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World News Quick Take

■ China
Baby seller gets 15 years
A woman has been sentenced to 15 years in prison for brokering the sale of newborn infants, a newspaper reported yesterday. Li Xiulian acted as an agent in the sale of eight babies, five of whom have never been recovered, the Shanghai Daily said. Li earned a profit of up to 1,000 yuan (US$125) from each baby sold, the paper said. Most of the infants were born in violation of family planning rules that limit most couples to one or two children, the report said. The paper didn't identify any of the buyers.

■ China
Warship auction a flop
The Chinese owners of a Soviet-built aircraft carrier-turned-theme park called off an auction after it failed to attract the minimum bid for the former warship, the China Daily reported yesterday. The carrier Minsk was put up for sale after a company that bought it and turned it into a floating theme park in the southern city of Shenzhen went bankrupt. An auction on Wednesday drew three bidders, but was cut short when none offered the minimum required bid of 128.3 million yuan (US$16 million), it said.

■ Hong Kong
Vatican softens stance
The Vatican may make concessions on the issue of appointing Chinese bishops, Hong Kong's newly appointed cardinal, Joseph Zen (陳日君), said yesterday. Zen also said the Vatican and China have begun talks to re-establish diplomatic ties, Hong Kong's Cable TV network reported. Zen was in Rome preparing to meet Pope Benedict XVI later yesterday. "The Vatican may make concessions and let China give its opinion, but it won't let Beijing have total say," he said.

■ Japan
Nuclear plant fire probed
Investigators yesterday were looking into what caused a four-hour blaze at a nuclear power plant in western Japan that left two employees slightly injured. No radiation leaked from the Oi power plant in Fukui prefecture during Wednesday's fire, but two workers were hospitalized with smoke inhalation injuries, authorities said. The cause of the blaze was under investigation, but it seemed to have started in the waste incineration part of the plant, Manabu Kobana, of the plant's operator, Kansai Electric Power Co, said on Wednesday.

■ Pakistan
Bazaar bomb injures eight
A homemade bomb ripped through a town bazaar in southwestern Pakistan yesterday, seriously injuring two boys, aged nine and 11, and six other people, an official said. The bomb was hidden in a plastic shopping bag and planted near a public telephone booth in Kohlu, a town about 300km east of the Baluchistan provincial capital of Quetta, local government official Nasim Lehri said. No one claimed responsibility immediately for the explosion but Lehri blamed local tribesmen, who have been accused of rocket attacks on security forces and bombings targeting railroads and gas pipelines.

■ Japan
Police probe N Korean office
Police investigating the alleged 1980 kidnapping of a Japanese man by North Korean agents searched the offices of a group affiliated with North Korea's de facto embassy in Japan yesterday, a news report said. Investigators searched the Osaka offices of the Chamber of Commerce of North Koreans in Japan in connection with the abduction of Tadaaki Hara, Kyodo News agency reported, citing police sources. Hara was 43 when he disappeared from a beach resort in southern Japan in 1980, and investigators believe he was abducted by North Korean agents. North Korea has admitted kidnapping other Japanese nationals, but says it has no record of Hara ever entering the communist state.

■ India
Re-arrests ordered in killing
Delhi's High Court ordered a politician's son and eight other men re-arrested on Wednesday, weeks after they were acquitted in the fatal shooting of an Indian model seven years ago. The 34-year-old model, Jessica Lall, died while working as a bartender at a private party in 1999. Prosecutors said Manu Sharma, the son of a powerful ruling Congress party politician, shot her after she had refused to serve him a drink because the bar was closed. But the prosecution's case fell apart in the trials court as key witnesses retracted statements linking Sharma to the death.

■ Indonesia
Papua landslide kills three
A landslide killed three people and injured many more on yesterday near a mine run by US firm Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold in Indonesia's Papua Province, police said. The incident came as the mine is under fire over its environmental practices. Four policemen and a soldier were killed last Thursday in Jayapura in clashes with protesters demanding the closure of the mine. The mud crashed into a dining area catering for Freeport workers in the compound, Freeport spokesman Siddharta Moersjid said, adding the incident did not take place in the mine. He said two of Freeport's sub-contracted Indonesian workers died in the slide, but Timika police chief Dedy Djunaedy put the death toll at three.

■ Chile
Tourists die in bus crash
Twelve elderly US tourists are confirmed to have been killed in a road accident in northern Chile when a minibus they were traveling in plunged into a ravine, Chilean authorities said yesterday. Earlier reports indicated that as many as 11 US citizens died in the accident, which occurred on Wednesday. The bus was taking the US tourists from a cruise ship anchored in Arica, on the northern border with Peru, to the Lauca National Park, located some 160km to the east in the Andes. The authorities said yesterday that four people -- two US tourists and two Chileans -- had survived the accident with injuries. Initial reports had said five people were injured in the tragedy. The crash victims' bodies are expected to be transported to Lima today in preparation for repatriation to the US.

■ United Kingdom
Terrorism bill passed
Prime Minister Tony Blair's government on Wednesday overcame resistance to a bill barring the glorification of terrorism, a measure he says is crucial to fighting militant ideologies. The House of Lords, which had repeatedly rejected the measure, dropped its opposition, fearing the impact on security of holding up other anti-terror provisions in the bill for too long. Peers voted 172 to 112 against an amendment which would have removed any reference to glorification from the bill, meaning the legislation, introduced after last July's London bomb attacks, will become law. The vote came after the Conservative Party decided to change its position and back the glorification provision. Lord Kingsland, a Tory spokesman, said peers would have the chance to revisit the issue next year.

■ Russia
Breakaway wants back in
The leader of Georgia's Moscow-backed breakaway region of South Ossetia said on Wednesday that his territory will ask to be recognized as part of Russia. "We intend to shortly lodge a petition with the Russian Constitutional Court because there are historical documents about Ossetia's status as part of Russia," Eduard Kokoity said in comments shown on Russian state television. Speaking on a visit to North Ossetia, which is a Russian region, he said that Ossetia as a whole had historically been part of Russia since the 18th century. South Ossetia has run its own affairs since breaking away from Georgian control in an 18-month war that ended in 1992. South Ossetia and another separatist province, Abkhazia, have close ties with Moscow, which has granted Russian citizenship to many of their residents.

■ Russia
Teenager acquitted
A jury on Wednesday acquitted a teenager accused of murdering a nine-year-old Tajik girl two years ago in St. Petersburg, one of the most shocking hate crimes in recent years, news agencies reported. Of the eight charged with the February 2004 beating and stabbing death of Khursheda Sultonova, seven were found guilty of hooliganism by the St. Petersburg jury on Wednesday. But the jury cleared the main defendant of murder. The girl's father and his nephew were also wounded in the attack. The teenager charged with the hate crime had pleaded innocent, saying an earlier confession he made to police was made under psychological and physical pressure.

■ Canada
Worker seeks better life
A bored Canadian bureaucrat fed up with office drudgery is seeking C$1 million (US$860,000) in donations so he can quit his job and "do something that makes a difference in my life and the lives of others." The unnamed man, who claims to have worked for a large civil service organization for over 10 years, has set up a Web site -- saveabureaucrat.com -- on which he explains he is desperate to escape his job. Despite promising not to spend donations on "Rolls-Royce cars, 10 bedroom houses, airplanes", the bored civil servant has quite a way to go. As of Wednesday morning, five sympathetic souls had sent in a total of just C$59.26.

■ United states
Central Park coyote caught
A coyote that came to New York to dine on duck in Central Park was caught on Wednesday after leading police and park rangers on a two-day chase. The coyote, a year-old, tawny-colored male, which is thought to have made its way to the city from the countryside to the north, was tracked down near 79th Street inside the 341-hectare park, officials said. "He's a very adventurous coyote to travel to midtown Manhattan," Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe told reporters. He said the animal was cornered in the southeast section of the park early on Wednesday before escaping over a 2m fence and crossing some water to make its way north.

■ Canada
Aussie ad banned again
First it was banned by Britain for its use of the word "bloody" and now Canada has vetoed a scene in a controversial Australian tourism campaign where a character lures visitors by saying "We've poured you a beer." Just days after Britain's television advertising regulator lifted its ban on the ad, which centers on the slightly risque phrase "bloody hell," Australian Tourism Minister Fran Bailey said Canadian regulators had now lost their sense of humor. "Buying a mate a beer is about as Australian as you can get. But the Canadian regulator has banned the shot because implied unbranded alcohol consumption [a part-empty beer glass] is unacceptable," Bailey said in a statement.

■ United states
Centenarian retires
After more than three-quarters of a century working for public transit agencies, a Los Angeles bus maintenance worker will retire on Wednesday on his 100th birthday. For decades, Arthur Winston reported to work at a bus yard at the crack of dawn. By 6am he would be supervising a crew of workers as they cleaned and refueled the region's bus fleet. "I'm kind of nervous about leaving the job, I've been doing it for so long," Winston said. He has missed only one day of work in his entire career, transit officials say. That was in 1988, when his wife died.

■ United States
Marooned family rescued
A family who disappeared in a remote mountain area were safely back at home on Wednesday after spending nearly three weeks marooned in their snow-bound motor home. The Stivers family van was stuck in more than a meter of snow after sliding off a road in south-western Oregon. They survived by rationing dried food and drinking snow using propane to heat the van. While the area was too remote to have mobile phone reception, they monitored their plight on their television set. On Monday, when news stations reported that rescue teams had called off the search for the lost family, the husband and his wife decided to strike out on foot.

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