■ SOUTH KOREA
Rice to attend inauguration
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will attend the Feb. 25 inauguration of South Korean President-elect Lee Myung-bak. The State Department said on Friday that Rice will also travel to China and Japan during her Feb. 23 to Feb. 28 trip. She is scheduled to meet with senior officials in all three countries to discuss stalled North Korean nuclear disarmament talks. While in Seoul, she also will discuss a US-South Korean free trade deal. The conservative Lee has vowed to improve the half-century alliance with the US.
■ AUSTRALIA
Crocodiles on the loose
Residents were warned to be on the lookout for marauding crocodiles on Friday after a monsoon storm left a northern Australian city flooded and forced the evacuation of up to 1,000 people. Mackay, a mining and sugarcane farming town in Queensland, was pelted with twice its monthly average of rain in 24 hours, meteorologists said, leaving streets and houses awash under muddy water. State officials declared the city a disaster zone and warned people not to venture out into the floodwaters. Among the dangers was the possibility that crocodiles that normally live in rivers and estuaries in the area would be swimming through the floodwaters, said state Environmental Protection Agency official Joe Adair.
■ VIETNAM
Bird flu spreads
Bird flu has killed a second man in Vietnam this week, infected a child and poultry in two provinces and a health official warned more people would fall sick of the virus, the government and state media said yesterday. The 27-year-old man died on Thursday night at a Hanoi hospital after he was taken there from the northern province of Ninh Binh on Tuesday with serious pneumonia, the official Vietnam News Agency reported. The provinces of Ninh Binh and Hai Duong, where a seven-year-old child was infected, are not on the government's bird flu watchlist, but health officials said more human infections could emerge as chicken is a popular dish at this time of the year.
■ CHINA
Ad angers passengers
An advertisement on Beijing's subway proclaiming "Squeezed in? Go and buy a car then!" has angered passengers who said it only encourages traffic jams, a state newspaper said on Friday. The advertisement is also contrary to the Beijing city government's aim of getting more people to take public transport, the official Beijing Daily said. "Isn't this out of tune with environmental protection?" it quoted a subway passenger surnamed Yang as saying. "The company sees subway passengers as potential customers, but the scornful tone of the advertising language exposes a lack of interest in human feelings behind a meticulous design," a female passenger surnamed Liu said.
■ INDIA
Taj Mahal to get face-lift
Indian archeologists have started giving a face-lift to the 17th-century Taj Mahal by applying a mud pack to the marble exteriors of the country's most famous monument. Last year, an Indian parliamentary committee said airborne particles were being deposited on the monument's white marble, giving it a yellow tinge. The mud pack will remain on the marble for about two or three days before it is peeled off and rinsed with distilled water.
■ UNITED KINGDOM
Crystal meth use rising
Use of the drug crystal meth is growing fast in Britain and could become as widespread as crack cocaine in just four years, leaks of a report written by the country's police chiefs said. Specialists say that even occasional recreational use of the drug -- a form of amphetamine which is crystallized in order for it be smoked -- is dangerous. The internal report by the Association of Chief Police Officers found that despite its low use, growth levels in Britain matched those already experienced in Australia and the US, the BBC reported.
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