■ INDIA
Rapists get life sentences
A court punished 11 Hindus with life in prison on Monday for gang-raping a pregnant Muslim woman and murdering her family during one of India's worst riots in which hundreds of people, mostly Muslims, were slaughtered. The court also jailed a policeman for three years for falsifying evidence in a trial seen as testing whether Muslim victims of the 2002 riots in the western Gujarat state could get justice. Human rights groups say about 2,500 people were hacked, beaten or burned to death in the riots that started after 59 Hindu activists burned to death inside a train in Gujarat. Hindu groups blamed a Muslim mob for the train fire, but a subsequent inquiry panel said it was an accident.
■ INDIA
Officials talk tourist safety
Tourism officials are meeting this week to discuss the safety of tourists after at least seven foreign women and girls said they had been raped or molested over the past 20 days, a ministry spokesman said. Several of the alleged attacks took place in Rajasthan, one of the country's popular tourist destinations. The tourism ministry is worried reports could deter potential visitors, which sees about 4 million foreign tourists each year. "We've asked states to report to us what happened in these incidents and how they can not be repeated," a ministry spokesman said.
■ AUSTRALIA
Pyongyang to close embassy
North Korea will close its embassy in Canberra because Pyongyang cannot afford the bills to keep it operating, the foreign ministry said yesterday. North Korean diplomats informed officials in November that the four-person embassy would shut next month. "The embassy advised that they plan to continue with non-resident diplomatic accreditation from Jakarta," a foreign ministry spokesman said. The mission said in a letter it was closing because of "financial reasons." Australia is one of a few Western countries to have diplomatic ties with the state.
■ BANGLADESH
Teachers sentenced to jail
A court sentenced three university teachers to two years in jail yesterday for inciting student unrest in August that caused the army-backed government to impose curfews in major cities, court officials said. The three were among four teachers from Dhaka University who were acquitted on Monday of violating emergency rules in another case related to the student unrest. "The court found them guilty for inciting the unrest, while the other was acquitted as charges could not be proved against him," a court registrar said. They were arrested under the country's emergency rules and later investigated by a judicial commission.
■ CHINA
Beijing exceeds growth goal
Scrambling to provide water and infrastructure for its burgeoning population, Beijing has exceeded its target population of 16 million two years early, state media reported yesterday. The number of permanent residents reached 16.33 million at the end of last year, an increase of 520,000 on the previous year, the Beijing statistics bureau said on www.chinanews.com.cn. The population, comprising 12.13 million residents carrying hukou (戶口), or residence permits, and some 4.2 million migrant workers, had surpassed the city's 2010 ceiling of 16 million two years early. Last year's increase was the fastest in five years for Beijing, which has become a magnet for workers seeking work on massive projects for the Games opening in August.
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