 37-year-old member of the Mara 18 gang was found near a Roman Catholic seminary on the outskirts of the capital Tegucigalpa on Monday, said a police chief. The corpse had been dragged through the streets on a rope. A white placard attached to the body read: "If the government wants to negotiate with the gangs, we don't; we will continue with a clenched fist." Human rights groups have in the past attributed execution-style killings of gang members to right-wing death squads believed to operate in the country.

■ Canada
Defense treaty expanded
The North American defense treaty between the US and Canada will be expanded to include maritime surveillance, Ottawa's newly appointed defense minister said on Monday. Defense Minister Gordon O'Connor said the existing agreement on continental air defense -- the North American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD -- said the joint maritime surveillance would not compromise Canada's control over its own military. He also emphasized the expanded treaty would not lead to automatic adoption of the Bush administration's plans to establish a ballistic missile defense shield. The expanded treaty is expected to be signed in May.

■ Brazil
Jagger's visit frightens son
Mick Jagger, visited his Brazilian son at school on Monday in Sao Paulo, eyewitnesses said, two days after his band performed a free concert for more than a million fans on Copacabana beach. The mother of Jagger's six-year-old child, Lucas, is Luciana Gimenez, a Brazilian model turned TV host. Lucas attends St. Paul's, an exclusive British school in Sao Paulo. The rock star's visit caused a commotion of fans and photographers that frightened the child, seen crying while leaving the school with his mother.

■ Argentina
Bosnian Serb extradited
A Bosnian Serb war criminal accused of leading a paramilitary group that killed dozens of Muslims during the Bosnian war was transferred from Argentina to face charges at a UN war crimes court, an Argentine official said on Monday. Milan Lukic, who had been on the run for nearly five years, was arrested in Buenos Aires on Aug. 8 last year. The UN charges against Lukic include beatings, mass executions and barricading groups of Bosnian women and children into houses that were later set on fire and shooting anyone who tried to escape. He was convicted in absentia last year by a Belgrade court for the 1992 murders of 16 Muslims and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

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