Other stories from around the world in brief
Turkey to press on with EU reforms
TURKEY: Turkish prime minister Tayyip Erdogan said yesterday his country would push ahead with political reforms required to join the EU, rejecting suggestions that the reform process was slowing down.
Diplomats have said recently Turkey's reforms had stalled and they were concerned that the entire accession process could be halted if key issues such as Cyprus, minority rights and freedom of expression were not resolved.- (Reuters)
Abuse inquiry mistake admitted
LISBON - Investigators in a high-profile child sex case were given phone records of scores of Portuguese politicians and judges by mistake, attorney general José Souto de Moura said yesterday.
Mr Souto de Moura had vowed last Friday to investigate a newspaper story about the records of more than 200 people, including his own and those of President Jorge Sampaio, which were handed over to prosecutors investigating sex abuse at the Casa Pia, Portugal's biggest child shelter.- (Reuters)
Two killed in Russian explosion
MOSCOW - At least two people were killed and 15 injured in central Russia yesterday by an explosion in a basement furniture shop that set fire to a five-storey apartment building.
Residents of the building in the town of Gus-Khrustalny were being evacuated, an Emergencies Ministry spokesman said.
Temperatures in central Russia have plunged to minus 30 Celsius, increasing the risk of fires and accidents as people light kitchen stoves or rig up makeshift electric heaters to keep warm. - (Reuters)
Tito's widow living in squalor
BELGRADE - The widow of the founder of post-war Yugoslavia, Josip Broz Tito, is living in disgraceful conditions in a bleak Belgrade villa, according to a government minister.
"I am shocked at the conditions in which the wife of the former president. . . is living," human rights minister Rasim Ljajic said, after visiting to check reports the house had broken plumbing and no heating.
Jovanka Broz (82) whose husband died in 1980, has been living for years in seclusion in the large, rundown, government-owned villa in Belgrade's exclusive Dedinje district.
Mr Ljajic said the government would send in construction workers next week to fix what they could.- (Reuters)
Former Pentagon analyst jailed
Washington DC - A former Pentagon analyst was sentenced to 12 years in prison yesterday for passing US defence information to two pro-Israel lobbyists and for sharing classified information with an Israeli diplomat.
Lawrence Franklin (59), had pleaded guilty to sharing the information and also to illegally having classified documents at his home. - (Reuters)