IN BRIEF (Page 11)

United States

Utah mom killed infants, police say

A Utah mother accused of slaying six of her infant children over the course of a decade secretly gave birth to each of the babies without medical assistance at home and then immediately killed them, police said on Wednesday. Megan Huntsman, 39, was ordered held in lieu of $6 million bail on Monday. Bodies of babies were found stashed inside separate cardboard boxes in the garage of her former home.

Austria

Iran neutralizes half its uranium

Iran has neutralized half of its stockpile of higher-enriched uranium that could be turned quickly into the core of a nuclear weapon, according to a confidential report by the International Atomic Energy Agency. The development leaves Teheran with substantially less of the 20-percent enriched uranium that it would need for such a purpose.

Thailand

Reporters face defamation case

Thai authorities charged two journalists on Thursday with defaming the navy in an online news report about the trafficking of refugees from Myanmar. The English-language news website Phuketwan posted a story in July carrying excerpts from a report by the Reuters news agency alleging that members of the Thai military were involved in trafficking captured immigrants from Myanmar's beleaguered Rohingya ethnic minority.

France

Drugmaker Servier, 92, dies

Jacques Servier, the founder of France's second-largest pharmaceutical group who became ensnared in a scandal over a diabetes drug widely used for weight loss, has died. Servier and his lab were at the center of one of France's biggest health scandals, in which the drug Mediator was alleged to be responsible for the deaths of hundreds of people.

Malaysia

Opposition figure killed

A leading Malaysian politician who gained fame defending opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim in his sensational sodomy trials was killed in an early morning road accident on Thursday, police said. Karpal Singh, 73, was killed along with a longtime assistant when his vehicle struck a slower-moving truck on a highway in the northern state of Perak.

Australia

Refugee center oversight sought

An outbreak of dengue fever at an Australian refugee detention center in the Pacific island nation of Nauru prompted calls on Thursday for greater oversight at the facility, which has been criticized by rights groups and the United Nations. Officers at the center had confirmed three cases of the potentially fatal tropical disease, which is transmitted by mosquitoes.

AFP-AP-Reuters

(China Daily 04/18/2014 page11)