■ Singapore
Ship surprises beachgoers
A 3,166-ton cargo ship was blown onto an islet off a Singapore beach, startling those basking on the sand and preparing for volleyball games, the Sunday Times reported. The Mahardi, an Indonesian-flagged carrier, had been moored at the Western Anchorage next to Sentosa Island when strong winds blew the vessel 600m with 20 crew members aboard on Saturday. No one was injured, a port authority official said. Danish expatriate Michael Petersen, 25, said he was warming up to play volleyball when he looked over his shoulder and saw the ship run around.
PHOTO: AFP
■ China
Tornado leaves 20 dead
A tornado killed 20 people and injured at least 37 others as it destroyed buildings in China's Anhui and Jiangsu provinces, state media said yesterday. State television showed pictures of vehicles overturned, trees uprooted and a factory unit flattened by the tornado as it hit several areas of Anhui's Lingbi County on Saturday. China News Service said at least 15 people died and 37 were injured there. Five more people died and many were injured when the tornado hit Nanjing, the Beijing Youth Daily said.
■ South Korea
Dancers expose too much
South Korean police have detained two male dancers for exposing their genitals on a popular music television program, Yonhap news agency said yesterday. The two masked members of funk group RUX dropped their pants and danced for about four seconds during MBC's live music show on Saturday, Yonhap said. MBC immediately issued an apology and said it would shut down the program. Broadcasting regulators said they would discuss punitive action against the network.
■ Mexico
Popo pops out ash cloud
Mexico's Popocatepetl Volcano on Saturday sent a cloud of ash 2km into an otherwise sunny sky south of Mexico City, Mexico's National Disaster Prevention Center reported. The moderate eruption came a day after two eruptions that sent a column of hot ash 2.5km into the air and spat red-hot rocks up to a kilometer from the volcano. Saturday's activity at the 5,450m volcano, 65km southeast of the Mexican capital, posed no danger to nearby settlements. Known as Popo, the volcano has been intermittently erupting since December 1994.
■ United Kingdom
Black teen killed in ax attack
A black teenager died Saturday after an attacker embedded an ax in his skull in a crime police say was racially motivated. Anthony Walker, 18, was waiting for a bus with his girlfriend and a cousin when a man started shouting racist taunts at them near Walker's home in Liverpool around 11:30pm Friday, police said. The three did not retaliate, instead leaving to find another bus stop in order to avoid any trouble, police said. But a group of three or four men followed them through a park, and Walker's companions saw someone bludgeon him with an ax. They ran to get help and returned a few minutes later to find him with the ax embedded in his skull, news reports said.
■ Russia
ABC blacklisted by ministry
Russia's defense ministry severed all contacts with ABC television following the network's interview with radical Chechen rebel leader Shamil Basayev, Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said yesterday. "Today I tasked our press service with making sure that no serviceman in the defense ministry would have contacts with the ABC television company. We will continue to be open with the media, but this channel will not be invited to the ministry or be granted any interviews," Ivanov said. The ABC "is now persona non grata, it is an outcast for the defense ministry now," Ivanov said.
■ Honduras
US drug agent shot to death
Honduran police said on Saturday a US Drug Enforcement Administration agent was shot to death as he visited a local religious shrine and that they arrested two young gang members in the killing. Two assailants shot the vacationing DEA agent in both legs on Friday near the Virgen de Suyapa shrine in the capital, Tegucigalpa, police said. The victim bled to death from gunshot wounds in what authorities said was probably an attempted robbery. Police said they arrested two minors in connection with the killing.
■ Northern Ireland
One killed in shootout
A man was killed and another wounded in Belfast Saturday in a shooting linked to a feud between rival Protestant loyalist paramilitary groups, a police source told reporters Saturday. The incident comes two days after the Catholic Irish Republican Army formally ended more than 30 years of armed struggle in Northern Ireland, pledging to lay down its weapons and combat British rule through purely peaceful means. Stephen Paul was the third victim in less than a month of the spat between rival loyalist groups.
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