■ India
Couple `sacrifice' offspring
Police in eastern India yesterday said that they have arrested a couple for allegedly sacrificing their young sons to please the gods. "It seems like a case of child sacrifice attached to tantric rituals," police superintendent Ravi Kant said in Orissa State, where the incident happened. Police said they had collected evidence of occult practices from the couple's house. Residents of the area told police that the couple had been advised by a tantric practitioner that they should offer their sons, aged seven and nine, to please the gods for luck and prosperity. The couple denied the charges.
■ China
Bomb kills two children
A roadside bomb in Shenzhen killed two children who found the explosive wrapped in a package and began playing with it, Hong Kong media reported yesterday. Before the blast on Wednesday afternoon, residents said they had received threatening phone calls and police thought the attack might be related to an unspecified grievance in the neighborhood, the Ming Pao Daily reported, citing unidentified sources. The two children who died were five and eight years old, and a nine-year-old boy was hospitalized, the paper said.
■ Vietnam
Medical checkup blocked
Police have prevented a leader of a banned Buddhist organization from visiting his hospital for a medical checkup, a Paris-based pro-democracy group said yesterday. Thich Huyen Quang, 87, patriarch of the outlawed Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam (UBCV), was stopped last month from traveling to Ho Chi Minh City, the International Buddhist Information Bureau said. Quang has been under house arrest for more than two decades.
■ Philippines
US military pact review
The government said yesterday it was prepared to amend certain provisions of a 1998 military pact with the US following public uproar involving a US marine convicted of rape. Manila and Washington have both "learned good lessons" from the case of Lance Corporal Daniel Smith, which has ignited anti-US sentiment and street protests in this former US colony and tested bilateral relations, presidential spokesman Igancio Bunye said. Smith was convicted in December of raping a woman in 2005 and sentenced to 40 years in jail. Manila is "resolved to review the VFA," Bunye said.
■ Nepal
Police stations restored
Communist rebels said they will allow the government to restore hundreds of police stations across the country that were removed during years of insurgency, in a move to facilitate elections scheduled for this year. In a statement issued late on Wednesday, Maoist rebel leader Prachanda said he has issued orders to his activists to allow the government to re-staff these police stations, most of which are in rural areas. Prachanda, whose real name is Pushpa Kamal Dahal, said the decision was made to help "create conducive environment that would lead to elections later this year."
■ Philippines
Traffic collision kills 12
The death toll in a collision between a cargo truck and a minibus carrying partygoers from a beach in the north rose to 12, police said yesterday. Officials initially reported eight dead and 17 injured when the minibus, overloaded with 30 mostly teenage passengers, lost control and hit the truck on Wednesday along a highway near Bauang, about 240km north of Manila. Superintendent Pedro Obaldo said four of the injured later died in a hospital. Another 13 passengers were being treated for injuries, he said. The minibus passengers were hurled outside as the force of the impact ripped apart two wheels, causing the vehicle to split into pieces, Obaldo said.
■ South Korea
Kidnap victim begs for help
A fisherman who was kidnapped by North Korea 31 years ago has escaped to China and is begging for help to return home to the South, an aid group for victims' families said yesterday. The case of Choi Uk-il highlighted the plight of almost 500 South Koreans said by Seoul to have been kidnapped over the past half-century. Relatives yesterday began tying yellow handkerchiefs to trees near the inter-Korean border to dramatize their concern. "I want to return home as soon as possible and live together with my family. Please help me go back to my homeland," Choi, 67, was quoted as saying.
■ United Kingdom
Woman to join Beefeaters
The guardians of the historic Tower of London are enlisting girl power for the first time in their 522-year history. The Tower's Yeoman Warders, known as Beefeaters -- whose ceremonial dress is a distinctive scarlet and gold tunic, white ruff, red stockings and black patent shoes -- have appointed a female member. "There were six candidates -- five were male and she was the only female," spokeswoman Natasha Woollard said. Woollard said the woman, whose name has not yet been made public, was serving in the armed forces and "will join her new colleagues in the Yeoman Body at the Tower of London in summer 2007."
■ United Kingdom
KFC ads criticized
Fast food chain KFC was criticized by the advertising watchdog on Wednesday for misleading customers over a promotion for cheap chicken drumsticks. The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) said posters offering "Spicy Zinger" chicken for ?0.50 failed to make clear that the deal was open only to people who also bought a complete meal. The watchdog upheld complaints from three people, saying small print explaining the promotion was not clear enough. It ordered KFC to state terms and conditions more clearly in future.
■ France
Soup kitchen discriminates
A court ruled on Tuesday that an organization with far-right links can continue offering pork soup to the homeless, rejecting police complaints that the food distribution was racist. Police banned the soup kitchen last month, arguing that the handouts were designed against Jews and Muslims, who do not eat pork. The administrative court said the distribution was "clearly discriminatory," but could not be stopped. The mayor of Paris condemned the ruling and urged the police to appeal the ruling. "Faced by this initiative which stinks of xenophobia, I want once again to express city hall's desire to fight all forms of discrimination, racism and anti-Semitism," Mayor Bertrand Delanoe said.
■ Sweden
Green navigation system
A new satellite navigation system developed by engineers at Lund Institute of Technology could be the ideal gadget for easing the guilt of gas-guzzling motorists. It picks out the greenest route to drive. While other systems find the most direct or fastest route, the new system plots the most fuel-efficient route by checking roads for traffic lights, junctions, speed limits and the tendency for traffic jams. Early tests suggest that taking more eco-friendly routes cut motorists' average fuel usage by 8.2 percent. The prototype was developed using a database holding details of car trips around Lund.
■ Zimbabwe
Private media stays open
The media regulatory board will not close down two popular private newspapers, even if their owner loses his citizenship in the country, state television reported on Wednesday. Prominent businessman Trevor Ncube, who publishes the Standard and the Independent, has been stripped of his citizenship because the authorities say he is a Zambian citizen by descent. Ncube is currently challenging the decision to strip him of his citizenship. There were fears that the authorities might use Ncube's loss of citizenship to close down his newspapers.
■ United States
Whitney holds fire sale
Looking for an Atelier Versace tan chiffon evening dress, beaded bustier or catsuit worn by Grammy-winning pop star Whitney Houston? Houston, one of the most celebrated pop artists of the 1980s and 1990s, is being forced to sell off clothes, instruments and sound equipment to pay a debt to a warehouse storing the items. The sale, to be held at A.J. Willner Auctions on Monday has been ordered by the New Jersey Superior Court. "Whitney is selling off at auction old tour equipment that is no longer in use," Houston's publicist, Nancy Seltzer, said in a statement.
■ United States
Busta busted
Rapper Busta Rhymes was under arrest after a man complained that the hip-hop star had beaten him up in a dispute over money, police said. Rhymes, 34, turned himself in and was booked on a misdemeanor assault charge at a Manhattan police station Wednesday night, police officer John Grimpel said. The rapper was to be taken to court overnight, Grimpel said. Grimpel said a man told police that Rhymes had punched and kicked him numerous times in a confrontation outside a lower Manhattan building on Dec. 26. The man, whose name was not released, was treated at a hospital after the incident, Grimpel said.
■ United States
Woman charged with neglect
A woman was charged with neglect on Wednesday after prosecutors said she allowed her three-year-old son to wander away from home and play along a busy interstate highway. Stunned motorists found Damon Dyer, barefoot and wearing only a diaper and T-shirt, early on Saturday while his mother slept in a nearby apartment on Indianapolis' west side. Police said at least half a dozen cars and a semitrailer swerved into other lanes on Interstate 465 to avoid the child, who was not hurt. Drivers pulled over and took care of him until officers arrived. Nancy Dyer, 30, was charged with four counts of felony neglect.
■ United States
Gerald Ford laid to rest
Former US President Gerald Ford was laid to rest on the grounds of his presidential museum after eight days of mourning and remembrance that spanned the country, from the California desert to the US capital and back to Ford's boyhood home. The burial service at sunset capped the official mourning for the 38th president, whose casket traveled more than 4,350km before reaching its final stop on a hill overlooking a river at the museum in Ford's hometown. At a graveside service that included a 21-gun salute and a 21-aircraft flyover, Vice President Dick Cheney presented former first lady Betty Ford with the US flag that was draped over her husband's casket.
■ Brazil
Rio launches elite police unit
New Rio de Janeiro Governor Sergio Cabral said on Wednesday an elite police unit would soon take the lead in fighting a bloody crime wave in the state that has killed 24 people in a week. Cabral, 69, said the National Security Force would first patrol the state border to prevent arms, drug smuggling and criminals from fleeing, but that by mid-year it would also deploy in the state capital Rio de Janeiro. Besides an alarming rise in gang activity in the city, heavily armed gunmen lately have begun systematically attacking police stations, hospitals and even public transport, leaving 24 civilians, police and gang members killed in the past seven days.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
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