IN BRIEF (Page 11)

China

Foreign minister to visit Africa

Foreign Minister Wang Yi will visit Ethiopia, Djibouti, Ghana and Senegal from Jan 6 to 11, Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said on Thursday. Choosing Africa as the destination of the foreign minister's first visit in the new year shows how China values Africa, Qin said, adding that it has been a tradition since 1991 for foreign ministers to first visit Africa every new year.

Egypt

Morsi on trial over jailbreak

Egypt's ousted president Mohammed Morsi will go on trial on Jan 28 over charges stemming from a 2011 prison break, official news agency MENA said on Thursday. Morsi will stand trial along with more than 130 other Muslim Brotherhood members for storming the Wady al-Natroun prison and kidnapping and killing police officers during the 2011 uprising that toppled his predecessor Hosni Mubarak.

Czech Republic

Experts examine blast substance

Experts from the Czech Criminology Institute will start on Thursday examining the safe and the substance that exploded in the new Palestinian embassy buildings in Prague and killed the ambassador Jamal Al Jamal on Wednesday. "We've been asked for a general check of the safe, of what the system and the lock system were used," said the institute's head Pavel Kolar.

India

Bus plunges into gorge, 30 killed

A bus plunged into a 120-meter deep gorge on Thursday in western India, splitting open on the rocky ground below and killing at least 30 people, police said. The driver lost control of the bus after it collided with a truck on a road near Malshej Ghat, a hilly tourist spot about 160 kilometers northeast of Mumbai, police officer Raghunath Yadav said. The death toll rose as rescuers found more bodies in the bus wreckage.

Cuba

Castro warns of 'campaign'

Cuban leader Raul Castro warned on Wednesday of forces waging "a permanent political and ideological campaign" in a bid to dismantle the island nation's socialism from within. Castro made the remarks at a ceremony in Santiago de Cuba marking the 55th anniversary of the Cuban Revolution in Cespedes Park, where former leader Fidel Castro proclaimed victory in 1959.

Iraq

Shiite militia leader arrested

Security forces have arrested a controversial Shiite cleric who leads an Iranian-backed militia, an Iraqi government spokesman said on Thursday. The spokesman, Saad Maan Ibrahim, said that Wathiq al-Batat, leader of the so-called Mukhtar Army, was arrested in Baghdad on Wednesday. Al-Batat last year formed his Iranian-backed militia to protect Shiites from attacks by Sunni militants.

Xinhua-AFP-AP

(China Daily 01/03/2014 page11)