'SHEER LIES': The Korean state media blasted a British news report that Pyongyang was helping Iran prepare for a nuclear test as an attempt to tarnish its image
North Korea yesterday dismissed allegations that it is cooperating with Iran in nuclear development, accusing Western media of spreading the accusation to mislead public opinion.

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China's national state-run television network has banned all images of pigs from advertisements to avoid offending Muslim minorities, a company official said.

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KAMIKAZE ATTACK: The defense ministry said that three rebel boats spotted near a restricted area was the first LTTE assault on the country's main harbor since April 1996
Sri Lanka's navy attacked and destroyed three Tamil Tiger boats yesterday as the rebels launched their first assault on the main port of Colombo in 10 years, the defense ministry said.

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'POLITICAL INTERFERENCE': Many cheered the decision to press charges over the death in custody of an Aboriginal man, but some police were furious about the move
A decision to charge a policeman over an Aboriginal prisoner's death was hailed yesterday as one of the most significant events in the history of indigenous relations in Australia.

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Determining what caused an Indonesian jetliner to plunge into the sea with 102 people is important for global aviation safety in case there are any structural problems with the world's most popular aircraft, experts said yesterday.

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Malaysia's ruling coalition is trying to prevent a by-election from being marred by low voter turnout after opposition parties said they would boycott the poll, news reports said yesterday.

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Amid its frenzied citywide makeover for next year's Olympics, Beijing unveiled two centuries-old temples that had been salvaged from decades of neglect and saved from the current construction boom.

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SENT DOWN: William Fulton got a 28-year sentence for a 1998 attack on police officers and a 25-year sentence for a 1999 pipe-bomb attack that killed a woman
A notorious Protestant extremist was convicted on 48 terror counts and sentenced to 28 years in prison on Friday following the longest criminal trial in Northern Ireland history.

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CORSICA BLUNDER: Segolene Royal has been tripped up on several occasions by off-the-cuff remarks, notably concerning issues of diplomacy such as on Quebec
An imitator known for phone pranks on public figures tricked Socialist presidential candidate Segolene Royal into thinking she was talking to the premier of Quebec, prankster Gerald Dahan said on Friday. However, the result was not a simple laugh.

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The editor of Britain's News of the World newspaper resigned on Friday after the Sunday paper's royal reporter was jailed for four months in one of the biggest privacy and newspaper scandals of recent years.

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DEVOTED SISTER: Both of the soccer legend's former wives received nothing, while his son Calum will receive just a 1994 designer wristwatch
The late soccer legend George Best has left his entire estate to one of his sisters -- but his only son will receive just a watch and his two ex-wives nothing, a lawyer confirmed on Friday.

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In a quiet corner of east Berlin lies Europe's biggest Jewish cemetery, a sprawling but dilapidated testament to a once-thriving community and the gaping hole left by its annihilation in the Holocaust.

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DAMAGES: Maher Arar, a Canadian-Syrian dual national, received more than C$10 million for Canada's role in his incarceration and alleged torture by Syrian agents
A Canadian-Syrian national won an official apology and millions in amends on Friday for being wrongly accused of terror links and turned over by US authorities to Syria, where he was jailed and allegedly tortured.

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GLOBAL SEARCH: The once high-ranking official has been found guilty of stealing almost US$500,000 from a 1994 presidential campaign
Colombian authorities said on Friday they have launched an international hunt for a former defense minister after the Supreme Court upheld his conviction for stealing almost US$500,000 from a presidential campaign.

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STRONG REACTION: A high-profile kidnapping has provoked public reaction strong enough for the British Foreign Office to warn tourists for the cricket World Cup
Businesses and schools across Trinidad were shut down on Friday in a protest against soaring crime rates and a spate of high-profile kidnappings that have propelled the twin-island republic up the international league table of crime hotspots.

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Yoko Ono's chauffeur was so stressed by his job that eight of his teeth fell out because he was grinding them at night, according to court papers filed by his lawyer.

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