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World News Quick Take

■ Indonesia
Bali bombing film banned
Authorities on Bali island have banned a film about the 2002 nightclub bombings, saying allowing the movie to be shown in cinemas there would reopen old wounds. "It is still too soon for the Balinese to watch this," said I Gusti Ngurah Gede, head of the island's film censorship board, on Sunday. Long Road to Heaven, which has been shown at cinemas elsewhere in Indonesia, offers an unflinching look at the bombings and the motivation of the Indonesian and Malaysian Islamic militants who planned and carried them out. The Oct. 12, 2002, suicide attacks on two nightclubs killed 202 people, mostly foreign tourists.

■ Australia
Man pelted with puppies
A man was in a serious condition in hospital after he was stabbed and pelted with puppies when he tried to stop thieves stealing rare dogs, police said on yesterday. The man found an intruder stealing dogs when he returned with a friend to her home in suburban Melbourne late on Sunday. "They saw a man running out of the premises with five jack russell cross dachshund puppies," police spokesman Adam West said. The thief was attempting to drive off with the dogs when the man ran up to the car and began kicking it. The intruder responded by throwing two of the puppies at him. "Another man got out of the car and stabbed him, causing serious injuries," AP quoted West as saying.

■ Australia
Hanson to run for Senate
Pauline Hanson, a former right-wing lawmaker who shot to popularity in the 1990s on a policy of curbing Asian migration to Australia, announced yesterday she will run for a federal Senate seat. Hanson told reporters she will stand as an independent candidate in Queensland in federal elections due later this year. The outspoken 52-year-old, who famously warned that Australia was "in danger of being swamped by Asians" during her maiden speech to parliament in 1996, has said immigration will be among her top priorities if she is returned to office.

■ India
Train bomb details emerge
Detectives probing the deaths of 68 people aboard the India-Pakistan Friendship Express have found that a total of six bombs were planted in three carriages, a report said yesterday. The police have also lifted a clear set of fingerprints from one of the two unexploded devices, the Indian Express said. All the bombs were hidden in suitcases left by the entrances of the carriages, effectively sealing escape routes, it said. While four bombs exploded in two carriages -- charring to death 68 passengers and injuring 12 on the night of Feb. 18 -- two other devices in the third carriage did not explode. Indian police last week detained seven people for questioning.

■ Australia
Teach brewer's droop: study
Schoolboys should be taught that binge drinking undermines their sexual performance, because other warnings about boozing have had no effect, a study said yesterday. A trial of a school alcohol program featuring a cartoon-based teenage drama found that only girls changed their behavior, the study by the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre said. "There's so much hero status in almost every aspect of male drinking that what we're teaching them isn't having an impact," researcher Laura Vogl said. "If we included something like erectile dysfunction then we'd have a chance of making drinking look negative," the researcher was quoted as saying.

■ Australia
Animal rights groups beware
The government plans to change federal law to help sheep farmers sue for damages over an animal rights group's peaceful campaign to prevent the sale of Australian wool, a government minister said yesterday. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, are lobbying clothing chains and fashion houses to stop using Australian wool because they claim the sheep are subjected to cruelty. The US-based group is opposed to mulesing -- the slicing away without anesthetic -- of folds of skin from a merino sheep's rump to prevent maggot infestations.

■ Australia
Lawyers seek release
A team of lawyers yesterday launched a court action to force the government to bring home a detainee held in the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. Lawyers for David Hicks argued that the government has breached its duty by failing to ensure a fair trial for the Muslim convert, who has been held without trial for more than five years. Government lawyers told a Federal Court judge, however, that while the government may have a moral obligation to assist Australians abroad, there was no legal basis for the case. Dubbed the "Australian Taliban," Hicks was captured in Afghanistan in late 2001.

■ Netherlands
Eurotunnel compensated
A court gave a damages ruling in favor of channel tunnel operator Eurotunnel against Britain and France yesterday over costs arising from the presence of illegal immigrants in the tunnel. Eurotunnel had claimed damages of about £30 million (US$58.9 million) for delays to services caused by immigrants from a French center at Sangatte, in northern France, who were trying to get to Britain via the tunnel. It also challenged bills from the British authorities for the cost of detaining and returning illegal immigrants who had arrived in Britain via the tunnel.

■ China
Ad seeks beating proxy
A Chinese businessman has advertised on the Internet for a stand-in mistress to be beaten up by his wife to vent her anger and to protect his real mistress, Chinese media reported yesterday. "When the woman found out her husband had a mistress, she insisted on beating her up," the Beijing Youth Daily said, citing the advertisement posted on a popular online jobs forum. More than 10 people had applied for the job, the newspaper said. The "successful" candidate would be 35 and originally from northeastern China and would be paid 3,000 yuan (US$400) per 10 minutes, it said.

■ Senegal
President declares victory
President Abdoulaye Wade yesterday claimed he had won a second mandate in the presidential vote on Sunday, but his assertion was challenged by opponents. "We have largely won in the first round. They are the first strong and unchanging trends," Cheikh Diallo, head of public relations for Wade, said yesterday. Prime Minister Macky Sall, who is also Wade's campaign manager, said that partial and unofficial results showed that octogenarian had garnered 57 percent of the votes. Many of his challengers have said only electoral fraud would make it possible for him to win outright in the first round.

■ Saudi Arabia
Envoy talks of political myth
The Bush administration's talk of breaking its dependency on foreign oil is a political myth, Saudi Arabia's former envoy to Washington and royal family member said on Sunday in Jeddah. "It has become very fashionable for [US] politicians to use the word `energy independence' or `independence from foreign oil,' and that is basically a political canard politicians and technocrats use," Prince Turki al-Faisal told an economic forum. Energy has been made into "a sensitive and a controversial political issue particularly in countries like the United States," Prince Turki said in his first public appearance after ending a relatively brief mandate in Washington.

■ Cyprus
`Baby bonus' proposed
A proposal by the government to pay women a US$47,000 "baby bonus" for a third child has resulted in a flood of inquiries about abortions from women considering delaying having a baby, members of parliament (MPs)said. Prospective mothers wanting to cash in on the windfall -- aimed at reversing the island's declining birthrate -- have deluged politicians and the local media, following the offer of the premium for a third child. "It's really bad. Pregnant women are calling in wondering whether they should have abortions now that they've heard about this very generous bonus," conservative MP Maria Kyriacou said.

■ Russia
Hamas leader arrives
Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal arrived in Moscow yesterday for talks aimed at capitalizing on differences among the Quartet of Middle East negotiators over how to deal with the Palestinian government. "Our goal is to encourage the international community to start cooperation with the Palestinian government and pressurise Israel to recognize the Palestinian state's right to exist," RIA Novosti news agency quoted him as saying. "We value Russia's position towards lifting the blockade from which the Palestinian people suffer." Russia takes a softer line on the Islamist Hamas than the US and the EU, which along with the UN make up the Quartet.

■ United States
Boy escapes kidnappers
A 13-year-old boy in Miami, Florida, bound to a tree in the woods, foiled a kidnapping-for-ransom plan by using a safety pin, his teeth and his hands to escape, police said. Investigators searched a house in the western Florida city of Bradenton early on Sunday and issued an arrest warrant for Vicente Ignacio Beltran Moreno, 22, a native of Mexico. Authorities believe he has fled the state. On Friday morning, about a dozen children at a school bus stop watched as Clay Moore was forced at gunpoint into a red pickup truck, police said. It appeared the boy was chosen randomly from the group of children in Parrish, a town about 48km southeast of St. Petersburg.

■ United States
Death at zoo investigated
Officials in Denver, Colorado, were trying to determine why a zookeeper killed by a jaguar had opened the door to the animal's enclosure when zoo policies ban staff members from entering exhibits when big cats are inside. The Denver Zoo's feline exhibits were closed on Sunday for the investigation. Zoo officials also were interviewing staff members to determine what happened. The zookeeper, 27-year-old Ashlee Pfaff, had opened a door leading from a service area into a jaguar enclosure on Saturday. Under zoo policy, staff cannot be in any large cat exhibit when the animal is there.

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