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■ CHINA

Firecracker blast kills 25

Firecrackers that had been trucked to the desert to be destroyed exploded as they were dumped into a ditch, killing 25 people and leaving five others missing, state media reported yesterday. Nine people were injured by the blast on Wednesday evening in the northwest region of Xinjiang, including two who were in critical condition, China Central Television (CCTV) reported. The accident happened in the Gobi Desert outside the city of Turpan. Footage aired on CCTV showed a large patch of brown sand that had been burned black and several sport utility vehicles reduced to charred shells. One was flipped on its back. CCTV said 904 boxes of firecrackers had been scheduled to be destroyed. The explosives filled eight trucks, the Xinhua news agency reported.



■ CAMBODIA

Elephant poisoners caught

Two men who allegedly poisoned a domesticated elephant before hacking off its valuable tusks have been arrested, police said on Wednesday. The 62-year-old bull elephant was found dead in March last year chained to a tree less than 100m from its owner's house in northeast Cambodia's Ratanakkiri Province. Police suspect it had been fed jack fruit doused with rat poison. The elephant's meter-long tusks, worth thousands of dollars on the illegal ivory market, were missing. Men Rattana, 42, and Klem Sam Oeun, 27, were detained earlier this week for the destruction of property, said provincial deputy police chief Hor Ang. "They could face up to seven years in jail if convicted because the elephant is considered to be a rare animal and it is considered state property," he said.



■ AUSTRALIA

Mayor chosen from trash can

For Ed Warren, becoming mayor of the outback town of Winton was the luck of the draw from a trash can. The cattle farming town famous as the birthplace of the country's unofficial anthem "Waltzing Matilda" chose its new mayor late on Wednesday by drawing a name from a trash can after local elections ended in a draw. Warren said yesterday he was surprised by the unconventional approach used to break the 423-vote tie with rival candidate Butch Lenton. "If I was prepared, I was going to say we'll toss for it," Warren told Australian Broadcasting Corp radio. Queensland State electoral laws allow for such ties to be decided by either the drawing of a name or tossing of a coin. Warren said a draw was used to choose the mayor in the city of Rockhampton eight years ago. But some opposition state lawmakers argue the law should be changed to remove any "raffle stigma" from the office of mayor.



■ RUSSIA

Villager sues space agency

A shepherd is suing the space agency for compensation after a 3m-long chunk of metal from a space rocket fell into his yard, just missing his outdoor toilet. Boris Urmatov, who is asking for 1 million roubles (US$42,000) from the Roskosmos agency, lives in a small village that lies underneath the flight path of rockets taking off from the Baikonur launchpad in Kazakhstan. "Something woke him up in the night, like something exploded," Urmatov's sister Marina said. She said her brother was seeking damages to compensate him for the stress he suffered.



■ RUSSIA

Men invade planetarium

Armed men on Wednesday seized the Moscow Planetarium, a futuristic silver dome on a valuable plot of land, as a long-running property dispute came to a head, the building's director said. "Twelve armed men entered by force, threw workers out onto the street and barricaded themselves in," planetarium director Igor Mikitasov told the Echo of Moscow radio station. He blamed the raid on Moscow City Hall, which owns 61 percent of the building to Mikitasov's 39 percent, RIA Novosti news agency said. A city spokeswoman told the agency the guards acted legally and were not armed.



■ BELARUS

Activists jailed, fined

Magistrates jailed or fined dozens of opposition activists on Wednesday one day after they were detained in Minsk during a banned rally to mark a nationalist holiday, activists said. Twenty-five people, including youth leaders Zmiter Dashkevich and Artur Finnkevich, were sentenced to 15 days, the Vyasna Rights Center said. Another 40 were fined up to US$500, a heavy sum in a country where salaries average US$50 a month, the group said. On Tuesday, about 2,000 people gathered for a demonstration in the center of Minsk to mark the period of independence enjoyed by the country after March 25, 1918.



■ UNITED KINGDOM

Facebook charge cleared

Magistrates cleared a 34-year-old man accused by his ex-girlfriend of harassing her on the social networking Web site Facebook. Michael Hurst admitted sending a "friend request," which asks Facebook users to approve or deny whether users can view each other's profile pages, to Sophie Sladden on Jan. 21, but denied that he was trying to intimidate her. He told Birmingham court that he did not think that being "Facebook friends" could be defined as "friendship in the traditional sense," noting that popular radio DJ Chris Moyles "has one and a half million Facebook friends. Do you think he knows them all?" Hurst had one previous police caution given to him for harassing Sladden.



■ ITALY

Circus slaves rescued

Police have arrested three people accused of forcing a Bulgarian girl to swim in a tank of freezing water filled with piranhas as part of a "circus of horrors," media reported on Wednesday. The three Italians allegedly reduced a family of Bulgarians to virtual slavery, La Stampa reported. The terrified 19-year-old girl was forced to stay in the tank with the flesh-eating fish as one of the circus acts, the report said. Her 16-year-old sister had to sit in a barrel as snakes and a tarantula were thrown in with her. Their father took care of the animals and their mother cooked and cleaned. A visitor to the Marino circus reported it to the police.



■ VENEZUELA

Chavez's brothers probed

The National Assembly opened an investigation into a congressman's accusations that two of President Hugo Chavez's brothers acquired 17 ranches in recent years. Lawmaker Wilmer Azuaje detailed his allegations in a closed-door committee session on Wednesday, presenting documents that he said showed how ranch lands were obtained by Chavez's brothers Argenis and Narciso. Azuaje said afterward that he asked the congressional audit commission to visit the haciendas for an inspection and to summon those who sold the properties for questioning.



■ UNITED STATES

Spacecraft samples soup

An international spacecraft that flew through geysers erupting from the surface of a Saturn moon has sampled an organic soup from the lunar interior, scientists said on Wednesday. The presence of the brew excited mission team members, who say it's a marker for further research into whether the icy satellite Enceladus possesses an environment that could be hospitable to extraterrestrial life. The chemical analysis by the unmanned Cassini spacecraft revealed that Enceladus' interior was similar to that of a comet. While the jet plumes were mostly water vapor, the probe found traces of methane and simple organic compounds, said Hunter Waite of the Southwest Research Institute, who is the principal investigator of one of the spacecraft's instruments.



■ CANADA

Minister presses Riyadh

Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day on Wednesday pressed his Saudi counterparts for clemency for a Canadian sentenced to death over a deadly schoolyard brawl, he said in a statement. During his trip to the Middle East, Day met with Saudi Deputy Minister of Interior Prince Mohammed bin Nayef and the head of General Intelligence Presidency Prince Muqrin bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud. Mohamed Kohail, 23, of Palestinian heritage, was arrested in January last year and charged with killing a Syrian youth during a vicious schoolyard brawl in Jeddah.



■ UNITED STATES

Fathers won't stop smoking

Young women who smoke cigarettes, use marijuana or binge-drink will often stop doing so while they are pregnant, but a partner's pregnancy has no effect on young men's pot use or binge-drinking, a new study shows. The researchers also found that while many women reduced their substance use during pregnancy, it quickly returned to pre-pregnancy levels after the child was born. The findings are "troubling," researcher Jennifer Bailey and colleagues from the University of Washington in Seattle wrote. Research has shown that if a woman's partner continues to drink or smoke during her pregnancy, she is more likely to do so or is more likely to return to substance use after giving birth, the study found.



■ UNITED STATES

Animal killer sentenced

A man who ripped the head off a live duck at a Minnesota hotel has been sentenced to community service. Scott Clark apologized in court on Wednesday. He had pleaded guilty to felony animal cruelty. He was at the Embassy Suites in St. Paul in September when he chased a duck from the hotel's lobby pool and ripped its head off. Police say he was drunk. The man was sentenced to three weeks in the workhouse and 80 hours of community service.
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