Mon, Apr 05, 2004 page6

• World News Quick Take

  • AGENCIES
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  ■ Pakistan

  Gunmen slaughter cops

  Unidentified gunmen stormed a police station in the southern city of Karachi yesterday and opened fire, killing five police officers in a dawn attack that came as some of the policemen were at morning prayers. Authorities believe one attacker was killed in return fire -- judging by a large pool of blood outside the bullet-perforated police station, said Tariq Jamil, police deputy inspector-general for Karachi. The assault hit a small police post near the airport at Karachi, Pakistan's largest city and the frequent scene of extremist violence. Ten gunmen entered the station and shouted, "We will not leave any police alive," Officer Abdul Khaliq Shaikh said.

  ■ Philippines

  Troops kill guerrillas

  Clashes between government troops and communist guerrillas killed at least six people in the Philippines over the weekend despite progress in peace talks between the two sides, officials said yesterday. Government and rebel negotiators ended a round of talks Saturday in Norway with a number of agreements, including the release of 32 people the guerrillas consider political prisoners However, they failed to agree on a possible ceasefire during the May 10 general elections. Army troops patrolling a village chanced upon 20 rebels at dawn yesterday in southern Agusan del Sur province, setting off a brief gun battle that killed three guerrillas. No soldiers were wounded and the other rebels fled, the military said.

  ■ Japan

  Bach composition turns up

  Part of a lost composition by Johann Sebastian Bach has been found in Japan about 80 years after it went missing, a Japanese music professor said yesterday. Eight pages of the 1728 composition Wedding Cantata BWV 216 by the German baroque master were recently found among the possessions of the late Japanese classical pianist Chieko Hara, said Tadashi Isoyama, a professor at the Kunitachi College of Music in Tokyo. The partial score, consisting of the soprano and alto portions of the cantata, was believed to have been copied by Bach's students under his direction at the time he composed the work, Isoyama said.

  ■ China

  Captive pandas are fatsos

  Pandas raised in captivity in China are often overweight and have trouble mating, hampering efforts to conserve the rare species, a Hong Kong newspaper reported yesterday. "They're fat, their limbs lack strength and they run out of gas quickly after standing up to have sex," the newspaper quoted Chinese panda expert Tang Chunxiang as saying. Tang said conservation workers have introduced an exercise regime to help the pandas lose weight and strengthen their limbs before mating season.

  ■ United States

  MacArthur doll released

  When General Douglas MacArthur uttered his famous "I shall return" in 1942, he didn't expect to be coming back more than 60 years later as an action figure. A limited-edition toy version of the five-star general will soon invade store shelves around the US. The 30cm-tall figures went on sale yesterday at the MacArthur Memorial in Norfolk. With MacArthur's signature sunglasses, combed-over hair and distinctive nose, the doll lacks the wrinkles and expanded waistline that MacArthur, who liberated the Philippines from Japan during World War II, had during the latter years of his service.

  ■ Iran

  Ministry denies report

  Iran yesterday denied a Reuters report quoting diplomats who said traces of bomb-grade uranium had been found at sites in Iran other than the two already declared to UN nuclear inspectors. "Reuters is making false, baseless and unfounded propaganda," Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told a news conference. A Western diplomat said on Friday that enriched uranium had been found in sites other than the Natanz enrichment center and a workshop of the Kalaye Electric Company, already known to the UN nuclear watchdog. The US accuses Tehran of pursuing nuclear weapons but Iran insists its ambitions are limited to generating electricity. Sources based in Vienna, the home of the UN International Atomic Energy Agency, who follow its work on Iran, confirmed traces had been found at other sites, but the agency would not comment.

  ■ United States

  Polls indicate tight race

  Seven months from the Nov. 2 election, President George W. Bush is neck and neck in the polls with Democratic challenger John Kerry, despite mounting criticism that he has been lax in the war on terrorism. The latest polls indicate a tight race between the president and the senator from Massachusetts, who a month ago, fresh from a string of Democratic primary victories, was well ahead of Bush. The president appears to have suffered only flesh wounds from congressional testimony and a caustically critical book by his former anti-terrorism czar Richard Clarke, who accused him of underestimating the terrorist threat before the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the US. "The people who are for George W. Bush seem to be for George W. Bush regardless of what Richard Clarke said," according to Stephen Hess of the Brookings Institution, a Washington think-tank.

  ■ Canada

  Lottery winner faces claims

  A man who waited for nearly a year before cashing in Canada's biggest-ever lottery winnings has apparently gone abroad, leaving two ex-wives wanting a share of his C$30 million (US$22.5 million) bonanza, a newspaper reported on Saturday. Raymond Sobeski bought his winning lottery ticket a year ago, but waited until two weeks before the deadline to claim his prize, saying he had been seeking financial advice on how to handle the windfall. But The Globe and Mail newspaper reported on Saturday that Sobeski has two ex-wives apparently eager to share some of the winnings. Nancy Ionson said she was served with divorce papers in January, after Sobeski had won but had still not claimed the winnings. She said she never signed those papers. Also interested in a possible share is Sobeski's first wife, who had custody of the couple's two children.

  ■ Colombia

  Fighting kills seven farmers

  Seven farmers were killed and some 1,000 displaced by fighting between leftist guerrillas and right-wing paramilitary groups in the central department of Caldas, Governor Emilio Echeverry said on Saturday. The fighting is between guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, the country's largest rebel force, and paramilitary fighters with the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia in the municipality of Samana, Echeverry said. Guerrillas are trying to force the area residents to leave the area, he said. Soldiers have been dispatched to the region, Echeverry added.
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