■Australia
Pot relief for ill people
Australia's most populous state plans to allow seriously ill people to use marijuana as a medicine, following trials of the drug as a pain reliever in several US states, Canada and Europe. However, a proposal for a four-year trial period by New South Wales State Premier Bob Carr provoked outrage among anti-drug campaigners even though he vowed to maintain the state's tough stance on recreational use. Under the scheme, expected to be approved and begin by year's end, those suffering cancer, AIDS, multiple sclerosis and other serious illnesses can register to use marijuana for pain relief. In what form it will be distributed has to be decided.
■ Thailand
Movies kick smoking habit
Thailand's film industry has kicked the habit of promoting cigarettes and now mainly depicts smokers as bad guys, according to results of a study published yesterday. The study by the Action on Smoking and Health Foundation and Chulalongkorn University PhD candidate Saowalak Assavathevavit analyzed 19 Thai movies released last year and concluded that they did not encourage viewers to smoke. Saowalak was quoted by the Bangkok Post as saying most scenes in which cigarettes were used showed smokers in the role of villains or people portraying negative images, such as prisoners or those involved in illicit activities.
■ India
Heatwave kills 50
A scorching heatwave with temperatures close to 50?C has killed at least 50 people in the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. The deaths from sunstroke occurred over the past three days, state health officials said, with 27 people dying on Tuesday alone. The worst hit were coastal areas, including the district of Visakhapatnam, 600km northeast of the state capital Hyderabad, where temperatures have been hovering at least 4?C above normal at close to 50?C. "The heatwave is being caused by dry, hot northerly winds blowing across the state," C.V.V. Bhadram, director at the Hyderabad Meteor-ological Centre said.
■ New Zealand
Kidnapper gets eight years
A New Zealand judge has jailed a Chinese kidnapper for eight years, saying a long sentence was needed to act as a deterrent to stamp out a crime endemic in the Asian student community in Auckland. Judge Cecile Rushton ordered that Da Wan, 25, who pleaded guilty to kidnapping a fellow student and demanding a ransom of 1.25 million New Zealand dollars (US$725,000) from his parents in China, serve at least four years before parole and then be deported. She yesterday told the Auckland District Court:"The message needs to go out loudly and clearly to those people who are in this country to learn English that they are here to do just that and that an offence of this nature will bring a substantial jail sentence."
■ Afghanistan
US kills Kabul soldiers
US soldiers guarding the US Embassy in Kabul shot and killed three Afghan soldiers yesterday who they mistook to be assailants, the chief of police in the Afghan capital said. The shootout occurred as the Afghan forces were unloading weapons from a truck, said Kabul Police Chief Basir Salangi. "It was a misunderstanding between the American guards at the US Embassy and our soldiers who were unloading weapons," Salangi said.
■Iraq
Heavy weapons banned
Iraqis must turn in all automatic and heavy weapons but may keep small arms at home for protection, under a proclamation allied forces will issue this week. Only Iraqis in the military, the police or an authorized security organization supervised by the US-led allied forces in the country would be allowed to carry automatic or heavy weapons, the daily said. Iraqis who disobey the edict will be subject to arrest, allied officials said. The proclamation, which also prohibits celebratory and other weapons firings within city limits, is aimed at improving security.
■ France
Orgy charges shock public
A senior civil servant leading a campaign to ban pornography from French television has denied sworn witness statements that he once took part in sado-masochistic soirees run by a convicted serial killer. In a case that has shocked and enthralled France, Dominique Baudis, the former mayor of Toulouse and current head of the broadcasting standards authority, denounced what he called "diabolical lies and calumnies." He said the claims were a "total invention" and part of a plot by the sex industry to discredit him. "It's utterly incredible," he said.
■ Turkey
Bomb goes off early
A suspected leftist suicide bomber was killed Tuesday after her bomb apparently exploded prematurely in the restroom of a cafe in Turkey's capital, the interior minister said. One other person was injured. The semiofficial Anatolia news agency quoted Abdulkadir Aksu as saying authorities found two batteries, a triggering device, and an explosive material at the cafe in central Ankara, suggesting a suicide attack. It appeared that the bomb had gone off early and the cafe may not have been the target. "While she was putting the bomb on herself in the restroom, it exploded," Aksu said.
■ Belgium
US accused of war crimes
The Belgian government decided Tuesday to pass on to American prosecutors a lawsuit filed in Brussels against the US commander in the Iraq war for alleged war crimes. The Belgian governmment took the decision on the advice of the federal prosecutor's office, where the suit was filed last week against US General Tommy Franks. Seventeen Iraqis and two Jordanians filed the suit under Belgium's "universal competence" law, which allows charges to be brought regardless of where the alleged crimes took place. The lawsuit alleges that US troops in Iraq fired on ambulances, did not show due care in avoiding civilian casualties and failed to safeguard Iraq's cultural heritage.
■ United States
Visitors get sex education
Visitors from six Southeast Asian nations toured an infamous Nevada brothel last week during a State Department-sponsored visit to the US aimed at educating them on sex-trafficking laws, US officials said Tuesday. The group of 10 accepted an invitation from a spokesman for the brothel -- the Moonlite Bunny Ranch -- to visit the facility outside the state capital of Carson City last Wednesday. The particular group was looking at US efforts to stamp out the trafficking of women and children. A state department official with knowledge of the trip said nothing "untoward" had happened.
■World health
Cheating firms get exposed
The World Health Organization (WHO) is to publish a survey of the prices of medicines, exposing the secrecy of the pharmaceutical firms over pricing and revealing the high cost of health to people in developing countries. Health care in poorer countries badly needs improving, but the price of medicines is proving the biggest obstacle, says a new WHO and Health Action International study. A Tanzanian would have to work 500 hours to pay for tuberculosis treatment, a Swiss person just 90 minutes.
■ Russia
New missile talks mooted
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said Russia is ready to start talking with the US about cooperation on a missile defense system, the Interfax Military News Agency reported yesterday. "We are prepared to talk with the US on the theme of cooperation in the field of anti-missile defense, but attached to the fulfillment of a number of conditions," Ivanov was quoted as saying during a stopover in Honolulu on his way to Washington. Russia opposed Washington's withdrawal last year from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in order to deploy a national missile defense shield.
■ United States
Woman stores dead kids
A woman was accused Tuesday of murdering three of her twelve children and keeping the bodies for a decade or more before leaving them in a rented storage unit in Arizona, where they were discovered last week. Diane O'Dell, of Rome, Pennsylvania, told investigators that between 1972 and 1984, while living in upstate New York, she gave birth to four children who died, including the three whose remains were found in Arizona, said Graham County, Arizona, Sheriff Frank Hughes.According to state police, O'Dell, 49, carried the remains with her from New York through several states before storing them in the shed in Safford, Arizona.
■ United States
Man may not sit on crate
Some New Yorkers make the news for taking a stand. Jesse Taveras is suddenly famous for taking a seat. The 19-year-old Bronx man was pictured on the front page of the Daily News after he received a summons for sitting on a milk crate in front of the hair-braiding salon where he works. "Unauthorized use of a milk crate" may not be high on the list of crimes that most New Yorkers worry about, but that is what Taveras was charged with in a police summons. New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said the area where the unauthorized sitting took place has been designated a high-crime area and police try to discourage loitering there.
■ France
Movie star attacks driver
The star of a series of hugely popular French films about a speed-crazy taxi driver has had his driving licence suspended after chasing a car on a motorway and attacking its driver. Actor Sami Naceri, star of the Taxi movies which have been slammed by road safety groups for promoting dangerous driving, appeared in court charged with reckless endangerment and resisting arrest in the car chase in October 2000. Prosecutors demand he be banned from driving for two years, given an eight month suspended prison sentence and ordered to pay a 4,000 euro (US$4,700) fine. His licence was temporarily suspended until sentencing.
Agencies
RARE EVENT: While some cultures have a negative view of eclipses, others see them as a chance to show how people can work together, a scientist said Stargazers across a swathe of the world marveled at a dramatic red “Blood Moon” during a rare total lunar eclipse in the early hours of yesterday morning. The celestial spectacle was visible in the Americas and Pacific and Atlantic oceans, as well as in the westernmost parts of Europe and Africa. The phenomenon happens when the sun, Earth and moon line up, causing our planet to cast a giant shadow across its satellite. But as the Earth’s shadow crept across the moon, it did not entirely blot out its white glow — instead the moon glowed a reddish color. This is because the
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Chinese authorities increased pressure on CK Hutchison Holdings Ltd over its plan to sell its Panama ports stake by sharing a second newspaper commentary attacking the deal. The Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office on Saturday reposted a commentary originally published in Ta Kung Pao, saying the planned sale of the ports by the Hong Kong company had triggered deep concerns among Chinese people and questioned whether the deal was harming China and aiding evil. “Why were so many important ports transferred to ill-intentioned US forces so easily? What kind of political calculations are hidden in the so-called commercial behavior on the
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