■ United States
Indian hackers charged
Three people from India were charged with hacking into brokerage accounts in the US as part of a scheme to pump up the value of their shares, officials said on Monday. An indictment charged the three with securities fraud, computer fraud, identity theft and other charges in connection with a high-tech "pump and dump" scheme that reaped millions of dollars. The Justice Department said two of the three had been arrested in Asia and were being held for extradition to a US federal court in Omaha, Nebraska. The case marked the first overseas arrests in connection with an online brokerage intrusion scheme perpetrated in the US, officials said.
■ United States
Zoo elephant to be removed
Ruby, the Los Angeles city zoo's oldest elephant, will be moved to an animal sanctuary after years of lobbying by animal-rights activists. "Today, after 20 years of living here, and over 25,000 pounds [11,339kg] of peanuts, I may add, we finally say goodbye," Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa told a Los Angeles Zoo news conference Monday to announce the move. "I've said very clearly that I believe elephants should be in sanctuaries, and not in zoos. But it's still a debate, it's a conversation that we gotta have. So what we've done here is create a balance," he said.
■ Colombia
Governor ordered arrested
Colombia's federal prosecutor in Bogota ordered the arrest on Monday of the governor of a northern province for his alleged links with the country's far-right militias. Chief prosecutor Mario Iguaran ordered the arrest of Trino Luna, governor of the province of Magdalena, said a spokesman for the prosecutor's office who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak about the case. Prosecutors are investigating links between Luna and the paramilitary leader Hernan Giraldo. A latecomer to the paramilitaries, Giraldo is alleged to have been one of the largest drug-traffickers in the country, exporting tons of cocaine from his stronghold in the Sierra Nevada along the country's Caribbean coast.
■ Gaza Strip
BBC reporter kidnapped
Palestinian security services were hunting yesterday for a BBC correspondent kidnapped at gunpoint by armed men in Gaza on Monday. Alan Johnston, 44, was forced from his car at gunpoint in Gaza City as he drove home from his office. Johnston, a Briton, has been reported from Gaza for the past three years, one of the few Western journalists to be permanently based in the territory. His posting was due to end next month. The Palestinian interior ministry and the presidency ordered all security services and police to search for the missing journalist.
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