Tue, Jan 06, 2009 page6

• World News Quick Take

  • AGENCIES
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  ■CHINA

  Bus crash kills 13 in Guizhou

  At least 13 people were killed when a bus in which they were traveling plunged into a valley in the country’s mountainous Guizhou Province in the southwest, Xinhua news agency said yesterday. The bus carrying 44 people veered off a highway in Guizhou’s Yanhe County to fall into an 80m-deep ravine, the agency said. It was not clear how many were injured. China’s roads are the deadliest in the world, with overtaking on blind mountain corners common.

  ■CHINA

  Internet crackdown begun

  Authorities have launched a crackdown against major Web sites that officials accused of threatening morals by spreading pornography and vulgarity, including the dominant search engines Google and Baidu. The Ministry of Public Security and six other government agencies announced the campaign at a meeting yesterday, state television reported, showing officials hauling digital equipment away from one unidentified office. The meeting “decided to launch a nationwide campaign to clean up a vulgar current on the Internet and named and exposed a large number of violating public morality and harming the physical and mental health of youth and young people,” the report said.

  ■AUSTRALIA

  Swimmers flee sharks

  Thousands of beachgoers fled from the sea on Sunday after sharks were spotted off some of Sydney’s most popular beaches, raising concerns the number of potential man-eaters in the country’s waters is increasing. Shark alarms sounded and people were cleared from the water off Coogee, Maroubra, Bronte and Tamarama beaches after three hammerheads, between 3m and 4m long, were sighted, said Donna Wishart of Surf Life Saving New South Wales. A surveillance helicopter and rescue boat tried to shoo them further out to sea, she said.

  ■AUSTRALIA

  Woman sets husband on fire

  A woman who allegedly set fire to her husband’s genitals because she believed he was having an affair appeared in court on a murder charge yesterday. After the fire spread through the family home, Rajini Narayan, 44, told neighbors she had only wanted to burn her husband’s penis “so it belongs to me and no one else,” prosecutors said. “It’s just his penis I wanted to burn, I didn’t mean this to happen,” she was quoted as saying, the Adelaide Advertiser reported. Prosecutors said Narayan’s engineer husband Satish was asleep in their home when his wife doused his genitals with methylated spirit and set them on fire on Dec. 8. The blaze spread when he jumped out of bed and knocked over the bottle of spirits, the court heard. Satish Narayan, 47, died in hospital last week.

  ■CHINA

  Hu: US ties to stay strong

  President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) used one of his last official talks with US President George W. Bush to voice confidence that bilateral ties would remain strong, the foreign ministry here said. Hu made the remark while talking to Bush by telephone late on Sunday Beijing time, a little more than a fortnight before president-elect Barack Obama moves into the White House. “In a new historical period, China and the United States will definitely be able to stick firmly to the overall direction of a relationship characterized by constructive cooperation,” Hu said. “This will help develop a Sino-US relationship that is healthy and stable, comprehensive and deep,” he said.

  ■GERMANY

  WWII bombs disposed of

  Bomb disposal teams defused two World War II bombs and carried out controlled explosions on two more on Sunday after 15,000 people were evacuated from nearby residential areas. The 250kg bombs were believed to have been dropped by British Royal Air Force planes on the north town of Osnabrueck more than 60 years ago. They were discovered between 2m and 5m under the earth of a housing estate mainly used by the British military until the soldiers were pulled out of Osnabrueck several months ago. The first two bombs were rendered harmless on Sunday morning, but experts were unable to defuse the others and covered them with earth and bales of straw to minimize the effects of the blast.

  ■SOUTH AFRICA

  Campaigner Suzman buried

  Several hundred friends and family members attended the funeral of anti-apartheid campaigner Helen Suzman on Sunday at a cemetery in Johannesburg. Suzman, who died at the age of 91 on Thursday, spent more than a decade as a lonely parliamentary voice against the racial policies of the former white minority regime. Attendees of the memorial service included the ex-wife of former president Nelson Mandela, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, and President Kgalema Motlanthe. Motlanthe had earlier ordered that the flags on public buildings be flown at half-mast in Suzman’s honor. During her political career, she was often hailed as the most effective parliamentary critic of apartheid.

  ■GUINEA

  Junta to hold elections

  The ruling military junta will hold elections this year, France’s secretary of state for cooperation said on Sunday. Alain Joyandet, representing the West African bauxite exporter’s former colonial ruler, met leaders of the National Council for Democracy and Development (CNDD) junta, which had promised elections within two years. “The CNDD said ‘yes’ to the time frame. Captain Camara was very clear ... in accepting the period of 12 months,” Joyandet told journalists. Captain Moussa Dadis Camara, until recently a little-known young army officer, seized power after the death of President Lansana Conte late last month.

  ■MEXICO

  Giant bread ready for party

  A huge, 11 tonne loaf of bread was readied on Sunday for the traditional Magi party that sees thousands of families coming together to celebrate with food and gifts for children. “This event is important ... we will not lose our traditions” that unite families, said Laura Vazquez, Mexico’s secretary for economic development. A central part of the celebration of the nativity’s Three Wise Men — described in the Bible as bringing presents to the newborn Jesus Christ — revolves around baking and eating La Rosca de Reyes (Three Kings Bread), a sweet, dry delicacy.

  ■VENEZUELA

  Tear gas attack condemned

  The government on Sunday condemned a tear gas attack last week at the studios of an opposition-aligned TV station. Information Minister Jesse Chacon said President Hugo Chavez’s government “categorically rejects” violent acts such as Thursday’s incident, when two people on a motorcycle threw the tear gas canister at the Caracas television station Globovision. According to Reporters Without Borders, a radical pro-Chavez group known as La Piedrita, or “The Little Stone,” has claimed responsibility.

  ■CANADA

  Funeral draws 4,000

  Around 4,000 people on Sunday attended the funeral of eight snowmobile enthusiasts who died last week near the small town of Sparwood after a series of avalanches. Family and friends of the eight victims, aged between 20 and 45, turned out to give eulogies at a ceremony, broadcast live on major television channels. Local authorities also read the condolences of Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Governor General Michaelle Jean. The eight men were found on Monday and Tuesday last week after they went missing last on Sunday when they were caught in avalanches in the mountains some 300km southwest of Calgary, British Columbia. Three other men survived the ordeal. The victims were all from Sparwood, which has population of 3,600.

  ■UNITED STATES

  Hawaiian shirt pioneer dies

  Alfred Shaheen, a pioneering textile manufacturer credited with creating the modern Hawaiian garment industry, has died at age 86. Shaheen died on Dec. 22 of complications from diabetes, said his daughter, Camille Shaheen-Tunberg. As tourists from the mainland flocked to Hawaii after World War II, many began to bring home colorful but cheesy looking shirts and sundresses that would be cause for much amusement among friends. Shaheen began to change that in 1948, however, when he opened Shaheen’s of Honolulu and began designing, printing and producing “aloha” shirts, dresses and other ready-to-wear clothing of better quality. Among those seen in Shaheen-designed shirts of that era was Elvis Presley, who wore one for the cover of his 1961 soundtrack album Blue Hawaii. Such Shaheen originals now fetch US$1,000 or more.

  ■BRAZIL

  Man held in boat mishap

  A man suspected of piloting a motorboat that struck and killed a New York winery owner as he swam off the coast was briefly detained on Sunday, police said. Seventy-year-old Christian Wolffer, owner of the Wolffer Estate winery, bled to death after suffering two deep cuts on his back while swimming on New Year’s Eve near the colonial town of Paraty, about 150km west of Rio de Janeiro, police inspector Marcos Cerqueira said. He said the cuts were caused by the propeller of a passing motorboat, and police have detained the man believed to be piloting the boat for questioning. Cerqueira said the detained man, who was released after several hours of questioning, said that on New Year’s Eve he was nowhere near the site of the accident. Police have said that Wolffer was at a lunch party at a Brazilian friend’s beach home when he decided to go for a swim.

  ■GUATEMALA

  Landslide kills at least 22

  At least 22 people were killed when part of a mountain collapsed onto a road on Sunday, officials said. Hugo Arvizu, a spokesman for disaster relief commission CONRED, said 22 people were dead but Vice President Rafael Espada later said villagers may have pulled an additional 20 to 30 bodies out of the rubble. The victims were hit by the massive landslide as they walked along a road in a hilly, sparsely populated area in Alta Verapaz, about 200km north of Guatemala City. The landslide was triggered by a geological fault, Arvizu said. Rescue efforts were hampered by further rockfalls and rescue workers were expected to resume work early yesterday.
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