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World News Quick Take

■ THAILAND

Thaksin allies strong in polls

Allies of Thailand's former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra made a strong showing in weekend polls for the Senate, although one of his chief critics also took a seat, according to results yesterday. Sunday's election, in which voters were choosing about half of the Senate's 150 seats, came just three days after Thaksin's dramatic homecoming following nearly 18 months in self-imposed exile after the coup that ousted him. Among the elected senators, 18 were former members of parliament or the relatives of top politicians. Most once had links with Thaksin or parties that support him. The winner for Bangkok province, however, was a prominent anti-corruption activist, Rosana Tositragoon. Tositragoon helped spearhead the protests against Thaksin in 2006.



■ PHILIPPINES

Typhoid infects hundreds

More than 900 people have been stricken with typhoid in a city just south of Manila, a Red Cross official said yesterday. The number could rise further as officials in Calamba City in Laguna Province continue to track down the source of the disease, provincial Red Cross administrator Rutelly Cabutin said. "It is quite alarming because the disease was not confined to one village, but is spread out in 18 villages," she said. The disease began late last month but the cases have quickly piled up over the past two weeks, she said, adding that some 5,000 residents in 18 villages have sought medical help from the local government.



■ CHINA

Food-poisoning deaths rise

Deaths from food-poisoning rose almost a third last year, even as the total number of incidents dropped, the Health Ministry said yesterday, underscoring the food safety challenge the country still faces. A total of 258 people died from food poisoning last year, up a little under 32 percent from 2006, the ministry-published Health News said. There were also 11 cases in which more than 100 people fell ill from food poisoning, but a fall of just over a quarter in total incidents, it added. In all, 13,280 people fell sick, the report said.



■ NEW ZEALAND

Cops raid ginger beer maker

A news report said that authorities responding to a burglar alarm thought they stumbled onto an illegal drug lab. The Waikato Times reported that security guards who opened the garage of a house in Hamilton discovered a still they thought was drug-making equipment. Police cordoned off the street and firefighters rolled up in a fire engine. But yesterday's report says the effort was called off after a woman inside the house told police the equipment was for making ginger beer -- a nonalcoholic homemade soda that uses ginger, sugar and raisins.



■ VIETNAM

Destroyer hits freighter

A Japanese destroyer collided with a Cambodian freighter in the port of Ho Chi Minh City yesterday, but no one was injured and damage to the vessels was minor, Japan's defense ministry said. The second incident involving a Japanese warship in two weeks may add to pressure on Japanese Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba to resign over the handling of the first collision, in which a destroyer ran over and sank a fishing boat, leaving two men missing, presumed dead. The reason for the collision, which scratched paint off the Cambodian ship and bent a flagpole on the Japanese vessel, was not yet clear, a ministry spokesman said. ■ GREECE

Blast causes minor damage

A bomb exploded outside the offices of a forestry department in Athens early yesterday, causing no injuries and minor damage. Police said the area had been cleared after an anonymous telephone call was made to a daily newspaper, warning of the attack. There was no immediate claim of responsibility. The blast followed two other telephone warnings regarding other sites in Athens -- a hotel and bus depot -- later determined to be hoaxes.



■ united kingdom

Bikers targeted Jagger

Rolling Stones singer Mick Jagger escaped an assassination plot hatched in 1969 by the Hells Angels, a new British Broadcasting Corp documentary has claimed. The program says Jagger was the target of the plot after he vowed not to use Hells Angel members as bouncers following the December 1969 death of an 18-year-old fan at the Altamont Speedway concert in California. Angry gang members hatched a plan to kill Jagger at his home in Long Island, New York, the BBC claimed. Tom Mangold, the presenter, told the Sunday Telegraph that the plan was disclosed during an interview with Mark Young, a former FBI officer, for the BBC's The FBI at 100 documentary. He said the men tried to reach Jagger's home by sea but they were thrown overboard during a storm. They all survived but made no other attempt on his life, Mangold said.



■ Germany

Army cooks draw blood

Two army cooks have been suspended for preparing sausages partly using their own blood, the Focus weekly reported on Sunday. Identified only as B and G, the pair were suspended in December after admitting under questioning they had eaten sausages made with their own blood drawn by the girlfriend of one of the cooks, the news magazine reported. Pictures of the sausages were published on the Internet. The two were denounced by a colleague solicited to join their operation, the article said.



■ united kingdom

MP to marry gay partner

A senior opposition member of parliament will enter into a civil partnership with his gay partner later this year, he told the Daily Telegraph yesterday. Conservative Party business spokesman Alan Duncan, 50, proposed to 39-year-old James Dunseath, a spokesman for the Liffe, London's financial futures exchange, on Feb. 14, while the pair were on a holiday in Oman, the Telegraph said. Britain has allowed civil partnerships since December 2005. "I never ever imagined that one day I would be a beneficiary of the legislation," Duncan told the Telegraph.



■ italy

Gelmini leaves priesthood

Pietro Gelmini, well known in Italy for his work with drug addicts, has left the priesthood following accusations he sexually abused young men at his drug rehabilitation center. Gelmini, who denies the accusations, said no longer being a priest would allow him to better defend himself legally without involving the Church. A magistrate in the city of Terni in central Italy is due to decide soon whether Gelmini, 83, should be ordered to stand trial or whether the case should be closed. Four men who were treated at one of Gelmini's rehabilitation centers last August accused him of having sexually abused them. Lawyers for Gelmini have said the men were kicked out of the center and accused them of trying to get revenge. ■ UNITED STATES

Driver suspected of lying

A New York driver accused of making up a story about a baby being abandoned in his vehicle faces charges in the abandonment of the girl that could earn him a year in jail, officials said on Sunday. Klever Sailema initially told police an unknown man left the six-month-old child in his livery cab. He was arraigned late on Saturday on charges of falsely reporting an incident and criminal facilitation. His girlfriend, Maria Siavichay, was arraigned on a charge of criminal facilitation. Police say she is the child's aunt. The 14-year-old mother of the child probably will not be charged because of her age, said a spokesman for the New York City Police Department. Police are seeking the father, said to be 27 and identified only as Siavichay's brother.



■ UNITED STATES

Cat escapes death twice

Charlie Brown is down to seven lives. Donna and Danny Pistole's black-and-white cat survived a tornado last month that destroyed the family's mobile home, coming out of nearby woods skittish but no worse for wear. However, the cat took refuge in a pile of debris from the storm that the Pistoles set afire on Feb. 21 while cleaning up their property. His paws and nose were scorched, his eyes matted shut and his coat singed yellow -- but he was alive. He underwent an exam by veterinarian Doug Mays. "He smells like an old, scorched wool blanket," Mays said. "His feet pads are peeling off. But they'll heal. I think he'll be OK."



■ CANADA

Jeff Healey dies of caner

Blind rock and jazz musician Jeff Healey died on Sunday after a battle with cancer, friends said. He was 41. Healey died in a Toronto hospital surrounded by family, said band member Colin Bray, who was also there. The Grammy-nominated Healey rose to stardom as the leader of the Jeff Healey Band, a rock-oriented trio that gained international acclaim and platinum record sales with the 1988 album See the Light. Healey had battled cancer since the age of one when a rare form of retinal cancer known as retinoblastoma claimed his eyesight. He is survived by his wife Christie and two children.



■ BRAZIL

Rio plane crash kills four

A small plane crashed near a busy avenue in an upscale Rio de Janeiro neighborhood at lunch hour on Sunday, killing all four people aboard, authorities said. The single-engine Cirrus SR22, owned by Brazilian trade logistics provider Cisa Trading, went down in a lot beside a car dealership about a block from the Avenida das Americas, Civil Aviation spokeswoman Sandra Fontella said. No one on the ground was injured. The plane had just taken off from nearby Jacarepagua airport and was en route to Florianopolis, Fontella said. Its engine seemed to make an unusual noise as the plane sank from the sky and exploded upon impact, witnesses told local media.



■ MEXICO

Police find more bodies

Investigators found three bodies buried in the backyard of a house searched by federal police in Ciudad Juarez that is home to the Juarez cartel, officials said on Sunday. The discovery came two weeks after police uncovered a clandestine grave with nine dismembered bodies in another house in the city. Officials didn't say if the gravesites were linked, only that police intelligence led investigators to both houses. Ciudad Juarez has been plagued by violence as a crackdown on powerful drug cartels stokes turf wars among traffickers that have been linked to hundreds of killings in the past two years.
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