Tue, Sep 13, 2005 page6

• World News Quick Take

  • AGENCIES
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  ■ Afghanistan
  Police patrol ambushed

  One Afghan policeman and a Taliban insurgent were killed and another policeman wounded when suspected rebels ambushed a police patrol in Afghanistan. The attack late Sunday in the southern province of Kandahar -- the former stronghold of the ousted Islamic regime -- came a week before Afghans go to the polls in historic parliamentary elections.

  ■ India

  Militants raid village

  More than 200 suspected communist militants raided a village in eastern India yesterday and started firing indiscriminately, killing at least 11 people. The villagers were attacked in Bhelwa village in Jharkhand state for trying to form a self-defense group to fight the militants, said the area's commissioner, J.B. Tubid. He blamed the Maoist Communist Center, or MCC, for the killings. There was no way to independently verify the claim. Police officers have reached the village to investigate and determine if there were more casualties, he said.

  ■ India

  Rat catchers quiet as mice

  New Delhi's government has a rat-catching department that hasn't caught a single rodent in more than a decade, the Hindustan Times reported. There are 97 rat catchers on the payroll of the Rat Surveillance Department, a decades-old agency that last saw a lot of action back in 1994, when a plague outbreak killed 56 people in areas of northwest India. Each rat catcher earns about 3,500 rupees (US$77) a month, but there are no records of any rodents being caught in the past 10 years. Officials said they did respond to complaints about rodents in other government agencies, although they couldn't recall when or where they had last set up a trap.

  ■ Hong Kong

  Women getting their groove

  Women in the territory are becoming more forward when it comes to sex, with 80 percent saying they have initiated sex with their partner, according to a survey published yesterday, which suggested that women are casting off their customary reserve about sex and making more sexual demands. Although only 3 percent said they had initiated sex on a regular basis. Forty percent said they usually let their partners initiate sex. Eighty percent of the 250 women aged 20 to 30 questioned by the University of Hong Kong said they had told their partner how they want to be touched and 70 percent had masturbated. Stanislaus Lai, president of the Hong Kong Sex Education Association, said that Hong Kong women were still relatively conservative, but they had become more liberal since the 1980s as a result of becoming better educated and more financially independent.

  ■ Australia

  Driver jumps in backseat

  An allegedly drunk driver stunned pursuing police by jumping into the back seat with his three passengers, leaving his car to careen out of control on an Outback road. Police charged the 24-year-old man with resisting arrest and driving under the influence of alcohol after he abandoned the wheel, ignoring the police car's siren and signals to pull over. One passenger suffered minor injuries when she panicked and jumped from the driverless car while it was still rolling at 40kph. The runaway car then rapidly lost speed, allowing a policeman to get out of his vehicle, chase it down on foot and bring it to a halt by applying the brake. The man had a blood-alcohol concentration of 0.178 percent -- more than three-times the legal limit of 0.05.

  ■ Cyprus
  Tourists stop plane take-off

  Frightened British tourists stopped an airliner from taking off from Cyprus on Sunday night because they suspected militants were aboard. Passengers in an uproar forced the plane to turn back while it was taxiing for take off to Manchester, England. There were 230 people aboard the plane operated by private carrier XLA. "The passengers saw two people whom they said looked like militants, the pilot of the aircraft then said he wouldn't take them either," a police source said. Police could not give details on the nationality of the two. State radio reported they were from Pakistan. Two individuals were questioned by police and the aircraft searched with nothing found.

  ■ Spain

  Anaesthetist eyed for jail

  A prosecutor is seeking a 2,214-year jail term for a Spanish anaesthetist accused of infecting 276 patients with Hepatitis C between 1988 and 1998 in the eastern city of Valencia. Four of the cases against him are for homicide as the patients died. Juan Maeso, 63, who worked in two hospitals in Valencia and was a morphine addict, allegedly administered a portion of drugs intended for patients to himself and then injected the remainder of the syringe's contents into the patients. He is believed to have infected 276 patients who underwent surgery with the hepatitis C virus, including 17 minors.

  ■ Switzerland

  Prayers made for animals

  A minute's silence was observed Sunday during a religious service for scores of domestic animals that have perished at the hands of sadists who cut off their genitals and mammary organs. More than 100 people in the town of Sursee took part in the ecumenical ceremony dedicated to human beings and animals, said the organizers, which included animal protection groups. In their sermons, the pastors reminded the congregation that respect for animals was a Christian duty, and later blessed several dogs, horses and mules that were brought to the service. Police admit they are no closer to arresting the perpetrators.

  ■ United Kingdom
  

  Police shoot gunman

  An inquiry was opened on Sunday after police shot dead a gunman who opened fire on a house in near Manchester after he earlier smashed its windows and the owner's 4x4 pickup with a machete. The shooting is the first time that Greater Manchester police have killed a civilian. Horrified neighbors watched as Craig King used a rifle in a quiet street in Ashton-under-Lyne, where armed police had arrived following the machete attack. Officers were interviewing Peter Bromley, 42, whose partner and her children were in the house during the first attack, when King phoned to threaten him. King appeared shortly thereafter, fired through the window and was then fatally injured as officers returned fire.

  ■ Russia

  Non-combat deaths listed

  The defense ministry admitted yesterday that 662 soldiers had died outside of combat this year, and almost 200 of them had committed suicide. Many of those deaths were probably due to the brutal hazing that many recruits undergo in the army, which Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov officially acknowledged earlier this year along with a pledge to crack down on those responsible. The figures published on the ministry's Internet site also said 183 soldiers were killed in traffic accidents.
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