IN BRIEF (Page 12)
Russia
Moscow boat crash kills 9
An overloaded motor boat crashed into a docked barge on the Moscow River in pre-dawn darkness on Sunday, killing nine of the 16 people on board, officials said. The other seven passengers swam to safety or were rescued as the boat quickly sank.
Vladimir Markin, the spokesman for the main investigative agency, laid the blame on the owner and captain of the boat, who was among those killed.
India
Trains collide head on
An express train collided head on with another passenger train in eastern India on Sunday, the Press Trust of India news agency reported.
The engine of the Guwahati-Bangalore express derailed as it collided with a local train in the Malda district of West Bengal, around 350 kilometers north of Kolkata, the agency said. At least two people were killed.
Syria
'Armed groups' shooting in city
Scores of gunmen were on rooftops in the Syrian city of Hama on Sunday and were "shooting intensively to terrorize citizens", Syrian state news agency SANA said.
"Armed groups in Hama set police stations on fire, vandalized public and private properties, set roadblocks and barricades and burned tyres at the entrance of the city and in its streets," SANA said. It said the groups were armed with machineguns and rocket-propelled grenades.
Israel
PM takes action on cost of living
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday ordered the creation of a task force charged with finding ways to alleviate the cost of living, a day after huge nationwide protests.
At least 100,000 people took to the streets in cities across Israel on Saturday night in the latest show of force by a protest movement that has exposed deep anger about the cost of living and income disparity.
AFP-Reuters-AP
(China Daily 08/01/2011 page12)