W O R L D

United Nations imposes new sanctions on North Korea 
United Nations, March 7
The UN Security Council today unanimously adopted a resolution against the recent North Korean nuclear tests, which adds to the sanctions already imposed on the reclusive nation. The resolution co-sponsored by the United States and China

North Korean soldiers attend military training in Pyongyang on Thursday. — Reuters

Chavez’s body brought ‘home’ to military academy 
Caracas, March 7
Hugo Chavez has been carried back to the military academy where he started his army career, his flag-draped coffin lying in state in the echoing halls until tomorrow's funeral.

Berlusconi sentenced to 1-year
Rome, March 7
An Italian court today sentenced former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to a year in prison over the publication of leaked transcripts from a police wiretap in a newspaper that he owns.

Silvio Berlusconi 

United Nations imposes new sanctions on North Korea 

United Nations, March 7
The UN Security Council today unanimously adopted a resolution against the recent North Korean nuclear tests, which adds to the sanctions already imposed on the reclusive nation.

The resolution co-sponsored by the United States and China imposes new financial sanctions to block financial transactions in support of illicit North Korean activity, crackdown on bulk cash transfers, and further restrict ties to North Korea's financial sector, if there is a link to its illicit activity.

"Acting unanimously and agreeing on effective and credible measures, the Security Council has sent an unequivocal message to the Democratic People Republic of Korea (DPRK) that the international community will not tolerate its pursuit of nuclear weapons and related acts," said a statement attributable to the spokesperson of the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

"The council action also demonstrates a firm commitment to upholding the global norm against any nuclear tests and strengthening the nuclear non-proliferation regime," he said.

Calling North Korea and other countries to fully comply with the resolution, Ban said he remains deeply concerned about heightened tension on the Korean Peninsula.

He urged the DPRK to refrain from any further destabilising steps or bellicose rhetoric.

"At a time of new political leadership throughout the region, the Secretary-General urges Pyongyang to reverse course and build confidence with the country's neighbours," said the statement.

The resolution among other things strengthens US' authority to inspect suspicious cargo and deny port and over flight access to DPRK-affiliated shipments where warranted. — PTI

N Korea threatens to nuke US
North Korea on Thursday vowed to launch a pre-emptive nuclear strike against the United States, amplifying its threatening rhetoric. A spokesman for Pyongyang's Foreign Ministry said the North will exercise its right for "pre-emptive nuclear strikes on the headquarters of the aggressors" because Washington is pushing to start a nuclear war against the North. 

Chavez’s body brought ‘home’ to military academy 

Caracas, March 7
Hugo Chavez has been carried back to the military academy where he started his army career, his flag-draped coffin lying in state in the echoing halls until tomorrow's funeral.

A woman mourns next to the coffin of late Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez in Caracas on Thursday. — AFP

As a band played the hymn from his first battalion, a long ribbon of tearful mourners numbering in the hundreds of thousands bid farewell to the larger-than-life leader after a procession carried his casket through Caracas.

With the entire government, including anointed successor Nicolas Maduro, caught up in the seven-hour procession, there were few answers to the most pressing question facing the country - the timing of a presidential election that must be called within a month.

Generations of Venezuelans, many dressed in the red of Chavez's socialist party, filled the capital's streets to remember the man who dominated their country for 14 years before succumbing to cancer on Tuesday afternoon.

Chavez's coffin made its way through the crowds atop an open hearse on an 8-km journey that wound through the city's north and south-east, into many of the poorer neighbourhoods where Chavez drew his political strength.

The head of Venezuela's presidential guard, Gen Jose Ornella, said late yesterday that Chavez died of a massive heart attack after great suffering.— AP

Berlusconi sentenced to 1-year 

Rome, March 7
An Italian court today sentenced former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to a year in prison over the publication of leaked transcripts from a police wiretap in a newspaper that he owns.

Berlusconi, who faces two more verdicts this month for tax fraud and having sex with an underage prostitute, can appeal the conviction which would suspend the sentence under Italian law.

Italian sentencing guidelines indicate that people aged over 75 and with sentences of less than two years do not have to actually go to prison. Berlusconi, a billionaire media tycoon, is 76.

He stood accused of violating secrecy laws after his Il Giornale daily published transcripts in 2005 that were widely seen as an attempt to discredit a senior member of the centre-left Democratic Party ahead of elections in 2006.

The leaks were about the attempted takeover of BNL bank by insurance giant Unipol. Berlusconi's brother Paolo, editor of Il Giornale, was sentenced to two years and three months.

Silvio Berlusconi also faces a verdict possibly as early as March 18 in a trial in which he is accused of having sex with a then 17-year-old prostitute when he was Prime Minister. — AFP jail over wiretap leaks 

Pak shrine bombing mastermind gets death penalty

Lahore, March 7
A Pakistani anti-terrorism judge has given the death sentence to the mastermind of a 2010 suicide attack on a Sufi shrine in Punjab province despite facing death threats from the Taliban during the trial.

Judge Asif Majeed of the anti-terrorism court in Dera Ghazi Khan yesterday awarded 52 death sentences - one for each of the 52 victims of the attack - to Behram Khan alias Sufi Baba. Khan was convicted of masterminding the attack on the Hazrat Sakhi Sarwar shrine in April 2010. — PTI

BRIEFLY

32 killed in clashes in Borneo as Malaysia rejects ceasefire 
Kuala Lumpur: Malaysian security forces on Thursday gunned down 32 Filipino intruders in Borneo, bringing the death toll in the three-week long standoff to 60, after armed followers of a self-proclaimed Filipino Muslim Sultan took over an entire village in Sabah province. Hours before the assault, Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak said Sulu militants must lay down arms and surrender unconditionally and operations against them "will go on as long as it takes", rejecting the cease-fire call by Sulu Sultan Jamalul Kiram. — PTI

Afghanistan’s first woman pilot Latifa Nabizada (fourth from left) stands with other women next to a helicopter at the Kabul International Airport on Thursday on the eve of International Women's Day. — AFP

Rigging claims in Kenya’s Prez vote 
Nairobi: Kenya's critical presidential election was plunged into further disarray on Thursday after the party of one of the leading candidates alleged vote-rigging and demanded that the count be halted. The accusations by Prime Minister Raila Odinga's running mate came a day after his chief rival, Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta, protested at the inclusion of spoiled ballots in the vote count, a process that could increase the chances of a second round runoff. — AFP

For 3 yrs, they lived with mum’s skeleton
Tokyo: Three siblings lived for up to three years with what is thought to be the skeleton of their mother, the police in Japan said on Thursday, with a report adding they believed she had not died but become a god. The three — two women aged 59 and 52 and their 65 year-old brother — have denied that they conspired to abandon a body, a crime under Japanese law, because they say their 88-year-old mother is still alive.— AFP

Indian carpenter found dead in Bahrain 
Dubai: A 24-year-old Indian carpenter was found hanging in his home in Bahrain. Sivaramakrishnan Balakrishnan, who hailed from Chennai, was found hanging in his labour accommodation in Muharraq on Monday evening, a media report said. He worked for Abwab Construction and Real Estate. — PTI