■ CHINA
Space walk planned
Beijing will launch its third manned space mission later this month, featuring its first-ever space walk, Xinhua news agency said. The Shenzhou 7 launch is to take place between Sept. 25 and 30, Xinhua reported late on Saturday. The spacecraft will be launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Gansu Province, the agency said, citing a spokesman from the center. It will carry three astronauts into space, one of whom will conduct a space walk, the report said. The space walk will be broadcast live using cameras mounted on the inside and outside of the spacecraft, Xinhua said. In 2003, China became the third country in the world — along with the US and Russia — to send a human into orbit.
■ PHILIPPINES
Dual landslides kill nine
Nine people were killed and 14 missing when two landslides struck a mining village in the south, police and local officials said yesterday. The first landslide in Masara village in Maco town, Compostella Valley Province, 930km south of Manila, occurred on Saturday after three days of continuous heavy rains. Six people were killed in the first landslide, including two children, Senior Superintendent Ronald Dela Rosa said. Yesterday, another landslide struck the village before dawn, killing three more, including village chairman Jovencio Anquera, who was overseeing rescue operations for the first accident.
■ SOUTH KOREA
City councilors indicted
State prosecutors have indicted more than a quarter of Seoul’s city councilors for corruption in the biggest crackdown on local legislatures, officials said yesterday. Twenty-eight members of the 106-strong city legislature were officially accused on Saturday of taking money from one of their own, who was vying for the body’s top post, Seoul prosecutors’ office said. The colleague, who was elected to head the city council in June, was arrested last month for buying votes from fellow councilors, the office said. The city councilors involved, all from the governing Grand National Party, had received kickbacks of up to 5 million won (US$4,500) each, it said.
■ INDONESIA
Polish diver missing
Search teams failed to find any sign of a Polish tourist who went missing eight days ago while scuba diving off the easternmost province of Papua, local media reports said yesterday. Kemal Abbas, chief of the Cenderawasih Bay National Park, said Robert Zsupuru, along with 10 other Polish tourists, left for the Auri Islands, near Matas Island off the Papua province on Aug. 27. “On their third day, all of them went diving, but since then Robert has not been found,” Kemal said. Search teams said Robert had most likely run out of oxygen while diving at a depth of greater than 80m.
■ THAILAND
Backpackers hit protests
Though some tourists have opted not to visit amid a state of emergency and anti-government protests, the demonstrators’ campground has attracted one type of visitor: budget travelers. Backpacking tourists, curious about emergency rule in Bangkok, have toured the Government House complex, where 5,000 protesters have squatted in tents for nearly two weeks. Daniel, a 25-year-old Mexican, tucked into a bowl of free bright pink sugared ice with condensed milk while showing his father around the stalls selling plastic clappers and other souvenirs for 10 baht (US$0.29).
■ EGYPT
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