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■ BANGLADESH

Sidr death toll rises

The death toll from the devastating Cyclone Sidr that crashed into the southern coast last Thursday rose yesterday, officials said. "The death toll has reached 3,447 and the number may rise again," said Major Kamrul Islam of the armed forces control room. Five days after the cyclone hit, the number of dead was still unclear as many of the areas affected were remote and had not yet been reached by officials. Many bodies were also washed away by a tidal wave caused by the storm.



■ CHINA

West Lake hunts wild pigs

One of the most popular tourist destinations in the country is waging a week-long campaign to hunt down wild pigs which have been frightening visitors, Xinhua news agency said yesterday. Professional hunting teams from the famed West Lake area of Hangzhou were under orders to shoot to kill the animals, Xinhua said. A regional official said the campaign began on Monday and that police would also get a piece of the action, as they were under orders to guard road junctions to prevent injuries from the pigs. No record of assaults or injuries caused by wild pigs inside the area is kept, but their presence was "not welcomed by locals and has hit tourism," Xinhua said.



■ INDIA

Maoists blow up track

Maoist insurgents blew up a railway track in Bihar yesterday, severely disrupting the rail network on the second day of protests over the killing of villagers in a land row. Dozens of trains were held up or canceled after the attack in Lakhisarai district, railway officials and police said. The rebels also shut down shops and blocked roads to protest against the violence in neighboring West Bengal's Nandigram area, which they blame on the communist-ruled state government. The communists lost control of Nandigram earlier this year after trying to force villagers off their land to make way for a chemicals complex. This month the communists forced their way back in, killing at least six villagers.



■ SRI LANKA

Military kills five Tigers

Soldiers attacked separatist Tamil Tiger rebel bunkers along front lines in the country's north yesterday, killing five guerrillas, the military said. The attack also destroyed two rebel bunkers in the village of Kilali, along the frontier between government and rebel-controlled territory, a defense ministry official said. Soldiers did not suffer casualties, he said. The government has intensified its military campaign against the Tigers, aiming to dismantle the rebels' de facto state in the north.



■ ITALY

Smoking ban angers some

Naples brought in tough anti-smoking measures on Monday, but not everyone was convinced that people in a city famed for flouting the law would stop lighting up in parks or near pregnant women. "However they try and enforce this, they will meet with laughter," Naples city Councilor Gennaro Capodanno said of the ban on smoking in parks, near pregnant women or children under 12 in public or during demonstrations. Neapolitans now risk a fine of up to 250 euros (US$366). The city council tightened legislation after health reports found the risk of lung cancer to be "significantly" higher there than elsewhere in the country.



■ ESTONIA

Unusual beauty contest

The government is planning a beauty contest with a difference to mark its 90th birthday next February: the world's prettiest language. Education Minister Tonis Lukas wants school pupils worldwide to record sentences of up to seven words for the contest, the Baltic News Service (BNS) agency said. "There's a story that a world championship of beautiful languages was once held in which Estonian took second place after Italian with the sentence `soida tasa ule silla,' or `go slowly over the bridge,'" Lukas said on Monday. "As part of the events for the anniversary of the republic, we're pleased to turn to other nations with a friendly call to check how our language sounds to others now."



■ NORWAY

School threat suspect held

Police held a suspect for questioning after video threats were made against a junior high school similar to those published before a school massacre in Finland, the media reported on Monday. The threats against Erdal junior high school were made in a video posted on the Web site YouTube, and had direct links to the Finnish shooting earlier this month, including a picture of the school. On Monday morning, all 280 pupils were searched and had to go through metal detectors before entering the school building. "We have a person in for questioning," Sheriff Odd Dale was quoted as telling a news conference. The detainee's identity or possible involvement in the case were not revealed in the reports.



■ NETHERLANDS

Frank tree chestnut for sale

An Amsterdam resident has put a chestnut that he says came from the tree that Anne Frank gazed upon while hiding from the Nazis on sale on e-Bay. "I had this idea for a few years, then I saw that the tree was in the news and I decided to put the chestnut up for auction," said 34-year-old Charles Kuijpers. Amsterdam officials have decided the 27-tonne tree was so diseased that the risk that the trunk could break was too great, and said that it would be removed today. Bids for the chestnut have reached US$700.



■ SPAIN

Car theft suspects arrested

Police arrested 27 people suspected of stealing luxury cars worth 4.5 million euros (US$6.6 million) and shipping them to North Africa and the Middle East, the Interior Ministry said on Monday. The suspects were arrested last Wednesday in six provinces. All of those detained are Moroccans, except for two Spaniards.



■ CANADA

Lawyer denies confession

The lawyer for a pig farmer accused of being the worst serial killer in the country's history opened the defense's final arguments by denying the man ever confessed to killing six women. Robert "Willie" Pickton went on trial in January on the first six of 26 charges of first-degree murder he faces in the deaths of women, most of them prostitutes and drug addicts from a seedy Vancouver neighborhood. Lawyer Adrian Brooks urged jurors on Monday to keep an open mind and reject the prosecutors' interpretation of what Pickton said. "This is nothing like a confession, it is not a confession at all," Brooks said.



■ VENEZUELA

Chavez excuses himself

President Hugo Chavez would not shut up for Spain's king but, over the weekend, he heeded a higher calling to stop talking -- his bladder. Surrounded by a throng of reporters at an OPEC summit in Saudi Arabia, Chavez, who enjoys the media spotlight and often answers questions at length, excused himself. "Look I have to go," he said in comments aired on state television. "For a while now, I have needed to go to the bathroom and I am going to pee ... Do you want me to pee on you?" King Juan Carlos set off a diplomatic spat that threatens Spanish investments in the country when he told Chavez at a summit in Chile earlier this month to "shut up."



■ UNITED STATES

Boys accused of rape

Three boys aged eight and nine were being held on Monday in a detention center on charges of raping an 11-year-old girl in the woods near a suburban Atlanta, Georgia, apartment complex, officials said. The alleged attack happened on Thursday and the girl's mother reported it to authorities on Sunday, Acworth police Captain Wayne Dennard said. "The juvenile victim stated that an eight-year-old boy and two nine-year-old boys that she had been playing with earlier pulled her into a wooded area, where one of the boys raped her," Dennard said. The three boys were charged with rape, kidnapping, false imprisonment and sexual assault.



■ UNITED STATES

Hate crime on the rise

Hate crime incidents rose last year by almost 8 percent, the FBI reported on Monday, as racial prejudice continued to account for more than half of the reported instances. Police reported 7,722 criminal incidents last year targeting victims or property as a result of prejudice against a particular race, religion, sexual orientation, ethnic or national origin or physical or mental disability. That was up 7.8 percent from the 7,163 incidents reported in 2005. Only 12,600 of the nation's more than 17,000 local, county, state and federal police agencies participated in the hate crime reporting program.



■ COLOMBIA

Makeshift submarine found

Marines seized a makeshift submarine capable of smuggling up to 12 tonnes of cocaine through the Pacific to Central America, making it one of the largest such craft found, authorities said on Friday. The nearly completed fiberglass submarine, found in a rural area in south Narino province, had space for four crew members, the Navy said in a statement. The country's Pacific coast has become a key transport route for traffickers looking to access commercial sea lanes north to Mexico and the US. Guerrillas, paramilitaries and traffickers often fight to control Pacific drug routes.
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