Beijing, May 18
China today declared a three-day national mourning for the 32,500 people killed in the Monday’s devastating earthquake and suspended the Beijing Olympic torch relay as continuing powerful aftershocks and a looming threat of floods led to panic in the affected southwestern region.

A man suffering only slight bruises was pulled out of the rubble of a collapsed hospital 139 hours after the quake in Beichuan county, official Xinhua news agency said as China today raised the official death toll to 32,477 and the number of injured to over 2.2 lakh in the disaster.

Exhausted rescuers also pulled out more survivors trapped for six days in the rubble, including a 50-year old man in Maoxian county, about 50 km northeast of the epicentre Wenchuan County.

More than 9,500 people still remain buried in southwest China’s Sichuan Province today, provincial government said, as the authorities revised the magnitude of the earthquake from 7.8 to 8.0 on the Richter Scale.

Massive landslides triggered by the earthquake and the aftershocks had blocked rivers and caused build up of water in several counties, causing anxiety in areas lying downstream, the Water Conservancy Authority said.

An aftershock measuring 6 on the Richter scale jolted Jiangyou county today, causing cracks in the mountain and seriously damaging the roads leaving huge crevices, sending waves of panic, it said, adding there were no casualties.

The Seismological Bureau has recorded 146 aftershocks of 4 or higher magnitude since Monday.

China also said its nuclear assets in the affected area were “safe” as the region has some key atomic sites and the countric calmness.

A Japanese team is looking for survivors at a collapsed middle school building where 700 students were still trapped.

The ministry of defence spokesman Hu Changming said rescue of survivors still remained a “top priority” and “as long as there is a glimmer of hope (of survival), we will make rescue effort”.

The rescue operations were now in a “crucial stage”, he said.

Chinese ministry of health said no disease outbreaks or emergency public health incidents had been reported by midnight on Saturday.

Bad weather, treacherous terrain and aftershocks have often compounded the problems for rescuers.

As the rescuers battled many odds in their mammoth relief and rescue effort, the Chinese National Meteorological Center (NMC) today forecast that rains or even thunderstorms might sweep several quake-hit localities next week which would hamper relief work.

The NMC said Sichuan, Chongqing, and southern Gansu and Shaanxi provinces would see mild rain or thunderstorms on Tuesday and Wednesday, adding torrential rains in some regions were likely to trigger landslides and mud-rock flows, Xinhua said.

It also warned that the quake-stricken areas would see warm weather next week, with temperature hitting 25 to 30 degrees Celsius (77 to 86 Fahrenheit).

Experts called for strengthened efforts in carrying out disinfection measures to prevent disease outbreaks. — PTI

Dhaka, May 18
Bangladesh’s High Court ruled on Sunday that the children of Urdu-speaking “Bihari” Muslims awaiting repatriation to Pakistan for over 37 years would be granted the Bangladeshi  citizenship.

“The children who were minor in 1971 or born after the independence of Bangladesh are citizens of Bangladesh,” the high court said in a ruling, over a petition by a group of

Bihari Muslims pleading for the Bangladeshi citizenship.

“They are also eligible to be enrolled as voters in Bangladesh,” said the ruling read out to Reuters by lawyer Hafizur Rahman Khan. With the ruling nearly half of about 300,000 Biharis waiting for Pakistan to accept them may become lawful citizens of Bangladesh,” Khan said.

“They may also vote in the parliamentary election due in next December, he added.

The Urdu-speaking Muslims, who migrated to former East Pakistan (now Bangladesh) from India following the partition of the subcontinent in 1947, sided with the Pakistan army during the Bangladesh’s 1971 war of independence.

Home ministry officials said about 140,000 Biharis, who were either born in Bangladesh or had expressed loyalty to the country would be granted the citizenship.

The rest would continue to languish in Bangladesh refugee camps waiting for an agreement with Islamabad to take the Biharis to Pakistan.

Pakistan has avoided the issue over decades despite repeated requests by Bangladesh, leaving the Biharis in crammed, squalid camps in Dhaka and other towns, run by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and the Bangladeshi government.

But the new generation Biharis, who say they do not belong to Pakistan or do not want to go there, have for years urged the Dhaka government to accept them as Bangladeshis, despite objections from their parents and grandparents. — Reuters

London, May 18
It has all the ingredients of a proper British royal wedding: romance, tradition, rain, and a gossip magazine feud. Peter Phillips, 11th in line to the throne, becomes the first of Queen Elizabeth's grandchildren to wed, marrying his Canadian bride Autumn Kelly in drizzly weather at a chapel at the queen's Windsor Castle residence near London. Phillips, 30, is the queen's eldest grandchild and son of Elizabeth's only daughter, Princess Anne.

Unlike his first cousins - Princes William and Harry - or his sister Zara Phillips, equestrian champion and Beijing Olympics hopeful, Peter Phillips has tended to stay out of the limelight. Nevertheless, he accepted an offer from gossip magazine ‘Hello!’ to allow its photographers exclusive access to the wedding for a reported nearly $1 million. But the rest of Britain's celebrity-obsessed media was locked out, and was predictably furious. ''What a start to married life for Princess Anne's son Peter Phillips, cashing in on the accident of his birth and literally selling his grandmother to Hello! magazine,'' the Daily Mail thundered yesterday.

Phillips and Kelly met in 2003 at the Montreal Grand Prix, when he worked for the Formula 1 racing team BMW Williams and she worked at the BMW hospitality suite.

Kelly, a graduate of Canada's prestigious McGill University, was raised a Roman Catholic, but converted to Protestantism before the wedding. Under British law, a royal who 
marries a Catholic loses his claim to the throne. — Reuters 

Washington, May 18
Researchers at the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) have found that a toxic gas present in air pollution and tobacco smoke plays a significant role in triggering tuberculosis infection. For the study, researchers study focused on carbon monoxide (CO), a colourless, odourless gas present in tobacco smoke, and vehicle and manufacturing plant emissions. CO is also produced naturally in brushfires and volcanic gas.

In the study, researchers showed that CO triggers Mycobacterium tuberculosis (Mtb), the causative agent of tuberculosis, to shift from active infection to a drug-resistant dormant state.

This is called latency, a global problem that results in tuberculosis escaping detection and treatment, and which contributes to overall tuberculosis transmission.

“This is the first description of a role for CO in mycobacterial pathogenesis, and may explain why smoking and air pollution contributes to TB,” said Adrie Steyn, Ph.D., assistant professor in UAB’s Department of Microbiology and lead author on the study.

During the study, the researchers worked with Mtb cells under biosafe laboratory conditions and found Mtb proteins ‘sense’ CO at the molecular level, much like the bacteria’s proteins sense other gases in the lungs.

The CO interaction is what led to a series of biological steps that sent Mtb into latency.

According to researchers, the finding holds political and social implications for speeding up clean-air measures as a way to improve public health, in addition to the environmental significance.

They said that the study holds promise for helping to discover new ways to fight extreme drug-resistant tuberculosis, or XDR TB.

“We’re talking about huge socio-economic and public health implications,” Steyn said.

The finding contributes to a growing understanding that exposure to high levels of CO through air pollution and cigarette smoke plays a role in tuberculosis infection rates.

Besides this, the study showed that low levels of CO present in the body are capable of triggering tuberculosis latency.

Inflammation, infection and oxidative stress are among contributors to CO in the body.

The findings were published online in The Journal of Biological Chemistry. — ANI

Washington, May 18
Suffering from high blood pressure? Well then all you need to do is listen to just 30 minutes of rhythmically homogeneous music every day. Researchers at the American Society of Hypertension’s Twenty Third Annual Scientific Meeting and Exposition (ASH 2008) reported that patients with mild hypertension who listened to just half an hour of classical, Celtic or raga music a day for four weeks experienced significant reductions in 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure (ABP).

“Listening to music is soothing and has often been associated with controlling patient-reported pain or anxiety and acutely reducing blood pressure,” said study investigator, Prof. Pietro A. Modesti, MD, PhD, Professor of Internal Medicine, Dep.Critical Care Medicine, University of Florence, Italy.

“But for the first time, today’s results clearly illustrate the impact daily music listening has on ABP. We are excited about the positive implications for both patients and physicians, who can now confidently explore music listening as a safe, effective, non-pharmacological treatment option or a complement to therapy,” Modesti added.

For the study, researchers recruited a total of 48 patients aged between 45 and 70, all with mild hypertension and using pharmacological treatment.

Of these, 28 patients aged between 45 and 69, listened to 30 minutes of classical, Celtic and Indian (raga) music per day while conducting slow, controlled abdominal breathing exercises. Twenty patients of comparable age, blood pressure values and antihypertensive treatment served as the control group.

All patients underwent ABP monitoring before randomization (baseline) and one and four weeks after treatment allocation.

Researchers found a significant systolic ABP reduction in those patients who had been listening to music daily at one and four weeks respectively.

Only small, non-significant BP reductions were revealed via 24-hour monitoring of the control group. — ANI

Manzoor Watoo, a prominent leader of the pro-Musharraf PML-Q and close friend of the President, has been named special adviser on political affairs to the Prime Minister, giving a new twist to the ongoing tangle between the coalition partners, the PPP and the PML-N.

Wato’s induction into an import slot in the government comes on the heel of the appointment of Salman Taseer and in quick succession to Nawaz Sharif's decision to pull his ministers out of the federal cabinet for failure to persuade PPP co-chairman Asif Zardari to restore deposed judges. Both Watto and Tseer are President Musharraf's nominees and are regarded as inveterate foes of Sharif.

PML-N information secretary and former federal minister Ahsan Iqbal said Musharraf was continuing with his intrigues to drive a wedge between the PPP and the PML-N. He said a break between the two parties would do irreparable damage to the present democratic transition and bolster Musharraf's plans to reverse the mandate of the people given in the February 18 polls against him and his allies.

Watto is senior vice-president of the pro-Musharraf PML-Q though he was elected to the National Assembly as an independent candidate. He has been meeting President Musharraf since the election in a bid to bring the PML-Q minus Chaudhry cousins closer to the PPP in order to the Gilani government free of dependence on the PML-N. Sharif believes that he and Taseer have been assigned to destabilise the Punjab government led by the PML-N and including the PPP as main coalition partner.

In mid 1990s, Wattoo revolted against Sharif to join hands with Benazir Bhutto and become Chief Minister with minority support bolstered by the PPP.

The PML-Q itself is divided and a fair number of its members have formed a “forward bloc" to support the PML-N. With the possibility of the PML-N winning most of the 19 provincial assembly seats at stake in the byelections on June 26, the party will enjoy a comfortable majority support free of dependence on the PPP vote.

In a significant development, PML-N president Shahbaz Sharif held a lengthy meeting with the members of the forward bloc of the PML-Q in Punjab to pre-empt Musharraf's possible assault to undermine the PML-N support in the province.

Sharifs have also indicated their flexibility in tough stance towards Chaudhry cousins who have been under pressure in recent weeks to step down from leadership of the party in order to facilitate its realignment with the PPP. However, last week Musharraf made amends and invited them to the Army House where he urged them to reunite the party and woo back dissidents who are likely to move close to Sharifs.

Former Prime Minister Zafrullah Jamali has reportedly renewed his attempts to united all factions of the PML and persuade them to support Sharifs in their current struggle to frustrate Musharraf's assaults.

PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif said his party would stay in the coalition without being a part of the government, but regretted that the PPP did not stick to its commitment of restoring the judges and had appointed Salman Taseer as the Punjab governor without consulting the PML-N.

“We were informed of the appointment and there is a difference between consultation and being informed,” Sharif said in an interview with the Voice of America.

He said the PML-N joined the coalition to strengthen the democratic order that emerged after the February 18 elections and honour the mandate of the people, who wanted restoration of deposed judges.

He said Musharraf was hatching conspiracies against the coalition to drive a wedge between the PPP and the PML-N and warned Zardari to beware of these intrigues.

Sharif said the Charter of Democracy (CoD) he signed with slain PPP chairperson Benazir Bhutto to free the country from military domination was still a valid document and his party was determined to implement it. He said the genuine implementation of the CoD was possible through the involvement of all parties.

Sharif said the PML-N and the PPP had passed through the 80s and 90s and had learnt a lot from that period.

“Now the time has come that we move ahead with our principled stance without, abusing and leg-pulling each other,” he added.

Explaining his demand to reinstate the deposed judges contrary to the CoD, he said, “I am still keeping my pledge and I am struggling for reinstatement of the deposed judges because they refused to take oath under the PCO.”

He said the PML-N had offered unconditional support to PPP co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari, claiming that the PML-N became a part of the federal government on Asif Ali Zardari’s insistence. He said his party had demanded only one thing from the PPP, the reinstatement 
of judges.

Referring to the newly appointed Punjab governor, he said such a person who might prove dangerous to the PML-N and PPP coalition, should not have been appointed.

Pakistan People’s Party co-chairman Asif Zardari has asked the law ministry to disburse salaries to deposed judges, giving a new twist to the issue that has become more and more complex because of protracted legal and political debate. Zardari took notice of media reports that several judges were facing serious financial hardship for being out of job since their dismissal on November 3.

Law minister Farooq Naik confirmed to reporters here that he had received the instructions from Zardari but said he was examining the legal implications of the matter. Zardari has no legal status to issue any directive but his advice as party chief would be respected, he said.

Legal experts say if salaries are disbursed to deposed judges, this would imply recognition of the fact that they legally continued to be judges. This would reinforce the lawyers' contention that the reinstatement of judges could be done through an executive order without requiring any legal or constitutional act.

Meanwhile, information minister Sherry Rehman on Saturday regretted the lawyers' decision to launch a 'long march' on June 10 but said the government accepts it as the democratic right of the lawyers' community.

"We will respect this right and do nothing to suppress their movement by force,” Sherry said while commenting on the lawyers' decision in Lahore convention to start the movement for restoration of deposed judges.

While observers here noted that the lawyers had given three weeks' time to resolve the issue, Sherry said the government was committed to restore the judges and was working out modalities for that purpose.

Melbourne, May 18
The first thing that people do after getting a burn is run to rinse it under cool tap water. And now even scientists have backed the practice, by suggesting that cold running water is still the best first-aid treatment for burns. However, they are still clueless about why this happens.

That’s what was told to The Scientific Congress of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons (RACS) where Prof Roy Kimble, director of the Burns and Trauma Unit at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Brisbane, said that though there is an increase in the use of alternative treatments for burns, water still rules the roost.

“We don’t know why the water running over the burn makes a difference, but it does,” the Daily Telegraph quoted Kimble, as saying.

He indicated that alternative treatments had no real benefit, while water “lessens the depth of the burn, which speeds healing, which in turn limits scarring”.

He further added that a number of RACS studies have already shown that water had an upper hand on at most of the alternative treatments on the market, such as aloe vera or tea tree products. But still he cautioned against using ice for treating burns as it may end up doing more harm than good.

“We will investigate over the next few years why running water is so important, what the optimal duration is and the delay after the burn where such first-aid treatment is still worthwhile. We believe such research will form the basis of first-aid burns treatment guidelines for the rest of the world,” he said.

The Children’s Hospital at Westmead recommends parents that if their children get scalds they should pour cold water on the burn for at least 20 minutes.

For those who apply a cold wet cloth, they should rinse it in cold tap water every minute so that the cloth doesn’t get warmed up at all. Even they advise against applying ice, iced water or any other creams or lotions.

During his address to the conference Kimble also called for federal government funding of microskin camouflage, a computer colour-matched camouflage used by burns patients to disguise scarring. This spray-on product can last for days after being applied to scarred skin.

“Some people adjust to burns scars but others suffer great psychological distress because of the scarring. We believe this product should be funded to allow it to be available to those who need it,” said Professor Kimble.

The congress is being attended by more than 2000 surgeons from across Australasia and they will be presenting more than 500 papers on the latest professional developments and innovations. — ANI

Kuala Lumpur, May 18
After scripting a turnaround in the fortunes of the Indian Railways, union minister Lalu Prasad has now envisioned the prospect of utilising surplus water from various rivers using large pipes for the country's 24,000-km railway tracks.

"The railways is like an empire, it is a league apart, its vast network criss-crossing across the country can help the government in water management," said the minister, who was in Malaysia to witness the signing of a railway double track contract awarded to public sector company IRCON by the Malaysian government.

He noted that surplus water from rivers during seasonal floods flowed to adjoining countries and states causing havoc."If we are able to connect all rivers like a garland from various points along its path and let it flow through pipes along the tracks, it can be diverted to areas which need water," he told.

"While projects like dam constructions have lead to major protests in the past as they involve acquiring of land from native people, this process will not require land acquisition as railways own the land alongside its running tracks", he added.

"We can float global tenders to invest in laying the pipes and sell water at a nominal cost. This can be an additional source of revenue for the Railways," said Lalu, who flew to Malaysia from Singapore after delivering a lecture at the prestigious management institute Instead. — PTI

Yangon, May 18
Thousands of children who survived Myanmar's cyclone will starve to death in two to three weeks unless food is rushed to them, an aid agency warned today as an increasingly angry international community pleaded for approval to mount an all-out relief effort.

The United Nations said Myanmar's isolationist ruling generals were even forbidding the import of communications equipment, hampering already difficult contact among relief agencies.

Myanmar has been slightly more open to aid from its neighbours, accepting Thai and Indian medical teams, which arrived yesterday.

The Indian team consists of 50 doctors and paramedics from the Army Medical Corp, said Indian Air Force spokesman Wing Cdr Manish Gandhi. He could not immediately say if they would be allowed to go to the delta.

A UN report said yesterday that emergency relief from the international community had reached an estimated 500,000 people. But the junta insists it will handle distribution to victims of Cyclone Nargis.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he was sending UN humanitarian chief John Holmes to Myanmar this weekend.

Myanmar's leader, Senior Gen Than Shwe, has refused to take Ban's telephone calls and has not answered two letters. Holmes will be carrying a third, UN spokesman Michele Montas said in New York.

Holmes was expected to arrive this evening in Myanmar's largest city, Yangon, said Amanda Pitt, a UN spokeswoman in Bangkok, the capital of neighbouring Thailand. — (AP)

Cannes, May 18
Congress president Sonia Gandhi has approved of a proposed film on her life, which will include details of her romance with her late husband Rajiv Gandhi during their student days in the UK, the film’s director Jagmohan Mundhra said.

“I have already shared with Sonia ji all the research that I have done on her. She has given me a go-ahead but asked me to hold on until the next general elections are out of the way,” Mundhra said. The film is scheduled to roll in 2009, he added.

Amid protests by a section of the Congress party, Mundhra’s plans to film the real life story of how the late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi and Sonia Maino first met in England as students were stalled last year

“All that has now been sorted out,” said the filmmaker, who is in the Cannes film market this year with ‘Shoot on Sight’, yet another film inspired by actual events.

Mundhra was on the verge of making a film soon after completing ‘Provoked’, which had Aishwarya Rai playing a real-life battered woman who ended up killing her abusive husband.

‘Shoot on Sight’, starring Naseeruddin Shah, Greta Scacchi and Om Puri, narrates the story of a Muslim commander of the Scotland Yard, Tariq Ali, who must stand up for his values and beliefs in a London shaken by the 7/7 terror strike in a tube station.

The protagonist of the film is modelled on Tariq Gafoor, the Pakistan-born officer who became Scotland Yard’s most visible face on television in the aftermath of the underground blasts. — PTI

Dhaka, May 18
Charges were framed against detained Bangladesh former Prime Minister and Awami League president Sheikh Hasina today in the power plant graft case by a special court.

The court fixed May 21 for trial of the case and summoned complainant and other witnesses to appear before it on the scheduled date.

After closing arguments by both the prosecution and the defence lawyers on Thursday, Judge Firoz Alam of the First Special Court had fixed today for its ruling, Daily Star reported.

The special court set up took up the case on February 7 for hearing.

On January 10, deputy director of the Anti-Corruption Commission Morshed Alam (ACC) and the investigation officer of the case submitted the charge sheet to Dhaka chief metropolitan magistrate’s court. In addition to the seven persons accused in FIR earlier, name of Bangabandhu Memorial Trust (BMT) curator Sayed Siddiqur Rahman was also included in the charge sheet.

The other accused were former energy secretary Tawfiq-e-Elahi Chowdhury, former power development board chairman Noor Uddin Mahmud Kamal, managing director of Summit Industries and Mercantile Corporation Private Ltd Aziz Khan, director Farid Khan, United Group chairman Hasan Mahmud Raja and director Abul Kalam Azad.

On September 2, 2007, ACC deputy director Sabbir Hasan filed the case, accusing Hasina and six others of using their influence through mutual understanding in helping a foreign company and its local partners win a deal for setting up barge-mounted power plants in Haripur, Khulna and Shikalbaha, depriving the lowest bidder. — UNI 

Kathmandu, May 18
Talking tough, Maoist chief Prachanda has outrightly rejected key pre-conditions of major Nepalese parties like disbanding of his guerrilla army for joining a government led by his party and declared that he will he will be at the helm by June 2.

Prachanda, 53, said his party wanted him to be Nepal’s first “executive President”, but he is ready to accept the post of Prime Minister with the responsibility of the head of the state like Prime Minister Koirala’s current position, if it takes a long time to make such a provision in Constitution.

Pushing for Koirala's resignation, the Maoist leader told Karan Thapar during an interview for CNN-IBN’s “Devil's Advocate” programme “after the result of the election came out the Prime Minister should have resigned, he should give a way to a new government which will get the status of a caretaker government.” When asked whether other political parties like Nepali Congress and Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) are ready to support a Maoist-led government, he said, serious debate and discussion are going on inside these parties and each and every political party has agreed in principle to it.

Terming their pre-conditions as “ridiculous”, Prachanda said, that they were put forth by parties for bargaining.

The new government will be formed within two to three days after the first meeting of the Constituent Assembly scheduled to take place on May 28. The new government will be formed on June 1 or 2, he said.

“No if, it will be a Maoist-led government,” he said when asked if it his party will lead the government. On UML’s demand that three key posts, prime minister, president and chairman of constituent assembly should be shared, Prachanda said he is ready to share power with other parties but not the posts of president and prime minister. — PTI

Kathmandu, May 18
Contrary to the official position by his party, the Nepali Congress (NC) and CPN-UML, Nepal Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala has stressed on the formation of a coalition to break the political deadlock in the Himalayan nation.

''Nepal has entered a new phase of coalitions and none of the parties can hold an absolute majority needed to form the government,'' he was quoted as saying yesterday.

Some have shown reluctance to this culture of coalition but they should realise that people have given an inclusive verdict, remarked the octogenarian Nepali leader.

''If we form a coalition government, it will make all the parties stronger and maintain mutual trust among us,'' he added. Koirala claimed that the development of a coalition culture was a great achievement of democracy. “Nepal will become stronger and people will become more prosperous only if we realise this concept of coalition,'' he remarked. Koirala also urged the parties to forget past bitterness and start working on forming a coalition. To prove his point, he said that worldwide this form of government was functioning with success.
The April 10 constituent assembly elections in Nepal had thrown a fractured verdict with the Maoists emerging as the single largest party but short of a majority to form a government on their own.

The NC and CPN-UML had hardened their stand on aligning with the Maoists and accused them of using intimidation, and propagating a culture of violence through its army and youth wing. — UNI

London, May 18
Does your husband leave his razor lying around the bathroom? Or, for that matter, is he critical of the way you drive? Well, in that case, you didn’t really make a smart choice in choosing your better half, at least that’s what the 1930s Marital Ratings Scale suggests. On May 15, a test was reported that claimed to show 1930s men whether they had made a wise choice of wife.

It also offered a guide for wives, and suggested that a good husband should be nice to his wife’s friends, hold her coat and read the newspaper aloud to her.

The test, written by American academic Dr George W Crane, listed 50 merits and 50 demerits. Each one was worth either one point or five. After answering all questions, the negative points would be subtracted from the positive.

If a man scored between 0 and 24, he was deemed as “very poor (failure)”, whereas if he scored 76 and above, a women had found herself a “very superior” husband.

The first demerit on the list was to stare or flirt with other women while out with his wife - take away five points - and he would lose a point for talking about the “efficiency of stenographer or other women” or writing on the tablecloth with a pencil.

Although some of the criticism is clearly dated, the crimes of leaving shoes in the living room or snoring were as irritating then as now.

But husbands who were good humored in the morning, helped with the dishes and remembered birthdays were — and still would be — greeted with approval. — ANI

London, May 18
Indian-origin writer Indra Sinha’s book ‘Animal’s People’, based on the Bhopal gas tragedy, has been adjudged this year’s best book in Europe and South Asia by the Commonwealth.

Canada’s Lawrence Hill won the top Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for her “The Book of Negroes”, a novel about forgotten story of 18th Century Africans. Hill has been named the winner of the best book award.

Bangladesh’s Tahmima Anam bagged the award for best first book for ‘A Golden Age’, a fictionalised account of her country’s war for independence in 1971.

South African Minister of Arts and Culture Z. Pallo Jordan presented a cheque for £10,000 ($19,600) to Hill and a cheque for £5,000 ($9,800) to Anam at the Franschhoek Literary Festival in South Africa, it was officially announced here.

Besides winning the prize, Hill will travel to London to meet with the Head of the Commonwealth, Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace, accompanied by Commonwealth Foundation Director, Dr Mark Collins.

He will also meet Commonwealth Secretary-General Kamalesh Sharma at the Commonwealth’s Marlborough House headquarters and give a public reading from his award winning book.

The Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, an increasingly valued and sought after award for fiction, is presented annually by the Commonwealth Foundation.

The prize aims to reward the best Commonwealth fiction written in English, by both established and new writers, and to take their works to a global audience, thereby increasing appreciation of and building understanding between cultures.

It is sponsored and organised by the Commonwealth Foundation with the support of the Macquarie Group Foundation.

On winning the award, Hill said: “The Book of Negroes dramatises the all but forgotten story of 18th Century Africans forced into slavery in the Americas, liberated after many years and miraculously returned to the mother continent in the same lifetime. — PTI 

Gunfire rang out on a grassy field at the St John Baptist de la Salle Roman Catholic parish on Saturday shortly before 11 am (local time), said police captain Steven Ruiz. “We believe this is an isolated incident, a domestic-violence dispute. The man, whose identity is not released, has a child who attends the church school and has had an ongoing dispute with the child’s mother,” Ruiz said. — AP

BRIEFLY

Indian gets Fellowship of American College of Physicians
New York: Dr Rajan Ravichandran, a Chennai-based nephrologist and Director of Madras Institute of Nephrology at Vijaya Hospital, has been conferred the prestigious Fellowship of American College of Physicians (FACP). The honour was conferred on Ravichandran in a convocation held in Washington during the annual congress of FACP on Thursday. The distinction prize recognises his achievements in internal medicine. A graduate of Seth G.S. Medical Coallege and KEM Hospitals in Mumbai, he completed sub-specialty training in nephrology in the same institute in 1983. He was also appointed adjunct professor in IIT-Madras in 2005. — PTI

7 Mexican tourists kidnapped
Acapulco: The police in Mexico's southern Guerrero state say that gunmen kidnapped seven Mexican tourists in a rare attack on a heavily-patrolled, four-lane highway leading into the Pacific coast resort town of Acapulco. The seven men were kidnapped on Saturday about 100 km north of Acapulco. One of them escaped and told the police that the gunmen had stopped his companions' car and forced them into three vehicles in which they were travelling. The police found bloodstains and 37 bullet holes in the victims' car. Kidnappings and gun battles have plagued Acapulco in recent years, but they seldom occur on the main highway, where armed guards are stationed at many toll booths. — AP

Halong lashes Philippines
Manila: Tropical storm Halong battered the northern Philippines with 95-kmph winds on Saturday, triggering floods and landslides and displacing about 6,000 people, stated the relief officials. There were no immediate reports of casualties but the civil defence office in Manila said the huge waves destroyed 10 houses and displaced 780 people in and around the coastal town of Botolan, about 145 km northwest of the capital. Large areas of the northwestern coast of the main Philippine island of Luzon were without electricity. More than 5,000 people were displaced by flooding and landslides in the central island of Panay when the storm brushed past the region last week. Floods cut off key roads in Panay, the neighbouring island of Mindoro and northern Luzon while a number of mountain roads in the northern Cordillera region were temporarily shut for preventive maintenance. — AFP