World News Quick Take

■ Pakistan
Muslim leader arrested
Police Sunday arrested a member of an outlawed Shiite Muslim militant group for his suspected involvement in the killings of several senior clerics from the rival Sunni sect, an official said. Ammar Raza Naqvi, an alleged member of the Sipah-e-Mohammed organization, was arrested in a raid on a hideout in Karachi's eastern Malir neighborhood, a senior police officer in Karachi said. Police seized an assault rifle, one pistol and two grenades during the raid while three other men, suspected to be Naqvi's accomplices, fled, the officer said.

■ Pakistan
Suspected US spy killed
Suspected Islamic militants shot dead a Pakistani tribesman whom they accused of spying for the US, in a tribal region bordering Afghanistan, an intelligence official said yesterday. Villagers found the man's body by the side of a road near Satar Sarobi, a village south of Miran Shah, the main town in North Waziristan tribal area, the official said. The victim had been shot in the head and chest and a note written in the local Pashto language that was left with the body warned, "Those who spy for America will meet the same end."

■ India
Maoist rebels kill four
Suspected rebels shot and killed a lawmaker, two of his bodyguards and a civilian at a soccer match in Jharkhand state, an official said. Sunil Mahato, 38, was watching the game as part of celebrations to mark the Hindu festival of Holi in the town of Bakudia late on Sunday when the gunmen opened fire, Jharkhand Chief Minister Madhu Koda told reporters. Mahato was hit by seven bullets, local police chief Pankaj Darad said. Eyewitnesses said that 15 gunmen were involved in the attack. Officials blamed Maoist rebels, known as Naxalites from the Naxalbari region where the movement was born, for killing Mahato, who was the General-Secretary of Jharkhand Mukti Morcha party and a member of parliament.

■ New Zealand
Two convicted of rape
Two men were sentenced to prison yesterday for rape and child sex abuse that went on for decades on remote Pitcairn Island, home to a handful of descendants of the HMS Bounty mutineers. Brian Michael John Young, 53, was sentenced yesterday in the Pitcairn Supreme Court sitting in Auckland, New Zealand to six-and-a-half years in prison after being convicted earlier on six counts of rape and three counts of indecent assault. Shawn Brent Christian, 31, was sentenced to three-and-a-half years in prison on two charges of rape and one of aiding and abetting rape.

■ Vanuatu
State of emergency declared
A state of emergency was declared yesterday after ethnic clashes at a squatter settlement, reportedly over claims of witchcraft, left two men dead and eight in hospital, officials said. Armed police arrested more than 100 people after the violence broke out on Saturday at the Blacksands settlement that houses thousands of people outside the capital, Port Vila and were maintaining a heavy presence there to prevent further violence, police spokesman Willie Ben said. Dozens of armed personnel from the Vanuatu Mobile Force were at the Blacksands settlement yesterday where arrests for unlawful assembly, assault and property damage were continuing, Ben said.

■ France
Jets fire on rebels in Birao
French Mirage jets fired on Sunday on rebels who attacked a small group of French military advisers in the Central African Republic, causing an unspecified number of rebel casualties, a Defense Ministry official said. Firing cannon and dropping bombs, the planes destroyed several pickup trucks used by rebels who had attacked a military compound where the French contingent is stationed near the town of Birao, said Commander Christophe Prazuck. No French soldiers were injured, but there "surely" were injuries among the rebels, he said, adding that a damage assessment had not been completed. At least two rebels were killed, a rebel spokesman in Birao said. The exchange of fire came a day after rebels re-entered the town.

■ United Kingdom
Algerian tycoon arrested
British arrested and released on bail exiled Algerian tycoon Abdelmoumen Rafik Khalifa on suspicion of money laundering, police said on Sunday. Khalifa, 40, is being tried in absentia in Algeria as the main defendant among 104 people on trial over the collapse of the country's largest private bank four years ago. Algeria is seeking his extradition from Britain. Khalifa, the former head and founder of the defunct Khalifa Bank, fled to London in 2003. The case centers on allegations that 3.2 billion Algerian dinars (US$47.6 million) in funds went missing from the bank's accounts.

■ Algeria
Militants attack checkpoint
Suspected Islamic militants attacked a police checkpoint with rocket-propelled grenades and machine guns on Sunday, killing five officers and injuring three others, according to a newspaper report. The Kabylie region, east of the capital Algiers, has faced a recent upsurge of violence by a Salafist group that claims ties to al-Qaeda, including seven car bombings on Feb. 13. In Sunday's attack, assailants are said to have fired a grenade on a police sport utility vehicle at a key highway crossroads as officers were changing shifts, setting the vehicle ablaze, daily Liberte reported. A second SUV came under machine-gun fire.

■ Switzerland
Avalanches kill three
Avalanches three skiers in the Alps on Sunday following days of heavy snow, authorities said. All the accidents occurred away from prepared slopes and trails in widely separated parts of the country. None of the victims were identified. The deaths raised the avalanche death toll for this season to nine. The Swiss Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research in Davos said avalanche danger remains high, especially at higher elevations where wind has drifted snow.

■ Russia
Avalanche kills child
An at the nation's best-known ski resort killed a 10-year-old child on Sunday and trapped at least three other people, the Emergency Situations Ministry said. The avalanche took place at Krasnaya Polyana, one of the ski centers that is part of Russia's bid for the 2014 Winter Olympics, in the Caucasus Mountains about 45km east of the Black Sea resort city of Sochi. Sergei Petrov, a spokesman for the emergency ministry's southern district, said the avalanche swept the four people off a chairlift. The resort is visited annually by Russian President Vladimir Putin for a skiing holiday.

■ United States
Teens arrested for video
Two Texas teenagers were arrested after police found a video of them showing two children how to smoke marijuana, authorities said. Fort Worth police found the video on Feb. 22, while investigating Demetris McCoy, 17, and Vanswan Polty, 18, in connection with some burglaries. In the video, the children are called "potheads" and a man can be seen placing a marijuana cigarette into a baby's mouth. In another part of the video a boy is seen smoking on his own.

■ United States
Suitcase killer goes on trial
A New Jersey woman accused of killing and dismembering her husband, whose remains were found in suitcases that washed up along a beach, was due to go on trial starting yesterday. Melanie McGuire is charged with first-degree murder in the April 2004 killing of her husband, William McGuire, 39. She pleaded not guilty and has remained free on US$2.1 million bail. Her trial was scheduled to open yesterday at Middlesex County Courthouse in New Brunswick.

■ United States
Fugitive found in the snow
Wearing coat nor shoes, a fugitive suspected of killing and dismembering his wife was found hiding under a fallen tree in a snowbound park after a bitterly cold night on the run. Stephen Grant had been the subject of a manhunt since police in Michegan, discovered a torso in the couple's garage and other body parts they say are of his wife, Tara Lynn Grant, in and around the home. Grant, had maintained his innocence in his wife's disappearance last month but went missing before police searched the home on Friday and Saturday. "I don't think he probably could have made it much longer in those kind of conditions," Emmet County Sheriff Pete Wallin said.