Sat, Mar 22, 2008 page5

• World News Quick Take

  • AGENCIES
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  ■ THAILAND

  Meatball man sets self afire

  A man set himself ablaze yesterday in front of parliament in what appeared to be a political protest, police said. The 44-year-old man was hospitalized with severe burns covering more than 90 percent of his body, police Lieutenant Colonel Ekachai Srirahong said. The man, identified as Man Trukmanka, a food vendor who sells meatballs near the Parliament, parked his motorcycle in front of the building yesterday morning. He then stripped off his clothes, doused himself with petrol and set himself on fire, Ekachai said, citing witnesses. According to Thai media, Man was demanding the resignation of the scandal-tainted speaker of parliament's lower house, Yongyuth Tiyapairat. Before setting himself on fire, he shouted "Yongyuth, get out!" media reported.

  ■ THAILAND

  Police end bombing probe

  Police have given up their probe into bombings across Bangkok on New Year's Eve in 2006, saying yesterday that they had failed to find any clues to the culprits. Three people were killed and 42 injured when nine small bombs exploded across the city during New Year's festivities. No one has been charged over the blasts, and deputy national police chief Thani Somboonsap said investigators had failed to turn up any evidence that could lead them to the bombers. "We have tried our best and questioned as many witnesses as possible, including the wounded. But we have not been able to make any progress in past year, so police will recommend to the Attorney General's Office that the investigation be stopped," he said.

  ■ SOUTH KOREA

  Six-year-old robs bank

  Police said yesterday they had arrested a woman accused of telling her six-year-old daughter to steal some US$140,000 from a bank in Jeju. The girl took cash and checks on Thursday from a small safe under the desk in the VIP room of the bank, they said. The mother was arrested the same day after a closed-circuit TV clip showed the child near the safe. "The mother insists she did not tell the kid to steal the money," a detective said.

  ■ AUSTRALIA

  Cops no help in weed theft

  A man's complaint of a break-in at his home went to pot yesterday when police arrested him for growing marijuana. The 35-year-old man in Adelaide called reported that six men had broken into his house through a window and stolen parts of his cannabis plants, South Australia Police said. Police were unable to find the intruders but brought a drug warrant to search the home, finding six large cannabis plants, police said. "Members of the public are reminded that the growing of cannabis is not only illegal but can also attract other criminal activity such home break-ins and assaults," they said.

  ■ CHINA

  Earthquake rattles Xinjiang

  A major earthquake struck China's west early yesterday. There were no reports of casualties. The 7.2 magnitude quake hit at 6:33am about 225km southeast of the city of Hotan in Xinjiang province, the US Geological Survey reported. China's Earthquake Administration confirmed the earthquake. There were no reports of anyone hurt so far, a spokesman for the agency said, and the area is sparsely populated. There were four aftershocks in the region, ranging from 5.0 to 5.2 magnitude, according to a notice on the Earthquake Administration's Web site.

  ■ GERMANY

  Gun found in stroller

  A stroller sold in an Internet auction came complete with a deadly plaything -- a pistol loaded with six bullets. A young couple from the northern town of Verden found the 9mm Sig Sauer pistol in a side pocket of the pram after collecting it from nearby Hamburg. They called the police. Officers searched the house of the 39-year-old seller, who could not explain how the weapon had got there. "He said it didn't belong to him," police said on Wednesday.

  ■ NETHERLANDS

  Shoplifter forgets son

  A shoplifter looking to make a quick getaway from a supermarket after stealing a packet of meat left police a crucial piece of evidence -- his 12-year-old son. In his haste the 45-year-old thief made a solo dash to his car, batting away a supermarket worker who had flung himself on the vehicle's hood in a bid to stop the escape. Police in the southern town of Kerkrade said they managed to contact the thief via the boy, but he had refused to return and collect his son. The man told officers to get hold of the youngster's mother instead. The thief later turned himself in on Thursday, a police spokeswoman said.

  ■ UNITED KINGDOM

  ATM gives free cash

  A cash machine became a big hit this week after it started paying out twice as much money as it should. The ATM, outside a supermarket in the northern city of Hull, began spewing out double the money on Tuesday afternoon and continued doing so for several hours, drawing a crowd of hundreds eager to cash in on the mistake. Those requesting the maximum daily withdrawal of ?300 (US$600) were being given ?600 and a receipt for ?300. "People were calling their mates up and telling them to get down there," the Hull Daily Mail quoted a passer-by as saying. After several hours the machine finally ran out of money.

  ■ ISRAEL

  Dirty, smelly money found

  Something didn't smell quite right with a pile of cash discovered on Thursday at a sewage purification plant in northern Israel. Workers at the Tiberias plant found about 7,000 shekels (US$2,000) of the dirty money, all in 200 shekel bills among the smelly sewage. Local TV stations showed the bills sticking out of sewage and stuck in pipes. The bills were cut in half. "I called the police but they didn't believe me. At first they thought I was playing a prank," plant manager Haim Cohen told reporters. Police are investigating the case.

  ■ UNITED KINGDOM

  Basil Brush not racist

  Children's TV character Basil Brush was cleared on Thursday of racism. Northamptonshire Police had launched a probe after Romanies complained about an episode of The Basil Brush Show in which a gypsy woman tried to sell the children's puppet theather and wooden pegs. The regional police issued a statement saying "this complaint has now been concluded to the satisfaction of all parties involved." Nobody was arrested or charged, it said. Joseph Jones of the Southern England Romany, Gypsy and Irish Traveller Network had compared the program with The Black and White Minstrel Show, a 1960s show which featured white dancers with black-faced singers. "Racist abuse of black people is quite rightly no longer deemed acceptable, but when a comedian makes a joke on TV about pikeys or gyppos, there's no comeback," he told the Mail on Sunday.

  ■ UNITED STATES

  Drunk driver gets 60 years

  A Texas man has been sentenced to 60 years in prison for his 10th conviction of driving while intoxicated since 1979. Prosecutors say 53-year-old Anthony Lynn Falco waived his right to a jury trial and pleaded not guilty to the felony charge over the June 22 traffic stop. A statement on Tuesday from the Williamson County prosecutor says tests showed Falco's blood alcohol content was 0.17 percent, more than twice the legal limit for driving in Texas. Prosecutor John Bradley says Falco had nine prior convictions and served prison terms from five to 10 years.

  ■ CANADA

  Cattle disrupt morning traffic

  A trailer carrying cattle tipped over on a busy highway in Toronto on Thursday and backed up morning rush hour traffic. Three cows and a bull were suddenly freed and fled onto the highway, causing chaos and forcing police to shut down the busy roadway for about an hour while they tried to get the animals off to the side. The animals then absconded into a nearby residential neighborhood, where they grazed for awhile on people's lawns. One escaped steer injured two people and charged at police, Ontario Provincial Police Constable Dave Woodford told reporters. After four hours of trying to corral the 450kg animal, an officer finally took it down for safety reasons, using his service revolver, he said.

  ■ CANADA

  Anti-terror blueprints leaked

  Public safety officials were investigating on Thursday how blueprints for a new anti-terror headquarters ended up in a trash pile on an Ottawa street. The blueprints detail the layout of the new home of the elite Canadian Joint Incident Response Unit at Trenton, Ontario. A passer-by found the blueprints and turned them over to the government after first contacting the media. Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day said officials are looking into it. "If there is some kind of security breach that's taken place then clearly that's a huge concern," Day said.

  ■ CANADA

  Thieves call taxi

  Two teenage suspects in a convenience store robbery in Oakville, Ontario, near Toronto, may have made a clean escape had they thought to bring a getaway car along for the heist. Instead, the young men fled the store on foot with an undisclosed amount of money, and then called for a taxi -- which showed up with two police officers inside. The police had been tipped off about the robbery by the wife of the store's lone employee that night. During a phone call with her husband she had heard a commotion, before the call was cut short. She phoned the police who asked a local taxi company to alert them of any suspicious calls from the area. When an out-of-breath caller asked for a cab near the store, police met the taxi, took over from the driver and headed to the pick-up location.

  ■ UNITED STATES

  Woman killed by stingray

  A 34kg stingray killed a Michigan woman on Thursday when it flew out of the water and struck her face as she rode in a boat in the Florida Keys, officials said. Judy Kay Zagorski, of Pigeon, Michigan, was sitting in a boat going 40kph when the spotted eagle ray, with a wingspan of 1.5m, leaped out of the water, said Jorge Pino, spokesman for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. The impact likely killed the woman, but it was not immediately clear whether she had any puncture wounds from the ray's barb, Pino said. The stingray died from the impact, officials said.
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