CHANGING BALANCE: Canberra's deal with Japan reflected a realignment in East Asia and recognition that the region can no longer rely on the US alone, an expert argued
Australia will seal a security relationship with Japan this week stronger than its defense ties with any country except the US. But Australian Prime Minister John Howard dismissed concerns it would harm ties with China.

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East Timorese election authorities said yesterday that all eight candidates had been approved to compete in the presidential polls next month.

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For nine months, a gaping hole in the ground has spit out a biblical-scale torrent of hot, black mud, swallowing thousands of homes outside Indonesia's second-largest city and attracting amazed geologists from around the world.

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SICK AND TIRED: A popular BBC local radio show ran a poll in which 83 percent of respondents called on politicians to enter a government without holding further negotiations
Politician and church leader Ian Paisley's Democratic Unionist party (DUP), strengthened by victory in the Northern Ireland assembly elections, on Friday came under intensive pressure to enter a power-sharing government with Sinn Fein.

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Ethiopia said yesterday it was in contact with an armed group that kidnapped five European and eight locals in a remote northern region -- but ruled out a military operation to rescue them.

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ABOUT-FACE: UN spokeswoman Marie Okabe said a letter from the Sudanese leader contradicted details of a UN peacekeeping mission he had agreed to in November
Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir has sent a letter to the UN secretary-general challenging a plan to send UN peacekeepers to Darfur -- a setback to international efforts to stop the region's escalating violence.

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Top Serbian and ethnic Albanian leaders met for final talks over the future of Kosovo yesterday, deeply entrenched in their opposing views on how to solve the dispute over the province.

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The pungent and oozing camembert, that king of French cheeses, is under threat from its own producers, who are moving toward using filtered milk to avert health concerns and to appeal to global palates.

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BAGHDAD SUMMIT: The conference was to seek ways of providing regional support for the Iraqi government, and came against a background of increasing US-Iranian tensions
US officials sat down with their Iranian and Syrian counterparts yesterday at a conference in Baghdad aimed at stopping sectarian fighting in Iraq before the conflict spreads throughout the oil-rich region.

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Chilean President Michelle Bachelet is facing a slide in public confidence on her anniversary today as Chile's first female leader, while insisting that Chile will be in better shape by the end of her four-year term.

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The FBI on Friday acknowledged breaching US privacy rules to access individuals' telephone, e-mail and financial records during terror investigations.

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PAY AS YOU GO: A resolution was passed to approve the placement of the first loo in Madison Square Park, near the `Shake Shack' food stand
Generations of New Yorkers have mastered the act of nonchalantly slinking through restaurants and hotel lobbies where they have no business in search of a toilet. But the furtive quest for relief in public may become a fading art starting this summer, now that the city has settled on a site for the first of 20 long-awaited pay toilets.

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LEFT-WINGER: President Rafael Correa, who said he wants to introduce socialism to the country, is an admirer of anti-US firebrand Hugo Chavez
Ecuador's political crisis deepened on Friday when the Constitutional Tribunal warned President Rafael Correa that he would be acting illegally if he ignores its eventual ruling on the constitutionality of a national referendum.

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■ New Zealand
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