■ Philippines
Militant gunmen killed
Four militant Abu Sayyaf gunmen were killed in fresh fighting on the southern island of Jolo, officials said yesterday, as US troops prepared to conclude joint exercises on the island. "Based on intelligence reports on the ground, four rebels were killed and six of my soldiers were wounded," in fighting on Thursday, local army commander Colonel Mark Supnet said. "We will continue with our relentless effort against the Abu Sayyaf until they are wiped out," Supnet said, vowing to press the offensive against the al-Qaeda-linked group that has carried out the worst terror attacks in the country.
■ Australia
Tourist seeks `extinct' tiger
A German tourist who says he has photographed a Tasmanian Tiger, solving one of Australia's enduring wildlife myths, said on Friday he had returned to the country to video the animal and end doubts over his find. The Tasmanian Tiger was a striped, wolf-like mammal that was hunted to extinction by European settlers. In February 2005, German tourists Klaus Emmerichs and Birgit Jansen said they had captured two digital photos of the animal in Tasmania's rugged forests. "I want to prove that it is not extinct, like the people think and the world thinks," Emmerichs told Australian Broadcasting radio.
■ Indonesia
Bomb blast injures 13
At least 13 people were injured in a bomb blast on Ambon island yesterday, police and witnesses said. The explosion went off at around 9am at the busy Yos Sudarso ferry terminal in Ambon, injuring port labors and travelers, they said. "We have collected evidence and questioned five people," Ambon police spokesman Tommy Napitupulu told reporters. No immediate explanation was given for the blast, but Ambon has a history of violent clashes between Christians and Muslims. Most of the victims of yesterday's violence suffered wounds on their feet, with witnesses saying nails were sprayed out by the device.
■ Indonesia
Actress banned from TV
An actress accused of insulting the first wife of Islam's Prophet Mohammed on TV was banned for one year from appearing on a government-run network, news reports said yesterday. Rosnah Mat Aris will not be allowed to appear in any Radio Televisyen Malaysia radio or television broadcasts for a year, Information Minister Zainuddin Maidin was quoted as saying by the New Straits Times, the Star and the Malay Mail. In a January show, Rosnah responded to a talk show host's questions on courtship with younger men, comparing the situation to Mohammed's marriage to Siti Khadijah, who was older than him.
■ Australia
Troops sent to East Timor
Up to 100 elite troops have been deployed to East Timor amid fears a tense stand-off between international forces and a wanted rebel leader could spark fresh violence, media reported yesterday. Four Defense Force aircraft transported the contingent of Special Air Service troops to East Timor's capital, Dili, Fairfax newspapers reported. The troops touched down as Australia raised the security alert for its citizens in East Timor and its forces surrounded the hideout of rebel leader Major Alfredo Reinado. Australian and UN security officials in Dili fear the breakout of widespread violence, possibly even civil war, if Australian soldiers kill or injure Reinado.
■ Germany
Nude pic ends pole protest
A German man who spent 10 days in a self-made box atop a 22m pole to protest a looming jail term was lured off his perch by his wife -- who sent up a topless picture of herself in his lunch box. Fred Gregor, 45, was bidding to have his 15-month conviction for fraud overturned by squatting in his tiny cubicle atop a converted television mast. He said in a telephone interview last week that he wanted a new trial. His wife Susanne, 25, backed his protest until the former stripper and mother of their five children decided she had had enough.
■ Morocco
King pardons prisoners
Moroccan King Mohammed VI pardoned nearly 9,000 prisoners to celebrate the birth of his baby girl, the Justice Ministry said. In addition to the 8,836 pardons, the king also reduced the sentences of 24,218 other prisoners, the ministry said in a statement released to the official MAP news agency on Thursday. The North African kingdom's massive pardon came after Princess Lalla Salma gave birth to a baby girl on Wednesday. Lalla Khadija is the royal couple's second child. The ministry said the pardons were based on humanitarian concerns and a hope of integrating many prisoners back into society. Those pardoned include people with disabilities, pregnant women and the elderly.
■ United Kingdom
Fertility `lottery' panned
Couples seeking fertility treatment in England face a "lottery" based on where they live, a report said on Friday. Some areas have introduced age limits, while others have ended treatment completely, despite a government stipuation that women between 23 and 39 years should be offered one free cycle of treatment, the report said. Conservative MP George Shapps, who compiled the report based on data from three quarters of England's 114 Primary Care Trusts, criticized the "entirely arbitrary borders that decide which couples can start a family and which couples cannot."
■ Slovakia
Factory explosion kills two
An explosion in an ammunition factory on Friday killed two people and injured 45, five of them seriously, an official said. Defense Ministry spokesman Vladimir Gemela said the accident took place in a factory run by the ministry where military equipment is repaired outside the town of Novaky. Gemela said the explosion occurred in a building where old ammunition is destroyed. He said the victims were not soldiers. Of the 25 people who were working in the building or nearby before the blast, six were missing, Gemela said later. He said the explosion leveled the building.
■ United Kingdom
BBC report squashed
The attorney-general obtained an injunction on Friday to prevent the British Broadcasting Corp (BBC) from broadcasting a story about a police investigation into alleged corruption in the political honors system, the BBC reported. The injunction was requested by police probing allegations that honors were given in exchange for loans to the Labour or Conservative parties. The Metropolitan Police said that there were concerns that disclosure of information would impede the investigation, and that the attorney-general was acting "completely independently ... and in his independent public interest capacity."
■ United States
Spielberg had stolen painting
A Norman Rockwell work stolen from suburban St. Louis more than three decades ago was found in Steven Spielberg's art collection, the FBI announced. The painting, Rockwell's Russian Schoolroom, was snatched during a late-night burglary at a gallery in Clayton, Missouri, on June 25, 1973. The Oscar-winning filmmaker purchased the painting in 1989 from a legitimate dealer and didn't know it was stolen. After Spielberg's staff brought it to the attention of authorities, an FBI agent and an art expert from the Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens in San Marino inspected the painting at one of Spielberg's offices and confirmed its authenticity Friday morning.
■ United States
Obama's family held slaves
Genealogists have uncovered a new ingredient in the melting pot identity of Senator Barack Obama, the Illinois Democrat who hopes to become the first black president: His white maternal ancestors once owned slaves. Obama is the American-born son of a white woman from Kansas and a black man from Kenya. The genealogists, led by William Addams Reitwiesner, studied the family history of Obama's mother and determined that his great-great-great-great grandfather, George Washington Overall, owned two slaves listed in the 1850 census in Nelson County, Kentucky.
■ United States
Coast guard ends search
The US Coast Guard on Friday ended its search for 49 Haitians missing after their vessel caught fire and capsized off the Dominican Republic. "Despite the aggressive search and a significant number of assets used, no survivors were found," the USCG said in a statement. Air and sea rescue crews had searched the waters off the Haitian island of Hispaniola, shared by Haiti and the Dominican Republic, after the sail freighter caught fire and capsized on Monday. The USCG said a Coast Guard cutter crew recovered five bodies, while two survivors were taken to a hospital in the Dominican Republic after suffering severe burns and dehydration.
■ United States
Pirate ship may be excavated
A shipwreck off the eastern US coast believed to be that of notorious pirate Blackbeard could be fully excavated in three years, officials working on the project said. "That's really our target," Steve Claggett, the state archaeologist, said Friday while discussing 10 years of research that has been conducted since the shipwreck was found just off North Carolina. The ship ran aground in 1718, and some researchers believe it was the French slave ship Blackbeard captured in 1717 and renamed Queen Anne's Revenge. Several officials said historical data and coral-covered artifacts recovered from the site remove any doubt the wreckage belonged to Blackbeard.
■ Venezuela
Anti-terror pact nixed
Venezuela refused to sign an anti-terrorism declaration approved on Friday by the Organization of American States, saying the US government is protecting a man accused of bombing a Cuban jetliner in 1976. Venezuela wants Luis Posada Carriles, a former CIA operative, to stand trial for allegedly plotting the bombing. The 79-year-old was arrested two years ago in Texas on an immigration violation and is being held in an El Paso jail while officials determine where to deport him.
Drug lord Jose Adolfo Macias Villamar, alias “Fito,” was Ecuador’s most-wanted fugitive before his arrest on Wednesday, more than a year after he escaped prison from where he commanded the country’s leading criminal gang. The former taxi driver turned crime boss became the prime target of law enforcement early last year after escaping from a prison in the southwestern port of Guayaquil. Ecuadoran President Daniel Noboa’s government released “wanted” posters with images of his face and offered US$1 million for information leading to his capture. In a country plagued by crime, members of Fito’s gang, Los Choneros, have responded with violence, using car
CYBERCRIME, TRAFFICKING: A ‘pattern of state failures’ allowed the billion-dollar industry to flourish, including failures to investigate human rights abuses, it said Human rights group Amnesty International yesterday accused Cambodia’s government of “deliberately ignoring” abuses by cybercrime gangs that have trafficked people from across the world, including children, into slavery at brutal scam compounds. The London-based group said in a report that it had identified 53 scam centers and dozens more suspected sites across the country, including in the Southeast Asian nation’s capital, Phnom Penh. The prison-like compounds were ringed by high fences with razor wire, guarded by armed men and staffed by trafficking victims forced to defraud people across the globe, with those inside subjected to punishments including shocks from electric batons, confinement
The team behind the long-awaited Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile yesterday published their first images, revealing breathtaking views of star-forming regions as well as distant galaxies. More than two decades in the making, the giant US-funded telescope sits perched at the summit of Cerro Pachon in central Chile, where dark skies and dry air provide ideal conditions for observing the cosmos. One of the debut images is a composite of 678 exposures taken over just seven hours, capturing the Trifid Nebula and the Lagoon Nebula — both several thousand light-years from Earth — glowing in vivid pinks against orange-red backdrops. The new image
Canada and the EU on Monday signed a defense and security pact as the transatlantic partners seek to better confront Russia, with worries over Washington’s reliability under US President Donald Trump. The deal was announced after a summit in Brussels between Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Antonio Costa. “While NATO remains the cornerstone of our collective defense, this partnership will allow us to strengthen our preparedness ... to invest more and to invest smarter,” Costa told a news conference. “It opens new opportunities for companies on both sides of the
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