■ INDIA
Soldiers feared dead
Seven soldiers and eight army porters were feared killed after avalanches triggered by heavy snow hit army posts near the border with Pakistan in Kashmir, an army spokesman said yesterday. He said troops had launched rescue operations in Uri and Machil sectors in north Kashmir near the Line of Control, which divides the disputed Himalayan region between India and Pakistan. "Two bodies have been recovered so far, five soldiers and eight porters are still missing," Colonel Manjinder Singh said. The snow and landslides also blocked the 300km mountain highway that links the Kashmir Valley to the rest of India, officials said.
■ BANGLADESH
Zia's son claims torture
Tareque Rahman, the influential elder son of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) leader Khaleda Zia, told a court bail hearing on Wednesday that he was tortured during questioning on corruption allegations, reports said yesterday. He said he was blindfolded and suspended from a ceiling on Dec. 31. Rahman was arrested in March as part of the military-backed emergency government's crackdown on graft. Zia, Sheikh Hasina Wajed, the leader of the other main party, the Awami League, and scores of other high-profile figures are also in custody facing graft charges.
■ NEW ZEALAND
Too much Christmas fun
A groping Santa, a drunken car chase, a bloody punchout. Festivities in Antarctica got a little out of hand this Christmas. Complaints of "inappropriate touching" were made against a Santa who had posed for photographs on a decorated snowmobile at the US McMurdo station, on the edge of the continent, a New Zealand newspaper reported on Wednesday. Meanwhile, a US staff member, suspected of drunk driving, raced along an icy road in a four-wheel-drive vehicle chased by a fire engine before she was intercepted, said the Press newspaper, without citing sources. McMurdo base is home to about 1,000 US scientists and staff during the summer months and is the largest community in Antarctica.
■ CHINA
Mice on flight disease-free
The quarantine authority said yesterday it had found no diseases in eight mice discovered on a United Airlines flight from Washington. Inspectors found the mice after the airline reported the stowaways to local quarantine officials upon landing on Sunday afternoon, Xinhua news agency said. The incident prompted an emergency team to rush to the aircraft to lay poison and traps, and send captured mice for testing at a laboratory, the agency said. The mice posted negative results in several categories of testing, including "parasites" and "bubonic plague antigens," the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine said on its Web site.
■ CHINA
Smugglers sentenced
Two men in Xiamen have been given suspended death sentences for smuggling pangolins and other exotic animals into China, Xinhua news agency said yesterday. Pangolins are in great demand in China, where their meat is considered a delicacy and their scales are believed to hold medicinal properties. From October 2005 to April 2006, a gang smuggled 17 containers of pangolin meat and scales worth 23.4 million yuan (US$3.2 million) into China, Xinhua said. Two gang leaders were sentenced to death, suspended for two years. Three others were jailed for life.
■ RUSSIA
Rogozin appointed to NATO
Russian President Vladimir Putin appointed a leading nationalist politician and foreign policy hawk as Russia's new ambassador to NATO yesterday, the Kremlin said in a statement. Dmitry Rogozin made his name in politics by defending the rights of ethnic Russians in Europe and recently formed a nationalist political party in Russia together with an anti-immigrant group. He has also served as Russia's representative to the Strasbourg-based Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), a 47-nation body that concentrates on human rights issues.
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