■ Japan
Cop lands in hot water
A policeman returning from an evening's drinking has landed in hot water after climbing into a relaxing hot bath in someone else's house. The 21-year-old officer from Nara, western Japan, was arrested and charged with unlawful entry after being discovered late on Friday night in the bathtub of a house about 50 yards from his own, police said. "I can't believe it wasn't my bath," NHK television quoted the policeman, who was off duty on the day of the incident, as telling investigators.
■ Australia
`Endeavour' runs aground
A replica of British explorer Captain James Cook's sailing ship Endeavour ran aground yesterday as it was recreating the seafarer's arrival in Australia. In a mishap never faced by its illustrious predecessor, the HMS Endeavour hit a sandbar in Sydney's Botany Bay, the site of Cook's original landing in 1770. After a gruelling five-month voyage from Britain, the ship's crew had been tantalizingly close to completing its aim of recreating Cook's original journey to Australia. A spokesman for the National Maritime Museum, where the ship was to be permanently berthed, said tugs pulled it off the sandbar. It was undergoing a damage assessment. Dignitaries had already boarded the vessel ready for a grand entrance into Sydney Harbor.
■ Afghanistan
Mystery `animal plague' hits
A mystery disease has killed more than 6,000 animals in Afghanistan's northeastern province of Badakhshan in the past two weeks, an official said. Authorities are waiting for test results, carried out by foreign aid workers, to find the cause of the epidemic. "It is a very strange type of disease, which locals call animal plague," said Engineer Mohammad Hassan, chief of agriculture. "So far more than 6,000 animals, largely goats, sheep and cows, have perished as a result of the outbreak," he said. Rugged Badakhshan lies near the border with China and Tajikistan and a majority of its residents rely on agriculture.
■ Indonesia
Plane wreckage found
The wreckage of a small passenger plane that crashed last week in Indonesia's remote West Papua province was found yesterday. All 18 people on board were feared dead. The 19-seat deHavilland DHC-6 Twin Otter turboprop crashed during a flight along the mountainous interior of Indonesia's largest province. Lieutenant Colonel Paulus Waterpau, police chief in Timika, said that a passing plane had spotted the tail of the ill-fated aircraft inside a ravine near a mountain. "The plane was believed to have hit the mountain and was totally burned ... all passengers are feared dead," Waterpau said. A rescue team has been sent.
■ South Korea
S Korean will be returned
Pyongyang has notified South Korea that it would return a South Korean and his boat that had ignored warning shots and crossed into Northern waters, Seoul's unification ministry said. "The North has informed us that it would hand over the ship and the person on April 18, at 3pm on the East Sea," the ministry said. The ministry said the North's message was delivered to the chief of South Korean Red Cross. South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said on Wednesday a small boat, believed to be a fishing vessel, had crossed the maritime border off the east cost despite warning shots. It identified the man on the boat as Hwang Hong-ryon and added he may have been drunk at that time. The two Koreas are still technically at war after the 1950-53 Korean War ended only in an inconclusive truce.
■ Germany
Neo-nazis spark riots
Extreme-right marches in several German cities Saturday met with hundreds of counter-demonstrators, who threw projectiles and prompted police intervention and dozens of arrests, authorities said. In the eastern city of Erfurt, some 300 people rallied against the march by about 60 neo-Nazis, throwing bottles, eggs and potatoes at them and yelling "Nazis out," police spokesman Manfred Etzel said. Police turned two water cannons on the crowd to break up the clash, and took 14 counter-demonstrators and five neo-Nazis into custody, Etzel said. No one was injured in that clash. Right-wing demonstrations in Germany regularly draw huge groups of counter-protesters.
■ Spain
Basque elections begin
The Basque region's ruling nationalists faced a test of their drive to secure more autonomy from Spain as elections in the wealthy northern region got under way yesterday. Some 1.8 million people were eligible to vote in the election for the 75-seat regional legislature. Seeking re-election as Basque president is Juan Jose Ibarretxe, whose moderate Basque Nationalist Party has governed the region since it gained broad self-rule in 1979. Opinion polls suggest Ibarretxe will lead the party to victory, and he hopes that a strong showing will put pressure on the government in Madrid to negotiate on his plan for broader autonomy bordering on independence from Spain.
■ Holy see
Papal ring destroyed
Cardinals destroyed Pope John Paul II's Fisherman's Ring and lead seal to formally end his reign, and the Vatican expressed confidence that unprecedented precautions would keep the name of the new pope secret until it is announced to the world from a balcony overlooking St. Peter's Square. The official nine-day mourning period for John Paul ended with a Mass celebrated Saturday afternoon in St. Peter's Basilica by Cardinal Jorge Arturo Medina Estevez of Chile. The destruction of the ring and the seal formally signified the end of the pope's 26-year reign, and came during the cardinals' last meeting before they sequester themselves in the Sistine Chapel beginning today to choose a successor.
■ Israel
Israel to release prisoners
Israel's Cabinet yesterday unanimously approved the release of nine Jordanian prisoners, officials in the meeting said. Jordan, which signed a peace agreement with Israel in 1994, has long demanded the release of the more than 20 Jordanians held in Israeli prisons. Under the decision, nine of the prisoners will be released in the coming days. Four of the prisoners are accused of being directly involved in attacks on Israelis, and the government refuses to release them. It wasn't immediately clear why other prisoners weren't included in the upcoming release.
■ Italy
Italian stallion cloned
Scientists in Italy said they have created their second cloned horse -- an Italian stallion that is the first ever produced from a sterile race champion. The foal was born Feb. 25 weighing 42kg and "is in excellent health," the scientists said in a statement. It was cloned from Pieraz, a champion race horse and Arabian breed that won the world endurance race championship in 1994 and 1996 and is now retired at a stable in the US.
■ Haiti
Five killed in gunbattle
At least five persons were killed in clashes in Haiti between police and armed bands, a military spokesman said Saturday. The incident occurred Friday as units of the Haitian police supported by the UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) battled against groups armed with modern weapons in the Port-au-Prince slum of Cite Soleil. Several policemen were also injured in the clash which lasted several hours, the spokesman said. Meanwhile, a UN delegation met in the country to prepare for elections in November. MINUSTAH is working to preserve order amidst the chaos that followed the departure of ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
■ Iraq
US troops killed in attack
Three US soldiers were killed when a Marine base came under indirect fire near Ramadi, west of the capital, the military said yesterday. Seven service members were injured in the attack Saturday night, a military statement said. Three were evacuated for treatment. The other four received minor injuries, and two of them have returned to duty. The attackers fled into a nearby mosque and were pursued by Iraqi security forces, the military said. But no insurgents were found there. The identities of the victims were withheld pending notification of their families.
■ Mexico
Gunned-down reporter dies
A radio reporter who was riddled with bullets on April 5 outside a Nuevo Laredo radio station died of her injuries on Saturday, authorities said. Guadalupe Garcia Escamilla, 39, had remained hospitalized since being wounded in the chest, abdomen, legs and arms during the attack in the tough border city of Nuevo Laredo, located across the US border from Laredo, Texas. The Tamaulipas state attorney general's office announce the death in a written statement. The shooting of Garcia Escamilla was just one in a string of recent deadly attacks against editors and reporters in northern Mexico.
■ United States
AOL monitor seduces minor
An Internet chat room monitor hired to keep children safe from sexual predators seduced a California girl online and was about to meet her for sex when he was found out by a co-worker, a lawsuit charges. According to documents filed April 1 in Los Angeles Superior Court, the online relationship began when the girl was 15. She met the AOL employee in a children's chat room and confided in him about her parents' divorce and her troubles making friends. Their conversations online and by phone became increasingly explicit, the lawsuit says. They were preparing to meet on the girl's 17th birthday when one of the monitor's co-workers became suspicious and prevented the encounter.
■ United States
Satellite works on its own
A NASA robotic spacecraft located a Pentagon satellite in space without any help from human controllers, but the mission ended early when the computer-driven craft detected a fuel problem, the mission manager said Saturday. The experimental DART spacecraft -- short for Demonstration of Autonomous Rendezvous Technology -- had moved to within 91.44m of the satellite orbiting 760km above the Earth but backed off late Friday, about 11 hours into the mission, manager Jim Snoddy said.
STEPPING UP: Diminished US polar science presence mean opportunities for the UK and other countries, although China or Russia might also fill that gap, a researcher said The UK’s flagship polar research vessel is to head to Antarctica next week to help advance dozens of climate change-linked science projects, as Western nations spearhead studies there while the US withdraws. The RRS Sir David Attenborough, a state-of-the-art ship named after the renowned British naturalist, would aid research on everything from “hunting underwater tsunamis” to tracking glacier melt and whale populations. Operated by the British Antarctic Survey (BAS), the country’s polar research institute, the 15,000-tonne icebreaker — boasting a helipad, and various laboratories and gadgetry — is pivotal to the UK’s efforts to assess climate change’s impact there. “The saying goes
Floods on Sunday trapped people in vehicles and homes in Spain as torrential rain drenched the northeastern Catalonia region, a day after downpours unleashed travel chaos on the Mediterranean island of Ibiza. Local media shared videos of roaring torrents of brown water tearing through streets and submerging vehicles. National weather agency AEMET decreed the highest red alert in the province of Tarragona, warning of 180mm of rain in 12 hours in the Ebro River delta. Catalan fire service spokesman Oriol Corbella told reporters people had been caught by surprise, with people trapped “inside vehicles, in buildings, on ground floors.” Santa Barbara Mayor Josep Lluis
Police in China detained dozens of pastors of one of its largest underground churches over the weekend, a church spokesperson and relatives said, in the biggest crackdown on Christians since 2018. The detentions, which come amid renewed China-US tensions after Beijing dramatically expanded rare earth export controls last week, drew condemnation from US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who on Sunday called for the immediate release of the pastors. Pastor Jin Mingri (金明日), founder of Zion Church, an unofficial “house church” not sanctioned by the Chinese government, was detained at his home in the southern city of Beihai on Friday evening, said
TICKING CLOCK: A path to a budget agreement was still possible, the president’s office said, as a debate on reversing an increase of the pension age carries on French President Emmanuel Macron yesterday was racing to find a new prime minister within a two-day deadline after the resignation of outgoing French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu tipped the country deeper into political crisis. The presidency late on Wednesday said that Macron would name a new prime minister within 48 hours, indicating that the appointment would come by this evening at the latest. Lecornu told French television in an interview that he expected a new prime minister to be named — rather than early legislative elections or Macron’s resignation — to resolve the crisis. The developments were the latest twists in three tumultuous
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